An Exploration Of Earth's Natural Beauty | Wild Lives (Compilation)

[Music] our planet is full of life people places and animals inspiring filmmakers to explore finding new stories taking our song journeys of Discovery into our natural world this is wild lives foreign [Music] kilometers east of Africa nestled within the vast Indian Ocean lie the Seychelles scattered archipelago of granitic islands and coral atolls one of the most remote of these has become a sanctuary to a huge variety of Wildlife several species of turtles Rays crabs and other marine life [Music] [Music] this place is important for one animal in particular sharks when I first came here in 2013 we knew that there are sharks we didn't know how many this small isolated atoll has been has been Sanctuary to a staggeringly large population of sharks Ornella and the save our seas daras research center team set out to understand why [Music] foreign [Music] Island and Saint Joseph's atoll are situated on the amarantes bank the atoll comprises of 14 islets and a shallow Sandy Lagoon at low tide It Is encircled by an uninterrupted Reef such a dense population makes this an irresistible location for shark scientist Ornella wadelli foreign in order to have a natural ecosystem sharks are kind of the garbage man of the ocean so they're eating the weak one the old ones so it's both top down and bottom-up importance that sharks have on the ocean and the ocean has on sharks did by people wildlife and Saint Joseph's has thrived but just 250 kilometers Northeast on the inner Seychelles Islands the reality is very different foreign unlike other iconic species in Seychelles sharks are unprotected targeted by large fisheries and populations here are in Rapid decline following a global trend as a result traditional shot fishing practiced for centuries is now also unsustainable Seychelles is developing rapidly and has become a much more accessible destination than it once was adding to the strain on this group of small islands and its wildlife [Music] is one reason why the isolated Saint Joseph's atoll attracts such a diversity of species [Music] [Applause] [Music] over several years of careful observation team have gained some intriguing insights into the Dynamics of life in the atoms thank you [Music] the tides are changed with every moon phase it gets from very spring tide to low deep tight the atoll itself completely changes so it also changes for the animals that live in there at low tide a whiptail ray seeks protection in an isolated pool taking care not to become stranded in the midday Sun foreign each species has found a niche in relation to the rise and fall of these tides [Music] Red Land crabs descend to scour the exposed Shore for food as The Tide Rises they are forced to retreat to the forest meanwhile black tip sharks explore and forage in the sanctuary of the Lagoon but these juvenile sharks are not immune to the continual changes of the tide as the water rises they must move to the safety of the shallows the sharks have to be dynamic they have to be as dynamic as the atoll itself so they need to keep on moving in order to survive when it's full moon or New Moon the tides are very extreme and this allows bigger sharks like lemons to come in you see them cruising along the sand flat and potentially hump baby sharks lemon sharks are able to cross the frontier of the surrounding reef and move into the Lagoon with their excellent sense of hearing they can detect prey up to 100 meters away such as crabs rays and sharks [Music] foreign water and the Tangled Mangrove Roots offer some protection for a vulnerable black tip despite their size lemons can maneuver in this very shallow water often exposing their distinctive angular fins foreign they close in using special cells that detect the tiny electrical Fields given off by all living things [Music] a flexible cartilage skeleton enables him to contort in and around these confined spaces foreign this time the blacktip manages to slip away and the window of opportunity begins to close for the lemons it will be another 12 hours before they meet again at the next high tide [Music] Honduras and Ella prepares to go into the atoll to collect shark data which he hopes will prove the importance of Saint Joseph's she too can only access the Lagoon at high tide [Music] when we look at the Saint Joseph actor it looks like a perfect Paradise Island beautiful palm trees with the crystal clear wall there's the white sun but there's so many species living in there there needs to be enough space for them there needs to be enough food for them we usually start with what species is it what sex is it what time what's GPS location and after that we get into the more detailed information and Ryan will turn him upside down to see how his umbilical looks and that one is closed so you can write down number three we put a small microchip so in case of a recapture you can read the unique number of each individual okay D5 on the dots [Music] we got a one okay after a few minutes the shock is released back into the Lagoon [Music] cornella's vast amount of data will take considerable time to analyze but one thing is clear I had the most amazing time discovering this place over the last three years I've collected 651 individual sharks so we could for sure say it's a shark Nursery the most important thing for the actual think it's that it stays as it has been there's nobody living there there is no boats coming in no fishing activity and that's how it should stay and should be forever Saint Joseph's atoll is one of the few truly wild places that remain for sharks in a rapidly developing world it is vital we protect them thank you foreign [Music] S one of the most unique species on Earth the red panda is in grave Danger of Nepal has been fragmented into 300 small patches this rare animal is suffering due to human grade poaching cases of red panda has been dramatically increased there may be fewer than 2500 left in the wild but there is hope one woman has devoted her life to fight these forces determined to make a difference this is the Journey of the Firefox Guardian [Music] the remote forests of the Himalayas are the last remaining home to the Magnificent red panda lovingly called the Firefox an endangered species struggling to survive a devastating fur and petried but red panda network has come to the rescue working with Forest guardians from the local communities each month they head deep into the panda territory to gather important data and search for signs of poaching but they face a huge challenge red pandas are hard to find only a handful have ever seen them in the wild for one of them it's been a long road to become a guardian foreign [Music] foreign a previous track revealed an abandoned Nest a sure sign that a panda here has recently given birth foreign all right these dense bamboo forests can be dangerous but this is Panda Country as an umbrella species the pandasia contribute to the Natural Balance of this challenging environment it's the last week of April and Monsoon is on its way the team only have three days to complete their mission meanwhile the forest provides important Clues and later that morning the Guardians traced the empty nest foreign [Music] foreign but as always the Himalayas have other plans foreign [Music] foreign [Music] relaxer with Newfound Spirit the team follow a strategy to split up in search of the panda as they head deeper into the forest excitement grows menuka catches a glimpse of red oh there we go but the Moss here plays tricks on even the Explorer die and despite their bright red coat the pandas are well hidden by these Misty jungles but menuka has worked hard to see more than most foreign to find the young panda darkness in this Forest brings leopards and black bears for now the team must stop their search and seek shelter [Music] [Music] so far the team have had no success but knowing this might be their last chance to find the young panda they decide to explore an area where the trail is even more dangerous [Music] [Music] thank you [Music] [Laughter] [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] finding this cup is another success for the Firefox Guardians giving menuka hope that what she has fought to achieve is still helping to secure the future of her firefoxes [Music] [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] Forest a famous star is facing his toughest performance a superb liar bird called The Pretender and his greatest fan is Jan [Music] male lion Birds must compete to win the hearts of females The Pretender is the reigning champion but having lost a critical part of his costume he has just one long tail feather left [Music] and remained the great Pretender each winter the Dandenong ranges near Melbourne hosts the annual liar bird breeding contest [Music] with lights stages and dazzling costumes [Music] the competition is fierce and only the best performing males will secure a mate this normally requires two curved tail feathers called lyrates that's how the liar bird got its name [Music] pretender's story is known due to the hard work of one lady I just think he's magnificent known as the lion bird lady Jan and her team of liar bird enthusiasts have been watching the population here for nearly 60 years [Music] we've got certain favorites that we love I've probably spent more time than other people always Pretender [Music] he's such a Placid bird you can't get quite close to him Jan has followed Pretender for more than half a decade she's won his Trust and made him into something of a celebrity I think he quite likes the camera I think he does he didn't initially so we used to say Pretender