I’ve been fortunate to spend 10 months with the Lincolnshire Wildlife Trust as a residential volunteer. As a career changer, the opportunity to learn on the job is ideal and living and working on site has been an incredible experience. The chance to fully immerse myself in the day-to-day life of managing a reserve has been even better than I imagined.

My placement has been split across two separate regions, so I’ve been very lucky to experience different habitats during my time with the Trust. I started at Far Ings National Nature Reserve, as the autumn/winter residential volunteer. Simon, the reserve warden, took me for an orientation walk around the reserve on one of my first days, and within five minutes of walking into the first hide I had seen my first ever bittern! Absolute beginners’ luck, but it certainly set a high bar for the rest of the season!

It’s also been great to experience the different work type of that we do across the seasons. Winter reserve work is very focused on habitat management. I was able to get stuck into everything and be actively involved in reedbed and scrub management. We also did lots of tree coppicing of species like willow and hazel, ditch clearing, hedge laying and general site maintenance. We had a small flock of Hebridean sheep to look after and four seriously photogenic Highland cattle, that also provided some adventures.

Watching the seasons change was just magical. Through winter the sunsets at Far Ings were spectacular and from November we were graced with starling murmurations, the first frosts and thousands of pink-footed geese flying overhead in formation to roost just a bit further up the river Humber. We had snow, rain, even more rain, more snow and then more rain, but it was all part of the fun!

In my time off I was able to get out and visit other reserves in the county and even ventured across the bridge into Yorkshire. One of the lovely things is how all the Trust reserves help each other out in particularly busy times, and a personal highlight was helping as a volunteer seal warden at Donna Nook as the pupping season started. Watching four pups being born on one of the days I was there was both terrifying and amazing.

As well as the practical habitat management, it was a huge amount of fun working with the volunteer teams on the reserve and in the Visitor Centre. Being quite close to several towns and villages, we had many regular visitors who would pop in every week for a coffee or hot chocolate to warm up after a walk around the reserve, so we would catch up on what new bird arrivals had dropped in, and where the resident otter was showing itself that week! I was able to help support the education officers with Wildlife Watch activities and joined the Area Group for interesting walks and talks. Every week has something new to try and be involved with – never a dull moment.

In February, the starling murmurations returned and I spent every evening in awe, watching the most beautiful sight of thousands of starlings wheeling and turning in the sky as the sun set. By March, the birds were all getting ready for breeding. The resident marsh harrier pairs were courting and we could watch their dramatic sky dancing displays and food passes. The bitterns were booming and the reserve soundscape was just glorious. I moved onto a new spring/summer placement at Saltfleetby – Theddlethorpe Dunes National Nature Reserve at the end of March, but I’ve been able to keep in touch and it’s been so exciting seeing the updates of bittern, marsh harrier and bearded reedling chicks successfully fledging!

At Far Ings I had stunning views of the Humber Bridge and watched marsh harriers hunting over the reedbeds outside my window. At Saltfleetby there are two residential volunteers and we often watched foxes and muntjac deer strolling along the dunes out of our kitchen windows, and can hear the natterjack toads singing every evening on our doorsteps. We had Highland ponies, also seriously photogenic, grazing on the reserves, who loved to come over and say hello if we were working on their patch. We even had a p1air of mistle thrushes nest under our accommodation building and successfully fledge five chicks!

Saltfleetby has been a fantastic place to be over the summer.  We do lots of surveying and monitoring for the reserve’s key species, and my botanical knowledge has improved so much having the opportunity to get out every day and practice identifying new plants. We’ve also had the opportunity to visit and work on other reserves and try our hands at drystone walling, help with sheep shearing and conduct habitat condition assessments. We do lots of night surveying during summer, including toads and moths. It’s such a fabulous time to be out on the reserve! The weather has sometimes been a bit hit and miss, but who would pass up the opportunity to see shooting stars overhead as you’re counting moths?

Of course, the best part of being a residential volunteer has been all the great people I’ve met and worked with and the friendships I have made. The reserve wardens are so dedicated, passionate and knowledgeable, and have been so supportive and encouraging. I’ve been able to learn so much from this experience, and it’s helped me be successful in obtaining a traineeship as my next step in moving into a career in conservation. I can’t thank Simon, Leanne, Matt, Ruth and the Wildlife Trust team enough for giving me the opportunity to be a residential volunteer over the past year. I can highly recommend being a residential volunteer with the Trust to anyone who wants to gain the practical skills and experience to help start their career in conservation.