DOG breeders have been given permission to live in a static caravan on their farm in a fight to protect the land from thieving bandits.

Landowners applied to site a static caravan, metal storage building and timber shed retrospectively at Torranburn Farm, Cunninghamhead – as well as permission to construct dog breeding kennels.

Plans were approved for a maximum of three years last week after applicants say repeated acts of theft forced them into the move – adding if no one was living on the land for security nothing could get done.

The dog business would be similar to one licensed to operate from the garden of a house in Barrmill.

The plans state: “We have owned this land since September 2010. In the years that we have owned it absolutely everything we have left here has been stolen. Six farm gates, fencing materials, steel framing for a shed.

“The only thing that hasn’t been stolen is a 13-ton digger, although the batteries and diesel from it have been stolen on numerous occasions.

“When we purchased there were two static caravans and a shipping container sited near the gate at the main road, which had been here for a number of years.

“The caravans had been vandalised to the extent they were completely destroyed. There was also mains water already here.

“We are in the process of building an agricultural shed and COVID made it difficult to obtain materials, and the weather is taking longer than anticipated. We then plan to start another.

“None of this would be possible if no one was living here for security purposes. We would like permission to live here for three years with the intention of getting an agricultural business established. This will be mainly breeding sheep and cows. And hopefully using one field for haylage/silage.”