RePollinate: Hands-on Help for Native Pollinators (Ep. 73)

Today we’re leaning into hope and action. Ecologist Nick Trull from the Scottish non‑profit RePollinate joins us to share how their innovative projects not only support bees and wildlife but also spark community learning, creativity, and connection.

This episode is part of Podcasthon, a global audio movement that brings together thousands of podcasters to raise awareness for charitable causes around the world.

Ecologist Nick Trull is Senior Development Manager at RePollinate, a Scottish non-profit, dedicated to reviving pollinator populations in the UK. Explore their beautifully illustrated Wildlife Gardening Booklet—perfect for inspiring your own outdoor space—and revisit our August conversation with Leigh Biagi to learn even more about RePollinate’s work. You can also meet the US‑based charity Environment America, who joined us for Podcasthon in 2025 to share their own pollinator‑focused initiatives.

Good to know

Nick mentioned he is inspired by the work of John Little, founder of the Grass Roof Company, which specilaizes in introducing wild landscapes into schools, public space, and onto roofs. In this video he takes viewers on a tour of one of his gardens. It’s a fascinating glimpse into the thoughtfulness that goes into every inch of space.

Transcript

[00:00:00] Welcome to the Bees Knees, a podcast wild about native bees. Wild and native bees are under threat worldwide. In each episode, we look at actionable things we can do to support these adorable little guys whose pollination work is crucial for maintaining biodiversity. I’m Jacy Meyer and I thank you for being here.

Welcome to a very special episode of the Bee’s Knees. We’re joining in on Podcasthon , a global podcast movement where creators around the world dedicate an episode to a cause they care about. It’s like one big international ripple of inspiring audio, and I’m so glad you’re here for it. Today we’re shining a spotlight on RePollinate a Scottish nonprofit working to boost the future of the UK’s threatened pollinators.

They partner with communities and businesses to create a connected network of high quality habitats. [00:01:00] Exactly the kind of hopeful hands-on work. We love celebrating on this show. Nick Trull is here to tell us more. Welcome, Nick. Thanks so much for joining us on this special Podcasthon, episode. Can you introduce us to RePollinate please?

Yeah. Thank you for having me Jacy. And, um, for featuring RePollinate, we’re a charity based in Scotland. We were set up in 2018 by the Scottish Bee Company who produced honeybee related products. So yeah, as many as your viewers will know, honeybees, obviously. Yeah. And. Bee conservation are, aren’t exactly friends, but the charity was really set up to contribute something to our wild bees, our native bees, which aren’t managed and which are really struggling as a result of various things.

Um, increasingly climate change. But you know, here in the UK it’s habitat loss. You know, we’re one of the most nature depleted countries in the world, um, which is frightening really. Yeah. So, [00:02:00] yeah, it’s really something that we’re concerned about. at RePollinate. Although we focus on bees, it’s, you know, perhaps that we talk most about bees, but it’s really pollinators more broadly and yeah, if we’re honest, you know, it’s, it’s all linked, isn’t it?

So yeah. Pollinators, bees as a spearhead for biodiversity more broadly. Yeah. Yeah. I’ll go into what, what we do specifically. Yeah. I suppose in, in a bit, but yeah, pollinator conservation is the key. Yeah. I’m involved in kind of developing the projects and. Delivery Really. It’s kind of quite a project managery role.

But yeah, I work with Lee and we sort of, yeah, we sculpt different projects like our bed, our beds for bees projects, but also work with schools where we try and focus on food production and the importance of pollinators in that process. Um. Also some of our garden creation work, which is slightly different from beds for bees.

[00:03:00] But yeah, it draws on a lot of what we focus on within beds for bees, which I’ll, I’ll chat to you. Yeah, I’ll, I’ll go into I suppose, but yeah, we work a lot in the public sector producing gardens in NHS settings, but also, yeah, for businesses as well in church grounds. Yeah. Often drawing, often sort of building in space for food growing.

But yeah, as we all know, it is integral to have. Healthy pollinator populations present and diverse populations as well, right? Yeah. They all fill those little niches for, for pollination. Um, bees. Yeah, moths, butterflies or all of it Really. Yeah. So, so let’s talk about your current project at the women’s prison in Sterling.

Can you tell me what you’re doing there? Yeah, you know, they had a space available. It was a current green space, but not really kind of much more than that. It was just sort of an area of grass. So yeah, the women’s prison in Sterling, which is sort of between Glasgow and Edinburgh [00:04:00] in the Central Belt of Scotland.

