Concrete Jungle: biodiversity through school gardens

Concrete Jungle is a new initiative to encourage schools to plant flowers and grow vegetables to create wildlife havens in their grounds. I’ve blogged before about the International Year of Biodiversity of which this campaign is a part. Concrete Jungle has been developed by Cool It Schools, a global programme for young people, encouraging them to do something about climate change. There’s a downloadable teacher’s pack with suggestions for developing a garden, and lesson plans and ideas to interest students.
I was particularly interested in this, since I’ve been developing a wildlife garden with a school which has now made real progress. After I set out the plot a group of volunteers set to with enthusiasm, and its hoped that the project will be completed this year.

Once schools have signed up with the Concrete Jungle campaign they can register the dimensions of their garden and use the site to show the progress they are making.

A Year of Biodiversity

The UN have designated 2010 “International Year of Biodiversity” in recognition of both its importance to all life on Earth, including the human species, and its increasing loss – mainly due to human activities such as deforestation, industrial monoculture food production, habitat pollution and climate impacts. The website declares the designation “is a celebration of life on earth and of the value of biodiversity for our lives. The world is invited to take action in 2010 to safeguard the variety of life on earth: biodiversity.”

“Why is it so important?”

Humans are but one animal within the Earth’s diverse flora & fauna, however there is one huge difference between our species and all others – we have the ability to protect or destroy the natural diversity. We depend upon the networks of other living species for food, fuel, health & wealth. Whether your belief in how this arose is through Darwinian evolution, or in the design of nature by a creator God or gods, there is no living organism on this planet which does not perform some service to others, and it is to our own detriment to endanger these networks – whether deliberately or unwittingly.

“Yes, but what good can I do?”

The main International Year of Biodiversity website urges us to do just one thing towards biodiversity, and gives a huge list of what we might pledge to do - from creating a wildflower meadow, planting a window box, not mowing part of our lawns, applying for an allotment, tackling Japanese Knotweed see here for more information on this), to encouraging bats.

The UK’s IYB website, hosted by the Natural History Museum, explains how we can all get involved. There’s information on saving the British dormouse; how to build a bug hotel in the autumn to help insect over-winter; joining in with the Big Wildlife Garden (more of this below); looking for lichens; enemy invaders (helping to monitor non-native species of ladybirds) and counting banded snails as part of Evolution Megalab, being run by the Open University, supported by the Royal Society.

The Big Wildlife Garden

Natural England are running this campaign which recognises two major aspects - the important part gardens play as habitats for many species, and that gardening in a wildlife-friendly way can increase the diversity of plants and animals. This is a topic I’ve alluded to several times here, such as growing fruits in my front garden, growing veggies in window boxes, and (not) tidying the garden for winter.

You can register your own garden here as part of the Big Wildlife Garden and gain points for the things you do to encourage wildlife - even just leaving a patch of nettles (which hosts 40 species of insects, including some of our most colourful butterflies) - building up your score towards Bronze, Silver, Gold and Green award levels. There’s an online forum too, to share ideas from other organisations.

School Wildlife Gardens

Of particular interest to me is the competition for the Big Wildlife Garden School of the year since I’m involved with a local infant school to develop just such a garden. Schools must work their way to Green level, and then send in an article and photos of their wildlife project. Judges will choose regional winners, as well as an overall national winner.

Biodiversity - join in – whatever size space you have!

School Woodland / Wildlife Garden: Progress

Earlier this year I was invited to design a woodland / wildlife garden for a local infant school.

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The school has a good-sized playing field alongside the playground and they had already planted a corner of the field with mixed tree saplings, but wanted help to develop it as a wildlife area with trails and study spaces which could be used as an educational resource, but which would also be fun for the children.

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My design includes a variety of habitats - scrub & hedgerow, trees with underplanted storeys of shrubs and perennials, a sunken bog area alongside a raised pond with a pebble beach, and adjacent wildflower meadow areas. There's also a living willow tunnel, a green-roofed shelter and we intend to include nesting boxes for birds, bats, hedgehogs, bees, lacewings and ladybirds.

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After completing and agreeing the concept design with the school, I structured the project into self-contained stages - each of which has an incremental, usable result, within a limited budget.

I'm very pleased to say that the school's fundraising efforts have been progressing well and the school "Friends" committee has approved starting work on the first 2 stages early in the new year. We're hoping that volunteers from amongst the community will take on some of the physical work - which will not only save costs but give everyone involved a sense of ownership and pride in the end result.

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The "Friends" group is a registered charity and organises events throughout the year to raise funds for projects at the school. They also liaise with businesses who may be willing to give donations or sponsorship. If you are in a position to help, please contact me and I'll be very pleased to introduce you to the school.

School Gardens

There's been an upsurge of interest in school gardens recently, due both to the interest in promoting healthier eating in our children, and in encouraging environmental studies. The Royal Horticultural Society is running a campaign, supported by Alan Titchmarsh and Chris Collins. The Kids Garden has some great ideas too, as does Growing Schools. Some of the large supermarkets are supporting these schemes, and the National Trust has joined with the Yorkshire Bank to promote greener school gardens in Yorkshire, as part of their greener gardens campaign.
I recently designed a wildlife garden for a school, which can be viewed here. I can't help feeling that the development of school gardens must be beneficial on so many levels, for both young people, teachers, school neighbours, and the environment in general.