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What Darwin Never Knew

Earth teems with a staggering variety of animals, including 9,000 kinds of birds, 28,000 types of fish, and more than 350,000 species of beetles. What explains this explosion of living creatures—1.4 million different species discovered so far, with perhaps another 50 million to go? The source of life's endless forms was a profound mystery until Charles Darwin brought forth his revolutionary idea of natural selection. But Darwin's radical insights raised as many questions as they answered. What actually drives evolution and turns one species into another? To what degree do different animals rely on the same genetic toolkit? And how did we evolve?

"What Darwin Never Knew" offers answers to riddles that Darwin couldn't explain. Breakthroughs in a brand-new science—nicknamed "evo devo"—are linking the enigmas of evolution to another of nature's great mysteries, the development of the embryo. NOVA takes viewers on a journey from the Galapagos Islands to the Arctic, and from the explosion of animal forms half a billion years ago to the research labs of today. Scientists are finally beginning to crack nature's biggest secrets at the genetic level. The results are confirming the brilliance of Darwin's insights while revealing clues to life's breathtaking diversity in ways the great naturalist could scarcely have imagined.

In the mid 1800s, when Charles Darwin published his theory of evolution, one species of animal remained a mystery; where did birds fit on his evolutionary tree? Several years later his friend and colleague, Thomas Henry Huxley, came up with an answer. Huxley had recently examined a new fossil from southern Germany called Archaeopteryx which was causing considerable excitement in palaeontological circles. There were clear signs of feathers and it was obvious this was the earliest fossil evidence of a bird ever found. Huxley noticed something else as well. To him it looked as though the skeleton bore a striking similarity to that of a family of meat eating dinosaurs known as therapods.

Transitional trail

In the 1860s, on the basis of this observation, he announced a new theory; birds must have evolved from dinosaurs. The theory ignited what was to become one of the biggest controversies in palaeontology. Could Huxley possibly be right; how could a large, land-bound creature like a dinosaur have ever evolved into something as light and sleek as a bird? Many questioned the accuracy of Huxley's observations and ever since there has been a search for further fossil evidence to confirm the theory; a transitional animal which would incontrovertibly show how, in one creature, birds had evolved from dinosaurs. It has become one of the big missing links in palaeontology.

In Spring 1999, at the Tucson Gem and Fossil Fair in Arizona, an American collector came across a new Chinese fossil which seemed to be just this transitional animal. It had the head and upper body of a bird but the tail of a dinosaur. It was called Archaeoraptor or 'ancient hunter'.

Fossil hunting has become an industry for some Chinese farmersChinese finds

Throughout the 1990s a number of important fossils emerged from China showing an apparent relationship between dinosaurs and birds. Practically all come from a region in the north of the country called Liaoning, one of the richest fossil areas in the world. Here, 130 million years ago, volcanic eruptions buried a wetland once teeming in wildlife. Many of the fossils have been magnificently preserved in the fine silt; some even have the remains of soft tissue attached to them.

It was here, in 1996, that Chinese scientists found a creature they called Sinosauropteryx, an animal which bore many similarities to a dinosaur but appeared to have been covered in a feathery like coat. Two years later a joint Chinese/American team found an even more striking creature; a dinosaur like animal with very clear feathers which they called Caudipteryx. Other similar feathered dinosaurs followed, including in 1999, an important specimen called Sinornithosurus. Yet to those who questioned the relationship between dinosaurs and birds, these fabulous finds raised as many questions as they answered. Were the feather-like markings really signs of feathers, or were they something else? And were the skeletons really those of dinosaurs or were they, in fact, the skeletons of new, as yet unidentified, birds? What was still missing was the piece of evidence which would satisfy everybody.

The best of both worlds

The new Archaeoraptor fossil, also from the Liaoning region of China, seemed to be just that. Here, in one animal, was a unique range of dinosaur and bird features. It had the skull and upper body of a bird, but the teeth and hands of a dinosaur. It also had the legs of a bird but the tail of a dinosaur. It was the most complete set of transitional features ever found in one creature. In November 1999 National Geographic Magazine gave it a special mention in an article about the origins of birds, calling it, "a true missing link.". The debate, started by Thomas Huxley in the 1860s, seemed to have been resolved.

