A River Keepers Work is Never Finished

After returning home from my few days away with Phil Cool, I’ve had a busy week on the river, teaching, fishing and some hard work along the river bank. My work started off collecting three black bin liners of rubbish from my 2 mile stretch of water. I then did some tree pruning in a couple of pools to allow my anglers to swing a fly under the far bank. I did manage to have a night session at Tewitfield where I failed to catch, but my friend Brendan Ince had personal best bream and carp on plastic corn. I’ve had one pupil on the river for four hour lesson, where he managed to catch his first brown trout on a fly.

Another day I hosted Dr Paul Gaskell of the Wild Trout Trust and Andy Pritchard of Trout in the Town another arm of the Wild Trout Trust. Having recorded a couple of programmes with Paul and Andy, I went off to the studio while they enjoyed trying to catch the River Ribble trout.
Having spent some time in the company of these guys I realised how much we owe Paul, Andy and all the others who get involved in Improving our rivers and streams. Well done guys.

I managed a short session trout fishing catching a few trout; I also had a salmon on a Dunkeld, fishing a Thomas and Thomas ten foot Helix, seven weight rod and floating line. I find this an ideal outfit for small river salmon fishing. Another member fished through the pool after I left, then having hooked a good salmon he had all the line stripped off the reel, then the knot broke between fly line and backing. Line and salmon were lost.

On Tuesday with the river coloured I realised it wouldn't be worth fly fishing, so decided to target the chub. Catching three averaging about 4lbs on trotted bread flake. I then spent an hour in the wood hunting squirrels shooting three.

In the hot weather, its been hard at work on the River Ribble hacking back the Himalayan Balsam, a large succulent, annual introduced in 1800's as a greenhouse plant, sadly like so many plants animals and aquatic life, it escaped into the wild, its an invasive plant and should be removed when found.

Balsam suffocates other plants and when it dies away our river banks are left bare and liable to erosion, causing silting up of the gravel spawning reds. The main aim in controlling this weed is to prevent it setting seed. It is easily uprooted and cutting at soil level should prevent it from resprouting. Cattle and sheep graze and trample the top growth. Probably the only good thing that cattle and sheep do for our river banks.

On the first day of hacking down this horrid invasive plant, I felt something sting me on the arm, thinking it was probably a red ant I rolled up my shirt sleeve to find a wasp, in trying to shoo it away I got stung. Then all hell was let lose as a swarm of these beasts attacked with a vengeance leaving me with eight stings. As I run across the field to escape the swarm I realised how funny it must have looked to some walkers. Eventually I was able to out run the critters.

None of my squirrel or mink traps have had any captures; I was rather disappointed I didn’t have a mink as I had baited with fresh rabbit chunks. Perhaps all my work in trapping and killing mink is showing a benefit. It’s a pity more landowners and fishing clubs don’t wage war on the mink and get a licence to cull cormorants. Perhaps at this time of the year our clubs should ban fishing for a week and get the members out on the bank hacking down the balsam. Our rivers and stream would benefit as will our fish.

Thousands of Fish Killed at Southport and District AA Three Pools Waterway

THOUSANDS of fish have been killed at Three Pools Waterway in Southport. It’s reported that Environment Agency people were called to the fishery after receiving calls from concerned members of the public. Fish including roach, bream, tench and pike have been killed, in a devastating blow to the Southport members. It’s reported that the Environment Agency said the incident appears to have been caused by sewage storm water overflows, combined with reduced dissolved oxygen levels in the water, following the hot and humid weather.

A full investigation is now underway, as the EA were trying to resolve the problem by pumping the sewer water away and diluting the effects of the pollution. Hydrogen peroxide was also used to increase oxygen levels for the fish. It’s reported that "Richard McIlwain, Fisheries Technical Specialist said “Environment Agency Officers are working to try and resolve this situation as soon as possible, and minimise the number of fish deaths. During very hot humid weather dissolved oxygen levels in rivers can be severely affected." Combined with the discharge of storm sewage this can have a devastating impact on fish life. We will be carrying out a full investigation into this incident.

If as reported that it was caused by storm over flow pipes. One must ask the question why we are using 19th Century sewage systems in the 21st Century. I have protested to Government Ministers and MP’s about Storm over Flow Pipes since the 1970’s and still nothing has been done. Their probably far too busy switching houses, or working on their expenses and perks to worry about the waterside environment.