Over 50 tonnes of wood debris from the Canal & River Trust’s Bevere Fish Pass on the River Severn made its way to this year’s world-famous Glastonbury Festival.
The wood, which collects in the fish pass when the river floods, was used as firewood for the event’s stone circle, which stays alight across the five days.
The Trust worked with Greg Klaes, chair of the Banbury Canal Partnership and a long-term visitor to Glastonbury, to collect the wood and transport it to Somerset, enabling it to be used at the festival and making a £3,500 saving on disposal costs for the Trust.
Contractors spent a week collecting the debris from the fish pass at Bevere, which was opened in 2020 by the Canal & River Trust as part of the Unlocking the Severn partnership with Severn Rivers Trust, the Environment Agency and Natural England to allow fish free passage past the nearby weir for the first time in 170 years.
The pass, just north of Worcester, is a 100-metre channel for fish such as the twaite shad, salmon, lamprey and eels to travel up the river.
Rob Labus, contract manager at the Canal & River Trust, explained: “Wood collects on the fish pass every time the River Severn floods. This debris needs to be removed to stop it from causing any blockages.
“It’s fantastic that this year the wood has been put to good use at Glastonbury and that we as a Trust were able to play a small part in such a huge event.
“We are grateful to Greg Klaes for his assistance because, as well as benefiting the festival, it represents a good cost saving for the Trust, so we can do more to preserve the region’s ecologically important waterways. I’d also like to thank our construction and operations teams in the West Midlands for their support in making this happen.”
Glastonbury Festival has been in existence for over half a century. It has developed into one of the world’s biggest music and contemporary art festivals, attracting crowds of around 200,000 people every year.
For more information on the work of the Canal & River Trust, including how to support through volunteering or making a donation, go to canalrivertrust.org.uk
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