you've got to get more um person friendlies particularly for photographers [Music] but this year Jan is worried that Pretenders time at the top may be under threat ah one feather that's sad isn't it that one lie right that's a bit embarrassing something has been detecting him and he's dropped these as a decoy to get away from the fox I would imagine it's a fox it's like entering your leg if you're a sportsman and you you do a knee injury or something like that and you can't play footy for the rest of the season [Music] Jan can only guess what the impact will be I don't think any of us know what happens when a bird tile is damaged as far as I can see he's behaving absolutely normally he's trying he's calling he's getting engaged in territorial Chase he's defending his territory but if it's about his dance his core and his display [Music] one will be making that a girl can tell that there's something missing [Music] as Dawn breaks males from all around are warming up [Music] the first thing you hear is kookaburras and then you hear the live Birds calling in the top of the trees and then they tend to start singing against each other singing in unison with each other it is the Battle of the bird mimics and Pretender is an incredible ventriloquist I love his kookaburra I love his whip bird and my absolute favorite is the little Twitty Birds but now it's the costume round and Pretender could be in trouble and as Rivals move in on his territory his vulnerability is showing [Music] a younger male in full feather makes his move the pretender's patch [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] ER wins and Pretender is knocked off his perch [Music] [Music] the next morning Pretender is nowhere to be seen you should put a radio tracker on it [Music] it is the first time Jan has been unable to find him there's not even a peep out of him I was just not College but we are very near where the girls got her nest it seems Pretenders territory was worth fighting for a young female has moved in maybe she doesn't know what to expect or she's not as discriminating against a male that's got a poor tail and her inexperience is also showing in other ways the school's Nest to me is like a gypsy's caravan it's got everything hanging off everywhere every time I've seen her run from her nest it's always been with moss and normally but it's time you slept much worse to their nest me and just when all seems to be lost there's another surprise [Applause] Pretender makes his entrance [Music] and the young female can't help but notice there's a little thing going on between those two if I was a mother of that boy I'd say hmm I think he's got a new girlfriend [Music] [Music] foreign [Applause] with a damaged display [Music] a few days later Jan and her team find promising evidence of Pretenders success when she's mated there's a little indentation in the in the um Mound and then there's some feathers yeah there's been a mating on this man it definitely looks like yep but can the cameras reveal the proof oh look at this gee I wonder he might have made it there look at that so there's the female and he's dancing around her so maybe all is not lost and there she is there so usually when she stops circling like that and he gets behind it that usually means he's in with a chance [Music] it's great yeah it's great it's means that although he's got a lie right missing he's still able to mate maybe tail isn't as important as we thought it was maybe it's all about your song and your dance [Music] good honey [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] foreign no ladies [Music] in Sonora Mexico in the rolling Sierra Madre Mountains a small population of jaguars struggles to avoid Extinction hunting and conflict with Ranchers have shrunk in their range making these last Borderlands Jaguars the most northern population in the Americas [Music] but in this unforgiving land ranchers also struggle to survive battling severe drought cattle disease and hungry predators here is so at the heart of this Patchwork of cattle ranches lies the 55 000 acre Northern Jaguar Reserve here water flows year round and vegetation is abundant attracting a variety of species from North and South it provides a safe haven for Jaguars and other Wildlife as long as they stay within the boundaries Miguel Ramirez a biologist for the reserve knows firsthand the importance of this unique location is America this is foreign foreign [Music] tormented foreign is a foreign mm-hmm dentist and fellow Rancher Diego knows everyone in town and uses his influence to bring ranchers and biologists together is [Laughter] foreign this is the principal is with Diego as a catalyst the northern Jaguar project started the viviendo confelinos program and others followed warming to the idea that jaguars can be more valuable alive than dead foreign [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] foreign relation [Music] now 12 Ranch owners agree not to harm any Wildlife effectively doubling the size of the reserve every month Miguel gives each Ranchero Del Jaguar photos taken from the camera traps on their lands foreign foreign [Music] [Music] thank you Laguna is [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] foreign [Music] foreign [Music] foreign [Music] [Laughter] mountains of Slovakia much has changed since the time Tales of Broderick were told [Music] old ways have been abandoned and traditional life on the farm is Vanishing but now a threat from the past has returned to the forest threatening the livestock dogs like bodrick maybe the only way for Shepherds to protect their flocks [Music] can the Shepherds look to their past for a solution to this new problem [Music] Slovakia Anton yancho still uses the old ways to protect his flock the farm lies at the edge of a national park that a growing number of predators call home [Music] right now [Music] while the shepherds are hard at work something is lurking in the forest watching the Sheep but the Shepherds can rest easy knowing that the Sheep are protected the animals in the forest are also being watched by a group of chuvach dogs they stand guard searching for threats and sensing if anything is wrong [Music] [Music] but now with his truevax dogs and Tom's sheep are safe across the mountains to the east chuvach dongs on another Farm are dealing with an even larger Predator brown bears hunt in the woods outside of this Farm if dushan isn't Vigilant his sheep could be the next meal these Bears have oh they attack foreign foreign has been a breeder for over 20 years and knows everything about the legacy of the chuvatch foreign they were part of a much larger life in the mountains [Music] then everything started to change [Music] after World War II shifts in populations and urbanization led to a decline in farming across Slovakia as the people left the farms and moved to Villages the dogs went with them and started to become a domestic pet chuvach dogs like the ones at yanin Ranch live a very different life to those that live on the farm instead of guarding sheep these dogs are being groomed to compete in dog shows but these truevatch pets aren't for everyone foreign it's hard to imagine it growing up to be a fierce fighting guard dog and while these pet dogs look quite similar to their guard dog cousins their physiology has changed dramatically through breeding the dogs have become smaller their personality might also be changing which is troubling to one young scientist zuzana buzakova studied the breed and is worried that they're losing their guard dog capabilities there are around 1200 pet chuvach in Slovakia far fewer serving as guard dogs on the farm however an opportunity to increase the number of guard dogs May lie in Slovakia's changing forests they once teamed with predators they played an important role in balancing the ecosystem wolves in particular help to keep the deer population under control these Predators weren't always held in such high regard and by the start of the 20th century they were hunted out [Music] now these predators are making a comeback protected by law and changing attitudes but when these Predators move into their old territories problems with Shepherds can still occur yes foreign [Music] foreign guard dogs the Shepherds that used to defend against the walls of a new rule yeah [Music] with the ability to prevent human Predator conflicts these livestock guard dogs actually help restore balance back to the mountains and breeders like Susanna are making sure that the true match is up to the tasks um [Music] James returned to the old traditions of Slovakia may be the key to a new era of balance for the chuvach and the Wolf IBA [Music] hey so priola foreign [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] the hero nandir flag nothing is foreign [Music] [Music] of over a hundred species of Lima found in Madagascar almost all of which are endangered like ninety percent of Madagascar's Wildlife they are found nowhere else [Music] Madagascar is an ancient Island separated from Africa for over 160 million years much of the land was once covered by Lush rainforest but now the trees have been felled what isn't used for agriculture has been left barren seasonal burning stops the forest growing back houring cliffs fragment remains this is Anza Beacon of Hope and the last refuge for the monkey [Music] yeah concerned that the forest was disappearing a group of local people formed a Community Association to protect Anza and the Lemurs on um foreign [Music] the association also established an entrance fee for the forest which is used to fund a local school many members now earn their living taking tourists to see the