TCV Blogs Editor

Our local green spaces can soon be enjoyed with family and friends once again after months of separation, as lockdown restrictions begin to ease. This new level of freedom is celebrated by many across the UK, however for our environment it signals the sign of a new epidemic.

Last summer the relaxation of lockdown regulations saw a dramatic increasing in littering and fly-tipping across the UK. People spent more time outside, yet failed to recycle or clean up after themselves, leading to extreme amounts of rubbish littered in public green spaces.

While it was fantastic to see so many people appreciate nature and their local area – and we hope this momentum continues – we were saddened to read that the top four littered items in the UK were all easily recyclable, according to Planet Patrol’s 2020 ‘Extent of Litter in the UK’ report:

1. Plastic packaging
2. Drinks cans
3. Plastic bottles
4. Plastic fragments

The same report suggests that a shift to an ‘on-the-go infrastructure’ in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic has meant that many of our green spaces are overwhelmed with their bin to litter ratio. This is something the report refers to as ‘poor binfrastructure’.

Our new measurement is…rubbish.

As part of our ongoing work to better understand the impact of our work, The Conservation Volunteers now measure the amount of rubbish collected during volunteering sessions.

Many of our teams and volunteers are involved in removing litter from sites and this is now something that we are doing on a significant scale across all our regions.

Last year between April and July, councils across the UK collected an average of 57 tonnes of additional waste on top of the usual amount according to Keep Britain Tidy.

When asking our teams to add what other tasks they complete aside from the environmental impacts we already measure, collecting litter was the most recorded. This ranged from an office chair through to general litter with 20 bin bags as the highest amount collected at one site. It is becoming a standard task in our volunteering sessions.

With much time being dedicated to collecting litter, it prevents our volunteers from spending time and effort into preserving our natural environment and making their local communities happier and healthier. 

How you can help.

The most important step we can all take to tackle the littering problem within the UK is simple…don’t do it!

If a bin is full, hold on to your rubbish until you find one that is not. You may not realise that the bin won’t be emptied for some time and your sandwich packet could quickly fly off to a stream or get caught in a hedgerow.

This will reduce littering, but better still is to take it home to separate out into your recycle bins. A soggy coffee cup might not feel appealing to carry around with you, but remember the huge difference your small efforts can make to the environment.

Even better still, take the step of finding a recycle bin out of the equation by cutting down overall waste.

Why not try using reusable bottles, cups, and containers? Single-use items have been favoured during the pandemic to stop the spread of COVID-19, however with lockdown rules lifting and hygiene standards that have been adopted still in place, these can still be used in a hygienic manner.

If you want to join in the battle against litter, as well as committing to reducing and recycling, join your local TCV volunteering group. Speak to your local office to find activities that involve socially-distanced litter picks, or see if there is a TCV Community Network group near you.

The events of 2020 have highlighted the importance of being outdoors to people’s mental and physical health.

Many people found solace in taking walks in their local natural environment and escaping the unnerving and unprecedented reality the world was slowly adjusting to.

It allowed people to recognise how social, economic, and environmental factors affect our health.

Medication alone would have been unlikely to provide a sustainable improvement to the levels of anxiety around the world. People and their community were at the centre of getting through these times successfully.

It is this idea of people and community that is at the centre of social prescribing. Patients who have long-term conditions, need support with their mental health, are lonely or isolated, or who have complex social needs which affect their wellbeing create a personalised treatment plan with their link worker.

This plan focuses on what matters to them, and that might be a dose of nature, which is where TCV comes in.

Green social prescribing

Social prescribing works by enabling all local agencies to refer people to a link worker. Read more about how social prescribing works here.

There are a vast range of programmes that link workers can prescribe to people under the social prescribing umbrella, one of those being green prescribing.

Green social prescribing links people to nature-based programmes and activities such as TCV’s Green Gym, health walks, community gardening and food-growing projects.

“The Conservation Volunteers have given me a reason to get up in the morning and keep myself active and healthy while putting something back into my local community.”

Pat, TCV Green Gym volunteer.

A link worker may prescribe someone struggling with social isolation to their local Green Gym, which are fun and free outdoor sessions that focus on health and fitness with a practical conservation project.

