"The timing of the programme is important. Winterwatch would be Godot-like, an empty stage, but spring means British birdlife at its whizziest - all that mating and nest-building, laying and hatching, fledging and flying the nest. Three weeks is also the ideal narrative span, long enough to encompass young ones being born and leaving home, which for humans can take more than 30 years. And Oddie makes the perfect oddball front man, enthusiastic, well-informed (a passionate ornithologist long before he became a celebrity with The Goodies) and reassuringly old-fashioned in his vocabulary - it's a while since I heard someone say "blighters" and "flipping heck".
The series has had an impact far beyond viewing figures. When Springwatch featured the white-tailed eagle, there was a tenfold increase of traffic on the relevant webpage of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds. And when peregrine falcons were shown nesting on the Post Office Tower, The London Wildlife Trust was besieged by membership inquiries. The Oddie Effect is like the Delia (or Nigella or Jamie) Effect - and though the only gastronomic delight he has been recommending to viewers is mealworms, several suppliers of mealworms have since sold out. "
I confess that I usually find Oddie intensely irritating but in this series of programmes his obvious interest in the subject matter and his refreshing unwillingness to conform to the usual BBC presenter standards make him the ideal front man for the programme. But the real reason for success is the terrific wildlife pictures. Check out the programme website here.
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