An edition of the Tyne Tees Television series on the wildlife of the north presented by Kim Inglis. In the first part of the programme a visit to Gosforth Park Nature Reserve near Newcastle and a survey being carried out by David Noble-Rollins into small mammals including Bank voles and Shews that live there. Next to the beach at Staithes and the work of wildlife sculptor Jo Perry who makes pieces of art from driftwood she finds the beaches of the North Yorkshire coastline. After the break...

An edition of the Tyne Tees Television series on the wildlife of the north presented by Kim Inglis. In the first part of the programme a visit to Gosforth Park Nature Reserve near Newcastle and a survey being carried out by David Noble-Rollins into small mammals including Bank voles and Shews that live there. Next to the beach at Staithes and the work of wildlife sculptor Jo Perry who makes pieces of art from driftwood she finds the beaches of the North Yorkshire coastline. After the break Kim meets wildlife cameraman Kip Halsey at Preston Cemetery at North Shields where he is making a video diary of the wildlife living there. Finally, Kim meets Newcastle University Marine Biology student Mattias Herborg along the banks of the River Tyne at Jarrow to find out if the invasive Chinese mitten crab has arrived in the river. Bank voles may be among our smallest animals, but they can still give you a nasty nip if you're not careful, as presenter Kim Inglis discovers . Kim goes on a visit to a nature reserve on the outskirts of Newcastle where animal expert David Noble Rollins has put out 30 small traps to catch small mammals alive. The traps have food and bedding in them, and are purely intended to give David a picture of how many mice, shrews and voles live on the reserve. Once examined and recorded, the small mammals are released back into the wild. Not all the animals take kindly to being trapped, it seems. One bank vole being held by Kim sinks its tiny teeth into her finger. 'It's all part of being a wildlife presenter,' she says ruefully. 'It may have been little, but its gnashers were quite sharp!' The vole even vented its annoyance on David, who is secretary of the Natural History Society of Northumbria. 'In 30 years of studying wildlife I'd never been bitten by a vole,' he said. 'But this little chap gave me quite a nip!' Kim Inglis finds a calmer atmosphere at the next place she visits - Preston Cemetery in North Shields. Not the most obvious place to get close to nature, you would think. But the cemetery, with its many trees and shrubs, is a haven for birds, as wildlife cameraman Kip Halsey has discovered. He has made his own video diary of the woodpeckers, robins, blue tits and wrens that nest in the area. 'I live just round the corner,' says Kip, 'and I noticed how many birds seem to use the graveyard as a refuge, so I started to come here with my camera and over the summer I built up a fantastic library of shots.' Also in the programme Kim joins researcher Matthias Herborg on the banks of the River Tyne at Jarrow, where he's studying an unusual crustacean, the Chinese mitten crab. These animals, so called because they have fur on the points of their claws, originally came from the Far East. They are common in estuaries in the South of England, where they cause severe damage to river banks by burrowing for food. Matthias is trying to find out whether they have spread to the Tyne. Credits: Presenter Kim Inglis Camera Lee Sutterby Dubbing Mixer Andy Ludbrook Editor David Hindmarsh Executive Producer Jane Bolesworth Producer Charles Bowden CBTV production for Tyne Tees Television A Tyne Tees Television Presentation. Granada. © Tyne Tees Television MMI