Original subtitles

(BIRDS TWEETİNG)

FEMALE NARRATOR: İn fhe countless landscapes of life on Earth,

things are not always what they seem.

What appears fragile may be fierce.

What appears innocent may be calculating.

Clever illusion is more than a means Of survival.

İÜs also a story of love.

And of the mysterious force

relentlessiy driving all living things to reproduce themselves.

By any means necessary.

İncluding deception.

/ live in forests like this.

But then, l live almost everywhere.

This tropical forest appears still, but everywhere living things

are following ihe mute commands of their genes to find mates

and to ensure that their species lives on.

Öne might imagine that the most important life forms are large,

or Hlashy,

or smarft.

But it is love among the little things

that actually runs the vast machinery of life.

(BUZZING)

Some of ihe most important events on Earith occur guletiy

in small and hidden worlds.

And some species critical to the grand scheme oflife

are not what you expecil.

This is a story about one of the mosit vital

and ingenious of all living things.

İt's my story.

!'m a flower.

'M going to tell you, on behalf of all flowers,

about life from our point of view.

You think we're just fragile wisps of beauty,

unaware that beauty is our strategy.

We're more important than you know.

We've helped life prosper across the ages.

Without us, humans might not survive.

Beauvity is not always what it seems.

Beauvity can be a fool of survival and seduction.

Every beat of every wing in every forest

is somehow keeping the great enterprise of life streaming forward.

The constant motion of life makes İove connections possible.

Animals with wings and legs can search for mates.

But we planis are forever rooted in öne place.

So we entice animals to us by offering rewards.

(BUZZING)

When they come, we use them

to make the love connections we can't make ourselves.

(BUZZING)

İn this forest in Panama, a iropical orchid bee

has picked up an alluring scent and he's searching for the source.

İt's me, an orchid.

And I'm öone of the most cunning of all flowers.

My perfume is a İrick.

The orchid bee depends on me for help with his central mission in life.

To mate with a female.

For weeks, he collects scent oils from orchids.

Eventualliy, he uses his mix of fragrances

as a kind of orchid "cologne” to attract a female.

The scents come from me, a bucket orchid.

The bucket is part of my frick.

The bee hasto climb a waxy slope

to reach the sceni oils cleveriİy hidden beneath a hood.

'Ve filled my bucket with a sticky fluid that makes the bee sink.

/ provide only one escape route,

which leads him just where l want him.

After the bee climbs out, İ grip him tightiy.

! glue two pollen sacs to his back,

each filled with tens of thousands of pollen grains.

(BUZZING)

These are the onlİy pollen sacs / will ever produce,

so İ won't let him go until the glue is dry.

İ may wait an hour or more before loosening my grip.

This one bee now carries my legacy.

When he comes upon the scent of another orchid that same day,

he heads right for it.

İf he slips into the bucket of this second orchid,

the pollen sacs on his back will come unglued.

Pollination can occur.

A new orchid generation can begin.

How nature has created such intricate strategies

is a mystery of life.

Yet we can unravel some of ihe puzzle if we go back in time.

Back nearly 200 million years.

During the Age of Reptiles,

there were no mammals larger than a mouse.

For a very long time, there were no flowers, either.

Without flowers, Earth was a drab place.

But about 135 million years ago, life began to change dramaticaliy

because of an invention.

(BIRDS HOOTING)

When dinosaurs roamed foresis like this,

most plants spread their pollen on the wind.

İf they were lucky, a few pollen grains would reach another tree,

creating seeds that would become the next generation.

(RUSTLING)

İt still works today for pines, grasses and many other planis.

But it's not very efficient.

Most of the pollen goes to waste.

Some unknown plant in the deep pasit, perhaps a magnolia ancestor,

produced a device that would ensure delivery of pollen directiy to a mate.

İt would prove to be öne of the mosit important events

in the history of life.

The device was me. A flower.

Our blossoms act like advertising billboards.

Our perfumes and tasty rewards İure passing creatures to us.

And we load them up with pollen

they will unknowingly carry to other flowers.

(BUZZING)

Beetles were among our first "love messengers.”

Our fruit, seeds, nectar and pollen

became crucial foods for millions of species.

We flourished and became a keystone life form.

Today, our pollination schemes knit together the fabric of life

across ihe planet.

