All language subtitles for Life.2009.S01E02.1080p.BluRay.x265-RARBG

Ati'en borough: The island of komodo
in Indonesia,

remote and barren.

Few people live here.

It's ruled by a giant reptile.

It looks like a survivor
from the age of the dinosaurs.

The I(Omodo dragon.

Nine feet long. A top predator.

Only one thing can challenge
a dragon's dominance.

Another dragon.

In the breeding season,
males are drawn into savage conflict.

Huge claws and 60 serrated teeth
can inflict terrible damage.

The I(Omodo dragon is the only reptile
that still rules the land

as dinosaurs once did.

It can dominate here
because it has no competition.

But for the rest of the world's
reptiles and amphibians,

survival is a much tougher struggle.

Like the dragon,
reptiles and amphibians seem primitive,

better suited to an earlier age.

Yet they have a surprising repertoire
of extra ordinary strategies.

And they still thrive
in many parts of the planet.

This is the story of how they do so.

South America, the remote jungle
where Brazil and Venezuela meet.

Sheer-sided mountains rise up
from the jungle.

Few places on earth are wetter.

It's the home of some ancient
and very peculiar amphibians.

The waterfall toad is just an inch long,
the size of a postage stamp.

Its special gripping hands enable it to
clamber safely, high in the treetops.

But it's not alone up here.

Most frogs and toads avoid predators
by hopping out of danger.

But this toad never evolved the ability
to hop for more than an inch,

and that's nowhere near enough.

One way it gets eaten,
the other way is thin air.

Not much of a choice.

But this isn't suicide.

It's a deliberate strategy,

and one that depends on the size and
strength of those extraordinary hands.

Free-falling like this
is a very effective way of escaping.

However, another toad
on this same mountain

has elaborated this strategy.

It lives a mile above the forest
on this plateau,

cut off from the world below.

This is a pebble toad.

It too is only an inch long.

These rocks may seem a paradise
for a toad.

It's even wetter than the forest below
and there are no snakes.

But there is a hunter here.

A toad-eating tarantula.

It ambushes its prey.

Like the waterfall toad
the pebble toad can't hop,

but it has a different defence.

It tenses its muscles, becomes rigid
and turns itself into a rubber ball.

It's so tiny and weighs so little
that bouncing doesn't hurt it at all.

Bizarre innovations like these

are one of the reasons why amphibians
and reptiles are still so successful.

Some of them, however,

have hardly changed
for tens of millions of years.

Brazil's pantanal.

Over 50, 000 square miles of swamp.

In the dry season,
the water is reduced to isolated pools.

And then, they contain the greatest
concentration of crocodiles on earth.

These caiman crocodiles are trapped
and fast running out of food.

It will be a long time before
the rains return and the rivers rise,

bringing with them
the caiman's prey, fish.

Being cold-blooded

they can go without food for months
and stay inactive,

except when they squabble.

A t last, the rains return
and rivers swell.

All reptiles are experts
at saving energy.

The caimans simply line up
and wait for the fish to come to them.

Reptiles and amphibians
must warm their bodies

before they can become active

and until then,
they are slow-mo ving and vulnerable.

The quickest way to gain heat
is to bask in the sun,

as this Basilisk lizard
from Central America is doing.

The trouble is that exposing yourself
inevitably makes you easily seen.

But a conspicuous perch
over a river like this

seems to be making yourself
unnecessarily prominent.

This Basilisk's greatest threat
comes from the sky.

Dark shapes overhead make it nervous.

A hunting bird might expect it to flee
to the trees.

In fact, it does the opposite.

This skitter across the surface
of the water earns it precious seconds,

and the nickname Jesus Christ lizard.

It drives its feet down
so hard and so fast

that it never sinks deeper
than a few inches.

A human would need to run
at 65 miles an hour to do this.

Reptiles are certainly expert
at a voiding trouble,

but the y're also very good
at finding a way to live in places

that don't seem to suit them at all.

They once included the largest animals
that have ever walked the earth,

the dinosaurs.

And some living ones are
a million times smaller than t. Rex,

smaller indeed than some insects.

The Brazilian pygmy gecko
could sit comfortably on a fingertip.

It's so exceptionally small
that no other reptiles compete with it.

But it's so nimble it can escape from
the hunting monsters of the undergrowth.

It is so small that it has special
problems with, for example, rain.

It could drown in a drop.

But its skin is hydrophobic.

Rain cannot wet it.

A tumble into a puddle, you might think,
would risk death by drowning.

But the gecko is unsinkable.

