Central Park

Zoo Field composting

We have been working alongside Food Plymouth's Generous Earth team to setup and support community composting sites at Central Park, Devonport and Keyham. We're helping to reduce food waste by turning it into a useful resource for Central Park, where monthly composting volunteer days are run to check on the composting and support the wider Zoo Field community garden. More recently, alongside Plymouth & South Devon Community Forest, we are supporting Generous Earth and Wise Roots CIC to further expand and improve Zoo Field for people and wildlife.

Heritage & green skills

Central Park is the perfect place to learn rural skills in a city! Historically managed as farmland before it became a public park, many traditional features like hedgerows and stone walls still exist with many needing some TLC. We are working alongside groups like Devon Rural Skills Trust to restore stone walls and run hedge-laying, promoting green skills for both staff and community members.

Central Park Volunteering

We run monthly practical volunteering sessions, which include activities like wildlife meadow sowing, tree care, path clearance and insect surveys. We also run monthly litter picking events in the park, linked to the Clean Our Patch litter picking hub setup at the Meadow Cafe. Check out our events page to find out more.

Golf course improvements

We teamed up with the Central Park Golf who were keen to improve the area for wildlife. Linking up with Plymouth & South Devon Community Forest, we co-designed course improvements with site users and ran many events to shape the golf course with nature through tree planting and meadow creation.

Schools, disadvantaged groups and more!

We work alongside many different groups in Central Park, to help improve their health and wellbeing through nature connection, and promote opportunities for them to actively get involved with caring for the park. We often team up with Montpellier Primary's Eco Warriors on improvements like tree planting and trails, as well as Devonport High School for Girls and Stoke Damerel Community College, where we are facilitating young people, particularly young women, to feel more comfortable in greenspaces and inspire nature ideas for their school.

We also regularly host activities for groups with additional needs, like eLivate Connected and The Vine, as well as run nature-themed activities to Argyle Community Trust's Walk & Talk around the park and St Luke's / Elder Tree's Compassionate Cafe. We support nature activities at several allotments around the park, including Horticultural Therapy Trust (Penlee allotments), and Central Park & Swarthmore associations.

The Green Communities Central Park team are based at the Central Park Hub. If you're thinking of hiring the hub for health and wellbeing activities, or are keen to learn about what happens at the hub, contact us to find out more!

Meet the team!

Holly (left) and Jess (right)