Emily M Lewisham Rivers

FREE Riverfly Training Course

Join Thames21 for a free training course to become an urban riverfly monitor. Find out more and book onto the course HERE

Date: 23rd April 2025

Venue: Manor Park Classroom, Manor Park, SE13 54L

Timings: 09:15 – 16:00 (more details are in the below table). Please note, timings are slightly flexible so we may finish slightly earlier than 16:00.

Structure of the day:

09:15 = Arrivals, registration and refreshments

09:30 = Intros, health & safety and biosecurity

10:00 = Introduction to Riverfly monitoring (RMI)

10:20 = BREAK (tea/coffee)

10:30 = Target groups – identification, life history & ecology

11:10 = BREAK (tea/coffee)

11:20 = RMI fieldwork – theory

11:45 = BREAK (early lunch. You can instead eat later if you like!)

12:15 = RMI fieldwork – practical session in the river

14:30 = Clean equipment and kit

15:15 = ID quiz (back inside the pavilion)

15:20 = Online database and RMI in practice

13:45 = Questions and feedback

16:00 = Finish

Getting there: Please note this is not a very car friendly area, so driving in isn’t the best option for any attendees unless they can find paid parking nearby. There are multiple entrances into the park and it is well serviced by bus routes and Hither Green train station which is nearby (7 minute walk). 

Lunch: Please bring your own lunch with you, or there will be time during the break to buy some. Please also bring a water bottle with you.

Clothing: Please dress appropriately for the weather: bring lots of layers and warm clothes for the practical bit outside! If there is rain in the forecast, bring a raincoat. In general for riverfly monitoring, please wear long trousers and wear or bring a long-sleeved top/fleece/jumper to protect yourself from nettles or giant hogweed. Please also wear sturdy shoes for the walk to the site for the practical session.

Waders: Please let us know what your shoe size is ASAP so we can make sure to bring enough waders to fit everyone. We won’t be able to let you keep these waders unfortunately – they will just be loaned to you for the training day. Also, please let us know if you are going to bring your own waders. 

Equipment: All equipment for the RMI practical fieldwork will be provided on the day – we will give you / the person representing your group monitoring kit to take home with you. This kit includes: a large net (approximately 1.5m tall so I would advise not cycling if you are the designated person in your group who is taking the net home), a 16 litre bucket, a large white tray, a nine-section divided tray, a large pipette, a couple of small pipettes, a couple of plastic spoons, a magnifying glass and a paintbrush.

Let us know if you have any questions by emailing at jack.beard@thames21.org.uk or calling 07597576706

Emily M River Ravensbourne, Thames21

Beckenham Place Park River Sessions

From Wednesday 25th September until the river improvements are complete, Thames21 will be hosting weekly weekday events between 10am – 2pm and they’d love local residents and park users who can give their time in the week to get involved. These sessions will be led by Tyler, Thames21 River Restoration Officer Tyler, supported by Vic known by many of our volunteers who have been in the river with us since June 2023.

Find out more and sign up by clicking here to view the multiple events on the Thames21 booking platform, Plinth.

SEPTEMBER-NOVEMBER 2024

The dates for confirmed sessions are:

  1. 25/09 – Wednesday
  2. 26/09 – Thursday
  3. 03/10 – Thursday
  4. 04/10 – Friday
  5. 08/10 – Tuesday
  6. 11/10 – Friday
  7. 17/10 – Thursday
  8. 18/10 – Friday
  9. 23/10 – Wednesday
  10. 24/10 – Thursday
  11. 30/10 – Wednesday
  12. 1/11 – Friday
  13. 06/11 – Wednesday
  14. 08/11 – Friday

Thames21 would love to welcome especially people who live or work close to the park in Downham, Bellingham and Whitefoot to join their sessions, so please help us spread the word to anyone you know who these areas of Lewisham – thank you.

If you would like to join our group of local volunteers at the Thames21 but have some questions first, please email BPPRiver@Thames21.org.uk 

Emily M Lewisham Rivers, Rivers, Volunteer

Volunteer Sessions in March

March has seen our volunteers working in the ponds adjacent to some of Lewisham’s rivers. Mid-March generally marks the common toad migration in London, and as one of our 8 priority species within Lewisham we survey the ponds and migration routes at this time of year. Our volunteer sessions changed from morning and afternoon to being ‘in the parks after dark’, one of these ponds that we surveyed was Bell Green Pond (alongside and connected to the River Pool). Common frogs, smooth newts & common toads all found, with common toads seen in mating pairs and toadspawn present.

