Our Greening the Banks of the Water of Girvan project is making great progress and with the fencing and green engineering aspects of the project complete we’re turning our attention to tree planting over the coming weeks. We had been scheduled to begin planting this week but with freezing ground conditions we have had to postpone this work until the ground thaws.
Watch the video linked below for more detail on the progress we’ve made over the last couple of months.
We are grateful to the landowner and the Girvan DSFB for their continued support on this project.
Coir matting being installed: the coir is dug into a trench to secure the top edge and is then pegged extensively with potato starch pegs to secure the membrane into the bank. This provides a very secure, erosion proof blanket over the recently worked site. Grass will grow through the membrane.
Despite being sewn at the end of September the grass seed had taken well and was fairly well established come November.
Coir matting secured across the site. This is a critical component of protecting and establishing the green engineering. Similarly fencing is crucial to preventing livestock accessing and damaging the recently worked site.
A potato starch peg hold the membrane in place. The membrane is biodegradable and over the coming years will degrade into the banking. The benefit of the membrane is short term protection and a substrate to help grass seed grow through.