Wansbeck Towpath Walks

The willows are down at the second bend

Two crack willows came down across the path at the second bend below Mitford bridge during the gusts on Tuesday night. One is across cleanly enough that a walker can step over without much fuss; the other has snagged in the alder on the far bank and the root plate is sitting half out of the water, which makes the path edge unsafe for anyone with a dog on a long lead. I have laid an orange marker on the upstream side. The trust have been told and the saw team are pencilled in for the second Saturday in June, weather depending. Until then the diversion is the field path above the line of holly — gate is unlocked, please shut it behind you.

The kingfisher pair are back on the deep pool below the weir. I watched from the bench seat for about half an hour on Thursday and the female brought back four fry in a row, which suggests they are feeding chicks. I have not located the burrow but it will be in the cut bank somewhere on the north side. Please keep dogs out of the water along the deep pool stretch for the next six weeks or so — it is a short section and there is plenty of river to splash in either side of it.

The April flood has rearranged the gravel bar

The high water on the second weekend of April was not the worst we have had this spring, but it was sustained for nearly two days, and it has done more work on the gravel bar opposite the old mill than the December spate did. The bar has shifted about ten metres downstream and the deep cut along the south bank is now a good half-metre deeper than it was. The path itself is fine — it sits well above the bank — but the dipping platform that the school party used last summer is gone. There is no plan to replace it. The bank is not safe for that sort of structure now and probably will not be again for several years.

The river does what it will. The warden's job is mostly to tell people what has changed and to mark up what is not safe yet.

Of more general interest: the kissing gate at the field corner below Bothal church has been re-hung. The old top hinge had been bending for three winters and finally gave up. The replacement is heavier and shuts properly. Thanks to the two volunteers who carried the new post and the gate down from the road — it was not a short carry.

Reopening the lower stretch

The lower stretch — from the Sheepwash car park down to the tidal limit — has been formally reopened for the season as of Monday. The winter closure on that section is not a legal closure, it is a request, because the bank below the alders is unstable in deep wet and a single misplaced boot at the wrong time can knock half a yard of it into the water. By the start of March things have usually firmed up enough. This year was wetter than usual and I held the reopening back by two weeks, which generated a couple of polite letters and one less polite one. The bank is now solid. The signs are down.

The barn owl box at the top of the meadow has been used over the winter — the pellets under the post are fresh. I will not be checking the box itself until late summer, after any breeding attempt is over. Please keep to the path along the meadow edge and do not encourage dogs into the long grass under the box; they put up the parent birds and we have probably lost broods in past seasons that way.