Episode 3 Countryfile Autumn Diaries

There's a change in the air and with it comes the most spectacular,

the most theatrical seasonal show of all.

Autumn.

It's a time of fruitfulness, of harvest.

When our six million acres of woodland come alive with colour.

It's one of the busiest times of the year across the land.

And for wildlife, it's a chance to stock up before the harsh winter days ahead.

All this week, we're travelling the length and breadth of Britain,

rooting out the very best seasonal stories that matter to you.

-That's a biggie!

-Yeah, that is our family walnut tree.

This is Countryfile Autumn Diaries.

Here's what's coming up on today's programme.

Margherita meets someone with one of Britain's most unusual jobs.

The first-ever hedgehog officer.

The current rate of decline, we're at a turning point.

Now is the time to act.

Paul finds out how you can turn your leftover lattes

into an autumnal favourite.

Wow! It's like an alien landscape.

And Diana Man investigates why ponies getting inked is bringing

the circus to the show ring.

I've never seen anything like it.

For the many creatures here in the Kielder Forest in Northumberland,

this place is a safe haven - and autumn, a season of plenty.

But across the countryside, it's also a season of crime,

involving gangs and poachers,

and the cost of rural crime is soaring,

as Jules has been discovering.

I've always counted myself very lucky to live in the countryside,

and whilst most of us like to think that it's a pretty peaceful and

tranquil place, well, sadly, that isn't always the case.

These days, like many other parts of the country,

it is blighted by crime.

It's big business for gangs who target everything from farms and machinery

to livestock and wildlife.

And the cost to the UK economy, well,

last year it was a staggering £42.5 million.

Rare breed poultry farmer Andrew Sheppey keeps up to 100 breeds of chicken

and amongst them is one of the rarest in the world.

The Burmese bantam.

Now, you were raided a couple of years ago.

-Yes, we were.

-Tell us what happened.

Somebody came in and obviously looked through a number of pens,

but didn't take anything until they found the pen that contained the breeding group

of these Burmese Bantams.

And then just took all the breeding females,

from our actual main breeding pen of these.

-So it was your Burmese Bantams they were targeting.

-Yes.

-So they absolutely knew what they were looking for.

-They knew exactly.

Were you able to recover your breeding programme?

We mercifully had another hen in a different building

and that saved the breed.

Obviously, the raid came at huge personal cost to you

-and nearly wiped out the opportunity to breed from these birds.

-Yes.

Is it possible to quantify the value of a live Burmese bantam egg

-on the open market to the thieves?

-Well, at one stage,

someone who had bought birds from us legitimately was selling

hatching eggs at £150 for half a dozen.

With thousands of acres of countryside to protect,

it is an uphill battle for police forces right across the country,

but with all of this illegal activity undermining the rural community,

it is something that law enforcement are determined to disrupt.

Countryside crime covers a whole gamut of things, from poaching...

It appears that the dogs have attacked this deer.

It is certainly poaching.

..to heritage crime...

It is a violation really.

It is an intrusion on something very personal.

..to rustling.

I thought I'd better go and have a look myself and I got there

and there wasn't one sheep left in the field.

I'm joining up with Lincolnshire Police,

as they target gangs carrying out a brutal blood sport.

Hare coursing.

They went up there, we heard a dog barking.

It was once a traditional countryside sport but hare coursing,

the practice of hunting hares with hounds,

has been banned for more than a decade.

You weren't going for hares, you say?

But that hasn't stopped gangs going to great lengths

to keep this activity alive.

The East of England's expansive flatlands are home to the brown hare,

making it a prime target for criminal gangs to carry out the sport.

But there's a small band of dedicated officers leading the fight

against illegal activity on farmers' fields.

The reason we target hare coursing is because it's not just the associated

criminal damage to crops, it's the fear of crime and intimidation.

Operation Galileo is a specialist wildlife crime unit,

supported by police forces across Lincolnshire,

Cambridgeshire and Suffolk to crack down on hare coursing.

The intention today is to positively police any incidents of hare coursing

and by doing that, reducing the fear of crime amongst the local community.

Well, that's it. The briefing is over.

We've assembled a team of over ten police cars,

well over a dozen officers,

that are now going to comb the entire county of Lincolnshire.

The weather is set fair.

