Groups looking to do something about the state of their local river often come at the issue from different angles. Manifold CAN is nature-focused but has support from anglers; the Friends of Cecilly Brook have a particular interest in improving the health of one of the last water vole habitats in the district. The Friends of the River Tean, Churnet and Blithe are especially focused on flooding and sewage spills from an ailing Seven Trent storm overflow. Other groups such as Dane Valley Climate Action have dipped their toes in the water via the entry-level Great UK Water Blitz (the next one at the end of April).
This variety of aims and ambitions makes it important that — once they go beyond fun or educational activities — groups should ask themselves a number of questions. What data do they wish to collect and why? Do they want to check whether river quality is changing — for better, or for worse? Do they suspect something is amiss and want to find the cause?
And if they wish to use these data to promote remedial action, how can they make sure the information they collect is robust enough?
Flood management used to be all about heavy-duty engineering – forcing water though rigid channels or building artificial barriers. But increasingly, the emphasis is switching to working with Nature, rather than against it.
Already in Staffordshire Natural Flood Management (NFM) schemes are being slowly put in place.
NFM is a holistic approach to flood management working at a whole catchment scale. In the headwaters of a catchment, leaky dams created by felling trees across a watercourse slow the flow of water whilst also providing habitat. Ponds and reedbeds not only store water but help to clean it too, whilst good management of upland habitats means that our land can act as a ‘sponge’ by absorbing and storing water.
There are projects in the Mere country beyond Newcastle, at Burton and above Endon, but the flagship project in the county is the Stafford Brooks scheme which targets 25 locations along Stafford’s rivers and streams, improving habitats which will enable wildlife to thrive. This project will reduce flood risk to nearby houses and businesses, alleviating seasonal pressures felt across the town caused by regular flooding.
This project also has a particular focus on extending, restoring and creating new habitats. These restored areas will become home to a variety of wildlife including otters, wading birds and a range of amphibians.
The new developments will also use natural solutions such as wetlands and reed beds to help filter polluted run-off from roads.
Photo credit: Staffordshire Wildlife Trust (with our addition).
We were excited to discover this highly professional toolkit for farmers who are keen to reduce their carbon emissions and also sequestrate carbon on their land - effectively farming carbon. It has been written by farmers, for farmers. In their words "it is not a definitive guide – more a distillation of useful information and sign-posting, designed to give you a good grasp of the issues and actions around tackling greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions on your farm.
Whether you consider yourself conventional, organic or on a journey towards regenerative farming or agroecology, you are welcome. We hope our toolkit gives you the tools to make sense of the subject and take positive action in response."
Enjoy....
FIND OUT MORE
We launched the Nature in Your Neighbourhood project at our HuG Festival this June and immediately attracted interest from across the Moorlands. We were always keen to give people as many visual keys as possible – to bring the project to life. We’re glad to say that Foxlowe visitors flocked to the project map, which was on a stall ably staffed by Angie Turner of Keele University and Briony Davison of Staffordshire Wildlife Trust (plus Briony’s dog Finn!) Since then, we have taken the map around the Moorlands, including recently to the Leek and District Agricultural Show.
Nature in Your Neighbourhood, spearheaded by Staffordshire Wildlife Trust, has MCA, Keele University, OUTSIDE Arts, Staffordshire Moorlands District Council and Staffordshire Council Voluntary Youth Services as partners. Its key aims are to enhance biodiversity in the Moorlands as well as calculate and demonstrate its impact on climate change.
For this five-year project, funded by the National Lottery Community Fund, we start by asking residents to nominate potential sites this year. The partnership will then help communities or a group to manage the sites better. Support will include Bioblitzes, training in ecological monitoring and management and, where necessary, any negotiations with landowners.
As members of the Nature Group know well, there are many ideas and initiatives on nature trails, some coming from the council and more from local communities. Two of our members, Jane Tattersall and Penny Oakley, had a meeting with Katie Hampton, SMDC’s biodiversity officer, in April in an effort to bring these closer to fruition. One of these is the proposed Leek Nature Trail, which could also address public health. Angela Dale, the SMDC officer with responsibility for promoting health and wellbeing, was also at the meeting. Angela has the lead on a new initiative called Move More. The aim is to encourage residents of Staffs Moorlands to walk more in their community, using graded routes. There will be an emphasis on the positive aspects of being out in green spaces, on both physical health and mental wellbeing. Better still, there is funding available to promote this initiative.
Angela and Katie envisage signage in Leek town centre, information boards at key points on the trail, the map being promoted on a specific part of the SMDC website and posters being available for public places such as health centres, libraries and tourist information outlets. SMDC would take responsibility for the graphics and the promotional materials; MCA's role would be to identify the significant areas of biodiversity in Leek and the routes or mapping. Katie will be contacting the Foxlowe’s Chris Thompson to talk to him about the Tree Trail and Kate Hamey (Swifts of Leek) to identify the key areas for swifts in Leek. Katie and Angela will get back to us once they have confirmed that this project is going ahead. Assuming this is confirmed, we hope that MCA members will all be able to produce information about the sections of Leek they feel should be included in the nature trails.
Spring has sprung (well perhaps crept) upon us and it has been a busy and mostly productive few months for MCA’s Nature Group, who have taken over the management of five Leek community orchards, formerly the responsibility of the district council. All but two orchards have now been pruned and had their mulch mats laid, along with the mulch. We hope to have completed the remainder soon. As well as providing a nurturing base for the trees, the mulch mats serve as a marker, hopefully preventing AES (Alliance Environmental Services, the council’s contractors) from strimming too near the trees and causing damage to the trunks.
SMDC has appointed a new officer responsible for the management of AES. He comes with a great background, having worked his way up from grounds maintenance, through the highly technical (but not typically nature-friendly!) world of sports pitches to latterly being responsible to Staffordshire University for making their grounds more wildlife sensitive (in partnership with Staffs Wildlife Trust). The group hopes to meet him shortly for further co-operation. On the orchards themselves, we have talked to SMDC biodiversity officer, Katie Hampton, about signage, as suggested by Cllr. Matt Swindlehurst when he attended an MCA Nature meeting. This will make clear that MCA are now managing the orchards.
- Nature in Your Neighbourhood
- Beavers, Bugs and Biodiversity Net Gain
- Family Fun Day at Tittesworth
- Opportunity for a Local Community Nature Trail
- First Swift of Summer Competition
- The Manifold Tree Planting Project
- Why on Earth - Should We Care About Soil?
- Beavers are Back!
- Leek Wild Week
- Kiss The Ground
- Nature and Landscape Recovery in England
- A Rough Guide to Using Leaves for Leaf Mould instead of Peat