Birds, Books & Bricks Blue Peter

Radzi, there's something fishy going on in studio today....

You better make sure today's guests don't see you,

CHEERING APPLAUSE

I chat to the creators of Mr Popper's Penguins and try to

Nathan Sykes joins us in the studio for an amazing

The Blue Peter Book Awards is back - will your favourite book impress

Christmas is coming, we are excited. Our second candle is lit on

the Advent Crown. They are shining brightly. Dim the lights. Only two

shows to go to the Christmas special. It got us thinking.

With that in mind we want to hear from you,

tell us what you think I should get Radzi and Barney for Christmas.

You can help us decide what to get each other for Christmas

by heading on to our Blue Peter website, leaving your suggestion

and we will read out as many as we can at the end of the show.

But first, time for me to find out how man

It's time for me to take on these massive towering turbines. Last week

you saw my sea survival training. Let's hope I don't need it as I join

the specialist engineering team who are going to show me how a wind

turbine works. We heading 12 miles out off the coast of Liverpool, it's

wet and very windy. The wind farm is approaching, so it's time for me to

gear up and prepare for these super-size structures. We've now

just entered the actual wind farm and the first thing you notice is

just the size of them. They are genuinely enormous. Each turbine is

approximately the height of 26 double-decker buses. And I love it!

As our boat approaches the turbine, everything starts to get serious.

This is by far the most dangerous moment in my whole day. The transfer

from the boat to the ladder. I got a bit confused in training. No, the

rope. But now it's the real deal, I have to stay high school. Tell you

what, it's a touch different to the swimming pool! -- stay ice cool. I

have to tread carefully, the runs are slippy with seaweed and the wind

is all around me. All I can do is keep climbing, this is one seriously

extreme job. And I've made it. I'm now 20 metres up. Can you hear that?

Because those are the sounds of blades... Look at the size of them!

Look how close they are, you can almost feel the air resistance

touching your cheek, it's amazing. In a few seconds I'm going to turn

those things off. This day gets better and better. The engineers

winch up their equipment and it's time for Paul and me to do a very

important job. It's incredibly loud in here. This turbine can generate

over 3000 kilowatts. With that amount of extra city we need to turn

it off to make sure we are safe. -- amount of electricity. There you go,

it stopped. The turbine is safe and there's no turning back now. This is

it, 120 metres up. Take me to the top. The shaft of this tower is so

massive it has its very own lift. As I had to the top, let's find out how

wind energy works. This generator makes electricity by spinning a

magnet inside a metal coil. You might have made a small version of

this at school, there are many different ways to power a generator,

in this case, it's using wind power. I'm now 80 metres up in the neck of

the turbine. This is the part that pivots the whole top of the turbine

with the blades and everything, it faces the wind in any direction. To

generate maximum power, the turbine blades must be facing into the wind,

but because the wind direction changes, these turbines need to be

able to rotate. The six rotors all turn in the turbine, you can see

this moving quite slowly. Automatically this will pick up

where the wind is and turn it any which way to find the best

direction. Such incredible engineering. It's now time to go

even higher into the head of the turbine, I am in the necel. What

goes on here. Outside you've got the hub and the blade, this turns the

main shaft. It goes into the generator, which produces

electricity. It goes from the wind outside which is free. Transforms

into everything we need for our homes. Now, a bit of a favour. Is

there anyway we could stand on top of the nacelle? D we could certainly

stand out the back on the weather deck, but not on top of this. I'll

see you on the weather deck. This is the moment I've been waiting for

since the start of my training. Time to stand at the top of this 120

metre mega structure. Would you take a look at these of you? Britton this

view. -- take a look at this view. What an

incredible thought. Genuinely flabbergasted, I've learned so much.

It's now time to get down. Guys? Help!

How epic was that? I'm jealous. Time to welcome our next guest. The team

behind Mr Popper's Penguins! Hello, welcome to Blue Peter, it's lovely

to have you. There were two Penguins earlier, now just one. What

happened? Here we go... Carrera! What an entrance. You let very

friendly, please don't peck me. That's nice. In this new family

musical you play Mr Popper. He is a painter and decorator who has always

dream. Being a polar explorer. One day eight packing crate arrives on

his doorstep and the adventures begin. You've created so many

puppets, Nick, you've done London opening ceremony for the Olympics,

now this, how did you make the Penguins look and feel so realistic?

It was a long process, it began by making a prototype of the Penguin

with wood and fabric. And I carved a faux head. I want to make them feel

as real as possible. We made the final Penguin with a soft rubber

beak so it can pack. They are lovely, can I keep one? Toby and

Lucy, you work these penguins very well, make it look very easy, how do

you do that? The head is controlled with this handle at the back, you

have a trigger for the beak. You can make him squawk. A couple at the

back for the wings. Its intricate. You make it look easy. It's Blue

Peter, we love having a go, can I get involved? Of course, this is

Greta. Captain Cook's lady friend. If you want to hold onto the

handle... Hold on there. Control the wings like so. Greta wouldn't be

complete without her squawk, Lindsey.

