Meet the Yorkshire Seal Group team

Matt Barnes - Co-Founder

Yorkshire Seal Group

After a decade of managing SCUBA diving centres around the world and sharing his passion for diving, Matt moved into marine conservation in 2011 after seeing the continued degradation of the marine environment. He has spent the last 10 years working as a project manager on a broad range of marine outputs including marine pollution, turtles, manta rays

Niamh Byrne - Co-Founder

Yorkshire Seal Group

After graduating from the University of Cork with a 1st class honours degree in Zoology, Niamh has continued to pursue her passion for pinnipeds. Her final dissertation saw her dissecting seal scats and looking at recovery rates of fish bones to aid seal diet composition. If that smell didn’t put her off then neither have over 150 smelly seal rescues s