Descent into the Mariana Trench • 2018 • episode "Part 3" • Deep Ocean

87:12

[3 parts] Steve Backshall explores the world of insects and their close relatives, the arachnids and crustaceans, in order to find out more about their habits and secrets. Ch1. Them and Us Steve Backshall explores the connections and relationships humans have with insects and their close relatives, the arachnids and crustaceans. He begins by revealing how huge armies of driver ants give houses a five-star clean-up in Kenya, while in China, silkworm caterpillars are credited with shaping culture and distribution. He also explains that, despite people's perceptions of these creepy-crawlies, mankind could not live without them. Ch2. Making Worlds Steve Backshall explores the influence that insects and their close relatives, the arachnids and crustaceans, have on the planet's many ecosystems. He reveals how the landscape of South America's grasslands has been created almost solely by one team of bugs - grass-cutter ants - while in east Africa, the savannah would quickly become swamped in dung were it not for the activities of a particular beetle. He also contemplates the idea that without one tiny creature, the blue whale could not exist. Ch3. The Secrets to Their Success Steve Backshall explores why an estimated 10 million species of insects are so abundant, and examines the secrets of their success. In Yellowstone National Park, he reveals how teamwork enables a colony of bees to scare off a hungry bear, and he travels to the Swiss Alps to highlight the relationship between ants, wasps and butterflies.

2013 • Nature

53:27

Sixty-six million years ago, an asteroid wiped out the dinosaurs in a fiery global catastrophe. But we know little about how their successors, the mammals, recovered and took over the world. Now, hidden inside ordinary-looking rocks, an astonishing trove of fossils reveals a dramatic new picture of how rat-sized creatures ballooned in size and began to evolve into the vast array of species.

NOVA PBS • 2019 • Nature

57:47

Enter the world of the lizard: from the chameleons, masters of the arboreal life to geckos tapping a code to plant-hopper insects and baby pygmy blue-tongued skinks huddling in their burrows long after birth. In the deserts are found some of the most bizarre lizards: baby Bushveld lizards mimicking acid-squirting beetles; the well-armoured and bizarrely spiky; thorny devils and the lizard kings - the Australian monitors - fast, intelligent and efficient hunters.

S1E3 • Life in Cold Blood • 2008 • Nature

58:26

A look at mammals which have adapted to the changes humans have made to their environment, from sea lions competing with stray dogs for food in the fish markets of Chile to pig-tailed macaques in palm oil plantations in south east Asia. Plus, a look at how elephants have learnt to use the cover of darkness to venture into towns in search of a midnight feast, often leaving destruction in their wake.

S1E2 • Mammals with David Attenborough • 2024 • Nature

53:13

In the second and final part of NATURE's miniseries "The Alps," experience the hostile and bitter cold ecosystems of the Alps, shaped by snow blizzards and avalanches. (PBS Nature Season 39 Episode 8)

S1E2 • The Alps • 2021 • Nature

4:45

Archimedes once said “Give me a place to stand, and I shall move the Earth.”

TED-Ed • Nature