Pocket Forests Talk

Catherine provided practical examples of how people can make a difference in their local community by taking a small piece of land (between 6 and 50 square metres) and growing pockets of native forests. The technique used by Pocket Forests is based around planting very young native trees and shrubs close together – the Miyawaki method which replicates how tress grow in nature.

Pocket Forests have planted almost 5,000 native trees in 101 different urban settings with the help of more than 1,500 volunteers from local communities.

Catherine pointed out that 11% of Ireland is covered in trees compared to the EU average of 38% and that only 2% of Ireland is native tree coverage.

Catherine finished by saying that she would be delighted to get involved in a project here at IADT once the tree planting season is finished.

Catherine is co-founder of Pocket Forests and has almost three decades experience as a journalist and author. She has created several podcasts and written four books. Catherine writes a weekly sustainability column for The Irish Times.

The talk was organised by Rupert Westrup of the Department of Technology + Psychology and was funded under the Education for Sustainable Development theme of the N-TUTORR programme.