Reg. Charity No. 1091000

The first one with…

We always knew this month’s community cleanup would be a big ‘un: the first part of a springtime two-hander supported by LOCOG’s Changing Places programme and the EU WATER project.

Brought to the Wandle via our partnership with the Association of Rivers Trusts, the WATER project has been selected within the scope of the INTERREG IVA France (Channel) – England cross-border European cooperation programme, co-financed by the ERDF.

We were also delighted to be running this cleanup in partnership with fellow Rivers Trust at Thames 21 (and a good thing too – because we wouldn’t have had nearly enough pairs of our own waders for such numbers!)

In fact, a new Wandle record of 90 volunteers turned out to help clean up the Ravensbury Terrace stretch of the river, just down the line from Earlsfield railway station…

Thames 21’s supply of floating half-barrels proved an instant hit…

… whilst the heavy brigade wondered: what’s down there?

At coffee time, the girls from Burntwood School presented us with several pieces of much-needed hardware:

Not long afterwards, the inevitable once-highly-expensive dirt bike appeared…

… and Andy finished his Riverfly monitoring in time to get to grips with a carpet that had clearly been frustrating him for months:

By 3.00pm we all knew we’d collected too much rubbish for just one Wandsworth Council wagon…

… 44 tyres, 13 metal pipes, 6 rubber pipes, 4 corrugated plastic sheets, 4 carpets, 3 mattresses, 3 metal cylinders, 3 trellises, 2 industrial bolts of fabric, 2 sheets of wire mesh, 2 pillows, 2 ghetto blasters, 2 tricycles, 2 pushchairs, 2 car seats, 2 coconuts, 1 motor bike, 1 safe, 1 car battery, 1 bucket, 1 lamp post, 1 kitchen sink, 1 bedhead, 1 metal trolley, 1 television, 1 gas canister, 1 toilet, 1 heater, 1 football, 1 washing machine plus around 80 bags of assorted other rubbish…

… but one of our volunteers phoned home, and soon we were loading a scrap lorry too.

See you all for part 2 in Merton next month!

Thanks to all our volunteers: Abi, Afzal, Aisling, Alex, Alex C, Alex F, Amy, Andrew, Andy, Andy B, Andy P, Anna, Beene, Ben, Carol, Catherine, Cecilia, Charlie, Christine, Cigdem, David, Debbie, Dennis, D Hiscock, D Whitcher, Edmund, Ella, Erica, Evisa, Gail, Gary, Gerry, Gideon, Helen, Henry, Ian, James, Jane E, Jane L, Jason, Jo H, Jo S, John B, John N, Jack, Julia, Justine, J Newton, Kobus, Lee, Lisa, Lizzy, Lulu, Maja, Mario, Matt, Melanie, Mike, Mireille, Nichole, Nick, Nicolas, Nigel, Nuria, N Paine, Paul S, Paul Y, Peter S, Peter T, Quentin, Reino, Rob, Roger, Rory, Rozy, Rushane, Ruth, R Woods, Sally B, Sally P, Sarah, Shelley, Steve, Susan, S Law, Theo, Tim G, Tim H, Tom and William

Even though there are still two years to go to the Olympic Games, everyone can be part of London 2012 now by getting involved and doing something to improve their local area.

The Changing Places programme has been set up by the London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games (LOCOG) to help volunteers find activities that make a difference to an area that will feature in the Olympic Games.

Changing Places aims to inspire communities to improve public spaces – for example parks, open spaces and watersides; enable people to learn new interests and skills; and improve the quality of the local environment around Games-time venues and beyond, to create long-lasting change.

Whilst the majority of work to date has been taking place in east London, other sites in and around London will play host to different sports.  Football, for example, will be held at Wembley, and all the equestrian events will take place at Greenwich Park.  Not surprisingly the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club in Wimbledon will host the Olympic tennis competition.  

So in May and June of this year the Wandle Trust, Thames 21 and the Changing Places team are going to join forces to enable over 100 volunteers to clean the River Wandle and its banks, and demonstrate what we can all do in the future.

Our May cleanup, Sunday 9^th, will be in Wandsworth at Ravensbury Terrace, and our June cleanup, Sunday 13^th, will be in Merton at Plough Lane.  Both sites are 1.9 miles from Wimbledon. 

Spread over two months, this double event will be supported by the EU WATER project. Brought to the Wandle via our partnership with the Association of Rivers Trusts, the WATER project has been selected within the scope of the INTERREG IVA France (Channel) – England cross-border European cooperation programme, co-financed by the ERDF.

Do keep an eye on our Calendar page for further details, or put your email address into the box on the left hand side of our home page to receive our monthly email ‘blast’ detailing meeting places and timings.