By encouraging a person struggling with social isolation to take part in an activity that not only benefits their mental and physical health but their community too, they build a sense of belonging and make friends along the way.

“For me, the social and community aspects of volunteering have been the most notable. Years of isolation had severely blunted my ability to interact with people socially, but Green Gym has provided a safe environment for me to relearn the skills I’d lost.”

Mark, TCV Green Gym Volunteer

Participants of Green Gyms have shown an average of 20% improvement in cortisol awakening response, the body’s ‘fight-or-flight hormone’. The same study showed that Green Gym participants reported higher levels of well-being and lower levels of stress.

Trust Me I’m a Doctor – Green Gyms Proven to Reduce Stress

Social prescribing and TCV

The positive impacts of connecting with nature and connecting with your local community are why link workers encourage green social prescribing for patients.

“There are very powerful, multi-sensory stimulation from being in contact with nature. We get that from the sounds of the birds; visually and aesthetically from the different textures, the different colours, the feel of the soil, the feel of the different plants, the smells that are constantly around us.”

Dianne Keys, TCV Operations Leader – Northern Ireland.

With programmes such as Green Gym and our work in social prescribing , TCV looks forward to developing green prescribing as part of a healthcare revolution that continues to have a positive and significant impact on the healthcare sector.

TCV Health Development Manager Rachel Hoyes shares with us how a COVID relief grant from The National Lottery Heritage Fund has supported TCV groups across the UK during the pandemic and various lockdowns.

I think everyone can agree that the past year has made us all appreciate our wonderful local greenspaces.

TCV’s weekday volunteering teams often support management across many sites and these sites were heavily used over the first lockdown. However, they suffered from the lack of ongoing habitat and site management that our hard-working teams provide.

TCV was delighted to receive a grant of £140,800 from The National Lottery Heritage Fund to support TCV to start addressing the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on our heritage.

This fund has enabled TCV to get nine of our mid-week volunteer teams back up and running, and supported work on three TCV sites.

Over the six months of funding more than 385 individual volunteers have leant a hand, creating over 13,129 hours of volunteer work.

Funding also supported extra staff time to deliver volunteering sessions and ensure that sites and equipment were COVID safe. Teams also bought extra tools and cleaning equipment with the funds.

Mid-week teams

TCV’s midweek teams in Essex, Norfolk, Birmingham, Leicester, Hastings, and Stirling have carried out essential conservation work including clearing invasive scrub on wetlands, cutting and raking wildflower meadows, coppicing in woodland, and clearing duckweed from ponds.

Other work has included fencing for grazing cattle, building footpaths to prevent erosion, and working with local community groups to build raised beds and benches.

London

Stave Hill Ecology Park restarted their regular Wednesday volunteer sessions and thanks to the grant funding have introduce two new volunteer days on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

These extra sessions enabled volunteers to work socially distanced and catch up on missed site work.

“One of the most important outcomes has not been the work itself, but the impact of that work on park visitors. The park has had a huge increase in visitors, and although damage was not deliberate, there was some negative impact.

The volunteers’ highly visible presence demonstrated to visitors that this was a site that was valued, that people worked to create this space that visitors were discovering for the first time. Volunteers were a key means of communication, explaining the work being carried out and guiding visitors into site-friendly behaviour.

This has been an immense benefit for us, the wildlife and the local community.” 

Rebeka Clark, Senior Project Officer, Stave Hill Ecology Park

As a result of the volunteer work after lockdown, Stave Hill was also approached by Jasmine Faulkner from the Ida Girls.

Jasmine told us that the ecology park had been a lifeline whilst she had been unable to work. She wanted to give something back and proposed a small free concert.

We were able to successfully (and safely) host this event as we had a team of volunteers who were used to working within COVID-19 restrictions and had all been issued with individual PPE. The concert was very well received amongst the local community, who thanked us for lifting spirits.

Glasgow

The Glasgow team used some of their funds to deliver popular online training and resources. This supported volunteers who were not able to join group activities to keep active outside and continue volunteering.

Hedgehog surveying proved particularly popular gaining 19 volunteers. A series of ‘Green Monday’ talks aimed to lift people’s spirits on ‘Blue Monday’ attracted over 205 attendees at each session.