And yeah, it’s a new facility and I suppose they’re just sort of thinking about what they can do with the ground. So part of the system of being in prison in this country is that you sort of develop skills, uh, for the outside world. Um, so we really wanted to build this garden around, yeah, around like a learning opportunity really.

So, um, it’s got, it will have space for veg growing, but also cut flowers and, um, sort of more ornamental beds, and then they can learn about all sorts, like how to propagate from seed, from cuttings, from Yeah. About planting design, what works well in Yeah. Diff a different planting area. Shady, sunny. What might be a good climber we’re gonna provide.

Yeah, the climbing trellis and stuff. Uh, so yeah, just we wanna sort of set the, set up the garden to allow for customization and learning. It’ll have like, yeah, sort of, um, yeah, indoor growing spaces as well for propagation for growing [00:05:00] tomatoes and stuff. Yeah, really looking forward to starting that one.

We are working with hp, the IT company. Who have a big contract with NHS Scotland and built into that is sort of giving back to, to community. Groups, uh, generally sort of customers of theirs, but yeah, so yeah, yeah, really excited to do it. One we’ll have, um, we’ll have some of the women in custody actually helping us as well.

And yeah, we’ll be doing a lot of problem solving with them. Like, yeah, there’s so much meaning in what we’re doing, you know, it’s, it’s creating a valuable community space and it’s gonna be great for. For women coming into the prison over so many years. You know, one really important thing when designing these gardens is the consultation prog, uh, process.

So always want to speak to the people that are actually gonna be maintaining the space. You know, the people employed by the prison or the hospital. That is it gonna be feasible for them to change what they’re doing [00:06:00] from just mowing, maybe to. Doing a lot more trimming, but you know, as it’s gonna be an active garden as well, what the, the, the women in custody will be weeding and, uh, doing all sorts of, of, of, yeah.

Garden redesigning and that will form part in the maintenance of course. But yeah, and just getting ideas from them around the different features they want, obviously. Um, what’s gonna help them meet their sort of learning hopes and goals for this space. Yeah. So you mentioned this was quite different from other projects that you have done.

Can you share some different ones that you’ve particularly enjoyed or had the opportunity to do something different? Yeah. This is on the larger scale of what we do really. Uh, most of what we do is our Beds for Bees project, which is a lot smaller. It is generally in terms of like the individual project scale.

So we work with community groups across Scotland and we work remotely. Essentially, yeah. We provide them with, uh, a [00:07:00] checklist of different things about their site. So we ask them what the soil is like. We ask them to actually send us a video of them kind of squeezing some soil just to see what the texture is like, you know, and.

Most of them are up for it. Uh, and, uh, yeah, just get to really intimately understand the site and, and its context. We are careful with beds for bees. We, we select native plants carefully based on the sort of maintenance that groups can, you know, expressing. They can actually, um. Commit to. So if it’s high maintenance, they can, they can do a lot of maintenance.

We can be a bit more free with the sort of wildflowers we choose. So yeah, it might be thing things like common toad flex, which has a tendency to spread quite a lot, but it’s just such a beautiful native plant. And you know, they may, might want a more naturalistic sort of, um, planting style. So yeah, things like, depending on the soil, we might choose like, uh, vitus bug gloss or something.

Which is a brilliant bar. Yeah. Board [00:08:00] member of the barge family. Yeah. Just so good for bumblebees, particularly if it’s a bit more formal, we’ll be very restrictive with the sorts of, um, native plants we use. So yeah. It might be things like Primrose is Violets, uh, sea thrift. Yeah. Various things that stay more sort of clump in that clump form.

They don’t spread too much either ’cause they don’t produce a lot of seed or. You know, they, um, they’re quite low growing, so they’re, they’re not able to cast seed broadly. Um, yeah, all obviously all the non-native plants that we focus on. Things that are particularly good for providing nectar and pollen sort of very early and very late for emerging pollinators and pollinators preparing to hibernate.

Yeah, I think that’s critical, isn’t it, really with like climate change? Yes, absolutely. You had a interesting project recently at a hospital. Can you tell us a little bit more about what you did there? Yeah. It’s a, it’s a chemo ward, but it’s a, [00:09:00] an outpatient ward. Um, so we were a bit restrictive with this type of materials we could use, so we couldn’t really use things that might encourage bacteria or fungi.

Yeah, we weren’t really able to use wood and we weren’t able to use wood chip or, yeah, wood was a particular. Thing we had to avoid. So we based the garden around metal really, and rocks, which, yeah, not sustainable, you know, not renewable materials really, but long lasting. And as we were quite restrictive, we had to, we had to go down that route.

Really. We always have a good look at the, yeah, the aerial views. That’s before, uh. Yeah, figuring out where things should go. So how is the existing green infrastructure, how can that be sort of, how can it be strengthened really? So there was a nice wooded sort of corridor that formed one of the boundaries of the garden.

Um, uh, so we sort of strengthened that with shrub and tree [00:10:00] planting. Mostly native, it was very heavy clay, so we had to be quite limited in what we could plant. But, uh, yeah, things like elder and dogwood and Hawthorne spindle all seemed to work quite well. Yeah. I think they’ve, yeah, there’s a lot of deer issue as well, so we had to have a, yeah, a lot of protection with, um, with big old rolls of, of uh, quite thick sort of fencing stuff.

But yeah, it had a, an interesting look, the garden now. I did, I did really like the end, end result and uh, yeah, it seems to be a big hit with the families and, and the patients themselves. Yeah, it was really disused the space before, so. Um, it’s really lovely to hear, hear how it’s impacted people’s lives.

Yeah. Thank you. So you mentioned about your partnership with hp and I’m kind of wondering if you could share some ideas on how businesses could use their space for pollinators. I’m thinking about maybe [00:11:00] things they don’t think about, you know, rooftops or parking lots or other. Disused spaces that could be greened.

Yeah, I think intentionality is key, isn’t it? So, yeah. If so, so creating a. A deadwood pile could be fantastic for, uh, ground nesting beetles and stuff, couldn’t it? But yeah, I think there’s probably an element of changing our aesthetics sort of preferences in there from just monoculture lawn. But I think, yeah, as long as it looks intentional, I think that’s a key, a key thing.

It doesn’t have to result in. Big changes in terms of the way that the space is managed. ’cause I know, yeah, they’re quite limited, aren’t we? By the time of, or money that requires to maintain these spaces. But even introducing little plug plants that will coexist and, uh, with, with grasses, things like, um, cow slips, yeah.

Oxide daisies and, and maybe changing the, the mowing regime a little bit. Yeah. Not cutting Right. In the [00:12:00] early. Period of the year, maybe delaying it until July, incorporating bulbs as well. Things like, uh, Kaia just, yeah, just really works in grassland. But I think knowing, yeah, knowing the soil’s important for knowing which plants to include.

Yeah. And again, tying it in with what exists already. So look at the corridors of habitat, the hedgerows and the woodland. The grassland, any, any water bodies, and. Prioritize with improving that, widening it, increasing diversity. But yeah, native, always best. Is there something or someone that is inspiring you right now when it comes to pollinators, something giving you hope?

One thing I’ve been really inspired by lately is the work of someone called John Little in the uk and it’s sort of like it’s looking at Brownfield sites and what they can teach us. Some of the best sites in the UK for invertebrates, for pollinators [00:13:00] are some of our sort of, uh, brownfield sites essentially.

So there’s a site called Canvee Wick down in Essex. I think it’s on the estuary of the Thames Old Gasworks, and it has averagely per square foot. I think it’s third or fourth in of all protected sites for invertebrate. Diversity, so richness and abundance. And it’s only 50 years old, you know, 50 years since it was just a massive concrete and just very disturbed.

And that’s, you know, it’s comparable to places like Abernethy Forest, you know, the largest intact area in Scotland of the native Caledonian, pine, forest, invertebrate diversity. So we can generate, yeah, we can generate significant benefits. For wildlife and rare invertebrates, you know, in short periods of time. So, [00:14:00] yeah, I think, um, that gives me hope, I suppose, because we don’t have long do we, to turn things around.

A huge thank you to Nick and to you for being part of this Podcasthon episode. If you enjoyed our conversation, help keep this movement buzzing by sharing the episode with a pollinator loving friend. And don’t forget to pop over to the Bees Knees website. You’ll find all kinds of goodies there, including a link to the gorgeous Guide to Gardening with wildlife in mind.

Nick created this with his talented sister Alice. You can also revisit our episode from last year with Leigh Biagi from RePollinate, where she shares her own pollinator journey. And while you’re exploring, check out our previous Podcasthon episode featuring Environment America. Thanks again for listening, and until next time, keep caring.