Episode 6 Springwatch

This is a blue tit nest box. It's hidden in the woods and it's coming

to you live. But what is in that nest tells an extraordinary story,

one in fact that's worthy of being on the Jeremy Kyle show. And Iolo

Williams has news of a world-of-record breaking bird.

That another truly remarkable wildlife stories, it can only mean

one thing, it's Springwatch! Yes, hello and welcome to

Springwatch 2016. It's our second programme of our second week coming

to you and a very fine evening here at RSPB. We have a super day and we

have a super show coming up with astonishing revelations. I can think

of at least three that we will reveal in an astonishing way in this

programme. As Chris says, it's going to be a fabulous show. It's been a

fabulous day. Let's start with the fabulous bird. This is our

sparrowhawk live, she's patiently sitting on that nest. She's five

eggs. We don't know when they're going to hatch but it could be any

time soon. So, keep your eyes on the live cameras.

Wonder when it's going to be? Shall we take a sweepstake? I reckon

Friday. I am going to go Saturday, actually. A weekend. Keep your eyes

on those nests at the weekend. I reckon Saturday. You could make a

guess too. See if you are right. You know, having that camera on that

nest means we have had extraordinary footage of that sparrowhawk. Our

nest watchers noticed this rather bizarre behaviour. Keep your eyes on

its eyes. Look at them. They're contracting.

They're dilating, going off in different directions. It's really

rather bizarre. Chris, what is that sparrowhawk doing, focussing on

something? I think it is. I think it's focussing on different things

at different distances and in different light levels.

The thing about the muscle that controls the pupil is that it can

move more rapidly. That rapid contraction is something that we

see. At the same time, it can also shift the position of the lens in

the bird's eye itself. It means it's changing the length of that. The

bird is probably focussing on different things at different

distances in different light and that's what it's doing,

independently with one eye and the other at the same time. I could do

that cross-eyed, can't do the contracting but I can do that and

then that. It's not an attractive look! We apologise to all the

viewers at home watching that in HD, that's not what you wanted to see!

What you might want to see is this, we have been able to look at another

as spect of the sparrowhawk's private life. There is a small pond

in the woods. We can go live there. There is a log on the side. The sun

is set off the pond now. People have been watching this camera and have

been privileged to see something I have never seen in real life and

it's this. The sparrowhawk at its bath. This is

the male. It's come in earlier. It's there flapping away, as you can

see. That is incredible. Imagine seeing

that in your garden bird bath, Chris. Imagine seeing it in your own

bath! Occasionally seen a poodle in my bath. He is jumping on to the

side, obviously when the bird is sodden the take-off speed is

reduced. They're vulnerable to predators. That bird has had a quick

look around to make sure there is nothing there and gone back in to

finish its bath. It's beautiful. Lit by the sun. Imagine photographing

that bird now! Don't say that, that's upset me. I would love to

photograph that. That's on our live camera. Privileged. Look at the

reflection! It's just stunning. When it takes off, wait for this, a

champagne explosion! That really would make a brilliant photograph.

They have been visiting that pond, both the male and the female, pretty

regularly. Do keep a look at our website cameras. You can look at our

website. There are four to choose from and you can also do that

online, as well, throughout the day and on the red button.

On Thursday, we introduced you to a new nest, it's smaller and maybe a

little bit duller than the sparrowhawk but it's interesting

nevertheless. It is the dunnock. Here it is live. Let's look at

what's in there. We can just about see one of the chicks sleeping, I

think. Four chicks in there. They're ten days old. They're nesting in the

gorse bush. On Thursday, you said don't underestimate the dunnocck. I

said never. You said because they've an interesting and complex social

structure. Can I tell you we have been watching our birds and it seems

that ours haven't. They're actually quite ordinary. Our specific ones.

Let's see what's going on at that nest. There is one female in

attendance, of course. Three chicks in there at the moment. What we were

hoping to see was the fact that the nest would be attended by more than

one male. These birds can have more than one male and equally have more

than one female in attendance but they can also be a group of males

and females together. This is extremely unusual in the bird world.

