Support for Landowners

The Aire Rivers Trust offers support to landowners as we know that what happens on the land affects the river. Flooding in recent years has caused misery to businesses and homeowners in the Aire valley. To help reduce this impact a range of measures are being implemented. In and around our cities’ engineered solutions are designed to protect properties. While in the rural areas existing land features can be used. This is known as Natural Flood Management and reduces the speed of rainwater entering the river without affecting productivity. Within the Aire valley is the most ambitious scheme so far in the country. The Aire Rivers Trust can help develop features on any suitable land.

The sort of features that we would want to implement are, intercepting runoff, rainwater storage areas, tree planting, buffer strips, leaky dams, and soil aeration. Any of these will cause rainwater to enter the river system slower than it does now.

Our DNAire project means that the River Aire is now open to fish passage and reverses 200 years where particularly Salmon were denied the ability to spawn in the upper catchment. Data shows that this change is just the beginning of what is needed to achieve a river that is a positive asset for the people and wildlife of the area. Our attention is to now work with the landowners who have land that drains into the river via the tributaries and water courses. Not only does this affect the river but has the potential to help alleviate flooding further downstream by slowing the flow. The land surrounding the River Aire is well used, there is good quality grazing; equine husbandry; recreational use such as sports, parks, and camping; private ownership; education; and our thriving urban centres. We can work with all types of land uses to promote the welfare of the river.

Leaky dams slow the flow of water high up in the catchment

Our aim is to provide a good summary of the options that may be available so that you can make an informed decision about making changes to your land. After an initial visit and assessment, we want to be able to provide ongoing support and advice to achieve shared aims.

Aire Rivers Trust has developed a regular programme of volunteer workdays. We deliver river clean-ups, invasive species removal, tree planting, footpath repairs and hedge laying. The volunteers help us carry out the practical improvements to the river and will be involved in the delivery of projects where possible.

Our volunteers hedge laying at Bingley North Bog

Currently we are seeking farmers and landowners who we could interest in planting Natural Flood Management features such as woodland, buffer strips and hedges within the Aire catchment. We will be able to offer advice and support in the development of projects and then link landowners to full funding for them under the Leeds FAS2 (Flood Alleviation Scheme) which is using organisations like us to engage with landowners to identify interested parties and draw up outline plans.

If you’re located in the Aire Valley and would like to find out more about how trees and other natural flood management measures could help your farmland to become more flood resilient and improve the river, please get in touch with Nick Milsom Aire Rivers Trust on 07378 878857 or email nick.milsom@aireriverstrust.org.uk

Working with Wild Trout Trust to Improve In Channel Habitats

We have been working with the Wild Trout Trust in a few locations to improve the habitat for fish by adding large woody debris to the river channel. The intention is to try and mimic or create the natural river ecology with variations in the flow rates, depths, and areas of deposition.

A river may look like a nice pleasant environment to people. But when we consider the modifications that have occurred up and down the water course it has a negative effect on fish populations. The reasons a course of a River can be altered maybe due to construction of a road, allow buildings, increase yield for agriculture, and to harness the power of the river

Otterburn beck looking upstream (left) and downstream after our work (right). What a huge change!

Otterburn Beck is a terrific location and one of the original Upper Aire Project sites. However, the beck has been straightened to accommodate a road. There are also signs of an older river channel about 15m to the left which may have been blocked to increase the size of the field. Recently trees had been planted and willow spiling to reduce bank erosion a little downstream. During our visit we did not see a trout as we would expect. A seriously depleted natural habitat.

To rectify this several Sycamore trees were harvested. They are growing in the road retaining wall and had previously been cut and now growing multi stemmed from the trunk.

Once the tree is cut the stem is anchored allowing the crown to be in the river. The effect will be to slightly alter the flow of the river and increase this area of deposition to enhance the slight meander we can see in the photo. The foliage will also provide shade for the river creatures which are also lacking in this section of river. These changes will provide more habitat potential for fish than previous. The phrase every little helps comes to mind.

Find out more about the Upper Aire Project

My year with the Aire Rivers Trust

As my placement comes to a close and I return to the University of Leeds at the end of September, I wanted to take the time to reflect on my year with ART and all of the opportunities and experiences I have gained, and how I have grown over the last year in my role as a Community Engagement Assistant and STEM Ambassador.

