By Lesley Walsh
LOCAL bathing waters have been at their best since current monitoring efforts began, with popular spots like Ballyholme scoring a dramatic improvement in water quality compared to poor results in years.
Each of the nine beaches assessed throughout Ards and North Down were deemed ‘excellent’ on the first day of testing on May 27, ahead of the start of the 2025 annual bathing season on June 1st.
Testing results up to July 7 showed only one week when water quality dropped to a ’satisfactory’ level, and that was in Donaghadee on a testing day in June 13. Following that, it resumed its ‘number one’ grading which it has maintained to-date.
The first results of the season are part of the monitoring by the Department of Agriculture, the Environment and Rural Affairs (DAERA) which is responsible for ensuring the quality of coastal waters are high enough to bathe in during the season which winds up on September 15 each year.
Bathing water is tested for traces of bacteria including Escherichia Coli, or E Coli, and IE, Intestinal Enterococci.
With a top ‘excellent water quality’ score of one, Ballyholme has seen dramatic improvements in water quality compared to recent years.
Other top scorers in the North Down area included Brompton Bay in Bangor, Crawfordsburn, Helen’s Bay, Groomsport and Donaghadee
Similar to Ballyholme, in Donaghadee, this year’s ‘excellent’ rating, marks a welcome upturn for bathers, compared to 2023 when it was ‘poor’.
It improved the following year to ‘sufficient’, in a trend locals hope will continue in future to maintain this year’s top billing, like its neighbour Groomsport, which has scored the best status for the past five years running.
As in Ballyholme, the water quality at Brompton Bay has improved over time from 2023 when it was poor to sufficient in 2204, bypassing good all together to secure this year’s excellent rating.
In Crawfordsburn, bathers have enjoyed excellent quality waters since 2021, only dipping to good in 2023.
Beside Crawfordsburn, Helen’s Bay’s has hovered between the two top tiers of bathing quality in the past five years.
In the Ards area, Millisle, Ballywalter and Cloughey achieved the top slot in bathing quality, with the latter’s high score reflecting a consistent record of excellence since 2021.
Millisle and Ballywalter have consistently scored either excellent or good since the current way of monitoring, with Millisle only dropping to good in 2023, between years deemed excellent.
Ballywalter was good for two consecutive years, in 2023 2024, so this year’s results brings it back to its excellent category in 2021 and 2022.
