Following the flow

Today the water levels didn’t look quite right down at The Scrapes so we set about investigating… We examined our new dam – a minor repair needed, but nothing that would explain the low water levels. We looked at the inflow, which was flowing but not as much as we’d like, so we followed the water back to the source…

As many of the readers of this blog will know, the water to the reserve comes from an aquifer a short way from the edge of the reserve on the ranges. Looking under the boards that cover our ‘holding tank’ it was nice to see that our water voles have spread beyond the boundary of the reserve, with a latrine with fresh dropping and piles of feeding remains around the edge of the pool of spring water.

It was also here that we found what we think is the source of our water flow problem, with a low flow level through the sluice and water flowing around the edge of the holding tank. Some manual labour and two wheelbarrows of clay later we have a clearer idea of the problem, but there’s still a bit more to do…