A watching brief was conducted on floor clearance operations at Sibthorpe dovecote. The watching brief took place on the 7th, 8th and 14th of November, whilst the clearance works ran from 7/11/2011 to 18/11/2011. Sibthorpe dovecote is a Grade 1 listed building and is part of Scheduled Ancient Monument 29908, “medieval village including monastic college, chapel, moat, fishponds, dovecote and open field system 200m south of Manor Farm”. Due to the condition of the roof and general neglect of the site the dovecote was classed as a Building at Risk. The interior of the dovecote contained large quantities of very dry twigs and dust. These were considered to be both health and fire risks. As part of a Nottinghamshire County Council Local Improvement Scheme project to improve the accessibility of the site this material was therefore cleared by workmen from Bonsers Restoration. Due to the sensitive nature of the site an archaeological watching brief on the clearance was undertaken by the author. Detritus consisting of twigs and dust up to 0.5m thick was removed from the interior of the dovecote. This material had been much disturbed by rabbits and in addition to their burrows, quantities of rabbit bones and a mummified rabbit were discovered. This upper layer also contained occasional flat stone (presumably fallen from the structure of the dovecote), broken plain tiles fallen from the roof and pieces of modern brick. Beneath the twig detritus a more compact, highly organic brown earth was encountered. This contained large stones, occasional plain tiles and fragments of twigs impressed into the upper surface. This was considered to be a layer of dirt built up upon the floor surface during use of the dovecote and hence excavation was stopped at this level. However, in places the floor had collapsed due to mining by the rabbits, particularly close to the walls. The holes provided a chance to examine what appeared to have been a crudely laid floor surface. This consisted of pieces of flat stone laid on bare earth. The stones were of different thickness so the floor was probably somewhat uneven. The rabbit burrows had thoroughly undermined this floor, particularly near the outer walls of the structure, leaving large voids immediately beneath the stones. During the watching brief it was also noted that, away from the dovecote, stone walls could be seen eroding out of the turf in several locations within the scheduled area.