Wilder rivers

River valleys are a key landscape feature in Suffolk, and they are home to some of our most iconic species, such as the water vole, otter, and kingfisher. Rivers act as blue wildlife corridors, connecting different habitats and they are a great resource for humans too, providing multiple ecosystem services. Despite this, humans have abused rivers by changing the way they flow through the landscape and releasing waste into them.

Our work on rivers has focussed mostly on water vole conservation in the past, funded by the Water for Wildlife Project with support from Anglian Water, Essex & Suffolk Water, and the Environment Agency. Our work on rivers now takes a broader approach to restoring river habitats and their floodplains. We now focus on advising landowners, land managers, community groups, and individuals on how best to manage or look after rivers in Suffolk. We help support and deliver projects to restore rivers and their floodplains and support individuals to be champions for their local rivers and the wildlife that lives in them. We also work collaboratively with a wide range of partner organisations to improve the quality of our riverine habitat for wildlife in Suffolk.

Different river species need a variety of microhabitats within a river to thrive. Some species will prefer the sheltered waters on the inside of a river bend, while others will benefit from faster-flowing sections. Plant material in the river channel provides cracks and crevices for river invertebrates to hide in, which in turn provide food for fish and other animals. In the past humans have taken away this brilliant diversity through intensive management or by straightening rivers and putting them into reinforced channels.

Suffolk Wildlife Trust has delivered several river restoration projects that have aimed to restore natural river processes and help river wildlife recover. We worked at a catchment scale delivering in-channel river restoration and riparian tree planting projects across the River Blyth catchment. As part of this, we installed large woody features in the riverbed to help enhance the habitat diversity and to create different flow patterns. We also engaged with landowners and worked with volunteers to control the invasive non-native Himalayan balsam and monitor the health of the river.

At our Black Bourn Valley nature reserve, we helped reconnect the river to its floodplain by creating wetland habitats in the meadows adjacent to the river. In winter the waters of the Black Bourn once again spill out across the meadows - as it would have done for generations –attracting flocks of teal and gadwall and feeding snipe on the watery edges. Where possible we should be making space for rivers to connect with their floodplains while providing other benefits for people and wildlife.  

If you are a landowner or land manager and you are interested in delivering a river or floodplain restoration project, please get in touch with our Rivers Adviser, Alice Wickman using the contact details below. We can visit your site to provide advice and work with you to develop project plans and/or identify funding sources.

We can also provide advice to landowners or land managers about how to protect and enhance rivers and waterways for wildlife. If you would like some advice on the management of a river on your land, please contact our Rivers Adviser. We can provide advice on issues such as bankside vegetation management, Invasive species management, protected species, or reducing pollution/runoff.

Please note, you may also need to speak to the Environment Agency if you plan on conducting work on a river or its floodplain and you always need landowner permission. 

Non-native and invasive plant species cause major problems in rivers and pond habitats, as they spread rapidly and cause issues like deoxygenation of the water. If you think you have seen an invasive non-native plant species, such as water fern, parrots feather, floating pennywort, Japanese knotweed, Himalayan balsam, or New Zealand Pigmy weed, please record it to the Suffolk Biological Records Centre.

You can find out more information about other invasive non-native species and the different schemes to record them on the non-native species secretariat website.

If you have any of the non-native plant species mentioned above in your ditches, ponds, or streams, and would like advice on how to manage them, please contact our Rivers Advisor using the contact details below.  

The North American mink is an invasive, non-native species of mammal that was introduced to the UK for fur farming and was first recorded breeding in the wild in the 1950s. They are very effective hunters and cause significant damage to native wildlife, including the endangered water vole.  A female mink can fit inside a water vole burrow, meaning the water voles’ usual method of avoiding predation does not work. They also predate on other native wildlife, such as frogs, kingfishers, and sand martins so it is necessary to control these animals to protect native river and wetland wildlife.

Mink were once widespread in Suffolk but thanks to the program of mink control, coordinated by Suffolk Wildlife Trust for over 20 years, mink numbers are now much lower in the county.  Since 2021 Suffolk Wildlife Trust has been a partner in the Waterlife Recovery East regional mink eradication project, which is a partnership project made up of different organisations in East Anglia working towards the eradication of mink from the region.  This project is delivering targeted mink control across East Anglia by coordinating a network of volunteer mink trappers, who have been supplied with smart mink rafts, like that shown in the photo below, and training on how to trap mink for conservation purposes.

The smart mink rafts include a recycled plastic raft and a cage trap that is fitted with a remote monitoring device that sends the user a text message when the trap has been triggered. This saves the trapper time and is better for animal welfare.

If you have seen a mink please report it here and If you think mink are causing a problem on your land and would like to join the project, please contact The Waterlife Recovery Trust.

Our wilder rivers work is supported by Anglian Water.

Funding for projects is also received from Environment Agency and Essex and Suffolk Water.