Welcome to the Essex Rivers Hub Catchment Partnership Newsletter! 

An Update from ESRT

It's been a while since our last newsletter but it has been a busy few months for both ESRT and our Essex Rivers Hub Custchment Partners!

After the departures of Brendan Joyce and Katie Philips, we are once again a small team of three, with Jess Duckenfield taking on a new role as Admin and Communications Officer and the addition of Dr Helen Dangerfield as our new Director. We've also recently recruited some new additions to our board of trustees.  

Above: ESRT Staff and Trustees pictured at a recent Strategy Planning Day 

Our new trustees Tara Arnold, Sarah Morton, Henry Wilkes, and Dr Alan Woods bring a wealth of skills and experience to ESRT including fundraising, governance, financial management and biodiversity habitat banking. We also welcomed Hannah Tickle as our new Associate Board Member and Young Trustee. Hannah has a strong interest in environmental affairs and brings experience in campaign development, as well as engagement of young people.  

Most recently Helen was Assistant Director of Consultancy at the National Trust, leading conservation work across the East of England in natural and built heritage for 10 years. This included directing a large-scale river catchment project and working on the board of the National Trust’s Riverlands programme. Previously Helen worked with a wide range of clients in her role as Director for London and South East Environment Group at RHDHV. 

In her early career she worked as one of the first geomorphologists in an engineering consulting firm promoting working with nature in river and coastal management. Throughout her academic and working life Helen has been focused on the restoration of wildlife and habitats. After being so inspired by early experiences in our rivers and on our seashores, Helen is also passionate about ensuring people and communities have access to nature.

Fiddlers Hill Project Update

Essex and Suffolk Rivers Trust has been leading a project along with partners including the Environment Agency, Woodland Trust and Essex Wildlife Trust, to deliver the initial optioneering phase of the Fiddlers Hill wetland and floodplain improvements.

ESRT have commissioned Atkins to develop a concept design to increase the frequency and duration of floodplain inundation across the Meadow. The main aim of the project is to increase the area of fen and other floodplain habitats present on site, using natural processes to reconnect the River Colne to Fiddlers Hill Meadow, increasing the frequency and duration of floodplain inundation. The project will create new, and enhance existing aquatic and semi-aquatic habitats in an area that is currently managed primarily for agriculture.

Above : Fiddlers Hill Meadow is located alongside the River Colne in Essex, The land is owned by the Woodland Trust and managed by a tenant farmer.

A key ecological driver is the desire is to increase the area of fen that is currently present on site, as well as the provision of pond habitats that are locally scarce. The Woodland Trust also wishes to plant a number of black poplar trees along the riverbank. Whilst the primary aims for the site are ecological, it is also acknowledged that delivery of these habitats as part of a more naturally functioning floodplain will provide multiple benefits by enhancing the range of ecosystem services that site can provide.

The LNP, chaired by experienced conservation leader Dr Simon Lyster, has made huge process since its launch last year in March 2022. The partnership now consists of a board and 4 working groups, including the Local Nature Recovery Strategy Working Group, Community Engagement Working Group, Agricultural Working Group and Biodiversity Net Gain Working Group.

The Local Nature Recovery Strategy (LNRS) working group are ready to go; but work was paused, following the news that the LNRS DEFRA guidance will not be released until spring 2023. However, the group are making behind-the-scenes progress and look forward to beginning the LNRS very soon.

The North Essex Farm Cluster is now up and running, and more than 40 farmers attended the launch on 2/11/22 hosted by Emma and Joe Gray, the farm cluster coordinators. Encouraged by interest in the North Essex Farm Cluster, with some farmers further down the Blackwater wanting to join in, we will look at what other clusters we can help get started over the coming year. The interest is exciting as clusters offer a real opportunity to deliver nature recovery at scale.

The Biodiversity Net Gain Working Group has been very active, despite the wait for further BNG guidance from the government. For example, the group have been working on a guidance pack to help local planning authorities, developers and landowners in Essex prepare for BNG. The BNG guidance pack can be found here: Guidance on Biodiversity Net Gain.

Get in touch and sign up to the Essex LNP Newsletter by emailing ‘Newsletter’ to the address below!

nature.partnership@essex.gov.uk

New Beavers Released in Essex!

Another four Eurasian beavers have been released into two brand new 50-acre enclosures on the Spains Hall Estate in Finchingfield, Essex as part of a ground-breaking Natural Flood Management Scheme.

Spains Hall Estate, a privately owned estate covering 2,000 acres of north Essex in England, first reintroduced Eurasian beavers (which had previously been extinct in England since the early 16th century) in 2019, with the help of the Environment Agency, as a way of reducing flood risk to the village of Finchingfield, increasing drought resilience, clean water and creating year-round habitat for wildlife. Since then, the beavers have had three sets of kits and have used their natural engineering skills to transform a woodland into a thriving wetland. The dams, which the beavers have created from locally felled trees, sticks, stones and mud, have played a crucial role in reducing flood risk in the area by slowing down the river flow and diverting it through new channels and wetlands.

