Riverfly Training

The Upper and Bedford Ouse Catchment Partnership recently secured funding from Anglian Water’s ‘Get River Positive’ scheme to help volunteers get involved with more activities, develop skills and learn more about water quality and the impacts that poor water quality has on aquatic life.

As part of Anglian Waters "Get River Positive" scheme, volunteers and supporting staff have been learning to use the ‘Riverfly’ invertebrate monitoring technique.

Riverfly is hosted by the Freshwater Biological Association and monitors specific invertebrates (including mayflies, caddisflies and freshwater shrimps) that are good indicators of water quality (see: https://www.riverflies.org/).

The project aims to increase the number of locations being monitored using the Riverfly system. Three sessions have been delivered so far...

A volunteer and tutor in a river training the Riverfly technique, looking into a net — Milton Keynes. A volunteer receiving instruction from John Findlay, EA.

The sessions in Milton Keynes, Clophill and Buckingham were very successful. They were led by Environment Agency Citizen Science lead John Findlay and resulted in 22 volunteers becoming qualified Riverfly surveyors and 2 volunteer coordinators (Chloe Apicella, WTBCN and Jon Balaam, Greensand Trust) becoming qualified tutors and are now able to train many more volunteers themselves.

Several invasive non-native species were found during the Riverfly survey. Both female (left, smaller claws) and male (right, larger claws, tail tucked under) Signal Crayfish were caught. These are larger, more aggressive and breed faster than native species. In high densities, signal crayfish burrow into banks, causing extensive damage, while eating most of the plants and small animals within the watercourse. They also carry a fungal disease that is harmful to our native species.

Two crayfish in a white bucket — Signal crayfish.

A demon shrimp under a microscope — Demon shrimp.

A Demon shrimp (Dikerogammarus haemobaphes) was also found. Both Demon and Killer Shrimp are voracious predators of native freshwater invertebrates and fish eggs/young which can affect the diversity of our watercourses. They also carry a number of parasites which can cause disease in salmonid fish and other invertebrates.

An additional Extended Riverfly training course took place this week, resulting in 1 volunteer and 3 volunteer coordinators (including Chloe and Jon) becoming qualified. The extended Riverfly scheme provides more detailed data on streams and rivers through the use of two biotic indices to detect and measure pollution and habitat degradation. The practical session took place at Duck End Nature Reserve in Maulden, with many interesting species being found including numerous Water Scorpion.

Water scorpion in a white tray — Water Scorpion and Damselfly found at the Extended session.

The Catchment Partnership and WTBCN will be looking at suitable locations for regular survey work and offering further training courses for volunteers next year.

The ‘Get River Positive’ funding also covers the purchase of water quality monitoring equipment, this has been purchased and is being distributed so that volunteers can learn how to use it. Equipment is being made available at various locations, making it easier to access.