Lemurs in the forest is foreign [Music] [Music] as Madagascar's most famous Lima many people come here just to see them over the years they have gradually become accustomed to people [Music] nowadays they have little to fear from humans but this wasn't always the case [Music] if uh [Music] one fantastic [Music] as the association brings real benefits to the local people they have come to see the value of the forest That Remains and their feelings towards the animals changing too um [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] now that the association is well established the True Legacy of Anza has become clear you need me do we say something boy who says foreign [Music] [Music] populations are drastically declining here at Anza the population is over 400 strong for its size Anza has the highest density of Maki in Madagascar [Music] the future is uncertain for much of Madagascar's Wildlife but it answer at least seems the Maki are safe foreign [Music] Island lurks a creature with a fearsome reputation foreign devil but due to their legendary brawls [Music] this irritable icon is now facing disaster and maybe in desperate need of our help [Music] foreign [Music] the first European settlers arrived in Tasmania they were met by blood curdling shrieks [Music] little did they know that this terrifying sound came from an animal only the size of a small dog but these little Devils earned themselves a formidable reputation seven times [Music] it seems these pint-sized Predators have found their way to the top of the food chain [Music] when the dingo arrived the thylacine or Tasmanian tiger and the devil became extinct on the mainland of Australia but we re we managed to retain all those species in Tasmania we didn't have the dingo in Australian ecosystems where our fauna are mostly marsupials our equivalent of the bone-eating hyena or the gray wolf is the Tasmanian devil however unlike the wolf or hyena Devils prefer a solitary life they only meet when they have to [Music] thank you when they mate and eat [Music] while they're the biggest pouch predator on the island they rarely hunt large prey the majority of their food is scavenged but scavenge carcasses attract others foreign and that means sharing [Music] to thrive in such a competitive environment the Devils have had to adapt it has very robust teeth and Jaws for eating bone and consuming the hard parts of carcasses and a notoriously bad temper [Applause] they do not get along so things usually flare up over dinner Devils bite each other and they bite each other a lot around the face into the mouth they can inflict deep wounds as they squabble over food you know but while this aggression appears brutal it actually plays a very important role in Devil life the Battle Scars are a badge of honor the side of a successful scavenger not to mention an attraction to females come mating season but more recently their love of fighting could be the devil's downfall [Music] it may be natural but this aggression has also led to a catastrophic series of events well I'm a I'm an immunologist and I'm particularly interested how cancer escape the immune system around about 1996 one female devil developed a cancer a photographer was taking photos in a place called Mount William and he sort of wondered why the devil population was a bit low but he also I noticed some deals with his horrible lesions and that was there were facial human disease and dftd as it came to be known was no ordinary cancer it's devil and then get another devil and transmitted a few cancer cells when you think of all the cancer there are and there's only three types of transmissible cancers it is extremely rare this tough and testy Tasmanian icon was suddenly vulnerable to a rare and deadly cancer and due to the devil's naturally aggressive behavior the disease now threatened to spread across the island all right and then that was transmitted to a second devil and then and from two Devils to four and it's been transmitted across most of the Tasmania over just 20 years the disease has eliminated some 80 percent of tasmania's devils but while some scientists have been looking for ways we can help the devil Manor Jones believes an answer May lie with the Devils themselves Mena has been focusing on a problem created by the devil's mating behavior as males and females fight during the breeding season transmission of the cancer increases devils are getting the disease when they first become reproductively mature because that's when they start biting other individuals and getting bitten and they are dying within six to 12 months of reproducing so they're dying at very young ages but men are on her team then discovered an extraordinary change in the devil's Behavior where there's very high mortality there's very strong selection pressure for the animal to survive we're finding that one of the responses to the disease is that devils are breeding much earlier they're breeding is teenagers only four or five months after they're weaned and they're tiny little animals there it seems the Devils have started to mate before they are exposed to the disease this remarkable adaptation has slowed down the spread of the cancer and has given other scientists like Greg Woods a chance to come up with their own solution it's my total research now understanding Immunology behind Dental facial tumor disease the next step is you need to develop a vaccine to protect elves from getting the tumor rather than curing Devils with established disease people would ask well vaccines aren't very useful in human cancers but the problem with human cancers is that we all get a different cancer but while this cancer can potentially be fought with a vaccine it will take time to develop the biggest challenges are developing a strong vaccine getting access to enough animals and test testing enough animals in the wild it's quite it's quite an interesting challenges lots of questions we still have to ask oh with time running out for the Tasmanian devil it seems these Infamous Brawlers have found an even more remarkable way to fight back despite our best efforts Mena has discovered an even more extraordinary response to the disease so for the first 10 or more years populations were declining precipitously and we haven't seen any further population decline in those areas since 2008 we have also recorded rapid evolution in the genome now if you put all of those three things together I think we are seeing the early signs of the evolution of resistance to the disease I think we're going to see changes sooner rather than later and not only are they fighting back they are doing so incredibly quickly I've been talking about Evolution for 10 years now but I was thinking maybe 20 30 years we might see some evolution of resistance in the devils and I think we're seeing it you know within eight years of local outbreak so people talk about you know we're going to find a Magic Bullet or a silver bullet but really the Magic Bullet is evolution and it's really a matter of watch this space it appears this little devil with a big attitude is doing battle with a deadly disease and some believe they may even be winning [Music] foreign [Music] remember quite clearly walking into a small clearing getting close to the Heron colony I looked up and I was right underneath an eagle nest we realized these Eagles were nesting right amongst the herons then this just didn't seem to match with what we understood you sort of assume the eagle is nesting near the herons because they're preying on the herons most people don't know the story hello hi it's Stephen Hey Stephen come on up thanks come on in as you know we have a heron Colony down here below us Heron's moved here and I've been watching them for 17 years yeah herons come every year which is just remarkable and just love to watch them arrive and they they mate and then the babies come foreign little chicks that are getting torn to shreds right in front of you so uh yeah there's definitely some some conflicting emotions there [Music] coming down to get some pictures of herons [Laughter] well maybe maybe that's it yeah just good to see people out looking at herons and my name is Rob Butler and I have a PhD in Zoology from the University of British Columbia my name is Ross venisland the field I was in was behavioral ecology yeah I mean Ross was one of my students that's a good question I I've worked on a lot of different birds through the years but herons definitely have a special place in my heart I guess I have this sort of weird ungainly Elegance that I find attractive [Music] foreign [Music] on the coast of BC here we have the fenini subspecies of great blue heron the subspecies numbers about four or five thousand birds and they're considered a species of special concern here in Canada [Music] that's funny the neighborhood hasn't changed very much since I was here this is where the old Point Roberts colony was be interesting to see if there's still nests in there [Music] aha now here's some uh some remains of nests around here it looks like a whole Branch should come down here that held a nest this would have been the materials that uh that the herons were using so back in the day when when this was all Heron colonies this was a crazy active environment hundreds of herons the noise was unbelievable now it's just a quiet Forest mostly thanks to the Eagles just a few years ago these trees were home to more than a hundred Heron nests that's until a group of eagles moved into the area terrorizing the birds and eating their chicks and their eggs [Music] foreign [Music] [Applause] [Music] shocked when this place abandoned it was our biggest longest