Episode 1 Springwatch

It's 8pm. It's bank holiday Monday. We're live and we're about to bring

you real wildlife in real time. Welcome to Springwatch. I'm not

Hello, good evening or should that be (in Welsh) I need to thank Jill

for their Welsh lessons and apologies if my accent was a bit

dodgy. I'm not going to apologise in any way for where we are. Look

at this, this is our new base. This is where we're going to be for the

next three weeks, bringing you live pictures and it is absolutely

gorgeous. We're on the coast of west Wales on the banks of the Dyfi

River where it meets cardigan Bay. This is Springwatch's new home of

the RSPB reserve at Ynys-hir. There are ancient oak woodland, meadows,

wetlands, and salt marsh. It's all just begging to be explored. It is

undenyably beautiful. It has a spectacular range of habitat. All

these habitats mean this place has a fantastic biodiversity. What is

that? It's a design for life. It's the number of different living

things, living in any given place and time. There is so much here for

us to see. Our job, of course, is to show it all to you. How will we

do it? We have a pretty good team. Of course, we've got the whole

place bugged. Plenty of cameras in nest boxes, revealing all the

action inside. Our wildlife cameramen are out and about, seing

what they can find, fabulous wood peckers here. Some of the cameras

have been placed for mods, revealing the insights of birds

like herons. Fingers crossed we might even see rare mammals.

Whatever, we have a great range of stars for you, some very attractive

little birds and of course, larger species too. And some, like this

buzzard, are certainly going to be feeding some others to their young,

potential bad guys. What we can promise you on Springwatch is real

drama, a real soap op ra. For me Springwatch is all about you

wha. Has your spring been like? We'd like to hear from you, your

questions, photos and videos. Get in contact with us on the web. You

can tweet us now. We're ot Twitter now! So modern. Listen to them, the

old folks. Look at that. Glorious. We have a new patio. Barbeque.

Quick. I know, and only a few days ago this was a shed for tractors,

now transformed into Springwatch's new home. New sofa. We have all our

monitors up and running. Don't get too close. We have got something on

those cameras. Lots of wood. Not short of wood. Kate, Kate. Oh, yes.

Very important piece of kit here. This giant screen is our link to

our wildlife man of the week. He is Charlie Hamilton-James.

Thanks guys G to be back on Springwatch. I'm loving your new

location down in Wales. But I'm not jealous. Because look at this: This

is the Knapdale Forest. This is classic Scottish landscape, right

in the heart of argyle. All the classic Scottish animals are here.

Including the midges. I've come to see one very special one. I've come

here specifically to see it. It is the beaver. It's the subject of the

first reintroduction of a mammal to Britain ever. Over the next week,

we're going bring you more detailed footage of these creatures than

anyone has ever got before. Join me later and I shall reveal all.

Thank you Charlie. Now some people have said to me, spring has come so

early this year that by the time you start Springwatch you may not

have any birds to show anyone. Do we look like fools? Don't answer

that. But we wouldn't let you down. Not only have we got some birds to

show you, we are going to start our first show with a first for

Springwatch. Let's go live to nest one and there it is. That's the

exterior. Who would be nesting in exterior. Who would be nesting in

this box? It looks like an average box. But the birds in it, I've got

to tell you, are absolute stunners. Let's look inside. There are

youngsters in there, six little youngsters, we'll tease you for a

moment. They look like robins. do, but a clue, when you saw that

youngster at the back there, spreading its tail feathers, you're

getting a little bit of colour. Any guesses? Six chicks in that nest,

they are red starts. They are stunning birds. SubSaharan migrants.

They arrive in the summer. The best place for them is Wales. Most of

the UK population north of the line from the Severn to the Humber.

We're in the heartland here. Let's look at the male. This thing scores

well I don't know, 6.5 at least. It's a very beautiful bird. You can

see the female a little bit duller, though I'm told she has a lovely

personality. Both birds are being very atentive parents. They're

feeding at about 54 times an hour at the moment. Both adults involved

in that. Yeah, they R the male there taking out a faecal sack.

We've seen it with the species on Springwatch before. The blue tits

and things like that, they have to keep the nest nice and clean on the

inside. All doing very well. Typically for Springwatch, we have

our story developers who monitor those little cameras, which you can

do too, viate web. Our story developers caught something unusual

on camera. Have a look at this. So bear in mind that, there we are,

the camera looks like it's not working terribly well. It had just

been set up. That's why it's juddery. It's producing a pellet.