Xu Xing from Beijing University first questioned the Archaeoraptor's authenticityYet within months, new finds in China showed Archaeoraptor to be an extremely clever fake. The head and upper body of a hitherto unidentified bird had been glued onto the tail of a previously unknown dinosaur. It was a journalistic disaster for National Geographic Magazine. The fossil, however, was anything but a disaster for palaeontology. By an extraordinary stroke of good luck, as scientists in China and America examined the head and tail separately, they found that both were, in their own right, unique and extremely valuable specimens. Both, in their different ways, contained powerful evidence that birds had evolved from dinosaurs

Join NOVA on a voyage beneath the waves, where you'll discover a bizarre, alien-like creature like no other. It's an animal with eight sucker-covered arms growing out of its head, three hearts pumping its blue-green blood, and a doughnut-shaped brain. It has the ability to change its color and shape to blend in with seaweed and rocks, and it has a knack for switching on electrifying light shows that dazzle its prey. Perhaps most surprising of all, this animal is quite intelligent, with a highly complex brain. In this program, underwater cameras capture the extraordinary powers of the cuttlefish.

Watch the Wildlife Nature Documentary . Sharks in the South Pacific - The Polynesian SHARK

Jaguar: Year of the Cat

The jaguar is the third largest cat in the world, surpassed only by the lion and tiger. These felines once roamed throughout the southwestern United States, throughout Central America, and down into Brazil and Argentina. But today, their numbers cut by the animal-skin trade and much of their habitat lost to farmland, jaguars exist only in protected areas and fragments of their former range.

In fact, the jaguar is almost impossible to spot in the wild. A silent hunter by day or by night, the jaguar sports a patterned coat that gives it near-perfect camouflage against the dapple of the forest, and unlike other large cats, it does not roar. This presents a big problem for wildlife cinematographers: how do you film an animal you can't see? The answer can be found in the NATURE program JAGUAR: YEAR OF THE CAT.

In 1993, as they prepared to make the film, JAGUAR's producers were faced with a seemingly insurmountable challenge. "It's very rare to see jaguars in the wild," says Barry Clark, the show's executive producer. "[Jaguar researcher] Alan Rabinowitz has spent many years studying jaguars in the wild and has seen only one. No one could do a program on wild jaguars, because no one could get the footage."


So the filmmakers compromised: instead of trying to locate this elusive animal, they placed a zoo-owned jaguar in an outdoor setting that mimicked the cat's natural habitat. The jaguar you see on the show is from the Belize Zoo, near the Cockscomb Basin Jaguar Preserve, the world's only protected area for jaguars.

Clark's crew created a series of more than 100 "sets" which, although constructed, were nevertheless totally natural. Just outside the Cockscomb Basin Preserve, the crew enclosed parts of the forest and installed lights, rain machines, and dolly tracks to make natural soundstages. Before they began filming, they brought in the jaguar to get it accustomed to the environment.


"The jaguar would live in the set for a period of time, sometimes weeks before the crew would film on the set," describes Clark. "That way, the jaguar would get used to the set and the crew would set the dolly tracks to what the animal's habits were." The jaguar quickly established a daily routine, which helped make the filming easier. The crew strove to keep the environment as real as possible, even creating a simulated rainy season, during which the jaguar waited out the storm inside a fabricated cave.

Skeptics might argue that this manipulation means JAGUAR: YEAR OF THE CAT is not a real nature film, but Clark maintains that the viewer sees only natural behaviors, not manufactured ones. Even though the circumstances are somewhat modified, everything we see the jaguar doing in the NATURE program is real.

And furthermore, Clark points out, in a film made this way, producers have the ability to spare the lives of other animals involved in the making of the show. During the NATURE show, the jaguar catches a turtle and carries it off to eat it, using his powerful jaws to rip through the turtle's tough shell. But in reality, after the jaguar had fished the turtle out of the river, it was quickly taken from him, released back into the water, and replaced with a dead turtle bought at a local market.


Clark is happy to be in control of the amount of violence during a shoot. "We don't need to kill any animals to get the scene," he says. That's good news for animal lovers -- and for wildlife cinematographers who want to lessen the amount of bloodshed commonly seen in nature films.

The Desert and Grassland’s Deadly Dozen starts with the planet’s speediest rattler.

The sidewinder. At that point head out to Africa for a nearby up take a gander at one of the planet’s deadliest -and littlest -8-legged creature, the six-eyed sand arachnid.

We humans have long wondered how animals see the world—and us. Does your dog really feel shame when it gives you that famous "guilty look?" What is behind the "swarm intelligence" of slime mold or a honeybee hive? How can pigeons possibly find their way home across hundreds of miles of unfamiliar terrain? In this episode of NOVA scienceNOW, David Pogue meets—and competes—with a menagerie of smart critters that challenge preconceived notions about what makes "us" different from "them," expanding our understanding of how animals really think.

