News

The application window is open from 6th February 2023, closing on 13th March 2023.

The Rivers & Wetlands Community Days programme is back for 2023, funding practical action by local people to make things better for their rivers and wetlands, now and into the future. Funded by Thames Water and run by a group including also the Angling Trust, Environment Agency, Institute of Fisheries Management and Wild Trout Trust, we’re looking to support projects big and small, from a couple of practical days with volunteers, through to larger-scale improvement work for rivers and wetlands.

We welcome applications from local, non-Governmental community groups working in the Thames Water catchment, including rivers and wildlife trusts, flood groups, countryside/catchment partnerships, angling clubs and conservation volunteers.

This recent report, Chalk streams of the future: The effects of climate change on biodiversity in England’s iconic river ecosystems is an easy-to-read summary of the challenges that our chalk streams face, with climate change compounding the impact of multiple pressures including physical modification, pollution, over abstraction and invasive species.

One of the key objectives of WTT’s ‘in river’ habitat projects is to build resilience to these challenges. Simple but effective measures that we use include using bankside vegetation to provide shade and act as a buffer to limit sediment and nutrient inputs, using woody material to help create a sinuous channel with pools and riffles and clean gravels and taking more radical action to restore natural processes – see video below. 

The Wild Trout Trust will be delivering a habitat workshop on a tributary of the River Aln in Northumberland (location TBC), supported by Northumberland Rivers Trust and the Environment Agency, funded through rod licence sales and the Fisheries Improvement Programme.

15 December 2022, 10am to 3pm.

The event will entail a river walk and talk to identify habitat issues currently affecting the river and general discussion around habitat management and improvements. The event is planned with local anglers in mind but is open to anyone that would like to understand more about riverine habitats.

Pollution from sewage outfalls and from farming is, quite rightly, causing outrage in the media. A major pollution event will cause fish to be killed, but what is the impact of chronic pollution on our rivers? 

Researchers have been awarded funding by the Natural Environment Research Council and the Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs from the £8.4 million understanding changes in quality of UK freshwaters programme to investigate how pollutants enter, leave and interact with rivers and supporting ecosystems. Research projects will also determine how the movement of pollutants will be modified with changes in the water cycle and create better tools to monitor and measure pollution.

Five projects are being funded, with two led by the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology. 

Earlier this year, Research & Conservation Officer, Jonny Grey, was awarded funding from the Yorkshire Water Biodiversity Enhancement Programme for a project very close to his heart.

Lothersdale Beck is an Aire headwater and an important tributary of the Eastburn Beck system, a major flow contributor within the Upper Aire so any work to slow the flow and improve water quality ‘at source’ is obviously very valuable.

A plan to restore our chalk streams to health has been published by the Chalk Stream Restoration Group. This group is hosted by the Catchment Based Approach (CaBA) and is chaired by WTT Founder and Vice President, Charles Rangeley Wilson OBE. 

Charles says: 

'It’s not a once-and-for-all fix-all, but I do think it marks a step-change in our collective attempts to restore good ecology to our beleaguered chalk streams.

A major barrier to fish migration has been removed from the River Ecclesbourne in Derbyshire. The 2.5m-high weir at Snake Lane in Duffield, near Derby, was built in the 1970s during a flood alleviation scheme, replacing an older structure at a former corn mill. The weir was impassable to fish, but the recent appearance of Atlantic salmon below the weir renewed the impetus to tackle the problem.

Salmon have begun to return on their annual spawning run via the Rivers Trent and Derwent, after previous fish passage improvements at weirs on those rivers. In addition, the restoration of fish passage at this site reconnects the fish populations of the River Derwent and River Ecclesbourne, the confluence of which is less than a mile downstream, benefitting grayling, trout, barbel, chub, dace, minnow, bullhead and brook lamprey.

The works to remove the weir took place between July and October this year, the culmination of planning and design work which began in February 2019. Following a fish rescue, the river was diverted around the site via a secondary channel (a legacy of the corn mill) allowing work to take place in relatively dry conditions. The reinforced concrete weir was cut into chunks using specialist diamond cutting equipment resembling ‘cheese wires’, allowing the sides to be left intact and the adjacent bridge and walls to remain undisturbed.