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00:01You know, sometimes, Yolo, I think wildlife gets the right idea.
00:05Do you know what, Chris? You're right.
00:07Nothing like being able to sit back, relax and enjoy a snack.
00:12Putting your feet up.
00:14Cosy. Cosy and content.
00:17Oh, I could see you all day.
00:19But, you know, guys, we can't. We've got to spring into action.
00:22It's our final show.
00:24Welcome to Winterwatch.
00:47Hello. Hello and welcome to Winterwatch 2026.
00:52Coming to you live from the National Trust at Mount Stewart Estate
00:56here on the banks of Strangford Lock.
00:58In case you're wondering where we are for just one more hour,
01:02here we are.
01:03As I say, we're on the east side of Strangford Lock.
01:06But this is, sadly, our last programme in the series.
01:10But don't worry, we've got plenty of good stuff coming up.
01:11We've got a remarkable animal, rare and beautiful.
01:14Yes.
01:15A giant skate and lots of new science about it as well.
01:19That's all coming up. We've been here for four days.
01:22We've had our live cameras out.
01:23Let's go straight to them now because look in the middle.
01:27Oh, we've got a badger.
01:28In fact, two of them.
01:29Two of the cameras we've got action on.
01:31It's the badgers.
01:33Honestly, these badgers have really provided for us, haven't they?
01:36Yeah, they should have.
01:37I mean, not only are we seeing it live now, that's a beautiful shot,
01:40but in fact, just before the show, all three of us have been sitting back
01:44and really enjoying some badger action.
01:48These are the young ones, probably last year's Cubs,
01:51and they are active.
01:53How long do you reckon they've been out for?
01:55Well, they've been out since not long after dark, I would imagine.
01:58But apparently they do this every night.
02:00They come out, they play for a bit, then they go off and feed.
02:02It's great, isn't it?
02:04I mean, they're really going for each other.
02:06They're very friendly.
02:08And, yeah, we've been seeing a lot of action on that camera.
02:12We've also been seeing a lot of action on the squirrel camera.
02:15We saw it right at the beginning of the show.
02:17I love these squirrels.
02:19There's no grey squirrels here at Mount Stewart,
02:21so these red squirrels absolutely thrive.
02:25They are being fed, and so this is my best.
02:28When they go in that box, it's just brilliant, isn't it?
02:31Making the most of all that food,
02:33it's really important at this time of year
02:35because they might start having their first litter in February,
02:38so really important for the females especially.
02:41But they look so well, don't they?
02:43They look like they're really filled out.
02:45Yeah, great to see.
02:47Really enjoyed those red squirrels.
02:49Well, from mammals to birds,
02:51and this weekend sees the RSVB's Big Garden Birdwatch,
02:55and they want you to get involved.
02:58Now, last year, an incredible 590,000 people took part,
03:03counting 9.1 million birds.
03:07Top bird, which was a top bird, Michaela, Chris?
03:09Number one?
03:10Tree sparrow.
03:11No, house sparrow.
03:12House sparrow.
03:13It wouldn't be the tree sparrow, would it?
03:14The house sparrow.
03:15Well, there we are.
03:15Look, the humble house sparrow was number one.
03:17And it's easy, it's easy.
03:19Try and get the whole family involved,
03:21especially the youngsters.
03:23Just one hour of your time this weekend.
03:26And if you want to know where to send for more information,
03:30well, visit our website.
03:31All the details are on there.
03:33Chris, will you be doing it?
03:35Because I'll be at home, right?
03:36Get home Saturday night.
03:37I'll be at home Sunday morning.
03:39Sunday.
03:39I'll be there.
03:40Victoria sponge.
03:41Victoria sponge.
03:42Vegan hot chocolate for me.
03:43Poised at the window with the binos.
03:44I'll tell you what, I'll WhatsApp you
03:46and tell you the birds I've got,
03:47because obviously I'm one nil down, so...
03:50OK, we'll have a second bird off.
03:52Second bird off on Sunday.
03:53OK, there we are.
03:54Are you two going to be competitive?
03:56Yeah.
03:56I'll tell you what,
03:57you'd be chuffed if you looked out your window and saw this,
04:00because this is what William Bird,
04:03great name for a bird watcher,
04:05saw in his garden in Aberdeenshire,
04:07this little blutit using this icicle to drink from.
04:12It's absolutely charming.
04:14I mean, you'd just sit there and watch it for hours,
04:17wouldn't you?
04:17Charming, delightful.
04:19Delightful, I think it is.
04:20Delightful, I would say.
04:21As is this.
04:22Look, Liz Vinson has been artistically responding
04:26to the squirrels on our feeder.
04:27She's produced this beautiful set of sketches here,
04:30really well observed.
04:31And as you see, she progresses down here
04:33till it's a little bit more finished,
04:35because she was working her way towards
04:37an altogether more finished picture,
04:38which you can see here.
04:39Look at this.
04:40Isn't that fantastic?
04:42Superb.
04:43Absolutely superb.
04:44And Michaela has told me that she's very keen to have a tattoo of that on her bottom.
04:51You'll never get to see it, but you'll know where it is.
04:55As an amateur tattooist, I'll volunteer, right?
04:58I reckon I can replicate that easy enough.
05:02Now, we've had our long lens camera operator,
05:06Mark Yates, out and about with his thermal camera.
05:08And tonight, once again, he's on the move.
05:11Has he got anything for us?
05:13Oh, look at him.
05:14He's actually literally on the move.
05:16That camera is just pointing out of his vehicle
05:19as he drives to his location.
05:21But we will be joining him later on,
05:24and he'll be bringing us, hopefully, some more live animals.
05:26Because we have done well at night with some of our mammals here.
05:30Pine Martins galore.
05:31Look at that one.
05:32A leap up the tree, into the squirrel feeder there.
05:35I love the big bushy tails they've got.
05:37They use that for balance, of course.
05:40Omnivore, so it's there, gorging itself on the food
05:43that's put out for the squirrels here.
05:45Down he goes, and off again.
05:47And look at this badger.
05:48Look at the nose on that badger.
05:50Look at it, bending up.
05:52It's nibbling away at the rotten logs.
05:55They're probably looking for beetle grubs, I would imagine.
05:58They love beetle grubs.
05:59It can smell it.
