Natures Weirdest Events Series 5 3of4

we live in a very weird world [Music] and the rule we discover about our planet the stranger it gets every day news stories reaches stories that surprise us shockers sometimes even scare us oh my god we've scoured the globe to bring you the most curious creatures the most extraordinary people I can stick almost anything to my skin without no glue and the most bizarre behavior [Applause] using eyewitness accounts and expert opinion to extraor weird world of unexplained underwater blows brian goes and glow-in-the-dark fish we examined the evidence test the theories to work out what on earth is going on [Music] in this episode we'll be shedding light on some of nature's weirdest mysteries why is this shark dressed for a night on the town what is so enraged this passive marine mammal and why has this guy got peanuts stuck on his head our trek into the world of weirdness kicks off with a tour of the transformative powers of light this is Hester on a sleepy Norwegian town there are hills and mountains and well to be honest that's pretty much it but when the Sun Goes Down its reputation for the weird has given this remote village global notoriety and Methodist food off top of it it was so strong that surprised me very much very bright that you feel that it sticks in your eyes nope that's not a trailer for the latest scandi crime thriller this is simply what hostel ins night sky looks like sometimes as often as 15 to 20 times every week since as far back as anyone can remember the lights are many different sizes many different behavior many different colors many different movements that's one of the reason why it's still a mystery and a good mystery proves crowds including intrigue academic Earling and the contents of his research shed he was determined to find some answers now of course the locals would love them to be UFOs but let's just put that notion aside for a moment and explore some more earthly possibilities elsewhere in the world earthquakes of sparks strange lights caused by the build-up of electrical charge where the ground rips apart so how about seismic activity you have found out that the historic district is the area of Norway which has close to no seismic activity with very very little scratch that off the list then but earnings not alone in his research atmospheric physicists view on Hitler Hodja has also been conducting some experiments of his own he took some readings of the light emanating from the phenomenon and discovered something extraordinary it was made of the same sort of light as the Sun a huge burning ball of plasma [Music] now we probably all know that there are three states of matter if we consider water you've got solid like this in the form of ice and then when it comes to the liquid well that's the water as we know it as you can see here at the bottom of this beaker and then emerging from that because it's hot we've got steam the gas but in fact there's a fourth state of matter it's called plasma it's like a supercharged gas of gas on steroids a gas where the atoms have got so hot they've split apart and they're emitting light it may sound sci-fi but in fact you can make plasma very simply all you need is one grape sliced into but still connected one microwave and 15 seconds all the energy in the microwave gets concentrated on those two tiny great paths bouncing from one to the other the skin between them becomes a bottleneck of energy getting so hot that the charged atoms bit apart and hey presto collecting at the top of the beaker plasma the same type of light it seems as the sums and Norway strange phenomenon so plasma well it's a really good theory to explain the hostel and lights quite good but not brilliant in fact it's got one massive draw you see plasma is hot that plasma is very very hot and there's one thing you must have noticed about her stolen it's snowing very sorry if it lists was flying around in the valley then it should be a huge amount of fires everywhere but it wasn't no one was talking about any kind of explosion no one was talking about the fire no one was talking about burnt grass or a burning bush or something nothing not even a trace of melting snow so not plasma after all but all is not lost the scientists have one final theory up their sleeves and it might just hold the key to understand it we need to look at the valley itself this area it's a huge mining area they have been digging out copper zinc sulfur for three four hundred years down there so histone itself could be a kind of chemical laboratory producing voltage it could be done inside the ground yes the Hesterman Valley might be acting like a giant natural battery Hester Don Valley is divided in two unsurprisingly by a river to the west are the remains of old zinc mines to the east the remains of old copper mines think of these as the metal ends of a classic Double A and when it rains water pours into the shaft of an old sulfur mine nearby dissolving the sulfur as it goes it drains into the river and pollutes it with a potent acidic mix the final ingredient of a battery could this be what's powering histamines night well it works all too well in our lab a few simple beakers of acidic mud each containing a stick of zinc and a bit of copper pipe are all you need to power a light bulb so just imagine the energy an axial battery the size of an entire valley could create well potentially enough for a severe electric shock