The RSPCA is urging wildlife lovers to sign up for a key volunteering role to mark King Charles III's Coronation.

Already, around 650 people have pledged to undertake a wide variety of tasks to nurture wildlife in their gardens or communities as part of the Big Help Out on May 8.

They have signed up as RSPCA 'Wildlife Friends' and many have already been busy in the great outdoors carrying out jobs such as planting wildlife-friendly flowers, building dead hedges and making bug hotels using old logs. 

Catherine Peerless and her family were among those joining the animal charity's volunteers as they spent time making a dead wood insect mansion at their home near Maidstone in Kent. 

Their work was inspired by staff at RSPCA Mallydams Wood Wildlife Centre in East Sussex who created a film explaining how to complete the task. The family used logs they bought from a local animal charity and drilled holes in them of different sizes to accommodate different creatures and buried them in the ground upright. 

They plan to plant grasses between the logs which are sited in a wildlife area which Catherine's children, Robyn, 8, and Wren, 10, (pictured) helped create during lockdown. The children are to submit their efforts as part of their work towards a green Blue Peter badge.

Robyn said: "It was really good fun drilling the holes in the wood and then bashing them with a hammer to get them deep into the ground. We saw lots of centipedes and bugs on the logs and we told them they'd have new neighbours soon.

"There wasn't much in our garden when we first moved in but we've planted a hedgerow, put in plants which we know insects like, put up bird feeders and created a huge bug home made of pallets and pine cones and twigs. Now we see more butterflies and birds coming in and we also see bats in the evening."

Wren added: "It was my first time using the drill which was a bit scary. It was really good fun making all the different holes and imagining what creatures will live in there."

The RSPCA has a number of suggestions for the tasks that Wildlife Friends could accomplish - they include:

• Building a bird box
• Getting together with friends for a litter pick 
• Creating a wildlife-friendly space with neighbours
• Planting wildlife-friendly plants in gardens/window boxes
• Joining 'No mow May' to make a habitat for butterflies, bees and insects in gardens 
• Recreating wildlife-friendly ideas from RHS Chelsea 

Volunteers could also support Hedgehog week (May 1-7) by putting food out for hogs or even creating a hedgehog highway.

By planting insect-friendly plants and dead-hedge habitats in gardens, people can do so much to help hedgehogs from starvation. They are great ways of ensuring hogs can travel around gardens safely and find plentiful food sources.