Zoo Jobs: Avicultural assistant

Saturday, November 6, 2021

Avicultural assistant

Avicultural assistant

A falcon breeding facility specialising in the breeding of gyr falcons, peregrine falcons, and hybrid gyr peregrines for export to the Middle East looking for an enthusiastic and highly motivated individual to join a small team situated in the South of Scotland.

You:

Essential

· Highly motivated and hard working with a keen interest in birds.

· Flexibility regarding work hours and an ability to demonstrate intuition when working with other as a team.

· An ability to effectively communicate with manager and other team members with good organisational skills.

· Practical skills and abilities in manual labour.

· Drivers licence with own vehicle.

· Keen to learn and broaden your own knowledge of breeding.

· Smiling.

Desirable

· Experience working with and handling birds of prey.

· Basic avian knowledge and a familiarity with the process of breeding falcons.

· Educated to college or degree level.

The job

During the spring and summer months staff work extended hours (including weekends) to cover the breeding season therefore the successful candidate of this position must demonstrate flexibility regarding work schedules.

Responsibilities

· Daily food preparation and feeding of adult falcons

· Daily monitoring of falcon behaviour throughout the breeding season and winter months

· Monitoring behaviour via CCTV systems throughout the breeding period with occasional night shifts

· Rearing newly hatched falcons up to 8 days old before returning to parent birds to resume natural rearing

· Participation in the shipping of falcons at the end of the breeding season

· Avicultural record keeping

· Rehabilitating sick and injured falcons

· Maintaining high health and welfare standards of breeding stock (cleaning bird baths, cleaning food trays, and routine medication)

· General maintenance and cleaning of the facility and aviaries during the breeding season and outside breeding season (cleaning food room, brooder room & incubation room, jet washing aviaries and astroturfs, removing dirty gravel from pens and replacing with new, keeping grassed areas cut and presentable)

The package

Salary to be negotiated upon meeting and based on experience. Free accommodation also provided on site! And an amazing opportunity to work alongside a small but unique team of staff willing to provide all the training required and teach whatever it is you want to learn.

To apply for this position please send your CV and a brief covering letter to sion@YLSFALCONS.com