Secret World Wildlife Rescue started life as a dairy farm run by Pauline and Derek Kidner, in 1984 Pauline and Derek opened New Road Farm (now Secret World Wildlife Rescue) as a visitor attraction as a way of diversifying their farm income.
After seeing the way that the animals were being cared for at the farm and the interest in conservation as a whole the public started to bring injured wildlife to Pauline in hope that the casualties could receive help. Pauline soon developed a great love and interest in wildlife, and as her knowledge grew, so did her reputation for caring for wild animals.

Secret World Wildlife Rescue (or Bluebell Sett as it was then known) was founded in 1992 to support this wildlife work which has been recognised nationally by winning the BBC Animal Country Award in 1995 and having been seen in numerous TV programmes. The name was chosen to honour ‘Bluebell’, one of the first badger cubs reared by Pauline. After being reared, Bluebell was released and free to go, but chose to remain at the farm where she raised two cubs of her own and adopted three others before her death in 1994.

Bluebell Sett became a registered charity in 1995, but then after the success of the ‘Secret World’ television series on ITV, the charity was officially renamed as Secret World Wildlife Rescue in 2005, incorporating the Bluebell Sett within the newly named charity.

Since 2005, Secret World Wildlife Rescue has grown into a 365 days a year wildlife rescue centre, caring for over 5,000 sick, injured and orphaned animals each year. The aim of our rescue and rehabilitation work is to return the animals to the wild whenever possible, and we believe in always giving an animal the best possible care and the best possible outcome.

We are supported in our work by a team of over 300 dedicated volunteers who assist in all sorts of ways at Secret World. Without our many voluntary team members, supporting animal care, fund raising, maintenance, learning and administration, we simply couldn’t help as many animals as we do.

Rescue, Rehabilitate and Release:
• Animal welfare is at the heart of what we do
• Secret World is a place of safety for wildlife
• We are always there for wildlife, responding to calls for help whenever possible

Sharing knowledge:
• We champion sharing our expertise and enthusiasm with the public and other professionals
• By engaging the public in learning about British wildlife, we help them to reconnect with nature and encourage protection of its heritage

Respecting:
• We are focused on using our resources wisely and celebrate the vital contribution of our supporters
• We appreciate the devotion and passion of our volunteers and staff, recognising that each individual has an important role to play

Secret World has just over 30 members of staff, this allows everyone to get to know each other really well and the organisation still has the same close-knit family friendly feeling that it had when the charity was started all those years ago by Pauline and Derek. Although you will be working within your own team everybody at Secret World works closely together, this allows you to develop knowledge in areas you may not have had the chance to in the past.

Secret World provides the perfect opportunity to get involved in wildlife care, research and education. These opportunities are often quite rare in themselves so joining an organisation that has all three can be very rewarding.

Our team are all very friendly and we even won the Petplan and ADCH Animal Charity Awards 2023 being awarded Animal Charity Team of the Year.