Meet the judges

Tim is a founder and director of Oakbank Game & Conservation Ltd, a company established in 2004 which supplies clients across the UK with seed and advice, helping them with grant applications, ecological surveys, and habitat creation and management. The Oakbank team also helps those who are considering a more regenerative approach to their farming system. 

Tim is passionate about the British countryside and still finds time to write for several countryside publications. He has been on the judging panel of the prestigious Purdey Awards for Game and Conservation since 2011. 

Well known for his prominent role in the acclaimed Clarkson’s Farm series, Charlie has 20 years of experience providing leading farm management and consultancy advice to clients across the west and south east of England. Specialising in farm management and strategic planning, Charlie is a registered agricultural valuer, a qualified agronomist (ICM and BETA), and has been a committee member of the Game & Wildlife Conservation Trust. He advises a number of high profile and high net worth clients, including Jeremy Clarkson.

Megan has worked in land management and agroecology for nearly 20 years, with a varied career that has entailed all sorts from working for government delivering agri-environment schemes to managing private estates, working for the CLA as a regional and national advisor, and now her current role at the GWCT as a senior farm environment advisor. Within this role, Megan facilitates two large Farmer Clusters, undertaking ecological surveys, planning and overseeing habitat connection, creation and management, and providing training and events. She also delivers GWCT advisory services and manages several individual client portfolios.   

Megan is a Member of the Chartered Institute of Ecology and Environmental Management and is listed on the BASIS Environmental Advisers Register. 

Vee is an innovator, co-inventor, and a chartered mechanical engineer. He has been with Branston Ltd, one of the largest retail potato packers in the UK, for 19 years and has held a varied portfolio within the company, recently marking 15 years as executive board director.  Vee is currently a board member and CEO of a group of agri-tech companies; B-hive Innovations Ltd provides commercial R&D for the agri industry, HarvestEye Ltd is a crop insight company for the fresh produce industry, and Root Extracts Ltd is a functional food ingredient start-up for the plant-based industry.

Jake is director of Holkham National Nature Reserve and general manager of conservation at the Holkham Estate in Norfolk. With 30 years of experience in land management on private landed estates, he has held a range of roles, including co-chair of the National Nature Reserve Steering Group, a panel member on the Designated Landscapes Glover Review, practitioner lead on Defra’s Species Reintroductions Task Force, and a member of the RSPB England Advisory Committee. Also the author of Land Healer, Jake is a sought-after speaker and contributor.

Alexandra Henton has been the editor of The Field since 2020, having joined the title in 2008. She is passionate about curating and creating exceptional content, with a keen eye for authenticity. Last year she launched The Field Junior: the first of its kind, it is a magazine for sporting and countryside-keen eight- to 16-year-olds. As a trustee of the GWCT, the British Sporting Art Trust and a Purdey Awards judge, Alexandra is an advocate and enthusiast for everything the countryside has to offer. She lives with her family and other animals on a farm in Leicestershire and is delighted to be part of the judging panel for the Schöffel Countryside Awards.  

Director of policy and the Allerton Project for the Game & Wildlife Conservation Trust (GWCT), Alastair is an agricultural scientist and BASIS-qualified agronomist. His work has focussed on combining productive farming with wildlife conservation. He has board-level experience with GWCT, Rothamsted Research, The Arable Group, Agricology and the UK Soil Management Initiative. He is a current board member of Natural England. Alastair received the 2023 National Agricultural Award from the Royal Agricultural Society for an outstanding contribution to the advancement of agriculture in the United Kingdom.  

Julie grew up on a mixed farm in northeast Nebraska, USA, and received her PhD from Glasgow University, joining the GWCT in 1995. She is a principal scientist at the GWCT and manages the trust’s Sussex Study, the National Gamebag Census, the Partridge Count Scheme, and GIS (Geographical Information Science) team. Her research involves utilising long-term and spatial datasets to explore the effects of agricultural intensification on grey partridges, invertebrates, arable flora, and the arable environment on which they all depend. She is also chair of the European Sustainable Use Group.

Livestock farmer and farm business consultant Rhys lives on a family farm on the Llyn Peninsula, North Wales and consults for Precision Grazing Ltd. He established Coed Coch Farms Ltd sheep share farming company in 2016 where low input, regenerative farming is practised. Rhys has a background in education and specialises in grazing management, regenerative farming, joint ventures, farm business planning and facilitates farm succession meetings. He has a passion for developing financially, environmentally and socially sustainable farming businesses.

Ross is director of moorland at Scottish Land & Estates where he leads representation on moorland and wildlife management. He previously worked for EDF Renewables and the British Association for Shooting and Conservation in Scotland, before which he studied Geography at the University of St Andrews and Sustainable Mountain Development at the University of the Highlands and Islands. He researched moorland and wildlife management extensively at both institutions.  

Ross is a fellow of the Royal Geographical Society and a member of the Chartered Institute of Public Relations. Outside of work, he enjoys game shooting, deer stalking, hill walking and skiing.  

