STACKPOLE ESTATE
Water Management
Pembrokeshire Farmer July 2015 Page 20
The streams such as illustrated in
Stackpole Churchyard have a fauna and flora which depends on clear
water ,gravel and rock beds.
The illustrated “solutions” are the
worst possible,runoff is legally the responsibility of the contractor
or farmer.
Agricultural run off is the
responsibility and the self interest of the cultivators of the
eroding land and must not be displaced to the shared water courses.
There is Legislation in place which
controls agricultural run off.
There is legislation to enforce
compliance, and specific rules about cultivation, cattle access to
water courses, and prevention of surface run off.
Enforce
the above.
Ponds
Before any actiona
Research methods and practice employed
by the original canal and drainage engineers of the Seventeen
Hundreds .
Part of the catchment area is red
sandstone draining to fractured limestone dry valleys.
The fractured limestone aquifer has
many outflows at sea level the aquifer can rise and fall seasonally
by many feet
The engineers turned a seasonal water
flow to the ponds into an impounded system.
Before the valley was damned all the
seepage points and springs were identified and puddled with blue clay
to seal in a basic level body of water this set a minimum level.
Several were destroyed by recent
dredging by NT which should have been stopped at the first sign of
the puddled blue clay.
The water to maintain the rare plants
and animals has to be managed and cropped regularly to to stop
eutrophication The cut vegetation
must be removed. .
This ceased in the late fifties, and
now is only spasmodic it needs to be planned intense and regular.
The pond above the one arch bridge is
now woodland and has always had to be regularly cleared that is no
longer feasible and should be allowed to become woodland.
The pond to the Hidden Bridge is open
water.
The stretch below was cleared several
years ago but dredging clearance and tree felling was overseen by
casuals and is an example of how not to do it to introduce people to
the ponds, they were cleared to the waters edge leaving intruders in
full view no longer a refuge for wildfowl,
A thin margin of vegetation allows wild
life to be observed but not driven away.
See Main Pond at the Grassy
Bridge,footpath at the waters edge
Main Pond management abandoned
Fallen trees should be left in the pond
to shelter fish fry vulnerable in the clear open water
Freshwater Mussels must be conserved.
Visitors only see the semi domesticated
species all the migratory water birds no longer use the ponds .
The
water quality is the problem.
Occasional sea water
improves the fauna and flora.
A
base line survey must be made of the rare species in the ponds which
are management sensitive to evaluate management.
We
have no confidence in the oversight by the designated so called
partners with only little superficial scientific knowledge
Their
record of scientific conservation is appalling
Ian
Campbell 200715
Dated
photographs www,loveitorloseit.info