lived colony but also very happy that they resettled not too far away so uh this is a tawasan colony this is where the birds moved when they left pointy Roberts we were quite surprised they moved in here with a level of development but even more surprising was they they moved in and surrounded the active eagle nest that was here foreign [Music] at that point the herons were the ones following the Eagles around and uh yeah it's just such a surprise like why would herons be nesting so close to this eagle oh yeah yeah look at that right there that picture says it all so about four out of five of the herons in the lower Fraser Valley are nesting around Eagle nests like this the eagle is a major predator of herons so why would they nest there foreign 2006 we had a really big Windstorm here I mean I think the wind speed was essentially a hurricane Force it blew the eagle nest in Chilliwack out of the tree and the Heron Colony started to do worse the number of young that were raised in that Colony dropped dramatically the following year the Eagles came back built their nest and the number of young increased we knew that the herons were nesting with the Eagles and we knew that they were doing better by doing so but how did this actually work [Music] Eagles set up big nests and they're very territorial around these nests I seem to be looking up too though and oh look there's a couple more Eagles over here so that's what they picked up on and there's another one over there well any Eagle that gets closer to the nest of the nesting Eagle here will be chased away an analogy we came up with was the mafia protection racket [Music] the mafia is making life difficult for the population near them the eagle will take some of the chicks and some of the eggs but they're also offering some level of protection look at this one coming down here we're gonna get something oh look look look here there's the chase it's chasing them off foreign has provided a safe place for them to Nest by keeping all the other eagles away there it is look at them go whoa look at he's coming down down down down [Music] so the herons that are nesting near Eagles are essentially sacrificing some of their young for an overall protection the herons know exactly what they're up to you gotta remember that you only have one pair of eagles around that big Colony whereas if you're out away from an eagle nest you've got all the eagles with their eyes on you for the herons it's kind of the the devil you know versus the devil you don't know and in this case it's better the devil you know than the devil you don't foreign [Music] -tailed Sea Eagle is Britain's largest bird of prey for many it is the king of Scotland's Skies once extinct on these Shores the sea eagle has now returned and made the Isle of Mull its home it'll always be known as the first place that they bred it was those early pioneering Birds which set the scene for the return of the white-tailed eagle however for others their presence brings Peril it must be really easy if you oh you're into these Eagles and you just see Eagles Eagles and you blinker yourself from what happens beyond that foreign [Music] local rspb officer Dave Sexton has been watching and monitoring sea eagles on the Isle of miles since the early 80s today he's traveling deep into the heart of tyrolan forest to visit a very special pair of eagles Fingal and Iona we know this pair really well the female was hatched in 1998. she's a Scottish bird from Northwest Scotland um but the male here is actually a Norwegian import from 1997. so they're good mature Birds now and have been raising chicks for for many years this year the pier have a hungry new mouth to feed but already there has been tragedy after losing their first chick of the season Al and Iona must now work harder than ever to raise their only surviving eaglet helping to restore the sea Eagle's original population we've got 21 22 pairs at the moment it's been between 20 and 22 pairs for about the last five years there is still room here for more and we're not there yet whilst Dave has seen the population improve 100 years ago it was a very different story and we had systematically exterminated this bird which was once the commonest eagle across the UK and there we are we've just done it we've got rid of the last one fearing that these prolific Hunters would prey on sheep they were hunted leading to their untimely demise in Scotland but 50 years later conservationists hatched a plan to reintroduce the native sea eagle from Norway and one of those pioneering Birds was Fingal who like Dave was eventually drawn to the magic of the Isle of Mull we were driving back along a sea lock and we knew the sea eagles might be around they'd been released on rum but they were beginning to explore and one or two sightings from Mal and suddenly as we were driving back there was this massive bird flapping hard across quite low over the water over the sea lock and we leapt out the vehicle and there was a seal and it was just an incredible experience and that's what really inspired me to get involved in this project that brings the Eagles back to Scotland I made a nuisance of myself ready by pestering the the guys in species protection department and I was sent on the secret mission to protect the only pair of nesting sea eagles in Britain Dave continues to fight to protect the sea eagles here and this year his thoughts are on the future of Fingal and Iona today he's heading down to their nest the team from the rspb what we're doing is trying to ring the chick of this pair the ringing process is is really important because it helps us monitor the overall population Justin and Lewis are now going to be measuring getting the ring on it's a British cholesterol Anthology ring on one leg and a color ring with big letters on on another leg that we'll be able to read hopefully from a distance the team begins a long and dangerous claim to the Erie they must work fast so the family aren't Disturbed for long [Music] The Nest you notice the check is unusually docile showing very little resistance then as they prepare to leave the chicken piece the remains of its last meal catches their eye when we go up to visit white Todd Eagle nests we sometimes find Lambs in there so we know they carry them in the question is how did they get them did they kill them did they scavenge them were the Lambs stillborn so many questions for hill farmers in mall the Sea Eagle is a real source of concern Ian McKay and his partner Claire simonetta fear for the lives of their flock as the sea Eagle's taste for lamb has once again brought the farmers and Eagles into conflict basically it's lament time you know that we really get the problems with the seagulls and they do you know take a lot of young Lambs it's an easy pay you know for anybody to turn around so you know they won't touch us sitting there it's it's easy to get at so really predominantly that time of year they go for lambs certainly in the years I've been here I've seen just how many lambs can potentially be taken by this eagle because the peak time for Eagles to feed their chicks coincides with lambing season Claire and Ian decided to try something different in 2014 we actually trialled an earlier alarming season so our Lambs were born a lot earlier than the ones on the neighboring farms and that actually resulted in all the local seagulls being drawn into our own area and just feeding on our alarms because that was the first lamb crop available for them as an easy food source and we had to wear slamming and in our own record since we've taken on this farm so that was really an eye-opener to to this eagle and as the Island's resident rspb officer it is Dave who is the first to receive any complaints inevitably some of them will take a few Lambs each year as well golden eagles and seagulls they're big predators they're going to take a few Lambs whilst research and Studies have shown a lot of lands that are taken are already dead or sickly in some way maybe previously injured by other birds like hooded crows that can do a huge amount of damage they're either not believed or they're thought to be biased in some way but there is a much more enlightened attitude in the public people want to see these birds they deserve to be here and we just need to find practical pragmatic solutions to helping the farmers live alongside them but no Dave thinks he has found a solution luring the Eagles away from sheep farms and back to their natural Coastal Home has really helped the local farmers and even created a new tourism industry I think what we do does Health Farmers because if you want to stop a particular apprentices eating one source of food give it another it certainly takes the pressure off the birds at a time when they are under pressure to feed their young obviously if they're eating fish then that's doing good for the chicks and they're not taking other things either Martin kyvers has been feeding these Eagles for a decade by mimicking fishing boats that throw fish scraps over the side hungrily taken by opportunist Eagles people will flock for miles to get a glimpse of their impressive hunting display [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] but whilst the relationship between these predators and Farmers is beginning to change the sea eagles of Mal still face natural challenges Dave's concerns are now mounting for the safety of Fingal Iona and their check some really unseasonably bad weather closed in storm Hector as it was known very strong winds cold and wet torrential rain the storm battled the island and Nest relentlessly Iona could do nothing but keep the chick dry as best she could [Music] but the next morning Dave and his team could see that the inside of the Mist remained eerily still our climbers went back in and very sadly found the chick had died during the storm in hindsight it was very well behaved it wasn't that feisty and it's always good if a chick puts up a bit of a fight so it was a sickly chick unfortunately and the storm the bad weather was was the final straw so a really sad end um for that pair you know you just you look at them and they just look a bit bewildered and they're looking at an empty nest um yeah it's it's heart-wrenching to watch [Music] whilst it's a sad end to this season Al and Iona will have another chance next year the Isle of Mull is a real sea eagle success story and now a sensory sensor Extinction opinions are beginning to change the seagull my own personal opinion is it's a big vulture slim creature but it is Iconic there's no doubt about that and I'm not here to say I want to see them eradicated I don't hold grudge against the eagle the eagle is an animal that's just trying to make a living if the Lamb's an easier prey than a fish you can hardly blame it we would all do the same so the bird deserves no hatred or anything [Music] whilst some still see these aerial Predators as a menace for many they have become an integral part of this island Mal is one of the key spots for the now across Scotland it'll always be known as the first place that they bred that'll never be taken away so people will always come here and the economic value of them will continue to increase I hope sea eagles continue to thrive and I hope they continue to spread across Scotland into their former haunts the future for the Sea Eagle is still very much in the hands of the people who share their Highland home but here on mall they are once again succeeding and even benefiting the island like never before here in a land Where Eagles Dare Eagles thrive [Music] in 2006 Daniel was a 13 year old school boy living in a poor community on the edge of Savo Kenya's largest National Park this is his story I was in primary [Music] my father died which was caused by a buffalo I was left with the three siblings one sister and two brothers my dream was just becoming a pilot [Music] my name is Daniel Zuma I live in the travel corridor around mango Village and we're bordering in the traveling East and a few ranches on the west side [Music] five of us in our family [Music] and the two siblings who are still in school they are all depending on me [Music] it's really hard getting a job in this Village because basically it's a small village no big companies and stuff so I don't know this is really really a big problem my dad was just a subsistence farmer and apart from that my dad used to ban charcoal to provide extra cash like Daniel's father many here rely on illegal and risky activities to earn a living because they have few options [Music] so when Daniel's father was killed by Buffalo the community mourned but nobody blamed him life with your parents is really smooth not that tough as compared to when you lose your parents tragedy and poverty had conspired against Daniel but he was determined to get back on his feet he wrote letters for sponsorship to pay his school fees when he succeeded he kept on dreaming dreaming big my dream was just becoming a pilot that a commercial pilot flying commercial aircraft but it was just a dream because it with the frustration after my parent died I did that point think that one day I'll become a pilot because of the foundations Daniel's luck was about to change [Music] I started helping around Wildlife Works at their workshop [Music] Wildlife Works owns a sanctuary that connects two of Kenya's largest national parks via an essential Wildlife corridor this Corridor is also home to Daniel and 10 000 others living in such close proximity conflict is inevitable seven thousand cases of human Wildlife conflict in Kenya each year is old in the death of at least 100 people and countless more wild animals foreign Rob a gyrocopter pilot Rob was in charge of a wildlife aerial surveillance team [Music] he took me to college and I attend my diploma Aeronautical Engineering I started working at his Hannah taking care of his aircraft the sanctuary between the national parks is vast it's incredibly hard to protect with only Ground Forces have become an essential tool for protect wildlife and helping reduce conflict with people apparently I'm helping with surveillance we got everybody with a top speed three times that of an off-road vehicle geracopters can respond rapidly to call out in remote and hard to reach areas having the gyrocopter Airborne having eyes in the sky enables us to identify where the problems are and get our range of force in to sort those problems out as quickly and as efficiently and as safely as possible when are we out flying we usually check out for poachers sometimes we get bad things like an elephant down through poaching of 13 elephants found dead in a sanctuary between September and November 2016. over 2 was shot poisoned or snared I've been living in a travel Corridor for all of my life but I never known the importance of wildlife till I started Living drug [Music] my passion changed all the way when I come back to Wildlife learning how important Wildlife is conserving it is and that's what has changed my passion to becoming a bush pilot which will make me fly around conserving my life every day foreign the first time I was kind of scared flying because I've never flown before you know but with time flying with Rob I got used to that and I loved to fly more and more [Music] and then tragedy struck again in March 2017 robbed suddenly passed away when robbed tragedy cam it just raised the bone that was like held when I lost my parents back [Music] Rob was like her that to me he showed me lost and lost especially on the conservation part [Music] he's taught me everything living with everything taught me how to fly taught me to how to sail he taught me how to drive [Music] that's how I remember yeah I'll I'll probably never forget him all of my life in the 12 months before his death Rob Daniel and the surveillance team flew over 600 hours and covered nearly 60 000 kilometers the elephant population here Rose by 600 over the same period I would like to be a gyro pilot so he keep his legacy running on [Music] [Music] five Yankee Charlie Bravo uniform flying low level around your king garage and traffic plays the device foreign [Music] [Music] foreign was just becoming a bush pilot conserving my life every day every moment always [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] for me nature is a place where I can escape to you just exist there and then it's mindfulness [Music] I can completely lose myself in the smallest detail and I come out of the ocean like as a new person [Music] I grew up in bulande which is a small archipelago of the western coast of Norway it's quite isolated in many ways because you have to take the ferry from the mainland and then drive from Island to Ireland to get to the island where I grew up it's a small but thriving Community where everyone knows everyone and it's very safe most of the people here work with something that has to do with the Fisheries there's quite a few big fishing boats in the village and they go all the way up to the north of Norway and they fish for Herring called mackerel and safe so growing up here is I guess a bit different from most other childhoods growing up here in the ocean is a big part of our life but I think I was the one that was definitely the most interested in nature I don't know why but that's just how it was I was always very interested in insects and the stuff that drifted up on the beach and I had my huge collection of spiders so I was always a bit different [Music] so the challenge of growing up in a small place like this is that you don't always have someone else that shares your interest I didn't have anyone else that was really keen on nature the way that I was so I was doing a lot of stuff just on my own so moving away from the islands and studying my passion marine biology was really good because then then I met everyone else they were also interested in nature so I wasn't the outsider anymore being somewhere else learning about nature and coming back here and seeing everything that we have here it just made me appreciate it so much more because I didn't realize when I was a kid how special this place is I think that most places on land have been explored by humans by now but in the ocean there's so much left to explore and no one has seen these sites before so I'm the first one to explore them and it's so exciting a lot of people think that there's not much to see in the colder Waters here in Norway and Sweden but you have schools of fish you have an enemy walls you have nudibrang bright colors fascinating animals there's so much to see even just when you go snorkeling [Music] but I'm scared that all this is going to be lost so one of the major environmental problems that we're facing now is there's so much litter especially plastic ending up in the oceans every year and it's a huge problem a couple of years ago I went for a walk here on the island and I found a dead gannet they had a rope around its beak so it had started to death I picked it up and brought it home and I assembled the skeleton so that I could exhibit it and show people what the plastic in the ocean does to the animals that live there [Music] so a lot of plastic end up in the ocean and breaks into tiny pieces and then animals eat it because they mistake it for food foreign so it's going to have a lot of consequences for us as