Meet the Spies • 2017 • episode "S1E5" • Spy in the Wild

48:04

High above the skies of Israel, an avian migration of staggering proportions attracts birdwatchers from all over the world. From gliding birds like the short-toed eagle to waders like red-necked phalaropes, here's your chance to track one of the most important stops on the bird migration route--no binoculars needed.

S1E5 • Wild Israel • 2018 • Nature

57:59

From a primate that's no bigger than a mouse, to a chameleon that can fit on your fingertip, the natural world is full of fantastically small animals. Biologist Patrick Aryee explores the fascinating secrets behind these miniature marvels and shows that they're not the underdogs you might think they are. Super Small Animals follows him as he meets the leading experts on these pint sized superstars, and finds out what makes them some of the most successful on the planet. First up, he reveals the huge benefits that being small can bring. There's the little lemur whose diminutive frame helps it to exploit a unique gap in the eco-system, the tiny hummingbird that uses its size to out-manoeuvre the competition, and the world's smallest seahorse that never has to leave home. He also explores why small animals are proportionally the strongest in the world, and introduces a peanut-sized beetle that can pull over a thousand times its own weight. Next he explores the challenges that animals face when they shrink in size, and the ingenious ways they overcome them. We find out how the smallest armadillo in the world manages to control its temperature in the searing desert sun, and the how the world's smallest fish can survive in nothing more than a puddle, because it never really grows up. Patrick meets a secretive hippo that lives in the dense jungle, and looks like it's been shrunk in the wash, and some of the world's smallest snakes that give birth to enormous babies. He also meets a scientist that studies how really tiny spiders have a surprising trick that enables them to travel an incredible 40 miles per day, using almost no energy. Then there are the animals that refuse to be pigeon holed as small, and manage to punch way above their weight. He puts some astonishing invertebrates to the test, to see how they work together to become much bigger than the sum of their parts and meets a pint-sized predator that takes on some of the largest and most dangerous creatures on the planet, getting hands on to discover how its build helps it to be brave. Finally he uncovers the incredible lengths that deep sea anglerfish go to in order to be big and small at the same time, and has an endearing encounter with a tiny carnivore that manages to be small in just one direction. Whether their size helps them to hunt, hide or survive, all these remarkable animals prove that good things really do come in small packages.

2017 • Nature

58:05

David Attenborough journeys to both Polar Regions to investigate what rising temperatures will mean for the people and wildlife that live there and for the rest of the planet. David starts out at the North Pole, standing on sea ice several metres thick, but which scientists predict could be Open Ocean within the next few decades. The Arctic has been warming at twice the global average, so David heads out with a Norwegian team to see what this means for polar bears. He comes face-to-face with a tranquilised female, and discovers that mothers and cubs are going hungry as the sea ice on which they hunt disappears. In Canada, Inuit hunters have seen with their own eyes what scientists have seen from space; the Arctic Ocean has lost 30% of its summer ice cover over the last 30 years. For some, the melting sea ice will allow access to trillions of dollars worth of oil, gas and minerals. For the rest of us, it means the planet will get warmer, as sea ice is important to reflect back the sun's energy. Next David travels to see what's happening to the ice on land: in Greenland, we follow intrepid ice scientists as they study giant waterfalls of meltwater, which are accelerating iceberg calving events, and ultimately leading to a rise in global sea level. Temperatures have also risen in the Antarctic - David returns to glaciers photographed by the Shackleton expedition and reveals a dramatic retreat over the past century. It's not just the ice that is changing - ice-loving adelie penguins are disappearing, and more temperate gentoo penguins are moving in. Finally, we see the first ever images of the largest recent natural event on our planet - the break up of the Wilkins Ice Shelf, an ice sheet the size of Jamaica, which shattered into hundreds of icebergs in 2009.

S1E7 • Frozen Planet • 2011 • Nature

59:06

In Madagascar, the travellers encounter the biggest and the smallest lemurs on earth. But they are searching for the aye-aye, a peculiar lemur which, according to local legend, brings death to those who encounter it.

S1E3 • Last Chance to See • 2009 • Nature

23:11

Clownfish can change genders, male seahorses carry their young, and some snakes have remnants of leg bones--but why? Discover how significant evolutionary changes inside these creatures have equipped them for survival.

S1E3 • Mysteries of Evolution • 2017 • Nature

58:04

Sir David Attenborough explores the wildlife of his London hometown, from urban deer to rooftop peregrines and many others, revealing how nature thrives in the world’s greenest major city.

2026 • Nature