Chalk stream conservation hailed a success

The five-year project aimed to improve and conserve the river, which is home to a wide variety of wildlife

A five-year-long project to improve the landscape around one of south Wiltshire's rare chalk streams has been hailed a success.

The Crystal Clear Ebble project aimed to inspire communities and volunteers to protect the river, which runs from Alvediston in the west to Bodenham, south of Salisbury, where it joins the Hampshire Avon.

Small grants have enabled landowners to open up the waterway and introduce helpful plant species, which has led to an increase in wildlife and protected the Ebble's water quality.

The river is one of only 200 chalk streams in the world, with 80% of those found in southern England.

Simon Allsebrook said that the project grants had enabled him to improve his section of the river, which had led to an increase in wildlife species

Simon Allsebrook received advice and a grant to improve the stream running through his property.

"They cleared the river out, graded the bank down and opened up the canopy to let more light in," he said.

"We had a two-month project of rebuilding the river bank, putting in coir matting, and then replanting, which has now got marginal and emergent plants coming through.

"There are more birds. There are more animals around. You notice the huge improvement."

Farmer Keith Hitchings said that the river provided exactly the right conditions for growing watercress

Chalke Valley Watercress, run by the Hitchings family for over 140 years, is one of the businesses dependent on the river water.

The clean, alkaline water, which remains at around 10 degrees, is perfect for growing the crop, and Keith Hitchings said maintaining that quality was crucial to the farm.

"There's a natural spring water that rises here, up to 5 million gallons a day," he said.

"The nutrients are actually naturally in the chalk, which is then carried into the water. That's what the watercress lives off of.

"It's perfectly clean if we do bacterial testing on it; the quality is absolutely fantastic."