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Poulton Court, Awre, River Severn Inter-Tidal Grazing Marsh Creation Project

Client: Environment Agency
Value: £37,000

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The Environment Agency is committed to ensuring that wetland habitats and species are protected, enhanced and sustainably managed, in particular in respect of the impacts of climate change and sea level rise (coastal squeeze) on our coastal grazing marshes. This project in partnership with the Gloucestershire Wildfowlers Association and Natural England has created 5.5ha of coastal grazing marshes within the upper Severn Estuary.

The Brims Pill is a tributary of the River Severn and the site is immediately adjacent to parts of the River Severn SSSI – our recreation of salt marsh on this site has added significantly to the existing habitat resource. The Severn is an internationally important wildlife habitat, and this site will provide an important link wildlife dispersal including otters, salmon, breeding waders and wintering wildfowl.

The exceptionally high tidal range of the River Severn has led to the evolution of the unique “High Atlantic Salt Marsh” habitat. However, as climate change leads inexorably to rises in sea level, these inter-tidal habitats are subjected to loss through increased frequency of inundation. The creation of this site has increased the sustainability of these habitats in response to climate change.

The site will be managed as a nature reserve by the Gloucestershire Wildfowlers Association in collaboration with the farm tenant and Natural England (Higher Level Stewardship Scheme). The GWA have a no shooting policy on this site which is rigorously enforced by the site manager.

Our work on site comprised five elements:

• The regrading and desilting of the main ditch through the site and the replacement of reeds
• Two water level control structures including concrete/sandbag headwalls and eel passes
• A 0.5 hectare reed bed with water up to 1m in depth. This is linked to the main ditch and periodically flooded by tidal water. We have transplanted reeds from the ditch into the reed bed
• Shallow scrapes and creaks have been created to distribute the tidal water across a wide area of the field, maximising the potential for salt marsh plants to colonise and to create a diversity of habitats
  
• An existing pond has been partially desilted and extended to create further wildfowl habitat.

The scheme was completed over a six week period in the autumn of 2009 at a cost of £37,000.