True top down catchment restoration
April 21, 2011
What a week it’s been! trying to cram in as much before the Easter break as possible.
Monday I did an interview with Martin James for his Radio Lancashire fishing program, and then walked a section of the Ribble with him to discuss various issues and pressures and how we might get to grips with some serious habitat improvement. In the afternoon it was Planning aapplication form filling for the Calder/Brun Fish passes.
Tuesday I met with the EA to discuss some remedial work that we needed to do, and then it was back to the office to get the planning application finished… then start on the land drainage consent! Some much work goes into these that it’s upsetting to see that for all the work is a envelope! But I was really picked up when we got the news that our Gayle and Cam beck project bid has been successful and that we have secured 80% of the funding!
This is an unbelievable opportunity to trial a mixture of restoring flows (grip blocking) improving in channel habitat (large woody debris) and improving riparian habitat (fencing and tree planting), but better still it’s on the formative becks of the Ribble – a true top down approach! This I hope will be a successful trial, that will lead us into applying for further funding to complete the project.
There is an absolute mountain of preparation, consultation, and planning to be done, but an opportunity like this comes along very rarely and with that in mind I think we can conquer that mountain and deliver a fantastic outcome for the Ribble!
Wednesday we had various meeting in relation to some research work this summer, a habitat scheme and then planning out the Cam and Gayle beck project. A long day that didn’t seem like a lot happened but it certainly did!
Today has been just as busy, trying to secure the last of the money for Gayle and Cam, proceeding other projects, visiting easington habitat scheme to deal with a broken pump on a cattle trough, and a lot more, but I’m just so excited about Gayle and Cam that I got on with some planning work!
We’ve also organised for our kick sample volunteers an opportunity to be trained in otters surveys, we have 10 places at the first course that will be run by the EA, which is given on a first come first served basis, in May. This will really help us to build up our knowledge of the current distribution of otters on the Ribble Catchment.
Keep tuned for updates, and have a good easter break!
Pilots and the trust
April 18, 2011
Well I imagine that people will be asking what does piloting have to do with a rivers trust, but it’s not that kind of Pilot! Over that last couple of weeks there have been some important announcements from the government about rivers and river improvements. There has now been recognition that the way to really protect and improve our rivers is through the “catchment” based approach. This has lead to the government and the EA choosing 10 “pilot” catchments to adopt this approach. The aim seems to be to try and find a successful process of restoring an entire catchment. The Ribble has been selected as one of these pilot catchments. We hope that this will lead to increased focus in restoring the entire Ribble catchment. As one would expect, this is what our trust (hence the name!) has been working on for 13 years, and it’s that fact that has meant that the pilot scheme is to incorporate working with the Rivers Trusts to deliver the outcome of a restored catchment. To that end myself and the Chairman spent most of Monday last week discussing with the EA the way in which we see this happening. One of the outcomes was that there is no one single process that needs to implemented, but actually a fine tuning of existing processes to deliver our joint goals.
Tuesday I was on site with MArk Rudd the EA fisheries technical officer for the Hodder at Chipping to look at the Chipping brook fish passage project. It was a useful morning and several ways forward were identified to address the 3 barrier to migration.
Wednesday I met with the council from Manchester Anglers at the Village hall in Horton-in-Ribblesdale. This was a sit down to go through our proposals for the work we plan to do on Gayle and Cam Beck, and to answer any question that may arise, I learnt an awful lot and came away with several positive points to incorporate into our plan. In the afternoon I was preparing the brief for our CAD (computer aided design) drafters to draw the fish easement on “Brun 3″ the small weir in Thompson Park. Wednesday also saw the announcement of significant amounts for funding from the Government to aid in restoring England’s rivers such that they adhere to the WFD. This was an amazing announcement and we hope that this will see lots of improvements across the catchment. Later that day I was then instructed to begin the planning process for the 3rd phase of river improvements. This fits in well because at the moment I am finalising our trust “Business Plan”. This is different from the usual business plan that is about how to make more money, it’s about how we plan to restore the Ribble catchment, and all the processes and resources required.
Thursday I had to get the planning application for the Brun/Calder Fish passes done, and liaise with the EA on several possible issues surrounding flooding. So between myself and our designers we had to do some water level monitoring. The good news was that according to our modelling the fish passes should actually reduce the risk of flooding in these areas.
Friday we held some phone interviews for the temporary fisheries research position that is looking into the impacts of the abstraction and how this will change with the reduced abstraction on the Brennand and Whitendale. We have had any amazing amount of applicants and I am still sifting the applicants that came through last thing on Friday!
