Apart from anything else it’s official
There hasn’t been any rain since April apart from a wet period in June.
And it’s been extremely hot and often quite windy so the soils are losing water much faster than normal.
Everywhere is parched. The lawns are all brown and even the little cats ears and hawkweeds have long since withered away.
Our efforts to stop water draining from the marsh have never been more important
We still have water.
Our dams are doing a terrific job of keeping the water level high.
There are wildflowers in abundance
The whole area teems with insects
And this huge area is kept lush and moist because we’ve built dams.
Now really is the proof that we can make a genuine contribution to restoring nature.
Not only do countless forms of life exist and thrive there, but these marshes won’t become wildfires.
This drought is already so extreme that there are some parts of the marsh that are rapidly drying out. The ground there is baking hard and the grasses are withering. Despite this some water is still draining away.
This is the time to get ambitious. We need a bigger dam.
The more water we hold back the bigger the wet area. The gradient of the land is very shallow. The dam doesn’t have to be that much bigger. A 1 inch rise would make a big area wetter. But six inches? Imagine a dam 6 inches higher and holding back water over a much much bigger area.
I wonder………
Could we turn this
Into this
And should we?
Rural Reading 