06:01Look, it knows it's in there.
06:02Come on.
06:03Rip that wood and get out of there.
06:06Amazing, isn't it?
06:07Just, and of course their sense of smell is absolutely superb.
06:11It's sprouting around in the bottom of that rotten log.
06:15Again, probably, Chris, I would imagine, looking for invertebrates.
06:18Yeah.
06:19Earthworms, wood lice, centipedes.
06:21It will have all of those, won't it?
06:22As you say, their sense of smell is unparalleled.
06:23Amazing.
06:24Fabulous, squishy nose there, wasn't it?
06:26Oh, no.
06:27I got one of those.
06:28Look, they spoke five times playing rugby.
06:31It did.
06:32It did.
06:33Way too much rugby.
06:33I could be a badger.
06:34There we are.
06:35Let me just put it back.
06:36There we go.
06:37Oh, no.
06:37That's got it.
06:38Anyway, two fabulous mustelies.
06:39You've got your badger and your pine, Martin.
06:41Do you want a third one?
06:42Yes.
06:42I'd throw in a third one because it's our final show.
06:45How about a stoat?
06:46Well, why don't you sit back and enjoy the winter survival story of a stoat in Yorkshire.
07:00The Yorkshire Wolds, the most northern chalk hills in Great Britain, where the landscape
07:07is exposed to wind, rain and shine.
07:18This is Bandita, a stoat whose name is Spanish for female bandit.
07:25Her homestead is wildlife artist Robert Fuller's farm, which he's made into a perfect habitat
07:32for these foot-long mustelids.
07:35And Bandita is by no means the only stoat around.
07:39They love it here.
07:44Hunting is often an ambush that relies on precision timing.
07:51Sometimes they miss their mark.
07:55But others are a perfect hit, with rodents and even small rabbits being targeted by stoats.
08:06There's fierce competition for food, not just amongst the mustelids, but with the local birds
08:12of prey, which share much of the same menu.
08:16Barn owls and a pair of kestrels are regular visitors to the farm.
08:22They also have a taste for small mammals.
08:27So, with so much competition, it pays to have a trick up your sleeve.
08:33And Bandita has a great one.
08:35One day...
08:41One day...
08:42Prompted by the shortening days, she begins her transformation.
08:48One day...
08:51Her muzzle then her tail molts from brown to snowy white, apart from the black tip.
09:05As winter sets in, the paws are next, followed by the legs and then the ears.
09:14Over the next few weeks, her back becomes more and more mottled, until finally, just in
09:21time for the heaviest dump of snow, Bandita is ready, camouflaged for the season.
09:37With snow on the walls, times are tough.
09:45Not only are the small rodents hard to come by, most of the stoats here haven't changed
09:50colour.
09:51They're still sporting their brown coats and easily spotted on the crisp white ground.
10:04Bandita was born with a gift, inherited jeans, giving her this special ability.
10:16And now, it could give her the edge in an audacious ambush.
10:26Bandita would usually give the barn owls a wide berth, but the temptation of food and her
10:33ability to melt into the landscape gives her confidence.
10:43It's a perfectly executed showdown.
10:56Bandita lives up to her reputation.
11:00And Bandita lives up to her reputation, thief by name, thief by nature.
11:07Meanwhile, her brown-coated rivals are seeing a drop in their strike rate.
11:14But it's temporary.
11:18In the UK, even in the Yorkshire walls, one thing is certain, snow doesn't hang around
11:25for long.
11:27Soon, the tables are turned, and it's Bandita that sticks out against the landscape.
11:36Just as well, then, that as winter loosens its grip and the days begin to lengthen, she begins
11:43to change back to brown.
11:46She'll soon be back on top, just in time for spring.
11:54Absolutely beautiful.
11:55I've got to confess, I've never seen a stoat in Ehrman.
11:58It's always been one of those bogey things for me.
12:00Well, very elusive creature.
12:02And so you've got to go somewhere cold these days, of course.
12:04I'll tell you what's not elusive right now are the badgers.
12:06They're back on our cameras, and they are being very active.
12:10I think, look, that looks like, is that fighting or is that still playing?
12:16Hold on.
12:17It's getting a little bit aggressive, isn't it?
12:19No, no, no, that's full-on fighting.
12:21So are those still the young ones, Chris, do you reckon?
12:24It's quite difficult to get...
12:25But this is in the area where they've been coming to feed, isn't it?
12:27So they're fighting over that resource.
12:29So that doesn't necessarily mean they've come from, obviously, a different social group.
12:32They could be two from the same that have, frankly, run out of patience when it comes to sharing the
12:37food.
12:40Give us a chance. Come on out.
12:43Now they're so wet, it's hard to tell.
12:47And we can't actually hear them right now as well.
12:50Yeah.
12:51But, wow, amazing to see that.
12:53And, obviously, we will be checking in with those live cameras regularly to see how that develops.
12:58We should say, Nick, that, to be quite honest, badgers are so tough.
13:01Their skin is so thick and they're so muscular that, although they do have these incredibly vicious and noisy fights,
13:09it's quite unusual for them to seriously injure one another.
13:13They do look young, though, don't they? They do.
13:15Yeah. The youngsters.
13:16And you see there that one had hold of the other one's ear.
13:19Well, very often, that tears the ear.
13:21They do damage each other's ears, and you'll sometimes see scars on the face,
13:25and that can be useful if you're trying to identify them.
13:27Not useful for the badger, of course.
13:28Squirrels, it looks.
13:30But useful from that point of view.
13:32Well, we weren't expecting to see that at the beginning of the show,
13:35but, as I say, we'll keep our eyes on those live cameras to see how that develops.
13:39Now, a couple of nights ago, we were showing you the wonderful marine life
13:43underneath the waves of Strandford Lock.
13:45And tonight, we're going to go deeper, not to the depths, but into the history.
13:50Because decades ago, Strandford Lock was home to this extraordinary animal.
13:56Now, this is a flapper skate, and it's the largest skate in the world.
14:01And it historically used to be seen regularly in Strandford Lock.
14:06In fact, it was famous for it.
14:08But it was a popular sport fish, and in the 60s and 70s, numbers declined.
14:13And very sadly, by the 80s, it was gone from the lock.
14:17And it was a very similar story throughout the Irish Sea.
