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Back Stream

A stream near Norton Fitzwarren, Somerset. No gauge of its own: what the river map and the banked data say about it.

Back Stream is a stream on Ordnance Survey’s river map near Norton Fitzwarren, Somerset, with about 5.5 km of mapped channel. On the map it flows into Norton Brook, which flows on into the River Tone, then the River Parrett and out to the sea.

Next gauge downstream

Halsewater on Norton Brook, about 290 m along the river below where Back Stream ends on the map.

0.19 mASD Normal · steady 31 min ago

After that, Taunton Market, about 3.5 km along the river.

No gauge measures Back Stream itself. A gauge downstream shows water that has already passed it, mixed with everything else that has joined on the way, so it says nothing exact about this stream.

Storm overflows on Back Stream

1 storm overflow is placed on this stream on the river map. Each status is the water company’s own monitor.

Bishops Lydeard WwTW Not discharging
Wessex Water · into Back Stream · 2025: 13 spills, 167 h

A status says whether an overflow is discharging now, never how much or why. A monitor that is offline or has not reported is not “not discharging”. Sewage in Britain’s rivers →

Live status: © Wessex Water storm overflow activity data, licensed under CC BY 4.0. Annual spill figures: Environment Agency Event Duration Monitoring return, © Environment Agency copyright and/or database right, Open Government Licence (OGL) v3.0.

Water-sampling points on Back Stream

3 Environment Agency sampling points are placed on this stream. These are dated samples taken by hand, not live readings, and FloodRadar does not grade them.

Back Stream at Fitzroy
Last sampled 18 Sep 2026 · 13 days ago · 18 samples banked
Back St BLW NTN F PS
Last sampled 14 Sep 2026 · 17 days ago · 19 samples banked
Back Stream at Abv B Lyd SW
Last sampled 8 May 2026 · 5 months ago · 25 samples banked

A sample is taken on a date; it says nothing about the water today. A sample below an overflow does not by itself show where anything in it came from.

Water samples: Environment Agency Water Quality Archive, © Environment Agency and/or database right 2026, Open Government Licence v3.0.

Places along it

From its source towards its mouth, the settlements within a kilometre of it on the map: Pickney, Fitzroy, Staplegrove, Norton Fitzwarren, Bishop's Hull.

On the map

The map needs JavaScript. Everything it shows is listed on this page.

The blue line is Back Stream; grey lines are other mapped watercourses. Lines from OS Open Rivers (edition 2026-04).

TA1 5AA, a postcode page near where it ends on the map (about 330 m away) →All rivers with gauges →

What this page can and cannot tell you

Its line, its name and where it flows come from Ordnance Survey’s river map (OS Open Rivers, edition 2026-04), which leaves out many small streams, ditches and culverts. “Flows into” is the map’s word: a channel that is not on the map is not shown here, which does not mean it is not there.
No gauge measures Back Stream itself, so its own level is not known here.
Storm overflows are listed only where the river map places them on this stream; an overflow it could not place is not counted.
Water samples are England’s only (the Environment Agency’s archive), placed where the map can place their sampling point.
Nothing on this page says whether any place floods. For an address, see its postcode page.

This uses Environment Agency flood and river level data from the real-time data API (Beta). Licence: Open Government Licence v3.0.