Connecting people and nature

Connecting with nature offers huge health, education and community benefits and the chance to help wildlife. It’s a win-win.

We need to make Devon a place where everyone is able to connect with nature.

The Devon Local Nature Partnership runs three networks relating to health, education and community action. Join today!

What we need to do and where

Two volunteers are talking, whilst standing on rocks in Plymouth. The rocks are covered in seaweed, and the volunteers look happy. — Plymouth Sound National Marine Park, Plymouth City Council

1. About

Connecting with nature has huge benefits for people’s health, wellbeing and education. To ensure that nature is part of everyday life we need accessible wildlife-rich habitats across the county, especially where people live, work, play and learn.

Connecting people with nature in Devon is about creating fair, inspiring and meaningful opportunities for everyone to experience the benefits of the natural world—wherever they live and however they engage. There are lots of committed organisations, community groups, schools and individuals working across the county to help people get outside, connect with nature and make a difference.

The Devon Local Nature Partnership (LNP) has three county-wide networks that help to connect people and nature. For more information see the drop-downs below.

Health and wellbeing and Naturally Healthy

The LNP’s Naturally Healthy initiative aims to make sure that everyone can get outside, get active and experience the powerful benefits of connecting with nature for their health and wellbeing. The initiative is led by Devon County Council and Active Devon. It brings together the environmental, access and health and wellbeing sectors with networking meetings a few times a year. To find out more and join the network see the Naturally Healthy pages on the Local Nature Partnership website.

The Devon Connect website and JOY app are promoted as the main online places where people can find activities for nature connection in the county. Devon Connect is used to help publicise the Naturally Healthy May campaign each year and is likely to be even more important for future campaigns as activities will be badged as ‘Naturally Healthy’. The JOY app is used by Social Prescribers and so is a vital link between health and nature connection activities.

Outdoor Learning and the Network of Environmental Educators in Devon

The Network of Environmental Educators in Devon (NEED) brings together a diverse group of people who are passionate about and facilitate environmental education across the county. The NEED vision is that everyone, everywhere, has access to the outdoors to learn and care about Devon’s nature, helping to increase environmental awareness and sustainability. The group has a large network of members who regularly meet to share information and best practice. To find out and to join the network see the NEED pages on the Local Nature Partnership website.

Outdoor Learning includes a wide range of approaches and activities, all based on learning that uses real world, immersive and memorable experiences that enrich and deepen understanding. Examples are:

Environmental Education and Forest School.
Fieldwork – specifically for geography and science but also very effective for history, culture and art.
Adventurous activities, expeditions and residentials.

Outdoor Learning is more than a ‘nice to have’. Peer-reviewed, published research shows that when planned properly, and integrated into medium-term teaching plans and schemes of work, Outdoor Learning contributes significantly to pro-environmental and pro-social behaviour, improves academic attainment and extends intellectual grasp of subject content, and develops resilience, self-confidence and self-esteem. Being outdoors, in natural environments and engaged in purposeful activity, also has physical health and mental wellbeing benefits.

Outdoor Learning is learning about the environment, in the environment and, importantly, for the environment.

Community action and Wild About Devon

The Wild About Devon network supports community action for nature across Devon. The network includes in-person forums, an active Facebook Page, grant funds, award schemes, and online resources such as a Community Action Map and information signposting.

Members include committed individuals, active local community groups and organisations, Devon Association of Local Councils, Devon Communities Together, National Landscapes, National Parks, Devon Wildlife Trust, Wildlife Wardens, and many more!

See the Wild About Devon webpage for more information and how to get involved.

Explore Devon and the Devon Connect websites

Devon County Council’s Explore Devon website promotes great places to visit and explore wildlife, history and geology across Devon. The website includes a map, information about sites and how to get there. Through the work for this strategy, more wildlife sites have been added to the map and each habitat and species page includes a few examples of places to visit and a link to the website.

Devon Connect is an online community hub that aims to connect people to their community and promote social action. It lists lots of events and volunteering opportunities and is supported by partners in the Devon Voluntary Alliance. See the Health and wellbeing and Naturally Healthy drop-down above.

Access to nature is about more than physical proximity. It’s about valued and used local spaces, inclusive design and community-led action. From mapping need and opportunity, to supporting grassroots projects and improving strategic planning, there’s lots of great work going on across Devon to connect people to nature in ways that reflect local priorities, support wellbeing and contribute to nature recovery.

This is a collective effort to make Devon a place where nature is for everyone – now and for the future.

2. What we need to do and where

Priority

Everyone is able to connect with nature, providing health, wellbeing, education and community benefits.

Actions

Manage and create accessible wildlife-rich spaces in Devon’s cities, towns and villages

Include access to nature in relevant strategies such as local plans and associated green infrastructure strategies, local cycling and walking infrastructure plans and health strategies. Ensure that access to nature is delivered, for example through planning conditions and legal agreements.
Support communities to create and use wildlife-rich spaces.
Support schools to develop and use nature restoration spaces in school grounds based on LNRS priority species and habitats, with opportunities for help through the National Education Nature Park programme.
Improve sustainable travel to more rural and accessible wildlife-rich spaces across Devon such as the coast, Dartmoor and Exmoor.
Improve and promote the Explore Devon website to help people find local and accessible sites.

