I'm Currently in Costa Rica . I'm looking for voluntary work within Costa Rica or Nicaragua, (preferable working with the enviroment or wildlife but not too fussy really as anything would be a valuble experience) which isn't too expensive as i'm your average backpacker and all the voluntary work I have come across so far is too expensive(sounds daft hey but true ), would anyone be able to advise me or put me in contact with somone?

Have you thought about, or heard about Aviarios del Caribe, a sloth sanctuary and rescue centre in South East Costa Rica, near Cahuita? I know they take English speaking volunteers and the place is absolutely stunning. If I have time I'll try to find the website.

http://www.ogphoto.com/slothrescuecenter/main.htm

... the charity is called The Buttercup Foundation. Aviarios is a Bed and Breakfast whaich helps to support the charity. We stayed there for a couple of nights at the end of our CR holiday this winter and wished we'd had longer. The charity seemed genuine, rather than a cynical way of getting you to part with your tourist dollars.

You don't say how much time you have for volunteer work. Try Idealist.org and see a large selection of volunteer opportunities.

By the way, serious organizations are justified in charging volunteers, especially short term ones. It takes time to train people whose time, duration and diligence may be minimal and it is not a good idea to take chances on that. It is also a valid way to finance a worthy cause. But yes, there are ripoffs as well.

It's probably worth pointing out that we were staying as hotel guests at Aviarios, not as volunteers, but we did speak to a couple of English students who were working there as part of their degree course (one doing a life science, the other Spanish) and they seemed to be quite satisfied. They had to work, but had reasonable accomodation and seemed in pretty good spirits, which again led us to believe that the charity is the real thing ... and were else do you get to feed a baby sloth?

You can find a good selection of low cost volunteering opportunities in Costa Rica here: www.volunteerlatinamerica.com