Associate Consultants
Kevin Peberdy BSc, MSc
Kevin is the Director of Centre Developments for WWT and is responsible for the development of all nine WWT Visitor Centres, including building design, visitor access and interfacing, exhibit development (including live animal exhibits), reserve management and interpretation.
Kevin holds more than 20 years' experience in wetland management, restoration and creation, but also has extensive knowledge of all aspects of visitor centre design and construction management. He was the senior designer and overall project manager of the internationally acclaimed WWT London Wetland Centre and has since undertaken major developments at WWT Welney (eco-friendly visitor centre, bridge and observatories), WWT Martin Mere (100 ha of wetland creation and innovative bird hide design), WWT Arundel (wetland creation and boat trail) and WWT Castle Espie (large-scale coastal wetland restoration, access, interpretation and visitor centre). In a consultative capacity, Kevin has undertaken over 50 projects in the fields of wetland restoration, visitor centre design, exhibit development and interpretation. These include work throughout the UK, Hong Kong (including the habitat and external exhibit design of the Hong Kong Wetland Park), North America, Brazil and Korea.
James Orr BCL, DipTP, MRTPI
James is WWT's Director, Northern Ireland, and is responsible for the development, education and conservation work of WWT at Castle Espie Wetland Centre and also promoting the work of WWT in Ireland.
James has a degree in Law, a post graduate degree in Town and Country Planning and a qualification in Leadership from Harvard. He has held many voluntary and statutory positions including the Strangford Lough Management Committee, Northern Ireland Environment Link, the Northern Ireland Biodiversity Group, the Drainage Council for Northern Ireland and the Northern Ireland Civic Forum. James is also a part-time lecturer at the School of the Built Environment and Queens University with a special teaching interest in planning for biodiversity and sustainable development.
Dr Baz Hughes
Baz is an experienced ornithologist, specialising in behaviour and ecology of waterbirds. His main interests include diving duck feeding ecology, alleviating damage by conflict species (both economic and biological), and threatened species conservation. He is experienced in Threatened Species Action Plan production and implementation with a long-standing interest in conservation of fish-eating birds, especially Mergansers and Cormorants. Baz is also experienced in business, managerial and operational aspects of ecological consultancy work. He has planned, run, and fundraised for international scientific expeditions (over 30 expeditions to Iceland, Turkey, Far-east Russia, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Bulgaria, Azerbaijan, Georgia, St. Kitts-Nevis, Turks & Caicos Islands, Ethiopia, Brazil).
Baz has 20 years' professional experience in waterfowl ecology and has published over 100 scientific papers and reports, and 50 popular articles. He has been Chair of the IUCN-SSC/ Wetlands International Threatened Waterfowl Specialist Group since 1999 and since 2004, has been Head of Species Conservation at WWT taking overall responsibility for WWT's waterbird monitoring, research and conservation activities.
Peter Cranswick BSc (Hons)
Peter has more than 15 years' experience of organising and participating in large-scale waterbird monitoring schemes and was WWT's Head of Waterbird Monitoring for eight years. During this time, he was responsible for many national waterbird surveys, including the Wetland Bird Survey (WeBS) (being head of the WeBS Secretariat from 1998 to 2004), and national censuses of several goose and swan species, and co-ordinated the international Icelandic Whooper Swan Census in 1995 and 2000.
Peter has conducted aerial surveys of birds in nearshore marine waters in the UK since the late 1990s, leading to the development of extensive survey of the English Irish Sea and North Sea coasts in 2004/05 and 2005/06 for Government and the windfarm industry. Peter has overseen and authored many reports of these surveys, and was chief author of the UK's annual report, Wildfowl and Wader Counts, from 1992 to 2003. Peter has also been involved in the development of national strategies for wildfowl monitoring; he regularly provides advice to Government and other organisations, and has contributed to relevant national publications regarding waterbird monitoring and conservation.
Peter sits on the UK Government's expert advisory panels on wild bird surveillance and contributes to the UK Government's Qualitative Risk Assessment for H5N1 Avian Influenza. As Head of Threatened Species for WWT, Peter is responsible for co-ordinating WWT's activity to conserve threatened wildfowl and flamingos worldwide, which is primarily achieved through an action planning approach.
