Sorry for the silence over the past few days, but cellar renovation works have rather taken up most of my spare time.  The river has been too low for decent salmon fishing most of this week, but a little rain last night has lifted it a bit so it may be worth casting a fly over some of the bigger pools today to see what's lurking and may be irritated.

There was a minor pollution incident at Horton at the end of last week when the main sewer backed up and overflowed in the heavy rain we had at the weekend.  My devolved river watching arrangement here worked perfectly.  After the last incident with this particular sewer I gave the EA Hot-line number to a local resident whose house overlooks the river and asked her to phone it immediately if she saw any overflow.  This she did and the EA were on site within fifteen minutes arranging for United Utilities to tackle the problem.  Little damage is likely to have been done as the river was in full flood and any sewage entering the river will have been well diluted and dispersed.  This sewer pipe is becoming a too regular source of trouble so I will raise this at the next Parish Council meeting and get a formal assessment of the problem from UU.

The recent major incident on the Trent just shows how vigilant we all need to be if our fishing waters are to be protected.  It takes just a moment of carelessness or crass stupidity to wreck an ecosystem that will then take years to fully recover.  The upper Ribble is especially vulnerable because of the natural barrier at Stainforth.  If we were ever to have a really major pollution incident then non migratory fish stock would almost certainly take a heavy hit along with all the fly life that are such a vital part of the system.  Organophosphates are our biggest worry up here, but there is always the fear that some unscrupulous fly tipper will dump something nasty up on Gayle beck where the road comes close to the watercourse.

Don't have nightmares!

Ian