as buin found out one time when he took a meter reading of Hesterman we're mushroom measured 8,000 volts on the mountaintop ouch that's the equivalent of over 600 car batteries the voltage was alarming highest of course a good thing if we touches something you know what will happen it's an amazing thought that there's enough power in the earth beneath Hesterman to charge the air above it firing lights into the sky but it is just a theory it hasn't been proven yet and they still need to work out just how the battery could cause the lights to hang in the air but it's pretty compelling I've got to say that I've also got to say that for the time being it's the best theory they've got next we're off across the globe to Yosemite National Park us survey where a glow of a different kind has been hogging the headlines just look at Yosemite horse tail falls better known as the fire Falls a waterfall of flames what is this fiery phenomenon well Michael Marion should know not all he spent 20 years trying to capture it on camera the very first time you see the fire fall actually having it's a it's breathtaking it really is amazing like liquid lava flowing down the side of the falls liquid lava sounds like a crazy idea doesn't it but it might just be possible you see an age-old event in Yosemite little didn't light up the hillsides with real fire a hotel keeper used to pour his dwindling camp fire coals over the edge of a semitic LIF this accidental spectacle caught on soon the parks tourists were paying good money to see it [Music] silently the glowing cascade spans out drifting down in slow majestic motions for a fleeting moment holding its beauty and holding you spellbound then you gather it up as your most treasured memory of Yosemite Valley of Enchantment visitors down below would look up and just see a brain of coals falling down and they called it fire fall but this is not our fire fall because the coal drop was banned by the Park Service in the late 1960s and these incredible images were taken in recent years so if it's not fire what is it what truly weird is the timing for eleven long months the Falls are well nothing special really but in late February the paparazzi pile in some years they get lucky others not a hint of inferno [Music] so what's going on here I mean sometimes it's there sometimes it's not only in February but not every February well the answer lies way above the falls in the depths of winter Yosemite freezes over but as spring appears so does the Sun melting the snow in the mountains above to create a waterfall below now on lucky years the Sun starts to work its magic as early as February giving us February fools for the plenty of water it's a fabulous cascade but it's simply not glowing you see to get the full fire Falls effect you need light in fact you need lots on life the fiery glow is in fact the light of the Setting Sun so let's see how it works as the Sun lowers the rocks around the waterfall gradually fall into shadow until for just a moment the Sun hits the Falls at such an angle that the land around it is already in shadow and the Falls glow a brilliant orange a brilliant optical illusion suddenly the Sun hits finished at this glow and it's only about a minute and a half two minutes that it's absolutely perfect only in February does the Sun strike the water at this angle this really is a unique freak of nature just incredible the tricks that light can play on our land but it's nothing compared to what it can do below the tide line which is where we're headed next to meet a creature that single-handedly changed the face of marine science the simple green field snapped in 2011 on a Caribbean coral reef now it may not look much but thanks to this one eel we've discovered that our oceans don't look like this they look like this now to understand this weirdness we first need a crash course in how life works now we all know that white light is made up of the full spectrum of color all the colors of the rainbow if you like but the Reds and the oranges are made up of light with longer wavelengths whereas the blues the greens and the Indigo's are made up of shorter wavelengths now all of this light can penetrate through air but when it comes to water it's only these short wavelength blue lights that can penetrate any distance and that is why the sea is blue but as we travel deeper and deeper but that bloom makes the ocean look Wow a bit boring imagine we're dropping under water as soon as we start going down after only about 10 meters all the red is done so if you were to bleed under water and you look at your blood it would look black because there's no red right there but in fact our vision is letting us down this blue light is responsible through a whole world of color down there that our eyes simply cannot see marine biologist David has long been studying calls the flow s fluorescent molecules in their skin absorb the high-energy blue light use up a bit of the energy then release what's left as lower energy wavelengths in other words a different set of colors shine a powerful beam on them and suddenly it becomes clear to us - okay that is already pretty weird I know what you're thinking what about the eel well one day David dived down in search of his beloved calls and what he found changed the way that he looked at the ocean forever so we're making an exhibit for the American Museum of Natural History it's a virtual coral reef well we're shooting