Episode 10 Springwatch Unsprung

APPLAUSE Thank you very much, thank you very

much indeed and welcome to the final Unsprung of 2017, coming to you from

the beautiful Sherborne Park estate in Gloucestershire. Fantastic time

here, for Unsprung and Springwatch too courtesy of the National Trust.

Tonight's programme is not life so you cannot contribute but we have

the usual mixture of science, photography, a bit of art and some

fantastic guests. It's my pleasure to welcome Sam West, director and

star of stage and screen and also a very serious birder, very, with a

big list. Also joining us tonight, Brett Westwood. Our naturalist in

residence, one of the greatest I've met and the man who has done 40

hours of live TV in the last three weeks. Is that more than scratch

mark I think it might be, yeah. -- is that more than us? What a great

evening to be outside. A little bit nippy. Many of you have been in

touch to say you have enjoyed Springwatch and that you are missing

it already. Max Little says that it is a joy, one of my favourite things

to watch, makes me want to change jobs and get out into the fields. We

have hit the mark there. We had a fabulous Unsprung for you tonight.

That is the first time I have blown that! We don't have a quiz for you

but we asked you earlier in the week if you could identify the animals in

our theme when we do Fantastical Beasts. There are seven animals.

This is what it sounds like. THEME PLAYS. I haven't got any yet, I can

barely hear it. It is a jangle of weird animals mashed together. Eva

Green, John Gammon and Cashman got a few of them but we haven't seen

anybody getting all seven of them. They work Fox, muntjac deer, sage

grouse, Red Deer, stoat, wild boar and humpback whale. I would have it

in my trousers if anyone had got all of those! -- I would have eaten my

trousers. Well done for taking part and having a go. Another fantastical

sighting we had in May was this picture, Chris. Have a look. An

albatross, that has to be unusual. Black browed albatross, should be in

the southern hemisphere although we have had them in the North before.

There was one that spent a lot of time in Shetland. Nice to see that

flying past. After we finished Springwatch last year, the day after

we left Minsmere, that bird past the beach. That was taken at Brampton,

and then it back down again. Unusual on this side of the planet. Well

done to Joe for seeing it. The RSPB are doing some citizen science,

looking at why pufflings are declining. Have a look at this

picture, it has come from Lee Smith. We also have a puffin in flight.

Look at that, Chris. Yes, yes it is. That's great. Get in touch if you

see a puffing with a fish in its mouth. Diplomacy! Thanks, let's move

on to our guests. Let's hear it for Sam.

APPLAUSE Sam, thanks for coming in. Thanks

for inviting me. We know you from stage and screen but we don't know

you as a birder. Your interest is very keen, how did it start? Apart

from dabbling as a teenager it started from having a hard job, used

to run the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield and I woke up most

mornings thinking, I can't do this and it was the first time I had

lived near anything while. I would drive west into the Derbyshire

grouse moors and try and identify what was flying past. How old were

you? I was 40. So you came late. I did, and then a baby came which made

me realise that, I don't know, there is something about it that... We

aren't... Man! Is it that you get outside and then you can switch off

and engage with something completely different? There's something about

having... You are painting the world with your human problems and then

seeing a kestrel and suddenly the world is orchestral and you are

released. Yeah. Can't do any better than that. You can disconnect from

everything and focus intently on something that is quintessentially

more beautiful than everything else. Exactly, well put. We have a picture

here, you came late to birding but you were earlier into rats, quite

clearly! You are snogging one! Kissing a pet rat. They were baby

substitutes as well. They are wonderful creatures, I love them.

They used to come when I called them. Today you have been out and

about, never without your binoculars. Extensions of my hand!

We saw yellowhammer. Corn bunting as well. A 90% decline since 1975. That

is shocking. We have tried to cover the declines in Springwatch, talking

about the pragmatic reality of how we shape the landscape and how these

birds survive. One thing that serious birder 's always do is keep

a notebook and sketchbook. We have some of your sketches and I think

they are pretty good, very good. I love this spring bill. It is one of

ten. This is not on my British list. I'm excited! This is after a half

now await, a harrier with its that the boa. That is my 350th bird. Did

you see that they had a male this year? This is from Kent, taken from

a photograph. I'm not very good at drawing but I'm working on it. These

are good drawings! That is a warbler singing last week on leads, near the

air of. Singing in full throated ease -- in Leeds. These are waxwings

where I live in Islington. That is about half the number present, there

were about 30. They one of these birds that we love to love. Are they

in your top ten? Absolutely, always a good day and always good for

non-birders, if you want to fire somebody up, if you say they are on

the corner of your road. And they do come to supermarket car parks. In

large numbers. I took this one last week. Started with its wings folded

and then it turned. It was taken on my phone through my boding

telescope. -- birding telescope. So it is wild life in general, then?