Amber is the director of membership, marketing and communications at the GWCT and the chairperson of a regional amphibian and reptile conservation group. Having trained as a wildlife biologist and completing an MSc in Ecological Monitoring, she has a varied background in biodiversity conservation, science communication and public engagement. Through her career she has designed and helped deliver a Natural England-funded landscape conservation plan, guided regional habitat improvement, and has developed citizen science projects with local communities and partners. In her role, she is passionate about sharing GWCT’s research and advice, and helping conservation and countryside management reach wide audiences.

Owen Williams is a professional wildlife artist and writer with an increasing involvement in the debate on management of the uplands, moorland, tree planting and farming. He is a trustee and Wales Chair of the Game & Wildlife Conservation Trust, and he has contributed to the published science on woodcock through 18 years of ringing and tagging of 2,500 individual birds. He recently conducted a scoping study looking at woodcock soil preference on their nocturnal feeding sites.  

As director of the advisory and education department at the Game & Wildlife Conservation Trust, Roger leads a growing team of specialist advisors and ecologists helping land managers deliver positive environmental outcomes within the rural environment. Roger provides science-based advice on land and wildlife management and natural capital services to farmers, foresters, game and wildlife managers, and policymakers.

Marcus is the executive director of Schöffel Country. He started his career in the safari and wildlife conservation industries in South Africa, where he grew up, before moving to Scotland to study Environmental Geography at the University of Aberdeen, and then London for a post-grad in journalism. He has since written for and edited a wide range of countryside and country sports publications, and joined Bradshaw Taylor as brand director of Schöffel Country in 2017. Marcus is an advocate of a pragmatic approach to wildlife conservation though sustainable utilisation. He has been on the judging panel of the Purdey Awards for Game and Conservation since 2014. 

Dylan spent his formative years studying and working in agriculture in Wales, before working for the Countryside Commission for Scotland on the wild north-west coast. 

As head of the game and wildlife management department at Sparsholt College, he created the first three-year National Diploma in Game, Wildlife and Conservation Management, which continues to this day. 

In 1991, Dylan founded the Royal Berkshire Shooting School. Following the acquisition of Royal Berkshire Shooting Group in 2018 by James Purdey and Sons, he went on to establish Pressendye Limited – a consultancy which provides private shooting tuition, assists rural businesses, and promotes a range of brands and companies. Dylan is also a consultant to the GWCT and Eat Wild. 

A gold award winner in the Purdey Awards for Game and Conservation, Stewart is an experienced estate, sporting and biodiversity manager with a proven track record of creating sustainable models for large-scale agricultural businesses. Skilled in conservation management, sporting estate operations and wildlife habitat enhancement, he is particularly interested in environmental sustainability and conservation management.

Shaun is director of the Wild Trout Trust, a conservation charity passionately committed to protecting and improving rivers, their trout and all the biota in and around them. He’s an unashamed fish bloke, inspired by a childhood in and on the Indian Ocean, in the trout streams of southern Ireland and now 40 years of a professional life in fishery management, both game and coarse, with a lengthy and ongoing scientific background and continuing involvement with the fisheries and fish farming sectors. He is an avid fisher though continuously disappointed that 58 years of practice appears only to make him worse with each outing.

Jim is a sustainable farming advisor for Frontier Agriculture’s specialist crops and environmental land management business, Kings Crops. Jim joined Kings in 2019, working across the whole agricultural supply chain while also providing farm-gate support. He has extensive knowledge on the effective use of environmental measures and believes it is key to incorporate good environmental management alongside commercial farming to help deliver a range of biodiversity and business objectives. He also helps supply businesses understand what is practical to deliver on farm.   

Prior to Kings, Jim worked with the GWCT’s Allerton Project as head of training and development, where he was also the founder of the Big Farmland Bird Count. He was previously technical director for the Farming and Wildlife Advisory Group. 

Francis is the GWCT’s head of wildlife recovery and holds a higher degree in Conservation Biology and Ornithology. He has spent over 25 years researching practical solutions for farmland wildlife recovery, in particular the grey partridge. In the recently concluded and highly praised PARTRIDGE Interreg project, he led an international multi-disciplinary team who demonstrated how farmland wildlife can be restored successfully. Widely regarded as the international expert on grey partridge conservation and an expert on farmland biodiversity, he has worked with a multitude of rural stakeholders, including single farmers, farmer clusters, hunters, farm advisors, scientists, conservation NGOs and agri-policymakers. He is currently developing a conservation plan for the Avon Catchment Environmental Farmers Group (EFG) together with GWCT colleagues. 

Joe Stanley is head of sustainable farming at the Allerton Project, the GWCT’s research and demonstration farm in Leicestershire. Prior to joining the GWCT in 2021, he spent 15 years as an arable, beef and dairy farmer on his family farm. Joe is a passionate advocate for the benefits of nature and climate-friendly farming, is a columnist for Farmers Weekly and NFU Countryside, and is author of Farm to Fork: The Challenge of Sustainable Farming in 21st Century Britain. He is rarely to be found more than ten feet away from his pair of Jack Russell terriers, Ted and Toby. 

