Five schools release their trouts into River Lambourn

The RENEWAL Community Project, which tends to the urban stretch of the river Lambourn in Newbury, has been busy working with five local schools on a project to raise brown trout in the classroom.
In January, the five schools – Victoria Park Nursery and Winchcombe, Shaw-cum-Donnington, The Willows and Robert Sandilands primary schools – were each given a large fish tank, complete with water chiller, air filter and basket containing 80 trout eggs, provided by the Berkshire Trout Farm, in Hungerford.
Pupils watched the eggs hatch and have since been looking after the fish, while learning about trout life cycles and river ecosystems.
Art was also brought into their river studies, after local artist, Nick Garnett, worked with two classes to make a trout sculpture made from rubbish found in the river during river clean up days, also part of the RENEWAL project.
Tuesday March 26 proved a big day at the school, when the sculpture was officially inaugurated and pupils released the trout into the river, near to the Almond Avenue recreation ground.
Sarah Jones, Assistant Headteacher at Winchcombe School, said the impact of the project at the school had been, she said “Huge, and continued:
“The children have learned so much about the importance and delicate balance of rivers and our learning environment has been enhanced with a permanent sculpture of a trout. We would like to say a big thank you to the RENEWAL team and to Nick.”
The River Lambourn was once nationally renowned for its abundant stocks of brown trout and the RENEWAL team hope the initiative might go some way towards returning the river to its former glory.