Volunteering & Student Placements

Join the team here at The National Lobster Hatchery, a marine conservation, research and education charity. There are a number of opportunities to support various areas of the organisation from supporting the visitor centre staff to hatchery operations.

Testimonial

“The staff at the National Lobster Hatchery were excellent at making me feel welcome and teaching me everything I needed to know. I have absolutely loved the hatchery and have definitely learnt so much in the 3 months I was volunteering. It was a truly rewarding experience and I would wholeheartedly recommend it to anyone who wants to learn more about the practical side of marine conservation.”

Iona Norwood – PhD student

Placement student 2023

Volunteer with us

We are always on the lookout for enthusiastic individuals to help engage with the public on all things lobster in our Padstow based visitor centre. This would suit someone (and us!) that can commit to a day a week or can support for a few days in each of the school holidays. Sorry no one under the age of 18.

Student Placements

Aquaculture

We have two volunteer opportunities each year to join our technician team to support the day to day running of our hatcheries, facilitating our lobster restocking conservation programme and supporting cutting edge research.

Hatchery volunteers – day to day tasks include but are not limited to:

Feeding lobster larvae, juveniles, broodstock, and aquarium exhibits
Assisting with the husbandry of brood stock
Cleaning tanks
Maintaining and enhancing recirculating aquaculture systems and aquarium displays
Water quality/chemistry monitoring
Releasing juvenile lobsters

The placements are for 5 months full time; Please note the next placement opportunity will begin January 2026, all placements for 2025 are full. We will select one student for each placement, if you are interested please send your C.V and cover letter to [email protected]

Engagement and Outreach

We have one volunteer opportunity each year to join our team to support our outreach and education charitable outputs. Gain the valuable skills needed for future roles in communications, outreach and management of a marine conservation organisation,

Engagement and outreach volunteer – day to day tasks include but are not limited to:

Talking to visitors in our centre about the work we do
Helping with public baby lobster releases
Capturing content for our social media channels
Helping at local events raising awareness of the charity and our work
Helping drive footfall to our centre by handing out leaflets and signposting within Padstow

The placement is for 5 months full or part time; running from April’25 if you are interested, please send your C.V and cover letter to [email protected]

Research and PHD Placements

Our team of researchers are involved in some of the most pioneering European Lobster research anywhere in the world. We are able to accommodate a small number of student research projects focussing on the subject of European Lobster aquaculture, biology or fisheries which would benefit from the use of our facilities and the experience and knowledge of our scientists. These projects would usually be conducted as a joint venture between ourselves and the University of the Student and are best suited to third year BSc students or Masters/PhD projects.

If you have a project or PHD proposal, please send along with your CV to [email protected]

Please note: All of the above roles are un-paid and you must be over 18 to work with the NLH team. Unfortunately we are unable to offer any accommodation.