The following is a summary of our meeting, using abridged notes from the official minutes they are not intended to be a replacement of those minutes, a full copy of the minutes are available from the group Secretary.
Minutes of a meeting held on Thursday, 2nd April 2015 at Clevedon Sailing Club
PRESENT: David Robinson (Chair), Stewart Edwards, Simon Osborn, Paul Trowbridge, Judith James
APOLOGIES: M Adames, Trevor Incles, Jackie Tait
MINUTES of the last meeting were agreed.
FINANCES/GRANTS – The Woodcutters have made a donation of £5 for using our trailer.
RIVER CLEANING – Punt was launched behind the Scout Hut on 18 March and a working party checked the river and recovered rubbish as far as Strode Road bridge. After several failed attempts to remove the timber from a culvert, another attempt had to be abandoned due to a higher than normal water level reducing clearance in the culvert. We are now on summer level and in addition the blocked trash screen at the Conservative Club has held water back and further increased the level upstream.
If watercress starts spreading as it did last year the EA has plans to deal with it. We will keep them informed if we see clumps of weed forming.
EQUIPMENT – Nothing to report.
FOOTPATHS/WALKS – David has contacted the farmer involved with the Two Rivers walk. There are possible issues that still need to be resolved, these include concerns about the liability of the owner on permissive paths. Letters to be issued to resolve.
Andy Carroll has ordered the sign for Jacobs Walk and David has indicated we would like it to be erected towards the end of April and to invite Frank’s widow to be present. Paul has inspected the state of the footpath and is of the opinion that the run-off from the roof causing the flooding should be in an appropriate drainage system which is North Somerset’s area of responsibility.
LEVELS AND FLOW – See ‘The River’ – Levels
REPORTS OF RIVER SECTIONS
Bernard’s section – Nothing to report
Stewart’s section – A few items left out for recycling had to be recovered following a windy night, otherwise condition and flow continue to be good for time of year.
Town section – The Company responsible, recently organised removal of accumulated rubbish removed from the trash screen in the Old Dairy Court. In future they will arrange for contractors to remove rubbish frequently to prevent any build up.
NSC have been contacted twice following a sudden large accumulation of debris on the trash screen resulting in a considerable build up of water with a level about 30 cm higher upstream than in the culvert. It is possible that demolition work near the river may have caused some material to fall in the river and collect on the trash screen.
Trevor’s Section – recently checked and cleared
Paul’s Section – Swans seen.
PUBLICITY – David will send an article to the newly revived Mercury newspaper.
WEBSITE – Simon suggested that we considered an amalgamation with the Clevedon Conservation Volunteers Web page, which covers Woodcutters/ Friends of Poets Walk and which gets a lot more hits than our site. It would be possible to post the same content on a dedicated area on this site and it would cover the volunteer aspect of our work. To be considered.
ANY OTHER BUSINESS – We shall have access to a riverside path when Staddon’s site is developed.
A student who lives locally and is studying at Swansea is writing her dissertation on the Land Yeo and the effect on water quality as a result of passing through an urban area.
The distribution of Minutes was raised and Judith would prefer to send them to Jackie for distribution as she holds the mailing list.
DATE OF NEXT MEETING – Thursday, 4 June at 7.30 pm
Land Yeo Friends 
Hello,
I often walk section of the river (and read your web-site) and did intend to become more involved with the friends, unfortunately I have been unable to do that yet.
My concern is the state of the river down stream of the town. I have lived in Clevedon for 7 years and in that time have noticed a decline in the clarity of the river. Up to about 4 years ago the river ran clear and contained a wide diversity of plant, invertabrate and fish life, right down from the Motorway to Marshals Field. Whilst the river still runs clear up stream of the town down stream it does not and in river los almost devoid of life.
Has the reason or this striking deference been identified?
Andrew Player
Andrew thank you for your inquiry. I have asked that our river expert replies to you as soon as possible. I will also include the response on this web site.
Hi Andrew,
The Land Yeo is gradually changing due to a lot of disturbance in recent years, due in the main to blocked culverts, the ingress of trees and vegetation and the dumping of litter and rubbish. Since the main culvert in Queen’s Square was cleared, a large willow tree removed and clearing of weed, silt and unblocking of several other culverts the river has been allowed to return to a more natural state. Unfortunately as a result of this, deposited silt has now started to move slowly downstream to the Pill and this has resulted in a fine deposit of silt in the water causing it to be cloudy and murky. The fish and invertebrates etc are still there, though not so easily seen as upstream. With the action of water fowl, swans etc and bottom feeding fish, eventually the silt will filter out, ending up in the Pill.
If you would like to learn more do come along to our meetings, where a great deal can be explained about levels and flow, winter and summer levels, tilting weirs etc. If you are really interested much can be gained by going on a guided walk sometime with one of our members.
Thank you for your interest.
David Robinson (Chairman, Land Yeo Friends).