Managing Muddy Gateways on a Working Farm

Why Gateways Turn to Slop

Every holding has one: the gateway that looks perfectly reasonable in July and by Bonfire Night has become a knee-deep bog you wade through with a bucket in each hand. It is rarely the farmer's fault and almost always the result of three things happening at once — concentrated stock traffic, compacted soil and water with nowhere to go.

A cow or a ewe standing in the same spot does two things. Its weight destroys the soil structure, and its hooves churn what is left into a paste. That paste holds water like a sponge, and water softens the ground further, so the next animal to walk through sinks a little deeper. Left alone, the process accelerates through the winter until the gateway is a foot or two below the surrounding field and acting as a sump for every drop of run-off from uphill.

On Peak District ground this is compounded by our rainfall. Whether you are on the clay-and-shale of the Dark Peak or the thinner limestone soils of the White Peak, we can get a metre of rain a year, most of it between October and March. You cannot stop the rain, but you can decide where it goes and where the cattle walk.

Deal With the Water Before You Deal With the Mud

Hardcore laid into a wet hollow is a waste of money. If water is still arriving, it will simply find its way around your stone or lift it out of the ground during a frost. Fix the drainage first, then think about the surface.

• Clean out the grips and ditches above the gateway. A blocked grip that has not been touched for five years sends the whole field's run-off straight into your gateway.
• Cut a shallow interception drain across the slope above the gateway, diverting water into a hedge line or ditch rather than letting it run through the gap.
• Install a rubble drain through the gateway itself — a trench of clean 40–65mm stone wrapped in a permeable membrane, falling to a soakaway or ditch. On heavy ground, a perforated pipe in the bottom of the trench is worth the extra cost.
• Crown the finished surface. Even a modest fall of 1 in 40 means water runs off the gateway instead of standing in it.

If the gateway sits in a natural hollow, accept it and consider moving the access point entirely. Nine times out of ten there is a better spot a few metres along the hedge.

Building a Surface That Lasts

A properly built gateway is a small civil engineering project, not a tipper load of road planings tipped and forgotten. Done once, it will outlive most of us.

• Strip the topsoil and any soft, poached material back to firm subsoil — usually 200–300mm.
• Lay a woven geotextile membrane. This is the single most-often-skipped step and the reason so many gateways fail. It stops your stone migrating down into the mud.
• Build up in layers. Around 150mm of clean 40mm stone as a base, compacted, then a 75mm topping of 20mm-to-dust or road planings for a firm, kind surface underfoot.
• Make the apron generous. Extend the hardcore at least 3 metres either side of the gate and fan it 6 metres into the field, so stock are not forced to turn sharply on soft ground.
• Keep the finished level slightly proud of the surrounding field, then feather the edges so machinery and hooves are not catching a lip.

Rotate Access Points and Rest the Ground

The cheapest gateway improvement is a second gateway. Once you have two, you can rest one while the other takes the traffic, and the rested ground will recover remarkably quickly in the growing season.

With electric fencing, temporary gaps in a wire fence are easy to create and close. Move the stock's route every few weeks in wet weather, and back-fence behind them so they cannot wander back over the same ground. If you are on a rotational or mob-grazing system, plan your grazing so that the wettest paddocks are used in summer, and the drier, free-draining fields take the winter stock.

Feeders and troughs are just as guilty as gateways. A ring feeder that sits in the same place all winter will create its own swamp; shift it every few days, and site troughs on hard standing or a gravel pad rather than in the middle of the field.

Looking After Stock in the Mud

Mud is not just an inconvenience. Prolonged standing in wet, contaminated ground is a direct welfare issue and a genuine cost to the business.

• Feet. Constant wetness softens the hoof horn and lets bacteria in. Expect more foul-in-the-foot, foot rot and digital dermatitis in cattle, and more scald and footrot in sheep.
• Skin. Mud fever in horses and cattle, and dirty, matted fleeces that lose their insulation value in sheep.
• Udders. Cows lying in slurry have a far higher risk of mastitis; clean, dry lying areas are as important in December as they are in May.
• Energy. Cattle wading through mud burn condition just keeping warm. A well-drained gateway can be worth more in feed saved than the stone costs.

A dry lie-back area — straw, woodchip or a hardstanding pad — is worth every penny in a wet Peak District winter.

A Seasonal Routine That Works

Mud management is really about timing. Walk your gateways in late August or early September, while the ground is still dry and workable, and sort out the drainage and any broken surfaces before the stock come in.

Through the winter, keep the ditches clear, keep moving feeders and access routes, and resist the temptation to drive a tractor through a gateway you know is soft — a rutted gateway is far harder to repair than a poached one.

In spring, as soon as the ground dries and the grass begins to move, pull the stock off the worst areas, level the ruts with a chain harrow or a light roll, and oversow with a hardy seed mix. A little attention in March saves an awful lot of shovelling the following November.

None of it is glamorous work, but a farm with sound, dry gateways is a farm that runs more smoothly all winter — for the stock, and for the person carrying the buckets.