It is the perfect day for hare coursing.

And later on, I'll be on the trail of a suspected hare courser.

They went up there.

We heard a dog barking.

Clear there.

Well, now, think autumn and one particular prickly little creature

springs to mind, the hedgehog.

But in the past 50 years, its numbers have plummeted by a shocking 95%.

Now though, Britain's first-ever hedgehog officer is hoping

to reverse that decline, as Margherita has been finding out.

When we think of wildlife heading towards extinction,

we often think of rhinos or stunning tigers, like JJ behind me,

with zoos like this for families to come and visit being the last refuge

for these endangered species.

But with one of our own here in the UK fast slipping in numbers,

could this become the final refuge for our humble hedgehog?

Thankfully, there's a new hero on the horizon who is dedicated

to keeping our prickly friends out in the wild and not in a zoo.

Meet Henry Johnson, the UK's first hedgehog officer.

So, Henry, how did you become a hedgehog officer?

Because I'm sure when I was flipping through the book of careers to do at school, that one wasn't in there.

Yeah, and I haven't come up with a decent joke to follow my introduction.

But I suppose it's just through working for the organisation I work for,

which is the People's Trust for Endangered Species.

What is actually happening to the population of hedgehogs here in the UK?

It looks as though we've lost about a third of the population

since the millennium. So we're currently declining quite severely.

And what can we do in our gardens?

How can we all help?

Just gardening with as many different types of plants as possible

to encourage the things they eat, slugs and caterpillars and beetles and worms,

so if you have lots of plants, don't pave over your garden,

then that's really good. They need a surprisingly large amount of room to roam in.

900,000 square metres of space to have a sustainable population.

Hedgehogs love gardens, but the average UK garden is only 14 metres square,

often enclosed by fences, meaning the hedgehogs get trapped.

Henry is spearheading a new campaign called Hedgehog Street,

encouraging homeowners to make small holes in their fences, connecting up

neighbouring gardens to create highways for the hogs to roam.

If we talk to our neighbours and work as a community,

then we can ensure these guys stay around for many years to come.

Yes. The current rate of decline, I think, we're at a turning point,

so it really is a bit of a call to arms.

Now is the time to act to try and save them.

With over a million acres of garden in the UK,

this could make a big difference.

Selina Birkenwald is one of 40,000 hedgehog champions who are transforming

their gardens into a hedgehog superhighway.

Selina, what is it that you sort of fell in love with about the hedgehog?

Well, first of all, they are very cute.

They eat all the slugs in my garden. I have no slugs.

It is fantastic. They are not a pest to anybody.

And what have you done to make your garden more hedgehog friendly?

Let me show you.

We made tunnels under both fences.

-Can you see down there?

-Yes. Yeah.

And then another one through there.

And to make sure the tunnels don't get blocked in the future,

they've been marked with Henry's handy signs.

So you've literally got a corridor...

-A highway.

-A highway all the way through your neighbours' gardens as well?

-Yes.

Yes, we have badgered the neighbours,

they've all been fantastic and they've all become very excited.

They have hedgehogs.

Other people tell us they have hedgehogs.

So now everybody orders food,

the neighbours over there have one that shouts at them if they don't

put his food out at the right time of night.

He goes up to the glass and he makes a noise and they have to rush out with his food.

They are real little characters,

and it's wonderful to get children

and friends involved,

because these little creatures are too precious

and need to be saved.

Next-door neighbour Elliott's certainly doing his bit.

Hi, Elliott. So who is this for?

Mr Prickles.

That's a feast and a half.

Feeding time for Mr Prickles.

Mr Prickles will be tucking into nuts and seeds, but you could always

leave out cat or dog food and some water.

But no milk, as hedgehogs are lactose intolerant.

Mr Prickles goes down here.

Job done. Hedgehogs fed.

Hedgehog hero Henry has got a job for me, too.

Henry, what is it about somewhere like this alley behind all

these houses that they love so much?

This scruffy bit at the back, they actually need even more so than your beautiful beds, for foraging,

for nesting, for all the different parts of their life cycle.

-And this is the time of year they're starting to look for that hibernation...

-Yeah, exactly.

Henry's enlisted another neighbour for the hedgehog highway

and with the light fading, there's no time to lose.

We're heading towards their favourite time of day.