well because the tiny pieces of plastic that are covered in pollutants they return to us through our seafood and it's going to affect our health in the future so I get frustrated I think when people don't care about nature because if someone throws plastic in the ocean it's going to have a consequence for all of us even for our children and grandchildren I think a lot of people have lost their close connection to Nature even people working with nature and in nature and depending directly on nature there's no ways appreciate it for what it's worth I mean we are so dependent on it and we all sometimes take it completely for granted but as long as people are not able to see what's there they're not gonna care so much about it and so that's what I try to do get to get people beneath the surface the projects that I work on are focused on what we call NAD Natori in Norwegian so nanator describes the nature that surrounds us every day because I think that people are more likely to connect to that nature and if they connect to it and appreciate it that they are more likely to want to protect it I made a couple of films about Marine litter to tell people about how serious this problem is and also try and Inspire them to find solutions for the problem and last year we made an outdoor photo exhibition to show people here what they're out to see in the shallows and so we took photos from the local environment just under people's floating docks just outside their houses when they get the information about what's there people get interested and they want to try it out so following the exhibition three women from the island asked if I could take them snorkeling because they wanted to see for themselves what's there [Music] they're not your typical diver they've never tried diving or snorkeling before they've never even tried a dive mask on so it will be interesting to see what they think of it I was a bit worried about the snorkeling with the ladies today because it's still only 10 degrees in the water even though it's June and it's been really windy so the challenge was to find a site where I could show them nice enough things for them to get excited about it but we just came back out of the water and it was a success they were really happy and they didn't think it was cold actually [Music] and they thought it was really beautiful I think there's nature everywhere even in a city but it's really hard to compete with shopping and materialism and TV and all these things but I think that once you get people outside and actually get them to see what's there if I can manage to get them fascinated you know you can get past the ID that they have that nature is a bit boring because there's nothing more fascinating than nature I think there's so many fun things to do and it's so much Beauty and so many stories to tell [Music] I don't think there's any point in pointing fingers because people aren't going to change if you do that so I try to inform people in a neutral way and Inspire them because we we don't have to give up anything we just have to change our ways so I think we should just all try and find a solution together and think about our children and grandchildren [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] Nigeria it has the highest rate of deforestation in the world but there are still pockets of forest left in one of these Pockets a passionate team of conservationists are about to attempt the largest primate release ever with 200 monkeys to release will they be able to get them all out of the sake [Music] beneath Affy Mountain like some of Nigeria's last primary rainforest in this wild place the forest is disappearing at an alarming rate giving way to Cocoa Farms but in this last remaining jungle there's a strange and charismatic monkey and there are some who are fighting for its survival we arrived here on an Overland trip in 1988 and it was a lot more for us then there was a lot less people across River state was really a peaceful place with a lot of beautiful forests and we became more interested in this animal called the drill which nobody knew anything about very little was ever written about it so we started a program for drills a truck makes its way from Joe Ranch into the local Village of guancho to buy animal food and to pick up their staff who are from the local community what Peter and his partner Liza started 27 years ago with a few orphaned drills is now a hugely successful breeding program and the time has finally come to release the first group of 200 into the wild Emmanuel has fed the drills every day for 12 years he's built trust that will be an important part to persuading them to leave their enclosure so we are just gonna go in and feed them they like mango so that's what I see there making some creamy sound of hungry yeah so they always do that when they see their fluoride food [Music] I see them three times in a day sometimes when we have less food we give them two times but my favorite view is the is Glory because she's she's close to human she's friendly she she takes what I'm giving her by hand she always make a sign that will make you come close to her for grooming [Music] thank you there are as few as 3 000 drills left in Africa they live in groups of 30 led by a large brightly colored alpha male these smaller groups often band together to form supergroups of over a hundred one of the largest group sizes of any Forest dwelling mount fighting is a big part of life in such groups but no tussle is irreconcilable and as soon as they've started fights are usually forgotten drill Ranch is the most successful breeding center in the world for drills and it owes much of its success to its Forest location without trees drills would have nowhere to sleep at night the nursery was just set up as an old example of what people could do here and it was one of one of the things I loved the most in this place and is what visitors absolutely adored as well the idea of doing it was to show people you know you can do this stuff our biodiversity and our environment is the mother of everybody here and we dare not lose it [Music] I always expect to play with some little things like butterflies lizard and uh I don't like killing so and I don't feel like eating bush meat I've been for 12 years working every time so I enjoy working with the climate my favorite part of the day is when I make sure my animals have food and also they have drinking water [Music] it's the first time we we are going to release the trees so I'm tracking them following them whenever they lose some of the malls gonna be all colors so the team to gauge the success of the release they need to know what happens to the drills in the wild they've chosen to fit five dominant males with radio collars as where these males go is likely a loyal group of females won't be far behind it's an important part of such a pioneering Endeavor and ultimately crucial for the drill's survival peterheads one final meeting with the release team as Emmanuel knows the drill is better than anyone they ask his opinion on the potential problem we have to go through and run all the what ifs I have backup plans have people assigned do you think they're all going to leave or some will stay in the enclosure yeah if you keep them hungry they will all follow that if they have something in their stomach someone would like to stay behind people should keep their distance from them but be there if they decide to start going the wrong way to kind of discourage them distract them back onto this direction and if you're challenged by a male at least run towards wildlife sanctuary with the collars fitted and a plan in place the team need to act fast everything now rests on tomorrow the day of the release [Music] as the sun goes down the drills go up into the trees where they spend the night together in their family groups most of the drills here have spent their whole lives in this enclosure and they know these treats well if the release goes according to plan tomorrow they'll have the whole Forest to choose from [Music] Peter hopes that Emmanuel will be able to coax the drills out of the back of the enclosure with wheelbarrows of bananas and bread everyone else will stay out of sight so as not to scare the troops forming a barrier in the bush the idea is to direct the drills onto Ackley Mountain far enough from local farms where they would likely cause trouble with the fence open the drills are free to leave all that's left is for a manual to show them the way out [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] today [Music] [Music] but most of the group was held back by the supergroup alpha male a Torah now begins a new chapter for drill Rush as there's lots of work to be done to ensure the survival of those drills Peter is worried about the future in the end it's going to be for someone else to carry the ball I'll carry it as long as I can it's for others and whether they do or not it's not something I can ensure and finding the people that have the ability to do this is very difficult you need the passion you need to be unreasonably optimistic and you need a huge number of skills and so those people don't just fall off the tree and you have to be willing to sacrifice pretty much everything too many people that actually are interested in doing that [Music] Emmanuel's Thoughts with its now wild drills out in their New Forest Home who he'll spend the coming weeks tracking I'll be worried I would miss them for booking me down for a long time I'm going to be there with them following them following them to see how they will surviving so that's my job [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] in