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(crickets chirping)
(tiger growling)
Anyone fascinated by the natural world
has probably wondered why some animals
have such strange looking sense organs.
The elephant with its huge ears,
the antenna of a butterfly,
which up close, look like feathers.
The snake with its split tongue.
And what about less obvious enhancements?
Like the sensory cells on a crocodile's skin.
Surely, these evolutionary traits
aren't just for decoration.
In fact, the size, shape and location
of these animals' sense organs is all for a purpose,
and just like us, animals rely on their senses
to communicate with each other, find their way around,
stay safe, and most importantly, to find food.
When you see how superior some animals' senses are
compared to those of humans, you might wonder
how we ever managed to stay on top of the food chain.
Animal super senses, you won't believe what's possible.
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Animal Super Senses has taken us on an extraordinary tour
of the sensory world of animals.
Showing us how many species
have remarkable powers of perception.
And every sense is employed to survive in a hostile world.
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The bear, with a sense of smell seven times better
than a bloodhound.
The chameleon with 360 degree vision.
The elephant, hearing infrasound.
With super senses like these,
human abilities are pretty poor in comparison.
In this episode, we revisit the most amazing
super senses of animals.
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(birds chirping)
To become the supreme predator of the African Savannah,
the lion uses sniper sight as a tool to kill.
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During daylight hours, their eyesight is said
to be about level with ours.
But at night, they shift gears.
Lions are believed to see eight times better than we do
in the dark.
The lion's eye is designed to pick up the faintest light.
When night falls, the available light comes
from the moon and stars.
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It makes the lion a formidable killer after dark.
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(cow mooing)
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The clue to the lion's superior night vision,
lies inside the eye. The retna is covered in tightly packed
light sensitive cells. Many more than humans have.
But that's not all, they have what is known as Tapetum.
A reflective layer of cells at the back of the eye.
It's what we see when we point a flashlight into the dark
and eerie eyes shine back.
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The Tapetum reflects visible light back through the eye
giving the photo receptors a second chance
to absorb light rays.
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Thanks to the lions super sense vision,
they can hunt in the cool of the evening
and save energy during the daytime heat.
The lion has become the master of all its surveys.
(birds chirping)
Another of Africa's big 5, the Elephant.
This giant shares the Savannah with the lion.
Both are social animals.
The African elephant lives in family groups,
of closely related females and young, led by a Matriarch.
Males wonder on their own.
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When you live in the Savannah, having the power to
communicate over distance is important.
It maintains family bonds and detects outsiders,
it sends out a message broadcasting who you are,
where you are and if you are friend or foe.
But it's a whirl that humans can't hear.
Most of the sounds that elephants make are transmitted
at lower frequencies known as infrasound.
Below the level of human hearing.
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These low frequencies travel great distances.
As a result, elephants can ease drop over a huge area.
They are known to make more
long distance calls, after hours.
Mainly at dusk, when it's cooler and
sound can travel further.
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It seems that the elephant senses are perfectly
adapted to it's environment and essential for it's survival.
A female needs to signal to wandering males that
she is ready to mate but a breeding bull
can be many kilometers away.
Sending out a mating call that can extend over a
Savannah size range, improves her chances of finding
the biggest and strongest male.
And its the trunk call that no bull elephant wants to miss.
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(birds chirping)
Sight and sound are good for long distance perception
but if you want to get up close and personal,
the sense of touch is going to be your best bet.
Touch plays an important role in the life of a Kangaroo mob.
Mutual grooming is a practical way for the
social animal to form close bonds.
And their are few bonds in the wild that are stronger
than a mother kangaroo and her baby Joey.
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Young Roo's test their strength with peers by pushing,
grabbing, and shoving each other.
(birds chirping)
But the real action is reserved for the adults when touch
becomes territorial.
And muscle bound males show off in a bush land gym.
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A tactile tool kit matters in the kangaroo world.
As the winning wrestler gets to mate the most.
(birds chirping)
One of the greatest noses on earth,
belongs to this creature.
Perhaps no other animal has a keener sense of smell.
Smell helps the bear to find food.
They can detect a meal several kilometers away.
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The sense of smell also plays an important role in
bear communication, helping them to locate mates.
And to recognize their young.
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Even though a bear's brain is only about a third the size
of a humans, the area of it's brain which manages smell
is at least five times larger.
The surface area inside their noses is thought to be
100 times greater than a humans.
Making their sense of smell seven times better
than a bloodhounds.
It can easily smell traces of food left on clothes
and in tents. So if you're camping out and there's
a sniffing sound, you may have a bear in your picnic.
(birds chirping)
Some animals seem to have super human senses.
Take for example, the Monarch Butterfly
with its superior sense of direction.
They spend their summer months in the eastern part of
North America before flying South to a single
mountainous spot in Mexico.
A journey of up to 5 thousand kilometers.
How do they navigate their way?
It's a question that's intrigued scientists for years.
Now experts think they know the answer,
the monarch butterfly detects the Earth's magnetic field.
An internal compass located in the Antennae contains
life dependent magneto sensors.
(wind blowing)
The butterflies that have flown south,
enter a period of inactivity as they over winter in mexico.
The warm lengthening days of March
signal them to be active again.
They become ready to mate and lay eggs as
they move northward.
