It's time for me to say goodbye and to thank you all for being such a wonderful bunch. You've been unfailingly kind, unerringly helpful, and unbelievably quick in responding to our calls for action. In short, it has been nothing but a pleasure writing for you and I hope I was able to return the favour.

Until next time...

Yours truly,

The Mole

Marcus Rheade-Edwards: "Who's up for a farewell party for Springwatch? I'll really miss the live shows next week, but am glad there are to be some Springwatch specials to ease us out of the series. Looking forward to them too. Sign here if you're up for the party."

Myrtlebird: "I'll get the wine. Shall we dance to the birdie song?"
Rob: [providing 33 emoticons of pints of beer] "Can we start now?"
Hawthorn: "Can I come in my jammies?"
PIKO4566: "Is it bring-a-bottle? I'll see if I can find a full one."
Bunnyeyes: "Do I need to put my best dress on, or come casual???"
Osprey: "Yaay - let's do the funky chicken!!!"

BonkersBlake, who had earlier revealed herself to be a teetotaler, was still able to express herself in ways that didn't include the art of dance.

BonkersBlake: "My word, what a fantastic last show! I really loved all the memories sequences, especially that very last one with the crew being absolutley bonkers as Simon puts it! Fantastic way to sum up the 3 weeks and my word am I looking forward to the 4 specials!"

But some people were getting a bit maudlin.
Milvus999: "I am such a prize wuss. I confess... ::sniff sniff:::.. i shed a tear or a hundred! I think it was Simon's farewell that did it, especially with the dolphins and knowing what happened in Cornwall after."
Bunnyeyes: "Anyone fancy a slowy ????".
Then, a little later.
Bunnyeyes: "Weeeyyy Heeeeyyy.....Rock on.. Hicc... I am now dancing on table, swinging my top around my head..."

Seizing his virtual chance, Piko chipped back in:
PIKO4566: "Who's for the hot tub?"

Then, a little later, perhaps while sitting virtually alone in his virtual hot tub:
PIKO4566: "Ok who put Spandau Ballet on...come on, own up."
Marcus R-E: "Hay guys and girls, this is the best party ever, [many emoticons of beer and glasses of fizz] who's up for a game of pass the parcel?
PIKO4566: "Me, me......Yes it stopped....what did I get, what did I get.....Oh, a balloon......"
Marcus R-E: "Well PIKO, some people get all the luck. Wondered where that balloon went when I was wrapping the parcels."

Myrtlebird was obviously still going:
Myrtlebird: "I've just fell over my handbag, soon get the idea how to dance round it."

Then, it's the next morning:
Fortrosian: "I thought I was the only one up!!! I'm just going to start a fry up, bacon anyone??"

But some people still hadn't stopped partying.
Misty_B: "Lets CONGA!!!!!! There's another Party A few threads away
We could join on the way!!!!!
SPRING WATCH.......
Should be on longer
So lets all do the CONga
Tra La La La
Tra La La La"

jay-tee-and-katz: "Still dancing, but I bet I have a terrible hangover tomorrow. In case I'm too sloshed to say it later, I just want to thank everyone for a super four weeks.

And finally:
karenlesley101: I may need help to get back off the floor here!!!! have enjoyed the party though, nothing like a good booze up and knees up to cheer you up! helps to soften the blow of the board closing...sob..sob..gettin all depressed now....let have a singsong to close with... we'll meet again...don't know where, dont know whennnnnnn.......and I don't know anymore words either.....!!!!!

Have a great night everyone!

Yours truly,
The Mole

It is too much to bear and Kate immediately starts crying. She falls to the floor, gnashing her teeth and ripping at her clothes. Chris sits in stunned silence, a single tear falling down his stony face. Martin dabs at his eyes with his silken locks, like a modern day Samson.

Usually, the whole team discusses what will happen in the pre-title sequence but today Kate is adamant.

"I'm sorry," she says, addressing Tim, the very nervous executive producer, "but today the pre-title sequence is set in stone and we're not telling you anything about it."

Tim has now gone beyond chewing his finger-nails and is now down to his knuckles. It is not a pretty sight.

"Don't worry," Kate says. "It will run to time, it won't be controversial, and you'll love it. I promise."

Tim nods quietly but there is more nerve-testing to come. On tonight's show Simon King is going to do something with a blow-up turtle called Tallulah. This gets Hannah, one of the assistant producers, singing the song from Bugsy Malone.

