With only a few days left before the live shows start, the production village is now complete and the producers and presenters arrived yesterday. Last night, a 'welcome to the community' event was hosted in the mess tent at the production village with good numbers of the local community turning out to meet the production crew and presenters. It was great to meet the presenters who answered queries and mingled with the crowd.
Today is a full reheasal day for next Monday's programme and we've got our fingers crossed it all goes ok and there are no technical hitches. Roving cameramen have been on site all week and have got lots of good shots of the wildlife on the reserve (including some birds that are new to Springwatch which we're really excited about!), but you'll have to tune into the show to find out exactly what they've caught on camera.
And it's not just the Springwatch team that have had a busy few days. The reserve staff have been putting up signs, repairing paths and steps, and generally tidying up the place so that the reserve looks its best for the influx of visitors we're hoping for.
The countdown to the first live broadast approaches and we're all waiting for the first programme with excitement, but a few nerves too. If you can't wait until 8pm on Monday for your first Springwatch fix then check out the video below!
How time flies! In less than a fortnight the BBC Springwatch series will again be broadcast from Ynys-hir. So how have we been preparing?
Sprucing up
In a local farmers field the production village is slowly forming, with caravans, trucks and cars parked on the special matting laid down. In less than a week the production vans, portable offices and catering tents will be erected, transforming the field into a hive of activity. The number of BBC staff present increases daily and camera teams are out checking the special nestboxes put up in late winter.
Excitement is also buiding amongst our staff and volunteers too, as the time for the first broadcast approaches.
On the reserve we have been busy; laying more stone on the overflow car-park, preparing the rota for staff and volunteers and 'sprucing up' the reserve's facilities – ready for the anticipated increase in visitors.
Over Easter, the Cambridge Conservation Volunteers laid stone on a rather wet section of footpath leading from the overflow car-park to the Visitor Centre.
This group of volunteers have been coming to the reserve every Easter for the last ten years helping out on a number of conservation tasks. Many thanks to them for their help and congratulations in their 50th anniversary year.
The stars
Despite the rather wet and cold weather the birds too have been busy. Blue tits and great tits are well into their nesting season with pied flycatchers and redstarts buiding nests in some of our many nestboxes. The woods are full of the sound of spring with all our summer migrants back, joining our resident species in a fantastic dawn chorus. Lapwing chicks can be seen on the lowland wet grassland and in the reedbed reed and sedge warblers are buiding nests.
What's next?
As BBC Springwatch draws nearer I wonder which of our many birds will feature on the programme; will the pied flycatchers have a better breeding season than last year, will the barn owls breed and will the buzzards again feed their chicks on so many of our grass snakes.
Tune in on May 28 to find out what happens. We hope you're as excited as we are!
The weather since I last posted a blog has deteriorated somewhat; from balmy March days to rather changeable conditions, though there is now a hint of warmth in the sun. Migrants have appeared in some numbers with willow warblers singing from every patch of suitable ground. Pied flycatchers are back in the woods and are joined by increasing numbers of redstarts. A cuckoo echoed across the valley this morning and a few tree pipits are singing on the bracken slopes of Foel fawr, the hill opposite the main part of the reserve. Carrying out a butterfly transect I saw speckled woods. peacocks, a small tortoiseshell and a couple of lovely male orange tips and saw a freshly emerged large red damselfly, the first of the year. In the next few days I expect the first wood warblers, sedge warblers and house martins which have already been seen elsewhere in the county but have yet to arrive on the reserve. Rather early this year has been the emergence of bluebells with many shooting up and flowering though the best of this magic blue carpet has yet to arrive.Spring is truly here, despite the odd night frost.
Astonishingly warm weather for March here at Ynys-hir. The winds have been ideal for migration with a trickle of migrants arriving daily. First here, as always, were sand martins, closely followed by wheatear and chiffchaff. Yesterday, the first blackcaps were singing and this morning a few willow warblers have arrived, the latter's song a lovely descending trill. Any day now, if the weather remains as it is, I expect redstart or an early pied flycatcher; definate harbingers of Spring. Celandines, marsh marigolds and wood sorrel are all in bloom but my favourite, the wood anemone has still to appear in splender. Reptiles are waking from hibernation with a few grass snakes seen in the wetter areas and on the lowland wet grassland, lapwings are displaying in good numbers with some already incubating a full clutch of eggs, the earliest I can recall. The grey herons are back in the heronry and, to my suprise, 12 little egrets were lined up on the salt marsh just below appearing eager to join their larger cousins. Reserve staff are arriving earlier and earlier too, eager to be the one to see the first pied flycatcher or redstart of the year. It is rather unfair, though, that the Area Manager lives on-site and invariably gets most of the year ticks. I will have to set my alarm clock earlier and earlier I think, to beat him to a redstart or pied flycatcher tomorrow.
Now the clocks have changed the dark, gloomy late afternoons and evenings of winter are upon us. Wader numbers on the lowland wet grassland are increasing with over 1400 golden plover and 1500 lapwing daily with smaller numbers of curlew and redshank feeding in the wetter areas. Birds of prey are now a regular feature with up to four hen harriers (three ringtails and one adult male) hunting over rougher areas of pasture with peregrine, merlin, kestrel, buzzard, red kite and sparrowhawk seen daily. A pleasant surprise yesterday was a very late osprey over the Dyfi near the Domen las hide; it should have been in it's winter quarters by now. Interesting waders include a spotted redshank and a common sandpiper, presumably the same individuals that have wintered on the reserve for the last few years. Redwing and fieldfares are goprging on the abundant hawthorn berries with an occasional brambling and crossbill putting in an appearance. Wigeon numbers have reached 1500 so far and the barnacle goose flock has built up to 336 individuals with 37 Greenland white-fronted geese also in. It is now too dark to spend a pleasant hour after work to birdwatch on the reserve so I will have to set the alarm clock a bit earlier to enjoy the reserve before settling down in front of the computer.