Original subtitles

In the wild, there are alliances everywhere.

But they're not always mutual.

This lemur is crawling with parasites.

This millipede isn't.

♪ ♪

What happens next is very weird.

The creatures of Earth are wilder than you

could possibly imagine.

Among the fast and fearsome are the astoundingly crazy.

With strange behavior and outrageous fashion sense.

They're all in a competition to survive.

And weirdness always wins.

♪ ♪

In the pantheon of sidekicks, we must reserve pride of

place for one of the giants.

A little guy who keeps herbivores all over the world,

pest-free and healthy, with his titanic appetite for crap.

Dung beetles, described by some entomologists

as God's gift to Earth.

Without these essential septic sidekicks acting as

clean-up crew, we'd all be swimming in poo.

♪ ♪

There are almost 10,000 different species of

dung beetles around the world, and they've

been breaking down droppings since the days of the dinosaurs.

We might avoid it, but for them, it's brown gold,

which they hide like buried treasure.

Eating it and fertilizing the soil all at once.

Don't poo-poo the poo!

It's full of partially digested food.

This dung beetle's super-sensitive antennae

have gone into overdrive.

It knows somewhere out there, fresh feces.

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

But other beetles have picked up the scent too.

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

He's gotta move fast.

Wing it!

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

He follows the scent for over two miles.

There it is, a sweet pile of scat.

This load is juicy good.

Great water content and heaps of plant material intact.

It's exactly what he needs.

The cow wants it gone and the removal guy is here.

Time to roll.

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

However, his poop prize has drawn attention.

This rival male wants it for himself.

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

With the astounding ability to move objects

1,000 times his own weight,

he rolls the challenger and the dung ball together.

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

Body slam!

The bandit is vanquished.

But the job's not done yet.

His home and partner are still 200 yards away.

Luckily, dung beetles are incredible navigators.

By day they use the sun and by night they even use celestial

navigation to plot their course.

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

Finally he reaches home.

♪ ♪

The waiting female buries the dung gift by the entrance

to their mating tunnel.

The dung ball becomes a source of food and a nursery

for the female's eggs.

The larvae that hatch grow big on essential nutrients,

creating a whole new generation of guano aficionados.

This young meat-eating vine has a very grown-up problem.

♪ ♪

The cloud forests of Borneo are a hard place to find food,

especially when you're rooted to the spot.

But if this juvenile pitcher plant grows old enough and high enough,

it may one day team up to form one of the

forest's most dynamic duos.

The young pitcher plant begins life at ground level as an

everyday carnivorous vine.

Stealing essential nitrogen from unsuspecting bugs.

Its modified leaves are a trap, luring insects

with its special nectar.

One false move or even a badly timed raindrop and they fall

into the chamber of horrors where the plant digests them.

♪ ♪

As the plant matures, so does its palate.

♪ ♪

When the plant was younger, this Tree Shrew would

have spelled danger.

But now the older pitcher has a deep appreciation for dung.

It's developed a new type of trap that looks

and works like a toilet.

The shrew's just here to lap up the pitcher's sweet nectar.

The sugary fluid gives him all the energy he'll

need for hard foraging.

He doesn't even take a toilet break, lest someone

else get to the food.

But when you gotta go, you gotta go.

Huh?

In one of the weirdest examples of co-evolution, this is how the

mature pitcher plant now makes its way in the cloud forest.

Because shrew's scat is rich in nutrients.

Precious treasure in this habitat.

♪ ♪

The Sea Anemone is a noxious killer.

Deploying stinging nematocysts on their

tentacles to subdue prey.

Pumping them with lethal toxins.

From fish to Sea Hares.

If they can trap it, they'll eat it.

Even their jellyfish cousins can't get a pass.

Look away now if you're squeamish,

because victims have no chance.

When it comes to their turf, sea anemones will

take down anyone who crosses them.

But for these iconic little fish,

the anemone's a sweetheart.

A wingman for life.

♪ ♪

Living among a deadly sway of tentacles, a layer of thick

slime protects clownfish from the anemone's sting.

So when it comes time to start a clownfish family of its own,

there's no better place to lay eggs.

Surrounded by tentacles, they're safe from any

marauding egg thieves.

This doting father takes great care of the eggs.

And maintains the household in his spare time.

In return for the anemone's protection,

he removes its parasites.

♪ ♪

And chases away other fish who want to feed on their home.

♪ ♪

But the biggest bonus comes from his feces.

Ammonia-rich waste is fantastic fertilizer.

It helps the anemone breathe, grow, and reproduce.

♪ ♪

Under constant protection of the parents and the anemone,

the eggs develop.

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

A week later, they hatch under the cover of darkness.

♪ ♪

Once born, baby clownfish take a little time to

acclimatize to the anemone.