"My name is Tallulah. I live til I die... Pop!" I know I saw it a long time ago, but I don't remember there being a 'pop!' in the original song...

Gradually, Tim is appeased by talk of real animals. If all goes according to plan, tonight's episode will include kestrel chicks, a wasp's nest, tawny owls, Arctic terns, razorbills, little ringed plovers, your own home videos, and an update on our cuckoo sightings.

Biggest of all though is the news that the adult male linnet has been seen holding the chicks over the side of the nest.

It is a sad moment and everyone is a bit shocked. But then someone spots some ducklings passing outside. People jump up, run out the door, and don't come back. It is a strange, anticlimactic - but fitting - end to our last presenters meeting.

Once again, nature is calling the shots.

Looking grizzly and unshaven (and ever so slightly older than when he started) Gordon started at the beginning:

They would pop out at 7pm which is an hour before going on air, but our slot was then about half way through the programme so you're waiting and thinking "Please stick around!" and they'd be coming in and out and in and out. Then it would be live over to us in Essex ... and the badgers had all disappeared!

One of the problems was that when the site was recced it looked fantastic. But that was in February. Three or four months on, all this undergrowth had sprung up and the badgers just sort of hid amongst it. We might have had eight badgers all around us but you still couldn't see them!

Another problem is that badgers are notoriously shy.

"Although Don [the man who had been studying them for the last 50 years] was able to go out and stand amongst them, they are very sensitive to any change. So a strange sight or sound - or a strange person suddenly showing up - well, they're wild badgers so they just disappear. In the end, we all had to be locked in this little hide and try to film everything from a distance."

But even when he did catch them on film, that wasn't the end of his problems.

"Don has known these badgers all their lives and could tell them apart just by looking at them. But one badger looks very much the same as another to me! They have grey bodies, a black-and-white striped head, and are all about the same size. We wanted to show these badgers' characters but to do that you have to know who they were. I was trying to take mental snapshots of anything that might make them stand out but it was really tough."

And this 'little hide' they were filming from, just how little was it?

"For one man it would have been palatial but there were four of us in this garden shed with all our equipment. And once we were in we were locked in because we couldn't walk around. It was quite intense with all of us having to stay quiet while also speaking to camera and doing the live TV. There was definitely a tinge of cabin fever."

So any plans for filming badgers again in the future?

"Definitely. They may have got away from me this time but I'll be back. No animal gets away from me forever!"

So there we have it. An episode with fledging greenfinches, rescued honey buzzards, ill swallows, and ... a sandwich. Perfect for those people who think we focus too much on the birds...

Talking of birds, Joe the day researcher has noticed some yellow colouring coming through on the goldfinch chicks. But since their nest is in an even more disgusting condition than the greenfinch's nest, and completely covered in faecal sacs, no one can be sure that the yellow isn't just wee...

The wasps are doing a much better job with their housekeeping... which is why it seems so unfair that they should be getting lots of hate mail.

"Hate mail," says Chris. "Why on earth are they receiving hate mail?"

Nikki, another day researcher, explains:

"Some people are saying they can't face watching the split screen with all the webcams on it because one of the webcams is showing the wasps."

Chris shakes his head with a pained expression, as though chewing on one of his beloved wasps. Trying to cheer him up, the producer says that a family of moorhens have been nesting under Martin's motorbike. This reminds Kate of last year's "toilet duck that had ten duckings". Now I know I wasn't here last year and I don't have a degree in zoology, but I'm beginning to worry about the sanity of those around me...

My fears are far from allayed when the team decide that tonight would be a good time to show a video of a man in a dressing gown...

Then it's on to marsh harriers, water voles, and moles. Some wildlife is welcome in one's garden, and some is not. Moles, it appears, are not (which may explain why I hardly ever seem to get out of the production marquee).

"Dog poo," says one of those gathered (which strikes The Mole as a bit strong - yes, there are similarities in terms shape but that's pretty much where the resemblance ends). "Apparently what you need to keep the moles away from your lawn is to litter it with dog poo."

"I'm not surprised," says producer Alex. "Anyone would hate to live in a house filled with poo."

"Anyone but goldfinches, that is," says Kate, and everyone agrees. Those goldfinches really are too much.

Last on the agenda are polymorphic banded snails. Young Lindsay has been out hunting them and has got himself quite a collection, all of different colours.

"We could have a competition," says Kate, "in which people have to match different snails. A bit like snap but with snails."

"You keep working on that format, Kate," says Chris. "But I wouldn't bother contacting Simon Cowell, if I was you."