a land dominated by structure and Order there is a wild place an untouched Forest and in recent years some of its magnificent creatures have been making a remarkable comeback all thanks to the extraordinary work of one tiny creature an architect of something incredible [Music] natural born chaos [Applause] within the vastness of this managed landscape there lies a pocket of wilderness where nature flourishes free from the order of the outside world [Music] this is the Bavarian Forest Germany's oldest National Park here are natural Harmony endures supported by the work of a remarkable human being every day Ranger Mario Schmidt sets off into his native Woods a guardian of this unique place he has a distinctive approach to his job the arrangers foreign [Music] they fall his efforts to conserve this Wilderness get a helping hand from natural disasters in 2007 Cyclone Kyro ravaged this region with hurricane force and flattened large sways of the forest winds like this prepare the ground for a destructive insect attracted by the scent of the weakened trees the European Spruce bark beetles attacked in large numbers foreign forage channels under the bark they cut off the sugar-rich supply of the trees the spruces are doomed although weak when working alone this tiny insect finds strength in numbers killing large patches of spruce they are feared by landowners so local Foresters interfere quickly and remove the infested trees all right they lay the blame with the park as it is argument this is [Music] the bark Beetle might seem to be a pest but behind its destructive Behavior it has a crucial role to play what if people like Mario don't interfere in the work of nature [Music] fungi thrives on trees killed by the Beetle and a new Forest begins to grow as the sun's Rays once again reach the Woodland floor and it's here beneath the canopy that one of the Park's most flamboyant creatures makes his home the Kappa Kaylee all his attention is fixed on impressing his judges he's looking for the right place to Stage an audition the perfect Forest Clearing soon after Dawn the curtain goes up and he begins to strut his stuff singing loudly he is determined to attract a mate [Music] even if a hen doesn't hear his ballad perhaps she will see his dance [Music] but maybe it just isn't his lucky day [Music] instead he's drawn to the many blueberries growing here now as crucial sunlight reaches the forest floor foreign immemorial the woods of the Bavarian Forest have resounded with the distinctive song of the Kappa Kaylee and nowadays thanks to Rangers like Mario he can still find an undisturbed home on these Woodland slopes [Music] [Applause] meanwhile today is an important day for his human Guardian Mario takes a special group of children Junior Rangers out into the woods and teaches them his craft here he tells them about another little known inhabitant of this magical place designs [Music] this is a woodland dweller that also gets help from these natural changes the ghostly eurolau is an elusive Predator flying silently among the trees leaving its prey little chance to escape its deadly claws in spite of these Powers the owl's queer sound has been absent from this place for many years recently this haunting Predator has begun to make a comeback thanks to the efforts of the Rangers to preserve its wild home however challenges remain there are still not enough old trees in which to Nest like this beach snack so for now the urall needs help to repopulate this area in early spring the female answers her partner's call the couples start their meeting ritual after The Long Winter [Music] foreign [Music] offerings of food to his mate [Applause] only if he can find enough vole gifts for her will the female lay eggs as the chicks don't hatch at the same time there is little competition for food while one sibling is already snoozing on a branch outside the other one still cuddles safely in the box at least until mom decides the time has come for it to explore its Forest home made it almost there is danger here on the ground lurking in the shadows a Martin on the lookout for a meal smile the mother is quick to react and rushes to her chick's defense for now at least the outlet is safe [Applause] and only a forest with plenty of dead wood can provide enough prey for her Young Fierce as she may be with her enemies she remains tender with her chick [Music] [Applause] [Music] thank you unlike his wild home in a sterile managed Forest The Little Owl wouldn't find logs to help him escape from predators thank you [Music] once both siblings are up in the canopy the parents anxious moments are swiftly forgotten [Music] while the father takes over the Twilight hunting the mum feeds her hungry chicks [Music] if there is some food left over the grown-ups take their shirt but only once they're young are full while the owl family pursue its existence in the forest Mario sums up the learning of today and these natural habitats are created by a small insect with a big impact as the Next Generation the children need to Enlighten the Park's visitors about these natural wonders the ranges to be share their knowledge about the owl's world through a quiz in the meantime Mario continues to guard this Natural Born chaos an island of wilderness so that for generations to come the untouched Forest can Thrive freely day after day and night after night [Music] [Music] the tropical Cuban forests are some of the most naturally diverse habitats in the Caribbean home to many species found nowhere else in the world 50 kilometers south of the Mainland lies the Isle of Youth with a history of pirates and gold this very location inspired the great novels Peter Pan and Treasure Island but these forests are critically endangered a cracked team of biologists and students led by Dr David Byrd and Dr Tony Cadiz are here to help their aim to document the extraordinary range of animals found here all in the hope of saving this pristine environment before it's too late this might be a new species yes this might be a newspaper yes with unprecedented access they're here on our Wildlife treasure hunt whoa these dry tropical forests are the last of their kind they remain largely unexplored and very few people have ever been here [Music] after many hours of traveling the team reached the remote location they set up their basic living arrangements with only a small beach hut for company [Music] with just 10 days on the island the team must act fast [Music] and Dave waste no time preparing for the day ahead but as the team make their way into the forest they discover they're not alone on the island foreign crocodile at seven foot long it may only be a small one but it's still a dangerous animal and the team proceed with caution today we're out in the forest looking for reptiles and we've got an expert Tony who's going to be helping us identify them and catch them the idea is to try and get a full list of all the reptiles that occur on the island the chances are there are new species to be found perhaps one of them might turn up here it's not long before Dr Tony Cades from Havana University has spotted his first Target he's good in it he's good Tony is an expert in Cuban reptiles but even for him the chance to visit this remote location is a very special opportunity not too many Studies have been done in this area we are discovering species that actually haven't been reported for this area for many years and it's very exciting to find speeches that for the first time have been discovered in this small island having seen how it's done the team get to work catching any reptiles they can find [Music] in this case a brown and nolas lizard a very common Cuban species leaving the group behind Tony goes off to see what else the island has in store with the hope of finding some of the more elusive animals meanwhile deep in the forest the team are not the only ones on the lookout for lizards thank you [Music] the great lizard cuckoo found only in the Caribbean this is one of the largest species of cuckoo in the world its main diet as the name suggests is lizards [Music] [Music] but no luck this time [Music] as midday arrives the heat is already taking its toll on some of the teams but perfectly adapted to the Cuban climate Tony has returned after a successful morning this morning was actually very productive and I'm going to show you briefly what we got we have from lizards different families of lizards to different kind of snakes first of all amaiva they live on the sandy beaches this Beach's character is of the long and thin tale which can turn blue in several populations even here in Punta Frances is a Cuban racer they are actually so fast that is not easy to collect we have to jump on it literally they are fast not only for moving but also for swallowing their praise we also have one of the most amazing reptiles of Cuba and it's called the q1 giant boa it fits mainly on small mammals it fits also in it feeds on bats so these pieces is quite common within the cave it's a very representative species from Cuba the largest boa in the Caribbean as the evening approaches Tony presents his findings to the rest of the group the other species we have here is usually found on rocks Rocky places [Music] back at the HUD a new cast of characters have emerged [Music] and Tony is still on the lookout [Music] as well as providing the team with shelter the Hut has also attracted a variety of visitors but I was faster than it actually what we are seeing here is the patterns of the juvenile as a red tail and many bands in the in the body as the team relaxed Tony's made an unexpected discovery so surprisingly we got another species