14:21It's now classified as critically endangered,
14:24and only really found here in the UK along the west coast of Scotland
14:28and the west coast of Ireland.
14:30And we're getting these fabulous shots of it here,
14:32because they're doing scientific studies on it.
14:35And look, it even means we get a shot of it underneath.
14:38You can see its eyes and its mouth.
14:40But let's just have a look at the size, because, as I say,
14:42they're the largest of all the skates.
14:45This is actually a replica of one, but they get even bigger than this.
14:50They can get to 2.5 metres long and 2 metres across.
14:56And then they've got...
14:562 metres across. I mean, that's double the size of this.
14:58I mean, they're enormous, aren't they?
15:00And they have this distinctive tail as well, this thick tail,
15:04which is definitely distinguishable from the thinner tail
15:07of the rays that you get.
15:09The other thing that is different between the two
15:11is rays give birth to live young,
15:13and these skates will produce an egg case like this.
15:17And it's a pretty big egg case.
15:20They're known as mermaids' purses.
15:22And inside there, you'll get a yolk,
15:25and it'll take about 18 months for the young skate to develop and hatch.
15:30So that's a pretty long time to develop, isn't it?
15:33To be safe on the seabed,
15:34because they're tangled up in typically marine algae.
15:37And to not be disturbed by fishing practices for 18 months
15:41is one of the reasons why they're struggling to keep...
15:43And they don't become sexually mature for over...
15:45Well, over 20 years before they become sexually mature.
15:4820 years.
15:48So they take a long time to recover
15:51if their numbers decline like they have.
15:54Yeah, a fragile species.
15:55It's got to wait for 20 years,
15:56and then you produce an egg that's got to lay on the seabed
15:58for 18 months before it hatches.
15:59In the modern world, that's a tough ask.
16:01But they are a remarkable creature.
16:03Mick, I'm going to spin this round
16:04and show the underside of the skate.
16:07It's great, isn't it?
16:08I mean, you can see the eyes and the mouth here
16:10and the gills as well.
16:11Fantastic, isn't it?
16:12But I want to draw your attention to these spots,
16:13because these are representing an extraordinary organ.
16:17It's called the Organ of Lorenzini.
16:20And these were discovered no less than in 1678,
16:24a long, long time ago, by Stefano Lorenzini,
16:28who was an Italian scientist.
16:29But we didn't know what they were about for 300 years.
16:32Thankfully, in the 1960s, we found out, and I can explain here.
16:35So each of those dots, and that was just a few,
16:38because there are hundreds of thousands of these organs on the skate,
16:41are a tiny little pore in the skin.
16:44So here you can see the spots on the surface.
16:46And here is the skin.
16:47So this is looking up through the animal,
16:49as if we'd taken a slice through it here.
16:52And this organ that runs up here,
16:54these are those pores, the organs of Lorenzini.
16:57And if you look over here, you can see that if we split those in half,
17:01so you can see inside, they're filled with a jelly-like substance,
17:04which is highly conductive.
17:06You've got to think of it as a wire leading in to the body of the skate,
17:11because these are electro-receptors, electro-receptors.
17:16They can detect electric fields,
17:18electric fields that are incredibly small.
17:22Now, the figures are mind-boggling.
17:24Frankly, it's five nanovolts per centimetre.
17:29So over the distance of a centimetre,
17:31these organs can detect five nanovolts.
17:34Now, I don't know about you, but a nanovolt doesn't mean much to me.
17:37So it's five-billionths of a volt.
17:41That's an incredibly low electric field.
17:44But lots of animals produce these electric fields,
17:47and what this means is that the skate can detect its prey
17:51in complete darkness and find it down there on the seabed.
17:56Now, the other thing that we've discovered more recently
17:58is that they have very similar organs,
18:00slightly different in their structure,
18:01and they're in the tail of the skate.
18:03And using these, they're producing pulses,
18:06very low, again, very low pulses of electricity,
18:09which we think that they are doing to communicate with one another.
18:14Researchers at Queen's University are interested
18:17in getting to grips with this aspect of it.
18:20So they built this.
18:21This is what they call their ray-gon device.
18:24Sounds like something from a Cold War novel, doesn't it?
18:27But it isn't.
18:28What it is, if I pop it off, top off here.
18:31So these are equivalents to the organs of Lorenzini here.
18:35And basically, if I take the top off,
18:37let's gently take that out, put that over here.
18:41We've got the equipment in here.
18:45And what this is doing is picking up the electrical pulses,
18:49which are being produced by the rays in the water,
18:53comes in here to this electrical circuitry.
18:56And their objective is to really try and learn
18:59how these fish are communicating with one another.
19:02Because if we can learn that and know more about them,
19:03we'll be in a better place to conserve them.
19:05Now, obviously, trying to see a tiny electrical pulse
19:08is quite difficult.
19:08But what they've done is put the acoustic equivalent,
19:12a bit like a bat detector.
19:13You know when you're using a bat detector,
19:15it produces sounds which are audible to our ears.
19:17They're not actually the sounds of the bats.
19:19Well, this is the same.
19:19Listen to this.
19:24So this is an acoustic version
19:28of those extremely small electrical pulses
19:31that are being put out by the ray.
19:34And they're calling it, wait for it, skate jazz.
19:39Skate jazz.
19:40Because as you can see, there's no rhythm to it.
19:43That's what they discovered.
19:44There's no rhythm to it.
19:45And they're thinking that skate jazz might be actually useful
19:49when it comes to communicating to these fish.
19:51If they can transcribe that into something
19:53which may be attracting the rays,
19:56or may be repulsing the rays,
19:58then we could move them out of areas
19:59where there's conflict with human interest
20:01and hopefully help preserve their population.
20:04The ray-gone device, skate jazz.
20:08That's what you pay your licence fee for.
20:10It's brilliant, isn't it?
20:12I mean, skate jazz and flapper skate.
20:14I thought suddenly I was in some sort
20:16of ice dance competition there.
20:17No, but I love the fact that it's so niche as well,
20:20that scientists have decided that that's the project
20:23that they're going to study.
20:24Beautiful thing, isn't it?
20:24Fish singing using tiny, tiny little electrical pulses
20:28in the water.
20:29What a wonderful world.
