News

WTT Conservation Officer Rob Mungovan has received a 30 year service award from the RSPB for voluntary work at Fowlmere Nature Reserve. 

Rob said, “Getting involved with voluntary work has taught me loads from habitat management to how lead people of different abilities. And, it was at Fowlmere Nature Reserve that I first started cutting river weed and continue to this day.”

Rob is an all round ecologist who brings huge depth of knowledge to the WTT team in his role as Conservation Officer for East Anglia and Central England. He started volunteering at a very early age !

The Haddon Estate, through its Peacock Fly Fishing Club, has kindly offered its fisheries on 14 & 15 July this year, as a fundraising weekend for WTT. This is an excellent opportunity to fish for wild browns, wild rainbows and grayling across four rivers including areas usually only open to the Peacock Fly Fishing Club members.

The Estate ceased stocking on the Wye, Lathkill and Bradford in 2004 and since then, has operated a thriving, catch & release wild fishery with strictly bankside, dry-fly only fishing. Nymph fishing and wading are permitted on the River Derwent section. If required, advice will be available from local guides to help you get the best out of your day. To find out more about the Peacock Fly Fishing Club, how the Estate’s fisheries are managed and what they offer, you are invited to join the river keepers for a BBQ at lunchtime (at no extra cost).

A limited number of rods are available at £50 per rod per day so do book soon.

You can book through our shop, just click HERE

or, contact Christina in the WTT office via: office@wildtrout.org / 023 9257 0985.

WTT attended a seminar by S&TC Cymru in Builth Wells in early April which highlighted issues around mega-dairy units in west Wales and intensive poultry rearing towards the east of the country. The impacts on Wales’ rivers and their really important trout stocks is headlined in official data on the number of pollutions reported: around 1.5 significant events per week and a Category 1 or 2 event (the most serious episodes, killing fish) about every other week.
The number of sanctions imposed by Natural Resources Wales suggests that the desperately under-resourced regulator is doing little effective regulation.

The Brecon and Radnor branch of The Campaign for the Protection of Rural Wales (CPRW) has set up a petition to try to encourage a debate in the Senedd. A target of 5000 signatures is sought by 22 May; the petition is open to those non-resident in Wales but who care for its environment, including its precious rivers and their trout.

More information here http://www.brecon-and-radnor-cprw.wales/ with the petition here http://brecon-and-radnor-cprw.wales/ipu-petition

WWF, the Angling Trust and the Rivers Trust have launched a new report called ‘Saving the Earth’ which highlights the damage being done to soil by farming. We are losing soil from the land at ten times the rate it is being replaced and too much soil is ending up in our rivers, causing huge damage to wildlife.  The report highlights the need to focus both payments to farmers and enforcement efforts on preserving our soils to ensure future food production and healthy rivers.

Tony Juniper said:

'Healthy soil is vital for our national security, yet we continue to cause immense damage to it, not only threatening our long term food supply but also harming our rivers and wildlife. None of this is inevitable though. We could have a farming system that restores soils and wildlife, while at the same time stopping agricultural run-off polluting our rivers. To do this we need not only the right legislation, however, but also robust enforcement and proper advice for farmers, otherwise new policies simply won’t work. The good news is that this will cost only about 10 million pounds a year.'

Link to the report is here and the WWF press release here