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Waterways

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Hello, I'm Chris Packham and this is Hands On Nature,

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your practical guide to the best wildlife locations across the UK.

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And today we're going to be wet and wild, both out at sea and inland, as we explore our waterways.

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And I've got to tell you, they're amongst the best places to find some our most exciting wildlife.

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I'll be checking out Northern Ireland's charismatic bird life.

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Gorgeous, I mean, look at them!

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Why don't they make cuddly cormorant toys?

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Look at what Janet Sumner discovers in a Welsh river.

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We're looking at the evidence of a four foot-long sea monster.

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There it is, look. Oh, it's there.

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And Mike Dilger finds a ghostly bird that patrols a Yorkshire canal.

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This is Strangford Lough in Northern Ireland, the largest sea inlet in the British Isles,

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and the stats about this place are amazing.

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Get this - every day 350 million gallons of sea water rush in and out here,

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and it's one of the richest marine environments anywhere in Europe.

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More than 2,000 species of plants and animals have been discovered here.

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But it's the creatures that live above the waterline that I've come to see and one of the best times

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to start to get to grips with them is at the height of the Northern Irish summer.

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Strangford Lough is beautiful, wild and rugged

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and it's a drowned ice-age landscape to boot.

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These small hilly islands have a special name.

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They're called drumlins and they were made when the ice age ended

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and the sea levels rose.

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Local folklore has it that there are 365 of them,

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one for every day of the year.

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I haven't been counting them properly but there has got to be at least, hmm...

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80, 85 islands out there, which is pretty impressive.

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But you don't have to stand here on the land looking at them.

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You can take a boat trip and that's also a brilliant way of getting close to some spectacular wildlife.

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David Thompson knows this place like the back of his hand.

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Just the man to show me the highlights, including one special place called Bird Island.

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You can see it from boat trips onto the lough, though landing isn't normally allowed.

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Dave, the lough's vast, isn't it?

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And it seems to have its own complement of communities. Its own little world, if you like.

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It is. It's a huge sea lough,

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almost landlocked, apart from these constricted narrows out into the Irish Sea.

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-150 square kilometres in area.

-Massive.

-It's massive, and I think we worked out

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there's 180 kilometres of shoreline when you add it all together.

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-It's so rich - lots of plankton, lots of fish.

-Lots.

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And vast numbers of birds. That's quite a show of cormorants.

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That's brilliant. Isn't it fantastic?

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They go up to 400 pair of cormorants here. One of the biggest colonies...

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I sense we're cormorant fans alike?

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Absolutely, I just love these creatures.

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Brilliant. Full of character.

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We don't have that aversity to eating a few fish.

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No, not at all.

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No aversity to watching them vomit up that fish to feed their youngsters.

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That's a delightful practice, don't you think?

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Course it is. Punk rock birds, cormorants - I love them.

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These pre-historic looking creatures are found all over the UK

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but it's their superb ability in catching fish that often brings them into conflict with anglers.

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Today, though, I'm going to get really close to them by helping David with a bit of survey work.

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These are big, healthy chaps.

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Yeah, they're really good strong youngsters.

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Look at the mouth!

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This bird's mouth is opened to the size of a mug.

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No wonder they can swallow such massive fish, it's a superb adaptation.

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Catch something big, get it down, digest it.

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Gorgeous. Look at them!

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Why don't they make cuddly cormorant toys?

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Seriously.

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Gorgeous little things.

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Look, this is what they're eating.

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-His dinner.

-Oh, that's nice.

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Look, there's some very young young here.

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They've just hatched.

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A day old, two days at the most.

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-Oh, my goodness me!

-Blind.

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No feathers. Looking like reptiles.

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-And a clutch of eggs?

-Yes.

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They're doing well.

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Look at these guys here. Oh!

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That's fantastic.

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Oh, look at you!

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You wouldn't, would you?

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Oh, you would!

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This one's still got his egg tooth. That little white thing.

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How about that for nest material?

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Stolen from children!

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Yes, they're wicked creatures!

