National Park plans to close as 11th foot-and-mouth confirmed

An eleventh case of foot-and-mouth disease has been confirmed at a farm in Herefordshire.

The new case, at a farm in Llancloudy, is the fourth confirmed outbreak found by Britain's Ministry of Agriculture officials within a few hours.

The British Ministry of Agriculture is warning Dartmoor National Park could be shut to the public to try to protect hundreds of sheep and cows that graze on common land there.

Meanwhile, hundreds of cattle and sheep on farms owned by a Devon livestock dealer hit by the foot-and-mouth outbreak are to be slaughtered.

The sites marked for the stock slaughter and incineration include Burdon Farm at Highampton, where the region's first outbreak was confirmed on Sunday, and another farm at nearby Hatherleigh where a second outbreak has been confirmed.

They are owned by William Cleave, who believes the disease comes from sheep he bought in Northumberland.

Results of tests for foot-and-mouth at nine other Devon farms owned by Mr Cleave have not yet been disclosed by the Ministry, but the Ministry for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food says the slaughter will extend to stock on those sites.

Britain's National Farmers Union south west regional director Anthony Gibson says farmers in that area of Devon are "living in fear". "It is the nightmare scenario, it is about as bad as it could possibly be," said Mr Gibson.

Eight-kilometre exclusion zones have been imposed at Highampton farm, and at the second farm, which has not been identified by MAFF.

And Dartmoor National Park Authority is appealed to walkers, riders and cyclists to keep off Dartmoor - where 200 square miles of common land is grazed by hundreds of sheep and cattle. A spokesman says that some of the livestock from the outbreak at Hatherleigh grazed on the common moorland.