20:30I mean, frankly, folks, what a wonderful world.
20:33And the more we learn, obviously,
20:35the more these fantastic skates can be protected.
20:39Well done to the scientists that have started that.
20:42It's absolutely brilliant.
20:43It is brilliant.
20:45You like that, don't you?
20:45You're going to take that off.
20:46I really, really love that, yeah.
20:49Right, OK.
20:51Well, from one fish to something that eats the fish, otters.
20:55Hannah Stiffel's been out.
20:56She went to a place where she was pretty much guaranteed
20:58to see otters.
20:59The question is, when you're pretty much guaranteed,
21:01do they deliver?
21:14Morning, swans.
21:15How are we?
21:19I'm in Antrim, and I've had some local intel
21:22that along the six-mile water towpath,
21:25I'm guaranteed to see one of my favourite mammals, the otter.
21:33Otters are famously secretive and tricky to find,
21:36but the fact that they're turning up here regularly in this urban park
21:40has become quite the local talking point.
21:43And apparently, they're even unfazed by the local park run,
21:47which stands me in good stead for catching a glimpse of one.
21:52All right.
21:56There's just one small problem.
21:59Because of all this rain we've had,
22:00the river is a lot higher and faster flowing,
22:03which is not the ideal conditions for otter spotting.
22:09But I've come armed with optimism and patience.
22:17Otters are formidable hunters.
22:19Fish make up around 80% of their diet.
22:22But they'll also predate amphibians, crustaceans,
22:26and on land, even small mammals and bird eggs.
22:30There's no sign of the otters yet.
22:33But Northern Ireland is a stronghold for them.
22:41There's one otter swearing up towards me.
22:58There's two of them.
23:02Oh, amazing.
23:05I think there were two otters just rolling around in the water walls
23:09one and another.
23:09It looked like they had some fish in their mouths.
23:22They've gone back underneath now.
23:24I don't know if they're coming this way or that way.
23:33A kingfisher has just flown into the other side of the riverbank.
23:46I don't know what to do with myself.
23:47There are two otters down there.
23:49There's a kingfisher over there.
23:50This is brilliant.
23:53What is this place?
23:55It's like Narnia.
23:59So we know this one is a male because he's got an all-black beak,
24:03whereas a female would have some orange.
24:10And just like that, both species disappeared out of my view.
24:15But then I was treated to a whole cast of characters.
24:24What a morning.
24:26What a morning.
24:37Kingfishers.
24:38Otters.
24:38In the same place.
24:39At the same time.
24:41Hannah got lucky.
24:41Well done.
24:42Top work.
24:43Top work.
24:43That was brilliant.
24:44But I did only manage to get a glimpse as the water along that river
24:48at the minute is so high because of all the weather we've been having.
24:51And usually, those otters, they're quite showy.
24:55And here's the proof, because this was sent in to us by Linda Thompson.
25:00Now, Linda took this on her phone.
25:03No way.
25:04Yeah.
25:05Same otters along that river.
25:06And you can see how habituated they are.
25:09And I tell you what, guys, that morning when we were down there filming,
25:12it was full of walkers, dogs, cyclists, joggers, and the otters.
25:17They just weren't phased at all.
25:19But I think you did well.
25:20You did well, Hannah.
25:21At least you saw them and you weren't given an awful lot of time.
25:24But listen, Hannah is the queen of our socials
25:27and you're constantly checking the Facebook, the Instagram, the X,
25:31all of the socials to see what's coming in.
25:34And people send such great stuff into us, don't they?
25:37I tell you what, in my opinion, I think that our Winter Watch and Spring Watch audience,
25:43they're one of the best in at telly.
25:45I mean, we couldn't do what we do without all of you at home,
25:48especially on the digital channel sending us in all of their photos,
25:52their videos, their questions.
25:53And what's really good about it is that we get to see all of the stuff that they send in
25:57and then we get to discuss it.
25:59It gives us a really good picture of what's happening all over the UK, doesn't it?
26:03It really does feel like it's an inclusive family.
26:07One big, happy family.
26:09And I tell you what, some of our audience have even got otters in their garden.
26:14Hope Nolan sent us this from Leicestershire.
26:17Lying in bed at 11pm one night, cameras triggered, look down into the pond
26:23and you can see, as Hannah said, there's an otter in the pond,
26:28a little pond in the back garden.
26:29I mean, that is striking gold, isn't it?
26:31Anyway, having had a view like that, she got herself a trap camera
26:35and put it down on the side of the pond to see if the otters would come back.
26:38Wow.
26:39It's a takeaway, isn't it, for an otter, a tiny pond like that?
26:42A perfect place to look for all sorts of food.
26:44But it wasn't one otter that turned up, but two.
26:47And because they're pretty much similar in size
26:50and because of their habits, we know, therefore, that that's a female otter
26:53with a cub that's probably about a year old,
26:56just about on the brink of becoming independent.
26:59Last lessons on fishing in a very tiny pool.
27:03It's fantastic stuff, isn't it?
27:04Well, of course, they will think that that pond will naturally be restocked with fish,
27:09but they'll also be feeding on invertebrates in there like dragonfly larvae
27:13and possibly frogs resting at the bottom.
27:16Yeah.
27:16But I hope they probably won't be there every single night, will they?
27:19I mean, it's like us going to the takeaway.
27:22They'll stay there for a couple of nights and then they'll move on.
27:25Get further afield.
27:26I mean, I personally don't stay in the takeaway for a couple of nights.
27:30I don't know about you, Bruce.
27:31Well, no, never, no.
27:33But you know what I love about that is, you know, we so often say to people when we're asked,
27:38what can we do to help wildlife in our garden?
27:40We say, build a pond.
27:41And that just shows.
27:42You build a pond and they will come.
27:45I mean, it was a small pond and you've got two otters in it.
27:48What a surprise you'd have if you look out your window and saw that.
27:51You'd also have a surprise if you looked out your window into your garden
27:54and saw this, a woodcock, Christian Paulson in Lincolnshire.
27:59It's unusual to see a woodcock in your garden, unusual to see it in the day
28:03because they're nocturnal.
28:05So that would definitely be a big tick.
28:07Very good.
28:08It's not just woodcock, though, is it?
28:11No.
28:12Somebody's got a snipe in their back garden.