Onto another set of ponds in the borough, but this time brand new ponds being planted up by Thames21 and our volunteers. Purple Loosestrife, Brooklime, Yellow Flag Iris are a few of the plant species that have recently been planted in.

Emily M Lewisham Rivers, Volunteer

Volunteer Sessions in August

August brought the volunteer team some hot weather, so being in the river was a pleasant break from the heat! We started the month working on the boardwalk section of Cornmill Gardens, removing plants that had grown up through teh accessible viewing platform then reducing the vegetation height so you can get a clear view of the river. One bonus from our time at Cornmill was we got to watch Lewisham town centre’s resident peregrine falcons flying overhead!

We’ve also continued the job of clearing eel tiles around the catchment, and monitored the areas where we know siltation happens in backwaters and small channels.

We were also very lucky to have Philippa Nicholls, European Eel Officer, from Thames21 come along to our group and present on London’s European Eel population and some of the challenges and obstacles they face within the Ravensbourne Catchment.

Emily M Rivers, Thames21, Volunteer

Thames21 WATERBLITZ [30th May 2023]

A WaterBlitz is a water sampling event that helps provide a snapshot of pollution issues across a river’s catchment area.

This event is for local people and citizen scientists to take water samples of points of interest to them across the Ravensbourne Catchment (which includes the Ravensbourne, Pool, Chaffinch Brook, The Beck, Quaggy, Kyd Brook) to identify ongoing pollution issues impacting the catchment’s water quality. This event will also be an important opportunity to sample areas in the catchment that generally have relatively good water quality to understand how poorer quality stretches of our rivers could perform throughout the catchment in the absence of pollution challenges.

There is booking page for people to sign up

Emily M Rivers, Volunteer

#PlasticBlitz

Last month, the Rivers & People volunteers took part in The Thames and Tributaries ‘Plasticblitz’ week. This week of events was organised by Thames21, the Environment Agency and Rotary in the Valley (through their international End Plastic Soup campaign) to collate details on the amount and differing types of plastic pollution groups find across The Thames and it’s tributaries.

The Rivers & People group held a session at Brookmill Park where we cleared 6 bags of rubbish from the Ravensbourne River and it’s banks. A wide variety of litter was collected from plastic bottles to curtains. Our team collected 6 full bags of rubbish over a few hours and covered a stretch of river over 250 metres.

All of the data collected will feed into the EU-wide ‘Preventing Plastic Pollution’ Project.

Find out the overall results of the #PlasticBlitz HERE.

Jess kyle Thames21, Training

Thames Ambassador training – Thames River Watch, 26th June 2019

Thames21 writes

Want to help create a buzz about the health of the Thames? Help Thames21 spread the word about what we are doing on the Thames, get people involved, and get people excited about taking action to help clean up and monitor the Thames by becoming a Thames River Watch ambassador. As a Thames ambassador, you will support our events by welcoming volunteers, chatting to locals, and answering questions about Thames21. Our events are good at generating curiosity, so we want to explain what we are doing and get people to join in.

This day-long training session will provide non-experts with the knowledge and tools to become a Thames River Watch ambassador. Click here to find out more about the Thames River Watch project.

The session will include:

  • An introduction to Thames River Watch
  • The story of London’s River
  • The tidal foreshore environment
  • Water quality on the Thames (including how to monitor it)
  • Wildlife in the river
  • Ways for the public to get involved

The session involves indoor learning and a practical session on the foreshore.

Please note: if this is your first training session with Thames21, please sign up here.

If you have already registered for a training session with Thames21, you can sign onto this one by clicking here.

If you are interested in other training opportunities offered by Thames21 please sign up to receive our Training Bulletin

Date and time: June 26 Time 10:30 am – 4:30 pm
Venue: National Maritime Museum, Greenwich

Contact Abbi Kent
Phone: 07826913307
Email: abbi.kent@thames21.org.uk