Category Archives: Mellingriffith Feeder

Event 172: Radyr Weir (25 August 2018)

(The rather creepy photo at the top is of a doll’s head found during this event!)

Over 40 volunteers from Cardiff Rivers Group returned to the River Taff on Saturday, 25 August, to tackle the area around Radyr weir.

The group split up into teams to tackle the riverbank, Longwood Drive, the Taff Trail, and the Melingriffith feeder.


The volunteers worked hard for 2 hours, and together they collected 109 bags of rubbish!

Much of this was found in the feeder. Volunteers kitted out in waders and wellies trudged through the muddy feeder stream to collect bags and bags of discarded drinks cans, which littered the stream floor.


Group member Louise Tambini said, “It was lovely to see so many people give up their Saturday morning to make such a huge difference to this area. Everyone who took part should be very proud of themselves!

The amount of cans we found in the feeder was shocking. I really wish people would dispose of their waste correctly and stop damaging this important habitat. I hope that a deposit return scheme comes into force soon to prevent people from irresponsibly littering their drinks containers in the environment,” she added.

All waste was collected by Cardiff Council.

More photos on our Flickr page.

Event 148: Melingriffith Feeder Stream, Forest Farm (24 June 2017)

Before we got stuck in to clearing the Melingriffith feeder stream, building dead hedges and pulling up Himalayan Balsam, we were incredibly happy to be presented with a cheque for £2,996.23 by Mark Poole of Viridor — the recycling, renewable energy and waste management company — who came along to the event with a colleague. (They both pitched in volunteering afterwards, too!)

The grant, which comes from the  Viridor & Prosiect Gwyrdd Community Fund, will be used to buy a small boat, to enable CRG to do even more work to help keep Cardiff’s waterways clean and beautiful.

We started clearing out the Melingriffith feeder stream almost two years ago, in August 2015.  Given how choked with trees the stream has become, it’s definitely a long-term ‘habitat management’ project, but we’re definitely making a difference.

Volunteers working in the stream

Removing trees from the stream greatly improves the flow, which in turn helps keep the stream  clean and should result in more fish living in it.  And more fish means that the local kingfishers and herons will visit the stream more often.

The huge number of  branches removed were then used to extend the ‘dead hedge’ that we started building along the bank of the stream two years ago (which has survived surprisingly well).

The dead hedge will stop dogs from further eroding the banks of the stream.

As well as removing trees from the stream, volunteers pulled up swathes of Himalayan balsam along the banks of the stream, which should help to control its spread a bit.

Pulling up Himalayan balsam

Finally, contrary to whatever Mr Hackett might say, it was only a very small branch that might have hit him on the head.

Lots more photos on Flickr!

Event 129: Melingriffith feeder (Forest Farm)

On Saturday 25 June, Cardiff Rivers Group made a return to Forest Farm to help the Rangers clean up the Melingriffith feeder stream, as well as removing Himalayan Balsam,  and doing a general litter pick of the area.

event128

Numerous trees blocking the stream were removed, and the branches and brash used to make a “dead hedge” to protect the banks from further erosion.

deadhedge

In addition, we removed a number of “invasive” sycamores that were crowding out the banks of the stream, thereby letting more light in and allowing the native plants and tree to flourish.

sycamorefelling

Thanks to everyone who came along and made a difference!


Top photographStones Across The Melingriffith Feeder,  by Stuart  Herbert. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/

Event 113: Melingriffith Feeder (Radyr Weir End)

18 volunteers from Cardiff Rivers Group joined hundreds of groups across Wales as they took part in a clean-up in support of Keep Wales Tidy’s  ‘Be Tidy’ event, which runs throughout September.

TheMaskedAvenger2The volunteers were joined by unsung superhero  The Masked Avenger  who fights litter crime across the city.

He donned waders with the volunteers to remove litter from the Melingriffith feeder stream near Forest Farm.

More photos of the feeder stream clean-up are on the CRG Flickr pages. 

They made the most of the lowered water levels (due to the building works for the new hydro plant at Radyr Weir) to clean out this stretch of the canal which looked like it had never been cleaned before! They collected over 40 bags of litter, traffic cones, plastic boxes, barriers… and a thong!

canandbottlesMembers were amazed at how many aluminium cans they found buried in the stream bed and banks, some of which had obviously been there for many years, causing a huge problem for wildlife.

They also took part in a Keep Wales Tidy survey to calculate exactly how much of the litter was drinks-related.

Volunteers sorted cans, bottles and cups from the other rubbish and were astonished to find that over 60% was from drinks.

During September, KWT are gathering information on the issue to come up with possible solutions.  If you have 10 minutes to spare please take the survey at https://t.co/cK9Yq6SZV7

A splinter team spent an hour removing the invasive Himalayan Balsam from the banks, opening up the views to the feeder stream once more.

Commenting on the clean up event, Louise Tambini, CRG committee member, said:

“We are delighted to play our part in Be Tidy and do our bit to help Keep Wales Tidy. I was absolutely astonished with the amount of cans and plastic bottles we found in the stream. Much of it was very old, illustrating that these needlessly discarded items cause a hazard to wildlife for many years. This is a problem that needs to be addressed otherwise we will be mining rivers and canals for cans for years to come!” 

“Once again I was proud to see so many volunteers give up their time on a weekend to improve the environment. Whilst you may get disheartened by people who litter, seeing the happy bunch of CRG volunteers swing into action to blitz the site is a delight to see”

All in all, it was a very successful morning!