River Cam

The original name of the river was the Granta and (unusually) its present name derives from the city of Cambridge () rather than the other way around: After the city's present name developed in Middle English, the river's name was backformed to match. This was not universally applied, however, and the upper stretch of the river continues to be informally known as the Granta. It has been said that the river is the "Granta" above the Silver Street Bridge (in Cambridge) and the "Cam" below it. The confluence of River Rhee is about 4.7 km upstream of Silver Street bridge. In the Ordnance Survey map, the Granta tributary is called "River Cam or Granta", and in the public environment database is the Cam. It has a small tributary named Granta, unequivocally. The Rhee tributary, in the Ordnance Survey map is called "River Cam or Rhee". == Minor tributary ==

Another minor tributary is Bourn Brook which has its source near the village of Eltisley, west of Cambridge, running east through Caxton, Bourn and Toft to join the Cam at Byron's Pool. == The upper river ==

The upper course of the Cam starts near the village of Widdington in Essex, flowing north past Audley End House to merge with the other contributary Rhee, which is also commonly called River Cam, a mile south of Grantchester. From source to its confluence with the Rhee it is in length, or according to Environment Data, . ==The lower river==

eight on the lower river about to be "bumped" by 1st & 3rd Trinity during the May Bumps rowing races 2005 The lower River from Hauxton Junction to the junction on the Ely Ouse has a length of . An organisation called the Conservators of the River Cam was formed in 1702, charged with keeping the river navigable. The Conservators are responsible for the two locks in and north east of Cambridge: Jesus Lock and Baits Bite Lock. The stretch north (downstream) of Jesus Lock is sometimes called the lower river. The stretch between Jesus Lock and Baits Bite Lock is much used for rowing. There are also many residential boats on this stretch, their occupants forming a community who call themselves the Camboaters. Navigation on the lowest section of the Cam, below and including Bottisham Lock, is the responsibility of the Environment Agency. ==From Jesus Lock and the Backs to Grantchester (middle and upper river)==

in Cambridge: King's College Chapel (centre) and Clare College (left) The stretch above Jesus Lock is sometimes known as the middle river (with the section above the Mill Pond being referred to as the upper river). Between Jesus Lock and the Mill Pond, it passes through the Backs below the walls of many of the colleges. This is the section of river most popular with tourists, with its picture-postcard views of elegant bridges, green lawns and graceful willows. This stretch also has the unusual feature of the remains of a submerged towpath: the riverside colleges did not permit barge horses on the Backs, so the beasts waded up the Cam to the mill pulling their loads behind them. Access for mechanically powered boats is prohibited above 'La Mimosa' Pub (at the upstream end of Jesus Green) between 1 April and 30 September, when the middle and upper river are open only to manually propelled craft. The most common of these are the flat-bottomed punts. Between 1 October and 31 March powered boats are allowed as far as Mill Pool, but few people take advantage of this, as there are very few public mooring places along the Backs, and the river is too narrow and the bridges too low to afford easy passing or turning for many boats. Punts and canoes can be manhandled around the weir above the Mill Pool by means of the rollers, a slipway from lower to upper level. From the Mill Pool and its weir, the river can be followed upstream through Grantchester meadows to the village of Grantchester and Byron's Pool, where it is fed by many streams. ==Tributaries==