As it comes out, look carefully, because the end of it appears to

have what we thought was a bird's beak in it. If you saw, can we see

it again? Look at it carefully there, you can see the curved piece.

We were thinking, could it be a treecreeper, what on earth could it

be? Surely no adult bird is going to be feeding something like a red

start some sort of... We were in there for ages looking. We noted

what should have been the top mandible was shorter than the

bottom one. That ruled out a beak. I thought, this has to be

vegetation, that the youngster has swallowed by accident and is

regurgitating. It proved my theory was correct actually. Look at this.

This is what we saw today. The male is coming in. Look carefully, you

can see a green caterpillar, look what's left behind. It's shaking it

out. Watch carefully second time round. There's the green

caterpillar in the mouth and as it leaves, look there's a twig left in

the mouth of the youngster. seems what the male has done is

plucked a caterpillar out of the vegetation to feed the chicks, but

unwittingly brought a bit of vegetation, whatever that

caterpillar was sitting on with, it and fed it to the chick at the same

time. In that case the chick managed to get rid of it. In the

case of the other chick, producing a pel the was a natural thing to do.

They are eating a lot of insects with tougher outer bodies. They

have to produce pellets. We have been watching those all day. I have

come up with a graph here... Chris, we've been on air five minutes. We

can't do grafts. Really, no! Let's do another really beautiful bird.

Look, no! Look at this. It is pied flycatcher. What would you rather

have, graph or pied flycatcher? It's a stunner. We haven't seen one

of these since 2006. If you were watching back then, you'll remember

we uncovered this fantastic story of a male, that black and white

bird, but it was a cheater. It seemed to have any number of nests.

We actually named it Casanova in honour of it's frankly

dishonourable behaviour. They are polyterritorial. It's not unusual

for males to actually be servicing more than one female, although

there are down sides for that male as you'll find out. Of course, it's

not just these birds, our wildlife camera crew have been away from the

nest cams looking for what they can find. Earlier they found this bird.

Let's cut live to the nest tree. There it is! Perfect. This is live

pictures of a young great spotted woodpecker. The adults have been

trying to tease their brood out all day long. We were really worried

because this is, again, a first for us. We've never had a greater

spotted woodpecker nest on our mini cams before. Earlier today, well,

this started to happen. We were watching the nest, eagle eyed, or

woodpecker-eyed. The adult comes in. Now tip for you, this is the female.

She has no red on the back of her neck. You can see that the, all the

chicks... One went out there. That was 10.30am. All of them have the

red cap. Yes and the male has the red on the back of its head. It's

teasing that chick. Then we see, it's moving back down the tree. So

a lot of noise. To encourage this chick to come out. It's feeding it

there. There it goes. That came out at 11.12am. We thought oh, no, a

first for Springwatch and they're not even going to hang around for

the first show. But only two have fledged. We don't know how many are

in there. We know that there's at least one more because we just saw

it live. Is it still there, shall we have a look. There it is. Still

peeping. What my concern is, Chris, that we've got two out of the nest,

we've got maybe only one left in the nest. They have up to six young.

That would be quite common. There could be another three in there for

all we know. Doesn't that mean that the parents responsibilities will

be split. Are they going to be looking after the fledglings or the

chicks in the nest? Both. Given it's just day one, the fledglings

won't have moved too far from that nest. They will attend them. Their

job is to coax them out. Sometimes they're really reluctant to leave.

Sometimes they spend hours, teasing them, go up to the hole, offer the

food and then the youngster hangs out and it goes back in again. It

can be really entertaining. Something to look out for on the

web kams. Can you do that by going to bbc.co.uk/Springwatch. We've had

a complaint. Not already. We've only been on air for four minutes.

It was on the blog. Jennie is complaining, she says our birds,

why are they so dull. All British birds are basically brown. Jennie!

Stick with us girl. You'll see there's nothing dull about British

birds. Have you actually got a colour telly. No disrespect. What

about this spring then. We've had a number of stats actually which I

put together here if I can find them. I can tell you about this A

it's been 3.7% warmer than normal. It's been the warmest April since

1910. In central England it's been the warmest April for 350 years.

The highest temperature, stay awake, the highest temperature 27.8.

That's pretty amazing that. Was in Surrey. In terms of sunshine, 150%

more sunshine than the last sunnyest April. No, we know where

we are with spring. Rainfall, most places only 10% of the rainfall.

There we are. It has been an extraordinary spring. What has been

lovely is that our cameramen have been here since before spring

started. We can show you how spring developed here at this beautiful

RSPB reserve. This is what it looked like if February, exactly

the same place, this month. Look at this, the woodland here.

