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The state of our rivers

In addition to this, there's the treatment of our riverbanks by brain dead people. I sat by the Ouse last night and endured 3 hours of a group of 7 teens/young 20's (male & female) on the opposite bank drinking, swearing, throwing empty cans and bottles into the river, smashing up any wood they could get hold of etc. Zero respect for the their surroundings or those around them. Totally yobbish behavior that I can only describe as depressing. Not an uncommon sight in recent times :(
 
Although the privatised water companies are slaves to their shareholders and profit is their main motive, taking them back into public ownership would not necessarilyimprove things that much. Yes, it would take away the search for profits but would the stewardship be any better than it is now? Look at the way that flood prevention drove river management in the 1970s with bankside clearance, straightening and dredging, all designed to hasten the flow of the water to the sea.

What we need is regulation with teeth and policies that are built around the protection of our rivers,not their destruction. Unfortunately, economic policy does not support that need with farming and industry having too powerful a voice for the Government to ignore. Not sure how we can square that circle, but until we have policies that are built around the protection of the environment, rather than just paying lip service to it, nothing is going to change.


Dave
 
I understand but do not accept pollution, etc from farmers and water companies. However, what I cannot comprehend is the general public desecrating the natural world. I am becoming more misanthropic every time I go for a walk. Changes need to start with the public before attempting to tackle companies and farmers.
 
Rhys Perry said:
The fines for polluting need to be bigger than the cost of proper disposal, much bigger, so it's not even worth taking the risk.
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Governments see house building as a means of boosting the economy (it's a short term superficial fix). All those involved with such schemes know the sewage system can't cope - yet they continue to build and more and more houses are being built on flood plains. Fine the water companies and farming conglomerates until they go bust - then what? Now we are in the recession of all recessions nobody is going to fund the replacement of this country's sewage system but houses will continue to be built faster than ever.
 
So the issues are well documented, the offenders are quite well known. To me it would appear our existing legislation and prosecution is ineffective and too soft.

More noise needs to be made, there’s people gluing themselves to trains over climate change and saving badgers, where’s the public uproar about this!?
 
Very sad, but ultimately that’s the net result of decades of seriously inept self-serving Government and toothless implementation of law and regulations.

Blair abolished English Nature which acted as an independent environmental watchdog.

Cameron appointed a house builder/ developer to the role of Natural England chairman and nobody seemed to bat an eyelid. And now we have the Fat Bluffer about to take a joyfully take a wrecking ball to the remaining environmental protections or ...’slashing red tape’ as he calls it.

Protection of the environmental should transcend party politics, but sadly it doesn’t. We only have ourselves to blame.
 
My work largely takes place on water treatment works, refurbishing and building new biological filter beds. I have been and continue to be very busy with work, so water treatment companies are spending money! There is a question as to whether rather antiquated filter beds with settlement tanks at either side of the process really cut the mustard with today's population density (where it is now, and it's continued growth), and whether more investment be demanded for more high-tec solutions for the return of cleaner water. However, drinking water and our need for it, in the form of the abstraction of water from rivers is also a problem. Unless we tackle both those issues I'm afraid the result is inevitable - a growing population using ever more water returning poorly treated effluent = rivers in a state of very poor health. Unless you fish a big river in which it's size buffers somewhat the effect of both of these issues, or a short river that contains few conurbations in it's catchment, I would bet you have seen a deteriorating situation for many a year now!
On many a front really we need to address some of the issues we face, not just environmental, with a better balance (in terms of where spending should be directed) with the things that really matter, and those which do not.
 
What a bloody day a massive bridge across my stretch collapses and Maple lodge dumps out sewage so we have had a river Colne fish kill
fish dying on the colne at coy carp.jpg
117770761_10157666328146538_7997234257806301190_o.jpg
 
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I'm simply lost for words. I hate how the environment I love so much, is being treated the way it is. It's simply depressing. I just wish I had the finances to leave this country to live in one that's more caring of theirs. We're just getting too overpopulated which puts devastating impacts on our natural resources and environment.
And it seems no one is doing anything about it. Successive governments just care about money and commerce. The environment doesn't really register on any meaningful level.
 
I posted on the Denham community Facebook page on Wednesday to warn of the Chesham sewage works dumping their tanks into the river,(They now do a press release when they dump sewage into the chess). I mentioned that Maple lodge would probably be dumping raw sewage next and less than a day later we get the fish kill directly downstream of the outfall. I Riverfly test just downstream of maple lodge and am not looking forward to my next test. Its a horrible situation to be in, due to the massive abstractions of quality water from the underground Aquifers in the area the rivers have to rely on sewage farm outflows to keep flowing. Eden spring a massive bottled water company are one of the biggest culprits under EA license sold on by Affinity water. Then the very sewage farms you have to rely on for flow dump untreated waste and kill your stock.
 
