Morning glory is a pushy plant. Try to clear out the vine and it will sneak right back in, seemingly overnight.

Alexis Ingham has spent the last two summers battling it and other invasive plants as part of the Bermuda Zoological Society’s Micro Forest Project.

The project was started by BZS officer Nick Coelho three years ago. Through it, 17 small plots of native and endemic trees and shrubs have been planted all over the island to increase natural biodiversity. The plots are cultivated using the Miyawaki method, which allows trees to be densely planted and, with proper ground preparation, grow significantly faster than conventionally grown trees.

Ms Ingham, who has just entered her fourth year at Dalhousie University, where she is enrolled in the environmental studies programme, said trying to keep invasive plants out of ground cleared for native and endemic plants was no easy task.

“They invade very quickly,” she said. “It is a constant battle, for sure. We try and keep a buffer zone between the invasives and non-invasives by putting down paths, but still they get through. Sometimes the birds drop the seeds when they fly over, or the wind blows them. The morning glory vines tend to creep their way over.”

She has, however, seen progress over the past year. The fledgeling native and endemic plants have grown up enough to push out the nuisances, exactly as the programme creators hoped they would do.

“In our first plots we have seen what appears to be a reduction in invasive species. This year when we visited a plot to weed it, I thought gee, this is so much easier to do than last year. The weeds were covering much less of an area.

“We have to look at the data more closely, but it looks like the micro forest project is working as anticipated,” Ms Ingham said.

Plots, typically 10ft by 10ft or 10ft by 20ft, can be found in Flatts, at Elliot Primary School, Dalton E Tucker Middle School, the Warwick Long Bay Playground, the Southampton Post Office, the Bermuda Aquarium, Museum and Zoo, Trunk Island and other places.

“The small size of the plots means they can be easily squeezed in just about anywhere, such as a school playground,” Ms Ingham said.

She said last month was “insanely” hot and sometimes she had to borrow Mr Coelho’s mosquito repellent, but it was all worth it.

“I just really want to make a difference,” Ms Ingham said.

Part of her effort this summer went towards assessing the growth of last year’s seedlings.

This involved laboriously recording the GPS co-ordinates of every single plant and tree in the plots. To do this she used ArcGIS, a cloud-based mapping and analysis solution.

“There are about 1,500 plants and trees,” Ms Ingham said. “The smallest plot could have 100 to 300 plants and trees in it. That was a very tedious job but it worked out.”

One advantage was that she got to work in the office in air conditioning, for a little while.

She is now in school in Halifax, Nova Scotia, pursuing a certificate in environmental assessment along with her undergraduate degree.

“It took a little bit of time to figure out what I wanted to do,” Ms Ingham said. “As an elective, I did a course called Introduction to Environmental Science. I ended up loving it. I had this passion for helping the environment. I was interested in climate change even when I was at the Bermuda High School for Girls.”

When she graduates she would like to work in some aspect of climate change, preferably in Bermuda.

“I feel like I’ve seen some changes in weather events, even just being out in Canada – we are seeing less precipitation or snow falling. You see less biodiversity everywhere. That is why it was great working for the micro forest project; we were increasing Bermuda’s biodiversity in small steps.”

She worked with the project as part of a co-operative learning programme at Dalhousie where, for four months out of the year, students go to a workplace to gain experience. She immediately thought of home.

“Two years ago I reached out to BZS and mentioned I was looking for a co-op position,” she said. “They said we might have something. They did an interview with me and I was able to join the micro forest team.”

One of the rewards of the work for her was seeing Bermuda’s nature flourish.

“I felt really, really good about the work that I was doing,” she said. “I would be out in one of the plots and see a bunch of wildlife appear such as butterflies and lizards. Increasing the native biodiversity is helping so many more species than you would initially think.”

Many of the micro forests, such as one by Warwick Playground on the South Shore, are easily accessible to the general public and have informative signs about the plants there.

“Sometimes people would walk by and say, we love this,” she said. “Or they would say we are so happy with the work you are doing. That makes me feel happy, knowing we were making a positive difference.”

• For more information about the BZS Micro Forest Project, visit bamz.org/support/bzs-micro-forest-project