The Afon Ceri is a large tributary of the Afon Teifi that feeds into the main river a little to the west of Newcastle Emlyn. Over the last thirty years the quality of the water, the surrounding wildlife and the fishing has declined considerably. It has been polluted by slurry and sheep dip - probably on a regular basis - and has suffered from illegal fishing and siltation arising from stock walking through the river unhindered.As you can see from the picture above it doesn't look like the archetypal polluted river but appearances can be deceptive.

This situation has continued to the point where large areas of the river have been literally stripped of their invertebrates leaving the fish and birds such as the dippers and wagtails with a substantially reduced larder. The drop in the fish populations have had an impact on the survival of kingfishers, herons and otters as well as the larger predatory brown trout that were residents of the river. Populations of sewin and salmon have declined as those eggs that weren't suffocated by silt have hatched into fry that have had very little to eat.

Problems such as these are widespread throughout Britain and in response the Wild Trout Trust was established to protect and improve the rivers.

Wild Trout Wales is a project which has been drawn up by the EA and the WTT to bring much needed habitat restoration to ten Welsh rivers that have fallen into decline. The Afon Ceri seemed like a good candidate so the application from the Teifi Rivers Trust went in and fortunately was approved in due course.

The initial survey or AV (advisory visit) was planned for June 2007 but as a result of constant high water through the summer had to be put back to September.