Yes Mark. French owned.
So probably don't give a.

As you know my Mother had a house on the Chess. I fished it as a kid from the town down to the Latimer fly water. Crystal clear water with natural rainbow trout spawning areas. Wonderful memories.

I did send a long e mail to the BBC when they did a minor piece on the Chess problems hoping they would go more indepth. Nothing.
 
As a small kid my dad would take me to catch pond fish and trout from the chess. Many a goldfish and golden orfe ended up in a canvas bucket. Back home to our pond they would come all were escapees from the Chess fish farm. Bloody great times as a kid sadly it will never be the same as it once was. Found this recently a monster Roach from the chess what a fish that must have been 4th biggest in the country
river chess roach.png
 
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Mark, I feel your pain. The Chess below the now Croxley hall fishery was on my West Hampstead ticket, Sabey's pool etc. down to the Colne. Was told about Trout upstream , St Georges park area. Aged about 16 I ventured forth and caught my first ever trout running a freelined worm under the fence going into the British Fresian society grounds. A future visit I met with the "keeper" in the park who showed me the one surefire 'lie' in the park, had a few over the years including a few Rainbows. The water was always crystal clear with a distinct lack of any weed whatsoever. Ankle deep maximum. That would have been the 70's and I went into a game fishing only for some years. Always kept my eye on the Chess though. Must have been about 93/4 I began to see weed growing, the level increasing, obviously, and some decent fly hatches coming off, this all apparently because of the Chesham sewage works improvements Healthy growths of Rannunculus established themselves and some phenomenal hatches of mayfiles happened. Water was now knee deep and in Mayfly season it was without doubt the best wild brown trout chalkstream fishing in the country. One of the last days I remember, I decided to count, I gave up at around 30, notwithstanding the juvenile tail slappers getting hooked in the tail attempting to drown the huge mayflies. Fish averaged about 1 1/4 lb. best one that day about 3 1/2 lb.
Sadly the river was devoid of weed, flies or fish the next visit, but was low enough that the doctor at Loudwater wouldn't get his riverside garden damp again.
The EA had done this. Destroyed an entire ecosystem.
They've managed to cock it up on several fronts since, fish kills, ignored warnings about bank breaches, they are worse than useless.
 
I truly believe 'where there is a will there is a way' but can't figure out what the way should be to save our rivers. Any ideas? There must be something constructive anglers can do to make a stand.
 
Edward Adcock said:
I truly believe 'where there is a will there is a way' but can't figure out what the way should be to save our rivers. Any ideas? There must be something constructive anglers can do to make a stand.
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As a club we wrote to our MP, who forwarded the letter to the EA, here is part of their response

4. What specific actions are the EA currently taking to address the currently well documented algal blooms on the River Wye?

Algae occur naturally in inland waters such as rivers, streams and lakes. It is common to experience an algal bloom following warm weather, such as we experienced recently. The water becomes less clear and may look green, blue-green or greenish-brown. They block sunlight from reaching other plants in the water and use up oxygen in the water at night which can suffocate fish and other creatures. Oxygen is also used up when the bloom decays. Elevated phosphate levels can also cause excessive algae growth, especially during low flows in the summer with increased river temperatures.

The Environment Agency understands this is a significant concern to anglers on the River Wye and other recreational river users.

It is important to stress that we have not received any reports of fish deaths due to the algal bloom through our National Incident Reporting Service.

The Environment Agency is already working on a range of partnership projects in Herefordshire to reduce phosphates and improve habitat or create additional habitat –for example a proposed Integrated Wetlands initiative.

The Environment Agency is also addressing the issue of nutrients entering watercourses through sediment / soil loss by using a range of technologies (including drones and GIS mapping) to effectively target resources to help reduce the impacts from agricultural runoff.

Our regulatory role as outlined above helps efforts to limit and reduce nutrients entering watercourses.

The wide ranging broad actions in the NMP to reduce phosphate levels will also assist with this matter.

So a GCSE paragraph on eutrophication, followed by no fish death so it is not an issue, but look what we are doing and were using technology to do it!!

What anglers could do in the first place is have a national boycott of the rod licence and I have a few more extreme suggestions regarding money but we would need a national approach and as far as I can tell we have no suitable body to lead this.
 
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