Pocket forests are popping up around Australia in spaces as small as a car parking spot, a tennis court or a street verge.
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00:00This is a pocket forest taking shape at a Perth school.
00:07It's very exciting.
00:08It's exciting.
00:09It's fun.
00:10It's fun.
00:11And I love it the most because I love animals and nature.
00:13They can fit into spaces the size of a car parking spot,
00:16a tennis court or a street verge.
00:18Under the guidance of Dr Greg Copeland,
00:20these students are following the Miyawaki method.
00:23That looks pretty good.
00:24Which has three main principles.
00:26It's planting locally native species
00:28that are specifically adapted to the area in which you're planting them.
00:32Soil remediation and the high density planting
00:34and all those things marry together to create the Miyawaki method
00:38and all the amazing benefits that you see from it.
00:40And it seems to work.
00:42This one here was planted just two years ago and look at it now.
00:46One of the benefits is cooling the urban landscape.
00:49It was a 43 degree day.
00:51It was 69 degrees on the local basketball court,
00:5542 degrees in the forest and then even 48 degrees on the grass.
01:00Once planted, the forests become part of the school curriculum.
01:03The more they are immersed in nature, the more they care about it.
01:07The children who participate in this program,
01:09some have never played in the dirt before,
01:11some have never planted a plant before.
01:13As part of the project,
01:15the health and wellbeing of students who interact with the forest
01:18will be measured against students who aren't involved.
01:21We want to re-engage children with nature.
01:23We've got children on one end of the spectrum
01:25who are really worried about the climate crisis
01:28and feel that they can't do anything about it.
01:30At the other end of the spectrum,
01:31we've got kids who are just on their iPads and their screens
01:34and totally disengaged.
01:35What's better, a forest or a classroom?
01:38Forest!
01:40Small forests with big potential.