X-Snails, Britain's Got Snails, Snail Idol: the dream is over before it has even begun...

After the safety talk they head off in the direction of the story developers and are told a little bit about how the programme is put together. Then there is a question before we move on:

"You know that person in Wales," asks a little boy, "did he find them cats yet?"

Chiara explains that the person in Wales is Simon King and that we don't know whether he has seen a polecat yet. I wait to see if anyone will ask whether - based on Simon's success so far - polecats even live in Wales, but nobody does. Instead there are more immediately pertinent questions such as "Where's the loo?" and "What's the time?". I can only admire the level of interest these Springwatch fans have in the lay out of the site and in recording when questions are asked.

In the gallery, as Chiara tells the children how difficult and full-on the job of director is, David the director takes a break from watching Ashes To Ashes to say a friendly hello.

Still in the gallery Chiara tells the children about 'talk back', the system that allows the director to have a word in Kate's ear while she is busy talking. One of the teachers comments on how difficult this must be. This, I think, reflects very well on his class. At my school, a teacher had to be able to talk sensibly while a whole classroom screamed in his ear...

As David the director goes back to Ashes To Ashes, Chiara asks if there are any other questions.

"When do we get to see Chris and Kate?" asks a little boy.

"I'm afraid that won't be possible," explains Chiara with a smile. "They're very busy people."

"Oh, that's a shame," says the boy. "I wanted to get their autographs and sell them on Ebay."

As the class heads towards the barn, I decide that this boy will obviously go far. A banker perhaps. Or a Member of Parliament.

"Now," says Chiara, "as we he head towards the barn please be as quiet as you can. There are open microphones out there and if you do make a noise it will go straight on to the web."

In an instant, the class's noise level is the highest it's been since the start of the tour. Fame, it seems, is now firmly on their minds but they are good kids and they manage to keep the volume just the right side of 'web audible' even when they finally catch a glimpse of ... The Sofa! The kids push their faces up to the window of the barn to get a good look at it. After the presenters themselves, this manky old sofa is the next best thing and the children are gripped by the sight of an inanimate object.

At the end of the tour, I am stopped by the boy who asked for Kate and Chris' autograph so he could sell them on Ebay. He asks me if I will sign my name on his hand. Flattered, I oblige and write my monicker - The Mole - on his palm.

He looks at it for a moment and appears excited. But as I turn to go, I see him stop to read the words on his hands. A moment later he rushes off to join the other kids. It is time, says the teacher, to wash their hands...

Great. Second fiddle to a sofa...

What is clear, however, is that linnets are different to other birds.

"Linnets," says Chris, "are different from most birds in that they eat seeds that are still growing."

"Must give them very sore tummies," volunteers a non-zoologist bravely.

"Yes," replies Chris, "which is why they have a Gaviscon gland that mixes Gaviscon in with their saliva. This helps their stomachs deal with eating live seeds."

As a non-zoologist myself, I resolve to keep my head down so as not to expose my ignorance but not everyone is quite so cowardly as the focus turns to Simon and the piece he will be doing on the razorbills and guillemots of Wales.

"Is it true," asks another non-zoologist, "that guillemot eggs aren't round?".

"Yes," says Roger the producer. "Otherwise they would roll out of the nests."

"So what are they then? Square?"

"That's right," replies the producer without a hint of irony.

The non-zoologist - who has two children - crosses her legs with a pained expression and Kate changes the subject to the fact that today is World Oceans Day.

For her part, Kate has recently fulfilled a lifelong dream of swimming with seahorses in UK waters. She tells us that they are being tagged so that conservationists can monitor their populations. This, needless to say, raises the question of how you tag a tiny little sea horse.

"They put a tiny little necklace on them," says Kate.

"What's on the necklace?" asks another non-zoologist who has learned nothing from those who came before.

"Their name and phone number," says the producer.

"And their star sign," suggests Chris.

Luckily I manage to resist asking how the necklaces will survive the incredible journey that these animals make as they grow from tiny little horses swimming in the sea to the great big four-legged giants that we see galloping around on land. I guess the necklaces are just made of really stretchy material...

