Encouraging care for biodiversity through curated landscapes: community art and citizen science.

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This project investigates the role of curated landscapes in encouraging the public to care for biodiversity. Working with our partner Green Estate (GE), we will centre the project around a comparative investigation of native and non-native plant mixes and their ability to attract pollinators. We will engage the local community in this question using pre-grown turf meadow mats across different green public areas in socially disadvantaged areas in the city of Sheffield.Turf meadow mats are pre-grown systems that allow rapid establishment of perennial meadows. Our partner, Green Estate, produces turf meadow mats of native and non-native plant species. Due to the short project length, these mats will allow us to rapidly establish meadows and assess, through citizen science and art community activities, how curated landscapes can stimulate the public to caring for biodiversity.During this project, the PI and RA of the Department of Landscape Architecture of the University of Sheffield, in collaboration with Green Estate, and with the support of Sheffield Green Spaces Forum, will work on three stages:Stage 1.- Co-design interventions in green public areas with turf meadow mats (of two different seed mixes) in 8 different locations in deprived areas of the city of Sheffield.Stage 2.- Curated landscape activities through community art and insect pollinator surveys with citizen science.Stage 3. Temporary exhibitions of community art and citizen science findings.The objectives of the project are:To understand how the co-production of interventions in green spaces, through the use of turf meadow mats with different seed mixes, can help communities integrate spaces for biodiversity in their urban landscapes.To understand to what extent citizen science and community art projects can help incentivise an attitude of care for biodiversity in socially disadvantaged areas.To test two different turf meadow mats: a) native meadow species and b) native meadow and non-native species for their effectiveness in attracting insect pollinators in eight different urban green spaces in the city of Sheffield.The results and outputs of these objectives will be used to feed into landscape architecture guidelines and help influence best practice and policy. They will enable us to maximise the use of resources allocated for the protection of biodiversity by understanding which activities can encourage citizens to positively engage with and care for local biodiversity.