the night coral reef something happened that totally changed the trajectory of my research we come back to the lab and in the photos is this one green fluorescent he'll like unbelievable this is the first green fluorescent fish that we've seen and there it was photo bombing us this was the first time that a fish had ever been seen fluorescing so was it a one-off a freak of nature well they're more glowing fish in the sea David had to find out so we design a new set of big balloon light and we began scouring the breeze it's kind of like et phone home for giving blue light off and we're waiting for an animal that's to respond back shining back to us I'm shining back at him was a deep-sea fluorescent Wonderland of nearly 200 species of bio fluorescent fish lizard fins bream scorpion fish a whole gamut but the weirdness didn't stop there yes the world's first glow-in-the-dark shark astounding there's little twinkly stars there's patterns on the females of these rings around their eyes in the deep blue these sharks are emanating patterns of green and the light show didn't stop there [Music] one more ocean inhabitant had a colorful secret to give away this time it was a marine turtle the first sign ever that reptiles can buy over s2 and that for the moment is where David's weird bio fluorescing marine list stops incredible the fish had been fluorescing right underneath the scientist noses so it's an astonishing discovery there's no doubt of that but it does beg the question why were these fish producing such a vibrant range of colors it could be used for mating for courtship it could be used for predator avoidance it's like a perfect camouflage for them in the swell sharks it's secret patterns among males and females perhaps to allow them to separate the sexes for identification of other members of the same species so it's like a secret channel of communication I like that I like that very much I like the fact that marine life has been communicating using a secret spectrum of color something that we're entirely blind to now if only we could figure out what they were saying to one another well as it happens our oceans are full of colorful communicators so here we are staying to meet our next magical marvel these little gems the jewel in the crown when it comes to using light for deception now you see me now you don't this sparkling blue beauty has been nicknamed a sea sapphire for obvious reasons they measure just a few millimeters they're like the bugs of our oceans floating around until they get gobbled up by a passing fish how remarkable that this tiny insignificant and yet very very beautiful little invertebrate has pulled off the holy grail of science the ultimate in trickery the art of invisibility but a real-life invisibility cloak shorty that's impossible isn't it it's a question that many a marine biologist has asked themselves you can have one right in front of you boy you just can't even find it a biologist losing his own subject come on then Steve let us in on its secret sea sapphires have a unique morphology and that they're very flattened they have very little tissue when you're entering the effect as you might expect is that it makes them transparent being thin and translucent clearly helps but there's a little more to it than that they are in fact cleverly constructed to get a little helping hand from the Sun the surface of the sea sapphire is made of layers that perfectly hexagonal crystals not just one layer but several one on top of the other with liquid in between think of it as like a wave opposite as the sea sapphire moves in the water the blue ocean light gets bounced off of these crystals creating an iridescent sheen of Blues and Barnet's what's more it can actually move the crystal layers to change its color a bit like a chameleon the key to its invisibility though is its angle to the Sun when the sea sapphire hits a crucial point of 45 degrees to the light the clever crystal layers bounce back only ultraviolet light UV which our eyes simply can't see combined with its ultra-thin transparency the sea sapphire seemingly disappears now is one clever trick of the light having this ability to effectively switch their colour on and off like a flashing ocean beacon is what gives these tiny jewels their real advantage these these sapphires may be using it to find each other you'll see a little column of these guys stacked up swimming just above each other at all Ike's swimming in a little line so they seem to be homing in using this blue iridescent to signal each other in in some kind of a social structure that has to be one of the most remarkable organisms that I've ever well never seen using its crystal shimmer to communicate across some vast oceans it's brilliant absolutely brilliant but I'm still struck by that invisibility that's one superpower I would very much like to have but mind-bending powers of light will never cease to amaze but that is just the tip of nature's iceberg of weirdness because next we're headed on a journey of exploration of well some other way to put it strange sticky things and it all starts with this guy here Jamie he looks pretty ordinary but in fact he has an extraordinary superpower kamon ability is actually sticking anything solid to my body I can stick cans bottles cellphones almost anything to my skin without no glue you know you want to at this point you want to rush into the kitchen empty you can and try and stick it