The Changing River

I have lived in Sheepwash for 65 years. I am a passionate angler and fishing for salmon and trout in our beautiful river has given me endless pleasure. During that time, I have witnessed great changes to the character of the river.

A feature used to be the mature trees (mostly oak) that lined the riverbank. On hot summer days these gave shade both to the fish and to tired fishermen. Sadly, bank erosion has caused most of these trees to collapse into the river. Nowhere is this more marked than the stretch below Sheepwash Bridge: for a mile the bank used to be lined with trees but now not one remains.

Sixty years ago, after a period of heavy rainfall, the river would rise steadily and if it burst its banks would remain in flood for several days. The locals used to call it “ waters”. How different today. The river rises incredibly quickly, floods and yet within the space of a few hours is back within its banks again. As a result, the banks are being eroded at an alarming rate, undermining the roots of trees some of which must have been over a hundred years old.

Why is this happening? After the Second World War successive governments were determined that Britain should become self-sufficient in food. Farmers were encouraged through grants, subsidies, and guaranteed prices to increase food production. Massive grants were available to drain land, previously too wet to farm. Driving along the A39 from Bude to Bideford was a depressing sight. Huge ditches zigzagged across the marshy waste with JCBs destroying a natural and beautiful landscape. This is where the many moorland streams join together to form the Torridge which then starts its 50-mile journey to the estuary in Bideford Bay. With the land no longer acting as a sponge, any rain rushes directly into the river. This problem is exacerbated by a noticeable change in the pattern of rainfall. Maybe it is something to do with our warming climate but these days, rather than steady rain over several hours, often there are short bursts of intense rainfall. Not only are the banks being eroded at an alarming rate but the gravels on the bed of the river, so vital as spawning and nursery areas for the trout and salmon, are being scoured out and washed downstream. One has to look no further than under the arches of Sheepwash Bridge: where the river used to run freely there are now huge banks of gravel. Rapid run-off, bank erosion and the scouring out of the bed of the river are changing the character of the river and changing it for the worse.

The single most dramatic change has been the spread of the dreaded Himalayan Balsam. The plant is shallow rooting so thrives near a watercourse where there is plenty of moisture. From seed it can grow to a height of eight feet in one year. The growth is so rapid and the spread so widespread that all the natural plant life dies through lack of light. In the autumn the seeds pop out, are washed downstream and in the following spring colonise another stretch of riverbank. In the autumn it dies back leaving the banks bare so allowing the winter spates to wash yet more silt into the river. The flowers in the summer are a delight and a boon for beekeepers, but for the biodiversity of the river

Himalayan Balsam is an unmitigated disaster.

The numbers of salmon returning every year to spawn in the headwaters are a fraction of what they used to be. There are many reasons for the decline in the numbers of Atlantic salmon, but the lack of suitable gravel for the hen salmon to deposit her eggs is a major factor.

The water vole is another species that has virtually disappeared from our catchment. In the 1970’s the river was infested with American mink. These voracious predators, having escaped or been released by animal rights activists from a local fur farm, adapted readily to life in the wild. Evil creatures that kill for the sake of killing, they cut a swathe through the waterfowl: whole families of ducklings were killed in a just a few seconds. The water vole population was decimated and has never really recovered. Although mink seemed to adapt to life in the wild they have been unable to establish themselves and now it is rare to see a mink on the riverbank.

To conclude on a positive note, while the mink have virtually disappeared, otter numbers have increased. Walking by the river upstream of Sheepwash Bridge you may well catch a glimpse of an otter.

The winding route of the River Torridge from its source near the border with Cornwall. The river describes a long loop through Devon farming country where its tributaries, the Lew and Okement, join before meeting the Taw at Appledore and flowing into the Bristol Channel.

Charles Inniss