28:15Oh, that photograph is incredible.
28:17And I'll tell you why.
28:18Because snipe, they're usually associated with wetlands and marshland, aren't they?
28:22But here, they've gone into somebody's back garden in the snow.
28:26How about that?
28:27It makes it easier to see them, though, doesn't it?
28:29A lot less camouflage.
28:31I mean, out in a grassy field, spotting a snipe can be quite hard work.
28:34Yeah, it can.
28:34But you get a really good view of that cryptic colouration there.
28:37And they'll be in the back garden.
28:38They eat invertebrates.
28:40So they'll be probing around looking for snacks.
28:42How about that?
28:43This is one of the favourite things of mine that's been sent in recently
28:46because look at this.
28:48It's wrens.
28:49Wrens.
28:50And not just one, not just two, not just three.
28:55In fact, six of them, eight of them, came into this nest and snuggled up in winter.
29:02And do you know the record is 61 wrens have been counted in a nest in Norfolk.
29:09I've got to say, that was way back in 1969.
29:1261?
29:12That sort of thing doesn't happen anymore.
29:141969.
29:15That was the sort of spirit of the times, wasn't it?
29:16Yeah, it was.
29:17It was.
29:18Woodstock.
29:19Yeah, Woodstock.
29:20They all snuggled up.
29:21Bob Dylan.
29:2260 wrens in a box.
29:23It's a great way to keep warm.
29:26And can I tell you, it's really, it's been windy here all week.
29:29So come on, Hannah.
29:30It is a bit windy.
29:30Let's all snuggle.
29:31Because you know how much Chris loves to snuggle.
29:33Come on, isn't that lovely?
29:35We're all snuggling up.
29:36Are you enjoying that, Chris?
29:37He's been dreading this all day.
29:39He really has, hasn't he?
29:41Yeah.
29:42I'm not in my social space.
29:45Now, we've got one more clip to show you.
29:47This is incredible.
29:48This has come in by Robin Cooper.
29:50And he took this on a trip to Loch Duick in Scotland.
29:54Captured this in the back garden.
29:55Look, there's a red deer there.
29:56But look in the corner, there's a pine marten as well.
29:59Eating the supplementary food put out on the table.
30:01But wait for it, as it is absolute mammal mayhem.
30:06There's one badger there that comes up on the table,
30:09cleverly edited in there.
30:11I'll assure you.
30:12Yeah.
30:13It is real.
30:14And then three badgers.
30:16Do you know what I love about all of this, though,
30:18is that people are putting these cameras up
30:20and really enjoying the wildlife in their back garden.
30:23It's brilliant.
30:24I want to know where that place is.
30:26I want to go there on holidays.
30:27Have your little picnic, yeah.
30:28Keep sending them in to all of our socials
30:30because then Hannah's got a lot of homework to do
30:33and she can look through them all.
30:33I will.
30:34They keep me busy.
30:35With all of that mammal mania going on there,
30:38we can now go over to Lira Valencia.
30:41She fancied a bit of mammal mania of her own,
30:43so she headed off to the island of Mull
30:45to see how many different species she could see in just one day.
30:54I'm Lira Valencia and I'm a UK wildlife champion
30:58and social media influencer.
30:59Born and raised in South London.
31:03I have been talking about spreading my wings for a while now.
31:06Getting out of London, exploring something new
31:08and I have news.
31:10I'm doing it.
31:11I am going somewhere completely different to London.
31:15Somewhere that is wild.
31:17It's remote.
31:19I am going to Mull.
31:22It's an island over 500 miles away from here on the west coast of Scotland
31:27and it's packed full of wildlife.
31:33I don't know if you can tell, but I'm pretty excited.
31:38Platform, platform, platform.
31:39What platform?
31:40Platform one.
31:40Okay, Glasgow.
31:41Let's go, let's go.
31:43So I'm catching the train to Glasgow.
31:48Meeting the crew.
31:51So we're going to go to open now.
31:52And after a quick sleep stop, catching the first ferry to be on the island for sunrise,
31:59to start my mission to see how many species I can spot in a day in the wilderness.
32:10The sun is just rising and me and Tom are heading to a good spot to see red deer.
32:17Malt is home to over 6,000 red deer.
32:19That's more red deer than people, by the way, here.
32:22Crazy.
32:24Okay.
32:26At this time of year, the deer make their way down from the higher areas
32:30towards the coast in search of food.
32:33So the deer here, they've just come out of breeding season or rutting season
32:36and the males have used a lot of energy to impress females and to mate.
32:41And it's not just the males that are feeling the struggle,
32:44it's also the females as hopefully they'll be gestating or carrying young.
32:53Wow.
32:54So we've just seen the kestrel fly over in the distance.
32:57There's two hen harriers going up and up and up, circling each other.
33:04Oh my goodness.
33:07Look at that.
33:09Just spotted from a peripheral, a golden eagle.
33:14Wow.
33:17So this is one of the two species of eagles that you can see on mole.
33:21And in fact, mole is known as the eagle island because you can see them pretty well here.
33:29While I was looking for mammals, you know, you have to look up sometimes
33:32and you see spectacular things.
33:35The list is growing.
33:37I'm trying to focus on deer, but I'm getting distracted.
33:39There are so many birds that I haven't seen.
33:41So look for the deer.
33:42Look for the deer.
33:47Hooded crow.
33:49I love a hooded crow.
33:50We don't get those in London.
33:55We've just spotted six red deer.
33:59And they're there sitting low, quite quietly, calmly, conserving that energy.
34:05You can see their red coat.
34:07It's super thick and has special hairs which are hollow, which traps air and gives them the extra bit of
34:12insulation.
34:15What an icon.
34:18Two hours in, a bounty of birds and Britain's largest lamb mammal is a great start.
34:24So I'm heading to the coast to continue my search.
34:30We have just had to jump out the car because we have spotted a white-tailed eagle.
34:35Look at this beauty.
34:38Mind his own business.
34:40This is a huge bird.
34:42In fact, it's got the longest wingspan out of all eagles in the UK.
34:48Look, it's oyster catchers.
34:49Oyster catchers.
34:50Look.
34:54That sound.
34:58There's far too many distractions here, but I'm dragging myself away to my final destination of the day.
35:06We have just spotted an otter right ahead of us on that island.
