As a schoolgirl I was passionate about
natural history programmes, and David Attenborough held my attention far longer
than Blue Peter or Doctor Who ever could. However, the bleak
warnings of habitat destruction and species extinction that inevitably came with
the narrative depressed me beyond words, even more than my failure to elicit
the attention of whatever spotty schoolboy I had fallen for. It was just too
distressing to be dazzled by the antics of leopards, gorillas, elephants and
lusty rhinos, only be told that their days were numbered thanks to the
boundless greed and casual cruelty of my fellow human beings. Rather than be
continually sickened, I buried my head in the sand and tuned into whatever soap
opera was being broadcast on another channel.
The recent screening of the BBC series Africa , has enticed
me back into the world of natural history documentaries. The six part series
took four years to make and has surpassed even the BBC’s own high standards and
reputation for making award-winning wildlife broadcasts. David Attenborough’s
narrative is impeccable and the camerawork, awe inspiring; they offer us new
and unforgettable insights into the private worlds of creatures that the
majority of us will never see in real life. The Africa team has brought us indelible images from the Sahara and
Kalahari deserts, Cape , Congo Africa takes us
on a journey that is both emotional and spiritual.
Elephants feature in most documentaries
about African wildlife. I’d be disappointed if they didn’t and Africa doesn’t
disappoint. We see nocturnal gatherings of forest elephants, never before filmed.
Bull elephants – heads alone weighing as much as a car – charge each other in a
fight for mating rights, while the females look on. Hidden microphones capture their
rumblings and trumpeting in this remote place, known as the Elephants’ Village.
On the savannah, the death of a baby
elephant is agonising to watch. The mother refuses to abandon her calf,
standing over her baby, nudging the little one with her trunk, emitting a deep
throbbing sound that is a measure of the immensity of her suffering. It is only
when her calf takes her final breath that the bereaved mother resumes her
onward journey alone, across a parched land to join the remainder of the herd. In the ten minute appendage, Eye to Eye, the film crew speaks of
their distress at being powerless to intervene in the tragedy. Fortunately, the
same episode brings us an antidote: scenes of a family of elephants traversing
green pastures, accompanied by a baby elephant trumpeting joyfully as she
chases egrets and races back and forth to her mother.
Thanks to the ingenuity of the Africa team we
have the privilege of eavesdropping on the social life of black rhino. Concealed
microphones capture the huffing and puffing, squeaks and excited grunts of a
gathering of black rhino on the darkest of nights at a waterhole in the
Kalahari. New technology – a starlight camera – films the tender exchanges
between these normally ill-tempered and solitary creatures. A young female greets
a mother and her calf, affectionately nuzzling them before turning her attentions
to an amorous male. Initially she flirts, but her interest wanes and a few
minutes later she lies down and pretends to be asleep to get rid of her suitor.
Up close she is perfect, beautiful beyond any limited conception beauty.
In Eye
to Eye, the bad news is broken: poaching claims the lives of around 365
black rhinos every year. The species is under grave threat of extinction; what
we have seen on our screens, the greatest gathering of black rhino anywhere on
earth, may never happen again EVER. I swallow hard and try to focus on the next
feature, an armoured ground cricket, a malevolent-looking creature resolutely
marching onward as part of an army in search of breakfast: meat, fresh meat.
Fortunately, this one is foiled in his attempt to tuck into a baby bird and his
comrades in arms take advantage of the injuries inflicted on him by the
hatchling’s mother to devour him. I’ve often suspected that demeanour can
reveal a lot about character, and the physiognomy of this African ground
cricket suggests something vile: cannibalism.
Eye to Eye offers an inside view of the trials
and tribulations of the camera crew during the filming of the series. In one
episode the team hired seventy-five guides and helpers to carry a ton of
equipment through east African rainforest in their search for a female
chimpanzee known to have a fondness for honey and a unique skill to access it.
We see the lady in question effortlessly scale a tower-block-sized tree and
fashion a tool from a branch which she uses to raid the hive. Delicately she dips
her long fingers into the honey and licks them one at a time with obvious
relish. Having demolished the hive, she smacks her lips and swings contentedly
across to a nearby tree.
Many images from Africa will remain with me
for a very long time. I still smile at the cleverness of the Drongo, a wily bird
who outfoxes meerkats by imitating their warning cry. The meerkats panic, go to
ground and Mr. Drongo swoops down to take his reward, their food. The heroism
of a lizard who risks death to hunt flies crawling and buzzing around the blood-stained
muzzles of sated sleeping lions has to be applauded. A solitary desert giraffe vanquishes
a rival male in a violent contest for mating rights. To see these elegant and
graceful creatures bashing each other relentlessly is gut wrenching and seems
so out of character. But then, what do I know about giraffes? The camera crew
waited 30 days in this scorched land to film this fight.
Close ups and ingenious filming techniques
bring us right into the world of creatures whose lives are a continuous fight
for survival. High up in the forests of the Rift Valley we peep into the nest of
a crowned eagle tenderly feeding her hatchling morsels of fruit bat. The
copper-gold eye of a frog fills our screen as he silently scales leaves and
stems in the rainforests of the Congo Indian Ocean
we get a turtle’s eye view of the sprint undertaken by tens of thousands of
hatchlings over sand dunes to reach the sea before they are picked off by kites
and crows. If she reaches the sea, a baby green turtle, only 7cm long, will not
touch land for many years hence, until she returns to this beach to lay her
eggs. David Attenborough tells us she has a 1 in 1,000 chance of survival.
As I said, Africa
is an emotional journey.
There is room for mystery too. Not
everything can be explained or needs to be explained. Giant Kingfish – the size
of a man – abandon their normally solitary existence in the Indian Ocean to form a shoal and
swim up the Mutentu
River
It took courage to watch the final episode,
The Future. What could the future
hold for African wildlife in a world ruled by profit-motivated greed and the
perception of animals as mere commodities? Out of respect for the efforts of
the film makers I watched it. Yes, many species are on the verge of extinction
but there is a powerful lobby devoted to their defence. Green turtle numbers
are doubling thanks to the local people in an island off the east coast of Africa . A baby black rhino, born blind, nuzzles up to David
Attenborough. There is hope that surgery will give the young rhino sight and
then he will be gradually reintroduced to the wild.
Overall, Africa offers glimmers of hope
but within a grim scenario. The delicately balanced ecosystem of the continent is
up against the demands of a rapidly expanding human population. Footage of a
rhino trotting uneasily across our screens, framed by a background of high rise
buildings, conveys the horror of the unfolding tragedy more powerfully than the
narrative could. But this is not the enduring image that I will hold on to from
the Africa
series.
On a deserted east African beach buffalo trot
along the sand; forest elephants join them; a gorilla watches from the shade of
a palm tree and a hippo rises and falls with gentle the surf of the Indian
Ocean. This is the scene from Africa that I will retreat to each time I hear about
ruthless poachers and habitat destruction. It is all I can do.
Image courtesy of Worradmu / FreeDigitalPhotos.net
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