They can't get through this back fence and we really want to connect

the garden to this network of land here.

-To make it easier for them.

-Yeah, I think down here would be

-the perfect place...

-OK.

-..to put one in.

Hedgehog Street has so far signed up 10,000 gardens

to be hog superhighways.

We're certainly getting to the hedgehogging hour of the day.

There's not much light left.

But with 25 million homes across the UK,

there's still a long way to go.

OK, officially, a hedgehog superhighway.

Yeah. Job's a good 'un.

If you'd like to become a hedgehog champion,

go to hedgehogstreet.org to find out more.

Taking a walk through the woods is one of the treats of autumn,

and if you keep your eyes open,

you could well spot the season's new fungi.

Not that you could possibly miss this one!

And of course, you have to know exactly what you're doing

before you think of eating them.

They are one of smallholder Paul Martin's favourite things to eat breakfast.

But he's about to discover there's a surprising new link between fungi and his morning brew.

I cannot get the morning going

without having at least one mug of coffee.

Sometimes it's two.

We drink 70 million cups of coffee a day in the UK and it's become

a £7 billion industry.

But our love affair with the black stuff generates more than

half a million tonnes of leftover coffee grounds every year.

Two blokes in Exeter, down in Devon, have come up with a novel way of

using our leftover cappuccinos.

They don't want us to throw anything away.

They're using spent coffee grounds

to make one of my autumnal favourites, mushrooms.

And they've asked me to bring my bike with me,

so it's in the back.

Most spent coffee grounds end up in landfill, but friends Eric Jong and

Adam Sayner saw an opportunity to turn waste into food production.

Now they're growing mushrooms in the coffee,

and where they farm their fungi is a little left-field too.

-Hi, Eric.

-Hi, Paul. How are you?

-I'm all right, thanks.

Look, I've cycled into the centre of the city.

-Where's the farm?

-It's just up here, the third floor,

right in the heart of Exeter, Princesshay.

-That's an office.

-It used to be an office.

It's now a mushroom farm.

So, why do I need the bike?

We'll just go around on a quick bike ride, collect a bit of coffee,

because we need quite a bit to grow mushrooms with.

-OK, the penny's dropped now. I see what you're doing.

-Follow me.

-What do you think of the bike?

-It's a lovely bike.

-Vintage.

-Classic.

Every day, Eric cycles round Exeter, collecting spent coffee grounds

from eight nearby coffee shops.

So, Eric, I know cycling is hard work, but I guess it saves all

the parking problems and parking tickets in the city centre.

Yeah, a van would be a nightmare.

We don't even need it, because we just collect the buckets on this bike,

we are done in half an hour because the cafes are so close to the farm.

Yeah.

Pedal power is definitely more environmentally friendly than a van, too.

Last year, Eric collected 34,000 kilos of coffee waste,

that's more than three million cups of coffee.

Exeter obviously loves a cappuccino.

Can I pass you this empty tub, please?

Thank you.

So, what do you think of this idea and why have you got involved?

I think it's great that we can work with a local business

and provide some natural resources for them.

What did you do with the coffee before?

We actually just wasted it.

So we had maybe 50, 60 kilos of coffee a week

that just went to waste.

So, I mean, it's great that we can help someone else out.

Exactly. And it saves you chucking it as well.

-Yeah.

-So, how much coffee do you sell each day?

Each day, I mean, we get through about eight kilos of coffee a day.

-Yeah.

-Wow! That's a lot.

So, it's now good that we can give it to another business.

And can I have my full tub, please?

-There we are.

-Gosh, that's heavy.

-Yeah.

-That is heavy.

-Enjoy.

-No wonder we've got a trailer!

Come on then, Eric. Thank you very much.

Thank you.

While Eric continues on his pick-ups,

I've headed back to their city centre farm.

18 months ago, this was an empty office block just off the high street.

Now, it's where Eric and Adam produce their latest batch of oyster mushrooms.

Hi, Adam. I brought you the coffee.

Perfect.

Look at that. Fresh from the cafe.

-There you go.

-Cheers.

The coffee grounds are added to a mixer,

along with some cut-up straw and then the fungi.

In here is the mushroom spore, which is kind of the seed of the mushroom.

It's living on this grain and what we do when we add it into there,

it just starts to grow across the whole mix.