to some part of your body yeah I don't know what you're thinking this simply cannot be true can it well yes it can because Jamie holds the casually titled world record for most drinks cans placed on the head using air suction and now he has a job as a walking ad campaign so not only does it all stick to my head here let me put these over here so it's out of the way I also can stick to my hands my bag my butt my legs my knees everywhere sticks I discovered my unique talents around seven years old things started sticking to me I climb trees and you know normal boy things just climbing around and that's why I thought maybe it had something to do with the sap from the trees but once he grew out of tree climbing his incredible ability to stick stuff to himself continued and he knew something was up Wow I think it was a handy when you get into snacks out of the kitchen watch this Drive hands-free wound right dang nuts on your head so what makes Janie sticky everyone's got an opinion it seems you know I thought maybe there like a magnetic plate you don't have laid your head you know there's plastic and aluminum none of it so he's not magnetic what he is is battling his doctors a lot of doctors have different opinions they actually think I'm a real-life mutant one thing so I'm like the human gecko another says octopus okay let's just hold it right there a human gecko could that really be geckos stick to things because they're bulbous toes are covered in hundreds of microscopic hairs particles in these bristles interact with particles on the surface of the wall or tree creating an electromagnetic attraction interesting theory for Jamie but I have to say he doesn't look particularly hairy to me so what about the octopus theory octopuses stick using suction morphing they're suckers to the shape of different surfaces muscles inside the sucker contract to create a watertight or airtight seal and there's no hiding the suction marks either perhaps Evie's more octopus than human humans with animal traits I like that I really do but there is a human trait here that we didn't want to overlook have you noticed that Jamie seems to be extraordinarily sweaty because my body temperatures so hot usually when it's really warm I have to constantly drive my head off because the sweat clogs my pores I think that because some sort of perspiration on his head that sticks that step that's amazing so could human sweat be sticky enough to make things stick we asked the dermatologist to take a look at the evidence it's remarkable and they seem to be pretty solidly stuck I've never seen anything like Jamie before his skin looks normal but he's sweating a bit the majority so it is just straightforward water as the water evaporates it leaves behind the sebum and that's the oily substance thing asking will end up feeling a little bit sticky some people complain an excess sweating and that's a recognized condition I've never come across any condition of the skin which specifically makes it more sticky but the sweat may be important nonetheless just from the video footage I would say that this is a suction thing rather than purely a sticky thing but if the skin was completely dry it would be much more difficult to create a good contact suction between the can and the skin so a little bit of moisture there and it's probably helpful for this it's an amazing talent the way he does it suction alone however doesn't explain how he can stick a mobile to his face so Jamie's condition still leaves rather more questions than answers but whatever the reason turns out to be for Jamie it seems it's a skill that has its perks I actually do love having this ability it puts a smile on people's faces they just look at me and they start laughing even if they think I'm a goof or whatever why would anyone think that Jamie also known as can head his name not mine are not being rude it's still mostly a mystery but it has also made him somewhat of a celebrity he now makes thousands of dollars wandering around America sticking cans to his head something to aspire to I suppose [Music] Jamie sticky superpower is just a bit of fun but for one Australian resident sticking things on its head is a matter of life or death [Music] that resident is a caterpillar but no ordinary caterpillar a very strange one indeed but I fully understand it you haven't first got to get two clips with just how difficult it is to be a caterpillar basically that their lives are pretty awful there I spend most of their life trying to avoid being eaten by various things if you are a caterpillar birds mammals reptiles even other insects think you're delicious in the UK a young blue tooth can eat over a hundred caterpillars a day oh and power sit it was like to lay their young inside you so that one day they explode out of you insides killing you in the process so what is a poor little caterpillar to do well one option could be to pile some spare heads on top of each other as protection it's obvious really yes I did just say spare heads and yes that is in fact possible meet the world's maddest caterpillar a caterpillar with a hat made of heads a mad caterpillar if you will otherwise known as a gum leaf skeletonize er it's a common Australian pest with a remarkable appendage so how did this come to be one of the challenges of being an insect is that to grow you need to shed your hard after exoskeleton and get yourself a newer bigger one that you can pull up from