We do see it in dunnocks. It's only recently been discovered. Their

social sex life has been a complete mystery. The reason they do this is

during the breeding season both males and females have separate

independent territories. The males overlap the females, therefore, you

may have a male with two female territories he might be attending.

Males can have supporting males, mates, if you like, that are

subservient to them in their own territory. The benefit being they

can keep out other dunnocks. The downside being that male will also

be attending the female. It's a fascinating thing. We haven't seen

it with this pair yet. But keep your eyes peeled because we used to call

these things hedge sparrows, I think we should call them hedge swingers.

Keep your eyes peeled! Where is Martin? He is in the woods with

volunteers, some nets and rings, what could he possibly be up to

tonight? You are absolutely right. I am down

here in the wild wood T would be perfect but we are surrounded by

mosquitos the size of World War II Wellington bombers! I am going to

join in tonight with one of the most important surveys they do here,

checking the bird population. Every ten days or so there is a stall set

up and I joined them this morning. They will catch as many birds as

they can and measure them and get all sorts of data.

Look at that one upside down. They'll ring them and let them go. I

should point out that you have to be licensed to do this. Before you can

get into all that, checking them and ringing them, you have to catch

them. How will they do that? Come with me. Don't know if you can even

see this, I can hardly can. This is a net that designed if a bird comes

along it gently stops it and it drops down here into that little

bucket at the bottom. What they do is they check very regularly and go

along and see if there is birds in it. The bird, if it approaches it,

you can probably see it from the side, but if you were coming head on

like a bird, does it disappear there?

It disappears there. That's what it's all for. What type

of birds might we expect to get here tonight? We might get a dunnock.

Here is a chaff. Bullfinch, wouldn't that be ausome? One of the joys of

this is you never know what you might catch in the net. You might

even get, yes, a sparrowhawk. It has actually happened.

Fantastic. Now, when you have the bird, you

ring it, but what is the point of putting that ring on the bird? Well,

as soon as you have a ring on it with the number you have got a sort

of identity and I will give you an example and you can find out the

history. They caught here recently a little white throat, a small bird.

It was ringed, that ring told them that bird had been back and forth to

Africa three times. It is four years old T had travelled a total distance

they've calculated of 21,700 miles. All from that little ring. If they

didn't have the ring they wouldn't have known any of that whatsoever.

Fabulous bird. Now, that's the white throat. We

have managed to get a camera on a white throat nest. Here it is live.

Look at that! The parents are in there. There are six chicks in that

nest. You can't see them all. Let's see what they've been doing

the last few days. They're very good parents. Watch the chicks. We will

watch them carefully, white throat chicks grow up incredibly fast.

They're due to fledge probably on this weekend. We will keep a close

watch on them. The parents are doing really well. A

fly going in there. Another insect. Look it's ringed, as well. We even

know the history of that one. OK. The nets are up. We have

actually got six nests in three different locations here. We will be

monitoring them every few minutes just to make sure if anything goes

in we will get it. If we catch a bird we will process it a little bit

later on in the programme. Back to Chris and Michaela. We look forward

to seeing what you get, Martin. Our live cameras have revealed

extraordinary things over the years. But the live cameras in the blue tit

nest revealed something that surprised us all. Let's have a look

at our blue tit nest. Yesterday we discovered that the blue tit nest

and those chicks being fed by a blue tit female are, in fact, great tit

chicks. How on earth did that happen? Well, before we explore that

let's rewind a little bit to look at that amazing single mother.

She is a blue tit mother. She had eight chicks to begin with. She was

working so hard as a single mother feeding them. It's amazing any of

them survived. Just four survived. You know what, she fed them twice as

much as she should be feeding her own blue tit chicks. She brooded

them. She fed them more. She cleaned the nest. As they started to grow

feathers, we noticed that, in fact, they were not blue tits at all, they

were great tits, which is is an extraordinary revelation. It is.

