Johnny Kingdom's Year with the Birds

The series begins at the end of autumn, with Johnny clearing out bird boxes and sorting out his new remote cameras in preparation for the winter. There are two birds in particular that he wants to film - the great spotted woodpecker and the wren. But the harsh winter looks as if it could spell trouble for the wrens and it will be spring before Johnny knows how well they have fared. He has better luck with the woodpecker and eventually finds their roost. Meanwhile, at home, he struggles to get shots of a mistle thrush as his wife Julie and his neighbours disturb this shy bird as it feasts on a rowan tree.

Spring has arrived and it is the busiest time of year for the birds. Johnny tries to film as many of them that are nesting on his land as he can. The great spotted woodpeckers have abandoned their roosting site and found a new tree to nest in, but with 20 acres of woodland Johnny will have his work cut out to find it. He also fixes remote cameras in place to film the nests of bluetits, blackbirds and swallows, but a period of unusually hot weather spells disaster for some of them. On a happier note, Johnny is delighted when a pair of Canada geese nest on the island on his pond and hatch out five goslings.

As spring moves into summer, Johnny is relieved to find a healthy brood of wren chicks and heartened to see that some adults did survive the cold winter. He is thrilled with his footage of swallow chicks, but now faces the challenges of getting close-up shots of the woodpecker chicks and finding a pair of barn owls to film. Johnny's old friend Bob tries to help out with the woodpecker chicks by fixing a camera on a long pole and Johnny returns to one of his old hides in an attempt to film owl chicks. While Bob's camera brings mixed results, the owl footage is an overwhelming success.