My favourite task

Looking back to my year I have enjoyed and been so proud of what I have achieved I could not just choose one so instead I have chosen 3

One of the biggest achievements I have had was designing and delivering our new schools’ program, River Defenders. I enjoyed doing this as I got to see my vision for the sessions come to life and it was so rewarding to see how excited the children were to both learn and visit the river.
During lockdown I was proud of being able to produce a video to replace our normal talks which highlighted the history of Kirkstall and our DNAire project. The feedback I got from this was incredible and it had over 1.5k views on Kirkstall 1152’s Facebook page!
Lastly I will always remember and have fond memories of our volunteering Fridays, I am proud that I managed to keep spirits high during all weather conditions we faced in the winter months and how much I have contributed to conservation probably planting around 4000 trees, collecting numerous flood debris and litter. Also getting the experience to install leaky dams in the upper Aire.

Challenges I Faced

I think this year we have all had to face challenges adapting to Covid and adapting our normal routines and job roles. Luckily at ART we continued to work, and my placement was not cut short. Although a challenge having to adapt our normal delivery, I enjoyed thinking of new ways for us to connect with others through social media and other platforms. Rather than seeing challenges as a negative thing I see them as being a way to grow my skills and through my placement I have set myself many of these challenges to create displays, videos, leaflets and data collection techniques having to face challenges to teach myself how to use new software or finding suitable ideas along the way.

Things I’ve Learnt

Through my placement I have learnt the importance and impact of community engagement. It has been a pleasure to work with our volunteers every week and see how much they enjoy and value helping the local area we are in and how much volunteering means to them. It also has been an honour to be able to design and deliver school sessions and hear from parents that their children had spoken about what they had learnt in the classroom mentioning salmon and teaching other members of their family how weirs and fish passes work.

I have also grown and come to see my own skills which I have developed over the last year. I have learnt my strengths such as being creative, being able to engage others, working to deadlines and being passionate and confident about what I am doing. I have also learnt what it is like to work for a small charity in the voluntary sector and I have really enjoyed having this break from university to have a taste of a job in the real world and learn more about what I would like to do in the future with my career.

One thing I would change

Although I am extremely happy with all the opportunities I got this year if I could change one thing about my time at ART it would have been being able to get out and teach more (which was halted due to Covid). I really wanted to be able to keep teaching independently, which I was able to do for 4 classroom sessions but I wanted to be able to get more practice at doing this for my own sense of achievement and capability that I could do it alone. I would also have loved to have spent longer with the Environment Agency to widen my experience in other sectors in case any were to be future career paths.

After a winter filled with volunteering days, I also wish we could have got out in the summer too and enjoyed the sunny days we have had this summer!

Overall, I have loved my time at ART, and thank everyone greatly for the experience and memories.

A placement with our contractors

At the beginning of the month I was lucky enough to have the opportunity to work with Suttles on construction sites along the River Aire as part of our DNAire project in partnership with Environment Agency. These construction sites are allowing fish migration to take place along the Aire, with fish passes being built to allow migratory fish, like salmon, to get back up the river to their spawning grounds of Skipton.

Fish passes are needed on the Aire due to the multiple weirs existing from the industrial revolution. These weirs act as barriers to fish due to a combination of the weirs being too steep and the river being too shallow to allow coarse fish to get the momentum to leap over the weirs. Installing the fish passes is a huge engineering project and I am grateful I got to be part of the experience. We hope that salmon being able to migrate and spawn once more will add to the improving condition of the Aire.

Working on the construction sites has allowed me to see the engineering, hard construction and planning that goes into creating the fish pass structures and how hard it is to be working in and near water. During the building process the river must be dammed and re-directed to allow for a dry workspace before the old weir face can be destroyed and building of the structure for the new fish pass can be started. It is crazy to think that the weir at Kirkstall has been around since the 12^th century and that no one will have stood on it and seen the beautiful stone work as I had the opportunity to since then. It also surprised me how large the fish pass structures actually are and the precise engineering needed to make sure the baffles in the fish pass would serve their purpose to churn up the water so that the fish can use the currents to swim against the water up and over the weirs.

The image above shows construction work at Kirkstall Abbey and just how large the fish passes are. Here you can see the steelwork at the top of the fish pass which needs to be put in to make sure the structure will hold against the large pressure of the flowing river. After the steelwork the fish pass is concreted as you can see in the lower part of the fish pass and the baffles installed. To the left of the fish pass there is also going to be an eel pass installed to also help smaller fish and eels get over the weirs.

Im going to be returning to Uni in Leeds soon but Ill be back. I can’t wait to hopefully see salmon in the Aire very soon!