It's a bit of a mystery. We thought we would try and solve the mystery

by going straight back to the beginning to the egg stage. We were

lucky enough to find this nest when it had eggs and start filming. Let's

look at the eggs. Here is the clutch in that nest box. You might, if you

are keen-sighted, see some look larger than others. They look the

same size as the great tits illustrated on the right of the

screen. When we break it down some smaller ones, we think four are blue

tits eggs. Five appear to be larger and three or four we can't actually

identify. Then, of course, when they hatch we

had this single size group of young here. They all appeared to be the

same size. A few days later when more of the eggs have hatched you

see there is a size difference. The one at the bottom appears

considerably larger than some of the others. After a couple of days when

the adult had been feeding them there is no doubt about it at all,

the four at the top of the screen are moch larger. Initially we

thought this was because they were advertising more, getting food more

quickly, they were growing more quickly. We didn't suspect they were

a different species. These are the great tit youngsters. Those at the

bottom and the poor little thing there on the right side of the

screen are the blue tit youngsters. Then they disappeared. All those

blue tits unfortunately died. At this stage we still couldn't see

what they were. By 12 days old we were suspicious because they were

yellow throated and there at 14 days old you can see they've got that

yellow band at the back of the head. Yellow on the chest, black cap. If

you contrast them with great tits - sorry blue tits of the same age

they're distinctly different birds. Absolutely fascinating. It's been

amazing to look back at that footage. None of us really noticed.

Then when you look you can see it's quite obvious they're different

chicks. Yeah. What happened, that's the question? We suppose it could be

this. Firstly, could it have been egg dumping, one bird flies to

another nest and lays eggs. That happens in some species, but not in

tits. It's unlikely that the blue tit had a nest and the great tit lay

eggs here. We think the great tit probably started the nest and laid a

clutch of eggs and then something happened to them. They deserted

them. Maybe they were even killed by our sparrowhawk. The blue tits'

single mother was so keen to breed thieves prospecting, found the nest

-- keen to breed. And she started to incubate them. The great tit eggs

were there first and hatched first. Then she had an advantage and she

fed those preferentially and when her own eggs hatched they couldn't

survive. Particularly as we had that very wet weather here last week and

that would have reduced the feeding and that impinged more on the

development of the baby blue tits than the great tits and they were

lost. That's a probably scenario. We will never know. All the Sherlocks

and the Holmes have been at work here throughout the day and that's

the best we can come up with. That poor, single mum has been

working really hard. Work has been done on other species and it shows

when it goes down to a single parent, and that is their own young,

it actually impinges greatly on the ability for that adult to survive

the rest of the season post-fledging fulsome she is putting an enormous

amount of energy into rearing and other species young for no benefit

whatsoever and she is wearing herself out in the process. A sad

story. We would not know any of that we did not have those nest cameras

in the nest box. It is amazing the insight they have given us. Do all

animals have personalities or are we just being a little bit

anthropomorphic. Martin has been delving deeper.

She's loyal, she's a little bit greedy and she's as brave as a lion.

But other dogs are quite timid, some are more aggressive.

And dogs, like many mammals, have real personalities.

But how about invertebrates, things like insects, spiders, snails -

Well, there is one group - the molluscs - that may be

just about to change our perceptions completely.

Meet the cephalopods, otherwise known as octopus,

And all of them can be found right here in the British Isles.

What's fascinating is that new evidence suggests these

underwater animals may have distinct and even complex personalities.

Dr Gavin Cooke of Bangor University has been carrying out research

To investigate this theory further, Gavin has set up an experiment.

In one tank is a timid cuttlefish and in the other a braver animal.

Both are siblings and will raise together in capivity.

This one seems to be hiding away now.

It's got the right colour, the right texture, too.

You can probably see this one clearer.

That's very distinctively different and yet they're siblings.

For this test we're going to present each animal with two prey items

of different sizes - one small crab and one large crab.

Neither cuttlefish has been fed and both should be equally hungry.

By analysing their reactions to the size of prey they choose

to attack, we can determine the temperament of the individual.

They often don't recover from their injuries.

Bacterial infections can kill them ultimately,

so risk-averse cuttlefish would treat their prey

more delicately and be wary of them.

Exactly as you thought, very, very little response.

It's not become conspicious in any way so it's perhaps a little bit

wary of revealing itself right now which would indicate that it's

It doesn't overcome its fearfulness of the environment to hunt

What will its sibling do when presented with

Yeah, you can see it has seen the crabs.

