Sadly I've had a few minor run-ins with farmers over the years. I suspect they are generally less access friendly down here (Suffolk) than in areas of the country where there are larger areas of access land?
Interesting to see comments about "farmers wives", as a couple of the least pleasant encounters I had involved them. One took great exception to our walking along a headland to avoid a narrow but busy road. I knew from her first words: "can I help you", that she wasn't happy! OK we shouldn't have been on the headland, notwithstanding the entire field was down to grass (setaside rather than for livestock). I explained we were just getting off the road and hoped we hadn't done any harm. I got various lectures about wild birds and dogs; I didn't have a dog with me
. The availability of permissive paths as detailed on Natural England's website that we could use; together with the general trespass talk.......
This was all well over the top but we went on our way, another walk spoilt. It was all the more amusing as the said landowner is on the county's local access forum, and is often on local radio/TV championing access etc... obviously the wife isn't so keen
. Anyway thereafter I decided to inspect all the ROW on his land, and came up with a long list of issues principally about missing signposts and waymarkers, which I reported to Suffolk ROW Department. In this case after a suitable delay of about a year they did install these. Hopefully the wife was pleased with these, especially those running through the farmyard and along the field behind the farmhouse, most of which had disappeared, notwithstanding he was a champion of access
Another farmer's wife whose dog was exceptionally aggressive towards us on a public road was another joy. She justified the behaviour of the dog as reasonable as they owned the fields on either side of the road. Mrs A explained that she didn't own the road and that was where we were. Anyway the farmers wife got ever more angry and said that we shouldn't complain as "she had a lot of problems"
She was clearly a very angry woman so we left her to it, but again another walk spoilt
BWW makes a very valid point about farmers understanding the value of their land for access. One farmer in the next village to ours is now allowing access to areas of his land to walkers, principally dog walkers I suspect, under an arrangement where they pay £10 per month. His land did have a number of permissive paths under Natural England's Scheme, but when this ended after ten years, he closed off access again to the general public. He has subsequently installed padlocked gates, and a lot of barbed wire, but provides keys to those that have paid for access to his land. Apparently, from talking to one of those "customers" he has about 100 people registered with him. Simple maths: 100 people £10 per month gives £12,000 per year. I am not sure that I would pay that as just a walker but for dog walkers having areas of land to let the dog off lead etc... it seems to be working for him and them.
I did point out to the lady dog walker who explained this set up to me that there really should have been some ROW on this farmers land anyway, but they clearly hadn't been put on the definitive map due to corruption thereof, but I think the detail of my argument was somewhat lost on her