Restoration Forth Newsletter

May 2025

May 20, 2025

Welcome to our Restoration Forth Newsletter.

Restoration Forth aims to restore seagrass meadows and European flat oysters into the Firth of Forth, to create a healthier coastline for people and nature.  Whether you have been taking part in the project practical sessions, focus groups or just interested in how to get involved, thank you for your time and enthusiasm!  

Find out more about the project here.

Oyster News

We are delighted to announce that we have now restored 40,000 oysters to the Firth of Forth!

A big thank you to the 96 volunteers and community group members who helped us clean and release a further 10,000 oysters this Spring, which brings our total up to 40,000 oysters restored over the past four years.

Volunteers from the Edinburgh and Lothians Regional Equality Council joined us for one of the subtidal oyster deployments. Photo credit: Maverick Photo Agency.

The team have been back assessing our intertidal oyster sites to understand the survival rate and growth of the oysters in their new home. We are really pleased to have seen huge success, with 85% survival rate over winter of the oysters that have been returned so far.

As we see continued success at our oyster restoration sites, we’re now exploring new areas around the Firth of Forth to return oysters. Keep your eyes peeled for events along the Fife coast, as we assess potential sites for restoration.

Seagrass News

This March marked our third seagrass restoration season! With the help of 40 volunteers, we were able to plant 64,000 seeds at two restoration locations. Thank you to all the volunteers who came out and joined us.

This year the planting protocol was altered to follow evidence reported in recent scientific articles, which supports the creation of larger restoration plots planted with greater seed densities. This led us to create five 25m² plots, each planted with 330 seeds/m². In addition to these larger plots an experimental plot was planted with four different seed sources (Burntisland, Moray and two from Orkney) to identify which is best suited for future restoration efforts here in the Forth. The germination results of that experiment are still to be collected, stay tuned for further updates.

In April, Restoration Forth’s seagrass team attended the second European Seagrass Restoration Workshop in Arcachon, France. This granted the team the opportunity to create new connections with members of both the UK and European seagrass community and to learn about exciting work happing across the continent. The Ecology Centre has created a blog on Lyle’s experience attending this year’s conference. Head over to the Ecology Centre’s website to read more.

Oyster Observer Guide Update

Thank you so much to those of you who have completed and submitted an Oyster Observer Guide survey. This information will help inform which sites will be most suitable for oyster restoration work. We so far have surveys from the following locations:

Fife: Kingsbarns, Ravenscraig, Aberdour Silver Sands, Aberdour Black Sands, Aberdour Harbour, Limekilns, Kirkcaldy Beach, Kirkcaldy Esplanade, Kirkcaldy Shiel Burn, North Queensferry South Bay, North Queensferry Port Laing, Burntisland Pettycur.

Edinburgh: Cramond, Dalmeny, Wardie Bay, South Queensferry West Beach, South Queensferry Central Beach, South Queensferry under rail bridge, Seafield Portobello.

East Lothian: Seton Beach, Yellowcraig, Morrisons Haven, Tynemouth at Belhaven Bay, Belhaven Bay, Longniddry (Bents 1, 2 and 3) Fisherrow Sands, Musselburgh beach, Prestonpans, East Beach (Dunbar), Cockenzie, west of Port Seton Harbour, Gullane, Gosford Bay East, Gosford Bay West, Skateraw, Thorntonloch.

Incholm North Beach and Incholm South Beach.

If you have completed a survey but are still to submit your results, you can do so here. Likewise, if you would like to get involved, the Oyster Observer Guide and instructions on how to take part can be found here.

We are still working on an interactive map where you can look at the different locations that surveys have already been submitted, so please watch this space!