It's so light and its skin
so wa ter—repellent

that it can literally stand on water.

Such miniaturisation
is certainly very impressive,

but the reptile body can be transformed
even more dramatically.

One of the most bizarre of all reptiles
hunts insects here in Madagascar.

The praying mantis
has 360-degree vision.

But it hasn't seen the danger
that is now approaching.

A panther chameleon.

Every part of its body
has become specialised

for a life of stealth
among the branches.

Its toes have become grasping pincers.

Its eyes rotate so it can look
in all directions.

Its skin can change colour
for camouflage or to signal emotions.

The chameleon body is concealed
from both predator and prey

so it can launch a surprise attack.

The tongue is like a missile

aimed at its prey's head
to neutralise its defences.

Chameleons, in short are so perfectly
adapted to a life spent hunting in trees

that it is hard to imagine
how they could live anywhere else.

The namib desert.

There are no trees
for hundreds of miles.

Yet these are undoubtabl y
chameleon footprints.

This female namaqua chameleon
is searching for a mate.

No part of her body seems suited
to such an environment.

Her feet, that could give her
such a good grip on twigs,

should surely be useless on soft sand.

But she's able to spread them
like snowshoes.

She needs to get warm and active
while the desert is still cool,

so she exploits the chameleon's
versatile skin.

The side facing the sun goes dark
to absorb the sun's heat,

while the other remains light

and minimises the heat escaping
from her body.

She's hungry and food is scarce.

But she's still not quick enough
to grab these desert beetles.

Her solution is simple.

She finds at last a little vegetation

and waits for a shade-seeking beetle
to come to her.

On she goes in her search for a mate.

At last, a wandering male.

But he may not treat her
as she might wish.

The courtship of most chameleons
is gentle.

But in this desert,

a male meets a female so rarely
he can't risk being rejected.

She marches on,
now carrying a new generation.

A six-month freeze, when temperatures
may drop to minus 40 degrees centigrade,

should surely make things impossible
for a reptile.

But here in Canada, beneath
the thawing snow, something stirs.

A male red-sided garter snake.

He survived the winter
by hibernating underground,

where the temperature
never dropped below zero.

The weak sun persuades
more males to emerge.

They are cold and can't move fast,
yet they are in an urgent race.

The first males to warm up
will have a head start

when the first females appear.

Meltwater provides the first drink
the y've had for six months.

At last, a female has emerged.

The warmest males will inevitably
be the first to react to her smell.

She will only mate once,
so competition between them is intense.

This male has overslept.

He will need hours to warm up.

At the moment,
he stands no chance of mating.

Most of the other males
are ready to chase females

but curiously, some leave the race
and go to join the cold male.

They slide their warm bodies over him

just as they would
if they were courting a female.

More and more males crowd round him.

Why?

Their relative temperatures show
what's going on.

His cool body, showing as blue,

is quickly warming as it absorbs heat
from the other males.

He's a trickster.

He's fooled the others by giving off
a scent just like a female 's

and they are trying to mate with him.

He only needs a few minutes of this
to steal enough heat from his rivals

to catch up and join the chase.

Every spring,
tens of thousands of garter snakes

fight it out in this mating frenzy.

It is, in numbers, the greatest
gathering of reptiles in the world.

Getting a mate is just
the first challenge a reptile faces

when it's ready to breed.

This collared iguana in Madagascar

will only lay
one batch of eggs this year,

so she needs somewhere safe
to hide them.

Her eggs are much sought after
by predators.

They are excellent pre-packaged meals.

She appears to have the answer.

She covers all traces
of where she buried them.

It's a good strategy.

But not good enough.

Hognose snakes have learned
to keep watch on iguana nesting sites

and to note the precise place
where the eggs lie buried.

She has been completely outwitted.

She can only stand by and watch
as her precious eggs are eaten.

Next year, she will have to find a
nesting site without a hognose snake.

On the other side of the world,
in the sonoran desert of a rizona,

a similar drama has
a very different outcome.

A female horned lizard
guards her buried eggs

and is keeping a lookout for anything
that might interfere with them.

A western patchnose snake.

It is an egg-eater.

And she won't stand for it.

The patchnose is no match
for this kind of aggression.

Her eggs are safe, for now.

Another predator, a coachwhip snake,
and this species is a lizard-eater.

And she can tell the difference.

The snake is too fast
for her to outrun it,

so she makes herself
look larger and taller.

The snake is wary of swallowing anything
that looks as big and as spiky as this.

And now the lizard plays her trump card.

The snake isn't accustomed
to prey that does this.