• Stoatal Recall
• The Empire Shrikes Back
• Saturday Night Beaver
• Ghost Bustards
• The Good, The Badger and The Ugly
• Fried Greenfinches at the Whistlestop Cafe
• Saving Parrot Ryan
• Parrots of the Carribean
• Some Like It Otter
• Goldfincher
• Warbler and Peace
• Beaver and Butthead
• Rooky
• Sleepy Swallow
• Polecat on a Hit Tin Roof
• 20,000 Grebes Under The Sea
• E.Teal
• Redstart Trek
• Star Warblers
• Crouching Badger, Hidden Dragonfly
• Tit-anic
• Great (Tit)pectations
• Men in Blackbird
• Terninator
• Captain Corelli's Pangolin
• Good Will Bunting
• Day of the Jackdaw
• Terns of Endearment
• Citizen Cane Toad
• Toad to Perdition
• The Redshank Redemption
• Night Jarhead
• Romancing the Stone Curlew
• Raiders of the Lost Aardvark
• The Elephant Moth Man
• Mission Impossibullfinch

Can you do any better (or worse)? Post your ideas below!

In the first group are those people who will reply with the name of an animal. The otter perhaps. Or the kestrel. In the next group are those people who will reply with the name of a presenter. So Kate, Chris, Simon, Martin or Gordon.

Kristina, Gemma and Robert are on the second shift today which means that they start at 2pm and go on until midnight, but it has its rewards:

"What I love," says Robert, "is the fact that we get to be film makers. We have no real camera training or anything but when I watch the show later on I can see where I've panned or pulled focus. We're making little films that get seen by thousands and thousands of people."

And there are all sorts of people out there.

"At the moment there's a discussion going on called Little Chris's Fanclub," says Gemma. "Some of the people watching the otter camera at night have seen a white-clawed crayfish doing its thing and have started a crayfish appreciation club called the Cray-Z-Gang. At the moment they are debating whether anyone can join or whether you have to have seen it first."

But it isn't just about watching and listening to the animals. In the first week someone told the story developers that they could hear a party going on in a nearby field. Then someone watching the blackbird stream heard the crew singing Happy Birthday all the way over in the production tent. Rather than asking for quiet they sent in a birthday message. And it's not all one way traffic either.

"The other night things were going a bit slowly so we asked if anyone could help us with a crossword clue. Sure enough, they got the answer and sent it back to us. After that they were asking us is there was anything else they could get us: wine, pizza, the Welsh rugby team."
.
And did they get any wine, pizza or Welsh rugby players?

"No, but it's nice to be asked," says Robert, tucking into his bag of birdseed.

"Just because they're alive and flourishing" he insists, "does not mean they're boring."

"I don't know why but I couldn't get to sleep last night so spent a lot of time thinking about those poor chicks being pecked by the adult male and wondering how we could best tell the story. And then I had the idea of a montage in which -"

"- we have the sound effects from Psycho," interrupts Chris.

Kate looks stunned.

"How did you know that was what I was thinking?"

"Because I was in the room next to yours last night," says Chris, "doing the sound effects from Psycho."

Everyone laughs but I notice that the two people seated next to him move their seats just a little further away as the conversation turns to bumble bees.

Chris puts his hand up.

"I am the president."

People move even further away. Chris is obviously delusional, eats nettles for fun, and we are trapped in a Portacabin with him.

"Of course you are," says today's producer, trying to appease him.

"No, I am. I am the President of the Bumblebee Conservation Trust," he says, and it turns out that he actually is, prompting everyone to breathe a quiet sigh of relief. Well, almost everyone. The executive producer complains that he can't go anywhere without seeing the faces of the presenters.

"You're telling me," says Kate. "I once got a text from a friend saying "I'm in a loo in Arundel and so are you."" This means that either Kate's friend was reading a paper which had a picture of Kate in it, or she really was in a loo with Kate but preferred to text her mundanities than vocalise them. Or both...

Gold star to Chris today for being a real live president of something... and not just thinking he is..

Then you were asked to come up with a name for Britain's latest great bustard chick, just born on Salisbury Plain. And yet again you have replied in force. Such force, in fact, that I have only had the time to look at the first 500!

First there were the sensible majority of you who came up with perfectly excellent names like Dave, Jessica, and Leslie. Then there was the less sensible group who opted for stranger names like Chris, Kate, Simon and Bill...

Others suggestions were more contextual:
Rohanf, for example, thought that the bustard chic should be named Lucky as it is lucky to be alive, and MexicanIan liked the name Clint since the great bustard is a "Great (Salisbury) Plain Drifter" (although the Clint I was thinking about was a High Plains Drifter).

One suggestion was contextual but didn't refer so much to the context that the chick might find itself in as the context that the viewer found himself in: "I think Micro is a good name because when I first heard about the chick I was eating micro chips!"