The two principal tributaries of the Cam are the Granta and the Rhee, though both are also known as the Cam. Rhee The Rhee begins just off the High Street (Ashwell Springs), at Ashwell in Hertfordshire. Running north out of Ashwell, it forms the county boundary between Bedfordshire and Hertfordshire for around two kilometres, then the boundary between Bedfordshire and Cambridgeshire for a further kilometre. At this point its course turns east and from here until it merges with the Granta it forms the parish boundary between a succession of villages, though until it reaches Barrington it remains at a distance of around a kilometre from any settlement of any size. It then touches the eastern edge of the village of Haslingfield before joining the Granta at Hauxton Junction. The headwaters of the Cam start in the parish of Debden to the east of the village of Widdington in Essex. After initially running south west to descend from the hills of Uttlesford, it turns north just west of the village of Henham. From there until Great Shelford it largely follows the course of the West Anglia Main Line railway. Its northward journey passes first through Newport, where it is joined by the streams known as Wicken Water and Debden Water. A couple of miles later it forms a picturesque addition to views of the stately home as it flows past the front of Audley End House, and is also joined by the stream known as Fulfen Slade. It then skirts the edges of a number of villages as it moves into Cambridgeshire, successively Littlebury, Little Chesterford, Great Chesterford, Ickleton, Hinxton, Duxford and Whittlesford, powering a number of water mills along the way. Forming the boundary between Great Shelford and Little Shelford, it turns west to flow past Hauxton to merge with the Rhee a mile south of Grantchester at Hauxton Junction. From source to its confluence with the Rhee it is in length. Granta The real Granta is a tributary of the upper Cam. It runs from south of Haverhill to join the Cam south of Great Shelford. Another minor tributary is Bourn Brook which has its source near the village of Eltisley, west of Cambridge, running east through Caxton, Bourn and Toft to join the Cam at Byron's Pool. ==Literature==

"The Reeve's Tale" from Geoffrey Chaucer's Canterbury Tales begins: The mill formerly stood by Brasley Bridge on Grantchester Road. The mill pond is extant and the foundations of the mill can be seen when the water is low. Byron's Pool is named after the poet, Lord Byron, who is reputed to have swum there. It was certainly a bathing place for Rupert Brooke and the Cambridge neo-Pagans. Brooke used to canoe from Cambridge to lodgings in Grantchester, which included the Old Vicarage. His homesick poem of 1912 evokes the river: {{poemquote|Oh! there the chestnuts, summer through, Beside the river make for you A tunnel of green gloom, and sleep Deeply above; and green and deep The stream mysterious glides beneath, Green as a dream and deep as death. ... To smell the thrilling-sweet and rotten Unforgettable, unforgotten River-smell, and hear the breeze Sobbing in the little trees. Say, do the elm-clumps greatly stand Still guardians of that holy land? The chestnuts shade, in reverend dream, The yet unacademic stream? One of Brooke's contemporaries, Gwen Darwin, later Raverat, grew up in the old mill by the Mill Pond. Her book, Period Piece, is a memoir of a childhood messing about on the river. The mill house is now part of Darwin College. Children's author Philippa Pearce, who lived in Great Shelford until her death in December 2006, featured the Cam in her books, most notably Minnow on the Say. The river is renamed the River Say, with Great and Little Shelford becoming Great and Little Barley, and Cambridge becoming "Castleford" (not to be confused with the real town of the same name in West Yorkshire). River Cam is referred to as "Camus, reverend Sire" in line 103 of John Milton's pastoral elegy Lycidas. Edward King, in whose memory the elegy was composed, was a fellow student at Cambridge. ==Use for recreation==

with the President's Lodge at Cambridge. Like many rivers, the Cam is extensively used for several forms of recreational activity. These include angling, swimming and various kinds of boating. on Suicide Sunday 2012. Angling The water is not murky and is clean enough from its source to its confluence with the Great Ouse to support fish. The fishing rights on the west bank are leased annually to the Cambridge Fish Preservation and Angling Society. The Cam below Bottisham Sluice may still hold burbot, a fish thought to be extinct in English waters since the early 1970s. The last known burbot caught in Britain was in 1969, on the Cam, and in 2010 a fisherman reported spotting two in the Great Ouse. Above Hinxton and Great Chesterford the river holds a stock of wild brown trout, though it is also stocked by the Audley Fly Fishers club and other angling societies who own the rights. Boating All boats using the river downstream of Mill Pond require a navigation licence from either the Conservators of the River Cam or the Environment Agency. There are public moorings just below Jesus Lock on both sides of the river and on the western bank just north of the bridge at Clayhithe (both with a maximum stay of 48 hours), and unofficial moorings on the railings adjoining Riverside in Cambridge (unlimited stay, but usually fully occupied) which are under review by Cambridge City Council and likely to be reduced to eight or nine formalised residential moorings, or removed altogether. The moorings on the commons in Cambridge (Jesus Green, Midsummer Common and Stourbridge Common) are reserved by the City Council for holders of its long-term mooring permits. There are also some privately owned moorings. There is a public slipway next to the garden of the Green Dragon pub in Water Street, Chesterton. This is occasionally used for launching small boats. Punting Punting is the most popular form of boating on the stretch of the river between Jesus Lock and Grantchester. Several of the colleges own punts, and they can also be hired from various companies, either with or without a person to operate them. The colleges and at least one private operator also own punts which are available for members of the public to travel on. Canoeing Canoeing and kayaking, both recreational and competitive, are popular at all times of year, especially on the section above the Mill Pond towards Grantchester. Both Cambridge Canoe Club (on Sheep's Green) and Cambridge University Canoe Club (just upstream from Newnham) are based here. Standup paddle boarding has also become popular. Powered boating Powered boats may navigate as far upstream as Byron’s Bear pub (next to Jesus Green) all year round, and as far as the Mill Pool between 1 October and 31 March. Rowing The lower river between Jesus Lock and Baits Bite Lock is the training and racing home of the Cambridge University Combined Boat Clubs' university and college, and the Cambridgeshire Rowing Association's town, rowing teams. The Cambridge Lent, May and Town Bumps rowing races, where boats set off at regular intervals, and the object is to catch and touch (that is, 'bump') the boat in front, are held here. Swimming Swimming on the upper reaches, between Byron's Pool and King's Mill Weir, is popular in the summer, and people bathe at Grantchester Meadows all year round. Hardy bathers take part in the New Year's Day swim. ==Navigation==

