Q&A: Going greener at home

Time to turn your house green? Try out our tips and ideas for staying green at home and with the family.

How can I help the environment at the weekends, while still having fun?

Why not start with an adventure walk with the family? Being aware of the natural world is one step towards taking care of it. Take a stroll around your neighbourhood or park with all your senses on red alert. What sounds can you hear? What sights can you see?

On a rainy day, try junk modelling. All you need are old cardboard boxes, wrapping paper and cartons to make all sorts of vehicles, musical instruments and houses (then just add some glue and anything from old wrapping paper to pictures from magazines). It’s the most fun way of recycling!

I love wildlife. How can I attract more into our garden?

A lot of garden birds and other wildlife are on the decline as a result of climate change and the loss of their usual habitats, so it’s really important to help them by making our gardens more wildlife-friendly.

Try putting up bird boxes and leaving out bird food – not just in the winter but all year round. Birds also like plenty of seedheads and berries on plants, so ask whoever does the gardening to leave a few over winter.

To encourage butterflies, plant their favourites, such as buddleia and sedum. If you have a nettle patch in the corner, leave it there – they love nettles!

Other insects need somewhere to shelter in winter, so gather a bundle of twigs and bamboo (about 20cm long), tie them together with string and hang from a tree. Insects will make their homes in the hollows. A woodpile at the back of the garden will encourage more insects and even small mammals such as hedgehogs.

If you have the space, a pond – or even an old sink sunk into the soil – is a good idea. It could draw in toads, frogs and possibly bats, to drink from it. Good luck, and enjoy your discoveries!

My dad is always moaning about our heating bills. How can I help to keep them down?

The easiest thing you can do is wear plenty of cosy clothes indoors, so you don’t need to have the heating up so high. If you all put on an extra jumper you can turn the thermostat down by 1˚C, which could save £60 off the bill for the year!

You can also help by going round and closing all the curtains when it gets dark – this will stop heat escaping through the windows.

Has your dad had the loft insulated? Nearly half of the heat loss in our homes escapes through the roof, so it’s definitely worth checking.

A fun thing to do is make sausage-dog draught excluders to put at the bottom of doors. Get some old tights from your mum, stuff one of the legs with torn up newspaper, sew up the end and stick on eyes, nose and mouth from old bits of fabric.

I want to try growing some vegetables. What’s easy to grow?

Growing your own veg somehow makes them taste even better, and it’s easy to do! In winter, a few pots of herbs on a windowsill are a great start. Come spring, try growing potatoes, tomatoes and strawberries in pots – they're really easy to grow. Beans and courgettes are simple and tasty too.

My dad always tells us off for leaving stuff on standby. How can I remind myself to turn things off?

There’s a really simple piece of technology that can help you all! Try using the Ecotech Standby Saver – it switches all standby power to zero on appliances that are plugged into it. You can buy them from Tesco direct.

Remember, some devices use nearly as much electricity when on standby as when they’re on. So anyone going greener will think it’s not a bad idea – not just your dad.

Is it possible to be green on holiday?

Of course it is! First, choose the right kind of holiday, for example by cutting your carbon footprint and staying in the UK.

There are some fun ways to enjoy a UK holiday, by camping in a yurt or tipi, for example. Try Cornish Tipi Holidays or Featherdown.

Another good idea are youth hostels. Many now cater for families and they’re really good value too. The YHA is also trying to make its hostels more sustainable. The greenest one features a rainwater harvesting system, a living sedum roof, solar panels and even a compost toilet!

There’s Green Traveller too, which has heaps of good ideas for greener travel in general.

Are there any green organisations or magazines for children?

Yes, there are. Try some of these:

• The first is the Young People’s Trust for the Environment, which runs residential courses and holidays for eight to 16-year-olds.
• The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) has a great children’s club called Wildlife Explorers. When you join you get a membership pack, a magazine every other month and free entry into all the RSPB reserves around the country.
• The membership pack from the Woodland Trust is great. It gives you lots of fun and exciting activities that you can get involved in throughout the year with the changing seasons. You’ll also get an interesting quarterly magazine called Bark.
• The UK’s leading environmental club for children is run by The Wildlife Trusts – it has regular local meetings for children aged five to 14.
• The Woodcraft Folk was set up in 1925 as an alternative to the Scouts. Now it has groups all over the country with fun, green weekly activities.
• If you’re after a magazine that deals specifically with green issues, ask your parents about The Green Parent magazine. Every issue comes with a free magazine called Green Kids, which is packed with fun activities and competitions about environmental topics.