As a result of the success of the project, the estate has expanded the project by building two new enclosures along the Finchingfield Brook which measure 1.9km long and cover 40 hectares (100 acres) - 10 times the size of the original enclosure.

Above: A female beaver being relesed at Spains Hall Estate (c) Simon Hurwitz 

This unprecedented £350,000 scale-up is jointly supported by a unique public and private partnership which includes Anglian Water, the Environment Agency, the Anglian Eastern Regional Flood and Coastal Committee (RFCC), Essex County Council and Essex and Suffolk Water.

This ground-breaking project is the first of its kind in East Anglia and is part of a wider scheme to repurpose the land of the estate towards a more environmentally sustainable future that can deliver cleaner more plentiful water, help wildlife recover and boost climate resilience in the area . Over time, the beavers will help make the Finchingfield area better equipped to cope with the challenges climate change will bring, and all the while providing inspiration and experience that others can use elsewhere. This innovative partnership will support local communities by not only reducing their risk of flooding, but also by establishing a link to the natural world and creating a landscape not seen in East Anglia for over 400 years.

Archie Ruggles-Brise, Estate Manager at Spains Hall Estate said, “Thanks to the incredible support of our partners, we are thrilled to be expanding our natural flood management programme and welcoming more beavers onto the estate. This is one of the many ways we are pushing boundaries of what can be done on private land, and we hope to be an inspiration and example to others who can do replicate our work to help make farming more sustainable and environmentally friendly.”

Essex Fish Migration Roadmap – Dedham Mill, River Stour

Dedham Mill has always been a significant barrier to upstream fish migration and although Stratford Old River (the original channel of the River Stour) still exists, the top end of this channel is often impassable due to a steep concrete weir. In extreme cases water has stopped flowing completely over this weir resulting in the need for fish rescue in the back channel.

Thanks to funding by the Environment Agency, Essex and Suffolk Water and Anglian Water’s contributions to the Essex Water For Wildlife project, the weir was finally installed with both eel tiles and an oak baffle fish pass in October 2022. Within hours we had already seen eels, brown trout and chub using the pass.

Essex Wildlife Trust is continuing to investigate barriers and commission designs to mitigate these and we are always happy to work with other members of the Catchment Partnership to enable delivery of as many fish passes as possible. For now we are concentrating on the Rivers Colne and Blackwater but there are barriers on every catchment in the county so we are only just at the start of this major river connectivity project.

Find out more and view the Fish Migration Road Map

Essex Wildlife Trust have just launched their updated volunteering scheme, ‘River Champions’, which builds on the success of the previous River Warden scheme.

Becoming a River Champion will give you opportunities to take coordinated action for your local river, working with others in your community to protect and restore our waterways. You could get involved with riverside tree planting, invasive species removal, litter picks, and more. Additionally, you could become a River Champion Surveyor, and get involved with citizen science projects such as mammal surveying and Riverfly monitoring.

River Champions differs from the previous River Warden scheme in that it introduces a greater emphasis on community self-organising. Our Wilder Communities team will offer support, advice, and guidance to those looking to kickstart community projects in their area.

As a River Champion, you can get involved however best fits for you. There will be opportunities to learn new technical skills, to learn surveying techniques – but those activities aren’t essential for you to be a River Champion. Our role, in many ways, is to provide opportunities and subsequent support to those who might want to take them.

If you have any idea for a river-based community project, want to start taking action locally for your river, and/or are seeking citizen science opportunities, then River Champions is the place to start. You can find more information, and sign up to get involved, by following the link here.

If you have any questions, please get in touch with Ben, EWT Wilder Rivers Officer, at benm@essexwt.org.uk

A number of partners from the Essex Rivers Hub recently visited Anglian Water's Colchester Water Recycling Centre. Partners were given a compresensive tour of the facilities and were able to see and smell how sewage is recycled into clean water! Did you know that they use 'cut grass’ scented odour catchers?

The site tour was followed by a really productive workshop on the future ambitions of the Essex Rivers Hub - watch this space!

The Rivers Trust have updated their Sewage Map to include the latest 2022 data.

 Combined Essex CaBA Catchment Data 

• In 2022, monitoring was carried out on 182 out of 292 storm overflows in the Combined Essex Catchment compared to 144 out of 92 storm overflows in 2021.

• A total of 1,973 spills were counted compared to a total of 3,083 spills counted in 2021.

• These spills occurred for a total duration of 9,790 hours compared to the total duration of 25,860 hours in 2021. 

   

"The data on discharges from combined sewer overflows (also known as storm overflows) from 2022 is distressing. Despite a fall in the overall number of spills and an increase in monitoring coverage compared to 2021, this is attributed to the historically dry weather rather than any significant improvements in water company performance or waste water infrastructure" - Mark Lloyd, Chief Executive of The Rivers Trust

Click here to view the interactive map. The Rivers Trust have added near real-time spill information for Thames Water, with data from other water companies to be added as it becomes available. 

Our next newsletter will be out in the autumn