Meet Hen Harrier Action's Team of Volunteer Directors and Trustees
Hen Harrier Action is run entirely by volunteers . We thank everyone who supports our work, including our subscribers, followers and donors, and especially the organisers of local events.
Meet the team:
Paul Samuels, Hen Harrier Action Co-chair
Paul is a wildlife and documentary film maker who lives in North East London. He has produced film content for WWT and RSPB and numerous film and video items for Hen Harrier Action. His early career was as a professional violinist but now he works exclusively in the world of film making and his output includes social documentaries on housing and support for the homeless, as well as events like the Great River Race, London and the Restore Nature Now rally in 2023.
Recording the natural world has been a lifelong interest, beginning with stills photography in his teens and developing into video in the last 10 years. Paul also directs and produces Skydancer Day, Hen Harrier Action's annual online live broadcast on YouTube.
Indy Kiemel Greene, Hen Harrier Action Co-chair
Indy is a naturalist and Goshawk lover from Nottinghamshire. He is lucky enough to live a stone’s throw from Sherwood Forest and has been fascinated by wildlife from an early age. He is a member of the RSPB's Youth Council and is well-known from appearances on Springwatch, 8 Out of 10 Bats, Hen Harrier Action's annual Skydancer Day and elsewhere.
He believes we should encourage engagement with nature through all the avenues available. He sees real importance not only in sharing the joyous encounters, but also highlighting the threat species and habitats are facing.
Andrea Hudspeth, Director & Trustee
Andrea runs Aquila Ecology, based in the beautiful Loch Lomond & The Trossachs National Park and offering walks and tours as well as ecological services. Andrea has always loved nature and all animals but worked first in the service sector and then in adult and further education before taking a degree in Wildlife and Countryside Conservation which included a dissertation on moorland management and Hen Harriers.
She has since worked for the RSPB, Yorkshire Wildlife Trust and others, and volunteered in raptor protection camps on Malta and Sicily. She completes yearly monitoring of breeding raptor species with Tayside Raptor Study Group. Andrea has organised three Hen Harrier Days in Scotland to date and many walks and awareness-raising events.
Adrian Rowe, Director & Trustee
Originally from Guernsey in the Channel Islands, Adrian lived in West Yorkshire for over 40 years and worked in a marketing agency based in Manchester. A passionate birder, in his spare time he could often be found at one of the many nature reserves in and around Yorkshire. He has participated in national Turtle Dove and breeding wader surveys.
Now retired, he lives in northern Spain, where he continues his passion for birding with renewed enthusiasm.
With a lifetime’s experience in online and offline marketing, he hopes to help raise the profile of Hen Harrier Action through its website, newsletters and by expanding its digital reach.
Jonathan Wilson, Director & Trustee
Jonathan is a communications professional at an international environmental organization. With a background in volunteering for organizations like RSPB, Wildlife Trusts, and the Marine Conservation Society, Jonathan is passionate about protecting our planet's natural habitats and species.
Claire Hopkinson-Brown, Treasurer
Claire lives in Stockport with husband and three sons, two cats and a small flock of chickens! She is a Chartered Management Accountant with over 20 years’ experience in Finance.
She has always been passionate about the environment with a particular interest in birds and conservation, with family visits to wetland centres, birds of prey venues and keeping a keen eye on the wide variety of birds in her garden. With two sons now at university she is keen to dedicate some time to a voluntary role to support a charity close to her heart.
With professional experience including commercial finance, business partnering, strategic planning, financial control, treasury and FP&A, her current role involves looking at human impact on the environment, working with a team which includes ornithologists, marine scientists, botanists and terrestrial ecologists.
Emma Butler
Emma is a communications and PR professional specialising in wildlife and environmental campaigns. Passionate about protecting our natural environment and the wildlife within it, Emma has worked with organisations including WWT, Whale and Dolphin Conservation, and Hawk Conservancy Trust, and is currently Head of Communications and PR at Butterfly Conservation.
Based in Wiltshire, Emma uses her communications expertise to raise awareness of the threats facing the UK's wildlife and natural habitats, drive greater connection to nature, and campaign for positive change.
Becky Downey
Originally from Northern Ireland, Becky moved to London to study Biodiversity and Conservation and has stayed nearby ever since (except for a 6-month stint in Mauritius!). She has always combined her love for wildlife and socialising into her roles, working in engagement and education within the environmental charity sector. Currently based at the Berks, Bucks and Oxon Wildlife Trust as the Community Organising Manager, Becky is passionate about ensuring nature is accessible by all as diversity and inclusion is essential to tackling environmental issues. Becky is also a keen birder and moth-er, having spent time working at Sandwich Bay Bird Observatory (where she saw her first Hen Harrier), and is also a bird ringer with the BTO. Her spare time is spent volunteering doing wildlife surveys, as well as hiking and wild camping! With experience in working with young people and diverse audiences, Becky hopes to bring more of Hen Harrier Action's work to community groups and involve more young people in our actions!
Dr Helen Whitehead
Helen is a Lecturer in Environment and Sustainability at the University of Salford. Her PhD research focused on using ecoacoustics to investigate the impacts of radiation on birds in the Chornobyl Exclusion Zone. As part of her research at the University, Helen is an ecoacoustician where she uses the acoustics to investigate impacts of noise pollution and climate change on biodiversity. Helen is passionate about biodiversity and the natural environment, making it an integral part of her research and hobbies.
Rob Knott
Rob is the Skomer Island Visitor Officer for The Wildlife Trust of South and West Wales, spending up to 9 months of the year on this internationally important seabird island, just off the Pembrokeshire coast. Rob looks after the day trip and overnight visitors to the island, who come to experience the sights and sounds of nearly 350,000 breeding pairs of Manx Shearwaters, more than 40,000 Atlantic Puffins and thousands of Guillemots, Razorbills, Kittiwakes and other seabirds. A zoologist and conservationist, prior to Skomer Island, Rob worked at the RSPB as a video assistant, and he has a collection of film, photography and podcasts on his own website (www.robknott.co.uk).
Advisors
Bob Elliot
Bob was a founder Trustee of Hen Harrier Action and is Director of OneKind, a respected and evidence-led welfare organisation helping to make a difference for animals in Scotland, exposing the cruelty and persecution so often encountered by our domestic, farmed and wild animals. His previous work, over nearly 25 years in nature conservation, included posts at the National Trust for Scotland, Loch Lomond & The Trossachs National Park and latterly as the Head of Investigations for the RSPB, managing and overseeing the detection and investigation of serious wildlife crime cases. When not at work Bob can be found leading nature tours, watching wildlife and sea kayaking.
Andrea Goddard
Andrea is a passionate conservationist living in the beautiful Highlands of Scotland. Volunteering at the RSPB's Tollie red kite centre from 2011, she graduated in 2019 with a degree in Environmental Science at the University of the Highlands and Islands. Her dissertation focused on the roosting behaviour of Eurasian treecreepers, which led to a feature on the subject on BBC's Winterwatch in 2020. Now working for SCOTLAND:The Big Picture managing a project to reintroduce common cranes to the Cairngorms, her spare time is taken up by managing the online wildlife crime campaign group Mad for Wildlife, pressing for a ban on rodent glue traps in Scotland and monitoring raptor nesting for the Highland Raptor Study Group.