Riverfly workshop on the White Cart

New monitors from Busby Angling Club, Avon Angling club and the Nuffield Foundation have joined the Clyde Riverfly Monitoring Partnership (CRIMP) following a training workshop on the White Cart. During the practical session, CRIMPers spent time learning how to kick sample and what to look out for when choosing a sampling site. The White Cart Water downstream of the railway viaduct in Pollok Country Park was a suitable sampling site as far as the river was concerned but we had to take care to avoid dense stands of Giant Hogweed (Heracleum mantegazzianum, read more on this dangerous invasive plant here). Once confident with the sampling technique, each group estimated the numbers of the target invertebrate groups in their sorting tray. These results were then compared back in the visitors centre, to see the difference in results collected and after a short riverfly ID ‘examination’ delegates received their certificates. Now we’re looking forward to the follow-up days with the new CRIMPers, from which we hope to increase the coverage of sample sites across the Clyde catchment.