It's transformed by the onset of spring. It really is a magical time

of year. It's a lfl time of year. - - lovely time of year.

We'd like to hear about your spring. If you've been taking photographs

please send them in. And we pinched an idea from our

unsprung programme, we're going to give a quiz. This magnificent

feather, almost completed surrounded by midges, what is this

feather? Get on the message board or get on tweet and tell us what it

is, please. I will get some clues. This is a large flight feather,

from a large bird. What you have to imagine is a little group of these

together, acting as fingers out on the edge of the wing. Now, every

week, we're going to be joined by a guest naturalist of great repute.

They're going to be not here in Wales with us, but other locations

across the country. This week we are going up here to Scotland to

argyleshire. I love the detail of this. Look at this, we're going

precisely to there. There we're going to be joined by the

incomparable Charlie Hamilton-James. Charlie, we've got a lot of midges

down here, mate, I'm sure you've probably got more than us.

Got a lot more. Thanks guys. I'm exceptionally privileged to be part

of the Springwatch adventure team. Because we've been given

unrestricted ak stos one of the most controversial and

consevenation projects happening in Britain today. The Scottish beaver

trial. It's a project that's been set up to see whether we should be

releasing beavers back into the wild in Britain. They've been

extinct here for 400 years. But two years ago, a few groups of them

were released onto remote lochs here. As you can see, they've

already been getting to work. There aren't many animals in the

world that can do this to a tree. So, our job on Springwatch this

year, is to reacquaint you with an animal that used to be familiar to

us all. But first, here's a taster of what these Springwatch adventure

This is the hottest, dryest spring on record in Britain, but not here.

We've lost power in the house. We have no edit suite and I'm supposed

to be filming beavers. Thankfully the storms didn't last long and

filming beavers is exactly what we've been doing, as well as

hearing the local debate that surrounds them. It brings a lot of

people to the area. I know it's a trial and there are mixed feelings,

but people are coming to see the beavers. It's another dimension,

something that people can see and enjoy. This farm has never had

beavers and as far as I'm concerned, it never will. To bring you the

story of British beavers we've brought the Springwatch adventure

team and all the kit to the heart of argyle to cover the story from

It's not just filming beavers, we want to investigate the response of

animals and people to these new creatures living in this project

area. Where do we start? Us modern Britons don't know the beaver.

We've got to get to know the beast. So, I went out with the Scottish

beaver trial to see if I could see a beaver for the first time and

It's not until the light begins to fade that beavers become active.

They're largely nocturnal, so just before night fall is the best time

to spot one. It's not long before I I can't quite believe I'm looking

at a new species of animal to Britain. It's right there. It's

just incredible. I've spent my whole life in Britain filming

animals and suddenly there's this enormous new one. Yeah, they're

large mammals. A fully grown adult could be up to a metre long, a good

20-30 kilos. What are they doing here? We've imported animals from

Norway as part of this trial reintroduction. It's not a full-

scale reintroduction. We're trialling it in the Scottish

environment. We have license to release up to four families of

beavers. It's a five-year scientific trial. We're going to

see how they get on in the Scottish environment and looking at how they

interact with the woodlands and other creatures and the socio-

economics effects on this ira. They're not fenced, these are

totally wild animals? Yeah, they're wild. We have a responsibility, we

monitor their health and how they're get ago long. So you know

each animal individually, who they are. You know everything about them.

We know everything about them. They're well monitored animals.

They have ear tags on. They're microchipped. So basically, they're

beavers on parole. Well, yes! Hopefully with a good outcome.

Well that was quite a moment for me. But for some avid followers of

British wildlife television, you're thinking, I've seen it before. And

we have. This story's been covered before. We've seen beavers floating

around. I know Chris has seen them here before. Hold on, what happened

next has never been seen before. In fact, most of what we've filmed

here this week has never been filmed before. So, come back later

and we'll give you some more. You see, Charlie, you think that

everyone wants to see beavers, but this is another Springwatch first,

chickens. Excellent. I've come down to the edge of one of the wetland

areas at this RSPB reserve. I'm with Lynsey Mccree, you're one of

our cameramen. Do some camera work. What have you been filming out here.

Is there anything in particular going on? It's been teeming with

life this week. Has it? Down at the moment, there's a lot of house

Martins and sand Martins. They're making the most, we are being

besieged by midges. We could do with them over here eating. They're

obviously feeding over the lake. We have horses in the background there.

