One of the ongoing aspirations of the Churnet Valley Living Landscape partnership is to inspire local people to get more involved in their surroundings. In conjunction with the Environment Agency, during October- 11 local volunteers gained certificates in riverfly monitoring. Riverflies and other freshwater invertebrates are a vital link in the aquatic food chain and are powerful indicators to monitor water quality, often referred to as the “canary of our rivers”.
Two workshops were held in Oakamoor, where local anglers and conservationists were trained in kick sampling and the sorting of the different types of larvae. The data collected over the coming seasons will be fed into a national data base. Dr Nick Everall from Aquascience Consultancy Ltd. said “the volunteers have been shown how to sample and analyse the larvae to the Riverfly Partnership standards and can go on to keep an eye on the Churnet’s water quality into the future”.
 CVLLP Training Officer Nicki learning how to identify river fly |
 Volunteers kick sampling in the river Churnet |