Friday 29 March 2024

The Great Thatched Wall of Wallop

 

Greetings!

 

It is one of those oddities of British planning law that I live and work in a historic mill most of which is over 600 years old, with a mention in the Domesday Book for parts of it, that is not a listed building but my thatched garden wall, certainly of lesser vintage but still very old, is a listed building.

 

Now, though a thatched garden wall is a thing of beauty and comment it is not without its issues, not least in the transitory nature of the thatch. After 25 years at Nether Wallop Mill we are now rethatching for the third time but this time it is The Big One, for which read expensive.

 

Straw thatch on walls has a life expectancy of about ten years, the routine rethatching involving stripping off the top layer and adding new. You can do this time after time for over a century but every time the thatch cap gets bigger, just a little bit thicker and larger, until it reaches a tipping, or rather collapsing point. Sadly, for my wallet that once-in-a-century moment of collapse has come under my watch.

 

 

Final trimming work-in-progress

 

I suppose the obvious question to ask is why thatch a wall? Well, around these parts, a chalk valley, chalk was a readily available building material that could be dug at no cost. Building a chalk wall is pretty simple, albeit time consuming and labour intensive. First create a foundation of flints to just above ground level. Next layer a foot thick mix to a consistency of stiff dough of crushed chalk, straw and water. With shuttering to hold it in place then tramp down the mix wearing shoes with iron plates attached. Leave for a week to dry (walls are best built in summer) and then add further layers until the required height is reached. It will take another year for the wall to be considered ‘cured’ at which point it will be coated with a chalk slurry.

 

Once built the wall has to be kept bone dry, hence the thatch cap. Without it, the wall will melt like a linear ice cream. However, for all its beauty I do wonder why some previous owner of The Mill went to all the time and expense of building our wall. It was hardly like the road was busy. Three or four hundred years ago, the traffic was at most a few passing horse and carts or docile sheep. Maybe it was a status thing? Millers were high up the pecking order in feudal times, so maybe in the absence of a Bentley or Gucci handbag this was the way to announce your wealth. I have read that chalk walls, that retain heat and provide shelter from frost, were useful for growing soft fruit so, as ours is south facing, maybe that is another clue.

 

 

Regardless of all that history, in the present, village thatchers Simon and Geoff Gates have been working on the wall for the past three weeks, starting with the old thatch which literally rolled off and then fell into the road in a rotten heap when the chicken wire was peeled off. This is because there is no subframe or wall fixing; the thatch cap is held in place by way of the shape and weight. First, a triangular stack of straw rolls are put on the top of the wall. Next straw eaves are bent over that stack to then by thatched over, held in place by hazel pegs and the decorative, but practical, hazel weave pattern, with each thatcher having his particular ‘signature’ style for this final flourish.

 

It will be good to have it done, and though we still have a few days to go it looks, I am sure you will agree, amazing. However my neighbour, who still has his to do is looking on with a certain amount of trepidation ……. 

 

 

Simon Gates with the final trim and his signature weave. Before and after below.

 

 

 

Ticked off

 

I seem to be something of a tick magnet. Every summer when the grass is high, however robust my trousers, I will have the dubious pleasure of removing, often multiple, engorged ticks. Now, like most people I worry about catching Lyme Disease and often wonder why I do not, or at least have not so far, it being fairly frequent in the river community. It transpires the Lyme virus is not endemic in ticks; they have first to catch it themselves.

 

There are around 20 species of tick in Britain but the one that mostly concerns us is the Common Tick Ixodes Ricinus which also goes by multiple names such Sheep Tick, Deer Tick or Castor Bean Tick. As fly fishers we will instantly recognise the life cycle of the tick of egg, larva, nymph, and adult. It is the nymphal stage when they are attracted to humans as they attach themselves to tall grass awaiting a body to brush pass to allow themselves to cling on to a warm blooded host be it human, animal or bird, blood being essential if they are to mutate into adults and for the adult female to produce eggs.