Oh, duck scoot ing across the surface. A young mallard actually.

Just bit horse. You've been with Springwatch for a number of years,

how are you finding our new home? It's stunning, heaving with life.

Fully the -- actually the first morning we are here I watched three

otters, a mum and two cubs, but I didn't have any kit with me.

schoolboy error. We haven't just got our manned cameras like Lynsey

with his camera here. Would you mind just going over, this is one

of our other remote cameras. We've called it rather imaginetively,

marsh cam. Can we see anything on that at the moment? It's a

that at the moment? It's a beautiful view. We have swans there.

That's another camera that we will be keeping an eye on. We've got a

camera set up on another part of the reserve having a lock at this

rather lovely bird. Let's go to it live. There it is. You can see, can

you see it? Can we go in a bit closer to just to see beautiful

bright orange, almost sword-like bill. Turn round. There you are.

That's nice. Little bit more maybe. It is of course an oystercatcher.

You can see the handsome black and white plumage. Just to give you an

idea of where that is actually nesting, let's cut to another view

of the nest. You can see the camera up there and it's pulling out to

reveal that the oystercatcher has actually nested on top of a wall.

It's eight feet above the ground. Now we tend to think of them as

ground-nesting birds. What they will do is find any sort of nest

site where the eggs are really beautifully camouflaged. They've

even been known to nest on the top of gravely roofs in towns. Now,

let's introduce you to the adult birds a bit better. Here's some

footage that we took earlier. You can see here's one of the adult

birds coming in. We get a really nice view of her two eggs. That's a

typical clutch for an oystercatcher. You can see how beautifully

camouflaged they are amongst the stones of the wall. Now that could

be she or he. Have a look at the other adult coming in. This bird is

giving a little bit of cause for concern. He or she is limping

rather. Now that might be the male at the back. He has a slightly

stubbier bill which is the only way you can tell the male from the

female. Both birds with incubate the eggs. The eggs should be fine.

But, that limping bird could get predated because it's not in great

shape F that happens we will lose the eggs. So already programme one,

we're on the edge of our seats keeping an eye on those oyster

catchers. But we have had all sorts of other lovely life. This area in

front of me has been teeming with life. Have a look at some of the

things that we've seen earlier today. Some Canada geese there with

their youngsters. Just youngsters everywhere, cygnets, swans and

their cygnets. Lovely shot of mall ardz with these huge families. They

have such huge broods. Now something's panicked these ducks.

We looked above usually something in the sky and what is it? A

buzzard. Now, Chris, were those ducklings right to panic? I think

they certainly were, Kate. I think they certainly were. Do you reckon?

Yeah, of course. Buzzards, are they magnificent hunters like eagles and

sparrowhawks. Wherever I see them they're eating worms. They will eat

worms. They're often seen in fields. Groups of up to 40 will go aworming.

Sometimes you'll see them dancing up and down on the soil. This is to

bring the worms to the surface. They will eat them. They are an

active predator. They have very broad tastes. They're Britain's

commonest rap tore now and Wales is a strong hold. We have a nest to

cut to now. Here it is, up in an oak tree. There's the adult bird

there as well. Mum or dad do you think? Difficult to say. He or she

has got one chick in the nest at the moment, about two-and-a-half

weeks old. So although it looks downy there, when it stands up you

can see there's quite a bit of feathering on the back. Is that

normal? How many chicks would you expect them to have? That's

interesting, they will lay clutches up to four eggs. They're one of

these birds designed to lay extra eggs, hatch extra young so that if

food runs short they've got a survival strategy where they will

weed them down. This nest did have two eggs but only one has hatched.

We have been following them really closely over the last few days to

see what they've been up to. Look at this, this is going to

illustrate the range of prey that these animals can take. Here we

have a mole. I thought they were distasteful to nearly everything.

Not normally eaten. Not trouble for rap tores and owls. That's a vole

Chris. That's a shrew I think. going down in one. You've got to

admire that. I've never tried it. It's quite a faet.

-- feat. Lots of mammals but should the ducklings be frightened. They

have a broad diet. They will go for frogs, worms and birds are on the

aJen da. We saw this earlier. This is a small bird and you can see if

you look at the head which... that's a bit gruesome. That's a

young moor hen. It can't get it down, like me trying to swalle a

golf ball. You haven't tried that have you? Not recently. Here's the

answer to the inquiry. That is a mallard duckling. I'm afraid it is.

Would it have actively hunted that? There's plenty of them. They're all

together in one place. They're not going to move far to. A buzzard

that duckling is a bird burger. Why so sad, it's part of life Martin.