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Gorgeous little things.

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-Wonderful.

-Aren't they brilliant?

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Oh, they're just superb.

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At the southern tip of Strangford Lough

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is the National Trust nature reserve at Killard Point

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and in June it's just carpeted with flowers.

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A feast for the eyes.

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-Look at that.

-Beautiful.

-A piece of paradise.

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Absolutely. Where else would you find this?

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Just about unique, really.

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-This kidney vetch is bright yellow.

-There's a sea of it.

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There were some spectacular wild flowers

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but sometimes the really lovely ones aren't always the most colourful.

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-Oh, wow.

-You nearly knelt on that. I nearly knelt on that.

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You nearly knelt on that.

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If I had knelt on that,

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-you'd have had to beat me!

-You'd have hated yourself for a week.

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-Frog orchid.

-You're absolutely right, frog orchid.

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-Now that is a monster.

-They're good specimens here, aren't they?

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Are you not used to seeing them so tall and lush?

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No, on the chalk where I come from, they're stumpy little things,

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but that's in its prime.

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Very healthy. Doing well.

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Called a frog orchid because it's frog-coloured

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and the flowers are said,

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or WERE said by the Victorian namers, to resemble frogs.

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-Do you see a frog?

-Not unless it's been run over by a truck!

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But it's a beautiful plant.

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Yeah, it's gorgeous.

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But in the autumn, Strangford Lough changes again,

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echoing to the sound of an entire species of bird on the move.

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This is THE place to witness the migration

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of tens upon tens of thousands of Brent geese.

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There's plenty of truth in the old adage

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that a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush,

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especially when it comes to getting to know your goose. Look at this.

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It's a little star.

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These Brents might come from the Arctic regions of Canada

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but they're very certainly not Canada geese.

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They're a distinct species and you can tell the two apart easily.

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The Brents here are much smaller.

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Look, they're the size of a duck.

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And they have that small blunt beak

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and they lack a very characteristic white facial panel.

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Super little thing.

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They might be small but these are remarkable creatures making an astonishing journey.

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The entire world population of these light-bellied Brent geese

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leave their Arctic breeding grounds to head for the lough.

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It's a 3,000-mile journey that leaves them on the brink of exhaustion.

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The Wildfowl and Wetland Reserve at Castle Espie is the best place to see them.

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The question for Brent goose expert John McCullough

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is what makes this place so attractive for them.

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The reason is food. That's all they're interested in when they arrive here.

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We have huge swathes of a thing called eel grass.

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They're coming to feed on this, as they've come through a huge journey

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and they want to settle with us in the winter and just eat.

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When's the best time to come and see the whole 30,000 doing their stuff?

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The best time to come is October. The month of October.

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You can see them from August onwards but October is the maximum time

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when most of the birds have gathered and come in and settled down.

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But you do have some birds which have satellite tracking on?

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Hi-tech low-tech fusion. The low-tech fusion bit of it is that we keep these on with knicker elastic.

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So you have a transmitter on the back of a little goose that costs us a fortune,

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yet we put it on with knicker elastic and glue.

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Robo-goose! State-of-the-art knicker elastic.

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Where are they now, then?

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We caught them in Iceland in May of this year.

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We followed them into the Arctic and now they're on their way back.

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What a bird, what a story!

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And you can follow their fortunes on the BBC's Supergoose website.

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One of the best things about watching Brent geese here

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is that you can visit the WWT reserve at Castle Espie.

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They've got a great captive collection, birds from all around the world,

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some of them even hand-tame, like these nenes here,

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and an excellent tea room, a prerequisite of any good birding trip out.

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You're watching Hands On Nature, your practical guide to the best wildlife locations across the UK.

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Coming up in a minute, Mike Dilger does some do-it-yourself pond dipping...

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-Can I have a go with a tennis racket?

-Yes.

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I fancy a comedy moment!

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But first, water plays an incredibly important role in the shaping of our landscape,

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particularly when it's draining down to the sea.