Their eggs mark the start of another annual lifecycle.
And a new generation uses the internal compass to make it's
epic journey North for the Spring.
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The monarchs phenomenal abilities in the air may
be matched by the shark's prowess under water.
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Animals seem to sense changes in the environment
that completely escape human perception.
In 2001, a team of researchers had been tracking
the movement of a population of black tip sharks
off the coast of Florida.
The sharks were residence in the bay for 6 to 8 months
during the summer and didn't leave the area until
migration time and definitely not in large numbers.
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Tropical storm "Gabriel" made landfall in central
Florida during their research.
(waves crashing)
(wind blowing)
When the team returned to check their equipment,
they reviewed the movements of the time sharks
defined an amazing result.
Not only did all the tag sharks leave,
but they had left some 7 hours before the
tropical storm hit the coast.
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Scientists examined the data to try and find out
what on earth was going on.
They found the sharks swam to deeper waters
just around the time when the air pressure started to drop
prior to the storms approach. It seems the sharks responded
to the decrease in pressure and got out of town
before the storm hit.
Animals that live life on the wing have to make the
most of what the areal realm has to offer.
Giving the vast openness of the sky,
their senses have adapted to cope.
Being small doesn't matter, the dainty dragonfly
is one of the most brutal and affective predators
in the animal kingdom. Thanks to it's superior sight.
(dragonfly buzzing)
They have multifaceted or compound eyes
and along with bees have the largest eyes of any insect.
They see the world in a mosaic.
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But that's not all, dragonflies have 5 obsesses
or light sensitive proteins.
Humans only have 3, for seeing red, green and blue light.
This allows dragonflies to see colors beyond human abilities
and its these obsence unique placement in the eye
of the dragonfly that helps them to hunt.
The upward facing part of the compound eye only
has blue and UV receptors.
It may help hunting dragonflies as the sky appears
to be very bright.
Giving a clear background against which small vast
moving prey can be more easily detected.
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Dragonflies have fighter pilot control and
rarely miss their target.
They can fly backwards, change direction in mid-air
and hover for up to a minute.
Because of this, their prey stands little chance.
(birds chirping)
And it's their super sense eyes that make the dragonfly
a formidable areal hunter.
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Another areal predator uses a revolutionary technique
to catch it's dinner.
They also have to grab small, quick moving insects
during flight but they have an additional challenge.
They have to find their food in the dark.
Micro bats spend their day in roost sights.
This is where they mate, raise their young and socialize.
During the summer females gather together in their hundreds
in what is known as a maternity roost.
Where they give birth to a single baby called a pup.
For around 4 weeks the baby bats are fed solely
on their mothers milk until they're old enough to fly.
This period costs a lot in terms of energy for the mother.
So they enter a state of torpor during the day
to reduce their body temperature and metabolic rate.
At sunset, they emerge from their roosts to pursue
insects and stock up on lost energy.
A bat can consume up to 3,000 insects in one night.
Their success in areal hunting is
thanks to a special super sense, Echo location.
Instead of using their eyes, micro bats see with sound.
They fire sound waves out of the darkness
and listen to the echoes that bounce back.
(bats chirping)
Using echo location the bat can determine where the insect
is, how far away it is and what direction it is moving.
It's a technique humans have used to develop
sonar navigation systems in the military.
Using large equipment and expensive technology.
Little bat of course just does what comes naturally.
Thanks to echo location, living the night shift
doesn't stop this bat using it's sense to survive.
(waves crashing)
Finding food hidden underground has similar
challenges to hunting prey in the dark.
In both cases, a sense of sight is tested to it's limit
and other sensory tools are needed.
The short need ekedna has a specialized diet.
It only eats ants and termites hidden deep in the earth.
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It uses it's powerful stout limbs to dig into soil
and rip open rotting wood.
But it's the ekedna's nose that is keen to it's success.
Ekedna's can detect prey by smell but they also have a
unique sense found only in handful of animals on the planet.
With the tip of it's snout,
they are thought to sense electricity.
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Until recently, the platypus and ekedna were the only
mammals known to use electro reception.
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The structures responsible for this electric sense in
Ekednas are sensory mucus glands.
It's not fully understood how they use these but tests
have shown they can detect weak electric fields in water.
As water is a good conductor of electricity ekedna's may be
able to detect moving prey in moist soil.
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Sensing changes in the environment is vitally important
to animals, their lives depend on it.
If winter is coming they have to adapt.
Some animals register seasonal change by refashioning
their winter wardrobes.
During the short polar summer, the arctic fox's fur is brown
but as winter sets in, the fur becomes thicker
and turns white. But exactly what is it worth
to help animals keep in sync with the seasons?
Deep inside the brain of many animals is the penial gland
it produces the hormone melatonin.
The penial gland can measure the length of day versus night.
It receives this information via the eyes.
Melatonin levels are low during daylight
and increase to a peak when dark.
As winter approaches the hours of daylight shorten
and melatonin increases.
The hormonal surge ques the arctic fox's sense of timing
to change it's coat color.
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In animal super senses we've seen how the sensory world of
animals is astonishing, varied and in many cases superior
to that of human abilities.
Senses are vital to animals without them they would be
cut off from the world unable to see, smell, hear,
taste and touch their environment.
Animals super senses are their key to survival.
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