Upper Wye
Natural Flood Management Project
Wye Soils was a project delivered by the Wye and Usk Foundation (WUF), funded by Welsh Government’s Natural Flood Management Fund via Powys County Council. This project allowed WUF to scope opportunities for a catchment market in the Upper Wye, to pay landowners to farm for water and reduce downstream flood risk. The catchment market would be known as Resilient Rivers Upper Wye and build on the learning from the development of the Resilient Rivers Monnow market. The initial target of the market would be to reduce flood risk at Builth Wells, which has suffered from multiple flood events in recent years causing damage to infrastructure, road closures and stress to residents. This is largely due to flood waters from the Wye, Irfon and Ithon meeting near Builth, and therefore WUF are seeking to reduce or delay flood waters coming from the Upper Wye, to reduce the overall flood peak. Flood waters would be delayed or reduced through a combination of soil condition improvements, such as grazing management or creation of species-rich grasslands, and natural flood management interventions, such as buffer strips, attenuation features, pathway breakers and track management. The amount of improvement required to significantly impact the flood peak at Builth has yet to be determined and a hydrological review of the upper catchment will be required in the second phase of this project.
Wye Soils saw us working in three catchments of the Upper Wye above Rhayader. These were the Afon Marteg, the Afon Bidno and the conjoining section of the River Wye. As part of the project, WUF engaged with over 60 landowners in the area and completed 45 questionnaires, aiming to understand current farming practices and market attitudes. This provided us with a strong foothold in the catchment and we have developed relationships with many key landowners that are keen to be involved in a catchment market. WUF also conducted infiltration testing on the various soil types found in the catchment, which showed that soil condition improvements will be less important in these catchments than elsewhere, and that attenuation of runoff to delay the flood peak is a key product in this area. To further our understand of flows in the catchment, we purchased two in-river flow gauges to gather baseline flow data and prepare for post-intervention monitoring. We also created a lesson plan to educate school children on the soil food web and delivered the session in two primary schools to great success.
Based on the learnings from Wye Soils, we were successful in sourcing funding for Wye Soils 2 which is currently underway. This aims to expand the project area, moving south along the main Wye towards Newbridge-on-Wye, and installing key NFM interventions in the Afon Marteg. We are also working with key stakeholders in the catchment, including Radnorshire Wildlife Trust and Natural Resources Wales, to find opportunities for collaboration and whole catchment restoration.
