THE ENVIRONMENT Agency is being threatened with legal action over fish farms and a sewage works which anglers claim is hitting fishing in a North Yorkshire beck.

Fish Legal says it has sent a judicial review pre-action letter to the Environment Agency for failing to review permits for a sewage works in Pickering, a private fish farm and the agency’s own fish farm on Costa Beck near Pickering.

Representing its member angling club - the Pickering Fishery Association - Fish Legal claims silt from two fish farms near the spring source has smothered the riverbed and prevented trout and grayling from reproducing in the beck.

A spokesperson said the beck was just to the west of Pickering, starting at Keld Head spring and joining Pickering Beck, which runs through the town, about two miles downstream.

"Once described as Yorkshire's finest grayling river, Costa Beck was classed as ‘poor’ for fish by the Environment Agency back in 2009," they said.

"In 2020, untreated storm sewage from Yorkshire Water’s Pickering works discharged into the beck on 108 separate occasions for a total of over 260 hours.

"Silt from the two fish farms near the spring source has smothered the riverbed and prevents trout and grayling from reproducing."

Andrew Kelton, Fish Legal Solicitor advising the angling club, said Costa Beck was one example of many from around the country where there had not been the will to address long-term pollution, which typically degraded the whole ecology of the water body in complex ways.

"At Costa Beck, the combined causes of degradation have been worked out, but the authorities refuse to grasp the nettle and take action.

"After many years of unsuccessful negotiation, legal action appears to be the only recourse.”

Martin Smith, Secretary of the Pickering Fishery Association said it was with some sadness that it now felt it had reached the point where legal action might be necessary.

"Our club (present and former members) has been working tirelessly for more than twenty years on how to restore this once wonderful fishery," he said.

" We have commissioned scientific research, involved the Angling Trust and Fish Legal, kept prodding the Environment Agency to take action, and talked with alleged polluters.

"Sadly, despite working closely with many good officers of the EA their processes seem to be incapable of rectifying the issues.

"We realise that legal action alone will not solve the problems, which have to be addressed on the ground and with real people. We will continue to talk (and to listen) but we are determined not to let this river be consigned to history.”

An agency spokesperson said they could not comment on an ongoing legal action.