THE Scottish Borders' biggest landowner has announced a merger of two of his vast estates.

From the start of next month Bowhill and Eskdale & Liddesdale estates - both owned by The Duke of Buccleuch – will be officially unified under one umbrella title of Borders Estate.

Bowhill Estate currently covers more than 58,000 acres of land, which spreads as far as the Eildons, Branxholm and Eckford, and Eskdale & Liddesdale is even larger, stretching over 74,000 acres from near Hawick all the way to the English border.

Estate bosses have provided assurances to its hundreds of residential and farming tenants across the vast areas that legal agreements won't change following the unification.

But they added that the merger won't halt the continued sell-off of land which has been ongoing for the past 20 years.

Since 1998 the Duke of Buccleuch has sold 24 farms, covering 32,000 acres of land.

And discussions are currently ongoing with approximately 40 other tenants.

From September 1 all activities and procedures across the newly formed Borders Estates will be organised and maintained under one system of management - overseen by experienced former Bowhill manager Edward Morris.

Chief Executive of the Buccleuch group, John Glen said: “The Bowhill and Eskdale & Liddesdale Estates have been operating closely together and it makes sense to create a single estate identity, which is more representative of our operations.

"There will be no change to our ongoing relationships with our residential and farming tenants."

Farmers have previously raised concerns about the security of their tenancy on Buccleuch land.

And they claim that attempts to reduce the environmental footprint of the estates has threatened agricultural space to make room for forestry.

At the beginning of this year, community and estate discussions were held regarding the planting of trees in the Langholm area, which would have involved disrupting the land currently held by three tenanted farms.

However these discussions have not progressed further.

Mr Glen added: “We have been in discussions with a number of tenant farmers who have expressed an interest in buying their farms and these discussions are continuing.

“The overall footprint of the combined estate will be significantly reduced as Buccleuch progresses its policy of selling land and farms.

“Buccleuch will continue to have a strong attachment to the Bowhill and Eskdale and Liddesdale areas and our policy of selling land will enable us to invest in new projects.”