Creating a Diversion

The silted-up refuge at the bottom of Beat 3A was tackled this morning by 4 guys from SERT and 5 from TAOA, so well done Andy, Chris, Cristophe and of course Nigel (et moi). We spent most of the morning shoveling silt from the blocked entrance to the Refuge, and we even rescued a Refugee! It was a small wriggly creature which we decided was an immature Brook Lamprey, and it was carefully re-homed from the entrance up to a less disturbed area.

The very heavy shovelfuls of silt and rotting vegetation were lifted out of the water into trugs which were hauled up the steps to fertilise the bramble patch at the top. It was very messy and pungent and the aroma still lingers with me even now. The SERT guys were busy supervising and setting up a petrol-driven winch to haul some very large logs from the top of the refuge down into the river.

The next step was was manoeuvering the logs into position and driving stakes into the riverbed to hold them in place. It's surprisingly difficult to predict exactly what will be the impact on the river flow by installing these deflectors, despite all the knowledge and experience present there. The varying river evels, in particular the regular spates of 1 meter or more, can do strange things to the river bed.

The hope is that these opposed deflectors will create a new channel nearer the centre of the river instead of the current ......er.... current running along the right bank just in front of the Refuge entrance. Hopefully that will mean that any silt will get washed further down the river, and won't clog up the entrance again. SERT will be back to check on its success next year, and meanwhile let's hope it really does provide a refuge from the raging torrents for small and young fish, including Brook Lampreys.

The work isn't over yet, as the SERT guys will be cutting down some of the big trees along Beat 3B from now until Friday 7th, and dropping them into the river to create more deflectors and habitat features. Because of that, all members are advised to steer clear of the river and the footpaths along Beat 3B for the rest of this week, or at least to proceed with extreme caution.

I'll add updates later in the week, including a picture of the Brook Lamprey, so watch this space.

Cheers

PeterB