It's pretty damn cold here in the valley.  We have had a bitterly cold east wind for much of the past three days and several local brass monkeys have been hospitalised.

I did manage to do the riverfly check last week and got a very interesting set of results.  I found a real abundance of heptagenia and baetis nymphs with good numbers of caddis and stonefly.  This result compares well with the spike in numbers that we got in the same period last year.  This does suggest that the winter months show markedly more nymphs present than during the summer.  Logic would suggest that this is due to eggs hatching and maturing with few nymphs moving on to imargo and adult stage in cold conditions.

Whatever, there is certainly an abundance of food for hungry trout at just the time they need it having come through the privations of spawning.

Sticking with riverflies I had an email from the local EA ecologist suggesting that we raise the trigger levels because of the good numbers of pollution sensitive invertebrates we are recording.  So already our work is proving useful beyond the immediate needs of our fisheries management.

Finally, I have been invited to talk to the local WI this week about the river and I thought it time that these good ladies got acquainted with some invertebrates.  So I plan a practical session involving lots of water, a large tray and hopefully plenty of riverfly nymphs.

Ian