Bee Bold 2024

BEE BOLD LOCKLEAZE 091024

We produced a community climate action plan with residents asking how we get to net zero by 2030. The lottery funded us to take one of our ideas forward and we chose the nature project, looking at how we could turn Lockleaze into an urban nature reserve. We have worked on seven spaces across Lockleaze: five greens and verges on people's streets, a public park, and at the sports centre where we have planted wildflowers in their attenuation ponds. The work we have done at the sports centre is really replicable across the country.

The wonderful thing about planting trees and wildflower meadows and hedges in your neighbourhood is that it gives you a real sense of the space and the place that you belong. This project has been a really good catalyst to help people get involved and know what they can do to support nature in our community. Not only has it been a lot of fun, but it has been really nice to connect with more of my neighbours. There are 250,000 miles of grass verges across the country that people can do this on.

People in cities can really make a difference by having a pond in their garden, by having some wildflower meadow or just leaving the grass throughout May and June so that the pollinators can feed on the wildflowers that grow there. It is a real pilot for what can happen across the rest of the country.

BEE BOLD AIRBUS 091024

The Bee Bold Awards is in its third year, set up to recognise and celebrate communities, charities, businesses, and schools that are engaging and connecting with nature in a meaningful way. This year we were delighted to see a global business, Airbus, enter the Bee Bold Awards. We wanted to create areas that were mimicking nature. We have looked at urban micro forests, very small versions of a big forest, and they recreate a natural system that will require no further maintenance after the initial support.

This means no pesticides, no fertilisers, and only rainwater. The Miyawaki micro forest will create habitat and ecosystem for small mammals, invertebrates, and birds, but also will support pollinators like butterflies, moths, and bees. This micro forest is made of 17 different native species. The Airbus project really highlights what can be achieved when you reimagine a space.

We had over 90 people turning up as volunteers in the sun and in the rain, including a lot of senior leaders in the business. If we want to achieve a sustainable transformation, it all starts with culture. People have to understand first why sustainability is important before they can act. To see beautiful areas of nature outside the windows allows them to reconnect with nature and remember why this is important.

BEE BOLD REDCLIFFE 091024

Bristol and the wider country is in a poor state in terms of nature and the habitat that we have for it. All businesses need to play a role where they can. Redcliffe is a really interesting area, right in the city centre. There is not a lot of green space here.

So we are really pleased to be able to do exciting projects that maximise these green spaces for the people that live and work in Redcliffe. We see it as a bit of an advertisement for wildflower meadows and what you can achieve. It is a very visual opportunity. People drive, walk, cycle, and get the bus past this location every day in their thousands.

We have had over 60 different people from 30 different businesses here to create the wildflower meadow. Seeing the project come together was incredible, partly because of the collaboration between all the different organisations involved, but also the fact it was volunteer-led makes me and the team really proud. They are looking spectacular at the moment and it is really inspiring us to ask questions like, what more could we do now? This project has been incredibly successful and as a result we have repeated it with Avon Wildlife Trust at their meadow on Brandon Hill.

Bee Bold 2024_ST PETERS_141024

I am the gardener here at St Peter's Hospice in Bristol. There is a huge range of people who benefit from this garden. Obviously our patients benefit most. It is really different to a hospital environment where you might be looking at a brick wall.

This wild area in particular changes the energy completely. The benefits of nature are proven: it reduces stress and cortisol, it calms you, it reduces sadness and anger. So patients benefit hugely, as do their families who are visiting them. We have tried to create a range of habitats here, so we have got some areas of short grass, some areas of medium grass.

In the medium grass we have got some wildflowers coming through, nettles, and cow parsley. This is really insect-rich here, and because of the insects, all the birds come in. We have recently started a gardening group with patients here at the hospice. We have been doing things like wildflower seed bombs so that they can do some guerrilla gardening at home or in their communities.

I would love to see gardens replicated in health settings. All health settings should have gardens. Access to green space and nature is so important. You have patients come here and immediately they start to feel calmer because they can see green space.

If you do have some space, be it a balcony or a space in a car park, I would really urge you to use it. Do not waste it. Use it for the benefit of people, plants, and pollinators.

Bee Bold 2024_EMERSENS GREEN_141024

We wanted to do something about climate change, having signed up to a climate emergency, and we realised we needed to get people in the area involved. The climate and nature group together set up a community nature reserve in Emerson's Green. We were aware of the fall in biodiversity, the threat to all animal species. So we encouraged people to sign up their gardens to care for them in a nature-friendly way.

There are about 7,000 houses in this area, and only 25 years ago these were farmers' fields. But if you join all those gardens together, you have got a very big area of places that nature can be made welcome. If everybody who had a garden did something for pollinators, we could make a massive difference. As human beings, we are totally dependent on the natural world.

We are part of nature. We cannot stand back and watch nature decline around us. We need to do something and we need to encourage others to do something. And it is much easier if you have got a bunch of people doing it together.

So much can be achieved in a small space. It does wonders not only for the environment and our pollinators, but for our mental health. Sometimes it is what you do not do that matters, like not mowing everything, not using herbicides and pesticides, but caring for the nature around you. We need urban spaces to step up, and you too can make a difference.

Bee Bold 2024_NEWLANDS DEVELOPMENT_030724

Legacy is really important to Newland Homes. We are building in communities across the region. Planning for the future is absolutely critical. The site here lacks ecological features and landscape.

One of the things we have been pleased to achieve is introducing wildflower, tree-lined streets and spaces people can walk through and enjoy. It is really important that the homes we are building sit amongst their character, landscape, and include biodiversity and habitat. Within the garden of the show home we have an example of what can be done: bird boxes and bat boxes, a bug hotel, and a hedgehog hotel. It is a great feature to give people an idea of how they can enhance their own gardens.

We really have future-proofed homes here. Including the provision of zero-carbon from the very start has meant that people are not having to retrofit solar panels and air source at a later date. They are already planned for, the cost of heating the home is almost zero, and that really does pay dividends in the long run for homeowners. We have made some great strides to do over and above what is required in new development and we are really proud of what is being achieved.

Legislation over time will require people to achieve what we are achieving here. We are ahead of the curve. We felt we had to be. It was our duty.