the inside when you do that you get a chance to reinvent yourself with a brand new look that's one way to put it normally caterpillars eat the skin they shared to recycle the nutrients within not our Mad Hatter pillow though it keeps its olds heads it steps them on top of its head like some sort of bizarre insect unicorn so it's got the bigger heads at the bottom the smaller older used heads at the top and it forms its great tera bald head capsules on top of its head interlocking hairs and tiny hooks keep the heads firmly stuck in place most of the time when I first saw them you just look at them and think what are you doing what's the possible benefit for having all those old heads stacked on top of your music well that data is a good question why indeed these are new it was for protection but just how he had to find out he put a Mad Hatter pillow with an impressive headdress in a petri dish with its nemesis the stink bug a stink bug is an insect with a needle-like mouth part that stabs its prey injects it with toxins and then sucks it dry definitely something to avoid and here is what happened what we found is that caterpillars are actually physically deflecting attacks by some other predators the wobbling of the head or the really dramatic sort of shaking of the heads and what you're using a sword to try and keep the animal away from you the Predators were also sometimes attacking this sack of head capsules instead of the actual body of the caterpillar and sometimes all it takes is that is that one chance to get away to make you win or lose that bet don't get too excited most of the caterpillars lost the bounce regardless but when dieter tested the theory in the big wide world outside the petri dish he got some interesting results when the animals were in groups with some had head capsules and others didn't the ones without them were far more likely to get eaten and the ones that happened in other words caterpillars that indeed have head stacks living amongst those that didn't survived better than their headless counterparts so the moral of that story is I suppose if you're a Mad Hatter piller with a towering head stack stick near your mates with only one head that way when an enemy approaches your mate will make far easier pickings than you well it certainly gives me into the prize many heads are better than one so all hail the power of the sticky and enviable superpower if ever there was one [Music] finally we're going to introduce you to a series of animals whose weird behavior leaves a lot to be desired kicking us off a refreshing dip in the West Irish Sea a hot summer's day off the coast of Doolin perfect for a swim but when the locals hit the surf they found they had company a sociable affable dolphin and not just any old dolphin it was dusty the dolphin a female bottlenose who become quite a celebrity on the Irish coast dusty is one of Ireland's friendly solidly community dolphins like famous funghi of Dingle dusty story starts on 16 years ago when she first appeared here as an adolescent and never left hanging out with the locals year after year after year building up quite the CV 30 dusty dusty the Peacekeeper she's brought so much joy to so many people she induces a lot of peace and I guess love you know dusty the environmentalist she came in she had the huge white bag on her nose and she brought it to us she was playing games but to clean the ocean you know it was so beautiful to do it with her and dusty the lifesaver yes dusty help save surfer Luke's life guiding him back to the shore after his surfboard split in two everybody said that it was I was amazing to watch a dolphin sort of Shepherd somebody firstly someone who's struggling there was a very beautiful experience saint dusty she swam with local residents kate and george for so long she's become part of the family it's no wonder when people see scenes like this that they want to join in which is what local resident Valerie did in July 2013 but she was in for a surprise dusty it seemed had gone I knew you know I needed to get out of the water quick I went to film our bus landing to me it was very powerful and she hit me with her nose I had spinal fractures and some broken ribs and a damaged lung in fact this is not the only time this five metre mammal has launched it staff that swimmers so how do you reconcile these two images [Music] well to understand we need to get to grips with what sets dusty apart from other dolphins now we all know that dolphins are highly social animals living together in pods so what on earth was she doing swimming around all alone solitary dolphins are common amongst males adolescent males hang out alone getting big and strong so they can compete for access to females but dusty is a female it's a bit weird to be honest and it's not typical and normal of bottlenose dolphins well most of the Dolphins around she office used to be hiding from them it seems to be that in Island especially people are almost looking for dolphins to swim with you know to go and to befriend so I'm not convinced the dolphin is seeking out humans I'm not convinced they're choosing a solitary existence whether she chose us or we chose her there's plenty of dolphin left in dusty and dolphins need other dolphins it's possible that dusty now sees her human friends as her surrogate dolphin pod and that could begin to explain the aggression if dusty treats humans like dolphins treat dolphins well put it