Manchester

In Manchester funding supported habitat work with the midweek team, as well as aiding the continuation of a gardening project supporting people with learning disabilities to gain skills and increase their health and wellbeing.

“One volunteer usually fills his week with volunteering with TCV and attending social groups for other autistic people. Unfortunately, this year, his social groups were cancelled due to COVID-19.

When we resumed volunteering, he was so grateful to be back. Volunteering gave him the opportunity to able to see people outside of their family and get a break from pacing the halls of their house!”

Ruth, Senior Project Officer

Northern Ireland

Funds in Northern Ireland supported midweek volunteering in Belfast, funding staff time to aid the group to get back up and running and supporting the work of the Clandeboye Tree Nursery.

Pre-COVID the Clandeboye Tree Nursery garnered over 120 volunteering hours per week, supporting the expert team of two TCV Project Officers to produce over 70,00 native trees per year.

In March 2020, all volunteering was suspended resulting in the main work force leaving their posts at a critical time of the tree growing season. There had also been an unexpected requirement to relocate the site.

This fund has supported volunteers to relocate the tree nursery to a new site and safely prepare over 120,000 bare-root trees for planting projects across Northern Ireland.

York

For the team in York, the funding enabled them to welcome back volunteers at the Hull Road Park project. When volunteering resumed, volunteers were eager to return as many are older and living alone and found the isolation and inactivity detrimental to their health.

Over the Christmas and New Year period, the fund aided the team to continue engaging with those volunteers to rely on regular interaction outside of their immediate household.

From the start of the current lockdown in early January, this engagement has been via a weekly ‘catch up call’. The team and volunteers exchange ideas and suggestions for activities they can do at home or in their gardens, such as The Big Garden Birdwatch.

This has kept volunteers engaged ready to start volunteering again when they can.

South Yorkshire – South Yorkshire Community Woodlands

South Yorkshire Community Woodlands consists of numerous locations across Doncaster, Barnsley and Rotherham covering 550 ha.

With funding the team have extended the contract of one of their Wardens, who has been a fantastic help in replacing damaged signs, clearing up vandalised areas, keeping sites clean, and helping the team improve the quality of local green spaces for people to enjoy.

This grant from the National Lottery Heritage Fund has made such a huge difference to staff, volunteers and to the wide range of sites TCV contributes to from improving habitats for wildlife, to mending the now well-used pathways.

It has also given staff the time to support volunteers in many ways, putting extra COVID-19 secure measures in place, keeping in contact with volunteers who have not be able to join any volunteering sessions, and providing fun and interesting online learning and support.

This was all possible due to players of The National Lottery. A huge THANK YOU to all National Lottery players from all at TCV.

Today is International Day of Girls and Women in Science day. The purpose of the day is to achieve full and equal access to and participation in science for women and girls.

To celebrate the day, we have asked Kirsty Crawford, Senior Project Officer at TCV Glasgow, to share the story of her journey to working in wildlife biology and conservation.

My path has taken many turns but I currently work as a Senior Project Officer in Glasgow, focused on Citizen Science projects. I’ve been in this role for three years, delivering a host of nature and community-based wildlife programmes across Central Scotland.

I didn’t always know I wanted to work in conservation, even while at school I had no idea about the range of jobs which could involve working in nature apart from maybe Park Ranger. At the time most of the biological science and outdoor jobs felt like they were geared up towards men.

My undergraduate was in Journalism and Creative Writing followed by a Performing Arts Diploma and years spent in London as a professional performer.

After a role at ZSL London Zoo as a wildlife presenter and an internship with the BBC Natural History Unit, I decided to apply for an MSc in Wildlife Biology and Conservation. I graduated in October 2020.

My entry to working with The Conservation Volunteers was through a brilliant traineeship scheme called Natural Talent UK. The aim of the programme was to increase expertise to protect our less well-known species and create awareness of the habitats that support them.

After a year of the traineeship in partnership with Buglife, combining skills in wildlife identification, project development, taxonomy and community engagement, a new role came up to deliver Citizen Science in Scotland.

Citizen Science can be defined simply as the involvement of volunteers in scientific research, an engaging and interesting challenge with many benefits.

Our TCV sessions are offered through our large-scale project Scotland Counts which has been running for over 12 years, as a means of substantial, thoughtful outreach with many diverse communities and members of the public.

