starting a dig

wildside

New member
Near to where I live there is  a rather interesting hole that drinks an enormous quantity of water when it rains and has a small draft coming out of it. Could anybody tell me the procedure of how to find out who owns the land as I have asked in my village and nobody seems to know and I would rather like to have a dig around in the mud Officially rather than trips in the night......
 

kay

Well-known member
You could try the Land Registry.
http://www.landregistry.gov.uk/

Tends to be a bit difficult for things without an address. I think you have to send them a map and pay for a manual search. And things which haven't changed hands in decades aren't necessarily registered. But it's a possibility if all else fails.
 

paul

Moderator
Of course it depends where the hole is as well. Is it in a field or a garden or...? If a field then find out who farns the land which shouldn't be too difficult.
 

wildside

New member
Its in a wood near a used railway line and possibly goes under the track bed and there are no signs and I have asked the local farmer and he said the wood has been sold recently but could not tell me more than that. I will try the land registry and see what they say thanks. Ive been up there today looking and it definetly looks promising but there are a lot of leaves and mud in there at the moment but its still draughting a bit. there is also a large swallet a bit further along that had an active stream going into it but the farmer has piped it away from the swallet now so that could be worth a look as well.........
 

graham

New member
If the wood has recently been sold then the land will be registered, or in the process of being registered, so the land registry will be the way to go.
 

cavermark

New member
Do you mean used or dis-used railway line?  Network rail may want to know if its really near (undermining?) an active line. It's not a culvert is it?
 

wildside

New member
Its a quarry line and is regularly used by very large trains the swallet is about 800 yards away and it looks like the it goes towards the railway. But hopefully it will go towards the wood I have put a 8 fot long post down into it and still did not touch the bottom. Its very interesting. The draught has got stronger since Ive been moving soil about and I can hear water trickling very faintly.
 

robjones

New member
graham said:
If the wood has recently been sold then the land will be registered, or in the process of being registered, so the land registry will be the way to go.

I haven't had cause to approach the Land Registry for many years and way back when I did, they could only tell enquirers whether land was registered, being barred from revealing land owners' names or addresses. Have things changed in this respect?
 

graham

New member
robjones said:
graham said:
If the wood has recently been sold then the land will be registered, or in the process of being registered, so the land registry will be the way to go.

I haven't had cause to approach the Land Registry for many years and way back when I did, they could only tell enquirers whether land was registered, being barred from revealing land owners' names or addresses. Have things changed in this respect?

If this link works.

What information is available?

Copies of title registers, title plans and Flood Risk Indicator results for more than 20 million registered properties in England and Wales can be purchased and downloaded in PDF format.

What are the fees?

    A title register costs ?4, a title plan costs ?4.

    A Flood Risk Indicator result costs ?6.50 (excluding VAT)
 

cap n chris

Well-known member
You might do well to check out:

http://www.natureonthemap.org.uk/map.aspx

If the land you're looking at happens to be an SSSI then you may as well give up as the landowner (unless he's easily fooled) would not risk the penalties incumbent upon him if he gave you permission to dig. Someone else can wade in and confirm/deny this.
 

graham

New member
cap 'n chris said:
If the land you're looking at happens to be an SSSI then you may as well give up as the landowner (unless he's easily fooled) would not risk the penalties incumbent upon him if he gave you permission to dig. Someone else can wade in and confirm/deny this.

Tosh lots of cavers dig perfectly legally on SSSI's all the time.
 

Mark

Well-known member
Give us a clue where it is, Someone may have had a look already and save you a lot of bother
 

Pitlamp

Well-known member
I think the point is that once Natural England has given permission (and they generally do provided there are no special reasons not to) then the owner / tenant is absolved of all responsibility, as far as conservation legislation is concerned. (If Andy Hinde sees this thread he could probably give a better answer than me though.)
 

cap n chris

Well-known member
It would be interesting to know more about the ongoing conversation audits for caves within SSSIs (periodicity, commissioning, pro forma etc.) and what would be considered an acceptable conservation/management plan for an as-yet undiscovered cave.
 

robjones

New member
Thank you Graham for the Land Registry update - at last it moves close to the American system it was modelled on but which the UK government and / or UK legal profession prevented it from fulfilling for so long - basically, until the 'opening-up' in 1990, the populace paid for the LR to make solicitors lives much easier but the public had, effectively, virtually no rights of access to the information gathered and stored.
 

graham

New member
robjones

As the husband of a now retired land lawyer I can assure you that it was not the legal profession who did not want that openness. Look more to the large landowners, who fought a long rearguard action to prevent the oiks learning the extent of their holdings.
 

ahinde

New member
Sorry for the delay in responding to Pitlamps invitation. He is quite right- When Natural England "Consents" an operation(dig) on a SSSI, the liability is transfered from the owner to NE for the specified duration of the works.
For "best practice" of digging on  a SSSI or anywhere else I would recommend looking at the usefull links page of the  Peak monitoring website
www.peakcavemonitoring.org.uk
Here you will find a digging best practice leaflet produced by Dave Webb and NE.
 

wildside

New member
Ive been exploring this sink some more and can now look into a small fissure one way and a nice mud filled minature boulder ruckle the other way.  I am still awiting an answer on who owns it so cannot do to much.
 
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