Have a little smell. It's a unique smell, isn't it?

Mushroom spawn carries the fungal cell structure that produces the mushrooms.

Why do coffee grounds make good mushrooms?

They've got all of the essential nutrients there

that the oyster mushrooms need to live on.

Will it influence the flavour and the taste slightly?

Yeah, it's a question people often wonder.

And the answer is no, it tastes the same as if it grows on wood.

It takes all the carbon, the nitrogen,

that it would do on wood, just from the coffee instead,

and it tastes exactly the same.

Once the mixture has been blended,

the mix is placed in large plastic growing bags,

punched with small holes which the mushrooms will eventually grow through.

Come in here, this is the incubation room.

Wow! Look at this lot!

So, what happens to these bags?

So, once they come in here, it takes them roughly three weeks

for the spawn to grow across the coffee mixture

-and eat it up.

-And it will look like that.

Exactly. At the end of that process, they'll be just like this.

And actually, this one is now ready to take into the fruiting room.

-And that's the next process.

-Exactly.

-Incredible. It is so simple.

This is the fruiting room.

Wow! It's like an alien landscape. It really is.

-It's quite amazing to walk into.

-That's fantastic.

As well as the three different varieties of oyster mushroom,

shiitake mushrooms are cultivated in a mix of coffee granules and sawdust.

So how much do you grow?

So, we grow here...

When this room is full in the middle of summer,

we grow about 75 kilos a week,

that's about 300 kilos a month,

which in quite a small space is an amazing...

It's incredible.

To mimic perfect autumn growing conditions,

the mushrooms are kept out of the sunlight and kept moist.

From planting to harvest, the mushrooms take five weeks to grow.

So, perfect little cluster of pink oysters.

Eric and Adam sell their mushrooms to restaurants and food outlets

across the whole of the South West.

I'm quite impressed, because it is a very small space.

It's a small operation. Yet, you're producing a lot.

Can anyone do this?

Could I convert a room at home and do it?

Yes, once you've learnt how to do it, it's relatively simple to do.

We also have a kit for people that don't want to go to that much trouble

and they can just grow themselves at home.

That sounds like fun. I'd like to try that.

I love the ethos behind this.

Locally sourced and grown.

And reducing waste can only be a good thing.

I can't wait to get this home to start to grow my own mushrooms.

The kids are going to love it.

And with a little care and attention, in two weeks,

I have my first harvest of home-grown mushrooms.

Well, look at that, guys. The perfect autumn treat.

And these mushrooms were grown in the kitchen.

And that was a cheeky face.

Today, Jules is investigating rural crime,

which is costing around £42 million and that figure is rising.

Criminals are targeting everything, from farm machinery

to livestock, to wildlife.

I'm on the front line with Lincolnshire Police,

cracking down on criminal gangs involved in hare coursing.

It's an illegal blood sport where dogs are set to catch wild hares

with bets placed on which dog will make the kill.

It's a rural crime on the rise,

with arrests rising threefold last year alone.

But as Chief Inspector Jim Tyner knows only too well,

they've still got a lot of ground to cover.

Lincolnshire is a beautiful county, but there's 2,600 square miles of it.

A lot of it is flatland, like you see here,

and waterways, and the flatland is what attracts the hare coursers.

When the crops are cut in early autumn,

it's much easier for the gangs to flush out the hares across this open farmland.

We find the hare coursers come from all over the country and in

the last season, we had hare coursers from South Wales,

we had hare coursers from County Durham, from Kent and from Surrey.

And from all points in between.

I think many people will be surprised that people will travel

those sort of distances to pursue their passion for coursing.

I mean, what are the stakes involved for those who do it?

Well, last season, we were getting information about stakes up to £20,000 bets.

Most hare coursers that we come across will have links to other type of crime.

And then associated with hare coursing as well,

if hare coursers feel that they are challenged by landowners,

that can become threatening and intimidating for the farmers.

Andrew Ward is one farmer who's experienced such threatening behaviour.

He now blocks access to his fields with hay bales.

That is a field of drilled oilseed rape there,

we've had vehicles go across there

and it's the tyre tracks and the deep ruts

that they cause and also the plants that they pull up

when they drive across the fields.

And they don't just pull into a field and do a small circle.

They will go across the field and they'll drive 600 yards

all over the place in that field.

