Rivers and streams in and around the County Town have mostly fared badly in a nationwide water quality test.

More than 4,500 volunteers nationwide - including many from Maidstone - took part in the Great UK Water Blitz run by Earth Watch.

The volunteers were sent testing kits in advance of the four-day event at the end of September which they used to measure the quantity of nitrates and phosphates in their water samples.

The results have been collated into a national report that has just been published, which shows that of the 2,338 sites tested, 61% showed poor water quality.

Although phosphates and nitrates are found naturally in our streams and rivers, once their concentration becomes too high it can lead to a process called eutrophication, where excessive plant and algal growth leads to high levels of organic matter and bacterial activity, which in turn decreases oxygen concentrations, negatively impacting aquatic plants and animals.

In the nationwide survey, water from the River Medway was counted in the Thames Basin, which overall was the second most polluted river basin in the country.

However, very specific results were found in the the sites tested around Maidstone.

The Loose Stream, tested at the Loose Viaduct, was found to be “poor”.

The River Medway, when tested at Tovil footbridge, at the riverbank below College Avenue, in front of the Archbishop’s Palace Gardens, between the two Maidstone Bridges, at St Peter’s Bridge and at Fords Wharf Boatyard, all showed “poor.”

However, the river yielded two encouraging “good” results, when tested just below Clifford Way and at Allington Lock.

Likewise the River Len, tested in the Archbishop’s Gardens in the town centre and at the River Len Nature Reserve near Sainsbury, also tested “poor” and visible pollution was observed at the nature reserve with lots of floating litter, repeating a pattern first reported in January of last year.

However, further afield, the Lilk Stream in Bearsted and Mallards Pond in Downswood both yielded “good” test results.

Cllr Tony Harwood (Lib Dem) said: “Nearly all of the samples from urban Maidstone identify 'poor ecological quality', with heightened levels of nitrates and phosphates.

“I tested water quality within the Palace Avenue mill pond on the River Len.

“The preceding night had seen heavy rainfall and the alarm bells were immediately set ringing when I observed bream gasping for air at the surface and some unpleasant floating debris.

“Dissolved oxygen had likely been hit by ingress of sewage and runoff pollution triggered by the rain.

“The readings were a little worse than those recorded on the urban River Len in June during a drier period.”

“The WaterBlitz methodology is useful as far as it goes for identifying what we already know - that far too much sewage and contaminated run-off from farmland is getting into our watercourses.

“However, there is a more insidious and persistent cocktail of pollutants affecting our local rivers and streams in the form of highway run-off. This can contain highly toxic hydrocarbons, heavy metals, salts and micro plastics.

”There is increasing investment in tackling sewage and farm run-off, but the scandal of polluted highway drainage is being totally ignored by National Highways and local highway authorities, such as KCC.”

A full map of the results across the whole country can be found here.

The Waterblitz results continue already disturbing reports of pollution in the Medway after a survey in August carried out by the Environment Agency.

Members of the Medway River Users Association, who provided the photographs for this article, carried out some of the tests themselves.