Cornwall council has organised boat trips on the River Fal as part of a new initiative to reduce runoff and protect some of England's most biodiverse marine habitats. The scheme, called Fal Rivers to Reef, aims to work with farmers and landowners to restore nature, build climate resilience and reduce pollution from the river's source in Goss Moor, through 22,000 hectares (54,000 acres) of farmland and woodland to Falmouth.
Citizen scientists monitor marine habitats
Volunteers, trained by the Cornwall Wildlife Trust, are using underwater cameras and floating GPS devices to detect changes in marine habitats over time. Their work is vital because beneath the surface of Falmouth's natural harbour, known as Carrick Roads, are two of the UK's most biodiverse and carbon-rich marine habitats: lush seagrass meadows and purple-pink carpets of ancient maerl – a rare and fragile coral-like seaweed. They are some of the largest such beds in England.
Parts of the slow-growing maerl beds, which stretch from St Mawes to St Just in Roseland, are believed to be up to 4,000 years old. They act as nurseries for commercially valuable species such as scallops and crab. Last year, however, divers found a “worrying deterioration” in the maerl beds, which were being smothered by algae, preventing much-needed sunlight getting to the seaweed. Algal blooms, fuelled by excess nutrients from agricultural runoff and sewage in the River Fal's catchment area, are also present today.
Farmers and fishers collaborate
Simon Tagney, 65, a retired TV camera operator turned citizen scientist, said: “When I went down in March this year, everything looked newly polished and clean. But going in today, there's lot of filamentous algae on everything. A lot of the maerl is obscured by it. You can't see the detail – it is like going into a dusty room.”
The Cornwall Wildlife Trust is among several environmental organisations backing the initiative. A key driver was catchment data from the Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) published in 2022, which identified rural farm pollution and waste from the water industry as the reason the Lower River Fal failed to achieve “good” ecological status. The initiative aims to improve water quality and protect seagrass, maerl and the last remaining native oyster beds in Falmouth estuary, which are harvested from sail and oar boats.
Matt Slater, marine conservation officer at the trust, said: “The Fal is full of nutrients and that can create mats of opportunistic algae that smothers seagrass like a blanket.” The trust has been forced to temporarily cancel a seagrass restoration project in Ardevora, on the Roseland peninsula, until the water quality improves. “We know that small changes by farmers can make a big difference in reducing runoff,” he added.
Beavers as a nature-based solution
At Gare farm, tenant farmers Claire and Martin Tupper have used “herbal leys” – a mixture of grasses, clover, legumes and herbs – to improve soil, cut down on fertilisers and improve drainage. With the council's help, they have also relocated a gate away from a slope where it was causing excess runoff, and are restoring an ancient orchard. Claire said: “You want to do the right thing but you don't necessarily know the right people to talk to. The support has been invaluable.”
Jason Pascoe, 56, one of a score of native oyster “sail-and-oar” fishers left in Cornwall, says silt washing down the river from development, farming and heavier rain is creating more mud in the river and threatening the fishery. “One of the biggest problems for the oyster fishery is silt,” he said. “The oyster shells need to be clean and the larvae need clean substrate to build those shells.”
Beef farmer Chris Jones has introduced beavers to an enclosure on his land since 2017. The animals have saved him from drought, reduced flooding in the village of Ladock by cutting peak discharge through the site by half and the floodwater transit time from 10 to 90 minutes, and improved the native oyster beds downstream by trapping silt. Jones, who was behind a change in the law allowing beavers to be released in England, said: “This idea of looking at a river from its source to the sea is the only sensible way of doing it.” He is in the process of applying for a licence to release 150 beavers into the county.
Tree planting and farmer-led approach
At Court farm in Philleigh, Jim Pascoe, a fourth-generation arable farmer, and his daughter Amie Pascoe are among 48 farmers and landowners in the Fal Rivers to Reef cluster. They have planted an orchard of 100 fruit trees and 5.5 hectares of woodland with the help of the planting project Forest for Cornwall. The Pascoes have also built a two-mile public walkway through the ancient woodland. Amie said: “We've spent our whole lives walking, riding in the woods and swimming in the river. I wanted to share that.”
Philip Marsden, an author who has 18 hectares turned into woodland and wildflower meadows, said the key to the success of the farm element is that it is “farmer led”. He said: “Farmers don't have time to look into funding. There is huge untapped potential for nature recovery.”
Philippa Hoskin, nature recovery manager at Cornwall council, has a 25-strong, mostly externally funded team and key members are able to “speak farmer”. The source-to-sea initiative is a long-term project and may encounter unforeseen obstacles, including the potential environmental impacts of a proposed development at Falmouth Docks. Loic Rich, Cornwall's cabinet member for environment and climate change, said: “Here, you've got the people with the vision, you've got the farmers, you've got the fishers. Everybody's together in the same room. It's the ideal way to manage a landscape.”
