Farmers and landowners

Ousewem works with framers and land mangers across the Swale, Ure, Nidd and Upper Ouse (SUNO) catchments – combining modelling with local knowledge to understand where natural flood management (NFM) can work most effectively.

How we work with you

Participation is voluntary and co-designed around your farming operation.  Working with you and led by our delivery partners, Yorkshire Dales Rivers Trust and Natural England, Ousewem can:

• Use advanced catchment scale modelling to identify where NFM is most likely to be effective on your land, and where it may not be
• Design a scheme around your land, your priorities and your constraints – with your input at every stage
• Manage consents and licences and support you with additional funding applications, working with trusted local partners including Nidderdale National Landscape and the Yorkshire Dales National Park
• Leave you with a management and maintenance plan, and help identify longer-term funding opportunities, working with our partners including Natural England
• Share what we learn from working with you to inform NFM practice and policy at a regional and national level

Working in partnership with the land

NFM is not a one-size-fits all solution.  What works in one part of the catchment may not work in another – and Ousewem’s modelling helps us understand why.  We work carefully and at your pace, and we are honest about what NFM can and cannot achieve.

See it in practice – Hauxwell

At the Hauxwell Estate near Leyburn, Ouswem worked with a land‑stewardship‑minded landowner to restore a meandering beck, create a 9-hectare wetland and reconnect the floodplain to its natural flow paths – co-designed around the estate’s priorities for regenerative farming and wildlife restoration.  It is just one is one of several sites contributing to Ousewem’s growing evidence base about what catchment-scale NFM looks like in practice.

Read about the Hauxwell project

Explore the site with our interactive virtual tour, brought to you via our interactive 360° photographs and a virtual tour, where you can navigate 'hotspots' with your mouse or keyboard to reveal information about the key features in the work undertaken. For instructions on keyboard navigation, see: seekbeak.com/accessibility.

Ready to find out more?

If you farm or manage land in the Swale, Ure, Nidd or Upper Ouse catchments and want to understand whether NFM could work on your land, we’d like to hear from you.  There is no commitment involved in an initial conversation.

Get in touch