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David Pereira

Ornithology Consultant
What employment sector do you work in?

Private Sector

How long have you had a green job for nature?

> 2 years

Salary Range

£20,000 – £25,000

Please describe the work that you do.

Analysing seabird and marine mammal data from airborne imagery from around offshore wind farms, and compiling the resulting statistics into reports used in the consenting process by OWF (offshore wind farm) developers. I use ‘Rstudio’ and QGIS to estimate seabird and marine mammal abundance, density and map their distribution. The role involves working with large datasets and various kinds of reports in a fast-paced environment where we must meet reporting deadlines. Most of my work is to support senior staff.

What do you most like about your job? Any dislikes?

I mostly enjoy working with data and problem-solving (e.g. R code troubleshooting, other technical problems). I enjoy using ‘R’ and QGIS, and managing and standardising large datasets. I dislike not working with data.

What inspired you into this career? 

Passion for ornithology. I wanted to work with birds or with bird data and there is plenty of the latter in my role!

Have you faced any challenges in progressing your career so far? 

Challenges with code or data so mostly technical challenges that I had to figure out by either asking someone in my team or sometimes by trial and error. No other type of challenges.

What education/training did you have?

A degree in Zoology and a Master’s in Applied Ecology & Conservation. Received in-house training on running R codes, QGIS (e.g. creating various map types of species distribution) and reporting. Received training to work on tenders and costing for projects.

What advice would you give to someone coming into the profession? 

This role would suit someone with a genuine (demonstrable) passion for ornithology and/or the marine environment. Also, it would suit a person that likes to work with data or enjoys writing reports or if both, even better. It is all desk-based and the role involves being able to keep organised and being able to prioritize as there are many reporting deadlines to meet. In addition, you need to have a keen eye for detail to ensure high levels of quality and consistency month-to-month.

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