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Now, the River Wye is the fifh longest in the UK,

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it rises in Wales and eventually goes on to form part of the border between Wales and England.

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It's largely unpolluted and an incredible area for nature conservation.

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No wonder, then, that Janet Sumner couldn't wait to get her waders on

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and explore a particularly beautiful stretch near Builth Wells.

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This is part of an 11-mile stretch of the Wye Valley

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that I plan to explore.

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The river passes through some of the most beautiful and unspoilt scenery you can imagine.

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It's a river famed for the diversity of its wildlife,

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including some of our most celebrated rare and endangered fish species.

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Some of the Wye's most magnificent natural features

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are where its tributaries tumble into the river, cutting deep into the rocks.

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This is what I mean - huge waterfalls,

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which is fine for us to come and admire,

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but it also has an effect on the wildlife.

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Now, just imagine that you're an Atlantic salmon coming back up this river to spawn.

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You've got to make it up this waterfall, so only the biggest and the bravest get to the top.

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It's no wonder that the salmon in this river are famed for their size.

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If you come in autumn, you might see these amazing fish in action.

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They'll have travelled 6,000 miles from the Atlantic

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and this is the last exhausting part of their journey.

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But even in spring, you can find salmon here in the Wye

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and some other lesser-known but equally fascinating fish

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making their own amazing migratory journeys.

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My guide to the river is local environmentalist, Simon Evans.

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Hi, Simon, is anything biting today?

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I had one on earlier and I almost had it to the bank to show you, but it fell off at the last moment.

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-I don't believe that!

-It's the fisherman's tale every single time.

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It's funny, isn't it, because everybody knows that birds migrate

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but other creatures migrate as well.

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Absolutely. In this river there are fish that come from many, many thousands of miles away

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just to come back to spawn.

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Apparently there's an amazing mystery fish in this river that we know very, very little about?

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Well, I hope to be able to show you one soon. I'm just looking for them at the moment.

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It's a strange fish that's actually a species of herring

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but here we are, 110 miles from the sea, and I'm fishing for herring.

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-Got him!

-Oh, have you got one?

-Here we go.

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Gosh, it's really bending the rod down.

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Oh, it's fantastic colours.

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-Now, what does it remind you of?

-Well, it looks like a sea fish

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which is bizarre because we're in a river.

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Do you want to know what the mystery fish is? This is a twaite shad.

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-A shad?

-A twaite shad.

-It's really bright and glittery.

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The scales are designed to be reflective so they reflect the colour of whatever's there.

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It's taking on the green of your jacket.

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No-one knows anything about these fish. There's only four rivers

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in the UK that have decent runs of these.

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And the shad are only here for six weeks of the year.

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The adults come up for a month, they spawn, the eggs hatch, two weeks later they're gone.

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So I've been really, really lucky to see this, haven't I?

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You've come at just the right time. Shall we let him go?

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It'll just take a couple of seconds just to get his breath back

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and then he'll disappear back into the depths.

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There he goes.

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-There he goes.

-Wow!

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Now, you don't have to be a fisherman to see fish or anythingelse in the water

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but here's a couple of things that will help you.

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These are polarising sunglasses. They really cut down on the glare from the surface.

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And if you want to take photographs, get yourself a polarising filter for your camera.

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Now, our cameraman, Trevor, is going to show you how well these work.

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Are you ready, Trevor? That's with the polariser out.

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And this is with the polariser in. And what a difference it makes.

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I'm now at the lair of what is, believe me, a real monster fish

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and here for just a few weeks in May and June.

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If we put our glasses on...

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Yeah, use my glasses.

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..can you see, there's a sort of scrape up here

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where there are no stones, it's been taken back to sand, and then a pile of stones behind.

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And if I just show you

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one of the stones.

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So this is a fish nest?

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Yeah, and that's the sort of size of stones that they're shifting.

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No way! Are you telling me that a fish moved something of that size?

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This is the spawning site of a sea lamprey.

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When they spawn, they clamp onto the stones,

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they lift up and then they twist back down and drop it back down.