Through this we deliver training courses, events, workshops, school sessions and design new surveys. Our flagship Citizen Science project is HogWatch Scotland, the first Scottish hedgehog conservation project which helps create new habitat, raise awareness, deliver educational programmes and carry out nocturnal work to survey this declining species.

In partnership with Earthwatch Europe, I also lead on the Naturehood community wildlife project in Glasgow, encouraging local communities to rewild their spaces and take action for nature.

Together with Scottish Forestry, we created a brand-new citizen science survey focused on assessing the health of local woodlands. The Dead Good Deadwood Survey highlights the importance of dead and decaying wood as a vital habitat for many rare species. We host training and community events to give volunteers and local groups the skills to carry out monitoring.

Part of our project also provides outreach to BME and recently arrived familied in Scotland to offer access to the outdoors, excursions, training and a range of events linked to Scottish natural heritage.

At a community level Citizen Science has been shown to be an agent for empowering communities to act as environmental stewards, protecting and improving their local and global environment. This is especially important for the young people which we connect with.

One of our projects this year, Pathways to STEM, has a focus on inspiring girls to consider conservation and environmental careers and STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths) subjects, in partnership with the Developing the Young Workforce campaign.

At secondary level we host dedicated workshops and discussion sessions for female pupils, including practical environmental sessions. More broadly, the project aims to connect young people with their local greenspaces and has worked with over 6,000 children.

Through Scotland Counts we try to reach outside the typical circle of people who are either already interested in wildlife or are studying a related subject, to allow us to target a new generation of citizen scientists.

I’m passionate about being ‘more than one thing’ in life and advocating for the impact of environmental education and the opportunities it can bring.

Our Christmas fundraising appeal was inspired by David, a TCV volunteer, and his son Joseph.

Our fundraising team use valuable case studies like David’s to share with people the importance of the individuals that we work with. Also to highlight how volunteering in a green space has such a huge impact on many people’s lives and the lives of others.

If you would like to make a donation this Christmas to help others like David click here. We welcome your support.

For David, his regular attendance at his local Green Gym was invaluable to helping him cope with his mental health.

“I went along [to Green Gym] and I was really anxious, and I met Jules and Zoe. The first time was a bit rocky because I didn’t know anybody but it’s different now.

There isn’t a topic that we cannot discuss now whereas before I didn’t feel like I could talk to anybody, Julie has made me feel so welcome. We do this now, so that everyone feels welcome.”

David – TCV Volunteer

When we spoke to David about him being the focus of our Christmas appeal, he was incredibly supportive and he also wanted to contribute to raising awareness of mental health.

Good mental health is an asset and is also linked to good physical health – both of which support positive social and economic outcomes for individuals and society.

“Doing Green Gym and other volunteering gets me out of my own head. I still suffer from depression and anxiety but I am working on them.

Getting out of the house makes a huge difference.”

David – TCV Volunteer

Mental health disorders account for almost a quarter of the total burden of ill health in the UK.

Sadly, we are starting to see more evidence that COVID-19 has had significant impact on mental health and health inequalities.

Since UK’s lockdown in March, TCV surveyed volunteers that told us about the importance of volunteering for reducing isolation. 72% of surveyed volunteers said that their social connectedness had become worse since lockdown.

Despite this, we have also seen how communities have come together during the pandemic, highlighting the value of community support.

64% of our volunteers said that their value of ‘community’ increased during this time.

“I take one day at a time, I don’t want to get my hopes up. I don’t even know what my hopes are, I just enjoy doing what I’m doing and I want to continue doing it.

Last year after Christmas, we were back in the Green Gym on 28^th December because we were so fed up of sitting at home and doing nothing.

We just wanted to get back in the Green Gym again.”

David – TCV Volunteer

Volunteering at TCV and exercising outdoors on projects with a purpose and with a social group has positive mental outcomes*. Projects such as our Green Gym contribute to participants’’ mental and physical health, as well as helping to improve local green spaces.

We know that the work of TCV helps thousands of people each year and we need your support to help our work continue – donate today.

David described how difficult his life was before joining TCV, and how different his life is now by volunteering at his local Green Gym. TCV has helped him with his mental health and given him confidence and connectedness to his community.