Rubbing themselves on its tentacles over and over,

the young fish acquire a kind of chemical camouflage.

The anemone is no longer

able to distinguish between itself and the clownfish.

Bonded together, the two will become one of the

ocean's ultimate allies.

Trusty sidekicks come in all shapes and sizes.

But what happens when that trust is repaired by cold betrayal?

No, not the hippo.

Say hello to his little friend, the oxpecker.

Africa's dry season is a particularly difficult

time for the animals here.

The only thing worse than the heat are the hordes of bugs

that plague its residents.

To make life tolerable, you've got to take any help on offer.

Red-billed oxpeckers run an on-the-go housekeeping service.

And business is brisk.

♪ ♪

The red bill is surprisingly dexterous and gets right

in where it needs to.

The birds and beasts form a classic

mutualistic relationship.

♪ ♪

Like tiny scissors, the oxpecker's bill scythes

through the top layer of fur.

But in the dry season, overcrowded bathing spots

cause tempers to rise.

Hippos war for territory.

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

The winner gets the last patch of water.

The loser gets covered in bloody wounds.

He could do with a bit of attention.

Oxpeckers clean the scratches and prevent infections.

♪ ♪

They've switched gear to become parasites themselves,

feeding on the hippo's flowing blood.

Oxpeckers have learned that incessant pecking can stop scabs

from forming, leaving wounds open.

Warm blood on tap whenever they need a drink.

♪ ♪

Over weeks, the wounds get bigger and the

oxpeckers keep at it.

Eventually the hippo dies from secondary infections.

♪ ♪

A tragedy for the hippos,

but a treasure for the voracious oxpeckers.

Sidekicks that will kick you when you're down.

Take-offs are tricky.

Landings are iffy.

And the hairless head is a travesty.

But if you want to make an inconvenient body disappear,

look no further.

With stomach acids that dissolve metal, vultures are the

sidekicks humans don't deserve, but absolutely need.

Make them an offer of rotting flesh and they never refuse.

They can finish off a small animal carcass

in half an hour flat.

Decaying carcasses often breed deadly anthrax,

botulinum toxins and rabies.

Vultures keep these diseases in check.

Masters of high altitude flight, vultures typically climb to

over 19,000 feet, surveilling the earth below.

Powerful binocular vision helps them zero in on their quarry.

Target acquired.

♪ ♪

These white-backed vultures have their place

in the pecking order.

Protocol is key.

Lappet-faced vultures will muscle their way in.

Larger and more formidable than their cousins.

Their dagger-like bills are made for ripping through tough hide.

The white-backed vultures will get their turn soon enough.

Using their less pointy meat cleaver bills.

They go to town on the soft tissue.

♪ ♪

It might not seem like it, but vultures are big on hygiene.

A bald head makes for easy cleaning.

The last in line for the rotting buffet are the foot soldiers.

Hooded vultures are the smallest of the lot.

But they are specialists.

They wield their narrow beaks like surgical knives,

removing the tiniest bits of flesh and diving to the

hardest to reach areas.

This methodical clean-up service is invaluable to every single

creature in the ecosystem.

Their appetite for the dead, in no small part, helps to

keep humans healthy and alive.

248 miles off the eastern coast of Africa,

wild monsoons lash the jungles of Madagascar.

Rivers swell, and everyone does their best to

wait out the rains.

As the forest steams and the storms wake, lemur species

all over the island now face a delicate problem.

♪ ♪

Their sultry conditions hatch plagues of disease-carrying

mosquitoes and gut-churning intestinal worms.

Every lemur is fair game for parasites.

They need a fix, and fast.

Enter Madagascar's giant millipede.

♪ ♪

These arthropods don't bite, and their defensive secretions

are mostly harmless to humans.

But to lemurs, they are precious.

♪ ♪

They smell weird and taste worse.

But lemurs don't want to eat them.

These unsuspecting insects are the answer

to their pest problem.

A quick nibble and the millipede secretes a nasty ooze.

The toxic sludge would deter most, but not lemurs.

The fluid contains benzoquinone,

a great insecticide that repels mosquitoes.

Mixed with their own saliva, lemurs rub the

foul-smelling concoction all over their bodies.

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

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Like sour candy, the millipede's secretions make the lemurs drool,

and their eyes glaze over.

♪ ♪

But there's something else at work here.

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

The spaced-out expression says everything.

The millipede juice may be good for lemurs' bodies,

but it's also a strong narcotic.

♪ ♪

But all good trips must end sometime.

An afternoon nap is the need of the hour.

Millipedes it seems get nothing from this

one-sided relationship.

But at least they live to tell the tale,

getting back to the business of being millipedes.

Until the next mosquito apocalypse, when lemurs

everywhere turn to these little psychoactive

avengers for salvation.