 

 

The chance of catching Lyme Disease, though worrying, is small with about 2,000 people a year in Britain infected. Most British ticks do not carry infection (1 in 5 at worst), which they themselves get by feeding on an infected wildlife host, usually a rodent, ingesting the Lyme bacteria which is passed on at the next blood feed.  However, even if you have the misfortune to be chosen as a host by a Lyme carrying tick all is not doom. It takes 36-48 hours for the transfer to take place, so if you remove the tick within 24 hours you will likely be fine.  

 

Ticks are part of the spider family, their looks and confirmation being that of an arachnid albeit very small. I must admit I do not often spot them at that stage, my first sign usually being that of a burrowed head in my skin with the castor bean shaped, blood filled torso protruding. It is tempting Hollywood style, to burn  them off with a cigarette end or coat them with Vaseline. Don’t! The shock will simply make them regurgitate their saliva back into your bloodstream. Use a pair of fine tweezers flat to the skin, a tick removal tool or fine thread to remove your parasite.

 

 

 

Video of the Week

 

If you thought Wild Summon was a bit off the wall, take a look at the trailer for Black Samphire from Sky, “an environmental folk horror, featuring the voice of Stephen Fry - fuses rural myth and the real-life threat of the climate crisis to shine a light on the UK's growing water pollution problem.”

 

From what I can gather (frankly I am bit confused) we have a one minute trailer that gives us a preview of costal foragers who are struck down after eating pollution tainted samphire, which sets off a “subtle, unsettling tale of insidious creeping horror” based in the pernicious water industry.

 

Currently there is a one minute trailer, with a thirteen minute short film to follow and full-length feature film in the works. Watch the trailer here ….. .

 

 

 

Quiz

 

The normal random collection of questions inspired by the date, events or topics in the Newsletter. It is just for fun with answers at the bottom of the page.

 

1)     Easter is quite literally A Moveable Feast. Who wrote a book, published posthumously, of that name?

 

2)     What is an aquaphile?

 

3)     The earliest date on which Easter can fall is 22/March; the next occurrence will be 2285! What is the latest date on which Easter can fall?

 

 

Enjoy the long holiday weekend!



Best wishes,

 

 

Simon Cooper simon@fishingbreaks.co.uk

Founder & Managing Directorwww.fishingbreaks.co.uk

 

 

Quiz answers:

 

1)     Ernest Hemingway, the memoir published in 1964 three years after his death.

2)     Someone who is an enthusiast of all things related to the water.

3)     It is 25/April; the next occurrence will be 2038.

Friday 15 March 2024

#stopthes**t

 

Greetings!

 

Fresh from their success facing down Southern Water over the sewage pumping at Chilbolton last month Hampshire river keepers are on the offensive again with a peaceful protest next week outside Fullerton Waste Water Treatment Plant (just upstream of The Mayfly Inn) which has been a serial polluter of the river for many years.

 

Time and time again Southern Water have acknowledged  the pollution from what the river keepers call the ‘pipe of doom’ and time and time again promised to do something about it. You can guess the outcome of that promise – beware low flying pigs. The situation is so serious that local MP Caroline Noakes, asked the Leader of the House of Commons an urgent question regarding the evasive answers from Southern Water 29/February over the ongoing situation at Fullerton and also called into question whether or not Southern Water were a 'fit and proper company'.  

 

 

Nick Parker preparing to sample the Pipe of Doom. Watch on You Tube

 

Southern Water’s general defence in these situations is that the pumping is essential, the impact localised and the harm negligible. River keeping brothers Phil and Nick Parker set out to show, in a 11 minute video filmed a few days ago just below the pipe of doom at Fullerton how asinine such a ‘do no harm’ defence is.

 

By kick sampling different sides of the river, one side affected by the pipe and the other not, they compare the results of weed, insect and fish life. The difference is night and day. Watch the video, prepare to be astounded and do, do share it however you can #stoptheshit

 

 

The Pie Chart of Shame revealed

 

As promised, I bring you more on the Pie Chart of Shame, that names the pollution culprits doing such damage to our rivers and coastal waters. I include the latter, notwithstanding the fact that most of the bad water that reaches the sea arrives via rivers, but because it is important to form as large an alliance as possible with the inshore sea fishing industry and leisure users as passionate as ourselves.