ÖOver time, our pollination tactics evolved.

Pollinators adapted in turn.

And life everywhere became infinitely more diverse.

There's an example in this rain forest.

Some of us began hiding our nectar in tubes.

İt encouraged some pollinators to speclalize,

developing mutually beneficial relationships.

Öne of these pollinators evolved a longer beak for nectar tubes.

And wings that can beat up to 200 times a second.

With these unigue aerobatic skilis,

hummingbirds can hover to feed

and maneuver like airborne dancers.

Now, after millions of years,

pollination partnerships occur almost everywhere.

In luxurious habitats like the rain forest,

but also in some of the harshest places on Earth.

The Sonoran Desert of northern Mexico

is a world of blistering heat.

(BIRD SINGING)

/ live here, too.

We cacti are flowering plants central to life in this arid world.

Living as long as 150 years,

we help feed generation after generation of desert creatures.

We are living water tanks.

That's how we survive.

But to reproduce, we form alliances with unusual partners.

In this harsh realm, our strategy is not to deceive,

but to nurture.

When pollinated, we cactus flowers turn into fruit

with seeds fo start a new generation.

So, on summer nights, to attract pollinators,

we open a few nectar-filled flowers.

And we walt.

Elsewhere in the nighit, our pollinators wait, too.

When the time is righit,

they will leave their home on an island in the Sea of Cortez

to search for the white flowers beckoning from the desert.

(SOUEAKING)

These nectar-feeding bats are all female.

They live apart from males while pregnant.

Most are due to give birth soon.

Some are already nursing.

They desperately need nourishment.

(FLAPPING WINGS)

Pollen sticking to their faces rubs off

and pollinates the flower of the next cactus.

A new mother gulps nectar

so she can nurse a baby born only momenits ago.

Each flower opens on onİy one nighi,

its sole opportunity to spread its pollen across ihe desert on wings.

In billions of these brief intersections of the animal and plant worlds,

life regenerates itself over and over agaln.

İf the flowers were pollinated and fertilized,

they will become nourishing frulit.

A wait begins among hungry creatures for the next gifts of the cacti.

A waiting game has also begun

among very different flowers in a very different world.

(BIRDS TWEETİNG)

The farm fields oOf the American Midwest.

(DOG BARKINGC)

(ROOSTER CROWING)

/ live here, too.

'M a kind of wildflower growing near the crops.

Each spring, l wait for a pollinator to sweep in from far away.

/ thrive across North America, but I'm considered a weed.

"Milkweed,” people call me, because of my special sap.

İ make a milky poison

that can sicken many animals that might feed on me.

But l also produce sweet nectar

that draws a kind of beautiful pollinator

from a hidden retreat more than 1,000 miles away.

(CRİCKETS CHIRPING)

In a forest on a mountain in central Mexico,

monarch butterflies are amassed by the tens of millions,

waiting for the rising sun to energize their bodies.

(RUSTLING)

In clusters so dense they can bend the trees,

they rest and prepare themselves

for the long journey northward to reach the milkweed.

Every autumn, to avoid freezing in the north,

they fly here from as far away as Canada

and perch in fir trees at an elevation of more than 11,000 feet.

İt's the perfect climate to help them conserve energy ihrough the winter.

As the morning sun warms their wings, they begin to cascade downward.

(RUSTLING)

To stay alive, they must rely on stored fat

they accumulated last fall.

But to turn fat into enerogy,

they need water.

Their mission each day is to search for a drink of water.

They must maintain their strength

for the exhausting flight from here to the southern U.S.

From there, the children and grandchildren of these monarchs

will journey on northward through the summer to Canada.

Their thirst guenched,

the monarchs return to the trees by late afternoon.

By next autumn,

their great-great grandchildren will return to these same foresits.

Soon ithey will set out on the longest migration

of any butterfly on Earth

to reach a little-noticed weed half a continent away.

Not all plant and animal relationships are so exotic.

But even a familiar one,

involving a common food and well-known inseci,

is an example of hidden beauty.

People raise this flowering plant, not for the flowers,

but for what the flowers turn into.

(BIRD TWIİTTERIİNG)

/ live here, too.

!'m a tomato flower, and l lock up my pollen tightiy,

so ihat only the most efficient pollinators can get it.