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

This primordial Southeast Asian jungle is home to one of

nature's most far-out pairings.

A flying rhinoceros.

Lifelong soulmates with a strange method of

sealing their union.

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

Hornbills have one of the weirdest breeding

strategies of any bird.

It all starts ordinarily enough.

The tallest trees in Borneo's forests are like arboreal cafes.

Leafy hubs for hornbill flirtations.

♪ ♪

This guy is the envy of the whole jungle.

♪ ♪

As far as this female's concerned, his massive casque

is massively attractive.

Now he's got her attention, they can move on to

a little courtship.

Hornbills pair for life, so this girl is looking

for her ultimate sidekick.

She has one chance to make sure her chosen

beau can go the distance.

She wants a snack.

Ever eager to please, the male presents her with

the juiciest figs in town.

And he's got more where that came from.

He's not just a pretty face, he's also a provider.

She's convinced this guy is her perfect co-pilot.

Next, the smitten couple must cement their union.

♪ ♪

In the hornbill world, cement is the operative word.

In one of the most unusual nesting practices amongst birds,

the female imprisons herself within a tree cavity

for almost two months.

Surely her loving partner will get her out of this predicament.

But it's quite the opposite.

Hidden behind a wall of clay, droppings and

saliva, she and her brood are safe from predators

and the sweltering heat.

♪ ♪

The doting male delivers fruit through the hole in the tree.

Cut off from the world and totally dependent on

her partner for survival.

The rigorous selection process that he was subjected

to finally makes sense.

He will bring her food nearly 20 times every day.

The future of their genes depends completely on

his ability to provide.

The pair will repeat this process almost

40 times throughout their lives,

rendering this couple the tightest of fits.

♪ ♪

This planet has quite a flair for creating life in

endlessly strange forms.

But evolution keeps making crabs.

And nobody knows why.

♪ ♪

In the last 250 million years, crab-like animals

have evolved independently at least five times

over from very different ancestors.

But the reason crabs keep appearing may be because their

body plan is so versatile when it comes to hiding

from predators.

So does a crab-like body make you an evolutionary rock star?

Well fire urchins and sea anemones think so.

Because once they've hooked up with certain crabs,

these power couples will change each other's lives forever.

Fire urchins are prickly deep-sea dwellers that

are as dangerous as they look.

Those spines are tipped with venom.

That would be enough to ward off most species.

But not the carrier crab.

The crab's modified back legs have just one purpose.

Whisking impressionable urchins away for the ride of their life.

Coupled up and happy, they hit the road.

The urchin's punked-up wig of venomous barbs protects

the crab from predators.

So he's free to indulge in his favorite foods.

♪ ♪

Like John and Yoko, this rock star couple have each

other's backs no matter what.

But rock star crabs can couple up in all kinds of ways.

The boxer crab is more a glam rocker, spends most of its days

attached to reefs in shallow waters.

At these depths, it's vulnerable to birds, fish,

octopus and even other crabs.

Tough crowd to control.

Luckily it's not alone.

♪ ♪

While these foxy white pom-poms may look like part of its eight limbs,

they are in fact two venomous sea anemones,

carried in its claws for protection.

Dancing and weaving on its back legs, the boxer floats

its white gloves as a warning.

Stinging anyone who dares to come too close.

In exchange for this defense, as the crab forages,

the anemones are nourished by the crab's food scraps.

♪ ♪

In the life of evolutionary rock stars, the carrier and the

boxer are two crabs that know the power of a great duet.

Among the world of aquatic sidekicks, there is a kind of

fish with a crude reputation as that annoying guest who

never quite knows when to leave.

In short, these fish suck.

Big time.

The remora's dorsal fin has adapted over time to become a

suction disc, making them super clingy hitchhikers.

With no air bladder to keep them afloat like normal fish,

they depend on hospitable hosts to travel and to find food.

But they've got to choose a ride that works for them.

How about these whale sharks?

Up to two dozen remoras crowd one whale shark.

They snack on parasitic copepods that plague the giant fish.

So whale sharks don't mind too much when it comes

to giving them a lift.

Then there's more sharky sharks.

You'd think it would be harder to hold on to fast-moving hosts.

But it's the opposite.

The remora seals its suction disc against the shark's body.

The faster the shark swims, the increasing water pressure

amplifies the remora's suction seal.

And if the host deems its guests a tad too annoying,

they make for handy appetizers.

Then there are these little suckers.

For this species of remora, green sea turtles are

the preferred superhost.

♪ ♪

Oh, something's stirring.

It just happens to be the turtle's tummy.

And the grateful bottom feeders suck up the offering.

The planet is filled to the brim with, um,

strange companionships.

But remora like this take the sidekick thing

to a whole new level.

Because nature is never weirder than a toilet-trained fish.