this way bottlenose dolphins can be quite brutal we perceive dolphins these friendly animals and let that lovely smiley face you know you don't trust everything that smiles it could be the smile of a sadistic killer dolphin this is a highly evolved marine mammal that is strong can wipe you out with a flick of the tail Ramy which is what botanist authors do they covered in scratches and scars they're covered in notches they're covered in two three the trouble is humans are not built like dolphins we don't just come away with scars we come away literally broken but dusty only gets mad with certain people so what about her Jekyll and Hyde character why do some people get darling dusty and others are very angry dolphin but it all depends it seems on whether or not you were in her pod if you are a regular to dusty like Kate and George you're fine but if you're a new face like Valerie you're a threat I've since learned since my accidents fast when just is having a moment with with with people who do swim with her she doesn't like to be interrupted gets very territorial and I think that's the reason why she attacked me sadly for Valerie she just wasn't in the in-crowd she accept some people and she doesn't accept some people it's hard but it's like that definitely it's like that Valerie was lucky she recovered from her attack and what's more she's made peace with dusty after why she came back to me and she was kind of bobbing vertically and we just locked eyes I personally felt there was a lot of remorse and she was trying to apologize I I don't have any problem with everything on them but I wouldn't get in the water dolphins are not like humans they are wild and unpredictable so don't get confused by the smile but with man and beast living alongside each other it's perhaps inevitable that we expect them to behave like us like our next colorful character a delinquent down under this is a lark heat it's a common Australian bird likely to cost your path but if you were to spot one in the small town of Palmerston near Darwin it's highly likely it would look like this [Music] pauley palette is having a bad day frankly she looks like she's had one too many down the local pub every year the rescue centre here in Palmerston fills up with apparently pickled parrots and every year the birds antics hit the headlines about 200 lorikeets are rushed to the hospital suffering the ill effects of what appears to be a big night out for decades these lower Keith's have been mocked for their drunken antics the story of these boozing Birds is ingrained in local folklore wobble about they their balance is affected they're weak and they further stagger it's pretty much the same as what happens to people when they're very drunk and fall over and hurt himself now obviously these birds haven't been drinking beer they don't have hands they couldn't raise a glass could they but that doesn't mean that we should dismiss this as a silly story you see they're inebriated state is certainly cause for concern this strange behavior only occurs in the wet season so why is this one species once a year behaving so oddly well the blame always lands firmly at the roots of what is known as the drunken power tree it's laden with sweet tasty nectar it's believed though that as the year hots up the nectar ferments all sweet things need to ferment is a bit of heat a bit of moisture and some natural yeast that eats the sugars and converts them to ethanol or alcohol and so says the local legend as the birds feed on the fermented nectar they get drunk it's not a crazy Theory fermenting food can cause drunk like behavior in many other animals a scroll after one too many fermented pumpkins as a Swedish moose that overdid the fermented apples but the lorikeets aren't just a bit tipsy no they take weeks to recover in hospital so were these birds getting drunk on fermenting fruit and nectar in the same way that that Swedish moose was well no in the small Australian town of Palmerston things were altogether more worrying I've been told the reason they did some blood tests on some of these lorikeets and their phone no evidence they're not no ethanol means no alcohol so definitively they're not drunk could the locals firmly held belief be about to be turned on its head well yes it's recently been found that what's attacking their body is most likely a virus like alcohol viruses can interfere with how the brain works affecting vision balance and coordination in other words causing similar symptoms to drunkenness and you can see people when they're suffering influenza are very weak they're hot they're fall around though they feel good headaches pretty much like when they're drunk just imagine how bad it would feel to have flew in midair [Music] I think probably they're trying to fly and they just ran out of breath they faith in minute and then fall to the ground dramatic stuff and why does it only happen in the wet season well that's most likely down to these pests mosquitoes and midges famously partial to hot steamy weather and famously disease-ridden tune it's huge news for Parma syns misunderstood parrots no more character assassination the truth is finally out far from being drunk these unlucky lower Keith's are in fact seriously ill thankfully with the right care most can be back in the wild within a few weeks but it seems that happy hour is not so happy after all at least for the birds [Music] our final weird wonder is famous