Volunteering for wildlife

Andrew is a longstanding volunteer and is incredibly dedicated to DWT and to Emsworthy Nature Reserve, where he is a volunteer warden. Andrew takes real ownership over his role, where he is brilliant at just getting on with what’s needed, whilst maintaining a fantastic relationship with the Nature Reserves team. He is always ready to offer help and advice, and even fields ecology enquiries from our membership recruiters. Andrew does so much for DWT, this is just the tip of the iceberg; Andrew is like a proverbial stick of rock, if you cut him in half, DWT would be running right through him!

Gordon has been volunteering with Devon Wildlife Trust for many years. He is known to be dedicated, reliable, kind and welcoming. Gordon is also incredibly knowledgeable, and has a real love for Andrews Wood, where he volunteers. He is also always motivating others to do more, to learn and to be kind. He makes everyone feel welcome and shares his knowledge of the flora and fauna on site.

Nicky volunteers at Wembury, and has been volunteering for at least 5 years. She is always one of the volunteers that pitches in when extra help is needed. Nicky regularly goes above and beyond, not only supporting Coral with the events at Wembury, but also assists at other events which are often full day events, requiring a lot of focus and engagement. She is also helping Coral to develop resources for school sessions, which is where her experience as a retired primary science teacher really shines. Nicky is fantastic with children and adults alike, is consistently there, and brings incredibly valuable experience to the team.

Eleanor has been volunteering at Wembury for two years, where she has made a big impact in a relatively short time. She brings enthusiasm and passion, both through the volunteering itself and socially. She takes excellent photos of the team and of the wonderful species we find, and even though she now has a full time job with Natural England, she’s still one of our most regular volunteers. Eleanor’s enthusiasm and passion has brought the Wembury team closer, and she is absolutely invaluable.

The Youth Rangers are a group of 20 volunteers, aged from 13-18, who regularly volunteer each month, dedicating their Saturday mornings to conservation. Today, we have Uriel, Peyton, Marta and Harry to represent them. They are not just a youth group, they are fabulous volunteers, working hard for nature. In the past year, they’ve litter picked, created hedgehog ladders, planted and learned how to care for an orchard, provide tree maintenance and more, getting stuck in every time. This group have come so far, growing closer as a team, growing more confident individually, each becoming more and more involved with the group.

Dick and Elaine Green are a pair of our wonderful Beaver Enclosure Volunteers (amongst other things). They are incredibly organised, efficient, enthusiastic, and very dedicated. Through their volunteering, Dick and Elaine have become experts on beaver ecology and movements, and are brilliantly autonomous, within the agreed boundaries of the beaver project.

Fred Gibson is a Lichen Events Volunteer for Saving Devon’s Treescapes, and has spent his time volunteering generously sharing his knowledge and love of lichens with others, to help them learn. Fred’s high level of lichen knowledge and identification has allowed DWT to run monthly events, and has been instrumental to the success of our lichen species monitoring.

Kevin New has several volunteer hats, since at least 2013, but has been nominated specifically for his Meeth Tree Nursery Volunteer role. Michael Rogers, despite only working for DWT since June, has said that no one has stood out as much as Kevin. He is synonymous with Meeth, it’s almost as if one does not exist without the other, and we are immensely grateful for his time, experience and passion.