Clifford Common nature reserve, is maybe one of our less visited sites, at least outside of the community of Clifford, but its position on the banks of the River Wye make it an interesting site to manage, as well as supporting a range of wildlife associated with the river, such as otters, kingfishers and dragonflies.

Being so close to the river means it experiences floodwater inundation almost every year and notably so last winter. This is having several impacts on the site, firstly the increasingly high river levels are gradually eroding the bank, above which the main public access track runs. Through the winter, the site may be totally flooded and dangerous to enter. The river carries with it all that falls in upstream and this debris is often deposited in the slacker water on the reserve. Mostly it is woody material but often includes man-made detritus, such as farm plastics and litter.

Perhaps one of the more easily seen arrivals to Clifford Common over the years, has been non-native Himalayan Balsam (Impatiens glandulifera ) with its bright pink flowers. The plant has gradually established across the reserve, taking up more and more of the natural habitat and pushing out native species.

Different methods have been tried over the years to control the balsam on the site, to varying degrees of success. Mowing the stands of the flowering plant before it sets seed (and it is prolific at this) will often knock it back for one or two years but we usually find within a couple of seasons that a new cohort of seeds from upstream, have been deposited on the site by floodwater and we are no further on, in controlling it.

Recent studies around the UK, have shown that a rust fungus which is known to be infect the balsam in its native range, can effectively reduce the spread of the plant and is approved by DEFRA to be released in the UK without any risk of the fungus affecting non-target species. Part of the roll-out of the programme of fungus release has been along the River Wye catchment, and we have been a partner with the Wye & Usk Foundation, and Herefordshire Rural Hub through the Restoring Our Amazing River (ROAR) Water Environment Grant (WEG) project.

The release and monitoring at Clifford Common has been done with the assistance of local volunteers, Simon Forrester and Will Bullough. With the support of the project, they have been able to inoculate balsam growing on the reserve with the rust fungus and monitor how much it spreads in these and other plants. Once established the fungus will remain effective on the site every year and we hope spread up and down the river to similarly infect and control balsam growing elsewhere. The results of this year’s release programme will be evaluated over the coming months.