April 2018 Upper Bure Valley Partnership

Bringing together the local community for healthy rivers, streams, wetlands and ponds, where native wildlife can flourish and where people grow to cherish their natural heritage.

Contact: [email protected], Telephone: 07827254281 Local Events Festival of Nature Norwich Forum 21st & 22nd April. Come and take part in a lively debate about ‘Fighting for Nature’ at the Forum on Saturday 21st April. On Sunday 22nd a wide range of free family activities will be on offer as well as well as more talks and workshops.

Welcome to the third edition of the Upper Bure Valley Newsletter – providing a snapshot of activits across the Upper Bure water catchment and the stories linked to the precious streams, rivers, ponds and wetlands within.

Much has happened in the pipeline to improve water quality Please get in touch to find out catchment since our last and we have been busy analysing more or if you would like to newsletter in August. Projects the river surveys and scoping share anything that you are have been completed on the new projects. Thank you to involved with in our next edition Scarrow Beck improving habitats everyone for their contribution due in August, Emily. at the lower end and installing to this work and the inspiring wetlands in the upper reaches. articles in this edition. [email protected] Future projects are in the Mobile: 07827 254 281

Family Day at Blickling with Aylsham Cluster Trust The good, the bad and the un-invited was the theme in the National Trust tent at Aylsham Cluster Trust’s Aylsham Cluster Trust annual event at Blickling. Family Learning Day at Aylsham High School With the invasive American Saturday 9th June 10:00 – 14:00. signal crayfish on display and in a number of outdoor crafts Come down and take part in a an opportunity to try and catch and activities from raft building wide variety of free activities for some of our iconic animals on to apple pressing. Other families, including crazy golf and the Bure, the River was the activities on the day included African Drumming workshop main focus of the day for the tree mud faces, willow frisbees, with Anna Mudakaor, kindly National Trust. woodland art and the National funded by Aylsham Rotary Club. Trust’s ’50 things to do before The perfect autumnal weather you’re 11 ¾’. brought around 400 people to the event in October 2017 where This mix of opportunities to families were invited to join the get involved, play and learn Aylsham Cluster Trust and their made it a fantastic afternoon team of volunteer’s to take part for all involved.

1 Woody debris on the Bure Update from the River Surveys Ten years ago the Blickling Countryside We are delighted to share that we have completed two of the 270 Team took to the banks of the opportunities identified in the River Surveys completed last year. to fell trees as a restoration measure. The wetland at Common This technique, often termed this technique at Blickling and was completed in the autumn Large Woody Debris or LWD, throughout the country: and has been working well has been favoured by river “Restoration of woody debris through the winter to collect road restoration and enhancement has been used to enhance run off and protect the stream projects as a tool to create in-river habitat throughout the through Sustead Common. More habitat diversity and kick-start world for over a century in tens details of this can be found in the natural processes. These works of thousands of projects. article by Dr Jonah Tosney. to mimic what would naturally Restoration LWD – Example Upstream of the weir after removal. happen in a river system as Woody debris is increasingly of the technique mimicking With thanks to Mr Neil a weir Weir in place at the time This shows the smaller channel naturally occurring LWD. of the walk over surveys. riverside trees mature and fall. used to reinstate natural and reduced water level. The flow in the upper tributaries has is more dynamic, able to support a processes, restore biodiversity out to test if, by felling trees in- His research showed the also been removed. This has We are now looking forward to improve the condition of our greater number of species. Over two phases between 2008 and thus recover degraded river, biodiversity and food web effectiveness of this technique already dramatically improved working with riparian landowners local streams and rivers. Funding and 2010 the team worked to river ecosystems. Yet, there is a metrics were restored relative at improving species diversity the stream, creating a dynamic and the community of the Upper will be available through the If you would like more information improve river habitat, improve striking lack of causal evidence to control (i.e. unrestored) of the river giving scientific flowing system in place of a slow Bure Valley to jointly put together Upper Bure Valley Partnership. in the meantime please get in the number of wild brown trout to support this approach. In and ‘target’ conditions where evidence to this well used flowing stretch. an action plan for projects that touch with Emily Long. and enhance the wildlife value of the first experiment of its kind naturally fallen trees were technique. the reaches. conducted across multiple already in place. We were able rivers (The Bure and Wensum to demonstrate causal links Ten years on Defra have Water sampling and wetlands Dr Murray Thompson has been in Norfolk, and Test, Loddon between habitat restoration, commissioned Cefas, with in the Upper Bure catchment monitoring the success of and Lyde in Hampshire), we set biodiversity restoration and continued fieldwork support food-web responses. For from the Environment Agency, Dr Jonah Tosney, Norfolk Rivers Trust instance, elevated species to assess longer-term recovery richness in restored areas (8-10years) at the same sites Nutrients and sediment are In the last few months the Bure relative to controls was primarily in March 2018. This study will two of the biggest threats to Valley Partnership have begun driven by the repopulation of provide evidence on whether the ecology of lowland rivers. to look at solutions to some rare invertebrate taxa which also recovery following restoration Too many nutrients coming of these problems. In order had many potential predators is sustained which is critical into a river can change the to be certain that solutions (Thompson et al 2017). information for policy makers, ecosystem completely, allowing will be effective we have been regulators, practitioners and some plants (for example Fool’s taking water samples at a finer We hope complementary stakeholders aiming to focus Watercress) to dominate at the scale – immediately above and approaches will be adopted in resources to the most effective expense of others, eventually below sewage works and road future studies, conducted across conservation interventions. reducing a river’s biodiversity. crossings, as well as observing Image Jon Lewis a range of restoration projects More to come on this later potential problem sites in next one, a similar project near also provide great habitat for and river systems with extended on in the year. Sediment running into rivers periods of heavy rain when Gresham. The Sustead wetland a wide variety of native plants, ‘Natural LWD’ - This shows a natural temporal monitoring to better fills the air and water pockets run-off is at its worst. We’ve also was constructed by the Felbeck insects and amphibians. example of the technique highlighting direct conservation efforts in gravel beds, killing one of been measuring water quality Trust and Norfolk Rivers Trust in the increased habitats that can establish around a fallen tree. towards the most effective the river’s most productive in tributaries where we would the autumn, and sits in between Wetlands work at any scale. solutions” Dr Murray Thompson. environments. Several years of expect it to be very good, so road and river. It was designed The Sustead one and similar sampling and walk-over surveys that we have a target to aim for. to capture and cleanse run-off projects require very little land Invasive species have identified where the major from the road before it enters or money and each one acts The results have led us to the upper Bure. as a small filter for the river. on the Upper Bure. For more information on sources are – typically sewage identification please see: works, fords areas where cattle building our first intervention At the other end of the scale Invasive species pose a severe threat to biodiversity worldwide www.nonnativespecies.org trample the river banks to enter – a small wetland at Sustead Wetlands slow flows, capturing Norfolk Rivers Trust and Anglian and are estimated to cost the British economy £2billion a year. the river. Common and planning our sediment, and also remove huge Water are currently building a amounts of nutrient and other one hectare wetland which will The Upper Bure is currently The plant is most readily seen in substances, keeping them out of entirely cleanse the effluent home to quite a few of these wet areas and on river banks. It the river. The Sustead wetland from a sewage works catering non-native species including can be identified by its sharply not only captures road run-off for 6000 people. As they need the commonly known divided and serrated leaves and but also took a huge amount of to sit in low lying ground they Himalayan Balsam. Another umbrella shaped flowers. It gets soil running off a nearby potato very rarely take up any arable invasive, Giant Hogweed, is its name from its height which field in an autumn downpour, land. If the partnership is able to known to grow in the mid- can reach up to 5m tall. and we suspect it may also deliver maybe 20 more of these sections and throughout the receive some septic tank features over the next few years Broads. We would like to ask If you’ve seen this, or are aware of any areas discharge. All of this it processes we can make a huge difference for your help to understand its that it is growing please get in touch with Emily: into native vegetation and keeps to water quality and sediment presence in the Upper Bure. [email protected] 07827 254 281 Image Jon Lewis from the river. The wetland will problems in the upper Bure.