Have you ever had any direct contact, Andrew,

with those hare coursing on your land?

Have you ever caught any in the act?

Yes, I have.

I've caught numerous ones in the act but my particular worst case was

probably four years ago, when I actually was run over by one of

the vehicles in the middle of the farm.

It actually injured my leg to the extent

that I had to go and have hospital treatment,

which resulted in requiring an operation on my knee.

Would you tackle hare coursers again if you saw them in person?

I would not hesitate in tackling them again,

because it's just not right.

They are on areas that they shouldn't be, they are trespassing,

they are doing something that's illegal,

and they're interfering with my life and my day and I don't think that's right.

It's clear the police have got a real battle on their hands.

During last season, running from September through to March,

the Lincolnshire force received an average of ten reports of hare coursing

every single day.

I'm back on Operation Galileo,

scouring the countryside with wildlife crime officer Nick Willey.

So, what tricks have you got up your sleeve that can help you identify

those engaged in hare coursing?

We've got ANPR in the vehicle,

those numberplates where vehicles are regular come to light.

Automatic Number Plate Recognition system.

-Yeah.

-So if a vehicle is known to be used by hare coursers and if it's

been spotted before, that will automatically come up if you spot it.

Yeah. Yeah, it gives us a little bit of a heads-up.

And it's not long before a call comes through.

'..On the A16 heading towards Spalding...'

-So, what's happening now?

-Someone has just shouted on the radio

they've spotted a vehicle which he believes is involved with hare coursing.

There is nobody with the vehicle.

There's nobody seen round by the fields.

So...

With little to go on, any help from the locals is gratefully received.

Now, this is where...

-Any hare coursers?

-There was a silver saloon...

-Oh, right.

-Three blokes and a dog in it.

-Excellent.

-Are they up there?

-They went up there,

then they went down towards the A52.

Then we heard the dog barking.

-Right.

-You know that bit that goes towards...

Yeah, that goes towards... Yeah.

-OK, lovely, thanks very much. Thank you.

-Thanks, mate. Well done.

In a labyrinth of country lanes and fields,

keeping on the trail of these criminal gangs can be difficult.

Clear there. Go, go, go.

ANC MT Echo 201, we're at the junction with the A52.

We are now eastbound on the 52.

If you can give us any better location,

-we are looking across the fields now.

-OK, things have just hotted up.

A man and his dog have been spotted hiding in the undergrowth.

At the moment, I'm arresting you on suspicion of trespassing in pursuit of game.

You do not have to say anything, but it may harm your defence if you

do not mention when questioned something which you later rely on in court.

Anything you do say may be given in evidence. Can you give us your hand, please?

He'll be detained for questioning while the police look for evidence.

With neighbouring police forces working together,

the police are making progress, using their powers to seize vehicles

and even dogs in their effort to end this illegal sport.

It's just another day in the rural crime world here in Lincolnshire.

The focus today, of course, has been hare coursing, but there are many

other areas they have to tackle as well.

But today, at least, they've got somewhere towards a result.

Well, now, almost every week,

there's another new headline about the latest superfood.

But could one of our everyday favourites be about to join the hallowed ranks?

Here's Tom.

Over the years,

we've become picky about what we want from our fruit and veg.

We've made apples crisper, sprouts sweeter, beans bigger,

even grapes without seeds.

Science has done a lot to improve the taste,

yield and disease resistance of our crops, but what about growing things

which are actually better for our health?

It's called biofortification.

That means breeding crops to improve their nutritional value.

It's led to the creation of one special vegetable that's taking

the health benefits of eating your greens to a whole new level.

Super broccoli.

Looks pretty much like the normal stuff, but tests are showing

this could reduce your cholesterol.

And it's on course to be the first raw vegetable with European approval

for its claimed health benefits.

There are strict rules to ensure any health or nutritional claim on

a food label is clear, accurate and based on scientific evidence.

This is to prevent consumers being misled.

And this broccoli is really being put through its paces.

They reckon eating around 400g a week, that's about a pound,

could reduce your cholesterol by 6%.

Rigorous human trials are almost complete, so about six weeks ago,

I thought I'd give it a go.

Thomas Heap, please?

First job, a quick cholesterol test at my local GP surgery.

