Matt Baker admits ‘it was a nightmare’ as he shares struggle behind scenes of BBC show

Presenter Matt Baker has given fans a peek behind the scenes on one of the nation’s favourite TV shows, admitting that one aspect of the BBC set became “a nightmare”

Award-winning television presenter Matt Baker has opened up about one of his famous colleagues on a BBC show, admitting some aspects of working with them were “a nightmare”.

In his long career Matt, 48, has hosted many major programmes such as Countryfile, The One Show, and Matt Baker: Our Farm in the Dales. However, he is likely best known for his stint on iconic children’s show Blue Peter between 1999 and 2006, where he became a fan favourite.

During this period he also won two BAFTAs for Best Children’s Presenter, picking up the gongs in consecutive years. When he left in 2006 he exited with dog Meg, who had also become synonymous with the show.

In an interview with Harry Hill on The Harry Hill Show on YouTube, they discussed Meg, who died in 2011, when talk turned to his long stint on Blue Peter was brought up.

When Harry joked about Matt walking off “with the dog”, Matt quickly explained that Meg had never technically belonged to Blue Peter and had a fascinating story all of her own.

He explained: “The dog was never actually owned by Blue Peter because she came from a neighbour’s farm in Durham. She was a working collie.”

Meg’s appearance on the show, Matt described, came about as a result of a request he made during his audition for the long-running BBC programme.

He added: “It’s interesting because when I went down for the Blue Peter auditions, they said to me, ‘Of all the things that you’ve seen on Blue Peter recently, what would you have liked to have done?’ expecting me to say ‘Jump out of an aeroplane’.

“I said ‘Train the dogs…I’d like to train the dogs. I want a proper dog that can, you know, jump through fire hoops and do all of that and have an action dog, and this dog will come everywhere with me, and that’s what I’d love’. So I got Meg from a neighbour’s farm, she was a working sheep dog and she came down.”

However, when Matt brought Meg down, he soon realised there was an issue that came from Meg’s original training being contained within a studio environment.

He said: “I mean it was a nightmare having a working border collie in a Blue Peter studio. You can imagine, you’ve got the Harlem Globe Trotters warming up in the corner, you’ve got a BMX group and the doors are opening up because a double decker bus is about to come in and this dog is just desperate to round everything up.”

Nevertheless, Matt paid tribute to Meg as a “beautiful” dog and even revealed she soon learnt that the Blue Peter music meant she could have some free time.

He recalled: “She learned that the Blue Peter theme tune was her indication that my attention wasn’t going to be on and she could run off and do whatever she wanted.”

Matt is returning to the UK’s screens tonight (Sunday, October 4th) on Countryfile at 5.40pm on BBC One.