DORSET will be back on the small screen next week in a celebration of the season's beauty.

The BBC's Winterwatch is being broadcast from RSPB Arne in Dorset, the UK's first Super National Nature Reserve.

The live broadcasts will see presenters Chris Packham, Michaela Strachan and Iolo Williams broadcasting from Dorset on a nightly basis on BBC Two at 8pm from Tuesday, January, 16 until Friday, January 19.

Iolo Williams said he is happy to be back at Arne. He said: "We can look forward to seeing Arne at its brilliant best. Winter in and around Arne is a fantastic time. Some of the summer highlights are not there, the nightjars have gone back down to Africa. A lot of the reptiles will have disappeared underground into hibernation."

Dante Munns, RSPB Area Manager for Dorset, said: “We’re really excited to welcome back the BBC to RSPB Arne nature reserve.

"The nature reserve was home to Springwatch last year, which was a fantastic experience and we’re excited to welcome the BBC back to this special place. 

"We’re delighted that audiences will now be able to discover winter at RSPB Arne from the warmth and comfort of their sofas. We hope this series will demonstrate how resilient our wildlife has to become during these colder months, where daily survival becomes so much harder for them."

Chris Packham, who will be leading the presenting team, said he expects to see 'an enormous amount of activity'.

"There's always this lingering misconception that winter is a time of death and decay, where everything has hibernated or migrated, and it couldn't be further from the truth, there's always an enormous amount of activity.

"Practically, there are no leaves on the trees. It makes it easier to see some species. We get an enormous influx of waders and waterfowl from further north in Europe. Poole Harbour, Brownsea Lagoon, and the estuary areas around Arne itself will be filled full of those migrant birds.

"We probably won't see some species which 20 years ago, 30, 40 years ago would have been quite common in that area because it would have been much colder further north in Europe, but it isn't this year. So that will that will have an impact. So we'll be able to discuss that as well."

Gillian Burke will be reporting from the opposite end of the British Isles - she's in Orkney, which is closer to the Arctic Circle than it is to London. She's keen to showcase the wildlife that makes its home there.

"The archipelago sitting at the top of Scotland is one of the UK's best wildlife spots where spotting birds of prey, seals, dolphins, whales, the marine megafauna, is an everyday occurrence," she said.

Winterwatch is on BBC Two on Tuesday, January, 16.