News

If so, now is a good time to write to your MP! 

The inaugural meeting of a new All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on chalkstreams will meet on 15 September 2020, led by Sir Oliver Heald and Sir Charles Walker. 

APPGs are there to gather MPs with common interests or common constituency issues. We know that all our chalkstreams are ecologically unique and face huge challenges from abstraction, housing development, pollution and climate change. If you live in a chalkstream constituency, please encourage your MP to join the APPG and make them aware of the importance of our chalkstreams and how they are under threat. Write to them, express your concerns and ask them to join the APPG. Here’s how:

Wild Trout Trust is member of the English Beaver Strategy Working Group, which aims to develop a strategy for the introduction and management of beavers in England. The group includes conservation charities, landowner and farmer representatives, academics and many other interested groups. Wild Trout Trust has chosen to participate in the group in order to influence how and where beavers might be introduced and how they are managed. Clearly, our objective is to look after our beloved trout (including sea trout) and ensure they are not adversely impacted, notwithstanding the benefits that beavers may bring for flood relief, water quality and other biodiversity. We are using our network of advisors and contacts to develop a broad and deep understanding of the issues and benefits that beavers may bring to trout and trout habitat, including learning from experience in Scotland, Europe and Canada / USA, updating the information paper prepared for us by our Research & Conservation Officer, Prof. Jon Grey (see below). We recognise that the recent decision by Defra to permit wild beavers to continue live on the River Otter in Devon has widespread media and public support; it is important for us to ensure that we provide expert input to future decisions.

The first output from the Working Group has been released, Proposals for an English Beaver Strategy – current and future proposals for restoring and managing beavers (14 August 2020), and we have chosen not to support that document but to continue to work with the Group and to participate in upcoming discussions and consultations with Natural England and Defra.

The Press Release from the Beaver Trust (who chair the Working Group) includes this quote from WTT Director, Shaun Leonard:

A new website has been launched with very comprehensive coverage of where to fish in Wales.

Wales is justly famous for its sea trout (locally called sewin) fishing on iconic rivers such as the Towy and Teifi, but it also has some excellent wild trout fishing for resident brownies in rivers, reservoirs and in the hundreds of mountain lakes (llyns).

The website uses intuitive interactive maps to enable you to find fishing and angling facilities in Wales quickly and easily. There is also information on where to stay at Visit Wales graded accommodation, where to purchase fishing tackle from local shops and where to hire a fishing guide or a charter boat skipper.The website will be regularly updated with quality written blog posts - some blogs written by staff and members of the WTT will be appearing over the coming months.

Duncan Pepper's blog post gives an interesting perspective on beavers and angling. Duncan guides on the Tay (amongst other places in Scotland) where beavers are, well .... problematic for some farmers.Visit the WTT website library page on beavers (and predators - which beavers are not!) for a review of the science on beaver-trout interactions and other useful links on beaver ecology and management.

Delivery of a cracking little project at Rectory Farm is a result of a partnership between the landowners, George and Ann Eaton, the Wild Trout Trust and the Environment Agency. Following two devastating pollution events in 2017 and 2018, the local community were keen to see the river brought back to health. Simply re-stocking the river is rarely the right approach, so a programme of habitat improvement work was agreed to restore the river from the ‘bottom-up’. It is anticipated that existing wild trout populations above the source of the pollutions will recolonise the area, taking advantage of the habitat improvements.

Six gravel riffles were created in autumn 2019 to provide new spawning habitat from brown trout, chub, dace and minnow. Bank re-grading work was set to follow but the floods of winter 2019-20 prevented river access. Spring came and the ground dried out, but then COVID19 restrictions prevented any work. The relaxing of movement restrictions allowed a small but effective delivery team coordinated by Rob Mungovan to complete the work in June 2020. The photos below tell some of the story…

WTT Conservation Officer, Rob Mungovan, just back from furlough, has got straight to work restoring a reach of a little river close to his heart.

Many of us already spend time battling against other non-native invaders like signal crayfish and various alien plants. So, with the Asian hornet in the news again as a threat to our honey bee, we thought a quick swat-up might be appropriate for interested WTT supporters.