This is just one of several experiments Gavin has carried out

on cuttlefish and his research clearly indicates

cephalopods really do have distinct behavioural differences.

So a shy, more cautious cuttlefish may thrive in an area

with lots of predators, while a bold individual may take

The right personality trait in the right environment could give

It's easy to understand personality when it comes to dogs, like my Pip,

yet it's truly remarkable to think of the possibility that all species

Remarkable animals and incredibly intelligent, the octopus, the squid

and the cuttlefish. Whilst there might be an advantage to being timid

and shy, there must also be an advantage to being bold, otherwise

evolutionary that would not persist. There is a species here at Minsmere

we have been looking at where there is a difference between their

personalities, this time between the sexes. It is the rabbits. At birth,

dashes at birth, there is a sex ratio of 1-1 between males and

females. Later there are three times more females than males. It is

because the males have to be bold. They had to come above ground and

there are established dominance hierarchies. Here we can see a bold

mail. If you are above ground, being dominant, you are preoccupied by

getting one-upmanship on other male animals, you are not looking out for

predators. You are making yourself available to all the predators. The

male population get weeded out and that is why there are more female

rabbits underground than males on the surface. There is an advantage

to being bold. If you survive the predators, you are the dominant male

and you will pass on your genes. There are winners and losers on both

sides of timid and bold. You have to think of the words of Maurice eagled

he said, China. You from doing everything in life you would like

to. I always say, fortune favours the brave. How about you? I do not

know how to come back to Chris. We are trying to do a live bird ringing

session. We have been lucky and caught birds. This is not a corn,

ladies and gentlemen. Roger... -- a con. I was watching these GIF chats

-- chiff-chaffs. I need to work out which way around they are. It is a

black cap. The incredible thing about that is this is one of our

birds. We have ringed it before here in a previous year at Minsmere. We

have recourse in here tonight. The thing to do is check how old it is.

One thing I can notice is this outer feather looks a slightly different

shade. It tells me it is a bird born last year. It has one old feather

from last year. This bird is one-year-old. It is male because it

has a black cap. If I blow on its stomach, you will see what it has

been up to. Whether it has had incubation on the nest. Shed some

duties of the incubation of the eggs and looking after the chicks.

Keeping them warm. That is right. A stunning bird. I would do a wing

measurement. I have to process the bird and get on with it. 75

weighing. We also have to weigh it. It looks a bit unorthodox. If I ask

it to sit on the scales, you know what will happen. Both are used to

being in dark places. I will pop it into the pot upside down. It will

stay there for a fraction of a second. That is it. The bird has

been processed. It will fly off and we will see it. Here we go. Goodbye.

Fantastic! Beautiful! What a lovely job. Let's have a look at these

rings. They asked me to hold the right way around. The rings vary

from this whopping great exercise like that. That is an owl ring. They

have asked me to hold it steadily. I do not know if that is the right way

around. That is an a a ring. Fantastic! They are carrying on

processing. I have to tell you last year they managed to find just to

bullfinches. Just two. This year they have managed to ring eight.

Numbers seem to be going up at Minsmere and we have managed to get

a live camera on a bullfinch nest. Look at that! Beautiful! They are

the most wonderful parents. We have been watching them over the last

couple of days. They are lovebirds. They seem to do everything together.