Increase opportunities to improve health and wellbeing through contact with nature

Join or support the Devon Naturally Healthy initiative.
Embed opportunities to connect with nature into the work of the health sector (including public health and social prescribing) to achieve health and wellbeing priorities.
Support organisations and projects that promote and deliver heath and wellbeing through nature.
Support websites and online spaces such as Devon Connect and the JOY app to help promote nature connection activities and link up the health, nature and voluntary sectors.

See the Naturally Healthy pages on the Local Nature Partnership website for more information and actions relating to this action.

Increase Outdoor Learning and environmental education across all subject areas

Join or support the Network for Environmental Educators in Devon to embed Outdoor Learning into the curriculum.
Use Devon’s natural environment to help achieve education outcomes.
Weave sustainability, climate and environmental education across subject areas to ensure children build understanding and agency for their future.
Support teachers to enable them to deliver Outdoor Learning.

See the Network for Environmental Educator pages on the Local Nature Partnership website for more information and actions relating to this action.

Increase community action for wildlife

Join or support the Wild About Devon network to help communities take action for wildlife across Devon.
Get involved with your local environmental community group or start your own.
Support your town or parish council with their duty to conserve and enhance biodiversity.

See the Wild About Devon pages on the Local Nature Partnership website for more information and actions relating to this action.

Where to focus action

All cities, towns and villages! Accessible wildlife-rich green spaces are needed everywhere across Devon. However, a good place to start is where people congregate such as schools, village halls, libraries and other key community hubs.

Community Access to Nature Opportunity Areas have been mapped for the LNRS. These are simple 500 m zones around all Devon’s village halls and state schools. See Mapping for the LNRS Viewer.

These areas show where creating wildlife-rich spaces could benefit communities in rural and urban areas. If the mapped areas are already rich in accessible nature, then great! This is a very simplistic approach to mapping.

Please see Find out more below for further discussion and information to help create accessible wildlife-rich greenspaces.

3. Inspiration

Case studies

There are lots of great projects across Devon to connect people and nature. A few examples are given below. See the Local Nature Partnership website for more information including a map showing community wildlife groups on the Wild About Devon pages and a list of outdoor education providers on the Outdoor Learning pages.

Connecting Actively to Nature

Connecting Actively to Nature was a programme led by Active Devon under the umbrella of the Devon Local Nature Partnership’s Naturally Healthy initiative. Active Devon worked with a wide range of partners to encourage older adults (55+) to be more active outdoors by connecting with nature. The programme offered a wide range of inclusive activities – from nature walks to conservation volunteering – designed to improve people’s physical and mental wellbeing while fostering a deeper connection to the natural environment.

Exminster greenspaces

The volunteer Green Spaces Group is a working party of Exminster Parish Council with a mission to brighten up the village and enhance green spaces for wildlife and people. The group is the primary means of delivery for an overarching nature recovery programme covering the wider Exminster area.

Their work includes adding wildlife habitats to the community orchard, parish meadow and churchyard, installing swift boxes in the church, tree planting and a mini tree nursery, a demonstration wildflower bed, setting up a village nature trail, and events such as Wassails, a photo competition, and guided walks. They work with schools, the church and a local NHS facility.

Two children and an adult, all in high-vis, are low to the ground topping up soil around a freshly planted young tree with green leaves. They are in a field with buildings in the background.

Plymouth, Torbay and South Devon

The Outdoor Partnership works to connect communities to outdoor activities in Plymouth and Torbay

Green Minds was an ambitious urban nature project led by Plymouth City Council that empowered communities to re-imagine how cities could integrate nature into everyday life.

Volunteers from Plymouth Sound National Marine Park are part of a city-wide movement to connect people with Plymouth’s rich natural and cultural heritage. They work in partnership with organisations across the city including Mount Edgcumbe, The Box, the National Trust, local community groups and many more.

Forest Rising is putting young people at the heart of the Plymouth and South Devon Community Forest Project.

Chudleigh Wild

This community wildlife and environmental group was created to share knowledge about local wildlife and to conserve and enhance existing wildlife and local habitats. They carry out a huge range of work, which includes:

– Supporting a local population of Greater Horseshoe Bats through surveying bat walks, managing a community ‘Bat Garden’ and liaising with Devon County Council to reduce street lighting at an important bat crossing.

– Working with Devon Wildlife Trust to manage a local nature reserve.

– Organising Open Gardens, a Town Nature Trail and a Gardening for Wildlife scheme, creating insect-friendly flower beds, managing road verges and monitoring local wildlife. They have also repurposed a phone box into a Wildlife Information Centre.

Children dipping a net into a pool with adult volunteers

Other examples:

Barnstaple Alliance Pathway Prescription is a great example of Green Social Prescribing being driven by Primary Care.

Community Action Groups Devon supports and empowers community groups to help the environment. They provide community groups with guidance, training, a grant to cover insurance costs and opportunities to network and share skills with others. Their main focus is on waste reduction, composting, sharing, re-use, repair, biodiversity, energy and other sustainability initiatives.

