Tree Planting for Aspen in the Class

The world has changed in the wake of COVID 19, but some things have not changed.  The RiverLife team and our volunteers are still – albeit in an adapted and socially distanced way – hard at work making improvements around the Almond and Avon rivers and their surrounding communities. 

Our Aspen in the Class project was scheduled to come to a close this autumn with tree planting taking place with local school children from four different schools.  Due to restrictions and changes brought about by COVID 19, we were not able to run the school planting days.  Instead, we were able to schedule COVID risk assessed volunteer planting days to get our Aspen sapling trees into the ground to their new homes on the riverbanks before Christmas. 

We chose four locations for the trees – West Calder, Kirkton weir, Rugby Club weir and Muiravonside Country Park.  Each location was chosen specifically because of the benefit the trees would provide in enhancing bank cover and solidifying and stabilising banks against erosion and flood risk. 

Aspen trees planted at West Calder were planted along a riparian bank that earlier this year had been covered in non-native conifer trees. The conifer trees, many of which were dying or unhealthy, were removed so that they could be replaced with native Scottish species.  The bank is now bursting with Aspen saplings.  While we were planting in West Calder we were lucky enough to have help planting from the Wonder Woods Woodland nursery.  The staff and kids of the nursery keenly gave us a helping hand one morning.  Some of our youngest tree planters yet!

Trees at Kirkton and Rugby Club were planted where previous trees had been removed to make way for construction works as the fish passes and rock ramps were being installed.  Sites at these locations that had become bare and treeless now have trees growing once again.

Finally, 150 Aspen saplings were planted along the riverbank in Muiravonside Country Park on 12^th December.  These are the first Aspen to be planted in the Country Park and they will help to reduce the risk of flood along a popular section of walkway near the Avon Aqueduct.

In total we planted 450 trees and had help from 15 volunteers during November and December. Although it was not quite the ending we had expected, it was a successful finale to our RiverLife Aspen in the Class project.  The Trust is looking forward to continuing our partnership with Eadha Trees in the future, planting many more Aspen and continuing educational activities and events about the benefits for rivers of trees in general, and Aspen in particular, for many years to come.