I'm not very good on dragonflies and butterflies but I'm a keen beginner.

Absolutely fantastic stuff. What next in terms of birding? Any trips?

Do you go abroad? I'm lucky that my work takes me, I've done some

terrible films in South Africa for instance but my South African list

is better than my British one! I should take the jobs where the birds

are good. Everyone is to know -- wants to know, what is your British

list? As of this week, 359, I got a specific tern a few days ago. I'm

impressed, absolutely fantastic. We will come back to you in a little

while. Lindsey. Hello, Chris, I have a prop. This is the photo from last

night. I have a great job, because with the digital team I look at the

videos and photos and comments and questions you send in. They are

brilliant and this one really went from a photo file into a photo win.

You gave this eight because it is a bird poo that looks like a bird. It

has the head and the tile, something dribbling but apart from that it

looks like a sparrowhawk. Well done, Ken McDonald. The attention to

detail is amazing but in the production meeting you said you

would like to challenge me to have a go at doing this ourselves because

you thought we could do it so I have brought you some paint, a

paintbrush, your own piece of paper and let's see who can do the best

poo art. So I'm going to splatter this now. I have seen that bird on

the side of the M25! Go on, then. I have some good practice. Here we go.

It's a dragonfly, look at that! You can't stop altering your work.

Unbelievable. I'm going to do mine with my finger. I don't think we can

compete. This is the best one we have had, thank you. We get many

fantastic pictures, our Flickr site is unbelievable. Here are some of

the best. Ending with that cuckoo. You said

that was one of the best we've had. Takes the biscuit. Sensational.

Pictures can touch the emotions but then so can words and an Unsprung we

have been celebrating unsung heroes and we have a special gentleman with

us tonight who has a very special way with words. Dara is 13 and lives

in Northern Ireland. In the last year he has started writing a blog

about his love of nature, changing his life and touching thousands of

others. As soon as I was a toddler, my mum and dad thought I was

eccentric. Kids my age walked away confused and bewildered. When I was

a bit older I realised why. Why was diagnosed with Aspergers on the

autistic spectrum, a different way of looking at the world and of

being. My obsession with nature and science helped me to deal with my

anxiety, isolation, inner feelings I couldn't understand. Dara's blogs

are inspired by his weekly walks into nature with his family. Oh,

Heron! There is another bird. They are beautiful. It has the big head,

showing "Look at my big head, I'm amazing!" Dara write down everything

he sees and he channelled his passion for nature into his blog

allowing him to express himself in ways that are normally very

difficult for him. I can't have conversations unless I completely

know the person before having that conversation and even then I find it

hard. I can talk to the screen without a care in the world of what

I put in it but I don't know what to say to humans. I told him he needs

to relax. Just be yourself. Myself isn't really relaxed, is it? Dara's

blog now has followers from nearly 30 countries from across the globe.

It's just amazing that I've done this and I'm like, wow, people are

interested in what I'm trying to say! Before this blog I was going

like this, does anybody care about nature? I started my blog and I was

going Wye, there are a lot of people who like it's just like me! -- I was

going Wye. He would say that something wasn't good enough and I

would say that if I wrote something I'd be very pleased, and I am an

adult. And some of the terms of phrase, how did you even come up

with that? And I am thinking, how did I think of that? Dara's use of

language in describing the natural world is remarkable, inspiring

countless others, young and old. The natural world to me is full of

wonder and fascination. It seems to me that when kids reach a certain

age the curiosity seems to fade. I would urge young people, especially

if the natural world gives joy and knowledge, to keep the interest

going. Nature and wildlife are wonders, their ability to teach us

so much about the world is limitless. Let's come together in

our love for nature and so that we are proud of wildlife watching and

we won't ever stop. APPLAUSE

What Annie 's oration or young person and I'm delighted to say that

Dara and his family are with us -- what an inspirational young person.

