Race Against Time (Coasts) • 2015 • episode "S1E6" • The Hunt

53:21

This instalment examines the earliest land vegetation and insects. The first plants, being devoid of stems, mainly comprised mosses and liverworts. Using both sexual and asexual methods of reproduction, they proliferated. Descended from segmented sea creatures, millipedes were among the first to take advantage of such a habitat and were quickly followed by other species. Without water to carry eggs, bodily contact between the sexes was now necessary. This was problematical for some hunters, such as spiders and scorpions, who developed courtship rituals to ensure that the female didn't eat the male.

3/13 • Life on Earth • 1979 • Nature

48:03

Witness the hard knock life of male kangaroos as they engage in constant fights to determine social rank.

S1E3 • Secret Life of the Kangaroo • 2016 • Nature

42:37

Encounter huge shoals of barracuda in Malaysia, fantastic meadows of coral in the Philippines and strange, miniature creatures inhabiting Indonesian reefs. Plus you’ll have to watch for deadly blue-ringed octopus and much more. Simply sublime!

Part 1 • The Magic of The Big Blue • 2011 • Nature

42:03

A pregnant Tuarangisaurus is in distress—and her young calf can sense it—as she travels waters that are home to the ocean’s deadliest predators.

S1E1 • Prehistoric Planet • 2022 • Nature

57:07

The first programme of Darwin's Dangerous Idea explores the impact of Darwin’s ideas on religion and morality. Andrew Marr discovers that an important part of the Beagle’s mission was to return three natives to their homeland, Tierra del Fuego, at the southernmost tip of Argentina. Years before he reached the Galapagos, they raised questions in his mind about the fragility of civilisation and what it really means to be human. Marr explores how Darwin developed his ideas when he returned to Britain and finally unleashed his theory of evolution by natural selection on the world. Darwin’s ideas are taken up by many of the major thinkers of the late 19th and early 20th centuries: Karl Marx, Friedrich Nietzsche and Sigmund Freud. We discover that his ideas helped motivate the Kaiser’s army in the First World War and would also help convince the United States government to drop its isolationist policy and enter the conflict. In the 20th century, we discover a growing backlash against Darwin’s ideas among fundamentalists from the world’s major religions. At the same time science has been showing that Darwin’s theory of natural selection holds sway over our behaviour - including our morality - as much as it does over the evolution of our bodies. There is significant scientific evidence that suggests that Darwin has returned humanity to nature, in all its wonder, its glory and its danger.

S1E1 • Darwin's Dangerous Idea • 2009 • Nature

54:27

This episode details the relationship between flowers and insects. There are some one million classified species of insect, and two or three times as many that are yet to be labelled. Around 300 million years ago, plants began to enlist insects to help with their reproduction, and they did so with flowers. Although the magnolia, for instance, contains male and female cells, pollination from another plant is preferable as it ensures greater variation and thus evolution. Flowers advertise themselves by either scent or display. Some evolved to produce sweet-smelling nectar and in turn, several insects developed their mouth parts into feeding tubes in order to reach it.

4/13 • Life on Earth • 1979 • Nature