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You can still see the scrapers,

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the double raspers where the lamprey's picked it up.

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-The fish moved all those stones?

-That pile of stones there have all been moved by two fish.

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But the thing about these fish, to shift these stones, these are big fish.

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These are 4ft long, as thick as your arm, and they're predators.

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-Are they in the water right now?

-They are. They're probably...

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The two that spawned this redd are probably in this pool behind us.

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Before you get too worried, don't worry, like the shad, they don't feed in fresh water.

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Can you believe that? Right here in the middle of the Wye Valley,

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we're looking at the evidence of a 4ft-long sea monster!

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The next day from that very bridge, we spotted that the lamprey were back.

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Our cameraman captured this amazing footage.

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The lamprey clamp their mouths to the rocks

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to move them out of the way.

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They're creating a safe nest.

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And they thrash their tails to make a dip in the river bed

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in which to lay their eggs.

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You don't need an underwater camera to watch them.

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This is the view from the bridge.

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Out at sea, these 4ft-long fish are ferocious parasites,

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clamping their lips onto prey

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and literally sucking the innards out of them.

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It's an extraordinary animal.

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Now, another way to get close to fish in the Wye is to get your net out.

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What we've found is a tiny baby version

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of the Wye's most famous resident - the salmon.

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Oh, wow, no, there he is!

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He's young of the year. He's hatched out of the gravel just a couple of weeks ago.

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How do you know he's a salmon?

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He's got giant petrel fins - those yellow fins on the side -

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and he uses them to hold him on the bottom.

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Fingers crossed, in five years' time he'll be coming back up this river,

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4ft-long, 30lb, leaping up the waterfalls,

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having been on a trip all the way out to Greenland.

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There's just one more creature that I'm hoping to see.

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He's a quirky little chap with an unusual mannerism.

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If you sit quietly by the river you might be lucky enough to see a dipper.

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They love this fast-flowing shallow water

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with lots of exposed boulders for them to use as perches.

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Just needs a bit of patience.

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There's one. Right now.

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On the boulders.

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They've got this funny habit of bobbing up and down when they perch.

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He's doing it now. It's a bit like they're doing tiny curtsies,

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and nobody knows why they do that.

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It's one of the great unsolved mysteries of the bird world.

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Birds of prey dip their heads down to get a better sighting

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on small mammals, but he's not doing that

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because he's fishing for insects in the water.

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He could be communicating with other dippers but I don't see any more around today.

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So the mystery remains.

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A great way to explore the river is by boat and you can hire one

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from Hay-on-Wye and other towns along the river.

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In the past, many of our waterways got a bad press for being dirty

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and polluted, and in some cases that criticism was richly deserved.

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But over the last 25 years, we've gone a long way to improving our water quality

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and where human disturbance has been kept to a minimum, wildife has been able to creep back in.

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Now, Mike Dilger discovered just such a place near Pocklington in the North of England.

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The Pocklington Canal might be only ten miles long,

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but what it lacks in length,

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it makes up for in its sheer diversity,

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both above and below the water.

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And to top it all, exploring it couldn't be easier or more relaxing.

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And if you get to chance to take a boat journey on a canal like this,

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I'd advise you to grab it with both hands.

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There's no better way to get a canal's-eye view

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of all the water birds, plants, and lovely insects.

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These yellow pond lilies that are fringing the edges of the canal

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are just lovely plants.

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There's a few species quite similar, actually.

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You can tell this one, the yellow pond lily, because it smells of brandy

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and the big leaves are perfect launch pads

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for the red-eye damselfly.

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Each male protects his own lily pad and says, "Get off, it's mine."

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You can find 13 species of dragonfly and damselfly on the canal.

0:21:220:21:26

In fact, in just a few hours I counted eight, which is pretty good,

0:21:260:21:31

including this banded demoiselle.

0:21:310:21:34

Just watch it waiting for passing prey.

0:21:340:21:38

Gotcha! A protein-packed meal of a midge.

0:21:380:21:42

I tell you what, dragonfly-watching doesn't get better than this.

