Restore nature pledge

Avoid pesticides. Pesticides are known to harm wildlife, contaminate soil and damage ecosystems.  There are natural ways to control garden pests without using poisons in your garden. Instead:

• Hand-weed – clearing a space by hand is rewarding and great exercise!
• Learn to appreciate ‘weeds’ like dandelions. These bloom early in spring when little else is in flower, so are therefore an important source of food for bees.
• Encourage natural pest predators like frogs by creating a pond or boggy area.
• Try companion planting to distract pests: marigolds repel aphids, nasturtiums attract caterpillars away from other plants and basil repels flies and mosquitoes.

Planting stores carbon and supports wildlife. There are many ways you can plant depending on your available space:

• Plant a tree! Fruit trees are a great choice for urban gardens. They create great structure in a small garden, give shade in hot summer months, support beneficial insects with much needed habitat and provide fruit for your family.
• Plant lavender (great for bees!) in a front or back garden or in a pot on your balcony or windowsill.
• Plant native shrubs like hawthorn which are great for wildlife habitats.
• Plant flowering plants such as salvia, sunflowers, or native annuals like cornflower and wild mustard. These are all brilliant for pollinators.

Water in your garden is essential to keep wildlife hydrated and allows birds and other creatures to cool down during hot weather. Even a small water feature helps frogs, birds, and butterflies.

You could consider creating a pond, a bird bath or a low-cost DIY alternative. An easy option is to bury an old washing up bowl or sink so that the top is just above ground. Simply fill the bowl with rainwater and add a few rocks so that wildlife can easily get in and out. You’ll be surprised how quickly frogs will appear in your garden - did you know that frogs eat slugs and snails, and that pond life keeps mosquitos at bay?

Installing a water butt in your garden is great for catching precious rainwater. Share the water you collect with wildlife in your garden. You’ll be hydrating thirsty wildlife and saving money on your water bills too!

Avoid artificial grass— it is hot in the summer, sheds microplastics and increases flood risk.

Grass lawns are an opportunity to help wildlife. Instead of cultivating a ‘perfect’ uniform lawn which has little benefit for wildlife:

• Let moss, dandelions, and daisies grow.
• Use grass seed mixes for variety.
• Convert parts of your lawn into wildflower meadows or bulb-friendly zones.
• Join No Mow May to let flowers bloom for pollinators.

Insects and other minibeasts need safe spaces to shelter, hide from predators and raise their young. Help them by building a bug hotel in your garden or outside area.

Your ‘hotel’ can be a multi-story mansion or a simple, small log pile – both and everything in between are beneficial! You can buy one or make your own.

For a simple DIY hotel - collect small logs, large sticks and pieces of rotting wood. Pile them up in a damp, shady area of your garden, then stuff some dead leaves in the nooks and crannies to make it cosy. Partially buried log piles are also great for stag beetles and smaller shelters work well for burrowing bee species.

By encouraging larger numbers of insects into your garden, you will also help provide food for our songbirds. Did you know that blue tits need around 6,000 insects to raise their young.  Increasingly, chicks are dying because adult birds cannot find enough insects to feed them.

Hedgehogs need to roam about a mile a night to find enough food to survive, and impenetrable fences and walls are making it impossible for them. In the 1970s they numbered around 30 million, now there are less than 1 million left and are listed as "Vulnerable" on Britain's red list of mammals.

We can make their life a little easier by removing the barriers to their survival – for example, by making holes in or under our garden fences and walls for them to pass through. A CD-sized hole  is sufficient for any hedgehog to pass through and will be too small for foxes to use. Could you encourage all your neighbours to create a hedgehog highway?

• If you have a fence, simply make a hole at the bottom of panel or two.
• If you have solid gravel boards, you can dig a channel underneath.
• If you have a wall, you can remove a brick or drill a hole at the bottom. Please take professional advice before completing this step.

Leaving vegetation and/or wood piles in a quiet corner is also great for supporting hibernation and can be beneficial to other animals too.

According to the Royal Horticultural Society, over a quarter of all front gardens are completely paved over! Over-paving means less habitat for wildlife and increases risk of flooding.

We know that parking is at a premium but there are simple steps you can take to swap some of your hard surfaces for greenery and preserve your parking space too. Here are some ideas:

• Plant along driveway edges. Wildflowers are often ideal in these spaces as they prefer nutrient-poor soils.
• Swap a fence or wall for a hedge to provide food and shelter for wildlife, reduce road noise and trap pollution.
• Take up a few patio slabs and plant in the space instead.
• Add large pots to driveways with plants like lavender.

Growing food supports health, biodiversity, and the planet. Even a single herb pot helps. Benefits include:

• Reducing pesticide use – growing your own food means you control what goes on it.
• Growing different food types and varieties is great for your health, increases biodiversity and attracts those important pollinators.

You can start small with tomatoes or basil. Many websites have brilliant advice, including this from the Royal Horticultural Society.

Redbridge supports a Community Gardening scheme where residents are encouraged to adopt public spaces to get growing on. Find out more and apply here. This is a great alternative to having an allotment site in Redbridge, the vast majority of which are over-subscribed.

Composting is great for reducing your household waste, saving you money and getting you outside. Having a compost pile or bin is also good for insects such as worms and beetles as it creates food and habitat for them.

Setting up a compost bin at home is a simple process and if you don’t have the outside space to be able to do so we can help via our community composting sites. Find out more on our dedicated composting webpage.

No garden or just want to do more? No problem—get involved through:

• Adopt a Tree Pit – Plant flowers in street tree pits
• Pollinator Pathways – Adopt all green spaces and help remove herbicides from your street
• Community Gardening – Take care of verges and public spaces
• Water new street trees - look for blue tags on street trees

Forest Farm Peace Garden is another place you can learn skills and get involved where a lot of food is grown locally.

You can also volunteer at Redbridge parks with Vision and gain practical experience in nature conservation in the process.

And finally, make sure you sign up to the Our Street e-newsletter to keep up to date with upcoming events and more top tips on how to help Restore Nature