Coast Path Connectors is a South West Coast Path Association project that hosts community engagement activities around the most deprived parts of the region including Plymouth, Torbay and north Devon. The project works with a range of partners (including Devon Mind, St Petrocs, Mustard Tree, Improving Lives Plymouth, University of Plymouth Student Union, Devon & Cornwall Refugee Support, Macmillan) to reach those who are less represented and help connect them to nature.

Where to visit

Explore Devon website

The Explore Devon website has a wealth of information about places across the county where people can enjoy nature. Find ideas for days out, wherever you live and whatever your interests, accessibility needs or favourite wildlife.

A few examples include The Granite Way on Dartmoor, Grand Western Canal in Mid Devon, Northam Burrows Country Park near Bideford and Drakes Trail in Plymbridge Woods near Plymouth.

Always follow the Countryside Code and keep to footpaths and sites that are managed for public access.

Seaton Wetlands

This is an area of freshwater grazing marsh, salt marshes and a tidal lagoon on the lower Axe Estuary, managed by East Devon District Council as a Local Nature Reserve. The 58-hectare site is on the edge of the coastal town of Seaton and enjoys over 120,000 visitors a year. A network of paths and boardwalks helps people explore the reserve and the recently opened Wetlands tram halt brings visitors from this historic tourist attraction onto the site.

The site is an important migratory spot for the spring and autumn movement of birds. In 2025, an Osprey nesting platform was installed in partnership with the Devon Osprey Project, in the hope that one day this iconic wetland bird of prey might become a breeding species. A population of Water Voles was reintroduced here and continues to thrive in the network of ponds, ditches and streams. You can read more about the birds that live on the wetlands on the Estuarine birds page.

A group of children exploring part of Seaton Wetlands.

Stover Country Park

With 114 acres of woodland, lake and marsh, heathland, grassland and a wide variety of wildlife, this Local Nature Reserve is a fantastic place to connect with nature. It’s designated as a dragonfly hotspot by the British Dragonfly Society, has a huge diversity of birdlife across its habitats and is a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI).

Tramper hire, accessible facilities and parking, and paths around the site are available. Additional recreation resources include interpretation boards, an aerial walkway, a bird hide, walking routes, a coffee van and picnic areas. There is also a wealth of historical interest.

If you’d like to get more involved with the site please volunteer with the Friends of Stover Park group or join one of their events.

Photo shows expansive still water reflecting a blue sky with pink clouds. There are reedbeds to the right of the water and mature trees in the background and to the left, as well as a large dead tree trunk coming out of the water in the left and centre.

For information on visiting these and other sites that are open to the public please see the Explore Devon website.

4. Find out more

Please see the Devon Local Nature Partnership website for more information and links, in particular the following sections:

Naturally Healthy
Outdoor Learning and the Network for Environmental Educators in Devon
Wild About Devon

See the websites of Devon’s various local authorities for information on their Green Infrastructure Strategies and Natural England’s web pages for guidance and their Green Infrastructure Map

The Devon Countryside Access Forum is a statutory body set up by Devon County Council under the Countryside and Rights of Way Act 2000. The role of the forum is to improve public access to land for the purposes of open-air recreation and enjoyment. See their web pages for more information including their position statement on greenspaces.

Creating accessible wildlife-rich greenspaces

The 500 m zones mapped for the LNRS are a simple way to show where accessible wildlife-rich greenspaces could be created to benefit communities. It’s acknowledged that this approach works better in rural areas than in urban ones.

Communities themselves will obviously know where wildlife-rich greenspaces should best be created. There are lots of reasons that may mean a mapped zone is not the best place to have accessible wildlife. Busy roads, railway lines or other physical barriers can make greenspaces hard to reach. People can also experience spaces differently depending on the lighting, safety or whether a space feels welcoming. In many cases Devon’s local authorities will have developed more detailed accessible greenspace targets and maps (often as part of their green infrastructure strategies) and these should be referred to. Areas such as Plymouth will collect their own evidence to make the mapping more meaningful and relevant for people who live in the city.

Areas with higher levels of deprivation often stand to gain the most from improved access to nature. Deprivation layers for Devon can be seen on the LNRS Viewer. Look under Other useful layers > Connecting people and nature > Devon indices of deprivation. For more information on these indices see Devon County Council’s Poverty in Devon webpage.

Devon County Council has a helpful tool that combines deprivation data with indicators like smoking rates, physical activity and obesity levels. This combined data can support more informed and equitable planning.

Natural England’s Green Infrastructure Map is a valuable resource for identifying where investment in nature could have the greatest impact (but note that the mapping is not comprehensive for Devon).

By combining local insight with strategic tools, we can prioritise action where it matters most—and make sure everyone in Devon has the opportunity to connect with nature.

Photo credits

Plymouth Sound National Marine Park – Plymouth City Council
Kickstarter scheme – Plymouth City Council
Dipping with the scouts – Chudleigh Wild
Grand Western Canal – Dave Smallshire
Seaton Wetlands trip – James Chubb
Stover Lake – Ian Tomlinson