From Materials Girl to Skokholm Poet: Sue Wolfe's lifelong adventures with birds, drones and islands

September 16, 2026

From Materials Girl to Skokholm Poet: Sue Wolfe's lifelong adventures with birds, drones and islands

She chose her outfit with care - a smart trouser suit topped with a velvet coat - for the dinner hosted by Aberystwyth University's vice-chancellor and left home in plenty of time to ensure she wouldn't be late. But as she drove through Talybont in the pouring rain, Sue Wolfe spotted a "lump" in the road and stopped the car. It turned out to be a tawny owl that had been hit by a vehicle. Sue didn't hesitate; she scooped up the injured bird and took it to the vets. When she eventually arrived at the dinner, she was soaking wet, bedraggled and very late.

"When you're so interested in wildlife, as I am, and you see a casualty, you have to rescue it," she explains. "I've rescued, and in some cases, rehabilitated, animals and birds over many years, and I'm sometimes the 'middle person' that people contact in order to find the appropriate wildlife hospital for sick or injured creatures."

Sue's love of wildlife is widely known, not least through her spectacular photography and the Welsh Wildlife Breaks tour company she ran until very recently. Less well known is Sue's former career as a materials engineer working on submarine cables for the UK company that invented fibre optics, and her more recent role heading up a Welsh Government project to open the UK's first civilian drone centre on the site of Aberporth Airport in Ceredigion.

But what has shaped her life more than anything, she says, are islands - especially those off the west coast of Wales.

"My love of islands started as a kid when I went on holiday to Devon and Cornwall," she recalls. "My dad told me that the little dot on the horizon was Lundy Island, and it just fascinated me. My first island was Skomer, and when I actually saw a puffin there, it was love at first sight. Skokholm followed soon after, and it's largely where my real foray into photography started, as well as my writing of island and wildlife doggerel."

Sue, who now lives in Abertrinant, has even been dubbed the "Skokholm Poet," having written probably hundreds of poems about the island during her twice-yearly trips there. "One of the first I wrote was called Puffins Mustn't Grumble, which I composed 20 years ago while sitting on a cliff watching them all fly in with sand eels for their chicks."

Sue and her camera on the Marloes peninsula overlooking Skomer

Sue's love of Nature can be traced back to her childhood in East London. Born in Forest Gate, she was brought up by her father, Jim - a stevedore in the docks - and maternal grandmother. "My mum died when I was 18 months old and I lived with Dad in a two-up, two-down terraced house and my nan lived next door. She spoilt us terribly! When dinner was ready, she would tap on the wall, and if Dad and I wanted a cup of tea, we'd knock on the wall and Nan would bring it round to us.

"Dad and I loved the countryside, and in early April we'd start going out every Sunday on his motorbike and sidecar and we'd pick primroses and the first buds of hawthorn. We'd take them home and put them in vases all around the hall where Nan ran a WRVS old people's club. Of course, I'd never pick wildflowers now, but the wood we used to visit is still there - and is still carpeted with primroses every spring."

Sue's love of birds also came from her dad. "He used to go fishing, but switched to birdwatching, and I'd do it with him. Dad and I were big mates; he felt more like a friend than a father."

Although Sue went to the local grammar school and excelled at science and languages, she left at 16 and joined Standard Telephones and Cables (STC), the company which in the 1960s invented and developed several groundbreaking new technologies including optical fibres. Sue was a student apprentice and still only 17 when she was given her own project - to design a specialised primer system for telecommunications cable jointing.

"I developed the process and it worked very well in the lab, so my boss said, 'let's go out and see how it works for real', and off we went down a manhole outside the Old Bailey in central London. Everything went well until we had to climb back up. I couldn’t get out, so ended up having to be lifted out by the jointer holding one of my arms and my boss holding the other! It wasn't my most triumphant day!"

After gaining a first-class degree in materials science from Thames Polytechnic, sponsored by STC, Sue was transferred to the company's research lab - STL - in Harlow, where for a while she worked for the inventor of fibre optics, Sir Charles (Charlie) Kao. "Increasingly I was working on submarine cables, developing ways to ensure the optical fibres could withstand the high mechanical strain of the installation process as well as lasting at least 25 years when at the bottom of the sea."

