Biodiversity is the variety of life on earth. This includes all species of plants and animals and all the natural systems that support them, the ecosystems. Biodiversity forms the living landscape around us and is essential to our survival. An environment rich in biodiversity will perform well in respect to other measures of environmental quality such as air and water qualities, and provide healthy and attractive environments for people to live in.

So, biodiversity is pretty important and is something we have heard increasingly more of in recent years. With this in mind, Civic Pride Rossendale is improving the biodiversity of the ecosystems in the Rossendale urban environment. But that doesn't trip off the tongue, so we are calling it Re-wilding Rossendale!

CPR already maintains over 20 public spaces and gardens in Rossendale so this seems like the best place to start to do what we can, however much or little, in those gardens to increase the variety of wildlife. The money is being spent on wildflower seeds, bird and bat boxes, bird baths, woodland plants, native plants, perennials, compost, insect hotels and hedgehog houses.

The work is carried out by the Civic Pride Rossendale volunteers in the public spaces and gardens that they maintain in Rawtenstall, Waterfoot and Crawshwbooth. What they do in each garden will depend on the type of garden it is and its location. But in every garden we are attracting more wildlife and making all of them more colourful and interesting places for the public to visit, explore and enjoy.