Cambridge had been an inland port due to its location on the River Cam prior to the draining of the Fens. As the university colleges rose in importance, the course of the river through the town, known as the Backs, was moved further to the east to accommodate their new buildings. A report conducted in 1618 by Richard Atkyns highlighted the problems caused by sandbanks above Clayhithe and watermills obstructing navigation. An order made by the parliamentary committee of the association in 1643 regulated use of the river for trade, but the biggest change was the construction of Denver Sluice on the River Great Ouse, which reduced river levels on the lower river as tidal waters were excluded from the Ouse. Both the university and the Corporation of Cambridge complained to Parliament in 1697 that the trade route to the town from King's Lynn had been severely impaired. In 1699, the corporation sought to obtain an act of Parliament which would allow them to improve the river from Clayhithe to Queens Mill at Cambridge. and created the Conservators of the River Cam, a legal body with authority to charge tolls for use of the river, which ranged from four shillings (20p) a ton for wine to one penny (0.4p) per person for passengers. The conservators, of which there were a maximum of eleven, had powers to mortgage the tolls, in order to raise capital for improvements to the river immediately. This they did, and built sluices at Jesus Green, Chesterton, Baits Bite and Clayhithe. Most of the tolls were collected at Clayhithe. The three locks are all of different sizes. Bottisham and Baits Bite locks are both fully automated, with a vertical guillotine gate at the upstream end and traditional mitre gates at the downstream end. Jesus lock is manually operated, and has mitre gates at both ends. Boat sizes are restricted to by the length of Bottisham lock, and to by the width of Baits Bite lock. Jesus lock is only wide. The navigable lodes of Reach, Swaffham Bulbeck and Bottisham, the last of which is no longer navigable, can be reached from the River Cam. ==Flooding==

The Cam is normally a placid river but flooding does occasionally happen. The most recent serious floods were in 2001, first in February and again on 22–23 October, and then in February 2009. The Environment Agency is responsible for managing water levels and issuing flood warnings for the entire river. ==Water resources==

Concerns have been raised about the abstraction of groundwater from the Chalk aquifer in the upper reaches of the Cam and the resulting impact on water levels and the chalk streams which feed its tributaries. In the 1990's, in an effort to mitigate the impact of reduced summer flows, the Environment Agency established a 'groundwater support system' which involved pumping water from the aquifer and feeding it into the river system at various points, which in some cases involve underground pipelines several miles long. == Further reading ==

• Pope's Corner, • Bottisham Lock, • Baits Bite Lock, • Chesterton, • Midsummer Common, • Jesus Green, • Jesus Lock, • Upstream end of Jesus Green, • River Cam at Cambridge, near Magdalene College, • The Backs, • Silver Street Bridge, • Mill Pond, • Sheep's Green, • Grantchester, • Byron's Pool, ==References==