And in the meantime, check out the Changing Places website if you want to lend your support to sprucing up other parts of London too.

The one when we cleaned up Frederic Halford’s old fishery…

Since the early 20^th century the course of the River Wandle downstream from Goat Bridge has been unrecognisably altered (check out those canalised concrete banks when you’re next walking that section of the Wandle Trail!)

Upstream of the Goat Bridge mills, on the other hand, the local Victorian fishermen who taught Frederic Halford to fish a dry fly for trout at this time of year would probably still recognise the long southward curve towards Culver’s Island, the poplars and blackthorn bushes on the banks, maybe even the trout that are starting to breed in the upper river again…

… but they certainly wouldn’t recognise the the housing estates, the iron railings, and the amazing amount of rubbish that builds up here between visits from the newfangled Wandle Trust (our last was in August 2008).

Starting in the willows below the wooden bridge, we worked our way up through a tunnel of blackthorn blossom…

… an idyllic scene not lost on modern-day Wandle angler Jason, who took an early bath in a deep hole, but luckily came up grinning…

 … or Carshalton and Wallington MP Tom Brake, who waded valiantly into the same deep sections without mishap, and pulled out a lot of rubbish in the process!

After coffee time, Jez and Gideon led a party of volunteers back behind the railings of the Wandle Valley Nature Reserve…

… whilst Erica practiced her scooter technique…

 … and most of the rest of us turned our attention to an impromptu wader patching party, or at least finding holes by filling the waders with river water…

 … before sending them off to be glued, welded and otherwise treated with professional life support (thanks to Jo and her company White Light for sponsoring the ambulance / courier service for us!)

Finally, we ended the sunny afternoon with one last sweep up to the former bleaching meadows at Culvers’ Island…

 … surely another of Halford’s old springtime haunts, and an inspiring reminder that we’re all playing our own important parts in the Wandle’s continuing history!

Thanks to all our volunteers: Abi, Andrew, Andy B, Andy P, Ann, Aya, Barry, Corinne, Dave, David, Di G, Di H, Di T, Dominic, Doug, Erica, Gideon, Harrison, Helen, Jamie, Jan, Jane, Jason, Jez, Jo, John, Josephine, Julie, Ken, Louis, Mahelet, Mike, Neil, Nick, Nora, Peter, Rebecca, Roger, Sally, Sam, Sihong, Theo, Toby, Tom, Val and Wayne

… who pulled out…

11 wooden boards, 9 tyres, 6 bicycles, 5 chairs, 4 traffic cones, 3 carpets, 3 footballs, 2 corrugated plastic sheets, 2 pallets, 2 kid’s scooters, 2 inner tubes, 1 road sign, 1 beer barrel, 1 metal fence panel, 1 basketball post, 1 suitcase, 1 skateboard, 1 length of guttering, 1 sheet of insulation, 1 table, 1 pram, 1 wheelbarrow, 1 corner bath and more than 30 bags of smaller rubbish for Sandra and her team from Sutton Council to collect for us.

The one with the dumper from…

This month’s cleanup not only brought us back to the river just south of Plough Lane in Merton, which we last visited in December – it also brought us more sponsorship, this time from local construction firm Cappagh, who generously offered to help us deep-clean another 50-yard stretch of this horribly-littered stretch of river.

With offices almost adjacent to the Wandle on Waterside Way, they lent us a dumper for the day, complete with precision-driver Sven (who impressively didn’t touch the sides of the towpath once on the long haul to and from our dumping site).

Nick, Sarah, Ben from Thames 21, Di and Caspian soon dredged a carpet up from the depths, which we hoped hadn’t come down the bank from the allotments on the other side of the river…

 … swiftly followed by bikes, shopping trolleys and many, many buckets of other rubbish (including perhaps the remains of a very mini dumper?)

Under the gazebo at coffee time, Sally and Jo had excelled themselves with an Easter sweetshop’s worth of homemade hot cross buns, cupcakes and extremely chocolatey Wellington Squares… our youngest helper, Ailis, approved thoroughly:

Buzzing with this year’s springtime sugar shot, we headed off to work again until past 3.30… and the pile of rubbish grew steadily…

 … at least 11 dumper loads for Gary and our friends from Merton Council to collect, including 23 tyres, 5 carpets, 5 plastic pipes, 4 metal pipes, 4 shopping trolleys, 4 bicycles, 4 traffic cones, 4 mattresses, 2 safes, 2 chairs, 2 buggies, 1 table, 1 sink, 1 barrel, 1 corrugated plastic sheet, 1 PC, 1 saucepan and a lot of less identifiable rubbish.

