The Digital Hub has partnered with social enterprise, Pocket Forests to host a unique tree nursery in a city location for growing native Irish trees and serving as distribution point for further planting around Dublin 8 and beyond.
The Tree Hub in an urban setting is the first initiative of its kind in Ireland and will improve the natural environment of the Dublin 8 area, of which several parts have been found to have low or below average tree density according to Mapping Green Dublin, an initiative between University College Dublin and Dublin 8 community groups.
In addition to the native tree nursery Pocket Forests have also installed Dublin 8’s first pocket forest in The Digital Hub campus. This forest, located in a reconditioned skip, donated to Pocket Forests by Thorntons Recycling, will promote biodiversity and pollination, and includes native plants such as birch, rowan, spindle and guelder rose.
Pocket Forests was set up in 2020 by event manager Ashe Conrad-Jones and journalist and author Catherine Cleary with the goal of improving biodiversity in urban areas. The idea is adapted from the Tiny Forest concept. Pocket Forests use permaculture methods to regenerate depleted soil and plant a diverse range of native trees and shrubs to recreate a forest in pockets of land as small as six square metres. Pocket Forest will run a series of six half-day workshops at The Digital Hub to educate people on the benefits of biodiversity, pollination, compost, soil health and the importance of healthy forest ecosystems in urban areas.
This partnership is the latest in The Digital Hub’s efforts to foster sustainable activities in Dublin 8. The campus is host to six beehives in partnership with the Robert Emmet Community Development Project’s Inner-City Bee Keeping Project. The Digital Hub also operates solar PV panels on a campus building to provide clean renewable energy to the campus, and is a lead partner on Smart D8, an initiative to improve the health and wellbeing of citizens through collaboration and innovation.