RSPB's Longest Volunteer Marks 60 Years Saving Birds — SkimNews
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- Nigel Hewitt, 77, began volunteering with the RSPB in 1966 during a break from A levels, joining Operation Osprey to protect the first pair of ospreys to breed in the UK in more than 100 years, guarding nests 24 hours a day against egg thieves
- Hewitt spent decades managing cirl bunting habitats at the Labrador Bay and Ashill nature reserves in Devon and was involved in the red-backed shrike project on Dartmoor, with fellow birder John White calling his knowledge "unbounded"
- The cirl bunting, once common on southern English farmland, is now on the conservation red list, though more than 1,000 pairs were recorded in the RSPB's 2016 national survey, mostly in south Devon with a reintroduced population in Cornwall
- Hewitt balanced volunteering throughout a 30-year career at Barclays, telling the BBC his initial motivation was getting closer to birds and nature rather than a desire to "give something back"
- RSPB volunteering development officer Tim Hughes said few individuals demonstrate such sustained commitment, crediting Hewitt with helping achieve some of the RSPB's biggest species recovery successes
- Hewitt said he won't manage another 60 years but noted "David Attenborough is 100, so I could still be pottering around then"
Why it matters: The cirl bunting's recovery from near-extinction in the UK to more than 1,000 breeding pairs is a tangible conservation win tied directly to sustained volunteer stewardship of specific Devon habitats — a model the RSPB credits as among its largest species recovery successes.
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