Dr Eileen Rees
Eileen is Head of WWT’s UK Waterbird Conservation Programme, based at WWT's Martin Mere Wetland Centre, with particular responsibility for long-term population studies of migratory geese and swans. She has nearly 30 years’ experience of wildfowl research and conservation projects, has published over 150 scientific papers and reports, and disseminated research results more widely through numerous popular articles.
Eileen’s particular expertise is in studying the behaviour, ecology and dynamics of waterbird populations.She has been active in promoting international research programmes along migratory flyways, leading the collaborative study of the Icelandic Whooper Swan population, and the Anglo-Russian study of Bewick’s Swan breeding biology.
From 1994-2001, Eileen was Chair of the IUCN-SSC/Wetlands International Swan Specialist Group, during which time she convened the 4th International Swan Symposium (held in Virginia) and published the proceedings as a special edition of the Waterbirds journal.Additionally, Eileen acts on the Scottish Executive’s Goose Science Advisory Group and other conservation fora.Other waterbird research and conservation issues addressed over the years include the effects of disturbance on behaviour and distribution, site selection, migration strategies, mitigation measures and inter-specific competition for resources.
Richard Hearn HND
Richard holds more than 15 years' professional experience in the field of waterbird conservation and is currently the Programme Manager for Waterbird Monitoring in the Species Conservation Department at WWT.He has extensive waterbird fieldwork experience, having carried out field-based research and monitoring on swans, geese, ducks, flamingos, waders and herons, both in the UK and abroad. He is also an experienced bird ringer with over 20 years' experience.
Richard has more than ten years' experience in the design, implementation, data analysis and reporting of waterbird monitoring activities. He has published nine peer-reviewed papers and over 40 reports, including key waterbird monitoring outputs such as four WWT/ JNCC Waterbird Reviews, and annual Wetland Bird Survey reports.
He also has extensive experience of project management, being currently responsible for the delivery and development of waterbird monitoring activities at WWT. This involves three core work areas: Integrated Waterbird Monitoring; International Waterbird Monitoring Capacity Building; and Indicators & Assessments. To this end he represents WWT on relevant bodies, e.g. SPA/ Ramsar Scientific Working Group, Defra's Hunting Bag Statistics Working Group, Defra's Brent Goose Management Review Group, and Wetland Bird Survey Steering Committee, and inputs to the production of outputs such as Birds of Conservation Concern, State of the UK's Birds, and Waterbird Population Estimates.
Carl Mitchell BSc (Hons)
Carl is an experienced waterfowl ecologist, bird ringer and aerial surveyor and is currently responsible for co-ordinating WWT's goose monitoring, research and conservation work. He previously held a position at WWT as Senior Research Officer (1986-1997) and has 21 years' professional experience in waterfowl ecology and land management. He has designed and managed several research contracts for WWT, including work on aerial surveys and goose ecology, and has published over 20 scientific papers and two site reviews based on 40 years of goose monitoring. Prior to his current position, Carl was site manager at RSPB Insh Marshes (Scotland) for five years and WWT Welney (Norfolk) for five years.
Dr Mark Trinder
Mark is a population ecologist and has undertaken modeling and statistical analyses on a range of internal and external projects. He is proficient in population modeling, survival analysis and distance analysis as well as general statistical techniques for analysing wildlife data.
Key outputs have included stochastic population models for several European goose populations, seabird population density estimation from data collected by aerial survey of proposed off-shore windfarm sites, population viability analysis for proposed species reintroductions and detailed analysis of long-term swan and goose data yielding insights into variations in survival rates and individual life-histories.
Mark was invited to represent WWT on a NERC-funded work group looking at the effects of climate change on wildlife populations, bringing together climate researchers from the UK Meteorological Office and ecologists, with the aim of undertaking detailed analysis of the role of climate variability in observed wildlife population trends.