worldwide well amongst birders like me anyway it's a bird whose behavior is so mysterious that it outwitted scientists in a game of hide-and-seek that lasted for over a hundred years so much so that they began to wonder if it had gone the same way as the dodo it's the holy grail of not only in Australia perhaps in the world it's nominated as Smithsonian Institute as the world's most mysterious bird and it is of the night parrot common in Australia hundreds of years ago but around 1912 this reclusive species simply disappeared [Music] looma and a few museum specimens revealed them to look a bit like big badger gasps a nocturnal ground-dwelling ground-nesting powered not the best ingredients for survival they hid amongst Australia's arid spinifex grassland well supposedly problem was no one could find one so in 1989 a $25,000 reward was offered for their discovery dead or alive [Applause] everyone took to the road from truck drivers to scientist and what happened next was incredible the curator of Ornithology at the Australian Museum was travelling at that Queensland and stopped by the side of the road legend has it to relieve himself as he looked down at his feet there was the remains of a night parrot a dead type parrot carcass a curator of Ornithology had accidentally found a night parrot in the middle of the vast outback the first confirmed sighting in over seven decades can you just imagine how excited he must have been when he finally rediscovered that bird after all of that time spent looking for ok I know it wasn't ideal it was dead but nevertheless it did prove that this mythical bird wasn't a mess after all and so began the hunt for a living specimen 16 more years went by and finally another was found lying beside a fence but guess what yes it was dead to assumably it had hit the fence and decapitated itself on the fence unlucky but trust me patience in ornithology does eventually pay off it was so dedicated and so determined there was a lot of obsession amongst certain people one of those determined obsessives was John young a naturalist who'd spent 15 years tracing the Outback for clues finally in 2013 success a bunch of feathers led him to a live individual after a hundred years the game of hide-and-seek was over and the scientists had won I just can't tell you how exciting this discovery was this was a bird brought back from the dead this was all of the logical dynamite the bird-watching equivalent of a supernova but don't go grabbing your binoculars just yet to protect the bird John kept the exact location a secret and to this day only three people on the planet are confirmed to have seen live night powers and this guy here ecologist Steve Murphy has gone one better he's actually held one when he and his wife fitted one with a tracker we really had to focus we were both you know shaking pretty madly at the start and the sense of responsibility was just awesome there is still just one known population of night poets in the world the rest were wiped out by fire and their number-one predator yes kitty it's quite a famous story of The Telegraph station master at Alice Springs and in the early 1800s lining the inside of his cabin with the wings of night parents that have been brought in each night by his pet cat unfortunately for the cats the best way to keep this chubby little powder live is to take Kitty out of the equation good girl prepare mug and for a while it seemed to be working when in 2016 Steve Murphy made an incredible discovery a nest a nest of two perfect night powered eggs [Music] this was dynamite this was like finding the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow not only were night pallets alive they were breeding but then just like every other aspect of this legendary tale there was another twist in the plot you see a couple of days later Steve returned to the nest and what did he find when he peered in broken eggshells can you believe it can you imagine how he felt well so great is the desire to preserve this specie so enormous was the gravity of this crime that the shells were collected and sent for analysis to try and identify the culprit and this time it was no cat it was a native king brown snake a new player in this now deadly game of hide and seek [Music] the story of this ground-living bird continues and in fact due to the incredible secrecy about its location its mythical status its legend lives on some devilish dolphins by are not so boozy birds to a very private parrot so whether it's ancient legends or brand new discoveries there's no doubt at all that there are plenty of weird stories out there and I can promise you one thing there were a lot more to go next time we'll be poking a giant pile of worms I've never ever seen that before meeting nature's artistic masterminds I was just like oh my god and solving a sperm whale mystery [Music] taking their first steps and facing their earliest challenges you can follow our animal babies on BBC iPlayer now well finally Spectre is conscious but there's one major problem stay with BBC two as the fall continues next [Music]

Channel: Richard Mckinney

Views: 9,234

Rating: 2.5652175 out of 5

Keywords: Natures Weirdest Events Series 5 3of4, Natures Weirdest Events Series 5, Natures Weirdest Events Series 5 Episode 3, Natures Weirdest Events Season 5, Natures Weirdest Events Season 5 Episode 3

Id: D1ZUlUY_260

Length: 59min 15sec (3555 seconds)

Published: Fri Nov 25 2016