The final short week for sometime….

June 14, 2010

So with a nice long weekend out of the way I had a short week – well not so short as we ran our invertebrate training day on Saturday – I used the time to get the final prep for the survey season sorted. So it was maps, forms, and databases.

Tuesday we got in a little bit later than usual (9:00!) after arriving back late from Scotland on Monday. It was straight down to business getting on with sorting out the database that we are going to use to store our data this year, then it was preparing methodology and field sheets for the walk over surveys of Cam and Gayle beck. Then in the afternoon a few bits and pieces to sort on Barrowford 3.

Wednesday I had to sort out some fund raising applications, and then it was onto preparing Land Drainage consents for the work at Stock beck and Barrowford 3. I also sent off some day rates for carrying out fish rescues for works in the Nelson area.

Thursday we met with Alistair Maltby of ART to look at the present and possible future works that are planned for stock beck. It was nice to bounce some ideas off him, and also to get some more that I hadn’t/would never of thought of! In the afternoon it was back to doing the research for Cam and Gayle beck research – mainly looking at instream temperature and pH monitoring instruments. We also squeezed in a visit to Talbot bridge to have a look at the fish pass – which is nearly done.

Friday I had to take the truck into the garage so I was stuck in the office, well nearly Catherine drove me over to check on talbot bridge which was complete (minus some reinstatement work), and then I was picked up by Martin Charlesworth from the AONB to go and look at a stretch of Bashall brook we plan to do some Balsam bashing on, next Sunday. Then I had to purchase all the temperature and pH recording instruments, which might not sound like much but when its worth a few thousand and they are coming from the US it takes some careful planning and Consideration! In the afternoon Stuart Croft from the Riverfly Partnership arrived and we set up our kit for the training day on Saturday. Which went off like a dream, beautiful sunshine, a great training room (provided by Hanson Cement) and a great Tutor, the only challenge was the amount of algae on the day! So another 10 people out monitoring, which is fantastic!

The count down to electro fishing really has started and in between then there are 15kms of detailed walk over survey, a Himalayan Balsam Bashing day, and another invertebrate training day… no rest for the …. dedicated!

Posted by Jack Spees | Filed Under General News, Restoration and Conservation Projects, Surveys, Volunteers, WFD | Leave a Comment

The Calm before the storm

June 9, 2010

Unfortunately the title of this weeks blog is not literal enough! The river really needs a good flush, although a sudden spate without the water table being slowly filled could be just as damaging as none at all. A sudden deluge would flush everything from roads, hard surfaces and the recently cut silage fields into the river for it then to drop to bare bones again with all the muck in it, this would cause serious oxygen and pollution issues, where as a few steady days rain to build up the water table and then a good spate would stop this from happening (I hope!).

The electro fishing survey season starts in just two weeks time, and amazingly I am nearly fully prepared, due to a couple of quiet weeks. And because of the quiet I decided to get a nice long weekend in fishing before I have a electro fishing back pack permanently strapped to my back! So last week was only three days, and this week would have been four but we are running our invert course on Saturday.

Most of last week was spent on preparing for the stock beck habitat project, which is to add suitable substrate. We carried out two days of flow and channel surveys, and then used this data to produce a flow model so that our added gravel would have the desired affect, without causing any flooding of the adjacent land. This took up almost all of the week, but we did manage to work on producing a database and data entry form to keep all of our records in. This should stream line our data entry and make looking up data later much easier. We’ve been very lucky to have some help on this, otherwise it wouldn’t have got off the ground.

And really that’s about it for last week, other than to say that we were amazed by the fly life we say in stock beck, including: Damsel flies, Dragon Flies, Sedges, True Mayfly, and plenty of olives! And not only that on the Thursday we watched several trout feeding behind one of the head lands (flow constrictors) that Stephen has been putting in for the last few years (with the help of George from Bailey’s our contractors).

Did I mention that this section of Stock beck is in the Passport Scheme….?

Posted by Jack Spees | Filed Under General News, Grants and project management, Inhabitants of the River, Recreation, Restoration and Conservation Projects, Surveys, Volunteers, WFD | Leave a Comment

Juggling projects

June 1, 2010

This should be a much shorter blog than they have been of late – not because I’ve done less in quantity, but less in diversity. It was a strange week in that I didn’t have any meetings or site visits planned, but it meant that I could knuckle down on a few things I’ve been avoiding!

Monday Philip came in and we went through the usual, and then I concentrated on getting our Highways licence for the A59 culverts. This took some time but I got it nearly done. After we had some juggling to do with the River fly partnership training day which is now fully booked not for one day but for two. This is partly due to the massive interested we had from some of the volunteer countryside rangers but also the readers of the Clitheroe Advertiser who saw our article two weeks ago.

Tuesday I sorted my electro fishing program – and man oh man am I going to busy this year!! But I enjoy the surveying as much if not more than anything so 12 hour days aside it’s going to be good! Following that it was up to Dunsop to carry out some maintenance on the spawning channels. Which was to spread the gravel build up at the entrance into the channel to improve spawning. I saw some true salmonid fry which were bigger than I expected but just what I needed to make me feel better about starting electro fishing in 3 weeks. After that it was back to the office to get my application for electro fishing, access, and survey on SSSI sites sent off. Which is a month in advance of last year!

Wednesday I worked on GIS data (Computer based mapping tools and data) in the office, looking at the rivers and streams that flow through the Duchy of Lancaster estate and a quick site visit to Talbot bridge to inspect of work progress. In the evening I attended the RFCA AGM, and it was good to see such a large turn out.

Thursday I had some project bids and paper work to sort out which took me the best part of the day, but I fitted in some GIS barrier data work in.

Friday I visited Talbot bridge to check the notch and flow levels through the bottom pool. We then had to make a couple of minor amendments to the notch widths and positioning, which took a long time because of the flow modelling involved, fish passes are a nightmare! Removal is the best option, anything that takes as much calculation as a fish pass is just not a sensible option!

Saturday, yes we even work Saturdays! With a couple of volunteer I headed to Swanside to finish off the major part of the work to the weir there. Thanks to the hard graft, and a chainsaw (risk assessment and qualification check done!) we finished much faster than expected and below you can see the results. After we had finished and were clearing up we then had a very unwelcome visitor…see below!