You will feel a sharp scratch, all right?

High cholesterol can increase your risk of heart disease or having

a stroke, so I'm hoping the results aren't too bad.

Your total cholesterol is 6.3,

so that is a little bit higher than we were talking about.

We'd prefer it to be 5 or below.

Not exactly the news I wanted to hear.

My cholesterol level is a little higher than it should be,

so I guess I'm a pretty good candidate for this diet.

A six-week super broccoli diet to see if it makes any difference.

Luckily, I do quite like broccoli.

It's good.

More from my rather unscientific experiment later.

First, I've come to where the real science is done.

I'm at the Institute of Food Research in Norwich

to meet the man behind the broccoli.

In 1984, a young PhD student

called Richard Mithen was studying wild brassicas in Sicily.

He brought one home and wanted to see what would happen when

he crossed it with the broccoli we buy in the shops.

Each time you make that cross,

you're taking a little bit of that wild plant

and putting it in a kind of broccoli background.

Now, we just have maybe three or four genes from that wild plant

in the broccoli.

Was this a GM process to do this?

No, no. This is conventional breeding.

So those three to four genes are enough to do what?

It's actually only one of those genes,

and what that does is it increases a particular naturally occurring

compound, it's called glucoraphanin and it occurs in all broccoli.

But that gene means that instead of having the normal level,

it has about three or four times the level.

And what is that compound doing that's good for my health

and how does that translate, you believe, into lower cholesterol?

Well, the bugs in the gut break that molecule down and we absorb

another compound called sulforaphane.

And when we absorb that, it's a bit like it retunes our body,

it gets all our metabolic processes working better.

If they are working better, we use our fuel more efficiently,

we feel healthier, and things like cholesterol,

which may be rather high, they go down.

-So I'm in the midst of a retune at the moment.

-I think you are.

It'll be interesting to see how are getting on,

and what the outcome of that is.

Professor Mithen says what makes his broccoli so special is that it fits

easily into an ordinary diet.

Put it in the steamer.

'I can put that theory to the test.'

Good, healthy broccoli. Again.

Today, it's broc-amole.

Yep, really.

Doesn't taste too bad.

And it seems to be popular!

My broccoli diary is really just a bit of fun,

but there are official human trials too,

aimed at gathering enough evidence to apply a European health claim.

It'll join foods like cholesterol reducing spreads and yoghurt.

These carry European approved health claims,

but they're all processed foods.

What makes the broccoli different is that it's raw.

A fusion of farming and science has set the ball rolling for

healthier foods straight from the farmer's field.

But has eating enhanced broccoli for six weeks had any impact on my cholesterol?

'Time to find out.'

You've got a little impish grin on there.

-You clearly know something.

-Yes.

Well, it's better than it was.

-Brilliant.

-It's gone down. Gone down from 6.3 to 5.77.

-Quite a reasonable change then.

-Yeah.

'It's gone down by nearly 9%.'

I'm not sure if I have only the broccoli to thank for that,

but I'm pretty chuffed.

Of course, one result from one person doesn't really tell us anything.

Except that it is possible to incorporate a pound of broccoli into your diet every week.

Next, the usually traditional world of horse riding is seeing

something of a new look and it's proving to be quite controversial.

Diana Man is on the case for us.

Come on then.

I've been pony mad all my life,

and as a result, horses have played a massive part in it.

I've ridden competitively for well over 20 years

and recently for Great Britain.

I started off in eventing and now compete in dressage.

More than 200,000 riders compete in dressage each year.

For them, it's about more than just performing well.

Your horse also has to look great.

But now there's something different.

No, not that.

This. Horse tattoos.

I'm not sure glitter tattoos aren't just a fashion fad.

Perhaps one of their creators, Nicole Schneider, can win me over.

-Hi, Nicole.

-Hi, Diana.

-How are you?

-Good. Nice to see you.

Wow! That's amazing, what you're doing.

-Thank you.

-I've never seen anything like it.

No, not very many people have.

No, so how did you first come up with the idea?

It was the brainchild of our art director, Sally, who, I think,

was fiddling around with children's glitter tattoos one day,

and just as a flippant comment said to some friends,

"Well, I guess you could even put these on horses."

And it seems, yes, you can put them on horses.

And here is the result.