Of course. Let's move on shall we. I must learn to be not so pragmatic.

You're hard, man. This feather, could it have been something that

we have just been seeing. Becky, have people been... Yes they V

have people been... Yes they V thank you very much. Jill Eccles on

Twitter, Lynsey Cook thought it was a buzzard. It's not. Keep them

coming in. It's something else. By the way, we're trending on Twitter.

What does that mean? It's important. Springwatch is not just about the

wildlife, it's about the people who enjoy the wildlife. All the viewers

at home, but also some great naturalists. We have been

privileged Chris and I to meet fantastic naturalists, British

naturalists. We've been out in the field over the last few weeks and

we met up with them. I met Sylvia Sheldon, a lady who's

been studying adders for 30 years. Richard everybodying natterjack

toad man, helping the hot hatches of the toad world to thrive on his

farm. Matt Hamilton is a student film maker who reveals the beauty

near his home in Hampshire. Charlie Elder manages to get his hands on a

fantastic finch. That's incredible. Ron Ho skins,

potentially the saviour of our honey bees. Astonishing. And Mickey

Smith, surfer, the human fish. Totally mind blowing experience

catching wave was dolphins. Can you tell she loves riding waves. She

can't fig it out, because we're obviously nowhere near as good as

she is. What a treat. We'll catch up with

those characters over the next couple of weeks to. Kick us off

those mark Everard, a lifelong angler. He has written a little

book about little fishes. He's going back to his first fishy

I think the first memories of nature are just deeply stay with us

forever. I first remember being around rivers from the age of about

one and I've never been far from them. Certainly some of my best

memories are of fish when I was really, really little. I suppose

it's natural that what you reach your teens or early 20s or whatever

and you get interested in cars and all the other things, you kind of

tend to think well, I'm just into big fish now. There's that macho

thing. You get a bit older and you think, actually the little guys are

just wonderful. It's these little guys that keep

the world ticking. They keep food webs linked up and they tell us

that rivers are healthy. Minnows are the barometer of the river.

Where minnows thrive water quality is good. Kingfishers eat them,

other fish eat them. They eat shrimps, insects and they keep the

engine of the ecosystem going F you run out of minnows, you probably

run out of minnows, you probably run out of river health as well.

They're one of the most curious fish you'll ever meet. If I was

that small and everything wanted to eat me, I don't think I'd be as

curious. They are irrepressible. Normally they're silvery with a

black line down them. These are females here. The males turn into

some of the most vivid staids. -- shade. This is what happens in the

spring, they're in spawning livery. This beautiful black chin strap,

gold on the sides, emerald and other colours in between. Whereas

the females, retain the winter colour and every now and again

those shows get together and spawn on the stones. Then they'll

separate again. They'll carry on all summer, through to July. Anyone

can walk along the river and spot minnows. If there are minnows there

They're generally displaying themselves in the edge If you've

got a net, got a mino trap, you can catch them as well.

One of the amazing things about the bull head, these guys, is that they

can live the whole of their lives under the same stone. To me there's

something slightly frogy about them with their big wide mouth and their

little eyes at the top of their head. Bullheads are difficult to

see normally. They don't venture out much fromer their stones, even

by night. The best way is to go into a streamy bit of river and

turn over stones and that's when put it back exactly where you found

it and put the stone that you turned over exactly where it was,

because that's its home. It will be totally disorient ed without it.

The stickle back was the first fish I ever caught with cotton and worms

tied to it. There's something about the face of

a stickle back that always reminds me of the knight in a chess set.

There's a pointy, slightly horsey face and the big eyes. They swim

around with a stiff body and fast moving fins in a stop, start way.

That's because they're armoured. Across their body are great big

scales which are effectively armour. It makes them tough, robust fish.

But they're also new men because it's the males that brood the eggs.

They form nests out of weed, typically out of vegetation and

twigs and whatever, glued together with secretions from the kidneys.

Into them they lure a female with a characteristic zig zag dance. Once

the females have laid the eggs, they'll drive them off and then,

he's got his nest, and the eggs, he fans fresh water through the nest

to brood the young until they're able to fend for themselves.

They're wonderful parents, wonderful fathers, should I say.

They've all got such different characters. The stickle backs live

in the still water on the edge. They're territorial, the males are.