Here is the female. And there are the chicks. The mail comes in. He

has chewed up the seeds and gives them to the female and they both

share the duties of beating the chicks. They seem to do everything

together. -- feeding. There are the chicks and here she comes. If she is

there, seconds later, the mail comes in as well. It is a lovely family

gathering. Four chicks. What a beautiful, loving couple. We'll be

keeping a very close I on them. Meanwhile, from the bird ringers,

back to Chris and Michaela. I like them. They are like the Richard and

Judy of the bird world. A lovely couple. They sit on the sofa. Even

throughout the winter time, the same male and female will be together all

the way through the winter. One of the only species that does that

during the -- in the UK. What is also rather lovely is that for the

first time the sheet we have managed to get some cameras into the nest of

a golden eagle and we have been enjoying fabulous images of these

birds. The youngster has put on quite a lot of growth. Here it is,

nearly three weeks old, standing upright. Not on its speed but on its

haunches. It is resting on parts of its legs. -- it's feet. It has a

crop, and expanding, muscular pouch which is used as a food store. It

separates the end just of a part of their diet, the feathers and so

forth so that they can produce a pellet. From this period, the young

bird is just like the adults, producing perhaps a single pellet

daily which it will squeeze out of its mouth with all the indigestible

bits in it. We have been really lucky. We have seen gorgeous shots

of the mother feeding the chicks. There was something rather

interesting that we noticed. The first 30 days, the Motherwell have

two of bits of flesh off to feed the chicks. -- the mother will have two

care bits of flesh off. This is not endearing for the young. We wondered

whether that was to lubricate the meat, particularly when it had fur

on it or it was drive. Someone suggested maybe it was that fauna. A

bit like us taking a probiotic. It has good bacteria and held it

swallowed the food down. I am going for lubrication, without a moment of

doubt. For the first few days, the adult does try to feed them meet

without any of that. As for the gut fauna, saliva does have a lot of

valuable bacteria, even our saliva, dog saliva. It is cleansing and

helps to clean wounds. It is not ever recorded in birds and maybe it

has to be investigated further. Why does it drivel? Lubrication, perhaps

colostrum. -- dribble. We have also had a privileged view of being able

to look inside the mouth of an eagle. This is the youngster and it

is yawning. It is very different in mammals. This square here, opening

at the back, it is where the nasal passages run down to the back of the

throat. That happens at the roof of our skull and it is where the

oesophagus starts, with stomach is starting, and it happens further

down in our throat whether stomach, the oesophagus and the trachea,

separate. Why is this happening in the mouth and not the throat of the

bird? It is simple. The bird does not want to have all of this

apparatus in its scope. It wants the skull to house its brain and how is

two huge eyes. That is what an eagle skull is about. Small is and a small

brain but massive eyes. That is why it had structured its anatomy

differently. Amazing to get a picture like that. How money people

ever looked into the mouth of a golden eagle chick?

We have had lots of birds of prey on the show, golden eagle, sparrowhawk,

last week we had that amazing falcon. The lovely white bird. With

which is your favourite? I am going sparrowhawk without a shadow of a

doubt. No contest. I thought you would. I go for the big large sexy

birds, so the golden eagle I think is mine. To be honest, you have

never really gone for the obvious, have you? You tend to always support

the slightly less endearing creatures. Dare I say it, the

smellier One Shows? The grass snake is one

of my favourite animals. But it is very elusive and hardly

anything is known about its distribution

and population in the UK. So, when I heard there was a site

just up the road in Norfolk where Angela Winnett

was studying them, I simply How many of these have

you got out, Angela? Not something you want to see

in close-up. It is this smell they are producing

to try to stop me predating them. When I was an eight-year-old,

out catching snakes like this, if I smelt of that when I got home,

I'd been successful. I suppose not many people

are going to like that. Oh, it's quite heady

when there are four of them. It's worth saying, Angela,

once you start handling them, Rather than just the perverse

love of the smell and admiration for the snake,

what are you up to here? My work is focussed on counting

them, trying to find out how many are on the site,

as well as monitoring their seasonality and trying to see

at what point throughout Already we have seen more

than the peak of last year. We have seen 35,

that's been the most. To find a site with over 35 snakes

in one square kilometre Angela is using a unique

attribute of the snakes You are doing something

which I really wish I'd thought You are looking at their ventral

scale patterns here, aren't you? Yes, they are a great

fingerprint to be able The ability to uniquely identify

individuals means that Angela's survey will avoid double counting

the same snakes and give Are you ready to move

your fingers away? Once you have got these photographs,

it means you can identify these individuals and see

whether they are moving around this site, whether they are coming

back year after year. I hate to say it but it is

smartly simple, isn't it? Something that could be done

anywhere else in the country. Yes, we don't know how to conserve

a species if we don't know It is very important

for conservation to see what these snakes are doing and get

out and find them. Let's put her back

underneath her shelter. If that had happened

when I was about eight, I'd be Snakes, fabulous. Can never get

enough. Here are the photographs that Angela and I took that

afternoon. You can see that this pattern here

is very clearly distinguishable. One black mark here. One here. This one

is very different with three. A couple of black squares on this one.

