RAIN Northamptonshire

📸 The wildflower meadows around the Rush Meadow Ponds wetland are really looking a picture at the moment! 📸

We would love to capture some photos of the meadows that we can display, as part of our project.

If any local photography group would be interested in coming to take some photos, we would love to arrange a day for you to visit.

If you'd be interested, do please either send us a direct message here and email our project team on [email protected] and we will be in touch to arrange a time for a convenient visit.

Our plan would be to showcase photos taken across our social media and project website.

Thanks!

The RAIN project team attended the Flood & Coast exhibition and conference this week. It was a brilliant opportunity to learn, share ideas and to see flood resilience innovation in action.

For example, this miniature model of a town where sustainable urban drainage has been put into action, versus a town that hasn't provides a fantastic visual of the impact sustainable drainage has on soaking up excess rainfall, reducing impacts on central drainage systems.

Through the use of rain gardens, permeable surfaces and nature-based solutions, it really demonstrated the reduction of water on our systems.

Thanks to everyone we met, the sessions we attended, and congratulations to everyone who was recognised at the Flood & Coast Excellence Awards, including our fellow FCRIP programme Resilient Roch.

Delighted to share with you the latest RAIN Project Newsletter – providing a great insight on all the activities we have been working on over the last six months or more.

It’s been a busy time with our various initiatives, from natural flood management works through to progressing the Property Flood Resilience installation programme on 95 properties across Harpers Brook and Wootton Brook catchments.

Read the newsletter here: https://rainnorthants.co.uk/rain-newsletter/

RAIN Newsletter - RAIN If you have taken part in RAIN's Property Flood Resilience (PFR) scheme, you will soon be receiving access to the Resilico Connect app - your free flood-smart companion.

New Pond Completed at Rush Meadow Ponds 🌧️💧🌿

Delighted to confirm that an additional pond has now been created at Rush Meadow Ponds wetland near Brigstock.

Designed with a variety of depths and shallow shelves, the pond has been carefully created to maximise its value for wildlife, providing a range of habitats for aquatic plants, insects, amphibians and other species.

The new feature also incorporates a timber structure, similar in principle to a leaky dam, helping to slow and manage water flows as they move through the site.

This photograph was taken just before the heavens opened and the rain began to pour - a timely reminder of why projects like this matter!

By holding water higher up in the catchment and working with natural processes, these interventions can play an important role in supporting communities further downstream.

A huge thank you to landowner Hugh Shrive for his continued enthusiasm, support and commitment to the project.

Thanks too to our project partners Ebsford Environmental Ltd and Nene Rivers Trust CIO in bringing this additional pond to life.

The team at Nene Rivers Trust will be returning to the site to further enhance biodiversity and continue monitoring the natural flood management measures, helping us to understand the long-term benefits these ponds deliver.

And while we're on the subject of Rush Meadow Ponds... the wildflower meadows are looking absolutely spectacular this year! 🌼🌸

Now, on to the next site along the Harpers Brook catchment... watch this space for more updates!

Our project manager Sarah enjoyed going to the Nene Valley catchment partnership meeting last week… it is so important to understand other works across the Nene catchment and how our work here at RAIN can feed into those stories and strategies.

We also had a great site visit learning about the cascade and a fish pass on the site along with some history of the gardens.

Thanks to the team at Nene Rivers Trust for hosting such a great event.