For many people aspiring to work in land management, getting the required experience can be challenging, especially if you aren’t from a land management background. Even if you are, land management for conservation purposes is different to other types of land management and therefore requires a different perspective. 

There can also be socioeconomic challenges, as the best way to get experience is to volunteer. Not everyone may be able to afford to do this without financial support, which this Traineeship offers. 

The Wild Traineeship aims to remove barriers preventing access to the sector, and equip trainees with the skills and knowledge they need to get their first job in land management.

This blog is my insight into the traineeship so far, since its beginning in September 2021. I’ll be talking about what we have got up to from the perspective of a current Trainee.  

The teams

There are a total of eight Wild Trainees split across two teams, east and west of the River Severn. 

On the west team, myself, Andrew, Ella, and Amy, work regularly with Kevin, Land Manager West, and Tom, Land Management Officer. We also work with other members of the Land Management Team, external volunteer groups such as the Dean Green Team (DGT), independently as a team of Trainees, and occasionally the east and west join forces to work on a task together. 

A typical day

We meet at our car parking spot at 9am where we switch over to our very own Trainee van. We then go to the workshop, which involves driving off road down a quarry track which is really fun. We're briefed on the tasks for the day, go through a risk assessment for the tasks and sites, decide what tools we need then load them into the van and head off. Some are just down the road and others can be about an hour away, but we enjoy getting time to chat and take in the scenery on the way. 

We have regular breaks and snacks throughout the day to keep energy reserves topped up as the work is physically demanding. When we have bonfires, I warm up my soup in the fire so I can have hot food on a cold winter's day to keep me going. This caught on with the other trainees and led to a soup revolution! 

When we’re finished for the day we pack up, leave the site tidy and safe and head back to the workshop. After we've finished maintaining and putting away the tools we back up the quarry track, usually getting back to our cars by 5pm. 

A Whatsapp group is used to communicate what we're doing next so we can come prepared each day. We also use it to share pictures from the day and extracurricular information or events we find interesting.

Volunteers 

Every other Tuesday the DGT joins us to complete a task. They're a friendly and passionate bunch with lots of experience which they're more than happy to share with us. Most of them have been part of the team for many years so they have really unique insights into the progress that has been made over time on each reserve. 

One of the highlights was when we all went and got fish and chips for lunch, and harvested our own Christmas Trees to celebrate the last task before Christmas!

We've already learned so much in such a short space of time. The list of skills we can add to our CV's gets longer every day, bringing us closer to our dream jobs!

The best part is we have so much fun as a team and get to see some of the most beautiful green spaces and wildlife Gloucestershire has to offer.