A mother grizzly bear brings up her two cubs in the wilds of Alaska. She must keep them safe from prowling males, teach them to hunt and prepare them to survive the savage winter. Alaska has the highest density of grizzlies in the world, so fights and face-offs are common. Biologist Chris Morgan spends the summer in this land of bears, often getting far too close for comfort.

Tall tales of giant man-eating crocodiles inhabit a world between fact and fiction. The truth is that some crocodile species, such as Nile crocs and American crocs, have been known to exceed 20 feet; the Asian-Pacific saltwater croc has been recorded to 23 feet. Today these gigantic creatures are very, very rare, but some of them are still out there in the wild, with a few held in captivity. Renowned herpetologist Romulus Whitaker attempts to ensure the future of the last of these leviathans. This show originally aired February 11, 2007.

Siberia : Wild Russia

Accounting for around 10 per cent of the world’s dry land, Siberia is famous as a brutally cold place. Yet it is home to a diverse range of habitats and animal life – including musk deer, camels, gazelles and the extraordinary Siberian salamander, which can spend years encased in -40°C ice and still survive. Exploring from the frozen north to the southern steppes, this is the real Siberia.

Wildlife film. South African naturalist Mike Rutzen is crazy about great white sharks. He never saw Jaws, so he doesn't share the terror that has made these sharks the world's most feared predator. For ten years Mike has been swimming with great whites, without the protection of a cage. He has spent so much time in their company that he has learned to read their body language and to think like a shark. It is this knowledge that keeps him safe. Mike's quest to understand them better now takes him into the heart of a seal ambush site where he hopes to witness their hunting behavior from underwater.
- Written by BBC

The search for massive freshwater fish reported from the Arctic to the Amazon river.
Investigation into eyewitness encounters seeking to find the biggest and nastiest giant fresh water fish from the Arctic to the Amazon.

Spiders have all the instincts of a warrior. The people of Kajiki, in Southern Japan, have harnessed these skills to create the sport of spider fighting.

The predatory Monster Spiders are said to viciously attack animals. A shaman in the small town of San Rafael, on the border of Colombia and Venezuela, apparently witnessed a giant tarantula creep out of the jungle and into the village, where it caught a small dog. The spider delivered a fatal dose of poison, and then dragged the dog into the jungle. Investigation on reports of large desert arachnids in Iraq called Camel Spiders and examines claims about spiders large enough to eat small dogs in Peru.

The Gorilla King

NATURE retraces the life of Titus, silverback leader, from birth to present reign, spanning a tumultuous period in the history of a species and a nation in The Gorilla King.

In 1974, renowned primatologist Dian Fossey introduced a young researcher named Kelly Stewart to a gorilla family Fossey was studying. Stewart, daughter of actor Jimmy Stewart, was the first to see a tiny new baby gorilla. She named him Titus, and her journal entry began the up-close observation of his life that researchers have continued to this day. Titus’s turbulent life story, from orphan to ruler and the challenge to his throne today, is chronicled in The Gorilla King.

At 33 years old, the 400-pound silverback Titus has ruled for nearly half his life, an astonishing feat given the early trials he faced. When Titus was four, his father was slaughtered by poachers. Shortly after, his infant sister was killed in a coup attempt by an interloper named Beetsme. It wasn’t unusual; when a male outsider takes over a group, he will kill all the infants in order to sire his own offspring. Titus’s mother and other sister fled, leaving him orphaned and abandoned.

In 1991, at age 17, Titus surprised researchers when he deposed Beetsme in a bloodless coup. Titus was entering his prime, but Rwanda was descending into the chaos of civil war, forcing researchers to flee. It created the only gap in his life’s record.

Follow the entire saga of Titus’s reign in The Gorilla King.

The Last Lions

The Last Lions is a 2011 African nature documentary film by National Geographic Society, videotaped and directed by Dereck and Beverly Joubert..

Fifty years ago there were close to half-a-million lions in Africa. Today there are around 20,000. To make matters worse, lions, unlike elephants, which are far more numerous, have virtually no protection under government mandate or through international accords. This is the jumping-off point for a disturbing, well-researched and beautifully made cri de coeur from husband and wife team Dereck and Beverly Joubert, award-winning filmmakers from Botswana who have been Explorers-in-Residence at National Geographic for more than four years. Pointing to poaching as a primary threat while noting the lion's pride of place on the list for eco-tourists-an industry that brings in 200 billion dollars per year worldwide-the Jouberts build a solid case for both the moral duty we have to protect lions (as well as other threatened "big cats," tigers among them) and the economic sense such protection would make. And when one takes into account the fact that big cats are at the very top of the food chain-and that their elimination would wreak havoc on all species below them, causing a complete ecosystem collapse-the need takes on a supreme urgency.

