As ever yesterday was a busy day at the Trust with the daily smolt trap check at Catrine only producing a single salmon smolt.

Measuring the only smolt in the trap yesterday morning, increased water temperatures and levels should help progress things.

After finishing up at Catrine it was off to do see how our habitat restoration on the Culroy Burn had faired over winter. We took a few alder trees that we have been propagating in the office garden with us to bolster the planting we did over previous years.

Muir planting an alder tree behind our willow weaving. This weaving is protecting the banking just as envisioned.

There is a small infestation of skunk cabbage (Lysichiton americanus) at this site and yesterday was a good opportunity to how this has progressed from last year.

Skunk cabbage, so named due to its pungent smelling flower. These plants reproduce from both seeds and rhizomes. This plant is a perennial. To remove it the whole plant has to be dug out and left to desiccate in the wind and sun. Any rhizome remaining in the ground will result in the plant regrowing. Spraying may well be the best method of control.

There is a small patch of these plants on some very wet, boggy ground behind the burn downstream of Culroy. We dug the plants that we could out and will return to spray the remaining plants in the next few weeks.

Here’s a link to an information sheet on our website https://www.ayrshireriverstrust.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/SKUNK-CABBAGE.pdf