It's retained from year to year even when the snakes shed their skins, of

course. I have to tell you it's perfectly legal for to you pick up

grass snakes. This is something that you could do for yourself. If you

have a population of them. Can I ask to you get advice before you do

that, because you have to handle them very gently. They're soft

bellied and you don't want to damage their internal organs. Building up a

database like this across the country and looking at various

populations would be a good thing because we need to under-Stanmore

about these animals, just as we do a species of snakes here. One of the

way we monitor these is by putting out sheets. These are attractive

because they warm up and these animals like that, especially first

thing in the morning, here is an adder on top of a piece of steel.

When it gets much hotter then that steel gets too hot for the snakes

and they beat a hasty retreat. Beautiful animal, the adder, of

course. Easily distinguished from the grass snake as you can see

there, that zigzag pattern on the back of this female, no danger of

confusing them. When it warms up they take shelter underneath the

iron. We thought why don't we put a camera underneath there? What have

we seen so far? We have seen a beetle. And we have seen a snail and

we have seen... Um... A large slug but no adders. Keep an eye on it, I

am certain at one stage an adder will sneak underneath there.

It would be great to see one under there. I am jealous, four grass

snakes. Beautiful. He was very stinky when he came back from that!

He loves it. As we know Minsmera has a variety of habitats. One of the

most famous is this one. We can go to it live.

It's the scrape. It's a series of Islands that are sur round rounded

by a shallow lagoon ideal for gulls, tern and avocets. There is plenty of

action on that scrape at this time of night. We have live cameras also

on an avocet nest. Here it is. It's just one of 101 pairs that are

nesting on that scrape this year. That's 10% of the UK breeding

population. They usually nest the third week of April so this pair is

either late or it could be a second nest attempt. Very important nest.

The RSPB manage that scrape specifically for these birds.

They're very beautiful. So elegant. They're gorgeous. Lovely.

Now the eggs of that avocet are due to hatch any time now. When they do,

they're going to join a whole throng of other chicks down on the scrape.

Especially these little ones, these are black-headed gull chicks moving

very slowly. That's in slow motion there! They don't look anything like

the parents at all. They're interesting. When they hatch out

from the nest on the scrape quite quickly they'll leave the nest and

move around looking for food. They can skrim, not very well. Being

carefully looked after by mum and dad. -- swim. They reckon there is

something like 2,000 chicks down on the scrape of various sorts. An epic

number. Martin, they're not the only gulls on the scrape. There are

black-backed gulls flying around. They are the pirates of the scrape.

Plundering lots of the chicks. I warn you this is gruesome. If you

can bear it, it's very interesting. This gull flies down. As soon as it

gets down to the scrape it gets mobbed by all of the other birds.

It's not going to give up, though. This is easy pickings for this gull.

If you look you can see that the black-backed gull has a black-headed

chick in its mouth. It flies off with it. Look what

happens next. Doesn't waste any time. It swallows it whole. As

Martin said, there are about 2,000 chicks here. The gulls are certainly

making the most of it. It sees one in the water, it fights off a few of

those black-headed gulls again. It gets the chick. It's having a bit

of a problem flying off with this one because it's quite large.

It has second thoughts and drops that chick. Maybe a lucky escape for

that one. There are lots of chicks there. It gives them plenty of

opportunities to have a very quick and easy meal. There goes another

one. Straightaway swallowed it. It's not just chicks, Martin. Look at

this one. It flies down again. It's getting mobbed. Goes to the nest. It

takes an egg. In this case, the egg gets dropped. But they really don't

give up. It's like a chick banquet. Those black-backed gulls are

absolutely relentless. It's amazing that anything survives, actually. In

fact, none of the acocet chicks so far this year have survived because

they've all been predated. She just inhaled a mint while she was doing

that bit, I would just like to say and she carried on. A proper

trooper! We are surrounded by them now. -- inhaled a bug! It's not only

gulls Kraussing problems potentially. They've -- causing

problems potentially. They've trouble with the neighbours.