And as we followed the dumper back along the towpath one last time, we all agreed: this had been a lot less tiring than wheeling it all the way in barrows ourselves!

Thanks to all our volunteers: Ailis, Barry, Ben, Caspian, Cecilia, Carol, Carolyn, Chris, Dave, Dave, David, Debbie, Di, Dominic, Dorothy, Duncan, Erica, Forrest, Henry, James, Jamie, Jez, Jo, Jo, John, Julie, Ken, Mike, Natasha, Nick, Nick, Sally, Sam, Sarah, Sihong, Stephen, Svetli, Paul, Rachel, Roger, Rory and Theo

… as well as Cappagh for helping make our Easter cleanup so much easier!

With this year’s Trout in the Classroom schools releases just days away, breaking news from our sister fishing club’s award-winning Anglers’ Riverfly Monitoring Initiative: trout are breeding successfully in the Wandle, and for the very first time one of their tiny fry has been photographed at Hackbridge.

As the Wandle Piscators’ news piece says:

It’s a brilliant vindication of the Wandle Trust’s and Wandle Piscators’ strategy to work with the Environment Agency, the Wild Trout Trust and many other partners to improve adult and juvenile habitat for all fish species on this stretch of the Wandle – and a massive boost for our ongoing mission to improve water quality, clean gravels, and open up fish passage throughout the river.

Read the full story here…

… and keep an eye out for even more opportunities in coming months to get involved in our work with the Environment Agency and the Wild Trout Trust on the upper Wandle: reducing weirs, installing large woody debris, all sorts of hands-on, wet-wellied habitat-creating fun!

Back in the day when this website was still young, you might remember that we threatened promised to report interesting stories from the front lines of urban river restoration everywhere.

Now, here’s a really good ‘un from the other side of Surrey: the growing community campaign to save Farnham’s historic town-centre chalkstream water meadows from developers…

(Image: the Bishops Meadow Trust)

… and presumably much of the rest of Farnham from catastrophic flooding if such an ill-conceived flood-plain development were ever allowed to take place on this natural flood storage reservoir (yes, the sort of flood storage that almost everyone else is desperately trying to put back elsewhere).

From a biodiversity point of view, according to the campaign and fundraising website:

“… Species rich pastures are the UK’s most threatened habitats and anything we can do to reverse this trend of disastrous decline must be grasped. 

Restoring Bishops Meadow to its former glory should be the first step in reclaiming the entire river meadow system that runs from the historic centre of Farnham to Waverley Abbey via the now derelict Moor Park meadows.

Farnham is blessed with such unique landscape features: Farnham Park to the north, the old Farnham Heath to the south and running through it all, like a necklace of green jewels, the neglected wonder of the water meadows. What this town needs urgently is a Farnham river meadows conservation policy”.

The first Bishops Meadow Trust AGM will take place on 24 March: if you live in the area, this looks like a great local cause to get involved in.

We just wish there were still water meadows left on the Wandle to preserve…

For the past few years, the Wandle Trust has led grass-roots efforts to tackle invasive non-native species (INNS) such as Himalayan balsam, floating pennywort and giant hogweed on the Wandle.

Last summer, Bella and our volunteers undertook an extensive mapping project along the river, identifying sites where INNS appeared, and collaborating very closely with Jo Heisse, our local Environment Agency Biodiversity Officer, to create a London-wide INNS forum.

So last Thursday we were delighted to see all Jo’s hard work bearing fruit – and Defra choosing the Wandle as their launch location for a UK-wide campaign to stop the spread of many INNS that reduce biodiversity and threaten to create what environmental writer David Quammen calls a “planet of weeds”.

In true Government 2.0 style, Defra’s Be Plant Wise launch included a YouTube two-hander: firstly from Minister for Marine and Natural Environment Huw Irranca-Davies beside a rain-lashed River Wandle in the National Trust’s Morden Hall Park…

… and then a chat with National Treasure Charlie Dimmock in front of her own garden water feature:

With our encouragement, the EA dedicated around £50k last winter to dealing with the river’s very serious floating pennywort problem: the second phase of this work is now underway, and with help from local landowners, we finally hope to get this fast-spreading species under control.

Meanwhile, we’re busily planning a Big Balsam Blitz on the upper river for June’s Wandle Valley Festival. So stay tuned to our Calendar page for more information about how you can get involved!

The one with the Valentines’ lovin’…

As Erica declared in her email to our supporters announcing this month’s event: we love the Wandle so much that we even organised a Valentines’ Day cleanup for 14 February!

