Drones, Bridleways & Nesting Birds

Drone hovers over bridleway signAs the weather improves and more of us get out and about, the Parish Council would like to highlight a couple of issues raised in recent meetings:

Drones/Quadcopters – Please would owners of model aircraft/drones etc be as considerate as possible whilst enjoying their new toys, especially those equipped with cameras. There are numerous concerns regarding these gadgets – privacy, noise and damage to property/cars/people. Drones should be kept under control (i.e. line of sight) at all times and generally should not be flown within 150 metres of property and people as a kilo or two dropped from height can hurt! Basically you should not be filming other peoples private gardens. Please also be aware that you should obtain permission if you plan to publish images of anybody, especially Fulking-ites, on social media. See the links below to CAA guidelines. You will find more links on the CAA website providing further information.
First Person View’s – an animated guide to the basic rules of flying a drone.
CAA Detailed Guidelines

Bridleways – please don’t forget the rules about bridleways and footpaths.  Bridleways are meant for walkers, horse riders and cyclists only, which means no motor vehicles unless specific permission has been given by the landowner.  There may be some confusion about the bridleway from Four Acres corner to The Shepherd and Dog.  This is a bridleway and the normal rules apply, but a few people at either end have been granted vehicle access to their properties by the owners of the bridleway. Footpaths are for pedestrians only – absolutely no vehicles or horses.  There are some local ‘byways open to all traffic’ (BOATs), information on which can be found from the link below. The link also details information on all public rights of way. Please respect these rules – if you see anybody breaching them, please remind and/or report them to the National Trust and/or Police.
Rights of way map
Rights of way guidelines

Birds Nesting – Finally, we all want our gardens to look good, but please remember that this is bird nesting season and hedge trimming should be avoided from now until the end of August. It is an offence under the Wildlife and Countryside Act of 1981 to damage or destroy the nest of any wild bird so do try to respect this. If trimming has to be done, please keep to an absolute minimum and please keep it brief.