Become a treekeeper at a new Tiny Forest in Southmere Park

Tiny Forests are dense, fast-growing native woodlands, made up of 600 trees planted in a tennis court-sized plot of 200m2. We're working with Earthwatch Europe to establish a new Tiny Forest in Southmere Park as part of our Making Space for Nature and CLEVER Cities work; a partnership effort between Peabody, the Mayor of London and Groundwork.

This two-year programme of activities will:

• Provide a nature-rich and accessible green space, an inspiring outdoor classroom and living laboratory, where people can come together and reconnect with and develop their understanding of nature.
• Engage up to 100 people, including existing communities in Thamesmead, in tangible environmental action through a volunteer planting day.
• Build community action through the Tiny Forest Keeper Team: a group of individuals with the skills to act as ambassadors for the Tiny Forest, and work with Earthwatch to support with maintenance.
• Support a series of monitoring activities, where participants collect data on forest growth, development dynamics and learn about climate change and the value of trees.
• Create compelling communications content throughout the Tiny Forest life cycle – from design and creation approaches to monitoring stories – that compliment wider communications from the development.
• Contribute objective data on the benefits of the Tiny Forest as it establishes and grows: e.g. thermal comfort, flood mitigation, CO2 absorption, biodiversity prevalence and wellbeing benefits.

We’re looking for six volunteers who are interested in joining the Tiny Forest Keeper Team, and there are three main ways that you can get involved: forest maintenance, community engagement and carrying out science surveys (full training will be provided).

Only a few of the maintenance tasks should be considered as a key part of this role, and when these tasks are split between all six Tree Keepers, we expect each individual will only need to spend a couple of hours a month helping to care for the Tiny Forest.

The planting day will take place in mid-February 2022, the date will be confirmed soon.

If you’re interested in volunteering to join the Tiny Forest Keeper Team, or if you’d like to find out more, email our Making Space for Nature team: [email protected]

Find out more about the work our Making Space for Nature team is doing here.