0:21:470:21:50

I'm watching Britain's biggest dragonfly, the emperor.

0:21:500:21:53

The female is curling her abdomen round

0:21:530:21:56

and laying eggs underneath the weed.

0:21:560:22:00

Superb.

0:22:000:22:01

One activity that appeals to the child in us all is a spot of pond-dipping.

0:22:090:22:14

And to show me how it's done, I've enlisted the help of expert pond-dippers Geoff and Roma Oxford.

0:22:140:22:20

Gosh, this is fantastic catch.

0:22:200:22:22

-I think there are lots of very young...

-Hello, chaps.

0:22:220:22:27

-Hi, there.

-Ah, hello.

-How's it going?

0:22:270:22:29

-Fine.

-It's really interesting.

0:22:290:22:32

We've found quite a lot of different aquatic invertebrates.

0:22:320:22:37

You've done phenomenally well already.

0:22:370:22:39

In terms of tools, this white tray's wonderful

0:22:390:22:42

because you can see everything that's inside. What about nets?

0:22:420:22:45

-This is a professional one...

-This is very specific to pond-dipping?

0:22:450:22:49

..and it's really rather expensive.

0:22:490:22:51

But if you're desperate and you don't want to use a professional pond net or an expensive one,

0:22:510:22:57

an old Wimbledon racket and a pair of your mum's tights.

0:22:570:23:01

Maybe I'll give that a go later!

0:23:010:23:04

But what you pull out of the canal can be amazing.

0:23:040:23:07

-The thing that immediately strikes me is this little critter here.

-Leech. Yes.

0:23:070:23:12

They're fantastic, aren't they? The way they writhe through the water.

0:23:120:23:16

People get the heebie-jeebies about leeches,

0:23:160:23:19

thinking they're going to suck their blood,

0:23:190:23:21

but virtually all of the leeches you get in freshwater

0:23:210:23:24

eat nothing larger than snails or snail eggs.

0:23:240:23:27

Further downstream, there's even more to find.

0:23:300:23:34

-Can I have a go with the tennis racket?

-You certainly can, yes.

0:23:340:23:38

I fancy a comedy moment! And if you have a go with that, we'll see what we can get.

0:23:380:23:42

I love it when the DIY techniques work as well as something you spent a lot of money on.

0:23:420:23:47

-Yes, that's right.

-Well, yes.

-Look at that!

0:23:470:23:49

What you catch in a canal depends on where you do your dipping.

0:23:510:23:54

And in this stretch, which is oxygenated,

0:23:540:23:57

you'll find different creatures like these freshwater shrimps.

0:23:570:24:00

If you're in any doubt about what you've got,

0:24:000:24:03

its worth taking a field guide along to help you out with any identification issues.

0:24:030:24:08

The water in this canal is really clear

0:24:080:24:11

and there's a good stretch that doesn't have any boat traffic,

0:24:110:24:15

so you've got a great chance of seeing eels...

0:24:150:24:19

..roach and dace...

0:24:210:24:23

..and even freshwater mussels,

0:24:240:24:26

which can lay a staggering 200,000 eggs each year.

0:24:260:24:30

Nick Askew has got one of the best jobs in the whole of Yorkshire -

0:24:330:24:37

studying an animal that's right at the top of everyone's must-see list.

0:24:370:24:41

And the grassland that fringes the canal is a great place to start looking for them.

0:24:410:24:47

A great evening, Nick, but what are our chances of seeing the barn owls tonight?

0:24:470:24:51

Sadly, over the last century numbers have fallen from about 12,000 pairs in the '30s

0:24:510:24:55

to about 4,000 pairs at present.

0:24:550:24:57

But this is one of the few areas where numbers have remained quite stable.

0:24:570:25:01

In fact, they've been increasing over recent years

0:25:010:25:04

so you've got a really good chance of seeing a barn owl round here.

0:25:040:25:07

But to see barn owls, a little stealth is required

0:25:070:25:10

and in a flat landscape like this, you need a bit of height.

