Changing Rivers

[weirwulf]

Since my local river medway produced a record barbel a long time back now there has been a relentless flow of wannabe's tramping it's banks day and night. The unscrupulous and illegal digging of the very dangerous banks coupled with rapidly changing water levels after rain due to additional and blocked open weirs has caused erosion on a huge scale. The recent population of signal crayfish has probably helped to undermine the banks as well and each bit that falls into the river reveals how deep the holes go in the newly exposed face.

The population of some species has declined noticably such as the roach and dace much of which I attribute to the cormorants as they are quite recent whereas the mink have been there many decades. Pollution too has had quite a profound effect and the problem with that is not the immediate one of initial fish kill but the greater problem caused by the loss of the lower food chain. Without a doubt mans intervention has done more harm than good

[poledark]

I used to fish the upper river Eden from the 1950's up to about 1995, and have seen some really dramatic changes. Strangely enough, the changes have been to the detriment of the whole stretch (from Godstone down to Haxted mill) This is a very small river, rising in the chalk downs. There had obviously been a huge amount of man management of this river, I should imagine mostly in the 1800's. Small weirs, mostly brick with wooden boards which were added or removed according to the seasons. Maybe to create a fishery, who knows, maybe for irrigation. These had created delightful little weir pools averaging a few feet deep and varying from a few yards up to maybe 20yds long. Dace,roach,chub and a few trout thrived. I saw my only wild Otter here in the mid 1950's, so there was no shortage of fish.

 

Slowly but surely these little sluices fell into disrepair and began to collapse and the pools silted up, the final nail was driven in by the EA in a flood management exercise which destroyed the last one just downstream of Crowhurst. Traces of the pools could still be seen up 'till a few years ago, usually marked by a ring of willows

 

Very sad to see that the river had reverted to nature.

 

Den

[Dick Dastardly]

Very sad to see that the river had reverted to nature.

 

I know what you mean Den.Nature isn't always the best for what we actually want with rivers.Good river keeping cab really improve our lot and the fishes as well I suppose its just when the "management" of the river is decided by "water" type issues (such as for example abstraction,flood control) rather than "fishery" ones that the problems from an anglers perspective start.

[chevin]

Another thing that can cause a river to change is the growth of towns and cities. Every extra square metre of concrete is another metre of instant run off. Before this extended urbanisation there were hundreds of square miles of farm land etc into which rain would soak before heading towards the river. Unfortunately these days, that land cannot handle the extra water and so it gets into the river more quickly, the floods are bigger and bank erosion is greater.

[Andy Macfarlane]

My local river changes every year. The banksides used to be maintained by the Busby Angling Club but their numbers have dwindled probably due to over poaching and now it resembles something akin to Ho Chi Mhin (a perang would be handy), which isn't necessarily a bad thing because you have to be made of stern stuff to get to the better swims, which have produced some better fish over the last few years. I had one just shy of 4lbs (a wildie no less) this year and another just 10 minutes previously which was pushing 3, which was a best fishing I've had for years. The club has all but stopped stocking the river (hurrah) and although the stocks are lower, the wild strain is recovering and now sea trout and salmon are returning in regular numbers. There are even pike and grayling to be had now too.

 

Rivers are forever changing environments, sometimes for the better, sometimes for the worse but that's fishing isn't it?

 

You won't know till you try.