My favorite is a very hard worker.

The bumblebee,

who gathers pollen for the egg-laying gueen

and the developing young.

(BUZZING)

Bumblebees are one of the few insects that care for their offspring.

When damage occurs in the hive, a worker gulckly repairs the celil.

Honey made from flower nectar is kept in wax pots.

The adulits eat it

and regurgitate it into the cells to feed the young.

They need a lot of pollen and nectar, and searching for it is a constant chore.

They spot a garden nearby.

As the foragers investigate,

they see things invisible to ihe human eye.

(BUZZING)

Because they are able to perceive ultraviolet lighit,

bees can detect markings produced by flowers

to gulde pollinators directiy to nectar and pollen.

The bees need more food than the garden can provide.

Ahead, they see what they're looking for.

So begins a fascinating kind of pollination.

The bee bites to hold on tight,

then blasts the locked-up pollen loose

by vibrating her flight muscles up to 440 times per second.

(THRUMMING)

She packs ihe pollen into baskets on her back legs.

Her vibration rate is the same as the musical note A.

She's like a living tuning fork.

Few flowers are "buzz pollinated,"

but they include some favorite foods enjoyed by human belings.

The workers will keep at this until they have enough pollen

to feed the colony's newly developing brood.

Such flower rewards sustain billions of creatures,

sometimes in places where there is little else to eat.

Weeks have passed in the Sonoran Desert.

My cactus flowers should have turned to fruit by now.

(SOUEAKING)

The female bats are depending on it.

They can't continue to nurse their young

without a new source of food.

The cacti may be their only hope.

From their island cave,

they make a long night flight.

A round-itrip of more than 60 miles.

İüÜs a demanding journey, but a feast awalts.

The mothers need nourishmenlt.

And so do ihose carrying new life within.

As they gorge on the fruit, they are also consuming seeds,

which they eventually spread across the desert.

We cacti are key to Sonoran Desert life.

But we couldn't endure without the help of bats.

And ithe bats and their young couldn't survive without our help.

This crucial connection between plants and animals

helps keep the deserit alive.

(MUFFLED TALKING)

There are others who depend on the cactus fruit,

collecting it at night so it can be consumed fresh each day.

(FAINT CHATTING VOICES)

Their distant ancestors so adored cactus fruit

that they honored the cacti as revered members of theirr tribes.

(BELL TOLLING)

Today, it's a way for people to provide for their famillies.

As well as a sweet pleasure.

So sweet that people plant cacti seeds in their gardens.

From a flower's point of view,

humans are just another species we can use for our purposes.

(GIGGLING)

But a delicious reward in one place can be the cause of conflict in another.

Ünlike the deserlt,

a İropical rain forest is rich in resources

and competition.

(İNSECTS CHİTTERİNG)

Survival favors the bold and aggressive.

(OMINOUS MUSIC PLAYING)

Even the seemingiy gentle turn out to be warriors.

And nectar-bearing flowers

are territory to defend.

(HISSING)

The winners will spread pollen that helps keep the forest lush.

Öne stakes his claim.

And ihe challengers arrive.

(DRAMATIC MUSİC SWELLIİNG)

İt's a standoff.

Then, the first move.

(MUSIC SLOWING)

(MUSIC BUILDIİNG)

Even a warrior can make a mistake.

(DRAMATIC MUSİC SWELLIİNG)

(MUSIC STOPS SUDDENLY)

The hidden spectacles of pollination can involve a few tiny rivals.

ÖOr hundreds of millions of voyagers.

From the high forests in Mexico,

the great migration of monarch butterflies

heads northward toward the middle of North America.

İn their long round-trip each summer,

the vast monarch population

will help pollinate and sustain more than 200 kinds of flowers.

As this first leg of the migration reaches farmland,

the butterflies are tiring.

İt's a strenuous flight.

They need fuel.

That's where l come in.

Milkweed flowers in a varlety of colors and shapes

serve as refueling stations

in return for a little help spreading pollen.

We milkweeds are wily.

Our flowers have narrow slits

that can snag the leg Of a feeding monarch

and hold herin a vise-like grip.

When she tries to jerk free,

she snags a cord, releasing sacs of pollen

she'll unknowinglİy carry to the next milkweed.

As they migrate, they also mate.

This overwintering generation of monarchs

may live nine months.

