New Year - time for something new?

If you can spare a few hours to help, we are always grateful for volunteers!

 Picture by Howard Vaughan

Volunteering is a brilliant way to meet new people, be active, learn new things, it's great for your CV, you get to spend time on a lovely reserve too.

The RSPB has more than 12,000 fantastic volunteers and between them, they contribute almost one million hours every year!

You can find out about volunteering for the RSPB, and all the different roles around the UK on the RSPB Volunteering section of the website.

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Here at Rainham Marshes we have an number of volunteering opportunities:

Want to learn all about wardening? We have a Volunteer Warden Internship coming up in 2020.

We're looking for a dedicated volunteer intern to work three days a week for six months, alongside the Warden Team on habitat management, reserve maintenance and survey work. Must be willing to undertake strenuous manual labour outside in all weathers. These tasks are vital to the conservation of the special site and the smooth running of visitor operations.

Tasks would include:

• •Habitat management including Lowland wet grassland and Reedbed 
• Anti predator work, including electric fence upkeep and monitoring
• •Infrastructure maintenance ie boardwalk replacement
• •Equipment and machine servicing
• •Visitor engagement and assisting with events.
• •Assisting with ecological monitoring and surveying

Andy Hay (rspb-images.com)

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If you would like some experience in retail or catering why not volunteer in our shop or cafe!

• We are looking for enthusiastic and friendly people to join our retail team, welcoming and serving visitors, answering their questions and helping to keep the shop looking great. RSPB shops and catalogues raise nearly 10% of our income, so with your help we can do even more to save nature. We would like every visitor to the reserve to have a good time so a big smile and a welcome is key! If you have a few hours each week that would be appreciated - we are especially looking for people to help on weekends and Bank Holidays.

There are more details here, or you can email Annie for more information and to apply: annie.jackson@rspb.org.uk

 Jesper Mattias (rspb-images.com)

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• We would like some help in our lovely cafe from serving customers to helping us prepare food - don't worry we would train you in everything and it's flexible so you can choose the sections you like! While you are here why not enjoy our bike hire, climbing boulders and guided walks. 100% of our profits go back in to nature conservation so you can help save nature whilst serving a cup of tea! Be part of a great team and helping nature.

You can find out more about the Cafe Helper role here, or email us for more and to apply: rainham.marshes@rspb.org.uk 

 Jesper Matias (rspb-image.com)

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If you would like to volunteer in the visitor centre -  chatting with people and having an amazing view you can help us as a Centre Assistant. 

• We want to ensure that every visitor to the reserve has a brilliant time and is inspired to come back again and again - this is where you come in! We're looking to build a team of Centre Assistants whose role it is to, (yes, you guessed it!) help out in our fabulous visitor centre.
  Sometimes the centre can get very busy and we would like a team of people to help! It could involve anything from greeting visitors, helping at events, serving hot drinks in the café, talking to customers in the shop, or chatting about wildlife or pointing it out as it dashes past! The key attribute we're looking for is 'people' skills - you'd need to be very comfortable and happy chatting to people and understand the importance of giving our visitors a great experience. Specifically we'd need you to: enthuse visitors about Rainham Marshes and the wildlife they can see there; provide them with all the information they'd need to make the most of their visit (we'd brief you on all this beforehand); inspire people about the work of the RSPB and ask them whether they'd like to become a member (if they aren't already). This flexible role will let you choose what you want to do and when! If it's busy in a certain area of the centre go there, if it's quiet you can decide to go out and show people wildlife! NB We'd train you in everything you need to know beforehand and you DON'T need to be a bird expert. Just have a passion for nature and wildlife.

Have a look here for the details, or email Sim if you want more, or to apply: simren.soor@rspb.org.uk

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 David McHugh (rspb-images.com)

If you would like to work with children you could always help out on our Education scheme, or our family activities:

• We are looking for people to help on our schools education scheme - helping to enthuse children to the wonders of nature.

Share in the excitement as a volunteer and you will have the opportunity to deliver our education programme to visiting schools where typical activities range from hands on exploration of meadows, woods and ponds to playing environmental games. To help us deliver environmental education at our reserves we need you to deliver fun and exciting activities as part of out of classroom learning. Our Schools on Reserves programme aims to give schoolchildren the chance to experience nature first-hand and you can be part of that exciting journey of discovery!

For more details have a look at the full information, or email Julie for more details or to apply: julie.foreman@rspb.org.uk

 David McHugh (rspb-images.com)

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• We also have a fantastic family fun events programme - we're looking for people with a real passion for enthusing children and adults alike about the natural world to run very informal and small family activity sessions for families who visit Rainham Marshes nature reserve. If you're a parent this could be a great thing to do with your child or children - you lead the session, they have fun doing the activity with other kids and families.

So, what do we mean by running 'activity sessions'? It's not scary, promise! It's stuff like taking kids pond dipping (we'd show you how this works beforehand if you've not done before), a bit of story telling, making fat cakes for birds, showing kids how to search for minibeasts (like spiders, worms and bugs!) and a bit of fun science (very simple science experiments to do with nature - again, we'd show you how to do these beforehand) If you're keen to give all these activities a go that's great, or if you'd prefer to just focus on your favourite activity and nothing else, eg, making fat cakes for birds or looking for minibeasts, then that's fine with us too.

For more details have a look at the full information, or email Howard for more details or to apply: howard.vaughan@rspb.org.uk

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We would love to hear from you if you are interested - please do mention which role you are interested in when you contact us!