Chalk rivers: nature conservation and management

This is a handbook about Chalk Rivers Nature Conservation and Management from March 1999 by the Water Research Centre and commissioned by English Nature and the Environment Agency, primarly provides an objective basis for formulating conservation strategies for relevant Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSIs) and Special Areas of Conservation (SACs). It was also seen as being applicable to chalk rivers more generally and has increasingly been regarded as important to the work of the Biodiversity Action Plan Steering Group on chalk rivers, which is led by the Environment Agency. This report contains information on characteristic wildlife communities, their habitat requirements and the ecological impact of activities that are relevant to the chalk river environment. It provides guidance on setting management objectives, options for mitigating impacts, and measures for the maintaining and enhancing the river channel, riparian and floodplain areas associated. The term `chalk river’ is used to describe watercourses dominated by groundwater discharge from chalk geology, including those that flow over a range of non-chalk surface geologies at various points along their length. England contains numerous examples of this river type, located in and downstream of areas of outcropping chalk in the south, East Anglia and up into Lincolnshire and Yorkshire. Indeed, England has the major part of the chalk river resource of Europe. A number of chalk rivers have been designated as Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSIs) and English Nature and Environment Agency work drawing up joint conservation strategies.