They're among the İongest-lived butterflies on Earth.

But now their days are numbered.

They have to produce young to keep the migration going.

Sometimes another male tries to intervene.

Even in small love stories, victory goes to the most determined.

Eventually, the male sweeps her off her feet

and carries her to the privacy of a tree branch.

He may keep her in his embrace for up to 16 hours.

Within two weeks, each female attaches up to 400 eggs

to the underside of milkweed İeaves, and only milkweed leaves.

UÜnlike bees, monarchs rely not on the care of their young,

but guantity.

Enough eggs

and some are bound to survive the onslaught of hungry insects.

(GENTLE MUSIC SLOWLY BUILDING)

The job of a monarch caterpillar is to eat relenitlessiy.

First, its own egg case.

Then, milkweed leaves exclusively,

growing to 2,000 times its original size.

İf it survives.

(OMINOUS MUSIC PLAYS)

Fortunately, hundreds of millions survive.

Their mothers put them on milkweed for a reason.

The toxic sap settles in their bodies.

The monarchs are unaffected,

but a predator who eats one is likely to become ill

and soon İlearns to avold them.

Eventually, each caterpillar finds a secure spot

and spins silk to hold onto.

İt's time to become a butterfiy.

The caterpillar grips the silk with its back legs

and hangs upside down.

Through contractions, the skin is loosened.

Eventualiy it splits,

revealing a new casing beneath.

Now, a dangerous maneuver.

İIn a matter of seconads, as the old skin and legs fall away,

she must thrust hooks from the new case into the silk.

If this delicate handoff fails,

she will fall to the ground helpless and be eaten.

Within this protective sheli, her caterpillar self is fading away.

Across the ages,

humans have seen in this transformation

the ultimate symbol of change.

(RUSTLING)

(GENTLE MUSIC SWELLIİNG)

Her body begins to pump fluid that will inflate her wings.

The scales on the wings are shaped fo reflect light

so ihat it produces a bright coloration.

Contrasting orange and black are warning colors in nature.

She still carries milkweed toxins,

and these colors say, "T'm not good to eat."

This strategy is so successful

that some butterflies without poison copy the monarch's colors.

We milkweeds will provide the flight fuel

as this first generation of summer

continues the monarch's İong migration.

(WIND RUSTLING)

There is no resi for pollinators,

not for butterflies

and not for one very hard worker.

(BUZZING)

In a farm field,

bumblebees are finishing the exhausting job of buzz pollinating.

When they're İloaded with pollen,

it's time for the bees to return home and store it.

The young are beginning to emerge.

They'lil need the colony's treasure of pollen and honey for nourishmenlt.

(BUZZING CONTINUES)

But the colony's riches can also attract danger.

A skunk will eat not only the pollen, but the bumblebees and their young.

A ihreat to the colony is one of the few times

these passive bees Will use their stingers.

With safety restored, colony life goes on.

A young bee entering the world will live on pollen and honey

in a home made of wax.

All are gifts from flowers.

And within a tomato blossom,

another kind of new life is beginning.

This is how l reproduce.

Pollen grains brought by bees from another tomato flower

send tubes to the center of the blossom,

delivering reproductive celis to ihe ovary.

Forming seeds,

each of which grew from one grain of pollen.

Fertilization occurs.

Gradually, a fleshy container forms around all of the seeds.

Most people don't realize that what they eat is a yellow flower

that turns into a tomato.

Around the world,

people depend on farming for their sustenance,

as they have for ihousands of years.

By growing their own food,

people were able to develop civilizations

and rise to dominance.

Humans consider agriculture öne Of their great advances.

But it was actually to our benefit.

People now take care of us

and spread our seeds.

Who is in control of whom, realiy?

Today, farming is a science.

This is an immense high-tech greenhouse.

Ten acres of tomatoes under one roof.

!'m here as well,

and the humans cater to my every need.

People have engineered ways to grow tomatoes

without even using Soİl.

Nutrient-rich water recycles constantly.

No pollution, no wasted water.

This operation produces one in six

Of all the supermarket tomatoes in the Ünited States.

Yet, despite many tries,

humans have been unable to come up with a pollination method

as effective as the one engineered by nature.

The entire operation and millions of dollars a year

depend on ever-reliable bumblebees.