35:13Oh, wow.
35:15Look.
35:17Just obviously woken up from a really good nap.
35:21Super cute.
35:22Look at it scratching itself.
35:26I can't believe it.
35:30You can just see how big they are.
35:35How agile, how slender.
35:42The otters in London that are used in freshwater sources like canals and rivers have really large ranges up to
35:4930 to 40 kilometers in size compared to these ones that have much shorter ranges.
35:54No one really knows the reason for such a drastic difference, but it's most likely because of food availability in
36:02certain ranges.
36:06What a way to end a day.
36:09A mammal to complete my mission of how many species I could see here.
36:14And buzz to have seen eight, including two eagles.
36:20Before coming here, I said I wanted to spread my wings and discover something new.
36:24And honestly, mole has delivered a hundred percent.
36:26It has been honestly epic.
36:28I have seen so many different species in such a short period of time.
36:32I couldn't ask for anything more, to be honest.
36:38Well, hats off there to Lyra and to a cameraman, Tom, as well, because to get golden eagle, white-tailed
36:46eagle, an otter and a hen harrier in one day is no mean feat.
36:50Even up there on the Isle of Mull.
36:54Now, we've got our long-length cameraman, Mark Yates, wandering all over the place with his thermal camera.
37:00Let's go and see if he's got us anything.
37:02Has he got anything?
37:04No.
37:05No.
37:07No.
37:08Nothing there.
37:09No owl.
37:10Nothing there at the moment.
37:11Well, okay.
37:12Now, one bird Lyra didn't see on Mull and it's fairly widespread over there.
37:16And that is this bird.
37:18It is the barn owl.
37:20And the barn owl actually is quite a rare bird here in Northern Ireland.
37:26There are fewer than 30 pairs here.
37:29Why is that?
37:30Well, it's a combination thing.
37:31We've witnessed some of it since we've been up here.
37:33Of course, Ireland lies right on the edge of the Atlantic Ocean.
37:36The winds come in from the west.
37:38Stormy winds carrying rain.
37:40Barn owls do not like to hunt in rain because they walk along.
37:44They don't like the wind either because they rely on their ears to hunt.
37:49And high winds means that they just simply can't hear the prey.
37:53But there are other factors too.
37:55There is the lack of prey-rich, rough grassland.
37:59There's very little of that out here.
38:01And there's also a lack of nesting sites.
38:05Now, Ulster Wildlife have tried to rectify this by erecting nest boxes.
38:11And I'm pleased to say that there's a pair here at Mount Stewart using one of these boxes.
38:18Here we are.
38:19That is the barn owl box there.
38:23Look at that.
38:24They even record them at night as well.
38:28Now, one unusual thing about the barn owls over here is the fact that they hunt at night.
38:35In the rest of the UK, they are, well, they are nocturnal, but they're also diurnal.
38:40They'll hunt at first light and last light, but not here.
38:44Why is that?
38:45Well, it's all got to do with their diet.
38:48Now, how do you study a barn owl's diet?
38:51Let me show you.
38:52Let me get this out of my pocket.
38:54Look at that.
38:55Looks like a small grey sausage, but it's not.
38:59It's actually a barn owl's pellet.
39:01And this is packed full of information if you know what you're looking for.
39:06They regurgitate this.
39:08It's what their gut can't break down.
39:11It'll have fur in there.
39:12It'll have feathers in there.
39:13It'll have bones in there.
39:16And it'll have skulls in there.
39:18So scientists are able to identify exactly what the barn owls have been eating.
39:23Now, let's have a look now, okay, at the difference, if I can hold this up in this wind, between...
39:30Hold on.
39:30Get a good hold of this, because it flies off, between the barn owls of Northern Ireland here and the
39:37barn owls of Great Britain, the rest of the UK up here.
39:41Let's have a look first at the barn owls of the UK.
39:46Okay?
39:47Now, 45% of their diet is made up of field bulls.
39:51And then you've got 20% is made up of common shrews.
39:56And 20%, sorry, 15% is made up of wood mice there.
40:03Let's have a look now, then, at the Northern Irish one.
40:06A massive 71% of their diet is made up of wood mice.
40:12And then you've got 14% is made up of pygmy shrews.
40:18First of all, let's address the nocturnal hunting.
40:22The Northern Irish barn owls hunt at night, because they're hunting mainly wood mice, and wood mice are nocturnal.
40:30Whereas the field bulls, which forms most of the diet of the British owls, is, well, it's active day and
40:39night.
40:39Right.
40:40There we are.
40:41If I can put that down now, put that to one side over there.
40:45Now then, the other thing is the fact that you don't have field bulls or common shrews over here in
40:55Northern Ireland.
40:56Well, at least you didn't until recently.
41:00Because now, they've found field bulls in the diet of some barn owls, and those are starting to spread.
41:11Now, these are non-native species, so they have been released deliberately by someone, and that is actually illegal.
41:20And now it begs the big question. What's going to happen? Are those voles going to impact on the native
41:27wildlife here?
41:28What's going to happen to the owls? Will the owls now start to hunt by day and by night?
41:34And will owl numbers increase?
41:36Well, we don't know, but there is a long-term research study going on, funded by Ulster Wildlife and Queen's
41:46University at Belfast.
41:48And hopefully, they'll be able to come up with a lot of answers about all of those questions there.
41:54Now, luckily, they've also studied the barn owls here at Mount Stewart.
42:00And what's really interesting is that these owls take a much higher percentage of rats, brown rats, than the Northern
42:09Irish average.
42:11The barn owls here eat 22% of their diet is made up of rats.
42:18But it obviously works for them, because last year, they reared three young, including this fantastic youngster here.
42:26Isn't that brilliant?
42:28Now then, if you've seen an owl in Northern Ireland, any species of owl, Ulster Wildlife, want to hear from
42:35you,
42:35please send in your records. If you want to know how, well, visit our website.
42:41Right, from the wind and the cold out here now, back to the teepee and Chris and Michaela.
42:49Do you know what? I'd completely forgotten that there were no field voles in Ireland.
42:53And then, thinking about the impact that that would have, not just on barn owls, but things like short-eared
42:58owls and hen harriers and things like that.
