Our July River Mole test results are in! Water quality testing by our fantastic River Mole River Watch volunteers shows overall the catchment remains in POOR ecological status without much change from June. The July catchment average phosphate level is 1.05ppm, the same as June but an increase from Spring.
New hot spots with a jump in Phosphate levels since June include Redhill Brook, Betchworth Brook and Gad Brook. Burstow Stream and Leigh Brook continue to score high screamingly pollution levels. A few streams scored lower levels including Earlswood Brook but it is still poor.
Testing looks consistent with a similar pattern of pollution showing up since we started our citizen science programme in Spring. Compared to June, July showed the Upper Mole tributaries were a tad lower in phosphate while the main river channel was a tad higher. The overall average for the entire catchment was, by coincidence, exactly the same at 1.05ppm phosphate!
Testing methodology and results look robust with a consistent pattern of pollution emerging since we started our citizen science programme in Spring. Tributaries again scored highest for the worst pollution and the main channel, probably due to dilution, scored somewhat lower. However, in July the downstream locations in the main channel returned higher levels of phosphate than June showing, perhaps, the impact of generally low flows in Summer.
Our volunteers monitor their adopted river and this word cloud shows the common issues they recorded; not all testers spotted visible signs of pollution so this just gives you the gist of key elements of visual pollution seen.
A huge thank you to our outstanding testers!
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