An important food of humanity

would not be grown and distributed worldwide

but for an ancient partnership

between a bee and a flower.

To me, all pollinators are important,

but to people, one is more critical than any other.

So critical that they carry them around as precious cargo.

İn many parts of the world, honeybees are so vital

that hives are shipped thousands of miles

from one kind of farm to another.

Travel can subject them to stress,

poor diets, new parasites, pesticides and diseases.

(HORN HONKING)

But many kinds of farms would fail without honeybees,

such as this almond orchard in California.

Honeybees tend to harass an invader who opens theirr hive.

But smoke has a calming effect.

The champion of all pollinators is ready to go to work.

(BUZZING LOUDER)

Nearly 200 million bees reaching every flower

in 1,700 acres of almond trees.

They return with loads of almond pollen

packed on their hind legs.

The foragers share almond nectar with the other bees.

This protein-rich pollen will feed their developing youngsters.

A returning scout directs her companions

to flowers she's discovered

using a complex way of communicating.

As she walks and shakes her body in what's called a "waggle dance,"

she indicates the distance to the flowers

and the direction to take according to the angle of the sun.

Across Earth,

pollination by honeybees is essential

to more than 1,400 crops people depend on.

Without bees, none oOf these foods could exist.

People forget that life begins with planits.

We not onlİy provide shelter and medicine,

but we're living solar collectors.

The only life forms that can convert sunlight into stored energy,

producing fuel and food, and supporting the entire web of life.

Weeks have passed in the orchard.

Pollination has led to the growth of young almonds.

But there is an ominous sign.

Most of the honeybees in the hive have disappeared.

İn recent years,

some honeybee populations have plummeted.

The causes could range from diseases and parasites

to a phenomenon in which hives seem normal,

filled with honey and developing young,

but the adult bees never returmn.

Are the missing bees a warning Of a greater collapse to come?

Some human activities threaten pollinators.

Farming practices can poison them and kill flowers such as milkweed.

Wild areas needed by pollinators are often cleared.

(CHAINSAW WHIZZING)

Ör they're covered by houses.

Or roads.

And across the Earth,

pollinators are diminishing.

Every third bite humans take is dependent on pollinators.

And if they continue to decline,

life may reach a tipping point.

The pollination scheme that knits together the fabric of life could unravel.

But there are solutions.

Öne of the most important is to restore İost flower habitats.

Where human construction eliminates wildflowers,

human ingenuity can replace them.

/ can Flourish even on a rooftop.

The love stories of pollination can unfold

in the millions of unused acres bordering the world's highways.

İn the past, farmland left bare has been planted with grasses.

But farmers increasingly turn it into wildflower fields to help pollinators.

(HOPEFUL MUSIC BULILDINGC)

People can turn a backyard into a productive flower habitat.

Neighbors are planting vacant lots with flowers

and teaching their children to grow their own vegetables.

Even a six-story building can support pollinators.

Children who learn the value of pollination

represent hope for the future.

The lawn of the past

can become a yard filled with Hlowers and vegetables.

(HOPEFUL MUSIC CONTİINUES)

Humans simpiy need to remember

how intimately their lives are connected with

and dependent upon flowers.

People use us to express İove.

To honor loved ones.

To enrich the great emotional momenis Of their lives.

They give flowers to congratulate.

To mark every milestone in life.

They surround themselves with flowers to bring color to their lives.

We flowers are grown and sold by the billions.

(UPBEAT SONG PLAYING)

İn the process,

people have become one of our most important pollinators.

(UPBEAT SONG CONTINUES)

Like other pollinators, they feed on our rewards,

and they even use our perfumes to kindle their own romance.

To people, flowers are ihe universal symbol of love.

After all, we embody ihe ultimate love story.

A İove story that feeds the Earth.

Day after day, as flowers lift ihe human spirit,

in hidden corners of the world beyond the view of people,

bees are helping plants produce the world's food.

Hummingbirds are helping to spread tomorrow's flowers through the forest.

Bats are dispersing life through the vast desert.

And butterflies are making exhausting flights,

including ihe monarchs,

now setting out on a marathon journey of 2,000 miles back to Mexico.

Everywhere, pollinators are working tirelessiy

to keep the vast machinery of life running.

(UPBEAT SONG CONTINUES)