Our Nature Restoration Funded Water of Girvan Project update sees us planting trees over the last few months. The weather has been far from kind to us but despite this we’ve planted 2900 trees on the fenced sections of river banks and upwards of 1000 willow cuttings into eroding sections of banks.
A cell grown crab apple about to be planted, we have planted a wide variety of species across the site, to give the river bank structural diversity. A diverse species mix will also lead to greater variety of insect and bird species utilising the river corridor. Each tree species yields fruit at different times of the year and some trees will blossom and provide nutrients to insects early in the year. Willow is an important early source of nectar for many pollinating insects.
The stabilised section of river bank is establishing well and now that it has trees planted on the banktop it should develop into a natural looking section of river bank capable of dealing with large spates and offering habitat contiuntity which was previously missing due to a lack of riparian trees.
This project is focused on bringing improving to the riparian habitats to bring benefits to fish species as well as all the terrestrial species that utilise river corridors. This video details the tree planting aspect of the project we are delivering on the Water of Girvan.
Access to many of the planting sites was difficult and often required long walks carrying trees, stakes and guards as the surrounding fields were waterlogged due to a very wet winter. We even had to use a small boat to transport trees stakes across the river in one instance – where there’s a will, there is a way!
We were joined by a number of volunteers over the weeks, pictured is a group from the Binnies Group, who used their volunteer day to come and plant trees with us. We’re very grateful to all the volunteers who came out and helped us over the course of the project.
Give our video a watch for more detail and watch out for a final more updates overview coming soon! #naturerestorationfund Net Zero Scotland.
We are grateful to the landowner and the Girvan DSFB for their support throughout this project.
