Andrew Dawes on the Dipper

Available for over a year

A new series of Tweet of the Day for Sunday morning revealing personal and fascinating stories from some fresh voices who have been inspired by birds, their calls and encounters. In Northumberland the river Coquet is forced into a narrow and deep gorge known as the Thrum. As a child fifty years ago Tweet of the Day producer Andrew Dawes would settle himself on a rock downstream and wait for the arrival of the dipper taking advantage of the food rich torrent exiting the gorge. For him all those years ago he found dippers to be mesmerising little birds, bobbing up and down on a rock or dodging and weaving through the torrent before thrusting its head under the rapids in search of prey. Producer : Andrew Dawes, BBC Audio, Bristol Studio Engineer : Ilse Lademann