First post

April 6, 2009

This is the first post of what I hope to make at least a weekly blog. This will allow trust members and those interested in the Ribble Catchment, including the Rivers Hodder and Calder, as well as all of their tributaries, to keep up with what is involved in my job, and what I am finding and working on.

The 5th of January was my first day back after the xmas break. We had a brief meeting to remind ourselves of projects and directions, now that we are reinvigorated and raring to go for another year. Then as part of building up a picture of the volume and type of blockages on the Catchment I visited the River Hyndburn, from Rishton Down. The river was not very inviting and reflected the poor invertebrate scores our volunteer monitoring has recorded to date. I visited photographed and plotted another weir onto our data base. Which is growing everyday, I try to see this as positive build up of info rather than a depressing list of problems.

I managed to complete my draft report for 2008′s Fisheries Surveys, and following a few ammendments I hope to get this out to members, partners, and interested parties. A site visit to Park Brook followed, and the identification of a tributary that seems to be a major polluter on what is a significantly sized tributary.

I had long meeting with Richard McIlwain to talk about targetted issues on tributaries and possible projects. This was a really positive meeting, and has helped to spur me on and give me confidence to get things done.

Thursday I set up my new microscope and following a visit to the off stream spawning channels on the Dunsop we recovered some scales from 4 kelts found. We also counted 12 live fish in various pools on the Dunsop and Knowlmere Stretch. None of the fish seen (live or dead) were adipose clipped, but we continue to keep our eyes out. Back at the office we had a surprise visit from Andy Pritchard who is heading up the Trout in the Town Project on the Colne, which was good to catch up and hear how he’s getting on.

The last day of the week allowed me to plot out the results from 2008 fisheries surveys onto maps. This really helps to visualise and demonstrate the scale of the work involved in protecting and improving the Ribble catchment. I also managed to get a few project proposals written up and sent to the EA. Fingers crossed some of these will come off!!

Posted by Charles Edward Poate | Filed Under Grants and project management, Surveys, Threats to the River, Uncategorized 

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