There you go. Thank you so much. Not only are you a Wildlife Hero, you're

a hero of mine. Let's shake hands. Fantastic. Absolutely wonderful,

such a great story. You have been so great at getting in touch across the

three weeks of Springwatch and I have got some statistics for you. I

have been doing my research. Over the last three weeks, we have had

over 60,000 uses of the hash tag Springwatch and in terms of viewing

the live cameras, we have had the equivalent of 617 days worth of

viewing, not including the red button, unbelievable. I have now

made this quite wonderful graph, you can see that we have gone off the

scale in terms of people getting in touch. That is a pretty basic graph!

We have had some imaginative grass. We even had one with the little tail

of a stoat. You are a wonderful person, Lindsey, but you have to

work on your grass! These do keep in touch over the summer, we are here

at and you have seen the website. If you want to head to it, it is just

on the BBC Springwatch page. Sometimes I ensconced myself in a

small tent with a celebrity, who is it going to be today?

This year, the Hide Share has gone mobile. And anyone could be hiding

inside. So who is next? Today, my hide has

gone all high society. I pitched it in this fantastic garden that once

belonged to the great Noel Coward and the current resident has a

polish and for mad dogs and Englishmen, so let's tell them to

today's private lives. I am in the glorious back garden of... Julian

Clary. Ensconced in April it all. There are not many people I would

squat in a nylon igloo for, Chris! I am very flattered! This would have

been a place in the 1930s, Julian, in a nice, warm, summer's evening...

The lawn would have been busy. Yes, there would have been a party here

with people like Laurence Olivier, Vivien Leigh, Katharine Hepburn.

Katharine Hepburn! Sometimes, if you half close your eyes, you can

imagine them. Yes. You are into gardening? Well, I am into telling

my garden what to do in the garden! He does a good job, even told him to

do the right things, it is very picturesque. It is just a sort of

Haven. Yes, I haven for animals, a lot of nectar which is great for

insects. Bird box and bird feeders, you diligent telling those? Tell

other people to them, there are a lot of stuff involved to keep me

happy! Goodness me! I grew up in Teddington and my father lived in

Norfolk so the sore holidays, it was rustic. And he had a big garden much

like this and so that is what I tried to recreate. He put me on

Observer of birds. I had that! Yes, I did learn a bit and my attention

span does not last very long. Oh, that is nice, I will go and put some

make-up on! I am looking around, what we see in the garden? Yes, tell

me what you can see. I can hear swallows singing. They arrived the

other day. They are on the TV aerial. They will come into the

house and fly around. They are marvellous. I would love to be a

swallow for five minutes. They come from Southern Africa and they would

take flies from your morning, any Beatles. They time that a rival when

the flies are hatching. They do. But it is now becoming so mild that for

the first time last year, the swallows overwintered in the UK and

this big. Problems sinking. I love problems. And a goldfinch. And a

magpie. I do not like the magpie. I know they are only doing their thing

but I had lovely black birds nesting over their and they were very busy

feeding their young and a magpie came along and the blackbirds

clearly were no more. But the magpies need food as well. Yes,

whatever! You have got a good garden in terms of structure and a lot of

nectar. But if I am going to be critical, and I always am, there is

a bit too much lawn. I know, I was thinking that the other day. The

plants have been pushed around the edge and I should be brave and have

a big something in the middle. And a pond, that would be nice for

wildlife. But I am worried about the dog falling in it. A shallow pond.

You could dig up some of the lawn and plant some wild flowers. It is

low maintenance and you cut it once a year and it looks stunning, full

of butterflies and bees, you name it. Wild flowers and a pond,

anything else? I would plant more trees and maybe some birch trees

that grow very quickly. I will turn my entire life into being of service

to birds! In my garden. Because you told me to! Excellent, excellent,

noting the degree of influence. Increase the staff by two problems.