Even the minos, here's some females and males, they have different

personalities. They're so important in the ecosystems. They're so

important also because we lose something of ourselves if we lose

our fascination with the tidlers What a lovely film. It's such a

crime just to dismiss wildlife because it's little or it's

overfamiliar. Those minnows are every bit as exotic and exciting as

something you might find in a coral reef. Someone that I don't need to

persuade of British river life is Charlie Hamilton-James who loves

the river, don't you? I do-a river. And I love a minnow. It's nice to

see a man championing the mighty minnow. At this time of year, when

they're in those colours, the vivid reds and that streak of turquoise

down them, they really are stunning. I'm going to stop wittering on. I'm

in nap Dale working with a Scottish beaver trial to reacquaint you with

an animal which was once skinningished. This is a beaver

pelt. It's surprisingly big. The reason this is so valuable to

people, and the reason they were hunted is because it's very warm.

You see these thick guard hairs. Underneath this soft, warm fur, now

that is very valuable to people. Because 400 years ago people wanted

to be warm. Now the funny thing about beavers is that people

thought they were very clever because they built dams and chopped

down trees and managed their landscape. So they had thought that

if they made hats out of them and wore this intelligent animal on

their head, it would make them very intelligent. There's a certain

irony in that. Beaver hunting is back in Britain now. The other

night we went out with the Scottish beaver trial to see if we could

into the night hunting beaver and I can't go with them because there's

no room in the boat. It's so frustrating. There's nothing I can

do about it. I'm stuck here. I will wait and hope that they actually

get one. The technique they're using to find

the beavers is a simple one. Using powerful torchs they scan the loch

hoping to pick up one of the reflective tags attached to the

beaver's ears. When One Shows up, because on that boat they've got a

It's massive! Do you want to scan it? Hold the button down.

We know that's Frank. Each beaver that's been released here has been

chipped, just like your pet dogs and cats. So that when the team

catch and scan them, they know which animals they're getting

information about. Why are we doing all this? We aim to trap each

individual at least once a year. We'll check its health and body

condition. We also take some samples for veterinary testing, if

we need to and replace any missing tags. He has an ear tag. Yeah, I

see his tag there. Would you like to take the tail length.

privileged to measure Frank's tail. You'd think he was a plait pus. --

platypus. 295 mm. What is this telling us so far? In car an teen

we lost a wee bit of body condition. Since the release they're all

putting on weight. He's in good condition. Good condition.

Watch all this going on and you realise this isn't a case of just

chucking some beavers out and hoping they do well. These guys are

really covering every single aspect of this. How he's coping with this

environment, is he in good health? They need to know everything if

this trial's going to work. The research is over within a matter of

minutes. Then Frank is free to go about his beavery business.

there. But it has to be serious research if we're going to find out

how and if beavers should be how and if beavers should be

reintroduced to Britain. Another problem for the scientists

here is observing beavers. They're very secretive. They're nocturnal

and difficult to see. So the Springwatch crew rolled into town

and we brought with us all sorts of gadgets and gizmos, so that

hopefully we'll be able to reveal the hidden lives of these secret

animals and get them doing all the things that you think beavers do,

chopping down trees and make doms and lodges Albuery that stuff. We

have astonishing footage. Come back later and have a look at some of it.

Thank you Charlie. We'll be doing that. Beavers are one thing, but

there is another British mammal which is far more widespread. OK,

it's a bit shy and it's nocturnal. It's also, at the moment, at the

centre of a long-running controversy. It has to be one of

the perennial stars of Springwatch. It is of course, the one and obl,

let's cut to badger cam. Looking a bit dark. It is becoming more and

more dusky outside. But we haven't just invested in one badger cam oh,

no. We have a second one. And here it is. You can see the wider view

of the set there. But is that the only one? No, I think we have a

third badger cam. We do. Optimism. We are not putting all our eggs in

We are not putting all our eggs in one badger cam basket. Can we

direct the camera? Can we pan to the right and zoom in on the soil

that's obviously at the mouth of that hole. What you'll see is that

there's a lot of leaf litter there, a lot of detritus. If there th was

a very active set with cubs, it would be scraped away. Are you

saying that basically it's a complete waste of time, there are

no badgers in that set? I wouldn't bet on a badger. I'm in the a

gambling man. Nothing's happening, have a look at this... Oh, doubters

amongst you. Look, look. There's a chaff finch. No wait, there's more.