And we’re off…
April 8, 2011
Well after promising to do my blog regularly on a Monday morning I failed. As a result I thought perhaps a Friday would be better as generally it is less manic than first thing on a Monday morning! So I set about writing up the last two weeks at the trust on Friday afternoon and before publishing it I pressed the save button, only to see everything vanish. So I set about re-writing in only to see it vanish again and then again. Anyway it turns out I missed the message that told me the website needed a software update, and all the problems were linked to that.
But rather than wait till Friday next week I thought I would get it written up today! So due to the delays this post goes all the way back to the 28th of March, which seems a distant memory - certainly to me with all that we have going on! Philip was on a well deserved break so our Monday meeting was forgone and I got out and about to see how things were progressing at Cockden Bridge, but also to meet our Topographical Surveyor at the Brun/Calder Confluence. Howard from Site Survey Services was already there setting up and many thanks to him for getting both surveys done in one day, and then burning the midnight oil to get the surveys on to Auto CAD to allow our concept drawings to get drawn up.
In the afternoon I got on with my bits, and had a surprise and welcome vist from the Hanson Cement Plant Manager of the Ribblesdale quarries. We had been trying to meet for sometime to allow us to thank Hanson for their support, but also to see if there was any chance of some more space. The meeting was more successful than I could have hoped for with Hanson Cement offering a new dedicated building with all the office space and storage we could possibly need. So a great big thank you to them. It is activities like this that really keep the trust going, as we could not afford to rent office space.
Tuesday we met with Paul Bradley of PBA and Ian Fleming of Manchester Anglers to discuss out proposed projects in the upper catchment, and how we would like to work with them.
We then received our first successful list of project bids to the EA, so Stephen and I spent the afternoon outline the project timeline – it’s pretty scary if I’m honest! However I can say that we will definitely be doing projects on Chipping beck, Stock beck, Easington brook, Barrow brook and the Hodder.
Wednesday I was out kick sampling with the EA as part of our joint pollution prevention campaign. This was a slightly more pleasant day than the December outing where I had to break ice to do a kick sample in water temperatures of 1 degree celcius. The results were fantastic, on the beck that had been at the centre of the EA actions we saw and increase in both abundance and diversity, I hope to write this up and put the report on the website.
Thursday I worked on getting the information together for our big projects ahead of applying for the various consents (planning permission and Land Drainage Consent). In the afternoon I gave a short presentation, to the Liaison Panel that Hanson Cement has with local stakeholder, on our activities.
Friday I met with a volunteer who hopes to undertake our kick sample monitoring on Gayle and Cam beck, we undertook a brief kick sample to be sure that the methodology was agreed. We found a good diversity and moderate abundance (which was expected). In the afternoon I rushed over to the Brun/Calder confluence to meet on of the National Fish Pass Panel members to look at the site and go through how we had arrived at out concept drawings.
Monday of the week just gone Philip came in and we had a good session bringing him up to speed on our activities. I then set about preparing a final draft of the trust business plan to present to the trustees at our next meeting.
Tuesday morning was more business plan, and then a short stint on Radio Lancashire to promote both the Trust and angling. This is vital, as the success of our projects requires a wider buy in than the direct stakeholders. In the afternoon/evening I met with the EA to go through our projects in detail and determine the way forward.
Wednesday I met our contractors for the Don Fish pass on site to go through any snags, and there were none! The projects is completed, on time and in budget. The project provides a demonstration of how we can deliver “quick wins” at incredible value:
Thursday I had a morning meeting with the EA to go through some legal agreements relating to projects, and in the afternoon I met David Hinks from the RFCA. We plan to hold these meetings every quarter to keep each other abreast of activities and identify anywhere that we need to work closer.
Friday was a day of flow modelling for the fish pass feasibility study we are doing on the river Brun. A whole day staring at excel spreadsheets when the sun is shinning is a real punishment for anyone. But at least I think I’m done! Our projects are now all go and hopefully we will have another successful year of delivering real river improvements accross our catchment.
Environment Agency news- 25,000 more homes to be better protected from flooding
- Completion of Olympics environmental works secures green legacy
- Environment Agency moves to stop rivers running dry
- Woman rescued as car is swept away by floods
- Environment Agency tracks alien invaders
- Unwanted Christmas trees provide festive flood defences
- Queens green energy scheme nears completion
- Case for change: Drought to be commonplace by 2050s
- New taskforce will tackle illegal waste sites that blight communities
- Environment Agency moves to manage scarce water supplies across Eastern England