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What we do Conservation River Watch
http://www.tyneriverstrust.org/index.php/home/what-we-do/conservation/river-watch
River Watch
People using and living near the rivers in the Tyne Catchment are an enthusiastic and valuable source of up-to-date information on condition and change. The Trust co-ordinates a growing network of volunteer ‘River Watchers', to collect data on the rivers such as temperature for climate change and invertebrate for pollution events, and to protect watercourses through practical work parties such as litter cleans and removal of invasive plants. ‘River Watchers' are also responsible for reporting threats and information on their stretch of river.
The information gathered by River Watchers will be used to inform and support catchment management priorities, recreation guides and byelaw enforcement. River Watch seminars and workshops are held regularly to educate and train people in catchment-related issues and ecology.
Explore the subject areas and activities below and if you are interested in helping out by becoming a river watcher, or starting a river watch group in your area, then please contact us.
Just in case you were wondering how we make sure we keep everyone safe on the riverbank we videoed our latest lifejacket test! View the videos here Equipment test 1 and Equipment test 2
River Fly monitoring
As part of the national Riverfly Partnership's monitoring initiative the Trust are the Tyne co-ordinator of the invertebrate sampling team and have the full support of the Environment Agency. We have run 6 full day workshops to date and now have an excellent band of volunteers gathering data on pollution sensitive invertebrates in the river and tributaries throughout the Tyne catchment. This is an extremely effective method of identifying potential issues and pollution events which we can then flag up for investigation by the Environment Agency. Partnership at work!
Follow the link if you would like to find out more about the River Fly monitoring project.
Guided walk with a purpose
Tyne Rivers Trust invited members of the public on a guided walk at Allen Banks.
Click here to find out more.
Environmental Leave
The Environment Agency run a 2 day leave programme to help with practical environment activities. Click here to find out how the Tyne Rivers Trust benefitted.
Garrigill Youth Group Kick Up a Storm
click here to find out what the youth group have been up to in the South Tyne
Identifying Obstructions
In January 2008 we held our first Obstruction Instruction training workshop for volunteers interested in helping us identify obstructions to fish passage in the tributaries. This work is a precursor to our habitat improvement project.
We welcomed Alistair Maltby from Association of Rivers Trusts who spoke on 'Barriers and Habitat Quality' and 4 new volunteers. The evening was a great success and we now have a number of eagle-eyed volunteers walking tributaries from confluence to source identifying areas fish find difficult to pass. You can download the full event report and Alistair's presentation in the documents section at the right of this page.