Genius! But others were even more highbrow:
Snowiewhite suggested it should be called Sarum, the old name for Salisbury. Another recommended Otis because the bird's scientific name is Otis Tarda; and mgketteridge suggested calling it Charles as it is "Darwin's 200th year." (Happy Birthday, Charles!)

Others of you focused on the word 'bustard' to come up with names such as Alan (after Alan B'Stard in The New Stateman); James, Charlie or Matt (in honour of the original members of the pop group Busted); Mustard (because it rhymes with bustard); and Bud Star or Rat Burds (because they are anagrams of the word 'bustard'...)

The vast majority of you, however, concentrated on the fact that the chick's mother is called Fanny. By suggesting names such as Dango, Dabydozee, and Pack you came up with whole new names like Fandango, Fandabydozee, and Fanny Pack (what we might call a 'bum bag').

Now some party-poopers have pointed out that this makes no sense whatsoever as a child's name is not usually preceded by the mother's name. But I beg to differ. My given name is Mole and my mother's name is The...

And my favourite suggestion? Well, as you ask, my favourite is the name suggested by janicexxxxx who says:

"It could also be Sammy..."

And why?

"..cos it rhymes with Fanny a bit."

Hurrah!

With minor issues like camera cables dealt with, Chris takes the opportunity to show us a gift that he has just been sent in the post. It is a bright blue knitted poodle wine-cosey. As you can see, Chris is a very proud owner.

Unfortunately, when everyone starts discussing tonight's content, things start to get bleak. There is murder everywhere tonight, whether the production team and presenters like it or not. It is always said about Springwatch that nature writes the scripts, and today nature has decided to write an emotional rollercoaster. For the first time ever, everyone is serious.

But the mood begins to lighten a tad as there is good news from Simon. Well, good news if you're Kate that is, as Simon is still having trouble filming polecat... and viewers are flooding the Springwatch website with their own polecat footage. Kate is delighted and decides that Simon should be sent a cake that she has had made in the shape of The Sofa (just smaller).

Then more bad news. It turns out that the cake was made last Monday, has been sitting in the fridge since then... and someone has taken a bite out of it. Now I have two reasons to check Jo's teeth...

Minutes before the end of the meeting, there is, at last, some unreservedly good news. One of the cameramen has caught some cracking footage of a reed warbler having a go at a cuckoo lurking near its nest. But why, wonders the series producer, would a warbler be clever enough to chase away a cuckoo but silly enough to feed a cuckoo's chicks if they hatched in its nest. Chris explains.

"It is all to do with the gape," he says. "A chick's gape - even when it belong to a young cuckoo - is a super-stimulus that a warbler is simply unable to resist... much like some men and silicon-enhanced breasts..."

Perhaps understandably, when Chris then starts talking about 'painted ladies', no one is quite sure whether he is referring to butterflies or not...

Chris: Now I've go to say, I'm humble in defeat - if you'll excuse the pun. But here's the score on the fledging at the moment.

At this point Chris handed Kate a card with a number 2 on it and kept a zero for himself.

Chris: What does Chris know about fledging? A big zero. What does Kate know about fledging? Two.

Kate: Now I know you said you're not a betting man but I think you should put your hand in your pocket.

Chris: You just haven't earned it yet, baby...

So what exactly was going on?!

Well, do you remember my blog yesterday called "One for the musos out there" in which I said that Chris was having fun slipping song titles into each programme? You do? Good. Because he was at it again last night... but as usual he hadn't told Kate.

"What I had told Kate," says Chris, "was that it would be great if she could ask me to 'pay up' for losing the bet. Which she did. But not in those exact words... which is why it all went a bit weird!"

So that's the story behind Kate's speechlessness but what's the story behind the song titles?

"A friend of mine - probably my only friend - bet me I couldn't get a song title into every programme. Of course I took him up on the bet but wasn't sure which band to focus on. The Clash would be too early for many viewers as I thought we needed a band who were big in the Eighties. That's when I settled on The Smiths."

Congratulations to those of you who spotted what he was doing! There were a very clever few of you who noticed him say:

'Hand in glove' in the 1st episode
'What difference does it make' in the 2nd episode
'Handsome devil' in the 3rd episode
'Frankly Mr Shankly' in the 4th episode.
And of course 'you just haven't earned it yet, baby' was in the show last night.

So the question is, which of the Smith's songs do you reckon Chris will namecheck in future epsiode's? And in what context? Check out the comments on yesterday's blog for some excellent suggestions.