And sure enough, 60 volunteers braved the raw weather to give our bewitching little South London chalkstream some real Valentines’ lovin’…

 … and pull out a gorgeous great pile of rubbish to impress passers-by at the end:

Since our last visit to this particular stretch of the Wandle on either side of Lydden Road in King George’s Park, we’d spent many months flirting with other areas of the river, so it felt good to come back to Wandsworth and grapple with shopping trolleys…

… HGV tyres…

… mattresses…

… and even a line-marking machine which Abi reckoned had probably painted its last pitch, a call confirmed by the local Sunday league referee!

Thanks to Jo and Sally, coffee time featured a romantic Valentines’ theme of roses, chocolates and heart-shaped cookies…

… before the Wandle-lovers set off again in search of darker, more lucrative artefacts…

… and finally another date with the lamp-post from last August’s cleanup a little further downstream (can the Council get it on this time with our old flame and an oxyacetylene blowtorch? we wait with bated breath).

By the end of the afternoon, even our friendly driver formerly known as Twizzle Terry from Wandsworth Council was feeling the love when we offered him a cup of tea whilst Andy and Wayne took charge of loading his cage-lorry with…

… 22 tyres, 11 shopping trolleys (10 Sainsbury, 1 Tesco), 10 traffic cones, 6 carpets, 3 bicycles, 2 mattresses, 2 garden chairs, 2 car seats, 2 suitcases, 2 vacuum cleaners, 2 dustbins, 1 line marking machine, 1 length of chain link fence, 1 television, 1 armchair, 1 boiler, 1 beer keg, 1 rocking horse, 1 toy pistol, plus numerous lengths of lamp-post, plastic and metal pipe, and around 50 bags and barrows of other assorted rubbish…

… a solidly-packed 2 tonnes at least, before the seductive charms of a well-poured pint proved impossible for most of us to ignore!

Thanks to all our volunteers: Aaron, Abi, Andrew, Andy B, Andy P, Ann, Anna, Ben, Brendan, Carol, Carolyn, Charlie, Chris D, Chris E, Christopher, Daisy, Dave, Debbie, Diana H, Diana G, Diana M, Doug, Forrest, Gideon, Henry, James, Jane, Jessica, Jim, Jo L, Jo S, Keith, Louise, Marc-Philippe, Max, Meave, Mike H, Mike W, Natasha, Nick, Nico, Nuria, Olivia, Orla, Paul, Peter, Polina, Rakan, Roger, Rory, Ruth E, Ruth W, Sally, Sally Ann, Sue B, Sue V, Theo, Toby, Ulyana and Wayne

A couple of weeks ago, BBC Open Country presenter Helen Mark and producer Steve Peacock visited the Wandle, exploring the river from Morden Hall downstream to Earlsfield.

Along the way they met up with many of our friends and partners from the Living Wandle project, including Zoe Colbeck from the National Trust, Tanya Houston from the fisheries arm of the Environment Agency, and Steve Dedman and Bill Skipsey of the Morden Hall Park Angling Club.  

Finally, at Trewint Street, they caught up with Bella and me to talk about river restoration, community cleanups, blown-out safes, and turning South London back to face the Wandle – and you can click here to listen again to the whole programme on BBC Radio 4’s iPlayer for the next month or so!

On Thursday 7 January, with all the Trout in the Classroom aquarium hatcheries set up in our 19 schools, and our pupils expectantly waiting for their trouty charges, we encountered two unexpected problems.

It was egg delivery day – but the eggs, which were beginning to hatch, were snowed in at the Environment Agency’s Sparsholt College in Hampshire. And most of the schools in the Wandle Valley were also closed due to the bad weather.

Thankfully, a thaw enabled Roger and me to dash down the A3 on the following Tuesday.  We still needed the use of a tractor to get across the snowy fields and down to the hatchery as the access road was blocked. 

With the help of our hastily reassembled team of volunteers, gathered for the off at Morden Hall Park, we managed to get around all the schools before dusk. Each school received its quota, even though our volunteers now had to deliver watery bags full of newly emerged alevin instead of eggs.

This year for the first time we formally recruited a team of volunteers through our own website, environmental jobs websites and our four boroughs’ volunteer bureaus.  These 20 dedicated assistants are really enhancing our project this year. They have been sharing their expertise with the thousands of fascinated pupils.

Thanks to all the team: David Alford, John Atkinson, Sue Bailey, Petra Barnby, Kalpna Desai, Chris Dodge, Jane Gardiner, Alasdair Hendry, Andrew Hutchinson, Sara Marshall, John O’Brien, Ben Roth, Marie Sanchez, Roger Stevens, Peter Treagust, Gary Renton, and Carole White.

Thanks also to Richard Mundy and the senior boys at Sutton Grammar, Andrew and Dominic, as well as Alan Black at Sparsholt, and Erica Evans here at the Wandle Trust.