You are professionals, I'll leave it to you. When can we see it pretty

much we're at the Lowry in Salford until the 10th of January and some

London dates either side of that. I'm excited and I know you at home

will be as well, here's a sneak peek.

But looks so lovely, I really like the look of that, can you stay for

ever? To see more from these penguins come head to the website,

there is an exclusive clip of these lustily jingle Bells. Radzi?

Barney's still on his holidays, so I'll say it in his absence.

Next, Christmas is getting closer, but if you aren't feeling festive

enough yet head online to the CBBC Advent Calendar where you can

have a go at Barney's 'Guess the Christmas Song' quiz.

He suits the beard. I like him with the big white beard. We are missing

him today. Hey, Barney. Let's head to the Badge Wall.

I love this one from Elizabeth, aged 10 from Newark of our

Blue Peter Advent Crown, it even has both candles lit

Full is to bid means not long until the Christmas special. You can see

the card we showed you how to make last week. Do you remember last week

when me and Greg Foot made a cloud in the studio? Here's a reminder. I

loved this, look at that! How cool was that?

Well, Ffion, aged 10 from Durham has drawn this brilliant picture of us.

Elsa, 10, from Huntingdon has sent in this great drawing show Barney

doing his aerial gardening from last week's programme.

Thank you to everyone who sent post this week. Some of you might be

waiting a while for your badge to come in the post because we've had a

record amount of post. Keep your fingers crossed and believe, my

friends! It'll come, it'll come in the post. Last week I showed you how

to make your very own repeat of Christmas card 2015, a lovely

cracker card. We want you to send them in whether you make your own

design, but bias on the front, send it to us. Hopefully we'll show it on

the Christmas special. We seen how you can make birds for the theatre,

Barney has been out and about with the real thing, real wildlife birds.

One of my favourite things about being a Blue Peter presenter is that

I get to do stuff that I love and call it a job. It's crazy, isn't

it? For me that's photography. I've managed to get a film where I take

photos, best job in the world! Here at the London wetlands Centre

they've got loads of my favourite photography subjects, wildlife,

which I happen to know a little bit about. Look, there's a Mullard or a

duck to me and you. There is a swan, look at those beautiful feathers. --

mallard. No, wait, that's an otter, amazing. To take really good

wildlife photographs you need to know what you are looking for...

Pardon? What do you mean they are not real? Made of toy bricks cost to

mark the otter is? Yeah, that's made of toy bricks. It turns out it's not

just an otter that lives here in Lego form, there's a whole host of

creatures and Hannah is part of the team that helps bring them here.

It's easy to see close up they are not real, but they are beautiful. We

decided to make giant brick animals to get closer to nature and learn

more about our threatened species and the work the wildfowl and

wetlands trust does to help conserve animals. I tried to make a car out

of this once, must have taken ages. It took 15,500 bricks to make Lottie

and 120 hours. That's a lot of time and bricks. It's a good job they

don't have to move them any time soon. Barney? Do you want to take

Lottie? We want to take them to Lancashire so children can enjoy

them there. We have to move them? It took 120 hours to build, will we

break them down and rebuild them? Much can club band that. That would

have taken hours! Got I've some quality time booked in with Radzi.

In fact, these brick beauties can be moved pretty much in one piece, it's

getting to them that is tricky. That is where me and these waders come

in. With is where me and these waders come

up each animal, we need to be careful. Swan wings, check. That's

heavy. Otter on a trailer, check. Duck on a yellow trolley, check. All

ready for their motorway migration. So there we have it. The van is all

packed, and next time we see our friends, they will be 200 miles

further north. And so as if by magic, well actually

I drove in a car, I am 200 miles north to make sure everyone has

arrived. Oh, no! All that time, all that effort putt oh, wait. It is

over there. People shouldn't leave toy bricks lying around. Thankfully,

the animals have made it in one piece. And so the flamingo goes in

with the flamingos, the Swan with the swans, and the duck goes with

the ducks. And they will be joined by a brand-new kingfisher which I

get to help finish. And before we know it, all of the animals are safe

and sound in their new home. So it is now time for me to crack on with

what I have only come here to do, take some photos. I want to get some

top tips of how to best capture some of the birds here, and I have heard

that the site manager, Tom, is the man to show me how. What are your

top tips? Relax for a bit, watch the birds, what they are doing, how they

interact, if they are about to take off. How about the actual taking

off? You don't need fancy equipment. Some of my best shots were done on

my phone camera at dawn as the sun is about to come up. And what about

a final tip? Are they better on land, flying? Get really low down to

the birds, down to eye level, especially when they are sat on the

water. The lower down you are, the focus is better. It makes the

picture sing. Good advice, and here are my photos. Inspired by the new

toy brick addition, I want to take a photo of an actual kingfisher, and

I'm told I have a good chance. Tom, look! I have got the

kingfisher! I think that is made out of Rex, Barney. Not again!

