Who is your wetland hero? | Marsh Award 2018

For the past two years, we have been rewarding people for their game-changing work with wetlands. So many people across the UK work hard to make a difference for wetland wildlife yet their enormous efforts are overlooked.

That is why this year we have added another dimension to our annual Marsh Award to highlight all the wonderful work going on in the wetlands around the UK. In 2018, we will be giving out not one, but two awards to the people that deserve them. One is reserved for a special person who has devoted a lifetime to supporting wetlands, while the other will be awarded to a person who has made the biggest impact over the last 12 months. This second, new award is about recognising a person who has recently achieved something amazing.

The winner of each award will receive a cheque for £1,000, thanks to the generous support of the Marsh Christian Trust. By working together to celebrate these wonderful people creating and preserving UK wetlands, we aim to inspire even more people to live wetland friendly lives.

You're free to nominate absolutely anyone. But to spark new nominations and provide some inspiration, we have spoken to four heroes who would make worthy winners for their contribution to wetland ways! Simply download and complete our nomination form to put forward one of these or your own suggestion. Our panel of expert judges will review applications after 31 May so please nominate today. It’s another way that as a supporter of WWT you are part of saving and protecting wetlands and their wildlife!

Today we introduce Daniel Modley, Grounds Support and Engagement Volunteer at WWT Steart Marshes.


Daniel grew up in in Bridgwater, Somerset until he left to join the Royal Navy at 17 where he served as a medical assistant for five years. He returned home with plans to become a nurse but instead decided to nourish his life-long interest in the natural world and joined the volunteering team at Steart Marshes.

Daniel has been a great asset to the hardworking crew at WWT’s first working wetland since he began helping out there in June 2015. His practical day begins with discussing sightings at the reserve during the week. Tasks for the day are set, which can include hedge maintenance or stock fencing to creating drinking bays for the herds of cattle which graze at Steart to keep the meadows in optimum condition for wildlife. Daniel is no stranger to the physically demanding side of wetland maintenance, devoting much of his time to pond clearance and vegetation control over an area that spans hundreds of hectares.

As he spent more time at the reserve, Daniel became increasingly interested ecology and an organism’s place and relation within the physical world. As such, he began studying invertebrates at Steart as part of his animal conservation degree in September 2016. His research project involves environmental variables and how they influence the abundance of sedimentary invertebrates of the intertidal area. His results have shown a significance between soil moisture content and the amount of invertebrates present and he is developing this study for his dissertation next year.

The course is validated by Oxford Brookes University and taught at Bridgwater and Taunton College, part of the University centre of Somerset.

But Daniel takes great satisfaction dealing with all the elements of working on the wetlands. He knows, that in some way, they make a difference, whether it’s enhancing the visitor experience of managing habitats for wildlife which in turn will provide food or shelter for animals thus giving biodiversity a helping hand.

Above and beyond his commitments to volunteering and further education, Daniel still spends some of his spare time on the marshes, taking in the reserves and observing the team’s accomplishments. It wasn’t that long ago that the Steart Marshes were nothing but flood-prone farmland but thanks to the dedication of Daniel and the other 59 volunteers at Steart, WWT’s first working wetlands have gone from strength-to-strength. They continue to thrive, attracting a fantastic range of birds such as spoonbills, herons, egrets and avocets as well as families of wild otters and fish fry.

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