The River Thet in Norfolk is beginning to benefit from an alliance between Local landowners, NACA and the Environment Agency.

The River Thet in west Norfolk was once renowned as a small river fishery hosting many large clubs along its banks with records of quality catches attracting anglers from afar to this small but productive river. The river rises in the Quidenham area and winds its way as a stream south of Attleborough, and first gets noticed by many as it runs under the main A11 road at Larling, from here it widens slightly as it runs through grazing meadows down to East Harling Mill and on further through the countryside to the Town of Thetford to which it lends its name.

However like many small Norfolk rivers its recent plight has been that of over abstraction, predation and in the case of the Thet pollution incidents that have led the Environment agency to state 'allowing highly polluting discharges to enter the environment causing significant damage to the river ecosystem'.

In 2010 Local land owner Chris Green contacted NACA's Chairman to voice his concerns on the state of the river and to ask for help to see if anything could be done. Chris had overserved the section of  river running through his land over many months and had noticed there appeared to be no signs of fish and as an angler and conservationist Chris was keen to find out what was going on.

We visited the site which appears to have reasonable habitat and a moderate flow rate which were good signs from the out set the river is classified as good condition under the water frame work directive and doesn't suffer from the diffuse pollution issues that continue to plague other Norfolk rivers such as the Wensum, the river has no environmental classification such as SSSI or SAC status which would allow regeneration work to be implemented but also means the river hasn't been looked after in the same way that a classified river would by generating the interest and funding to ensure the river retained its protected status however we needed to find out what had happened to the fish stocks and in fact find out if any where still there.

NACA has an excellent working relationship with the Environment agencies  FAB team in Norwich but this would be a new venture working with their Central area office however we discussed the river with them and the need to survey the area as it became apparent that it had been several years since any fish surveys had been carried out.

The survey when it took place in April 2011 was very concerning with virtually no fish found in the surveyed area yet below the mill at Harling roach are in residence sometimes in numbers.

Regeneration of the river started in May 2011in the upper reaches of the Thet and as these areas we are looking at already have reasonable habitat it was a sensible approach, the agency team were quick to respond with an immediate stock introduction of 60,000 Dace larvae from their Calverton fish farm in the area upstream between Snetterton and Shropham, further introductions from Calverton have taken place in November and December 2011 figures below:

November 2011

2000 1 year + Dace (18 months old)

2000 1 Year + Roach

500 1Year + Chub ( East Harling)

December 2011

10,000 1 year + Dace

4000 1 year + Roach

1000 1 year + Chub (East Harling)

The significance of introducing 1 year plus fish is that they are stronger and more likely to survive in heavy flood conditions and as we have seen with the barbel and roach tracking work on the river Wensum they will stay in the areas to which they are introduced. They will also be ready to breed sooner giving a further boost to the river.

The river mill structures always present a problem to fish migration and it was felt that the situation on the Thet was no different and wash out in heavy flood conditions could be partly a cause to the lack of fish in the upper reaches of the Thet enabling the fish to find the way back to the upper areas and decent spawning, with this in mind the agency applied for a fish pass at Thetford for both eel and coarse fish which was completed in September 2011 and plans are underway to install a pass at Harling mill again for eel and coarse fish which will be a great addition to aid the mobility of the fish stocks this we hope will be completed spring 2012 further plans we will be looking at with both the land owner and EA in the near future will be riffle creation and jetting of existing gravels to aid spawning areas and looking into side stream fry protection areas.