of gecko another species I know those species what do you think about that well actually these are the Expedition for geckos I think I need to I need to take it to Havana and check it because I don't know exactly which speech is this one and it could be a new record for this whole island of these small Islands so I think it's important to take a good picture of it okay okay let's try with this uh let's hope he behaves himself an important part of David's work here is to photograph every addition to the growing species list this is what you find on this kind of expedition you get all these new things turning after people haven't seen before it turns out to be a new record for the island that'll be uh that'd be great Tony's discovery of a new gecko species looked like being the highlight of the Expedition until he was top trumped by Cuban biologist elier Fonseca I just collected um please do the honors it's a it's let's wait and see let's wait and say no guessing stop guessing wait come here [Music] foreign this strange animal is known as an anphis bayonet and is neither a snake or a lizard they live underground and are very difficult to find little is known about their biology and for Tony this is an extraordinary discovery wow guys pretty good wow guys I mean wow this is a wow moment this is the yeah this is the trip after one moment yeah my God have you have you seen one before yeah no no this is my first one alive really this is my first one alive that's why I was confused this is my first one I like this might be a new species yes this might be a new speech Yes yes I have no idea of of what species of and it's been nice living here I have no idea so me neither I wasn't expecting this I mean yeah it's out of the frame guys this surpass my expectation by far nice one get over there there's so many reasons to call this trip the big tree yeah the trip of the new things yes in English [Laughter] I don't know the Expedition also documented many insects birds and mammals their discoveries provide valuable data that prove the importance of this threatened location and will hopefully secure its future oh [Music] [Applause] everybody's life on that boat is changed forever because they will never ever forget that [Music] [Applause] thank you [Music] many years ago a farmer from South of the Border arrived on the Scottish island of Mull here on the Eastern edge of the Atlantic Ocean he discovered a magical Place full of life I love the sea I've always had a deep love of the sea and it all started there because I immediately first thing was had to get back on the sea again and I did got a wee boat and went fine well these fantastic animals you know what a puffin is well I didn't know what a puff it is I hadn't got a clue in those days and knew nothing about Wildlife at all except what a partridge was and here we've had parrots at Sea amazing anyway to cut a long story short I was absolutely flabbergasted by all on Wildlife out at sea but just out this way I mean you can see it all you've got to do is go offshore here a couple of miles and you can see just about everything you possibly imagine in the bridge Isles then in 1982 Richard had an encounter that changed the fate of the Region's Wildlife forever this is the story of the Legacy left by that magical moment I was out there one day of sea fishing funny enough not while I'm unfortunately just south of coal the island Nicole calm day and I saw the stores will Finn in the distance coming towards us and I was a bit wary of this now why would a dorsal fin be heading towards us this unusual and it came closer and closer and got to the point where I was really quite alarmed anyway I left on the roof of the boat holding onto the Mast I can still feel myself doing it and watch this huge animal come straight under the boat start the other side and turn and come back the others come back under and around the most person between 15-20 minutes is spent just circling and going and run around us so there were two things which staggered me one was Intelligence of that animal to spend time with us missing all those monofilament lines you know which you could actually see underwater but more importantly was that animal had decided to come to me and the boat because we were stationary in the water and to spend time with us and that absolutely corn swaggered me whatever you like to call it after this extraordinary Discovery Richard became determined to tell more people about the massive marine mammals swimming just offshore and thus I can see him doing it in the Wheelhouse turned him he said Richard you can't do that no no first you must prove it and that's where it all started the research so we had to prove it to fund his pioneering research Richard ran trips for visitors to see these extraordinary creatures and so British whale watching now a multi-million pound industry was born but not everyone supported this new venture and the clitoris World actually tried to close me down for running a com trip off the North End of Mull to go look for Wales when there weren't any whales you got too big for me much too big in the end I couldn't just couldn't possibly control it anyway I was slowly becoming bankrupt but who cares as the challenges mounted it was time for Richard to hand over the Reigns so now a new generation is taking up the challenge my name is Pippa garoud and I'm the community engagement officer for the hebridean whale and dolphin Trust so my role is to go out and talk to people about whales and dolphins get people infused about them and encourage people to report their sightings and get involved with the trust further I know when I first started as I kind of got hooked and now whenever I'm near the sea I just have to be looking I just can't be next to the next to the ocean without looking and scanning out to see so I think it becomes a bit addictive but there is one animal in particular that Pippa would dearly love to spot I'm always on the lookout for killer whales yeah but um no no it's like a dream pepper spends much of her time educating the public about the UK's only resident family of killer whales the West Coast Community pod but despite her dedication Pippa is yet to see any of the group with her own eyes traveling hundreds of miles from the west of Ireland to Scotland's East Coast in search of food the last British Orca are extremely elusive out of this West Coast Community there are there was originally 10 animals identified but we now think that there are eight these are animals that have been identified by distinctive markings on their fins and we've been able to kind of track where they've been and what they get up to over the years and jonco and a number of other of the individuals were first seen in 1992. there is one individual amongst all the others whose Finn makes him unmistakable so jungko I always tell the kids as like local celebrity it's very easy to remember him because of the notch missing out of his dorsal fin so kind of as soon as you've seen him as soon as you see a picture of him you know it's him however the future does not look bright for these ocean-going Giants since scientific studies on them began in the early 1990s they have never reproduced either they're too old it could be toxins they're things like pcbs build up in their blubber and a cause them to be potentially infertile but B they actually when they have a calf they would release all the toxins into the calf through the milk so that will then cause the calf to die there's a lot to learn about them and it's kind of a Race Against Time and to try and learn as much as we can and so every sighting is important so orca or killer whales now if we see Orca or killer whales today you will also see me crying because I'll be so excited also the only citation species that you can tell the male and the female just by sight so this is the female here in the background much more dolphin looking sort of dorsal fin there whereas this is the male absolutely huge two meter um Dorsal fins we don't really get any warning about when they're going to come we just see them sort of once or twice a season and they can just sort of pop up out of nowhere so you never know today could be the day two waters just at 12 o'clock there four of them and share Waters again okay oh yeah welcome so it's in right so in the middle of the left of the trash net and Mall huge fan again he's coming towards us is it it's John Cowell I've spent the last two years telling everyone all about jonko so to actually see him for him to be the killer whale that we saw to me is personally just really amazing oh [Music] 34 years four years after Richard's encounter seems the sighting of Scotland's remarkable ocean giants still has the power to change a life tell me to turn around on you oh what was that Andy I'll die happy now [Music] this has got to be what I do I want to tell people more about this because not enough people know that you don't need to go all the way across the world to see amazing animals like we have them right here one respects to see almost always respect the sea and never think you're better than the sea or any of the animals actually in it and vastly way ahead of us to see particularly we're all way too no I'm not going to deal with that no no yeah okay I should this time I shut up for goodness sake [Music]

Channel: TRACKS - Travel Documentaries

Views: 1,063,423

Keywords: travel documentaries, tracks travel, tracks, beautiful travel, full travel documentary, full documentary 2021, tv shows - topic, culture, travel, tourism, Documentary movies - topic

Id: ynw1gwPBWXM

Length: 167min 38sec (10058 seconds)

Published: Sat Nov 26 2022