Since growing up in a small village in the Norfolk Broads surrounded by water, I’ve always felt very close to the freshwater environment and its wildlife. In my youth I spent much of my time close to the local rivers, dykes, ponds or lakes, usually fishing or boating.

Joining Gloucestershire Wildlife Trust (GWT) in August last year, I began working on an exciting project that aims to be the first canal restoration in the UK to achieve Biodiversity Net Gain in the process. The Cotswold Canals Connected (CCC) project will not only make the currently derelict canal navigable again for barges and paddleboards alike, but also create blue-green corridors that support ecosystem recovery in the face of climate change, strengthen the Nature Recovery Network, and improve habitats between Saul Junction and Stonehouse.

As well as the new waterway habitat that digging “the Missing Mile” provides, the project has also acquired around 20 hectares of land - a fantastic opportunity to create a brand-new wildlife haven. Within this purchased land there is a traditional orchard, a sloping south-facing grassland and approximately 14 hectares of grazed flood meadows.

This is a huge task, and it wouldn’t be possible without the involvement of local landowners, residents and our project partners Stroud District Council, Cotswold Canals Trust and Stroud Valleys Project to name just a few. So let’s dive into what the Missing Mile is, the different aspects of the project, how it’s going so far and more.

What is the Missing Mile?

The canal is mostly silted up and could be considered overgrown in places, which may be unsuitable for boats, but this provides a wonderful wildlife habitat. There is also a section between the villages of Whitminster and Eastington that was filled in due to the construction of the A419 and M5 in the early 60s, which has been dubbed “the Missing Mile”.

Shockingly, we’ve lost over 90% of our wetland habitat in the UK over the last 100 years, which has had a huge knock-on effect on the invertebrates, wading birds, amphibians, mammals and more that rely on them.  

One of the aspirations of the CCC project is to create new and better-connected habitats for a range of species.

The Stroudwater Canal has been identified as a key area that can link the wetlands of the Cotswold Escarpment to the east, the nature reserves in the Severn Vale like Coombe Hill and Ashleworth Ham, and the Severn Estuary to the west. In fact, this area is seen as so key to wetland connectivity that the Lower Frome area forms one of GWT’s Nature Recovery Zones or ‘Wildlife Cities’.

These new wetlands between Frome and the canal would also have a significant role in holding water in high-rainfall events and over the winter months. By allowing the river to utilise its floodplain when the water levels are high, we help restore natural processes and, at the same time, create that vital wetland habitat.

By creating a series of connected shallow depressions or “scrapes” within the floodplain we can hold water for longer on site, which also provides important feeding areas for overwintering waders and wildfowl. Alongside the scrapes we plan to dig a number of deeper ponds that will hold water throughout the year.

Part of my role is to monitor the existing state of wildlife within the area, and to evaluate the impact the restoration has on our native mammal species.

Water voles are classified as ‘Endangered’ on Great Britain’s Red List for mammals and have undergone one of the most serious declines of any mammal in Britain. They usually live in burrows surrounded by vegetation along streams, ditches, canals, ponds and lakes. They feed mainly on plants like reeds, rushes, roots and other wetland plants, and need to eat around 80% of their body weight every day.

We’re lucky enough to have a significant population of water voles in and around the lower Frome, and their welfare is at the heart of the work that we are doing.

I regularly visit mammal monitoring rafts that I’ve placed around the project area, checking for field signs of water voles like footprints left on the clay and droppings, which are usually deposited in groups called “latrines”. Water vole droppings are uniform in size and shape and resemble dark green tic-tac mints!

We also have a number of cameras that I’ve set around the project area. With the help of a volunteer, photos are uploaded to MammalWeb where volunteers, or ‘citizen scientists’, identify the species captured and record this data. By checking the rafts and collecting the trail camera footage we’re able to monitor water vole movements and numbers.

The project is creating lots of new suitable habitat for these once common rodents, often by digging a series of linear ponds that will have suitable banks for burrowing and will be planted with their favourite vegetation for cover and food. Another way of helping water vole populations is by providing drinking stations for grazing cattle on the floodplain and by fencing off the riverbank. By preventing cows from entering the water this stop the banks being trampled and encourages the riverside vegetation to grow and once again become appealing for these endangered rodents.

The Missing Mile is another section that should help support and grow our water vole population, by directly linking isolated colonies of voles and by providing new lengths of canal which has been designed with them in mind.

We’re lucky enough to have a wonderful diverse range of habitats in the lower Frome valley.

Over the winter we had curlew feeding on the nearby floodplain fields, and fieldfares and redwings feeding on the apples and mistletoe berries in nearby orchards. Overwintering water rail can also be spotted amongst the overgrown canal margins.

When the overwintering birds head back to their summer breeding grounds, our summer visitors start returning. Species such as the cettis warbler and blackcap have now returned and are in full voice along the canal scrubby margins. The first swallows and martins are returning from their migration from sub–Saharan Africa, soon to be followed by the swifts in May, triggered by the rise in flying insect numbers and the increase in daylight.

This surge in insect numbers also means bats have made their way back from their winter roosts and are becoming more active in the evenings. On the Stroudwater Canal we are lucky to be visited by lesser and greater horseshoe bats as well as Daubenton’s, Noctules and both Soprano and common Pipistrelle bats.

Other mammals like otters, stoats, weasels, badgers and water vole are located along the canal. These species are very elusive and usually only active at night, or early in the morning.

As the weather warms up more and more wildflowers come into bloom. Marsh marigold, lesser celandine, primroses and blossom from blackthorn and orchard perry pear trees have been full of wonderful colour so far this spring and are providing important early food for pollen loving insects.

The restoration of the canal can be beneficial for many reasons, not only the biodiversity net-gain. The canal becoming navigable again will allow boats from the Gloucestershire to Sharpness canal in the west to travel into the towns of Stonehouse and Stroud once again. Paddleboards, canoes and barges will once again be a familiar sight. The increase in accessible towpaths will encourage more groups like cyclists, anglers and walkers to spend more time outdoors, enjoying the natural environment and all the health benefits that go with it.  As with all projects that try to deliver multiple benefits a key measure of success will be how these competing needs are balanced – so we are looking to have circular walks and bird hides that allow people close to nature but also leave some areas undisturbed for wildlife.

The CCC project will hopefully become a great example of how a large-scale infrastructure project can deliver for the environment and how a canal, if restored and manged sensitively, can play an important role in the Nature Recovery Network. Developing best practise and ways of working across partners will help us achieve maximum benefits for the environment whilst also delivering a navigable canal to be enjoyed by people and wildlife for years to come.

If you’d like to visit to see our progress, we’ll be hosting a Wildlife Fun Day for families in Whitminster on the 5 of August. We’ll be putting more information about this soon on both the Cotswold Canal Connected and GWT website’s so please keep your eyes peeled.

If you’d like to find out more about the Cotswold Canal Connected project, click here