Volunteering

Volunteering At Folly Wildlife Rescue

With up to 200 volunteers, Folly offers an inclusive and supportive environment for anyone passionate about helping wildlife and has 4 hours of free time, at least once a week.

A regular, weekly commitment is required when applying for our volunteering roles. This provides us with stability of numbers and ensures you are kept up to date with working practices here at Folly. Please ensure that you are able to commit to 1 shift a week before applying.

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Working in our hospital is very rewarding and includes working with a variety of British Wildlife, although we tend to have high numbers of hedgehogs and pigeons in our care all year round. Depending on the time of year, the role can get extremely busy but staff are always on hand to help where needed.

A shift outline involves:

Being allocated to a unit or aviaries, where you will work alone or as a pair cleaning animal cages and providing them with fresh food and water. This can involve a lot of kneeling, bending, and stretching.

Handling wildlife when required, moving them whilst cleaning and weighing them if asked to do so, and documenting this onto their care sheet. This may include hedgehogs, pigeons, gulls, crows, rabbits, and mice.

Collecting faecal samples when needed.

Following protocols for cleaning and maintaining them to a high standard to avoid potential cross contamination and further illness to the animals.

Cleaning your work area when finished, emptying bins, sweeping, and mopping the floor.

Re-stocking your work area ready for the next shift.

Although animal husbandry is generally carried out in the mornings, here at Folly the working day continues and there are other tasks you can help with to contribute to the smooth running of the hospital.

Duties typically include:

General cleaning duties (inside and outside) – this may be in animal units and communal staff and volunteer areas

Laundry

Cleaning animal cages that may be left over from the morning shifts, especially in the summer months

Cleaning aviaries and getting them ready for new admissions

Topping up animal units with essential supplies

The role of receptionist can be a very demanding one, so you do need to be cool in a crisis – but it is a very important role too.

You will be:

helping our staff by co-ordinating collections of casualties

answering general phone enquiries and giving advice

Seeing in admissions from the general public

processing donations

keeping the working area clean and tidy.

Shifts are mornings or afternoons and tend to be three or four hours long depending on the time of year.

No experience is required. However, you will need to be able to work well as a team, adapt in a calm manner to varying workloads, have good communication skills and a pleasant manner.

If you enjoy a challenge, and like working with people (and animals!), it could well be the option for you?

Wildlife casualties are normally brought to us by members of the public, but this isn’t always possible, and where we can, we will collect from veterinary surgeons, the elderly, or people without any transport, and this is where our Wildlife Collection Volunteers come in.

Using your own vehicle, you would be collecting pre-boxed casualties and bringing it to our hospital for treatment and rehabilitation.

Animals that need collecting are most often hedgehogs and other small mammals, pigeons and baby birds. Larger animals that require specialist equipment to contain will be outsourced to an experienced rescuer.

We maintain a comprehensive list of drivers, covering the whole region (but always need more!), and when a pick-up is required, our receptionists will phone around until they find someone who is free. It’s all absolutely at the volunteer’s convenience and there is no obligation whatsoever.

It’s a great way of helping to save lives!

Our small group of Land Army carry out management and maintenance work, both in the hospital and on the surrounding nature reserve. Duties are varied and dependent on what is needed on site but may include jobs such as routine repairs, landscaping, weeding or re-painting the outside of the hospital.

No skill or experience is needed.

Our small fundraising team fill one of the most important roles at the Trust.

Being a charity, it does NOT receive any local or government assistance, or lottery funding, and relies almost entirely on its own fundraising endeavours. We are constantly looking for fresh ideas and ways to raise the funds that Folly needs in order to continue its work.

We are a small friendly team. Get in touch if you are interested and we can show you around the wildlife hospital and the projects that we are raising funds for. Once you’ve joined, you can opt-in to email communication or join our dedicated fundraising page on Facebook, where you will be informed about upcoming events asking if you can spare a couple of hours. We always work in pairs or small groups and there is no obligation at any time.

Availability: April – October

Minimum placement: 1 week

Folly Wildlife Rescue welcomes students seeking work experience placements in conjunction with animal care or vetinerary courses they are undertaking.

Placements comprise a working week of 5 days, over a 7-day period (to include one day at weekends), with 2 days off per week (to reflect the normal 7 day a week operation of the hospital). The work includes cleaning and setting up pens and enclosures, observations, food preparation, hand-feeding baby birds, and record keeping. Students are also expected to participate in the normal cleaning regimes undertaken by other staff and adhere to all Trust protocols.

Due to the physical nature of the work, we do not recommend you apply if you have any previous or existing ailments or injuries.

Full support and training is given, so you don’t need any previous experience, but commitment, and an interest in wildlife and the natural world is essential.

Ideally applicants should live no further than a 40-minute drive from the hospital and must organise their own transport and accommodation if needed.

On receipt of your application, we will (subject to availability and approval), contact you with an offer of a provisional place. Spaces are limited, so if at any point, you are unable to proceed, please let us know as soon as possible, so that we can offer the place to another applicant.

We are unable to take on student volunteers under the age of 18. As a small team of staff, we do not have the ability to provide safeguarding and monitoring in a high-risk environment.

Kent Volunteers has a section dedicated to volunteering opportunities for Under 18s.

Facts You Should Know

We are extremely thankful for you support and your generous donations and contributions.

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Admitted Animals Per Year

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Funds Raised - November 2024

Volunteering

Volunteering At Folly Wildlife Rescue

Select Vacancy

Facts You Should Know

Quick Links

Location

Contact

Email

Volunteering

Volunteering At Folly Wildlife Rescue

Select Vacancy

Facts You Should Know

Quick Links

Location

Contact

Email

Student Volunteer Application Form

Wildlife Care Volunteer – Mornings Only

Afternoon Volunteer For General Duties

Folly Fundraiser Volunteer

Folly Land Army Volunteer

Wildlife Collection Driver Volunteer Form

Wildlife Hospital Reception Volunteer