Dr Ruth Cromie
Ruth began her career in wildlife health by gaining a PhD for vaccine development in wildfowl from University College London in 1991. Since then she has worked on various aspects of disease control from diagnostic technologies to environmental management in both wild and captive animals. She has worked on numerous health and welfare projects of, primarily, birds and marsupials in a number of organisations including: the Smithsonian Institution's National Zoological Park, Washington DC, USA; Hong Kong University; the National Birds of Prey Centre, Gloucestershire; and the Durrell Institute of Conservation and Ecology, Canterbury, Kent.
In addition to being responsible for WWT's Threats to Waterbirds Programme and overseeing ex situ research projects, Ruth regularly teaches wildlife health and conservation biology on a number of post-graduate programmes and co-directs the Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust's Summer School in Endangered Species Conservation and Management. Ruth has played a key role in the formation and implementation of WWT's Animal Welfare and Ethics Committee to ensure high welfare standards in all WWT's animal-related operations. Ruth is a member of the British and Irish Association of Zoos and Aquariums (BIAZA) Research Group, Defra's Lead Regulations Steering Group, and the Convention Migratory Species' Avian Influenza Scientific Task Force, due to being heavily involved in Avian Influenza surveillance, contingency planning and training.
Dr Seb Buckton
Seb is Community Wetlands Programme Manager for WWT. He has 15 years' experience in wetland conservation in the UK and abroad, and is now responsible for WWT's wetland conservation projects where people from local communities are central to their development and implementation, and are themselves the principal beneficiaries of the multi-functional values that wetlands bring.
Prior to joining WWT, Seb completed his PhD in the ecology of river birds at Cardiff University, after which he lived and worked in Hong Kong (assessing the disturbance impacts of housing developments on the Mai Po Ramsar site) and Vietnam (assessing the conservation status of Mekong Delta wetlands. He has undertaken wetland conservation projects in diverse environments, including upland bogs, sub-tropical floodplains, tropical fishponds, mountain hillstreams, continental salt lakes and tropical deltaic wetlands. He has extensive overseas work experience in addition to Hong Kong and Vietnam, including in Nepal, Kenya, Uganda, and Mongolia.
Prior to taking on the role of Community Wetlands Programme Manager, Seb was a Principal Research Officer at WWT, where he was responsible for developing and implementing a range of wetland research projects. He has published a variety of peer-reviewed papers on wetland related issues.
Dr Sally Mackenzie
Sally is the Programme Manager for Functional Wetlands within the Wetland Conservation Department of WWT, based at Slimbridge. She is responsible for the development of the Functional Wetlands Programme, the aim of which is to develop, demonstrate and disseminate best practice models and understanding of wetland functions which benefit both society and wetland biodiversity.
Sally has more than seven years' experience in the design of wetland habitats which integrate water quality improvements with nature conservation objectives. She has specialist skills in the ecological survey of wetlands and bio-monitoring techniques for the assessment of pollution impact.
Prior to starting her current role, Sally worked as a wetland ecologist and was involved in a variety of consultancy projects including wetland treatment system design and monitoring, wetland habitat creation, and the assessment of flora and fauna to changes in hydrological regime. She has published a variety of peer-reviewed articles on wetland treatment system performance and ecological assessment.
Simon Rose BSc, MA, Dip LA
Simon is the Centre Developments Manager for the WWT and is responsible for the design and implementation of new exhibits and other developments at WWT's nine visitor centres.
Simon is a qualified landscape architect with degrees in Landscape Design from Birmingham, Landscape Management from Manchester and Environmental Science from London, and has 25 years' experience in the private, public and voluntary sectors. Simon has also lectured at Manchester Metropolitan University and taught professionally at Pershore College of Horticulture, where he set up and ran the HNC in Garden Design in 1995 and designed and built several award winning show gardens.
Amanda Bradbury HND, BSc (Hons)
Amanda is Head of Interpretation for WWT and is responsible for interpretation master-planning, design and installation of exhibits, graphics and other interpretative media across all nine WWT visitor centres.
Amanda has ten years' experience in graphic and interpretation design. She qualified in Natural History Illustration (HND) at Bournemouth & Poole Art College, and Biological Sciences (BSc) at Exeter University.