What to grow in my small and slow stream on our property?

[twh57]

Hi,

Don't know where to post this so thought I would try here first.
So we have a small flowing brook/stream on the back of our property. It's got a little polluted with all sorts of rubbish and probably an oil leak sometime ago. We've damned our portion of the brook up a bit to collect water.

My question is does anybody know what we could grow to help oxygenise and generally improve the water quality for wildlife and plant etc.? It's a clay based bed, and banking. There is on open plot of land that has thick grass and a few windflowers growing on opposite our land. It doesn't get too much sun, but it does get a little.

Thoughts?....

[Bigmallly]

Hello & welcome to the vine. Can you divert it & make a wildlife pond?

[twh57]

It's a possibility but a little unlikely at the moment because there isn't that much room down there. On both sides there a steep banking. Just enough to walk along the side.

What did you have in mind?

[veggiechicken]

Hi and welcome to the Grapevine.
Could you put a photo up of the stream and the banks to give us an idea of what you have. Its difficult to imagine it.

[twh57]

Not sure the picture is great quality, but think it gives you an idea. (Was quite cloudy as you can tell, so doesn't give you an idea of sunlight. It does flow, but pretty slowly unless we get a lot of rain over a couple day, then it can flow quite fast.)




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[twh57]

Not sure the picture is great quality, but think it gives you an idea. (Was quite cloudy as you can tell, so doesn't give you an idea of sunlight. It does flow, but pretty slowly unless we get a lot of rain over a couple day, then it can flow quite fast.)

It didn't seem to upload, haha, will try again, but the ipad doesn't seem to like uploading pictures!



Sent from my iPad using Grow Your Own Forum

Sent from my iPad using Grow Your Own Forum

[twh57]

Lets see if it worked!

[twh57]

That's about half of the length, the other half goes on behind me in the photo, but it gets harder to reach unless you walk in the middle!

[WendyC]

Whatever you plant I think it has got to be a British native plant as the possibility of pieces escaping and rooting downstream are quite high. There is quite a lot of information on Plantlife's website:

Invasive, non-native species | Campaigns

[andy_j]

Lots of water loving ferns such as Osmunda regalis, Maybe a Gunnera or what about a Rheum.

Some Pontederia, a few Buttomus, caltha, primula and Iris and you'll have a lovely lot of foliage and flower