Alconbury Brook Flood Group Bulletin February 2024

Many of our projects not mentioned, but here’s a flavour of what we’ve done during February 2024

Hydro-planters (large drained soakaways which also filter water) now installed at two strategic  locations in the villages:

• Memorial Hall the Emergency Refuge for village, flooded in 2020 with water  from overflowing ditch, carpark, adjacent hill and Alconbury Weald Enterprise Zone.

• Community groups will use planters

• Tested recently with 20mm rain and worked superbly, no flooding on car-park.

• Sports and Social Club access to sports areas inaccessible

• Drain outlet shows scheme working well. Puddles rather than a lake.

• In part re-seeded with our own hard wearing special deep-rooted grass mix.

• Many thanks to Anglian Water for funding these projects, SilverFern Agri for working so conscientiously on the excavation, the trustees of both establishments and at least 25 excellent volunteers over 2 week-ends

• Work on two more strategically placed Hydro-planters in Alconbury Weston under way.

Alconbury Weston and other ponds

• Target for the Sallows Farm Pond commencement  remains March 11th weather permitting

• Defra Funding bid for £191,000 has not been successful, however we are hopeful that other regional and local funding to fill the gap can be found fairly quickly.

Partnership Agreement with Natural England

Work has started on these projects including using some of the funding to purchase a phone app for farmers called ‘Soil Mentor’ This helps farmers to improve productivity and soil health. Healthy soil helps rain infiltration.

Farmers and community members will be invited to ‘farm walks’ starting at the end of April to have a tour of some of the innovative work we are doing on Cowpasture Farm. (Many thanks to T H Branson and Son)

Environment Agency Flood Alleviation Scheme

• The model of how the brook behaves  has now  finally been signed off.

• The cost of ‘doing nothing’ is being calculated on a property by property basis. This gives a base-line cost of flooding.

• Thorough work at this stage is essential for a solid business case.

Other projects

• The subsided bank in Alconbury Village  is now filled, needs topsoil and will be netted and seeded this week.

• Members have been collecting soil samples for the sediment provenance project

• The accuracy of our soil carbon measurements are being verified by a national laboratory

• New rain and soil moisture sensors have arrived for distribution around the catchment. These are being tested at present. Thanks to the Cambridgeshire Community Foundation.

• The Flood Group has bid for funding this month from the HDC community ecology fund to help with the Sallows Farm pond biodiversity improvement and Alconbury Parish Council for safe use of herbicides near water

Contact us to volunteer at info@alconburybrookfloodgroup.uk

Donate if you can to www.justgiving.com/thealconburybrookfloodgroup