Squirrels. OK. Nice. And after dark, gone to infrared, mouse. Wait for

it. Look at that. That's difficult to

see, it must be a tawny owl. would say it is a tawny oil. Hold

on, a glimpse. What do you think? It's quite difficult that one. I'm

going to say tawny owl. OK I'll give you a point for tawny owl.

may not be a badger, it's not say we won't see badgers. Can you keep

an eye on those cameras. They will go, when it gets darker, they will

go to black and white. They will go to infrared. Have a look on

bbc.co.uk/Springwatch. Can you keep an eye on those badger cams. You

can see if the owl reappears and can see if the owl reappears and

keep an eye on our other nests as well. For those of you who love

owls and think, hmm, Springwatch hasn't had any owls live on air for

some time, watch tomorrow. That's all I'll say. If you want my

advice and have you anything that you can, cross it. If you want to

see those badgers you might need to. Of course, there's more than

badgers here. There are a wealth of other mammals. These are the sorts

of things that our camera mn are looking for. Fox cubs, in the a

looking for. Fox cubs, in the a finer sight. Fantastic. Stoats,

look at this. Always entertaining. Top value. Ferocious Karin vorz of

course. There's lots of rabbits here. And water voles. Wouldn't

that be lovely. You mentioned with Lynsey that otters are about.

did mention that. Mark Yates said there are otters about. That brings

us to... The challenge. challenge. We all get on very well.

But there is a competitive streak. We thought we'd get one of these

remote cameras that you can buy, and each one would set it up and

try to get a photograph of one of the mammals that lives on the site.

in fact. To win the war, I have to find an otter and to do that I've

come to an area of the reserve known as the wet modo, which sounds

like quite a good place, if you're an otter.

Maybe a weasel would be better? Long, slim body, yes. Summer coat,

edge of ears white. I don't like to try too hard. After all, why would

I? It's in the bag. Oh, nice! Mark Yates, otter

cameraman extraordinaire said that if I came down here to the end of

this bit of water, I would see something that looks like an otter

footprint. Four very distinct toes. OK, this is a long shot Stoats and

weezels, will we get a photo of them. Imagine the prize if I do.

See there, that could be the same tree! It's perfect.

I've got this in the bag. Chris and Martin, you don't stand a

chance. My philosophy is when it comes to

wildlife photography, it doesn't matter how hard you try, it's

results that count. I suppose I'd OK. You are so smart! We set up

those cameras just a couple of days ago. We've got our first results in.

Do you want to see mine first. You will remember that I set up my

camera just at the edge of that camera just at the edge of that

water. I caught a pair of mallards, walking through. It's a start.

They're watery. This one, beautiful picture I think you'll find, top

bird. Lovely. And just wait for it... The otter? I'm waiting for

the otter? Nearly... Look. A squirrel's tail. What's wrong with

that. That's brilliant. Look how sharp that is. It's well framed.

You'd love that sort of photograph. That is some kind of nothingness.

didn't get my animal initially. I got something quite scary.

LAUGHTER I was testing it. Is that it?

how did you get on? It's a start. We're going to let them go on. I've

got something else to show you. Let's lock at yours. Are you ready?

Let's see. Look at that! Beautiful. Absolutely

beautiful. I despair. What about that then? Couple of squirrels.

put it under a bird feeder. That's so cheating. What about this

squirrel I'm teaching to pole dance. It's got a great future. I did get

a bit of luck. It happened right at the end. I did just manage to...

That's a lie. You cut that out... That happens all the time. This

will run and run. Both of you are horrible cheats. Shall we do this?

I think we should. Becky, the feather, please may we have a look

and see. Thank you very much. A lot of people responding? Yes.

Brilliant. Most people got it brong. They thought it was an osprey or a

heron, Debbie thought it was an osprey, kite springer on the blog

thought it was a heron. Correct answers, Trystan, and Ron Lag were

right, a receipt kite feather. done to you. That brings us to the

next brand new first for Springwatch. Have a look at this

lovely lady. This is, of course, a red kite, an

iconic bird for Wales. She's nesting just a little way away from

the reserve. And thanks to the Welsh kite trust, who've been just

so helpful, we can get this amazing access and beautiful pictures.

She's got just one chick. The red is just beginning to come through

on the down. It's about two-and-a- half weeks old. Absolutely glorious.

I think you can just... A classic kite's nest. It really is. A big

tangle of material in the oak tree there. Lovely view that we've got

down onto it. How do you tell the difference between male and female

red kites? The male is generally a bit paler, age is difficult,

because males... We have both of them on this next bit of film. See

if you can see. The chick is scruffy. No, it's not.

There we are. This is the female. would suggest. So it's likely that

the male is collecting the food, passing it to the female close to

the nest and then she's bringing it in and breaking it up for the

youngster. It's still a time when the youngster might be picking at

the food but it can't successfully eat it for itself. She's being very

atentive tearing up what a rabbit there. Oh, here's the male.