It was around this time that Sue first encountered Wales. "One of the first trials we did was along the site of the Vale of Rheidol Railway," she remembers. A few years later, she came on holiday to Wales. While studying for a PhD at Queen Mary College, London University, Sue had met David, a physicist who was doing his post-doctorate, and they were soon a couple. "I knew David liked trains, so in 1979 we came to Tywyn because of the Talyllyn Railway. The second time we visited, we stayed in Bron y Gader in Abergynolwyn, where some years later we bought a bungalow with a deposit left to me by my nan. By this time, David and I had both fallen in love with Wales and planned to move here at some point."

There's a puffin on your leg, Sue! On Skokholm

When Sue took voluntary redundancy from the cable company in the mid-1990s, she decided it was time to "take the plunge" and put the Wales plan into action, with David following on soon after. "But that was in 1996, and he's still not followed," she laughs. Instead, the couple - now married - maintain a long-distance relationship, meeting up every few weeks - "although there may be changes afoot soon"!

Sue's first job in Wales was business development executive with the Development Board for Rural Wales (DBRW), based in Newtown, working with small businesses. "I think that was the best job I ever had because it was about getting to know and helping people who ran small businesses in one of the most beautiful areas in Wales. When one of those businesses was awarded a contract or took on new staff, you celebrated with them."

When DBRW amalgamated with the Welsh Development Agency (WDA), Sue started working more with universities. "One particular area was working with timber companies. I could see there was a real gap in the support and grants WDA could provide to the sector, so I started working with businesses from the crafts sector, forestry workers and estate owners, as well as with Bangor University, to pull the whole sector together. We set up a trade association, Welsh Timber Forum, which is still going. That was one of my favourite things - helping small businesses in rural Wales, which the 'one size fits all' approach doesn't suit. If you don't have the infrastructure in government to help them flourish - which you don't now - people move away."

In 1999, after the Welsh government bought Aberporth Airport - formerly RAF Aberporth and now called West Wales Airport - from the MoD, Sue was given the task of "doing something with it". And what she came up with was both innovative and controversial at the time - the development of drones for civilian use.

"It involved setting up a development centre for drones, growing industries that would use them in a civilian rather than military way, such as crop monitoring and drug delivery," she explains. "The launch of the centre was planned for the summer, and the WDA marketing team wanted a drone-flying display, so I had from January to July to plan and put on the display - something that had never been done in the UK before. It's one of the hardest things I've ever attempted, but we did it, thanks to a fantastic cross-sector team, including the CAA and industry. When the centre opened, it was the first time a drone had been flown outside a 'danger zone' in the UK."

Sue (far right) at a Project URSULA conference

Sue then went to work for Callen-Lenz, a company that was developing a fixed-wing drone, helping it to obtain funding for a project in collaboration with Environment Systems on Aberystwyth Science Park. "We did some fabulous work with the Forestry Commission, looking at different drone applications for spotting forestry diseases early on."

During her time with Callen-Lenz, Sue took part in one of the first seabird trials by drone on Cardigan Island. "Of course, drones are now widely used for wildlife counting and monitoring, especially on remote islands."

Sue's materials science background meant she was able to help researchers on Skomer identify a better adhesive for attaching tiny cameras to seasbirds' feathers to learn more about their migration and feeding habits. "Materials and birding finally came together," says Sue with a smile.

Sue has visited islands all over the world - from the Farne Islands and the Falklands to Shetland and the New Zealand subantarctic islands - and many of the holidays she organised for clients included trips to Welsh isles. She's still discovering new ones, too: next April, she's off to Brownsea Island, in Poole Harbour, Dorset, to photograph red squirrels.

One of Sue's many wonderful wildlife shots

"My favourite poem, written in 1926 by Rachel Field, begins: 'If once you have slept on an island, you'll never be quite the same...', and that's so true, even today, 100 years later," says Sue. "Islands get into your blood. Island wildlife is so special, but it's island communities that make everything possible, from generating electricity to providing a water supply. On Skokholm, volunteers undertake not only the research, but also the building and repair work - they even make curtains and hand-crocheted blankets for the rooms. Skokholm is an island that works on love and dedication, and I leave another little piece of myself there every time I visit."