Green Streets Project
In September 2024, WEN was awarded a grant from the Postcode Neighbourhood Trust to be used on projects to improve biodiversity and respond to the climate emergency. The funding is raised by players of People’s Postcode Lottery and it enabled us to set up the Green Streets project, which had two aims:
- Increasing biodiversity and access to nature at our Falkland Road environmental hub in Wallasey, the Green Hub at the St James Garden in Birkenhead North, and the approaches to both areas.
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Recruiting and supporting volunteers to raise our presence at events and demonstrate eco solutions
Raya joined the WEN team as Volunteer Coordinator for Biodiversity and Climate Action. We would like to thank Raya for the work she did during the project, which ended in September 2025. Her knowledge and experience of biodiversity was incredible. She brought a delight in and appreciation of nature in all conversations and workshops. She came up with creative ideas and we could see her forest school training take root (excuse the pun). Thank you Raya!
Raya’s achievements on the Green Streets project are detailed below.
Achievements
Habitat creation and improvements around WEN, St James Garden and surrounding areas
This included:
- Restoration of an established pond
- Creation of a mini pond
- Addition of bird boxes and solitary bee hotels
- Wood piles for invertebrates, fungi and shelter for small animals
- Building a hibernaculum for hibernating frogs
- Building pollinator palace (sandarium to provide nesting area for mining bees, pollinator plants and caterpillar food plants, solitary bee boxes)
- Hedgehog houses
- Native wildflower seed bombs given to residents and local community groups to use in the local areas
Community engagement
Surveying residents to learn what they were most interested in, and encouraging them to improve their own gardens and areas for wildlife by providing them with items such as pollinator planters, wildlife friendly perennials, bird boxes, native wildflower seed packets and native wildflower seed bombs.
Encouraging and increasing engagement in citizen science projects such as:
- RSPB’s Big Garden Bird Watch
- Butterfly Conservation‘s Big Butterfly Count
- City Nature Challenge bioblitzes at Birkenhead Park and at WEN’s base at Falkland Road
- Attending Wild Weekend (organised by Cheshire Wildlife Trust) at Birkenhead Park Visitor Centre to promote WEN and the biodiversity work we were doing
- Volunteer groups at WEN and Green Hub
Education
Teaching the importance and benefits of maintaining and improving biodiversity and how to take action to do this. There were talks and workshops on subjects such as:
- Wild wellbeing (a talk on the importance of nature connection on human health and mental wellbeing)
- Wildlife gardening basics, including the importance of biodiversity and the potential for gardens to help provide a home for wildlife
- Gardening for pollinators including what to plant, addition of nesting habitat
- Gardening for birds including planting, supplementary feeding and bird box types
- Practical workshop on how to build, site and maintain a bird nesting box
- Practical workshop on how to build, site and maintain a bee hotel for mason bees
- How to make native wildflower seed bombs
- How to build homes for wildlife such as hedgehog houses, bug hotels and wood piles
- Gardening for Wildlife and Food, on how to grow food in your garden to cut down food bills but that also helps wildlife
- How to make a recycled bottle bird feeder
- Willow weaving workshop making a willow bird feeder
- Training people on how to use the wildlife recording app iNaturalist and how to engage in citizen science survey
Providing information sheets on subjects such as:
- Wildlife gardening tips
- How to create ponds and provide water for wildlife
- Gardening for birds
- Planting for pollinators
- Providing nest sites for bees
- Planting for food and wildlife
- Saving water in the garden