Bringing in a stick by the looks of things. Is that the male being

absolutely rubbish, why is he bringing in a stick to the nest?

It's not a terribly well made nest. They tend to disintegrate through

the breeding process. I suppose running repairs. Bit of DIY.

like dad doing something on the roof, just hope he doesn't fall off

like mine used to. Fantastic to see. And of course, they are the result

of a fantastic reintroduction project. The kites hung on here but

they've supplemented their numbers through reintroductions. When it

comes to reintroductions our top ibic -- topic of the day is beavers.

Charlie, the midges down here, I don't want to go on about, that

I've been savaged. I've lost pints. I think it's a lot worse here,

Chris! Welcome back to Knadale. We're here trying to film the first

reintroduction of beavers to Britain. We've seen them floating

around in the daytime, caught one in the net. Behind me, this is

Frank and his family's handiwork. The beaver researchers here they

study and tag every single one of these trees that's felled as part

of their resarch here. But they've never actually seen a tree felled.

So, we set ourselves a mission, can we film a beaver felling a tree?

You'd think it would be easy, but it's not. Because take a look

around me. There are thousands of trees here. So which do you choose?

Which do you point your lens at? I shirt, I found a tree no beaver

would be able to resist. Just like we have our favourite foods,

beavers have their favourites. What I've got here is a great big aspen

sprig, which they just love. We're going to stick it in here. I'm

going to sit over there all night and see if we can get the shot of

Hopefully, when they get out of bed, they'll be able to smell this aspen,

which we can't smell at all. It doesn't smell of anything to me. It

smells of leaves. They apparently can distinguish this from all the

other trees in the area. Because there isn't any Aspen in this

immediate area, hopefully they'll come straight for it. It could be a

long wait, but I think it's worth a So, did I get the beaver? Well, I

waited. I got cold. I got bored. I got tired and I got nothing. But

being Springwatch, we weren't daunted. We sent specialist

wildlife cameraman into the hide and he sat there until 1am and just

this guy is called Christian. You can see he's amongst our kit having

a good old sniff around. Our scent, the camera crew's scent is probably

still there. He's being a bit cautious. Then look, he locks onto

our tree trunk that we stuck in. There it is, stuck into the mud

there. The first thing he does look, have

a good sniff. He's trying to work out what he can about that trunk.

He's reading all the information off it like a barcode. He's

stretching as high as he can, probably getting a sniff of the

leaves. Everything is too high. He won't stretch high enough. He will

have to chop this tree down to get to the yummy leaves up there.

No, don't go! No, no. He's started sniffing another branch. Come back.

Come on, come back. Yes, come on.

That's lovely. It's your favourite. Look at that. He's having another

sniff, a little taste. No, that's not a taste, that's a bite. He's

He's getting stuck in now. We've sped this up so you can see

it. He's going for it. He's going to strip that bark around the tree

and then go for the wood inside. He's really going for it, look.

He's chopping in. He's using an angle of 135 degrees from the

bottom and 45 degrees from the top. That's the optimum angles for

cutting down a tree trunk. If you fancy trying to cut down a tree

with your teeth at home. He's showing you how. He's stopped and

listening. If that tree trunk falls on him, it could crush him and kill

him. He has to get out of the way. He reckons it's safe. He's back in

again. He's nearly through it. I wonder how far he will get. So,

will Christian fell the tree? Or will Christian get squashed? We've

run out of time today. So you'll have to come back tomorrow to find

out. Thank you Charlie. Of course, more

on -- of Charlie, no he's enough as he is, but more from Charlie

through the week. We've just had the most enormous thunder storm.

And the train. We love to have your photographs and videos too, like

this one sent in by Katie Frampton. She had a surprise guest at a hot

cross bun picnic. A black adder. that unusual? They're relatively

rare. Can you always tell adders they always have a zig zag running

down their back. Even if they're black. They're not very good at

riding bikes. They don't usually steal them. We want lots of photos

and lots of film from you. Of course our webcams are going to be

up and running all night or most of the night. You can keep an eye on

that. And you can make contact with us by going to bbc.co.uk

Springwatch. Now that was the first show. We have plenty for you for

the second. We certainly have. Adders are on the menu tomorrow as

I meet a lady who's been studying femme for 30 years. I promised owls

and we will bring you owls. We have barn owls right here on the RSPB

reserve. We'll bring you those live. We're going up into the tree tops