Please if you can make a donation this Christmas to help others like David click here.

Everything that lives on our planet depends upon the wonderful web of wildlife that fills the earth beneath us. That’s the message of the UN’s World Soil Day. 

Soil is not just dirt. It teems with a community of plants, animals, fungi and micro-organisms – ranging from the familiar mole and earthworm, to the truly alien: a microscopic worm-eating fungus that catches its prey with a lasso!  

The health of this invisible jungle is vital to us all. But what can we do in our every-day lives to protect the life in our soils?  Here are some practical steps you can take:

1. Reduce, Reuse, Recycle. Even if you don’t have a garden, or look after a community green space, you can help save our soils by being careful what you throw away. The less that goes into landfill, the better for our soil and everything in it.
   
2. Grow trees – preferably deciduous native ones. Trees do a terrific job below ground as well as above.  Decaying leaves provide nourishment for earthworms and microscopic invertebrates vital for the health of the soil while tree roots create an intricate network of underground habitats and bind the soil to prevent erosion.  I Dig Trees offers free trees to help you get cracking!
   
3. Use plants that suit local conditions – vegetation that doesn’t need a lot of looking after will allow the other inhabitants of your soil too thrive too.
   
4. Lay down a log – decaying wood provides a home and nourishment for topsoil inhabitants. A little pile of stones will also provide shelter for creatures that aerate the soil like ants, woodlice and earth worms.  If all you have is a patio or decking, plant pots or even bin bags full of stuff will provide useful shelter for earthworms.
   
5. Add water – a small pond can provide a habitat for toads which contribute to soil turnover, or create a mini-wetland: dig out a shallow area, lay down a plastic sheet and re-fill the hole.
   
6. Compost, compost, compost – save every scrap of vegetable and throw it on a compost heap.  This will nourish your plants and soil life while reducing or eliminating the cost of buying commercial (peat-free) product.
   
7. Use less water-soluble fertiliser – organic materials that need to be broken down in the soil will encourage a healthy population of micro-organisms.
   
8. Make peace with pests – growing plants that are resistant to local pests will mean less need for chemicals which can harm wildlife above and below ground. 
   
9. Take up Citizen Science – there’s still much we don’t know about the fantastic diversity of organisms in the soil (even the humble earthworm has its mysteries).  Get recording!
   
10. Join in, feel good – it’s a jungle down there and TCV teams and community groups are out every day caring for it!

Volunteering is at the heart of all we do here at The Conservation Volunteers. We are incredibly proud of our community of volunteers across the country who devote their time week in, week out, to care for and protect our local green spaces.

We don’t have to tell you that this year has been a strange one, with our volunteering sessions being temporarily suspended during the height of the UK lockdown earlier this year for the first time in over 60 years.

This International Volunteers Day, we want to take the opportunity to thank each and every one of our volunteers. Without your hard work and dedication, we wouldn’t be able to achieve all that we do.

You are what make TCV so special. You are all heroes in our eyes.

So, we want to take this opportunity to highlight some of work that has continued throughout the most unusual of years and we look forward to seeing what you will achieve in 2021!

We are still mad about trees

Tree planting season has book-ended 2020, with many of our volunteers using the new year to get outside and plant the trees they received through I Dig Trees.

We are always amazed by the continued dedication of our volunteers who are out planting trees in the dead of night (or early morning), coming together as a community to increase the number of trees planted. Even our corporate partners were out planting trees to help fight climate change.

Locked-down, but not out

While many of us were adjusting to the lockdown measures that came into place in March, TCV volunteers didn’t let that stop them.

Read all about the efforts our team and volunteers made to keep connected to nature and their community in the first couple of months of lockdown.

We saw communities all over the country come together to help the most vulnerable members of their community and make sure we got through the most difficult of times together. We are incredibly proud of all at TCV who played their part during lockdown and beyond.

Join in, feel good online

With social distancing guidelines in place, many of our volunteer groups went online to stay connected with each other and to nature.

WhatsApp groups, Facebook groups, newsletters and much more were created to ensure that social connectedness was not lost at a time when we felt the most distant from each other.

Teams such as TCV Birmingham have been making the most of going online by making sure that they are keeping everyone busy with hints and tips for gardening, recipes to use once produce is ready to harvest.

