Thank you for your interest! As a small non-profit, volunteers are the backbone of our organization. We provide training for all our volunteers; no experience is necessary- just a passion and desire to learn.
To get involved with any of these opportunities below, please email nrnc@nisquallyestuary.org to be connected with the appropriate coordinator and to receive next steps.
Visitor Center Volunteering:
Visitor Center Volunteers help run the Center on the weekends. These shifts are very low-key. Usually our Visitor Center Volunteers work 1-2 shifts per month on a Saturday or Sunday from 12-4pm. You can bring a book or your own things to work on when the place is quiet – and then greet and interact with the public when they visit! You will get to enjoy the beautiful views and connect with people in the community! If you are interested in learning how to help care for the aquariums, we would love to teach you that skill, as well!
This is perfect for the passionate nature admirer, retired naturalist, or someone looking for a place to spend some time on a weekend!
Maintenance and Special Projects:
We are always looking for people with a skill they can lend or use to help the NRNC facilities. If you like working with your hands, carpentry, landscape work, art, or aquariums – this might be a good fit for you!
- Building Maintenance Special Projects: We have rotating seasonal projects that involve tasks like pressure washing, painting, and more. If you are a handy-person, please connect with us and we can put you on a short-list to reach out to when we have a project that fits your skillset.
- Landscaping: Looking for volunteers to spruce up vegetation around the building. Volunteers experienced with plant ID and pruning is preferred.
- Aquariums: We are looking for folks to be trained to regularly help clean and care for our open-system aquariums on a fortnightly basis. Due to it being an open system aquarium, we need to clean it much more frequently than a typical aquarium. If you want to help care for our critters in the tanks, this would be a great opportunity to do that.
- Events/Feast at the Reach: Help NRNC staff plan, set up, and clean up and run special events. Special events include our annual fundraiser: Feast at the Reach, volunteer celebrations, holiday parties, and other fundraising events.
Environmental Education:
Classic Beach Camp Volunteer: Volunteers are crucial to helping our Classic Beach Camps run smoothly. Help ensure everyone’s safety, connect kids with nature, enjoy time on the beach, and learn about the estuary and marine ecosystems. Camp volunteers assist campers with the day’s activities, which can include crafts, games, free time on the beach, using microscopes, birdwatching with binoculars, and scientific data collection such as measuring shore crabs.
Education Activity Prep: This opportunity has a very flexible schedule! Help the Education Director complete tasks such as organizing craft supplies, researching games and activities, printing and cutting out craft pieces, organizing science materials, and cleaning science equipment at the NRNC. Late spring is the time when a lot of prep work needs to be done, but the days and times are completely up to you.
Field Trips at NRNC: Are you interested in gaining experience teaching? During the school year, students from various schools come to the Center for 1-4 hour field trip programs. Under the direction of the Education Director, volunteers help lead activities that engage students in learning about marine life in Puget Sound. You can have a powerful impact on these students’ learning experiences. Help students complete activities such as counting fish and measuring shore crabs. Carry equipment to and from the beach and assist with group management.
Eye On Nature: Eye On Nature is a field trip program that includes nature walks focused on ethnobotany and nature mapping at the Billy Frank Jr. Nisqually National Wildlife Refuge. Staff and volunteers each lead a small group of 3rd-12th graders on a guided nature walk and provide an immersive experience in scientific observation. Eye On Nature programs occur on certain weekdays in the Spring. See our Eye on Nature page for more information.
Exhibits: This volunteer opportunity involves maintaining and improving non-aquarium exhibits within the NRNC visitor center. This could include organizing biofacts, developing signage, writing labels and descriptions, cleaning exhibit materials such as posters and signs, or other tasks. Dates and times are flexible.
Public Outreach: Help NRNC staff engage with the public while tabling at public outreach events. Assist with setting up and taking down tables. Chat with the public about NRNC’s mission and programs. Usually involves 1-2 hours of prep and cleanup and 2-8 hours of tabling. You can help out with one shift (2-3 hours depending on the event duration) or you can help out with the entire event.
