Bev is one of several local community volunteers who look after a council-owned land at Ipswich Road Paddock. Yet to settle on a name, the group grew from the Holland-on-Sea Resident’s Association, but is now a group of dedicated volunteers from across the community.

Essex Wildlife Trust have been working with this project for the last two years. Advising the group on planting, habitat creation and the importance of retaining wildlife features like ivy and deadwood, lifelines for pollinators.

The group carry out their work with the consent of the council, who work in partnership with the volunteers who meet every Saturday morning.

For wildlife, the volunteers have introduced a dead leaf compost mound, hedgehog houses, planted pollinator-friendly shrubs and flowers, and created a mini meadow.

It is through the work of people like Bev and her volunteer colleagues, and their friends and supporters on the local council who welcome them, that habitat is being created in the heart of suburban Essex, and we are beginning to see signs of positive change.