Residential on Reserve (More than 4 weeks) (Long Term Residential Volunteer- Reserve Team)

Volunteer Role: Long Term Residential Volunteer, Spring/Summer 2026

Volunteer Manager: Mike Knipe (Tayside Estate Worker)

Where will you be based: RSPB Loch Leven, Kinross.

When? We are looking for someone to start in the role from late March 2026, to work with us throughout the breeding season, predominately monitoring, recording and reporting on our breeding Lapwing nesting and fledging success. Ideally, the role will continue beyond the end of the breeding season, assisting with essential habitat and estate work throughout the summer and autumn. As a minimum, the role will continue until the end of July 2026 but may be extended until the end of October, covering a period of up to seven months.

Why we want you? Our volunteering placements cover a wide variety of RSPB work and specialisms. From practical conservation, to communications, to advocacy and ecology. We have created placement opportunities so we can help people gain the skills and experience needed to start a career in conservation, and it means we get to work with brilliant people who are helping save more nature. Volunteers bring in a variety of ideas, experiences, and energy into our teams, it's so much more than just getting work done; we want to hear from you if you feel like you have the motivation and passion to save nature.

What will you be doing? This placement will take place across the three Tayside reserves, Loch Leven, Loch of Kinnordy and the Tay Reedbeds, with the majority of time based at Loch Leven. For the duration of this placement, you will become a full-time member of our team and will have the opportunity to get involved in all aspects of working on a nature reserve.

Your main priority from the end of March until the end of July will be monitoring breeding Lapwing. This involves monitoring all of our Lapwing nests from nesting, egg laying, hatching to fledging. The main goals of this are to monitor and record our levels of productivity, predation pressures and habitat and nesting preferences in order to continue our long running data set and to inform our future management and measures.

During the breeding season, you will also assist us with our various suite of surveys across all three reserves which vary from wildfowl, wader, invertebrates, wildflowers, and breeding bird surveys at Loch Leven and Loch of Kinnordy, plus Bearded Tit surveys at the Tay Reedbeds. Later in the summer we will also carry out surveys for Beaver at our Loch of Kinnordy reserve.

You will work alongside the reserve team and volunteers to achieve our goals of managing the various habitats for wildlife, with our main focus on wet grassland management for Lapwing. As summer comes to an end, you will also play a big part in looking after our estate by assisting with other practical estate work, before the return of the Pink-Footed Geese in September. Some of the work that you might assist with include;

• Habitat Work – Brush-cutting, predator fence maintenance, scrub clearance, maintaining shingle islands and rafts, INNS management and water control.

• Estate Work – Fence and water trough checks and repairs, path works, health and safety checks, hide maintenance and painting.

• Reserve Monitoring – Dipwell and sward data collection, stock counts, fixed point photos and predator monitoring through camera traps.

• Surveys – WeBS (Wetland Bird Surveys) and Goose counts out with the breeding season. Breeding wader and wildfowl surveys, BBS (Breeding Bird Surveys), wildflower surveys, Bearded Tit and Beaver surveys.

As a team, we are open to your needs and want you to get the most out of your time here. Although the role is based with the practical reserve team and will mainly involve practical work, surveys and some office work, there could be opportunities to work with the visitor experience team. You can also set your own development goals and we can help you achieve these.

The skills you need. The aim of our placement is to help build skills and to help people gain the experience necessary to help take steps towards a career, primarily in conservation. We are looking for individuals who are interested in saving nature and with the energy to learn. We are not looking for experts in conservation, or even people with lots of experience, if you are new to the sector, changing careers or looking for a new challenge, this could be for you.

Some desirable skills include:

• Basic IT skills

• Experience spending time outdoors in nature

• Communication skills

• Planning and organisational skills

• Basic wildlife ID skills

What's in it for you? This role is well suited to someone looking to change their career, or someone who is just starting out. If you want to work in nature conservation, placements are volunteering opportunities that are created around your needs as much as the needs of the RSPB. You will have a say in your own development and you can work with your line manager to develop the skills you need. You will learn all about how environmental charities work to save nature and start to figure out what area of work is most suited to you. You will be working as part of a wider team and will have the opportunity to work with lots of different people.

What’s included? • On site accommodation in our bothy for the duration of your stay which includes utilities.

• PPE necessary for the work carried out.

• Access to all digital learning opportunities on our iLearn platform.

• The opportunity to take part in ecology courses (subject to availability)

• All training and support required to complete the tasks.

*Please note this is an unpaid role with a duration of up to seven months. However, it is essential that we have someone in place throughout the breeding season, as the Lapwing monitoring aspect of this role is crucial.