One very confused snake.

Now she can return to guard duty.

And several months later,
she is rewarded with her first baby.

Looking after your eggs is an even
greater challenge for reptiles

that have left land to live in the sea.

The pacific island of Niue is home
to the world's entire population

of one particular type of sea krait.

This snake is superbly adapted
to life underwater,

except when it's time to breed.

After a few minutes in a mating coil,
the female is fertilised.

But now she has a problem.

Reptile eggs can't survive underwater.

The developing young would drown.
They have to be able to breathe air.

She and her eggs are both vulnerable
to predators if they return to land.

But she has an extraordinary solution.

She dives beneath the island

to find the entrance to
a long underwater tunnel.

At the far end is a cave
with an air pocket.

This is the dry land her eggs need.

There are no predators here.

The cavern is sealed by a roof abo ve
and the water below.

She searches for a crevice
where she can deposit her eggs.

The eggs will be completely safe here
and she can return to the open sea.

Six months later, a baby snake
takes its first breath.

Somehow, the young snakes
must find their own way to water.

Then, down the tunnel and out to sea.

A male giant bullfrog.

Reptiles and amphibians rarely care
for their young after they hatch

but this South African bruiser
is an exception.

The males sort out their dominance
through combat.

The strongest will mate
with the most females.

You might not expect such an aggressive
male to be a caring father.

Yet one male stays behind to watch over
not just his own,

but everyone else's offspring.

The females laid their eggs in the
shallows around the margins of the pool.

But the sun is intense and the shallows
have shrunk to a single pool.

There is a real danger that
the tadpoles will be stranded.

The guardian male
recognises the problem.

They will be dead within an hour
unless he can do something to help.

There is only one thing
he can do to save them,

Dig a channel to the main pool.

They are safe.

Remarkable innovations have made
amphibians and reptiles

a modern success story.

What is more,
among their ranks is one reptile

that is still an undisputed
top land predator.

The I(Omodo dragon.

They mostly hunt deer,
which they ambush and easily overpower.

But in hard times, the dragons risk
hunting something much bigger...

Water buffalo, an animal
ten times their size.

Until now, a dragon hunt
has never been filmed.

It's the dry season.

A buffalo sleeps through
the heat of the day

in one of the last waterholes.

Dragons lurk around the margins.

The buffalo seems to view them
as just an irritation, not a danger.

A serious mistake.

The dragon is wary.
A jab or a kick could injure it fatally.

The bites are just flesh wounds,
but other dragons are alert now.

Like sharks, they are excited by blood.

The buffalo leaves with just a limp.

The dragons appear to have failed.

Yet they show a peculiar interest in the
buffalo and follow it wherever it goes.

As the days pass,
the buffalo's wounds don't heal.

It starts to weaken.

The dragons' hunting method
begins to come clear.

A brand-new disco very reveals that
the dragon has venom, like a snake.

The bite will eventually prove fatal,
but it's going to take several weeks.

The dragons, however, can afford to wait
for a meal of this size.

They simply stick close to their victim
and conserve their energy.

Thousands of years ago,
dwarf elephants lived here.

The dragons probably hunted them
in exactly the same way.

But the process is
a long, drawn-out one.

Three weeks later and
the buffalo is very weak.

The dragons sense that the end is near.

They must remain wary.
The buffalo could still lash out.

Gradually, they close in
to try and finish it off.

The dragons' strategy
is certainly merciless.

But it is the only way that
they can get a meal like this

and in hard times,
they need it if they are to survive.

The buffalo died in the night.

Ten big dragons have gathered to feed.

They strip the buffalo to the bone
in just four hours.

This is the biggest venomous
animal on the planet.

We don't need tales of Jurassic park
and veloci ra pto rs

to see a reptile-dominated world.

It's all here.

No one has ever before
followed the whole process

of a I(Omodo dragon hunting a buffalo.

So cameraman I(Evin flay
and researcher Matt s warbrick

didn't know what to expect.

They thought it would be
a physical challenge

but they hadn't bargained
for emotional turmoil as well.

They've reached I(Omodo
after a four-da y journey.

I(e vin, an expert at filming reptiles,
knows the y're in dragon territory.

Swarbrick: Look how wide that is.

- Look at that.
- Yeah.

Their only protection is
these rangers, armed with sticks.

These big ones look
really scary, actually.

And not until they come really in close
and when they're by the camera,

then you tend to question your faith
in our friends with the sticks.

We got any guys with sticks?

But this dragon isn't a big one.

At five foot, this dragon
is just over half grown.