Shelducks. Here is the acocet. Everyone is running away. In comes

the shelduck with all the chicks making that poor avocet very

nervous. Now she gets her own back here. The chicks are on their own,

if she piles. Hassling them. This is a game of

three halves. After that it goes back the other way again. There is

the adult. Then back at the nest. Look at this.

The shelduck comes in. That's a big bird compared to the avocet and

takes a chunk out of here. Oh! A load of feathers taken out of it.

The poor old avocets are having a grim time. They are this year. They

had a better year last year. They had a good year last year. There

were 60 nests and they managed to hatch out 58 chicks last year which

is a really good year. Not such a good year this year. They only have

to replace themselves in their lifetime to keep their numbers

level. If they produce two chicks in their lifetime which could be as

long as 15 years, on average seven years, then they've done it. They've

achieved what they're on earth for! Now yesterday we enjoyed seeing the

wild boar and their tiny humbugs, well, they weren't that tiny! They

were out and about in the Forest of Dean in the sunset. We decided to

see what they get up to after dark. The Forest of Dean looks rather

glosly on our tight-time camera. -- ghostly on our night-time camera.

After dark is when the wild boar are most active.

This large social group of nearly 30 boar called a sounder has many

mouths to feed. With the cooler evening

temperatures, cold can be a killer for the little boarlet's.

Their tiny bodies glow white hot on our special camera.

But this is just the start for them of a long night of foraging.

They're highly sensitive food-finding snouts leave trails of

warm breath in their wake as they rootle.

Moist knowses are key to picking up the scent of buried food -- noses.

And as each patch of woodland is exhausted, the dominant sow keeps

moving the sounder on. Fun night forays will bring them

closer to people's houses. Cars are a real danger and the sounder has

two stick together for real safety. In the dark they communicate with a

variety of noises. Snorts of alarm, squeals of displeasure. And, as they

are feeding, quiet rumbles of contentment. The continual snacking

and walking can go on for up to eight hours during the night. A

rolling wave of hungry snouts hoovering the forest floor. The

lactating sows have to eat well to ensure their milk supply. With the

youngsters in tow they must take time out to nurse before they are on

the move once again. By dawn, the poor often circle back to their

starting point, close to their refuge. They may have covered ten

kilometres overnight and a seemingly never-ending journey for the tiny

boarlets. Exhausted, they sleep, before doing it all again tomorrow.

Entrancing views. Rather magical, like a fairy tale down in the woods.

Unfortunately not everyone is taken by the poor and we will be

investigating a human aspect of their relationship tomorrow night.

We have been featuring lots of Superman 's and we will show you

another one that inhabits this grassland. It is our mother stoat.

Yesterday we saw it predate a rabbit. We followed her yesterday

and we have some gorgeous shots of the kits. Here are three of the

eight she has, which are moving. Where not sure how old these kits 's

are. They start to make their own kills. They must be between six and

11 weeks. We are guessing they are probably about 9-10 weeks old. The

average date of birth in Suffolk is early April. She had left one

behind. She stood up and called it. It took no notice and she went to

get it. Now it is following her. Really lovely to see you. Absolutely

beautiful. She has moved three and now she must move the other five.

This is not terribly unusual. Once every couple of days, the stoats

will keep moving their kits around. It is amazing how old they are.

