About Us

Roy manages the day to day running and development of Cofnod. Before joining in 2005 he worked for various conservation bodies including the Countryside Council for Wales (CCW), working in their Geographic Information Unit and as a Conservation Officer in Anglesey and Meirionnydd. He also spent a year working as the LBAP Facilitator for Wales. Blending his conservation background with commercial experience, Roy will endeavour to make the development of Cofnod beneficial to the wildlife and people of North Wales.

Aisling manages the flow of data into Cofnod, its processing and incorporation into the Cofnod database. She directs the work of a small team of data specialists who make this possible, namely Jennifer Vidal, Catharine Moss and Cathy Wuster. Aisling also has a key role in initiating and maintaining relationships with data suppliers, particularly County Recorders and National Recording Schemes and Societies, including making relevant data received by Cofnod available to them. Maintaining Data Quality is another focus for her, working on this with the assistance of County Recorders in particular.

Originally from Ireland, Aisling continues to improve her Welsh language skills, recently assisted by her five year old daughter. She now balances her time at Cofnod with looking after two small and lively children, but hopes to have more time in the future for active recording, her main area of interest being plants. Aisling has been part of the Cofnod Team since January 2006, previously having worked for Flintshire County Council, Gwynedd Council and the Welsh Assembly Government in Aberystwyth.

Tim moved to North Wales at the end of 2005, having worked for several years in the IT industry. Looking to combine his experience in this field with an existing interest in the countryside, Cofnod was the ideal place to do this. As Information Systems Officer, Tim manages all things IT related, from the company website to GIS, and the day to day running of Cofnod's computer systems.

Catharine moved to North Wales in 1998 to study Agroforestry at Bangor University and subsequently carried out research into local knowledge of soil fertility management in Nepal and Ghana. In her spare time she enjoys studying wild flowers and bryophytes. She is mainly working to update our database, but gets involved in a range of data management tasks.

Jen moved from Devon to North Wales in 2012. Previously she lived on North Ronaldsay in Orkney, to increase her knowledge and passion for birds. After volunteering with the Wildlife Trust and Cofnod, she joined us on a GO Wales placement digitising Wildlife Sites and historic habitat maps for the Llyn Peninsula.

Since 2014 Jen has had two contracts with the RSPB and now works part-time for Cofnod as a Data Officer, wrangling data into a suitable format for import into the ever-growing Cofnod database. Outside work time, Jen is busy looking after her 2 small children but enjoys casual birdwatching and general wildlife when out for walks or bike rides at weekends with the family.

Richard grew up locally, leaving the area to study Pollution and Environmental Control (M.Sc.) at Manchester. He has a broad, life-long, interest in natural history. Arachnology is Richard's primary focus, and to these ends he is editor of the British Arachnological Society Newsletter and an active Spider Recording Scheme member. In his spare time he researches the taxonomy of African tarantula spiders, publishing several papers on the group and describing new genera and species in the process.

Richard joined Cofnod in 2006 and works on Data Requests and Data Processing, but turns his hand to other aspects of Cofnod's work as and when required.

Paul is working on the new Cofnod website and helps Tim to ensure all the Cofnod systems are running smoothly. He moved from Nottingham at the beginning of October 2023. He's a keen triathlete and a member of GOG Triathlon, and also loves salsa dancing and playing the guitar.