Keele University is teaming up with a leading wildlife charity for a new project that will support communities to revive green spaces.

Local residents in the Staffordshire Moorlands will be encouraged to transform areas to boost wildlife under the Nature in Your Neighbourhood initiative, which is backed by a £752,415 grant from the National Lottery Community Fund.

Researchers and students at Keele will be directly involved in the project, carrying out surveys, running workshops, analysing data, and producing a final report on the scheme's success among other activities. They will work alongside teams from Staffordshire Wildlife Trust, Moorlands Climate Action, Staffordshire Moorlands District Council, OUTSIDE, and Staffordshire Council of Voluntary Youth Services on the five-year project.

The partnership will help communities to develop relationships with landowners and work together to improve habitats across the area. This could be a roadside verge with potential to become a mini meadow, or an area of parish council greenspace which could be transformed into a wetland where wildlife thrives.

Angie Turner, Lecturer in Environmental Sustainability at Keele University, said: "We’re delighted to be involved in this important community campaign that will transform and revive green spaces for our local communities.

"The project is centred around community groups taking the lead on making their local patch better for nature. Importantly, decisions are evidence-based, and residents will survey habitats, species and soil characteristics at the start, during, and end of the project to determine a baseline and track some of the effects that any change in habitat modification or management has on the site. By monitoring the level of carbon stored in each space, or the number of pollinators visiting a site for example, we can then use that information to track how these change as the habitat improves during the project.

"This wildlife monitoring will give us the opportunity to gather data and publish research that will provide an evidence-based and best practice approach that can be replicated and applied to similar schemes all over the UK, so the impact could reach far and wide.”

The initial few months of the project will see partners working together to establish which areas and groups will be involved. Staffordshire Wildlife Trust will provide ecological knowledge of sites, training and good practice guidance for the community members.

Alexis Johnson, Community Connector at Staffordshire Wildlife Trust, said: "We’re thrilled to embark on this innovative project and support communities in the Moorlands to take action for nature.

"Nature and the climate are on a cliff edge; we must act now if we want to turn things around. We can only do this by working together through projects like Nature in Your Neighbourhood. It's an exciting chance for locals to make a real and lasting difference for their local wildlife.

"Science and research are an incredibly important element of this project. The data collected by members of the community will enable the researchers and students to provide evidence of how community driven projects play a significant role in tackling climate change."

Communities can submit suggested locations to monitor and improve by emailing wilderenquiries@staffs-wildlife.org.uk