High Ongar Roding Weir

[Andyac]

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Hi All
Apart from a slight increase in Oxygen I can't see the point. Top photo original weir and bottom new stepped weir. Any ideas? sorry photos from opposite sides

[Aitch]

Another month or two and there'll be no flow and choked with weed... it was last year... shame as its a lovely little river... our section from Langford Bridge downstream has very few fish now

[Tengisgol]

Probably to enable eel migration.

[Wanderer]

Probably to enable eel migration.

And probably other species too.

[Wallyboy Rob]

Definitely looks like a fish ladder but not for Eels, they are like long rectangular boxes filled with bristles



The old weir is similar in design to the counting weir on the Wally which has an Eel ladder attached and also in the last few years had spikes put in the centre to help Sea Trout get over it, I would imagine the stepped Roding weir is to aid coarse fish movement.

[Tengisgol]

As Aitch says, the first ingredient it needs is some water and sadly that is scarce on the Roding in summer.

[Harry H]

I can remember watching a programme with Jack Hargreaves in the 70's with him raising his concerns about water extraction and the lack of flow in our rivers leading to them silting up and covering the gravel beds used by fish for breeding.
I'm quite fortunate in that the river Blackwater that I fish is used to transfer water from the Ouse to Hanningfield Reservoir otherwise it would be in the same condition as the Roding I'm sure as it is the only fishable swims are a couple of deep corners and a weir pool.

[Aitch]

Most of the Roding is heavily overgrown and abstraction had decimated its flow... sadly with Mink, Otters, Cormorants, and Pollution its a pale shadow of the lovely river from my youth

[Andyac]

Hi All
I done a Eel survey with the zoological society at Bow on the river Lea about 12 years ago and we caught more Chinese Mitten Crabs than Eels in our trap.

[Andyac]

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This is what we need all year round