David Attenborough tells the story of one of the most intriguing wild places on earth: Madagascar, the huge island of dramatic landscapes where the wildlife is strange and unique, some of it having been filmed for the very first time.

In this episode we travel deep into Madagascar's most luxuriant landscape; the rainforests that cloak the island's eastern mountains. Remote and mysterious, this little-known region of towering peaks and precipitous escarpments is home to over half of all Madagascar's unique species.

Narrated by David Attenborough, this second episode showcases an amazing collection of wildlife, many of which have never before been filmed. Cyanide-eating lemurs, cannibalistic frogs, meat-eating plants, cryptic leaf-tailed geckos, tadpole-eating wasps, tunnel-digging chameleons and house-proud flycatchers are just some of the weird and wonderful wildlife featured in this programme.

Along this coast, every cliff and valley is like a lost world where nature has run riot. Amongst the boulders of the Andringitra Highlands, a few hardy troops of ringtailed lemurs make their home. More at home in the hot southern forests, these eke out a living at the top of the coldest mountain on the island. To fight the sub-zero cold, they have developed thick coats and can only survive the freezing nights by huddling together in rocky crevices. In this high 'desert', they must eat cacti for moisture.

Descend just a few hundred metres and it's a very different world, where dense forests are permanently shrouded in clouds. The Marojejy Massif is the last sanctuary of one of Madagascar's rarest lemurs, the elusive, ghostly white silky sifaka. There are thought to be only two hundred of these playful and endearing creatures left on earth.
Over 80 per cent of Madagascar's animals and plants are found nowhere else on Earth. Discover what made Madagascar so different from the rest of the world, and how evolution ran wild here.

We love to keep pets, forming close bonds with them, and making them part of our lives. But around the world some people have sought out unusual - and even potentially dangerous - relationships, with some very surprising animals.

For a human to want to befriend a lion or a buffalo is one thing, but why do these animals also form close relationships with us? Can science help us understand how a hippo can become part of the family? Why a polar bear would let a man give her a hug? And how it is possible to join a pack of hyenas without being attacked?

Wildlife biologist Liz Bonnin is on a worldwide journey of discovery to uncover the reasons behind some of the most unexpected friendships between animals and humans. She wants to find out how these relationships are formed, why they work, and what's in it for both the humans and the animals.

Here in this Episode 2, Liz Bonnin looks at some of the most unexpected friendships between animals and humans.

Wolverines are among the most elusive creatures on the planet. They seek out the toughest terrain – the most rugged, remote and fiercely raw – and they’ve always been scarce to begin with. So they’re hard to find. They weigh only about 30 pounds, but they have a ton of attitude and a reputation to match. They eat everything, dead or alive, warm or frozen, and will climb anything, even mountains. It’s impossible for humans to keep up with them. They’re built to travel long distances with minimum effort across deep snow or up the sides of sheer cliffs. They roam an enormous territory of about 500 square miles – a home turf larger than an average grizzly bear’s. And they share it only with their immediate family. It’s “no trespassing” for everybody else.

Few researchers have observed wolverines in the wild, though some have tried, for years on end. Most must settle for capturing their images on remote cameras, tracking them from a distance, and getting to know them from their DNA. Those that study them become completely captivated by them, full of admiration and respect for these totally outrageous and independent creatures. Author and wolverine enthusiast, Doug Chadwick, puts it this way: “Like most of the guys on the project, what I really want to do is just be a wolverine. I want to go where I want to go, do what I want to do, bite who I want to bite, and climb what I want to climb.”

Yet there is one man whose experience with wolverines has been completely different. Wildlife filmmaker Steve Kroschel has spent 25 years with wolverines, and has even shared his home with them. Caring for injured and orphaned animals on a sixty-acre refuge in Alaska, he is one of the few men in the world to raise wolverines in captivity. The two orphans he has cared for since their birth have become his lifelong responsibility – and they are a handful! But he remains their committed and devoted advocate, a more than willing substitute parent to these remarkable animals he has come to love.

The Most Extreme Animals Documentary (Complete Series)

Each episode of The Most Extreme series focuses on a specific animal feature, such as strength, speed, behavior, anatomy, or diet, and examines and ranks ten animals that portray extreme or unusual examples of that quality.
The rankings serve only to give a broad depiction; a scientifically rigorous procedure is not employed to quantify them.