TCV Community Network Welcomed New Members

With TCV Community Network membership free for new and existing members this year, with thanks to players of People’s Postcode Lottery, the network has been thriving.

During lockdown, many of the groups let us know how they had been adapting and caring for the local green spaces and their communities.

Incredible Edible Garforth set up a raised bed at their local train station to provide commuters with fresh fruit and veg on their travels. The Pightle Millennium Green Trust created an enchanted forest for children and adults to enjoy during their daily walks.

Award winning volunteers

Back in June, TCV Belfast received the Queen’s Award for Voluntary Service. This is the highest award a volunteering group in the UK can receive and is the equivalent of an MBE.

Helen Tomb, TCV Belfast Operations Leader said of the group’s win: “We are absolutely thrilled to win the prestigious Queen’s Award for Voluntary Service. This award is a great achievement for all those who devote their time and energy to making a difference.”

TCV Belfast was one of 230 charities, social enterprises, and voluntary groups to receive the award this year and will attend a garden party at Buckingham Palace in May 2021, along with other recipients of this year’s award.

In December, our People’s Postcode Lottery Volunteer of the Year winner was announced. See who was victorious this year over on our YouTube channel.

Want to do something different in 2021?

If you are as inspired as we are by our volunteers, why not join your local TCV group and try something new in 2021. Head on over to our website and find out how to join in, feel good.

1,078,000 trees. That’s the number of trees The Conservation Volunteers’ partnership with OVO Energy celebrated being planted with their I Dig Trees programme in 2019.

With 370,000 trees up for grabs this year, the biggest yearly pledge to date, the 2020/21 tree planting seasons looks to be even bigger!

With the start of the tree planting season, quickly approaching, we are taking a look at why trees are so important in the fight against climate change and how you can still be part of this year’s effort whilst remaining COVID-19 safe.

Looking back at the 2019/20 planting season

Last year, the climate crisis dominated the news agenda around the world. School children across the globe went on strike, people marched to demand action from their leaders and governments and promises of more trees being planted by governments across the globe were promised.

With the coronavirus lockdown beginning as the 2019/20 tree planting season drew to a close, the climate crisis has taken a backseat to a more immediate threat. However, this doesn’t mean the crisis has stopped.

In 2019, we kicked off the tree planting season with a fantastic TCV 60^th Anniversary Tree Planting Event in West Hampstead, London. Over 100 TCV volunteers joined us to plant 3,500 new native trees.

Our I Dig Tree partners OVO Energy joined us for the special event and by the end of the season, we reached over 1 million trees planted through I Dig Trees since the programme began!

If laid out tip to tip, the trees planted as part of I Dig Trees would reach from Aberdeen to London, or collectively cover 46,750 tennis courts! It’s easy to see why I Dig Trees won the Charity Times Award for Corporate Social Responsibility Project of the Year.

TCV and OVO Energy promised that next year would be bigger and better as we encouraged more people across the UK to plant trees in a bid to beat climate change, and whilst lockdown may have put a stop to our spring and summer activities, we’re hopeful that we will be able to make good on our promise this autumn and winter.

2020/21 Tree Planting Season

With lockdown measures changing regularly, we are working hard behind the scenes to ensure that we are able to go ahead with our tree planting plans for this season.

The planting of trees is an important and simple thing that we can all do to contribute to the fight against the climate crisis. Trees help to reduce the amount of carbon in the atmosphere by absorbing carbon dioxide, using the carbon to produce sugars for tree growth and releasing the oxygen back into the air.

In April, due to the global lockdown, daily global carbon emissions were down by 17% compared to 2019, but they rose to just a 5% decrease by June.

As lockdown measures have eased around the world, the brief respite we had in global emissions will be long forgotten, therefore it is important that we focus on what we can do now to protect our planet for the future generations.

That is why for the 2020/21 tree planting season, I Dig Trees is pledging its largest number of trees to date: 370,000! However, none of the success of I Dig Trees happen without the help of YOU, our wonderful volunteers, coming together to make a difference.

For climate. For wildlife. For communities – I Dig Trees! To find out more about I Dig Trees visit our website or follow us on Twitter to keep up-to-date with the latest TCV news.