![\"File](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/0_Sewage-discharged-into-coastal-waters.jpg\")
<\/p>\nSlurry was leaking into waterways from a ditch<\/p>\n
File picture of an Environment Agency worker treating a river(Image: PA)<\/p>\n
A Devon farmer has been told to pay more than \u00a34,700 after more than 300 fish died from slurry pollution.<\/p>\n
On March 9 Michael Wade of Higher Melbury Farm, Yeo Vale in Bideford<\/a> pleaded guilty at Barnstaple<\/a> Magistrates’ Court to two counts of illegal water discharge.<\/p>\n The court heard the Environment Agency (EA) investigated two slurry pollution incidents at Higher Melbury Farm in January 2023 and August 2024.<\/p>\n Slurry discharged through a farm ditch into a tributary of Dipple Brook before travelling 1.6km in 2023.<\/p>\n Sewage fungus found in the water showed the slurry had been polluting the water for “some time”.<\/p>\n In 2024 slurry was seen discharged from a ditch at the farm into a tributary of Holebrook.<\/p>\n The EA said over 300 fish, including salmonids and lamprey, died as a result.<\/p>\n The EA used “considerable resources and pumping equipment” to remove the slurry contaminated water to avoid a more serious incident.<\/p>\n Wade was fined \u00a3340, ordered to pay a victim surcharge of \u00a3136 and costs of \u00a34,302. The farm previously paid \u00a311,130 to the EA to cover costs of the pollution.<\/p>\n Nicola Rumsey, Environment Officer said: \u201cFarmers have a responsibility to ensure that slurry is properly stored and spread, to avoid the risk of harm to the environment.<\/p>\n \u201cIf farmers have concerns about not having sufficient slurry storage capacity, we recommend they contact us, so that we can give advice ahead of time and avoid an incident.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen incidents do happen, these can kill fish and impact water quality, as well as requiring significant resources to clean up.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Slurry was leaking into waterways from a ditch File picture of an Environment Agency worker treating a river(Image:…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":472068,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[39063,39761,44896,1343,1397,90,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-472067","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-angling","tag-barnstaple","tag-bideford","tag-courts","tag-environment","tag-science","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/472067","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=472067"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/472067\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/472068"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=472067"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=472067"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=472067"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}