Nick joined the GWCT's uplands research team in 2017 with a PhD in Biodiversity and Community Ecology. Based in the Scottish Borders, he has worked on a variety of both English and Scottish projects, including research on red and black grouse, capercaillie and wading birds. Most notably, Nick has led on the recent GWCT research projects on mountain hares in Scotland. Having previously worked for both ecological consultancies and rewilding charities in southern Scotland, he has helped deliver practical conservation and habitat restoration at the landscape scale. In his spare time, Nick, who is now head of advisory for GWCT Scotland, enjoys training and working gundogs and is involved with local game shoots in the Scottish Borders. 

Born and brought up on the beautiful Llŷn Peninsula, North Wales, Lee is a first language Welsh speaker and comes from a farming community where his grandfather farmed sheep and cattle. Lee studied Environmental Risk Management at Cardiff UWIC. On graduating, he worked in boat building and then spent time in South Africa working on cattle and game farms. 

Lee has been with the GWCT for nearly five years and has worked on a number of projects involving species such as woodcock, fallow deer, curlew and grey squirrels. He is also a CAA drone pilot and has developed this work within the Trust for surveying species. 

In the 35 years since joining the Game & Wildlife Conservation Trust in 1989, Andrew Hoodless has worked on key research projects which have gone on to influence policy and best practice. Having started as a graduate, completing his PhD on woodcock breeding and wintering ecology, he has gone on to become a recognised world authority on woodcock. The results of the GWCT’s studies of this elusive bird have since changed the understanding of woodcock migration. Other notable achievements are the Upland Predation Experiment in Northumberland, work to quantify the effects of gamebird releasing on woodland wildlife, and studies on breeding waders, which have all had a lasting impact.

Matt is head of education and advisor for North England and Wales for the GWCT. With an MSc in Wildlife Ecology and Conservation, Matt has worked in the land management sector for nearly 20 years helping landowners, shoots and estates improve their conservation outputs. He champions the work of land and wildlife managers, highlighting their efforts to policymakers, and advocates the importance of predation management.

Matt has previously lectured on college and degree courses and is passionate about maximising other’s potential as working conservationists. He now heads the Trust’s education programme for gamekeepers and land managers.

Winner of the Rising Star category in the inaugural Schöffel Countryside Awards, Tom Hilder has already gained a wealth of experience in nature and wildlife conservation after graduating from Sparsholt College in 2017 and University Centre Sparsholt in 2020.

After securing his first job in the conservation sector at just 17 years old, his career has grown from strength to strength. Most recently, Tom has spent the past three years managing Bartley Heath and Hook Common nature reserves for the Hampshire and Isle of Wight Wildlife Trust (HIWWT), where he restored rare heathland, grassland, wetland and ancient woodland habitats, and helped local wildlife to recover. Tom has now stepped up and is responsible for delivering wide scale conservation across huge suite of nature reserves managed by HIWWT in his role as Senior Nature-based Solutions Officer. 

Rupert Brewer is the game and wildlife manager on the Bisterne Estate and a fourth generation gamekeeper with a background and qualifications in commercial horticulture and agriculture. Winner of two awards at the inaugural 2025 Schöffel Countryside Awards – individually in the Working Conservationist category and, together with the estate team, in the Wetlands and Watercourses category.

A passion for wildlife was key to Rupert successfully reversing the decline in breeding red-listed wader birds in the Avon Valley, as part of the GWCT Life project ‘Waders for Real’. His achievements also include a long list of habitat improvement and collaborative projects across the estate, ranging from stream re-bending, heathland improvements for sand lizards and woodland management for breeding woodcock and nightjar. This gives Rupert a broad range of knowledge and experience of range of habitats and species.

Alison is the restoration director for the Atlantic Salmon Trust, acting as a link between evidence gathering research, and management action on the ground, working with a range of partners. She is instrumental in delivering robust catchment and regional partnerships to ensure there is systems and landscape-scale change for the benefit of wild Atlantic salmon and sea trout; and the environments on which they depend. She is also the independent chair of Angling Scotland.

A former soldier and professional horseman in the Royal Household Cavalry, Richard now lays hedges for a living and is an award-winning conservationist, writer and author. Recognised as one of the leading practitioners in hedgerow management and rejuvenation – carrying out much of his work in Norfolk and Suffolk – he also co-hosts CountrySlide, a weekly podcast that covers various aspects of life in the British countryside through a blend of interviews, storytelling, and comment on current affairs.

As chief executive of the Institute of Fisheries Management, Paul has enjoyed a varied career and has a great deal of experience as an environmental scientist, and in water surveying and fisheries management. He is chairman of the East Yorkshire Rivers Trust, a member of the British Record Fish Committee, and sits on the Angling Advisory Group for the Canal and Rivers Trust.