The Kit Brook Catchment Action Plan
2
The Pitch
Problem statement
The Kit Brook is a tributary of the River Axe. The River Axe and her tributaries are in a poor condition primarily because of the high nutrient load in the rivers. SWW has informed us that about 20% of the nutrients come from sewage and other domestic sources. The remainder comes from farming practice. Chardstock Eco Group is leading a pilot project within the Triple Axe Plan to develop a catchment action plan co-created by the 'people of the place'. The innovative aspect of this project is that it will bring together all stakeholders with an interest in the river quality from land managers, farmers to residents and children
Solution
A key aspect is to develop citizen science opportunities which will engage residents more closely to the river. Chardstock Eco Group currently undertakes Westcountry Rivers Trust CSI https://wrt.org.uk. We now wish to expend this work to include Riverfly and MORPH citizen science data and evidence gathering. The funding will be spend on purchasing both Riverfly https://www.riverflies.org and MORPH https://modularriversurvey.org/training for c20 volunteers. The impact will be two-fold: firstly more residents will get involved with caring about their river. Secondly, the data gathered will help shape the catchment action plan which needs to be evidence-based and data-led.
Why are we best placed to deliver?
Chardstock Eco Group has been identified by the East Devon Catchment Partnership (consisting of the Environment Agency, Devon Wildlife Trust, the AONBs, South West Water, the NFU, Natural England and multiple other partners to be the power house behind this pilot project. Members of the Group are already engaged with citizen science work, good working relationships within the partnership, a sound understanding of the key issues, local knowledge and access to professional expertise and specialists through the Triple Axe Plan team. We have an ecologist as a member of the Group, and have very close working relationships with Westcountry Rivers Trust.