43:01So, although, obviously, that introduction is unwarranted, unprecedented,
43:05it will be interesting to see what happens with those birds if that population of voles expands.
43:10It definitely will, won't it? I mean, it's so interesting that you only see three of the species here in
43:15Northern Ireland.
43:16OK, let's check our live cameras. Let's have a see, because we got some great action right at the beginning
43:23of the show with our badgers.
43:26They're not there right now, but we have had a lot of action from them, haven't we, Chris?
43:30Yeah, we've been watching the badgers here at Mount Stewart, and they've really delivered this week, actually, showing us lots
43:35of new behaviour.
43:36Now, these three animals here, you'll note, are all about the same size.
43:41They're quite fluffy. They're in good condition. No nicks on the ears from fighting like we saw those two earlier.
43:47No scars on the face. Difficult to sex. No, you know, big, broad face for the male, long tail and
43:54slimmer body for the female.
43:56And they're playful. And all of those things lead me to believe that these are last year's cubs.
44:02And as you can see, they've still got that playful side to them.
44:06I say playful. I mean, this is also about establishing hierarchies within that social group.
44:12The males are likely to move off probably next summer.
44:16But, you know, nice to see those young badgers there.
44:20But if you've been watching, you'll know we've had drama in the badger set with an animal that's been chasing
44:25another one and keckering.
44:27Now, you have to look towards the back, though, in the back of our shot there, but that is that
44:32male badger.
44:33And here you can see it's approached another one. We think the female.
44:37And there appears to be a bit more passive behaviour going on now, a bit of mutual grooming.
44:44But that animal is away from the set entrances, which have been fiercely guarded by at least one of the
44:50other badgers as it's been trying to get into that hole.
44:53Now, given that this animal has been on the set pretty much the whole week and hasn't been chased off
44:59in a ferocious fight,
45:00we've come to the conclusion that it is in fact part of this social group.
45:04It's not an intruder from another social group.
45:07But it's definitely not wanted in one part of the set.
45:11And here you can see that they've split up and they go their separate ways.
45:16One goes down one hole there on the left.
45:19And then that male goes round to the other hole on the other side.
45:22Now, of course, we don't know what's going on beneath the ground, but there's every chance that those chambers could
45:28be connected or not connected.
45:30But the key thing is, Mick, that some of the behaviour that we've seen these animals exhibiting this week, you
45:34know,
45:34we've never seen before in all of the years that we've been watching badgers on the watches.
45:39So that was pretty exciting.
45:41The extraordinary bit when it was lying down.
45:43But isn't that the amazing thing?
45:45I mean, every year we try and get this live behaviour.
45:49And I know some people say, oh, it's badgers again.
45:51But it's only when you have these cameras on and you keep watching the behaviour that you see stuff and
45:57learn new things.
45:58And as you say, we've seen behaviour that we've never seen before.
46:02That's right. Entertaining and equally interesting.
46:04What about this behaviour, though? Because we've had these cameras on for quite a few days and we've been watching
46:10them.
46:10They will be going off tonight straight after the show at eight o'clock.
46:14This particular badger, though, decides that, yeah, I've I've been on this live camera quite a lot.
46:20But quite frankly, I think it's time that I unplugged the camera myself.
46:24And it does. It interferes with the camera and then that camera works no longer.
46:31So, as I say, those cameras will be turned off at eight o'clock.
46:35But it has. It's been fantastic to see all this different behaviour.
46:38Yeah, another thing we were trying this week was replicating some aspects of an experiment that had been done in
46:42the Netherlands,
46:43looking at whether wild mammals, principally small animals, rodents, would run in wheels like those we put in cages for
46:49hamsters.
46:49And they found that they did.
46:50Well, we've had wheels out all week and we've been baiting them.
46:55We can go live to our mouse wheel now.
46:58And there's an absence of mouse in the wheel.
47:01We've had a number of things that have been curious and coming in.
47:04We've had the mice.
47:05We've had the pine marten and now the badger.
47:08And again, we've got to suppose that rather like the pine marten, you know, the badger has come in because
47:13it smelt the mouse.
47:14And it's more interested in eating the mouse than running in the wheel.
47:16Blue tip popped in there.
47:18Pine martens have been on the wheel.
47:20This one is typically used for exercising cats, not exercising pine martens.
47:25And sadly, the squirrel, although it shows a degree of acrobatic behaviour, doesn't have the way to spin the wheel.
47:32But we're going to persevere.
47:33I'm going to get my own wheel.
47:35I'm not joking.
47:37I'm going to get a wheel and put it in the garden.
47:38We're going to keep our wheels out here to see if we can finally tempt those animals.
47:42And I know what you're thinking.
47:43You're thinking that large wheel has been a bit wasted.
47:45But actually, something did visit that big wheel.
47:49Look what it was.
47:50Yes, I love this.
47:52It was the pack of what do you look like.
47:56Is that the way you run?
47:59Because quite frankly, you're not going to get fit doing it like that.
48:02Well, I don't know.
48:03I thought it was a sort of an underlying chance of the next Olympics in there, to be quite honest
48:06with you.
48:06Do you know what I want to say to that?
48:08The wheels have definitely come off, Chris Packham.
48:11Off you go. Thank you very much.
48:11I can't take any more of this ridicule.
48:13I'm going to go outside and hang out with Yolo, Mick.
48:16Now, if you were watching last night, you might have seen that we had a buzzard on our thermal camera
48:21and that initially when we saw it, you could see its eyes and its nose and its beak
48:25because they were glowing in the dark.
48:27But then we witnessed it tucking its head underneath its wing to stay warm.
48:33Well, that was a nice big buzzard.
48:34The question for Yolo and I is, how do those smaller birds that are out there on this freezing cold,
48:40windy night
48:41stay warm enough to survive, Yolo?
48:44Yes, that's a very good question.
48:45Now, the average temperature in Northern Ireland in December was 5.9 degrees centigrade.
48:52That's cold and it's been for a few years here.
48:55And at one time it hit a low of minus two.
48:59Now, for us, you know, that's all right.
49:01We can put on a few extra layers like Chris or extra six or seven layers in his case.
49:07We can go indoors. We can turn up the thermostat a little bit.
49:12But do you know what? How about us small birds?
49:14Well, last night, of course, we saw a robin, didn't we, using our thermal camera.
