The River Churn In our Element

 

Before visiting the river in my first imaginings of the river Churn, I envisaged a large powerful flowing river- even the word Churn suggests turbulent flows of water, so was surprised to find a watercourse no wider than a few meters . On visiting the river later in the year, I witnessed the Churn in spate as it surged along a totally altered landscape as it overwhelmed its previous water level and spilled out into the remaining water meadows. Grassy fields that I had walked with ease now overtopped my wellies, places where I had hopped over the river were now raging torrents, this was a powerful force. The river was truly never the same river twice.

After walking along the Churn (especially through Cirencester I started to notice how the river has essentially been ignored and shoved to one side over the years (there are times when the river is literally shoved under ground or placed in a concrete culvert). The Churn is not a 'power' river (it has some mills along its length), and is non naviagable it even seems to get smaller as it runs to its confluence with the Isis/Thames.

As the research stage of the project began to unfold and I began to get a feel for the river its surroundings various images and visions of artworks relating to the river and its ecology started to emerge.My initial starting point for these came very much from the natural environment and biodiversity of the river corridor. Over time these images were superceded by what is essentially the man made interventions along the river. This was reflected in the video as the human presence superceded that of nature. I am most interested in the zone where the urban and rural/natural and manmade zones collide.

So where to start in terms of understanding a river – maybe to look at a map? Alfred Korzybski came up with the phrase, "the map is not the territory" meaning that a map can describe a territory in some similar structure that allows us to traverse the land, which gives us a useful tool, but that our perception of the map can never equal the territory, but only our version of it, our map.Well you have to start somewhere
My map of the river Churn has gone through an incredible number of manifestations – Literally starting with a map – a Google map,sat maps, an OS map(s) – a Parish map, old maps new maps. It then becomes apparent that the river is an ever changing territory and never stays the same growing shrinking and meandering with the seasons.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Not a Rat

Vole Prints

Otter print

Mink prints

Dr Simon Pickering in his natural habitat

Ecology

During the process of investigating the river, I undertook a number of walks along its course. On several occasions I accompanied Dr Simon Pickering the Cotswold Water Park Ecologist in order to help with the collection of observational data relating to Water vole and other aspects of the Biodiversity audit of the river. Not owning a pair of waders, I donned my trusty wetsuit and set off upstream (working upstream means you do not cloud the watercourse you are walking into).

We were principally looking for signs of Water Vole (Arvicola terrestris) and other mammals.The Water vole is a particularly threatened species due to loss and fragmentation of habitats as well as predation by mink. The CWP are doing all they can to try and encourage the habitation along the river Churn by trapping mink and creating habitat for the voles

Along the course of the river we eventually found traces of vole footprints on the mud and I excitedly saw a little brown ball of fur disappear into the reeds, we also found traces of Otter and Mink

Other obvious fauna that I noticed - huge numbers of beautiful Banded Demoiselle (Calopteryx splendens), American Crayfish (non native -very tasty thank you), Brown Trout, Mallards on nests, Herons - dead and alive and dozens of butterflies and moths, kingfishers

Banded Demoiselle Dragon Fly

American Crayfish