These tattoos don't hurt the horse,

but should be washed off after 48 hours to avoid any skin irritation.

And how popular has it proved to be?

Well, a lot more popular than we could ever have imagined.

We've got international teams and flags, corporate logos,

it's eye-catching, it's got very, very popular very quickly.

Now, I'm used to making sure my horse is well turned out,

but are glitter tattoos a step too far?

Hannah Henderson doesn't think so.

She's part of the Irish polo team.

For the last two years,

she's been decorating her pony's hindquarters for polo matches.

-Hi there.

-Hi.

-Nice to meet you.

-And you.

This is really impressive, what we are seeing out here.

Just tell me a little bit what these ponies are doing.

This is young horse chukkers,

the end of our main summer polo season.

The professionals now would have the opportunity,

while the ground is dry and we have this fabulous autumn weather,

to give the young horses a runaround,

and educate them in what we might expect of them next season.

A lot of preparation goes into making sure those horses look well

and are well cared for, that they are clean

and washed for each game and made to look very smart.

But I can see with these ones, you've gone one step further.

What is it with these tattoos you've got on them?

So, this is a new thing

that I've been introduced to two years ago.

Sponsors have enjoyed putting their logos on the horses,

through to the international circuit where the Irish team have enjoyed

seeing their flags flying high in Germany,

and we took them to snow polo.

So it kind of brings the team together,

it also helps them stand out on the pitch, amongst the other players.

So, what sort of feedback have you had about them?

Reporters have asked about the product and

individuals on the side of the pitch have asked about them,

a little girl might say, "Mummy, I want that on my pony."

So it's great all round.

This might seem bonkers, but adornment of horses isn't new.

For centuries, horses at ceremonial events have been dressed up to the nines.

Are you going to show me how to do one of these then?

-Yeah.

-OK, are we going over that side?

We're going to pick this pony over here.

Last year, a national equestrian survey revealed a drop in rider numbers.

A downturn that's also been noted by Sport England.

It is all on, girls? Is it stacked everywhere?

I think we've missed its nose as well, don't miss the nose.

So, could the chance of creating your own fairy tale pony

get youngsters into riding again?

So, what colour are we going to do this?

We are going to do silver on the tail.

Silver on the tail?

-It's going to be a bit of a rainbow pony, eh?

-Yeah.

Shall I do a little bit of that one?

-Attention to the artistic directors here!

-Yes.

-Well, that looks pretty good to me.

-Now, I'll peel it off.

No, not that end!

You have to do it right.

You have to do it in the direction...

Both of you do it together, please.

-There you go.

-Wow!

Good job, girls.

Look at that.

Well done. Now, shall we give the pony a name?

-Glittery.

-Glittery.

I think I'm a little bit taken by them now.

I normally keep all my stuff rather plain,

but I can maybe see it on my horse's quarters.

I don't know what the judge would think, though.

Well, I have to say,

I wasn't convinced about the whole idea of glitter tattoos

on ponies, but having been here and seen them for myself,

I can see they're loads of fun and I can see exactly why the girls

enjoy them and they use them for the polo team.

Only time will tell

whether we're going to see them more in the equine world.

Now, with the nights drawing in and Halloween almost upon us,

I went to the Usk Valley in Wales

in search of one little mammal that only comes out at night.

Hidden deep in these woods

is the biggest roost of lesser horseshoe bats

anywhere in Western Europe.

A team of guardians is pushing at the boundaries to protect them,

and I've been invited to the secret location of this roost

to find out how they're making a big difference

to the lives of these tiny mammals.

Weighing as little as 5g,

this is one of the smallest bats in Europe.

It's named after its horseshoe shaped nose,

which it uses to amplify its calls.

These bats feed under the shelter of tree tops and fly along hedgerows,

feasting on midges and other small insects.

Because we've been grubbing up hedgerows at an alarming rate,

the species is in trouble, except here in South Wales,

where its habitat has largely survived.

19th-century stone buildings with slate roofs

are the favourite roosting spot for these bats,

so this place is ideal for them,

and there is no less than 900 living on the top floor,

and what makes it even more special is that this is a maternity unit.

More lesser horseshoe bats are born in this disused building

than in any other roost in the country.

The Vincent Wildlife Trust, which keeps guard here,

aims to encourage even more.

Henry Schofield is the trust's bat expert.