Sometimes they are incredibly shy. Look at this! The whole family

walking right by visitors to Minsmere. Right by their feet! It is

amazing to see them morgue trotting across the grass, to their new home,

wherever that might be. She bounds across the ground and they slink

across. When she is coming back here with the other five, they are stuck

to her. They move almost as one animal. Like elders through a

stream. Stoats and beg young move through the grass. Why are they

moving? -- bear young. It could be the den where she has had them has

been disturbed. There are not many foxes but badgers could have found

them. It is equally likely she could be leading them to food. If she has

caught another adult rabbits, sometimes she will go to them and

move them to the food. It is a huge family to feed and a huge family to

move. Imagine with eight kids in tow! If you have been reading the

papers he may have seen a bird hitting the headlines. It is an

Arctic turn, an extraordinary bird. Yellow Williams has managed to come

face to face. -- Iolo Williams. Last year, some of you may remember

that Springwatch's very own Nick Baker helped out

on an exciting new research project on the Arctic tern colony

here on Inner Farne. Dr Richard Bevan and Dr Chris

Redfern from the University of Newcastle designed

and successfully fitted 28 geo-locator tags to try and unlock

the secrets of the incredible migration of Arctic

terns from this colony. We have been waiting with baited

breath to find out whether any of the birds would make it back and,

if they did, what they might reveal Well, I am delighted to be able

to tell you that many of them have been spotted back on the island

and Chris and Richard have returned today to try to retrieve some

of that data. Richard, Chris,

how are you both? You must be like expectant parents,

waiting for the birds to come back. I have to say, I thought

I had the worst hat How has it been

for the terns so far? They have been slowed to settle

down, compared to last year. You don't want to get them straight

after they have laid but a few days afterwards so that they have

that bond with the nest. If it was me, I would be

jumping up and down, Until you have the bird

in the hands, that is The team used the visitor centre

as a makeshift hide. Keeping their distance while waiting

for one of their tagged birds We let her settle down and get

in the zone for incubating her eggs. When she has settled,

we will think about trapping her. There is a lot of waiting

in this game, is now? After making sure the bird has

started to incubate again, it is time to go out

with master trapper Chris. The trap is carefully placed

over the eggs and works Right, we should go and let her

come back down. We will wait here while Chris

goes in to get her. With the tag removed,

it's time to release her. The important thing now

is to let her go so she can get back As you can see she's

a feisty girl, as well. Now we have the next worry bit,

which is, is there data on there? The tags use a light sensor

to record the day length and when this is combined

with a date and time data, we can work out the bird's

global position and plot Well, that's the theory

anyway. This is still raw data at this stage

and will take time to process. Off the West Coast of

Africa, look. But already we can see

that our globe-trotting tern has been all the way to the bottom

of the world and back. I have to say that is actually quite

mind-blowing because we are talking here about a bird that weighs

less than 100 grams. About 100 grams, that's travelled

all the way down off the Iberian peninsula,

off the West Coast of Africa, all the way down around the Horn,

down to Antarctica. It's travelled widely when it's gone

down there, as well. All the way back up,

not just to the UK, And then it's got the energy,

when we go out, to attack us. I can tell you the team has

recovered 15 of those data loggers. A lot more data will be forthcoming.

We have a map of this remarkable journey. The young tern took off

last July and moved all the way down here, round the south part of Africa

and into the southern Indian Ocean where it hang around for about a

month. Then it moved down to Antarctica. This is where it was

active for that period. It stayed there for some considerable time.

Then it went over here and ended up down here where it spent most of

March. Then, remarkably, on 23rd of March, it made the return journey.

It went up to South Africa and reached here about 4th of April.

Another month and it was back here in the farm islands on the 4th of

May. An incredible journey. -- Farne. That bird has travelled

60,000 miles. That will make it the longest recorded bird migration ever

in the world. Fact. It is a record-breaker. Fantastic stuff!

More data to come. It could be longer. Let's have a look at our

live owls. They are out and about. Could it be they are semi-fledging?

They have laughed up. Look how different they are. -- fluffed up.

Let's go to the bullfinches. A loving couple. Late into the night.

We have been filming around the site. We have seen this. You know

this feeling... So embarrassed. I will go down the hole! We are coming

to the end of our programme. Do join us tomorrow on BBC Two. The last

people to do some poems. Tomorrow night I should be going out and

about. -- we shall ask the people. I shall be getting into the water with

this little fellow. We follow one man's to introduce a long, lost

species, the fabulous great busted. A unique opportunity for you. You

have the opportunity to name this small species of clap. It was

thought to be extinct for some time but now it is back.

-- crab. Do keep an eye on our live cameras which will be there 20 hours

a day. See you tomorrow. Goodbye. This woman is doing

this amazing thing -