Community Science:
Pigeon Guillemot Surveys:
Conduct behavioral research on the local populations of these seabirds so we can help government scientists keep an eye on the health of Puget Sound. These birds are considered an indicator species and our data is being used to help estimate population abundance. Once a week May through September, volunteers go to various beaches in the early morning (generally on the beach by 7:30) to conduct an hour-long survey of pigeon guillemots and their nesting behavior. We survey from the beach and by boat. Each season we monitor more than 15 colonies in South Puget Sound from Ketron Island to Totten Inlet and waters in between.
The project is part of the Salish Sea Guillemot Network (SSGN) and NRNC works with a dedicated team of volunteers to coordinate the community science data collection in the South Sound region around Olympia and Anderson Island. There are a series of Zoom training volunteers are highly encouraged to attend every year (though recordings of the last session are always available). Depending on a prospective volunteer’s location and mobility, we will usually assign them to one of the several PIGU colonies around the area. Volunteers are put in touch with a local team lead who will work with them to find the best dates for them to conduct surveys.
Each bird colony is surveyed once a week (the specific days are decided by the team leads depending on the tide schedule) by one or two volunteers. Surveys consist of hiking out to the bird colonies, locate the bluffs where they nest, and record the number of birds using the area and trips made to and from the burrows, as well a whether or not prey is being delivered to chicks. Surveys start at 8 AM and last for approximately 2 hours.
This project also offers remote volunteer opportunities, as data entered by surveyors needs to undergo QA/QC, which can be done by any volunteer who signs up for it with the coordination team by June.
Juvenile Crab Light Trap:
Help us monitor local crab populations by conducting weekly surveys spring-early fall out at Zittel’s Marina.
We have partnered with the Pacific Crab Research Group (PCRG), the Nisqually Tribe, Washington State Department of Fish & Wildlife (WDFW) and Washington State Department of Natural Resources (DNR) to routinely check the catch of a light trap located by Zittles Marina. One of our long-term, most dedicated volunteers has been taking turns (usually on weekends) with representatives of the Nisqually Tribe, DNR, and WDFW, to empty the light trap and identify the species of crab larvae caught. We are particularly interested in finding Dungeness crab larvae and keeping an eye out for invasive European green crab larvae.
While we can always use more hands on deck to help our long-term volunteer with her tasks, this project is particularly suited for people who foresee volunteering with us for multiple years. The project requires familiarizing oneself with the identification of crab larvae and is thus ideal for people who can commit to it for long enough to learn crab ID. If this sounds like something you would like to get involved with – please reach out!
The project runs April through September.
Nisqually Reach Seal Surveys:
We are piloting a new project this year, in partnership with Cascadia Research Collective. Volunteers will either attend an in-person training at the reach or shadow a more experienced volunteer to learn how the surveys work. The project consists of running two surveys a week in the proximity of the nature center, recording the number of harbor seals hauling out in the area during pupping season (June through August). The team of volunteers involved will take turns running surveys around the nature center.
Internships: NRNC has internship opportunities for our research programs. Internships can be full-time or part-time; 20-40 hours/week). Spring internships are focused primarily on planning and prep for the summer field season in addition to some field work for larval crab surveys and ocean acidification monitoring. Summer is our busiest season and is focused primarily on pigeon guillemot surveys (field surveys 10-25%, volunteer coordination 50-80%, data management 10-25%), larval crab surveys (mostly weekend mornings plus some weekdays), and ocean acidification monitoring. Fall switches focus to the start of the forage fish survey (field surveys 10-25%, sample processing 10-15%, lab analysis 25-30%, volunteer coordination 15-25%) season and a smaller component with the pigeon guillemot program (data QC, data analysis, report writing). Winter is similar to fall but involves early planning for the pigeon guillemot program. We encourage folks to branch out and dabble in other areas such as environmental education, communications, and more. Our interns work side-by-side with our Science Director to manage and run programs.