 

Though clearly not pollution, the largest existential threat to our rivers, and chalkstreams in particular is abstraction taking a 35% share of the blame. In short but explained further in the You Tube video of the talk I recently gave in Nether Wallop, the nub of the issue is that we have a water provision system designed at a time when our population was 50 million and household water consumption was 60 litres a day. Today, a generation later, that consumption stands at close to 150 litres and the population 65 million.

 

Strangely, for most of the year and in most of the UK, we have plenty of water to meet even that increased consumption. But, in those critical months, generally July-October in many parts of the country our rivers are being sucked dry. I can take you to villages that surround the fast growing Hampshire towns of Andover and Basingstoke, once picturesque for being beside the tiny headwaters of the River Test, where the village pond has dried to nothing and bubbling brooks a long distant memory.

 

 

The solutions lie in water storage - no new reservoir has been built in 30 years. Water movement – a national grid of water so the water rich may supply the water poor at times of greatest need. Desalination - literally the only way we can ‘make’ water at times of drought. And finally, a la Singapore, take our sewage treatment works to a new level so the water can be reused.

 

Next up is farming, the single biggest polluter by some considerable margin. In just about every aspect of modern day farming the processes and practices have a negative impact on rivers. The dire effect on the River Wye due to intensive chicken farming is well known. In Dorset, the dust that percolates into the River Frome from the many thousands of acres of water-hungry maize is smothering salmon eggs to death. Pesticides (there is a clue in the name) are wiping out huge swathes of riverine insect life. I could go on, but I do wonder if anyone in government is listening such is the power, and public sympathy, for the farming lobby in the name of cheap food and food security, though whether our food is either cheap or the supply secure is debatable.

 

The answer lies in a generational change to farming practices that should be predicated on a ‘no harm’ basis. In our society we have fairly clear social contract that the actions of one person should not have a detrimental impact on the life of another. Why should farmers be any different? Frankly, we do not need more legislation or regulations. Simply enforcing those we already have on the statute book would be a good start. As a farmer you will statistically likely have an inspection from the Environment Agency once every 235 years – quite the deterrent to bad practice – would that speed cameras be so sporadic! But it is worse than that; the perpetuation of doing harm is institutionalised. Take banned neonicotinoids that do such harm to bees, insects and birds. Well, they are not really banned at all thanks to the fourth year in a row that sugar beet farmers have given emergency approval for their continued use. This reminds me so much of the organophosphates that nearly wiped out British otters. It took thirty tears, despite a mountain of evidence against the derivative of DDT, for them to be banned due to the powerful farming lobby and a government that went along with the selfish arguments for their continued use from the 1950’s to 1980’s.

 

 

The 20% of pollution from other sources is more complicated including our feeble water companies of which we know plenty, aided and abetted by appalling oversight from regulators and government and a public that rails against the aforesaid water companies but without taking a hard look in the mirror. We are what we use. Look under any modern kitchen sink and you will see an array of toxic chemicals unheard of 50 years ago, that go from plughole to stream largely unimpeded. We have become obsessed with cleanliness e.g. wet wipes. at the cost of nature. We have even transposed this obsession to our pets. Flea treatments that are largely unnecessary but plugged by a veterinarian industry that knows an opportunity when it sees one, are wiping out insect life. Did you know the chemicals in flea treatments, fipronil and a neonicotinoid banned (sic) in farming but legal for pets, remain on the pet for 4 weeks? So, when you stroke your cat or dog then wash your hands no prizes for guessing where the chemicals end up. And heaven forbid what happens when you let your dog swim in a stream or give it a bath.

 

The built environment at 15% largely speaks to the funnel effect of modern building: more houses, more roads and fewer green spaces sees the washings from roads (brake asbestos/tyre rubber/petro-chemicals and detergents) head straight into drains then rivers. In the past twenty years we have built a million homes on land once designated on flood plain, a buffer and filter, with one in ten of those in designated flood zones. To repurpose the Kevin Costner quote from the film Field of Dreams, build them and they will flood.

