Hi,

We have been on a hobby farm for almost 20 years. We inherited the previous owner's adgistment arrangement with a local farmer. There was no formal agreement - simply they continued to have cattle here and continued to pay us the rate agreed with the previous owner. We have not had any problem with this even though the rate was way below 'standard'. Now, however, the farmer wishes to cease paying the fee as there is not much food on the ground at present. We have no problem with that either as long as the cattle are no longer on our land. We would like the land to have a rest and regenerate anyway.

The issue is, the farmer also adgists land across the river and his cattle will continue to come on to our land. Whilst this occurs, we expect the farmer to continue to pay the very small adgistment rate. He, however, maintains that we need to fence off the river to keep his cattle off our land. We have no wish to fence off the river - nor could we afford to do so. We believe that the responsibility for keeping the cattle off our land lies with him and not with us. There is a natural barrier which forms the boundary of our land and we have no other reason to fence it off.

When we purchased the land originally, there were bits of barbed wire strung here and there stopping the cattle from crossing the river. We did not remove these (even though we would have preferred they weren't there) and they have been broken and degraded over the years by his cattle and the general passing of time. Originally, the farmer maintained these bits of barbed wire sporadically. However, since he also took over adgistment of the property across the river he has not bothered.

We do not want these bits put back on our side of the river now his cattle are officially not meant to be here.

The farmer wants to stop paying adgistment but leave it as our responsibility to keep his cattle out.

Where can we find out our legal rights in this matter? I have searched the internet for who is responsible for containing livestock and it would appear that it is the livestock owner but I can't find a definitive answer.

Sorry it was such a long question!!

Thanks,

Tracey