When Barney tells his dad jokes, I genuinely like them. I don't. We

need to cut those down. And if you love taking pictures

like Barney, head onto our Blue Peter website were you can

watch some of Barney's top tips on Next it's time to kick off the

Blue Peter Book Awards 2016! Earlier this year we saw

The Silly Book Of Side-Splitting Stuff and The Spy Who Loved School

Dinners get crowned 2015 winner. Each year the judging gets

harder and harder, and this So we asked some book-loving

celebrities to lend us Books, books, books. Funny books,

sad ducks, clever books, thrilling books. There are so many to read,

but how can you choose which ones are the best? Our judges are

deliverable Central library to pick this year's Blue Peter book awards

2016 finalists. Working their way through 40 books, a job is to choose

the top three storybooks and the top three fact books. Pamela, last

year's winner of the Blue Peter book awards Best storybook. Jim runs

Premier League Reading stars which turns football fans into book fans.

Top television presenter Angellica Bell loves reading books with her

children. Blue Peter editor Euan will be making sure it all runs

smoothly. Let the judging begin! I started off

saying no to this one, and then I moved around to it. She learns to

walk again, but in this one, she doesn't. We all have our own mind

and we know what we do and don't like, but I think we're going to

compromise and listen to each other, and I think we will get the best

three of each category. After a lengthy discussion, we can reveal

our top three fact books. What week in insects does the

average person accidentally swallow any year? How many days can an

albatross keep flying without flapping its wings? If you need the

answers to questions like these, the epic book of a thickness is the book

for you. Most books have words, but he Silly

Bulk Of Weird And Wacky Words is all about freaky phrases, tongue

twisters, rhymes and so on. From excellent experiments to

optical illusions. A Random Book Of Trivia stuffs you full with quizzes

about incredible inventions, chemicals and volcanoes.

And these are the top three storybooks. The Nowhere In For by

Ross MacLean C moves from place to place and through time. Yet no one

who has been inside can remember going there. But this all changes

when a boy called Daniel stumbles through the doors and meets the

mysterious shopkeeper Lucien. He returns the next day and begins a

compelling adventure. Beckett is all at sea, his dad runs

away with him and his brother. In The Boy Who Sailed The Ocean In An

Armchair, they work out what has happened between all the grown-ups

and meet brand-new neighbours. The Rooney is ready for anything.

His favourite motto is don't be scared, be prepared. But he is not

ready for the day when he suddenly turns green. Is the ill or is he a

superhero? All he needs to do is sneak out of the hospital to

discover what his special power is. He is Via Standing Broccoli Boy.

Some good books there. You will have to wait until 2016, world book day,

to find the winner. And now it is time for the music.

He's scored ten Top Ten hits during his time in The Wanted,

and now he's taking the charts by storm as a solo artist, going

straight in to the singles chart last week as the highest new entry.

Please welcome to Blue Peter Nathan Sykes!

CHEERING Nathan, welcome.

I can't wait to see your performance of your brand-new single Over And

Over Again. I have just released the video for the song, which I am very

excited about, and I am working on my new album which is coming out

next year. And what is coming next for you? Touring with Little Mix.

And Christmas? I spend it with my family, watch movies with my dog. It

is great. Just with your dog? Nobody else is allowed. Nathan, thank you

for coming on the show, and I can't wait to hear your song. Jump onto

the Blue Peter website to see more of our interview with him.

Earlier on today, we asked you send in your suggestions to what we

should get each other for Christmas, and loads of you have been in touch!

Thanks so much for all your comments.

Amber says Radzi should get DVDs of all the BBC people doing the happy

dance. And Shelley apparently needs a nice new bed to hibernating.

Mustard thinks Lindsay and Barney should get the James Bond car. Radzi

should get sweets because he is sweet, and Eddie should get an alarm

clock. Cornelia and says matching onesies for all the presenters!

Thank you so much for all your comments.

That's it for today, but don't miss next week's show, because Barney is

catching up with our friend, British astronaut Tim Peake,

We're revealing the shortlist for the Young Sports Personality

And I'll be showing you how to make this Christmas tree that's full

But to finish today's show, here's Nathan Sykes performing

# From the heat of night # To the break of day

# I'll keep you safe # Hold you for ever

# This spark of life # It will never fade

# Every day gets better and better # And I won't leave you

# Always be true # One plus one is two

# Girl, when I'm with you # I lose track of time

# When I'm without you # You're stuck on my mind

# Be with me till the day that Ideye # I'll love you

# Over and over