 

 

Finally, I have given 5% to climate change though I do wonder whether this might be an overestimate. The first thing you need to know about British rainfall is that the annual average has barely budged over the past 300 years. The Environment Agency have extensively modelled UK rainfall for the coming 50 years and concluded that we might have slightly wetter summers and slightly drier winters, or possibly the other way around. The fact is they are not really sure. As for flood events, they are certainly no more frequent or extensive than in the past though most certainly less fatal. A flood of the Wallop Brook in the 1830’s accounted for two deaths something that is hard to conceive today. Also flooded homes today might just have something to do with the fact they are built on land our forebears deliberately avoided for good reason. And as to whether we will run out of water due to lack of rain, forget such alarmism. We only need 6 inches of our annual 32 inches to supply our needs.

 

But ultimately, I give climate change such a low score because, in the end, we are going to destroy our rivers and coastal waters by our own localised misdeeds long before global warning gets us. You may watch and hear more in my talk The state of our rivers and how to save them on You Tube.

 

 

Taking the pledge

 

I made a pledge to myself many years ago that, if I complained about a lack of rain I could not, in all conscience ever complain about too much. It must be said the last 12 months have tested that pledge to its very limit.

 

As you will have read February was the wettest in 250 years, the rainfall two and a half times the average for the second month of the year. The past six months are over one and a half times the average and the past twelve months almost the same. It is an unprecedented run and different to the winters of 2013/14 and 2003/4 when we had extreme floods interspersed with dry months. This has been relentless: our river restoration programmes for October-December were abandoned without a sod turned.

 

So, what will it mean for fishing? Firstly, you may have noticed some of our rivers scheduled for opening in April will not open for until either later in the month or May. This is often as much about protecting the banks, a few of which are currently impassable, rather than the fishing prospects though it will certainly be harder to spot fish in turbid water. Likewise, anticipate less than placid, gin clear waters early on along with soggy margins. Wear boots or waders, go carefully and take a long handled net.

 

On the plus side we have more than enough water in reserve to carry us through the season and winters like this are amazing for the trout and salmon breeding population with egg survival rocketing; expect a significant spike in the numbers of juvenile fish when you visit the chalkstreams in 2025.

 

 

Photo of the Week

 

I am a great fan of Jack Perks who has made his name as the UK’s leading underwater freshwater filmmaker; he often pops up on BBC Countryfile.

 

Most days I catch up with his latest short film, and sometimes madcap experiments in his back garden, that are put out on X. His photos are always amazing, as is the underwater footage. I also like his brief commentary of the daily topic that always has some revealing nugget of fascinating information.

 

 

This week Jack featured the water shrew, the largest shrew species in Britain, which with a typical Jack flourish he tells us also has a venomous bite. I must confess I was completely unaware that (shame on me) there was a specific water shew that inhabits wetlands and river margins, one of our three native species the other two being the pygmy and common. Just for a change they are on no watch list, with a healthy population of between 40-50 million living in Britain though you will not find them in Ireland, the Scilly Isles or Channel Islands.

 

Follow Jack Perks here https://twitter.com/JackPerksPhoto

 

 

Quiz

 

The normal random collection of questions inspired by the date, events or topics in the Newsletter. It is just for fun with answers at the bottom of the page.

 

1)     What intellectual cyber property was registered for the first time on this day in 1985?

 

2)     How many islands are there in the British Isles? a) 400 b) 1,400 c) 2,400 d) 4,400.

 

3)     Who wrote Taming of the Shrew?

 

 

Have a good weekend.



Best wishes,

 

 

Simon Cooper simon@fishingbreaks.co.uk

Founder & Managing Directorwww.fishingbreaks.co.uk

 

 

Quiz answers:

 

1)     The first Internet domain name www.symbolics.com was registered. It still exists making it the oldest of 350m internet domains.

2)     Roughly 4,400 over ½ acre including 850 in Republic of Ireland. 210 are inhabited.

3)     William Shakespeare