Why are these bats so very particular about where they live?

Well, historically, they used to roost in caves all year round.

But they've actually adopted human structures

that mimic those original roosts.

And they've moved in here in large numbers.

The team has converted this building into a top spec bat roost.

Reroofed with new windows and special entrances,

the bats shelter safely here.

And at what stage are they now?

Well, they are a few months old now, so they're flying.

They're practically the same size as the adults.

And they'll be out foraging,

probably still following the mothers in some cases,

to foraging areas and learning the terrain around here.

At twilight, they'll emerge.

So, under the watchful eye of Henry,

we are setting up our night-vision cameras.

I'll be coming back later, hoping to catch a glimpse.

But while it's still light,

I'm going to check out another project the trust is taking on,

an unexpected landmark that's here

because the valley has always been a gateway to Wales.

It's hard to make it out,

but this was actually a Second World War pillbox,

now heavily camouflaged by decades of vegetation,

but it's one of several that were built along the River Usk

to defend against invasion.

Now though, it would make a very nice piece of real estate for bats.

Right. Into the darkness.

'Project officer Jane Sedgley is sizing it up.'

This is like a man-made cave, isn't it?

Well, it is. It's as close to a cave as you can get, I think.

Is there any sign that bats have been in here, do you think?

Well, the most obvious thing to look for is droppings.

Anything around here?

I'm not sure what a bat dropping looks like.

A little bit like a mouse dropping, that sort of thing.

-Very small.

-Oh!

-Yeah. That's one there. Look at that.

-Oh, yeah.

What sort of bat do you reckon left that?

-It's the lesser horseshoe.

-OK.

It's like a string of sausages divided in the middle,

so very distinctive.

Very descriptive!

So, what can you do to make it more attractive for bats?

Well, there's lots of windows here,

so I think we'll block some of them up,

because it could be very draughty.

-They don't like a draught.

-Absolutely not.

They are looking for somewhere nice and cosy to come and hang up in the night,

digest their food, have a bit of a groom and a rest,

and then off out again.

As the light fades, the bats over at the maternity roost are stirring.

Our night-vision kit is set

and Henry can tell just when they'll be ready to leave.

As you can hear, there is some activity in there already.

This is a bat detector.

This is picking up the bats' echolocation calls,

and turning them into a sound we can hear.

Because obviously, it is well above our hearing.

The bats have obviously woken up and they're flying around in there.

So I think in the next five or ten minutes,

we'll see the first bats coming out.

I'm very excited by this.

You must have seen a hundred times. A thousand times maybe.

But I've never seen it.

It always excites me, but we've had two going out already.

Oh, yes.

And back in again.

And back in again.

Soon, night has fallen and the whole roost is taking to the sky.

(They're so quick.)

Do we need a licence to be so close?

You need a licence to go in the roost and to handle the bats,

but we are sat out here, away from the roost,

and the cameras we're using are all using infrared.

It is all set up remotely.

We're not causing them any disturbance.

-So it's quite all right to be doing what we're doing.

-Yes.

There's another one.

How far will they travel?

Well, usually, they stay within about 2km of the roost,

but we've radio tracked these bats and some of them go up to

6km, which is quite a distance for a small animal.

And they'll be back in the roost after a couple of hours?

Yeah. At this time of the year, yes.

In the middle of the summer, they'll stay out all night.

Will the pups come back here to have their babies?

Yes, they will. That's why these roosts build up.

This maternity colony is made up of mothers and daughters and sisters

and aunts and nieces, so they are all interrelated.

'Before long, the last of this huge bat family is heading out to feed.

'Tonight's bat watch has come to an end.'

So now, the night sky is once again bat territory.

And it's good to know that in this corner of the UK at least,

this small, incredibly vulnerable little creature is doing well,

and keeping down the midges.

And that's all we have time for today,

but I do hope you can join us again at the same time tomorrow,

when Margherita finds out how man's best friend could help with your child's reading.

A dog never interrupts and he never corrects.

Whenever I get snuggled up with him, he makes me concentrate.

Paul gets to grips with a sensitive ram.

It should be about 30-40 centimetres.

I'll take your word for that. I don't have a tape.

And I'll be discovering why autumn is the season of the spider.

Until the same time tomorrow, bye-bye.