River Hipper


The River Hipper is a tributary of the River Rother in Derbyshire, England. Its source is a large expanse of wetlands, fed by the surrounding moors between Chatsworth and Chesterfield, known as the Hipper Sick on Beeley Moor, which is part of the Chatsworth Estate. It then passes through Holymoorside and down into Chesterfield, just south of the town centre, before flowing into the River Rother. In July 2007, parts of Chesterfield flooded when the River Hipper burst its banks during a substantial storm that caused extensive flooding in North Derbyshire and South Yorkshire.

Water Quality

The Environment Agency are responsible for measuring the water quality within each of the river systems in England. Each is given an overall ecological status, which may be one of five levels: high, good, moderate, poor and bad. There are several components that are used to determine this, including biological status, which looks at the quantity and varieties of invertebrates, angiosperms and fish, and chemical status, which compares the concentrations of various chemicals against known safe concentrations. Chemical status is rated as good or fail. However, a survey by the Wild Trout Trust sound that the Hipper had been impounded by a number of weirs and that its channel had been straightened. The impoundements prevent genefow between populations of fish in the different pools created while the straightening of the channel reduces the variety of habitats available to wildlife.
The water quality of the Hipper was as follows in 2015.
SectionEcological StatusChemical StatusOverall Status