BART signed up to the SmartRivers Initiative in 2019 and undertook our first sampling in November 2019 on the River Chew. SmartRivers is a scheme spearheaded by Salmon and Trout Conservation (S&TC). It is a water quality monitoring project that trains volunteers to undertake macro-invertebrate samples in order to collect species level data which can be analysed to understand more about the pollutants that are stressing our rivers. SmartRivers – River Chew – Site 5 Benchmarking Report – Autumn 2019
It was no surprise to find that our results showed that the River Chew is being impacted by multiple stresses and sources. Here’s an example of some of the outputs from the first Smart Rivers samples on the River Chew. The charts show some of the data from the Dapps Bridge site at the downstream end of the River Chew in Keynsham. The macro-invertebrate taxa found at the Dapps Bridge site during our Autumn sampling have been analysed to produce the graphs shown.
As you can see, the graphs show that the site is impacted by pesticides, flow, siltation and nutrients; so there’s a lot of work to be done to improve this site ecologically! BART hope to continue this monitoring at the same five sites on the River Chew into the future to get a much clearer and more informed idea of the impacts on the catchment and where we should focus our efforts.
Please contact jess@bristolavonriverstrust.org to find out more about our SmartRivers results on the River Chew and our plans for the future or visit the S&TC website to learn more about the scheme.