And get some nature Conservatives in here and let me know when there is a

position for official bird-watcher and I can swan around in the garden

and point things out. APPLAUSE. And that in many ways to

encourage wildlife into your garden, you can build a pond, go on a beach

clean, just basically do everything. Join Morris has said, how come we

never see Chris putting the hide back in its bag? I have done on

numerous occasions. It is only me that can fold the wretched thing and

put it away! I thought it might because you could not fold it

because they are impossible, they take one second to put up and one

hour to take it down. An expert showed me. Very good. I love a bit

of snail male and I have got this from concerned Keith Simpson who

says, I am not getting the usual birds in my bird table despite using

the best quality seeds. Could any member of the team give me a clue as

to the reason for this? Excellent programme, by the way. And he

included this picture, any ideas? Can I have that? Look at this, it is

a cat in the bird table! It is quite literally a cat amongst the pigeons

and the starlings and the bluetit and the benches and everything. What

can I suggest? Reposition your bird table out of the way of the

wonderful cat that you have got living there. And you need a

Fantastical Beast. You need a cat owl which was my pioneering and

asked to call beast, it dwells in suburbia and it only eats domestic

cats. I know! There is a fan, do you want one as well? Hands up who would

like a cat-owl! Not that popular! Three people. Shall we move onto

Fantastical Beasts? Let's do that. Some, you have got to come up with

an animal which is potentially viable and has an ecology and

physiology and might exist at some stage in the future and could play a

productive role in the ecology of the UK, like a cat owl. What have

you come up with? We are a proud nation with a proud history and at

times of division, it is important we look back for our inspiration as

well as forward. With that in mind, I would like to present for your

approval the recently rediscovered species, the second world Second

WWarbler. It is hard to catch their irrepressible and cheeky energy. It

is stocky, between a bullfinch and a bald dog. It has a Latin name. That

stands for ten headed, strong or brave one. At first glance, it seems

to be a black cap, it is a tin helmet. It is very easy to be an air

raid warden when you can actually fly. You have a blue cap and

Redwings. And a white this. And I noticed the cigar. These are the

normal nesting materials, a cigar and a little gas mask. We have all

known the pleasure of listening to nightingales at dusk and the Second

World Warbler also sings at night and the song is even lovelier,

listen to this. SIREN. And it is joined by a second

and they make a chorus together. I can really see it taking off! Yes,

it had better take off and scramble into the skies, to be honest with

you. We like the Second World Warbler!

Thank you, Sam. APPLAUSE. Brett Westwood, you are

our resident naturalist, you have done 40 hours in the red button, it

has been great. I have enjoyed it, it is tiring and fascinating and

really revealing. And I highlight? The highlight was when the two

Peregrine parents that the two chicks together from above,

simultaneously, and we knew they had accepted the foster chick, there was

a lump in my throat. It was quite a rescue. And Sherborne? It is

fantastic, I love the rolling landscape and the flower Richfield

borders which are wonderful and you do not see anything like it. Walking

is like tuning a radio and you are chewed into a new wave birdsong and

sounds, and there butterflies everywhere. An astonishing place.

Would you mind accompanying me over to the Fantastical Beasts board? We

will take the Second World Warbler withers. It is time to pronounce

judgment and I would like you to share your favourites. I like them

all and it amazes me how inventive people are. We have got Botticelli

and Rubin and everybody here. And Pollock over there! I think they are

really different and look at the different styles. I am not sure

about evolutionary if they would survive a very long and I worry

about what they would inhabit. Pick a winner. This is really difficult,

especially with some over there. It is very good but I will go for

something simple and clean, the top one. Deborah Medon. I'm going to

demote Stephanie Cole and Sam by the looks of it, and I will move Sue

Perkins into second place, and we are sadly running out of time. We

have had a great time. Come over here, Dara. Sam, thank you very much

for coming along. We hope you have enjoyed it, hope to see you again

next year and don't forget Autumnwatch!

APPLAUSE. Never clapped at the beginning, it

might be rubbish! I am really enjoying this weather. I love damp

weather. I love the outdoors, as extreme as it is. Quite wonderful,

the kestrel that they have made. Your life will be enriched by a

cacophony of sound! This is a dead bat, that is what you pay your

licence fee for, seriously! As any questions you would possibly like

the answer to. Graham says, is Chris Packham wearing that jumper for a

bet? Magpies need food as well. Yes, whatever! This is my favourite, it

is a poo... In the shape of a bird. You are the

only person I know looking after them so you are an Unsprung Hero.

It is food -- it food is dong. Caple. Can you imagine what is

inside here? A Flindow, a fly that can open its own windows.

I say, ladies and gentlemen. It has some charm. Is that a

company? I am trying to find a compliment.

Thank you very much! That is all we have got time for, goodbye!

APPLAUSE.