The boss of Chester Zoo has slammed a water company after raw sewage was discovered in a local river.
Jamie Christon, the zoo's Chief Executive Officer, sent an open letter to Welsh Water imploring it to tackle the issue of untreated sewage being released into the River Dee, describing the situation as “totally unacceptable.”
Writing to the water firm's chief executive, Pete Perry, Mr Christon, shared details of a number of important species and habitats in the river, including an invertebrate called the Scarce Yellow Stonefly, which is facing extinction.
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The River Dee is the only site in the UK where the species is known to reside, and Chester Zoo is involved in its conservation efforts.
Mr Christon went on to write: "Your discharge site is only a couple of miles upstream from the Dee Estuary Special Protection Area, Special Area of Conservation and Ramsar site. These designations represent the international importance of the Dee estuary and lower river catchment for rare and declining birds such as redshank, curlew, black-tailed godwit and pintail, as well as for declining habitats including saltmarsh, Atlantic salt meadows and mudflats.
A Chester parent also told Cheshire Live their son had chronic sickness and diarrhoea after swimming in the Dee near Eccleston some weeks ago.
The letter goes on to say: "We believe the current situation is totally unacceptable and would like to know what Dwr Cymru are doing to stop the discharge of sewage into the river in Chester, both in the short term and as part of your long term strategy for ensuring our waterways are clean and healthy."
"As I am sure you can appreciate, pollution of this environment puts these species and others at risk and undermines the protection afforded."
The River Dee was covered by a series of sites of special scientific interest (SSSI) designations on the English and Welsh stretches and was home to important wildlife including declining invertebrates like the Scarce Yellow Stonefly which was only rediscovered in the river in 2017.
Mr Christon added: "Whilst we can provide help via our expertise in husbandry and conservation breeding at our Chester Zoo site, we are ultimately reliant on there being a clean and healthy environment along the river itself to allow a successful restoration of populations in the wild."
"Sewage discharge at any point along the river presents a significant threat to these species and to those higher up the food chain such as fish and otters."
Continuing his explanation, Mr Christon said that the zoo "understood" the pressures on the wastewater system ,due in part to the recent dry weather they did not feel that discharging sewage into the river was necessary given alternatives available. One alternative mentioned was the use of sustainable drainage systems which can manage storm water locally.
Chester Zoo is currently supporting measures to set up new wetlands and drainage friendly habitats along their Nature Recovery Corridor which follows the line of the Shropshire Union Canal from Ellesmere Port to Chester. This was a project in partnership with other organisations such as Cheshire West and Chester Council and the Land Trust at the Countess of Chester Country Park.
Welsh Water have been approached for comment.
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