2 3 Emma Dixon 07825 288936 [email protected] Scarrow Beck River Norfolk River IDB – Paul George – 07788 914392 [email protected] Restoration

The Norfolk Rivers Internal The scheme has resulted in Drainage Board (IDB) has the 800m being significantly successfully completed a improved by the restoration of river restoration project on a more natural channel width a section of the Scarrow and gradient. This was achieved Beck, south of the village by re-profiling the steep and of , which has eroding banks to help create successfully restored its composite berms and improve natural characteristics riparian habitat. Locally over a 800 metre stretch. sourced trees were used in the After construction of the berms with Scarrow Beck is a chalkstream the aim of encouraging channel The Project has been delivered headwater of the River Bure diversity and invertebrate in a partnership between the in which colonisation; a winning Norfolk Rivers IDB and the flows through the villages of combination to attract trout Environment Agency (EA). The Aldborough, Calthorpe and back to the area. Two hundred initiative was funded by Water Erpingham and converges with tonnes of gravel was imported Environment Improvement Before the River Bure upstream of to reinstate a gravel bed to Fund, through the EA, with the market town of Aylsham. Like provide a more natural and aim of improving the Ecological Please contact the Water many streams and watercourses uniform gradient throughout Potential of the Scarrow Beck Management Alliance or the in Norfolk, the Scarrow Beck the reach and provide an catchment from its current Environment Agency if you has undergone some significant improved spawning habitat for Water Framework Directive would like to discuss this or other modification over the course trout, chub and dace. status of Moderate to Good by restoration schemes in more detail. of time, due to post-war 2027. The work was designed We will continue to keep you up to changes in agricultural practice The project has greatly and constructed by the Norfolk date with any further developments or as a consequence of the improved the flow characteristic Rivers IDB. within the Upper Bure catchment milling industry, resulting in of Scarrow Beck, restoring the via our partnerships with the the deepening, straightening, natural condition and habitat National Trust. widening and slowing of the benefits for many aquatic water in the channel. These species. This work aimed to changes have altered a once restore the channel to a more fast-flowing dynamic headwater natural state, but also improve The Upper Bure stream, rich in clean gravels, bankside and emergent starworts and trout, into a deep vegetation for water voles Catchment and sluggish ditch environment, and make a positive influence choked with burr reed and silts. throughout the river ecosystem. Such improvements help make the river a more self-sustaining, higher energy system and contribute toward improved water quality and flood risk management potential within the catchment. During

In Partnership with:

Gravel bed and berms under construction

Design: Fiona Gowen www.fionagowen.co.uk 4