"Environment Minister Elliot Morley has today agreed to make a drought order to allow Southern Water to reduce the compensation flow from Weir Wood reservoir to the River Medway."

See: http://www.defra.gov.uk/news/2005/050726b.htm

Tight Lines - leon

its about time the companies were forced not to raise money on lucrative abstraction licencies ,the golfcourse next to our pond is green and verdant whilst all about it is brown ,i dont mind the greens being watered but the fairway too :mad:
if they stopped the abstractions and plugged their leaks we'd have plenty of water :mad:
went past a potatoe field the otherday HUGE jets of water watering it ,if the land doesent produce natural crops and they water it no wonder its cheaper from abroad

So the residents of Yalding and Farleigh can expect to be flooded out shortly then.

Chesters, maybe the farmer has an artesian well under his field, many do.
Of course if he has to start using ground water on a regular basis (every year? ) then He will probably grow some other crop and the price of your (and my) tatties will go up.
Surely the use of water to grow crops is the first priority, well above garden flowers and car washes.


Agree with you about the golf courses though!

Leon, as a matter of interest, what did they do about the Medway before Wier Wood was constructed?

Den

[ 27. July 2005, 11:11 PM: Message edited by: poledark ]

you maybe right Den but who could afford such crops,the water would need paying by someone and it will be the potatoe eater in the end ,the abstration licences arnt for a few buckets but millions of gallons and all of it in the end feeds the streams that feed the rivers ,even the stuff going back into the groundwater is now heavilly poluted having gone through the actions twice and i suspect only a small % actually gets back to where it comes from.
what really should happen is the farmer has water holding lakes that fill when it rains or gets out of the business full stop.
its pointless forcing crops to grow where nature doesent want them the farmer should find a crop that doesent need artificial ways to support them ,let them look to crops that exist naturally in dry areas like olives or grapes etc.
the water companies come down hard on the householder for wasting a few gallons but turn a blind eye to the billions of gals the water companies waste :mad:

[ 27. July 2005, 11:33 PM: Message edited by: chesters1 ]

What worries me is the coarse fish populations in the tidal stretch below Allington.

With the Medway flowing through the sluices there, there is a slug of mainly freshwater that rises and falls with the tide, flowing down then being pushed back up again.

Without a good flow of freshwater to maintain it, then it is likely to become increasingly saline and those tidal coarse fish will be lost.

Not many anglers fish the muddy tidal stretches, but there are some really good specimens of carp and pike there, as well as shoals of large roach, perch and dace etc

(Jim Gibbinson has caught roach amongst the bladderwrack and crabs whilst mullet fishing at Rochester!)

Tight Lines - leon

I don't know the history Den, but the hydrological management of the Medway has been changed a lot.

(sometimes the river flows this way, then it goes back in the opposite direction )

I should imagine that the water companies were given permission to extract from the Medway to fill the resevoirs, on condition that they maintain the flow during droughts.

It's interesting that at Burham, the resevoir there is filled from the Medway (fishing there is sometimes like fishing a beach as the 'tide' rises and falls).

Basically they don't take water out of the Medway for Burham when the river is in spate as it contains too many nasties to be used as drinking water.

So when it's been raining hard, and no water is being pumped in, the resevoir empties.

However when it's been dry for a while and the river is fined down, they top up the resevoir, and you have to keep moving your stuff back up the 'beach' as it fills!

Tight Lines - leon

More on this:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/

Tight Lines - leon

I would have thought that reducing the flow from Wier Wood would have more of an effect on the upper river than the Tidal river. I dont know the figuress but I am sure that most of the water flowing through Alington Sluice comes from the Grom,Eden,Bourne,Teise,Beult etc rather than Wier Wood. I stood at the confluence of the Eden and Medway a few days ago and the Eden actually looks the larger of the two.
My main concern is for the upper river Between Forest Row and Hartfield which is no more than a stream but contains much wildlife including a natural Brown Trout population and I believe a few native Crayfish. The reduced flow will have a significant effect at this point.

Ironically I stood on a bridge above Tonbridge a few nights ago and saw a genuine flow on the water, as apposed to a raging flood which seems to be the only time there is any flow at this point. I am now really looking forward to my match at Barming this Sunday.

I don't think you need worry

In just the same way as the Grom, Eden, etc supply the Medway below Withyham, so do the tributary streams Plawhatch, Sunnyside Brook, Hindleap Brook, Broadstone Brook, Quabrook, Cansiron Stream, Pippingford Stream (AKA Old Buckhurst Stream) and Buckhurst Stream supply the Weirwood tailwater (Medway) between the Weirwood dam and Withyham (ie through Forest Row and Hartfield).

Many of these tributary streams are true headwaters, and even those that are not, behave as such. (dams on the Pippingford and Buckhurst streams are small and don't influence the flow significantly). So any rainfall on the Medway side of the watershed on Ashdown Forest and its surrounds gets into the river quite quickly. As many of these streams come from woodland areas the water is cool, and its purity good.

Ashdown Forest consists of many alternate layers of clay and sandstone. The many sandstone layers hold a hell of a lot of groundwater in total, so there is a huge reservoir there (and good flow in the streams listed) even when there is a drought. The many thin sandstone beds have the additional good feature in that they are not easily tapped by water companies!

Have fished the area for sixty years - since before Weirwood was built, and have harvested many, many trout throughout that time.

Had grayling and trout from the Upper Medway not a fortnight ago. Low clear water, well overgrown (herbage from banks practically meets in the middle in many places), but the fish are still there.