Story out of today's Daily Post: http://www.dailypost.co.uk/news/north-wales-news/2010/06/11/gold-prospectors-endanger-rare-mussels-near-dolgellau-55578-26630964/ 

Oh lordy.

A lot of the problems with CCW stem from the individual case officer - some can have a bit of a passion for certain things... ::)

Of course, the mussels are there despite many hundred years of mining, when river pollution would have been many, many times worse.

This thinking is usually lost on CCW operatives, who generally believe that any slight change is likely to result in total environmental armageddon and therefore doing anything whatsoever should be prohibited entirely because it could have an impact (whether positive or negative).

The proposed redevlopment at Gwynfynydd faced a lot of opposition from CCW because of the presence of rare lichens/mosses growing on trees - unfortunately (or fortunately depening on your point of view) CCW happened to have a local case officer who's special love happens to be for lichen.

It's a funny old world - many of those natural things that co-existed with mining are now apparently under threat from people just ambling about (eg walking in a mine and lifting sediment off the bottom, which gets into a river).

Anyway, I could go on...



::)

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Of course, the mussels are there despite many hundred years of mining, when river pollution would have been many, many times worse.

Can you be sure about that? Is it known that they haven't just flourished since intensive mining stopped? I have no idea but thought the question worth asking.

Regarding Gwynfynydd and its lichens, are they truly rare or just not often recognised - with a field that's a bit "specialist" you have to wonder how much of an allegedly rare species is actually quite happily growing in locations that haven't been closely looked at by someone who knows what they're looking at!

I also wonder whether some ecologists appreciate that mining can have a positive effect on diversity, a fine example would be the site of some 1970s opencast sparring in the Peak which is now supporting a fine diverse array of plants. An ecologist who saw this insisted that it was long-established unimproved pasture and refused to believe it was only about 30 years old until shown air photos of the area when it was being sparred.

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Regarding Gwynfynydd and its lichens, are they truly rare or just not often recognised - with a field that's a bit "specialist" you have to wonder how much of an allegedly rare species is actually quite happily growing in locations that haven't been closely looked at by someone who knows what they're looking at!

Ah, now this is a common issue!

There is a suggestion that one of the reasons that the Menai Strait has such diversity beneath its waters is down to the fact that the School of Ocean Sciences in Menai Bridge has spent the last 40 years exploring every last inch of it.

It's not necessarily that something is rare; it may just be that nobody has bothered looking for it.

It's certainly an odd thing to say that something is rare when you don't actually know that it doesn't exist somewhere else - because you've not actually looked there.

It's very frustrating for anyone who wants to do anything - I've had similar issues with CCW when they've said: "Ah, if you do that, you might damage Species X".

When asked: "Are there many of Species X about?", they tend to reply: "They might be: we'd like you to do a study"

You then ask: "And are Species X disturbed by this sort of activity?" - to which they say: "We don't know, but there might be. It would be worth your while studying this."

The response to this is along the lines of: "Right, so you don't know if Species X are present; or whether Species X are in fact disturbed by what we're proposing. But you're worried about Species X (which might not be there anyway) and how we might disturb it (although we might not; and it might not be there anyway). And you want us to study this, despite the simple fact that you have no idea of whether there is a risk to Species X at all?".

And then they say: "Yes."

So you go away, spend £5k, come back and say: "There aren't any Species X around; and if there were, they wouldn't be affected."

At this point, the nice operative from CCW says: "Good. So... what about Species Y...?".

Been there, done that... :curse:

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This is a reasonably good document for learning about the freshwater pearl mussel. I imagine the susceptibility to siltation might be a concern where panning is taking place.

http://www.northyorkmoors.org.uk/uploads/publication/8473.pdf 

Whack some signal crayfish in there, and then the panners will be doing the environment a favour.

Humans are ruining the environment in more profound ways. PC Yoghurt Beard needs to get a sense of perspective. It's not as if this is the only stream in Wales!

Don't forget dog walkers too are a danger to lichen going on trees. Their dog's tails wagging are a serious threat apparently! :guns:

Don't forget dog walkers too are a danger to lichen going on trees. Their dog's tails wagging are a serious threat apparently! :guns:

Indeedy: I know one of the people who witnessed that incident - he's got a lot of experience of those sort of issues and even he was surprised!

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Some 40 years ago a brook local to our house was a great place to play. We would regularly see water voles there. The whole area was surrounded by fullers earth extraction, and sand pits. The sand processing plant started using a discharge pipe leading into this brook, and when operating the brook would be covered in foam. after a few years we noticed that there were no water voles. I can't tell you if the voles disappeared for this or for another reason. I do know that they are a lot rarer at a national level these days. While I think that conservation bodies do over-react to potential threats, I can also see a certain blind disrespect from some people when it comes to this sort of thing. If we want to argue the case for more tolerance, it doesn't do any good to be so dismissive, and it should be in everyone's favour to understand the issues from BOTH sides, and form a rational conclusion without rubbishing the conservationist viewpoint just because it scores points on "your" side.

It seems those promoting the economy often have a lack of education in all things green.

(The contrary also being true).

I have several mates who are council non-jobs relating to the environment and their influence is profound yet rather disturbingly, they have little idea about how the economy works aka the means by which their socialist gravy train exists. My chum Red Pete is the most amusing, as Allotment Officer in Bristol, he would have banned capitalism and had everyone back in caves (whilst getting to keep his two houses himself.....same old outlook as the pigs in Animal Farm)

tangent off.

The mussels are 2 miles up the Eden, upstream of where it joins the Mawddach. They are 'thinking' about reintroducing them on the Wen and Mawddach. They *might* be disturbed at some point in the future. ::)

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Ah ha, so they want to reintroduce something that isn't there at the moment? So how can panning be affecting something that isn't there?

The mussels are 2 miles up the Eden, upstream of where it joins the Mawddach. They are 'thinking' about reintroducing them on the Wen and Mawddach. They *might* be disturbed at some point in the future. ::)

Would I be right in thinking this might be a spanner in the works of a bit more than a few panners?

There has been 1 'panner' digging at one spot for 10 months solid. They call it *mining* and he's been standing his ground. They have pulled the proverbial sledgehammer out.

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Right, well I'm off up to North Wales to go Mussel collecting!
Anyone fancy a trip??...

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Sorry Daz

No can do I'm afraid. Got belly ache from the glut I harvested last time I was up there. Still got a bloody ton in the freezer!

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Funny isnt it.. People have been panning for YEARS - hundreds of them, and there are still mussels... despite the fact that I used to pan more mercury from that river than gold - great gobs of the stuff. They forget that panners are actually cleaning the river up. They forget that they have been doing it for 100's of years, and the ?mussels are still there..

I asked permission years ago to pan - the local water bailiff used to meet me in the pub in the evening to see what I'd got - and he always looked at my big bottle of mercury to see how much less there was in the river.. He was happy as larry with my being there..

Manicminer is right - its all about one person taking it too far..

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This is really interesting.....

Was the mercury there as some sort of previous fault of a previous amalgam plant operator, or was it native mercury?

This is exceedingly rare. I've always wanted to find some cinnibar and as far as I knew, it's pretty non-existent in the UK.

Native mercury is pretty rare stuff, I would have thought....

The mercury came from the old mill. It was *the* method of the day in recovering gold. About 1/3 was *lost*

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