In collaboration with Clouston Associates, our Nature in Cities team created a detailed concept for 10 hectares across Camden Council’s John Oxley Reserve in western Sydney to deliver measurable outcomes for both people and nature. Partners, community volunteers and professional planting teams installed 17,000 native trees, shrubs and groundcovers at this flagship site to demonstrate the importance of nurturing nature in our urban landscapes.

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Associated with our Cooling the Schools initiative, from 2020-2023 we planted more than 63,700 native trees at community sites across Sydney (in addition to planting over 23,300 native trees with 130 schools) in partnership with five local councils and one academic institution. The plantings aimed to establish urban micro-forests, which will become a living legacy landmark, and important sources of shade, cooling and recreation for Sydneysiders.

Western Sydney Dry Rainforest (WSDR) is a critically endangered ecological community of the Cumberland Plain. Remnants are mostly found on private land. With funding from NSW Environmental Trust, we held practical workshops for landholders on monitoring and managing this unique ecosystem. We visited multiple properties to conduct vegetation assessments and provide Site Management Plans, and propagated 3,000 local provenance native WSDR plants for landholders in the Razorback region to add to their properties.

To help bring nature back to the ‘burbs, Western Sydney Parklands Trust contracted Greening Australia to engage primary and high schools in a series of educational, hands-on planting events. Over three years, we worked with students from 90 schools to plant more than 60,000 native trees and shrubs, providing habitat and relinking bushland in three highly developed Sydney suburbs – Abbotsbury, Dean Park, and West Hoxton.