River Idle - Conservation

Conservation

There are four areas of grassland adjacent to the lower Idle, which are subject to periodic flooding, and which provide habitat for wintering and breeding birds. They form the Idle Washlands Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI). Historically, a much greater area would have functioned in this way, but much of it is now cut off from the river by high flood defence banks. The Washlands SSSI once covered an area of 250 hectares, which was used as grazing pasture during the summer months and was often covered by shallow flooding in the winter, but during the 1980s, further flood defence work and land drainage reduced this area to 88 hectares. Some work has been carried out under the National Environment Programme to ensure that the wildfowl and wader habitat is not lost completely, and the Environment Agency have produced a water level management plan to further protect the SSSI. Parts of the Mother Drain are also a designated SSSI.

Further up-river, the Sutton and Lound gravel pits are still part of an active quarrying operation which is run by the construction group Tarmac, but some 316 hectares have been designated as an SSSI. They provide an important wetland habitat for a large variety of birds. The pits won the 2008 "British Trust for Ornithology - British Energy Business Bird Challenge" in the category for quarries over 100 ha. A total of 172 different species of birds were recorded, including a number of birds which normally occupy the coastal fringes rather than inland sites. These include ringed plover, little ringed plover, shelduck and oystercatchers. Other birds seen include the black-necked grebe, which is rare in the United Kingdom, and the nightingale, which was extinct in Nottinghamshire before 2004. The Nottinghamshire Wildlife Trust have been active in planting reeds to improve the habitat, which are grown at Langford Quarry in a joint venture between Tarmac and the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds.