Community groups are helping to rehabilitate weed-choked native vegetation, enabling it to regenerate, and thus restoring native biodiversity. Find your local group and lend a hand.

If not for many years of neglect, our urban creeks, parks and roadways could be vibrant with indigenous vegetation. It's time for us to remedy this erosion of our natural heritage. We can bring a rich array of birds and creatures into our daily lives. In addition, we would be creating a sustainable living space in step with Australian conditions. If we regenerated astutely we could even lower the temperature in our cities and make them more pleasurable places.

How to do it now!

Find an urban regeneration group in your community.

Create a native or indigenous garden - convert your patch (or even just a part of it) to a larder for local birds and wildlife.

Contact your local council - Many city councils, rivers and creeks have community groups working to improve and regenerate neglected and degraded natural areas. Bushcare groups, 'Friends of ...' groups or simply concerned citizens pick up rubbish, work with councils and raise funds for local regeneration projects.

Find a group online - The following sites have regeneration groups in urban and rural areas and may list a group local to you:

• Greening Australia (national)

• Landcare (national)

• Tree Project (Victoria)

• Trees for Life (South Australia)

• The Understorey Network (Tasmania)

Regenerate your street - Lobby your state and local government to start putting overhead wires underground and regenerating the streetscape with native plants (which will attract native birdlife). This will also improve shade to the roads and reduce heat absorption (and storage) in summer.

Why is this action important?

Raising the quality of the natural environment in our local rivers, creeks, parks and roads increases our appreciation of nature and our day-to-day enjoyment of life.

Think about the difference between walking out your front door into a shaded street on a hot day and seeing a flock of Rainbow Lorikeets playing in a flowering gum and walking out onto a baked concrete strip with  power cables dissecting a shrivelled paper bark.