Profile

I currently live in Oban, which is a beautiful place on the West coast of Scotland, close to lots of beaches, mountains and islands. I live with my long-suffering partner, nine fish, three gerbils, three chickens and a rescue pigeon called Errol. We have a big garden that is full of random trees, bushes and ponds, and we sometimes get red squirrels and deer wandering in.

(This is one of my chickens, Shirley).

I enjoy watching rugby, and am addicted to Diet Coke. I ‘m also addicted to rock music, and go to lots of gigs, although not many bands come to Oban so we have to go and visit our nearest big city, Glasgow (which is an awesome city). I play guitar and drums, and have tattoos and a nose piercing, so I don’t look much like a “typical” scientist. No-one here seems to mind though!

I mainly love being outside, which is what I get to do a lot in my job. I especially enjoy our big red kayak that we use to go on adventures on the water. We also go for walks up mountains, although I think I prefer snowboarding down (I can be a bit lazy)! Often in the evenings I like sharing pizza and TV shows with my friends: we’re currently watching Glee and Game of Thrones (not at the same time). We enjoy playing board games and computer games too: I have an Xbox, Megadrive, Playstation and Wii, and I think I’m particularly good at Katy Perry on Just Dance.

(This is me out kayaking on our local loch)

My job title is “ecological researcher”, which is a fancy name for someone who is interested in plants and animals. I’ve done a lot of research all over the world, from rhinos in Namibia, to seabirds in America and chickens in London!

My current job is to try and find out what kinds of things live on our seashores in the UK, how many there are and whether they are ok. Sometimes different things can affect them, like rubbish that gets thrown away, or people using up all the space on beaches for other things like buildings. Our job is to make sure there is enough good space and food for them all.

(This is me doing a survey)

Of course, there is a lot of seashore around! The way we try and get to look everywhere is that I have a fantastic team of people who help out by looking on shores near them. We often get together to share ideas or swap notes, and a lot of my job is to chat to all these people and collect all the information they have found out. I also work with lots of great scientists all across the country: I have friends in Newcastle, Bangor, Hull, Portsmouth, Plymouth and Ross-on-Wye who are all looking out for the plants and animals near them as well. It is great, because it means that I can tell other people when I find something exciting, and they get excited too.

(This is most of the team together down in Newcastle)

My days are really varied: sometimes I’m just sat inside all day just working on my computer, which is important but can be a bit boring if the weather is nice outside.

My favourite days are when I get to go and work with other people that are working on my project. I have lots of fantastic volunteers, who are all really enthusiastic and funny, and give up their time to help out. I get to teach them all sorts of cool facts about how to find interesting animals and plants and how they live, and then we go out together on to beaches and write down all the stuff we find. There is always plenty of tea and biscuits, and I normally find my stomach aches from laughing so hard at the end of the day, often because I have fallen into a rockpool.

(This is some of us out learning about seashells)

I sometimes go out on my own to look for something special: for example, last week I was out looking for barnacles (tiny animals that are stuck to rocks). It means I get to go to remote places, sometimes on islands, and spend the day counting or collecting things. It can be really fascinating: a few weeks ago I was looking under the water and found all these eggs from sea slugs and sea snails: they look like aliens!

Sea squirt