49:20Here it is, look, puffing up its feathers there, tucking its head in, tucking its head, doing its very best
49:28to keep warm.
49:29Now, of course, they've got feathers and that is a big, big help.
49:34But how about small pasteurines like the great tit here?
49:38Well, they can feed all day, of course, which they will do from dawn until dusk.
49:45And not too much is the critical thing, because you put on too much weight, you're a bit sluggish,
49:51you're going to get eaten by a sparrowhawk or the local cat.
49:55And great tit's put on 10% extra body fat, but they burn that off overnight.
50:02That is the equivalent of you and I eating eight kilograms of prime cake and then burning it off overnight.
50:11Eight kilograms of cake? Eight kilograms of cake. Do you reckon you can manage that?
50:14I've probably tried on a couple of occasions.
50:16But it is risky, of course, because then, come dawn, you need to find some more food.
50:23And if you struggle to find food, well, then you are going to be in quite a bit of trouble
50:30with that.
50:31Scientists have also discovered that the choice of nest site is also very, very important.
50:37And if a bird finds the right nest, roosting site, sorry, if a bird finds the correct roosting location, it
50:46can save up to 50% of its energy.
50:5050%?
50:5150% of its energy, yeah.
50:52Now, that is a considerable amount of energy.
50:55So it's not surprising that when they do find the right roost site, they will fiercely protect it.
51:01Take a look at these two great tits in a nest box.
51:04And they are fighting ferociously for this.
51:07Now, they choose the best sites because of a lack of parasites.
51:10Perhaps the nest site has been warmed by the sun in the daytime.
51:13And what they did find is that when there are many boxes there, the ones which are better are fought
51:17over even more fiercely.
51:19Particularly when there is bad weather because that increases the competition.
51:24Now, the key thing is that scientists who were doing this work found out that hierarchy plays a role.
51:30And the adult males get the very best sites.
51:33And the young females are the ones which get turfed out and get the very poor sites.
51:37And, you know, in that one study, they found that in some of those roosting sites, the birds killed one
51:43another twice.
51:44Two dead great tits in there killed by others just because of that extra 50%.
51:49That's how important it is.
51:51Yes, but birds have a trick up their sleeve.
51:54And that trick is called rest phase hypothermia.
51:59Let's have a look at some roosting birds in the trees around here.
52:04Now then, the birds, what they do is they can lower their body temperature by 6 degrees from 36 degrees
52:13down to 42 degrees centigrade.
52:17And, of course, Chris, it takes less energy to maintain a lower body temperature, for one thing.
52:25And also, a colder body actually loses less heat into the environment.
52:32So it's actually a very good tactic.
52:35It is a very good tactic.
52:36And we can see it here in graphical form.
52:39Because here we see two great tits that were measured overnight.
52:42They're starting up here at more than 40, 44 degrees centigrade.
52:47And it drops right down to the bottom here to below, about 37.
52:51And you can see that they've measured it on two birds.
52:53And what's interesting is that the conditions overnight mean that they're moderating their temperature in parallel with one another.
52:59So, look, this is great for saving energy.
53:02But, again, it does come with compromises.
53:04Because if you slow yourself down like that and you become sluggish, you're vulnerable to predation.
53:09Pine martens, domestic cats.
53:10And we've also discovered that it reduces your immune system.
53:14So, yes, you might survive the night, but you could get eaten by a pine martin and catch a cold.
53:19Yeah.
53:20Not good.
53:21Not good.
53:22Not good at all.
53:23Let's move on to our mindfulness moment now.
53:26And this one's a little bit unusual.
53:28Dr Catherine Cooper has been studying murmurating starlings.
53:32But she wanted to follow the track of an individual bird through the flock.
53:36And given that there were vast numbers of that, she needed to advance the technology, which she's done.
53:41And you'll see that in a moment.
53:43But what she also discovered is that when she pointed her camera to the sky to study these birds, it
53:49was not only mesmerizing, but extraordinarily beautiful.
53:52Woof!
53:55Woof!
53:58Woof!
54:04Woof!
54:11Woof!
54:12Woof!
55:25It was extraordinary, wasn't it?
55:27Amazing.
55:28Beautiful.
55:28It was art, wasn't it?
55:29Absolutely art.
55:31Here's some more art.
55:32Young Belle is recovering in hospitals from essential treatment at the moment.
55:36She's a big fan of the programme, watching the live cameras all day, and she's painted
55:40all of these birds on the window.
55:42What about that?
55:42Well done.
55:43That is lovely.
55:44Well, I haven't got art for you, but I've got a stonker of a bird.
55:48Have a look at this.
55:49This is a male gossock sent in by David May.
55:52Not just a male gossock, male gossock in the snow.
55:55How about that?
55:56How about that?
55:58Do you know what?
55:59Unfortunately, we've reached the end.
56:01It's not just the end of tonight's show.
56:03It's the end of Winter Watch 2026 as well.
56:07We have thoroughly enjoyed investigating all the habitats here, and a big thank you to
56:14all the staff.
56:15You've been fantastic hosts.
56:16I will raise a drum to you tonight.
56:20We'll be back in spring in Northern Ireland, but we'll be broadcasting from another site,
56:24ensuring to bring you the very best of British wildlife.
56:28So that's it.
56:29It's all gone too quickly, hasn't it?
56:31But as Chris said, we'll be back for Spring Watch, so that leaves us all to say thanks for
56:35watching, and good night.
56:37Good night.
56:40Good night.
56:41Counting to live in 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, 0.
56:49We're on air.
56:52We arrived on a mission to explore a new landscape.
56:57Through rain, wind, and occasional shine.
57:05Mance Stewart's cast of characters has captivated us.
57:14When the sun set, secrets were revealed.
57:25And the fields and the woods came alive.
57:35It's not just the wildlife that's delivered.
57:38But as we've heard from people with a real passion for nature.
57:43That's in the water, I just fly near me.
57:46This is a cool bird.
57:50He's sitting looking down at us now.
57:53Throughout the harshest months of the year, the wildlife has adapted, thrived, and survived.
58:06Now, it's time to hunker down, wait for the tides to turn, and the seasons to change.
58:13And of course, we'll be back.
58:16See you then.
58:25See you then.
58:38See you then.
58:45Bye-bye.
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