Foot & Mouth Disease

Advisory Information

Since the onset of the horrific Foot & Mouth situation there has been mounting fears that access to the crop circles will be denied. This scenario has been borne out recently in a couple of instances. First at a formation near Barbury Castle, Wiltshire. In this case as soon as the farmer became aware of its presence, he erected various visitor counter measures consisting of F&M disease warning signs and “keep out” tape, etc. It soon transpired that this particular farm is purely arable, with no livestock on the premises at all. This is clearly a case of a farmer using F&M as an excuse to keep people off the land and out of the crop formations. Unfortunately, I fear this is going to be an all too common story this year with a lot of the farmers jumping on the band wagon. 

In another recent case a farm at Berwick Bassett near Avebury, Wiltshire was the recipient of a crop formation. This circular visitor left the farm owner very irate indeed. From our conversation with the “land owner” it was clear that the main cause of concern was the cost of the damaged crop more than anything else.  It later turned out that this farm, along with half a dozen others in Wiltshire, had been infected with the F&M virus earlier in the year and a number of animals were destroyed in accordance with government control regulations. Although we have the greatest of sympathy for the farmers, it could be argued that walking on this particular farm could pose a significant danger of disease recurrence. However it must be stated here that the formation is nowhere near farmed live stock and the access to the formation is direct from the road.  So in this case the risk of spread is very slim indeed. Nevertheless, it should be remembered that the virus can live for up to six months on the land after the animals have been culled.  For this reason I would strongly recommend people not to go near this farm or any of the other farms that are listed at the bottom of this page . The list is a full run down of F&M in Wiltshire. My advise would be to stay away from these farms. 

(Going into a crop circle isn’t worth getting shot for!)

C & F © 2001

More F & M info www.maff.gov.uk

Confirmed cases in Wiltshire