0:25:100:25:13

This is absolutely ideal habitat. You can see all the rough grass we've got

0:25:130:25:17

on the edges of the canal and in the fields.

0:25:170:25:20

-So this is perfect barn owl habitat, yeah.

-So, best habitat.

0:25:200:25:23

-What's the best time?

-Dusk is very good if you're not an early riser.

0:25:230:25:27

If you are, then dawn's good as well.

0:25:270:25:29

Especially during the summer, May to September.

0:25:290:25:31

They're nice, big obvious birds. Just keep your eyes open.

0:25:310:25:35

They've got a lot of things right here. The rough grassland is full of prey,

0:25:350:25:39

and watch out for these curious dog kennel-like structures.

0:25:390:25:43

These are barn owl boxes.

0:25:430:25:45

-There it is, look! It's there.

-Yeah. I see it.

0:25:520:25:55

-Fantastic!

-That's it.

0:25:550:25:58

Oh, wonderful view!

0:25:580:26:01

-I think you're right.

-What unbelievable timing!

0:26:010:26:04

-Here it comes.

-Just floated straight into shot.

0:26:040:26:07

That's lovely.

0:26:070:26:09

This is classic barn owl behaviour, flying about 10ft off the ground

0:26:130:26:18

whilst listening and watching for prey.

0:26:180:26:21

He's off to hunt to find some food for his chicks, isn't he?

0:26:210:26:24

He's got a lot of voles to catch.

0:26:240:26:26

By now things were moving on, so it was time to help Nick with his research into barn owls chicks.

0:26:290:26:35

OK, so let's see...

0:26:370:26:39

-what we have here.

-Oh, just fantastic.

0:26:390:26:42

There's so much down as well.

0:26:420:26:44

Yeah, it's just falling off now. You can see all the quill dust as well.

0:26:440:26:47

You can see that beautiful heart-shaped face.

0:26:470:26:50

We're going to fit them with rings.

0:26:500:26:52

It's worth bearing in mind that Nick is licensed to touch barn owls and nobody else can.

0:26:520:26:57

-So even though it's Hands On Nature, it's hands definitely off barn owls.

-Unless you have a licence.

0:26:570:27:02

One thing you can get your hands on is these.

0:27:020:27:05

-Yeah.

-The old barn owl pellets. Most people think these are a kind of faeces but they're not.

0:27:050:27:10

No, these are vomit. These are the regurgitated remains...

0:27:100:27:13

-In a word!

-These are regurgitated remains of their prey.

0:27:130:27:17

If we just put them in the water it helps break them up.

0:27:170:27:20

There we go. These are just full of fur and bones and they tell us exactly what they've been eating.

0:27:200:27:26

-I've got a skull here.

-Oh, great.

-So that's the upper skull as we look at it.

0:27:260:27:30

And if I just turn it over, can you see those two rows of teeth there?

0:27:300:27:35

Can't believe how well we did today.

0:27:350:27:38

We've seen adults flying around, we've seen chicks in a nest box,

0:27:380:27:42

we've analysed their pellet remains. I think we've had a pretty good day.

0:27:420:27:47

The Pocklington Canal Amenity Society run boat trips along the canal during the summer.

0:27:560:28:01

There's more information on our website...

0:28:020:28:04

Well, sadly, that's about it for today, but I hope we've given you a few ideas

0:28:100:28:14

of waterways that you can't wait to explore.

0:28:140:28:17

Let's face it, your sofa's nice but this is so much better.

0:28:170:28:21

That's it for this edition of Hands On Nature.

0:28:210:28:25

'Next time, I'll be catching up with one of our favourite animals.'

0:28:250:28:29

Look, there's another one!

0:28:300:28:33

I've got to try to control my excitement.

0:28:330:28:36

'And Samjida O'Connell is in East Anglia...'

0:28:360:28:39

# Di-di-dee, do-do-do, do-dee-you. #

0:28:390:28:41

'..bowled over by birdsong.'

0:28:410:28:44

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