From desert rats to Mexican jumping beans, from miraculous lizards that walk on water to super swift sharks, from anthrax-eating vultures to blood-licking bats, The Most Extreme series examines fighters, gluttons, lovers, jumpers, and more. It also asks who are the top 10 dads, moms or disguises? What about the top 10 body parts?

If you think you're sneaky, just wait until you see the dirtiest rotten scoundrels in the natural world. Are chameleons really the masters of disguise? Are foxes as cunning as we think?

Nurturing 30 babies with only four nipples, laying one of the world's biggest eggs, travelling 4000 miles to find a mate, and literally breaking your back to give birth are just some of the extraordinary reproductive feats of the natural world.

Watch The Full Documentary of The Most Extreme Animals (Entire Playlist):

The Most Extreme is a documentary television series on the American cable television network, Animal Planet. It first aired on July 7, 2002. Each episode focuses on a specific animal feature, such as strength, speed, behavior, anatomy, or diet, and examines and ranks ten animals that portray extreme or unusual examples of that quality. The rankings serve only to give a broad depiction; a scientifically rigorous procedure is not employed to quantify them.

WE HAVE THE FOLLOWING BELOW COLLECTION OF MOST EXTREME ANIMALS:
Watch and Enjoy!

The Most Extreme CHEATS - The ways animals trick one another.
The Most Extreme KILLERS - The animals with the highest human kill counts.
The Most Extreme SUPER SHARKS - The "highest tech" sharks in the water.
The Most Extreme GARDENERS - The unusual ways that animals impact vegetable growth.
The Most Extreme APPENDAGES - The most unusual animal attachments.
The Most Extreme BODY PARTS - Animals with relativelty large body parts.
The Most Extreme BIRTH - Extreme reproduction in number of young, size and other factors.
The Most Extreme STRENGTH - Proportionally, the strongest animals in the world.
The Most Extreme SPEED - The fastest animals on land, air and water.
The Most Extreme TROUBLEMAKERS - The animals that causes the most troubles for humans just doing what the do.
The Most Extreme MOMS - Moms with the heaviest, hardest or most unusual jobs on the planet.
The Most Extreme DEFENDERS - The best and most unusual self-protectors.
The Most Extreme STINKERS - The worst smelling animals, including one with stench that kills.
The Most Extreme DAREDEVILS - Top stunstmen of the natural kingdom
The Most Extreme BITERS - The deadliest, most prolific and most extreme biters.
The Most Extreme THE LIVING DEAD - Not actual zombies, these extreme hibernators can appear to come back from the dead.
The Most Extreme ANIMAL MYTHS - The most misunderstood animals.
The Most Extreme SWARMS - Hordes in the animal kingdom including millions and even billions of individuals.
The Most Extreme PREDATORS - The most efficient predators come in many sizes.
The Most Extreme MOVERS - The animals that move the best with the least limbs for movement.
The Most Extreme FREELOADERS - Opportunistic species that gain benefits by associating with others.
The Most Extreme FIGHTERS - Warriors of the animal kingdom.
The Most Extreme SMARTS - Intelligence in the animal kingdom.
The Most Extreme BIG MOUTHS - Proportionally, the ten largest mouths in the world.
The Most Extreme GOURMETS - Not all animals gobble their food. These species put time and effort into their food preparation.
The Most Extreme DADS - Dads in the wild can go to extremes to take care of their young.
The Most Extreme JUMPERS - The fastest, highest and best jumpers.
The Most Extreme GLOBAL CONQUERORS - The most invasive animal species.
The Most Extreme TRANSFORMERS - 10 transformers capable of altering themselves in extreme ways.

What Darwin Never Knew

Horizon : The Dinosaur that Fooled the World

Kings of Camouflage : The Cuttlefish

Sharks in the South Pacific - The Polynesian SHARK

Jaguar: Year of the Cat

Worlds Deadliest Animals Deserts To Grassland

What Are Animals Thinking?

The Natural World : Grizzlies of Alaska

Supersize Crocs

Siberia : Wild Russia

Great White Shark: A Living Legend

MonsterQuest : Gigantic Killer Fish

The Samurai Fighting Spider

Monster Quest: Monster Spiders

The Gorilla King

The Last Lions

Madagascar : Lost Worlds

Animal Odd Couples : BBC

Wolverine: Chasing the Phantom

The Most Extreme Animals Documentary (Complete Series)

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