The really big ones live inland,

which is exactly where
I(E vin and Matt must go

to find a place where dragons
and buffalo might meet.

Flay: We could spend five weeks
walking around all over the island

just trying to find dragons
randomly coming across buffalos.

But fortunately for us,
it is the dry season

and there's only one decent
waterhole left on the island.

And both the dragons and the buffalo
require water, obviously,

which brings them together.

A'i'i'en borough:
I(E vin decides to wait here,

but after a few days
with no sign of dragons,

it looks like the wrong decision.

Oh, here comes a buffalo.

You know, this is about as exciting
as the day gets. Look.

See that?

Hello, mate.

Ati'en borough: After almost a week,
something changes

and a couple of dragons appear.

- Have we got a ranger here?
- Guys, can we have a ranger?

Always know how dangerous
a situation is.

But it does seem a bit concerning that
one of our rangers is sat up in a tree.

Ati'en borough: But the dragons show
no interest in the buffalo or the crew,

and the frustration continues.

Yet their task seems so simple.

Swarbrick: So, what we need
is for him

to film him attacking him.

But it looks like he
is about to attack him.

Just cut myself.
That's not good in dragon country.

I'd better be careful.

We've got to start now.
We've got to start our walk home.

It takes just over an hour
but the thing is, if stuff's happened

and you've managed to
film good stuff, then it's really easy.

You just trot on home
and find some dinner

and find out what the rats
have done to your room.

But it's still really hot
at this time of day

and so if you've not filmed a lot
and you've just sat here all day long,

then it's a hell of a long walk home.

A'i'i'en borough:
They have a lot of long walks home.

But finally, a new dragon appears.

Something about its attitude
seems different.

Maybe we could be on to something.

But I've now lost the other dragon,
which makes me a bit nervous.

Ati'en borough: At first it's wary,

unwilling to get too close
to the buffalo.

Big dragons involved here.
Somewhere.

That came from absolutely nowhere.

That guy has got some real attitude.

A'i'i'en borough: That first bite
and the smell of blood

set off a chain reaction.

All the dragons seem to come to life.

The peaceful watering hole is now
a dangerous place to be.

I've definitely got two heads
at the moment.

One as a cameramen saying,
"yes, brilliant!"

And the other one is thinking,
"that poor animal."

You know, that's not nice.
That's really not nice.

- Ranger 1: Careful.
- Here it comes, here it comes.

- Ranger 2: Camera, camera.
- —got it.

Swarbrick: Nice.

Quickly, quickly, quickly.

My heart's pumping a bit.

At least my heart still works.
Good lord, that was a bit hairy.

Ati'en borough: Now the crew must
follow the buffalo every day

to finish their filming job.

This begins to take a toll
on their emotions.

He knows he's injured,
he can't walk properly,

and you've got these predatorsjust

gathering around him,
waiting for the opportunity.

It's gruesome.

Ati'en borough: Shadowing the buffalo
means staying close to the dragons, too.

This is mad.
We've just followed the buffalo

and I think six dragons?
I've lost track now,

I think it's six dragons,
down into the riverbed.

And, you know, they're stalking it.

We're all a bit nervous.

It's actually quite frightening,
I have to say.

Swarbrick: They're so capable
and so unafraid of us

and they would have no problems at all
causing us major, major damage.

At the moment, I feel about
5 to 10% confident that I'm safe here.

But the truth is we just don't know.

Ati'en borough: As the days pass,

I(e vin and Matt can't help but feel
more deeply involved.

And I'm sure they're starting to think
of us as death, you know,

this camera team, because although we're
not influencing it in any way, really,

we're always there
when the dragons are there

and, you know, she's sick,
so we're following her.

And you see her looking back at you
and I'm sure I feel like, you know,

death and his scythe coming in to kill.

I'm not really that sure
how cut out I am for this.

If the game is spending all your time
watching an animal die,

I don't know about that.

A'i'i'e n Bo ro u g h:
The dragons seem brutal,

yet this is the only way
they can get large prey.

For the team,
the event has become personal.

Swarbrick: I think as
we've got to know him,

and, you know, we see him every morning,
we see him every evening, you know,

you build up a relationship with him.

And today I think he kind of gave up.

A'i'i'en borough:
The next day, it is all over.

Flay: Now it's over, you sit back
and reflect, you sort of feel,

”t hat was just astonishing. ”

And it feels so prime val.

It feels you're watching something
from a different era.

And they really are
the most fantastic things to be with.

Scary,

awesome, you know, to look at,

you just feel that you are looking at
something from j u rassic pa rk.