Original subtitles

[narrator] In battle, communication can be the key to success... From a warning cry

You hear the wails and squeaks.

These alpha males can be really big bullies.

[narrator] To loud mothers...

If she loses this fight, her cubs could die.

[narrator] Some bat the breeze...

Shrieking, screaming, cackling.

[narrator] And an apex alpha to beat all others.

A king of kings.

The scariest animals on the planet. Hands down.

[narrator] Because these animals don't just talk tough.

They're that damn good.

[narrator] Everyday, everywhere,

our planet is a battleground.

Turf wars...

Food fights...

And mating mayhem rage on.

as animals outwit and outmanoeuvre their own kind

in Battle of the Alphas.

The shady canopy of South America's tropical forests.

This is the realm of the brown capuchin monkey.

Named because they resembled 16th-century monks.

But as habits go, these monkeys have some dangerous ones.

When capuchins are casualties of something,

it's usually at each other's hands.

[intense music]

[narrator] Living in large groups of up to 30,

the troop is led by the dominant male.

Capuchins or capuchins are intensely sociable animals,

particularly the brown capuchin.

But there is a really clear, distinct hierarchy.

The alpha male is the main man.

[narrator] Finding food is crucial monkey business

and takes up two thirds of their day.

They eat primarily fruits and fruits have patchy abundance.

Everyone's always hoping to find enough to eat.

[narrator] So, when a good source is discovered,

a special call goes out.

But if another troop invades the alpha male's home turf...

You hear the wails and squeaks

and you can hear the rustling through the trees.

[narrator] Feeding grounds can quickly become battlegrounds.

They use lots of different types of vocalizations or calls

depending on whether it might be

a neighbouring troop of monkeys

or whether it's a different type of predator.

When two troops come in contact with one another,

how they communicate. It starts with this whistle vocalization,

whistling at one another.

[narrator] Then this rumble gets real.

No one likes uninvited dinner guests.

[screeching]

But surprisingly,

the alpha reserves the harshest punishment for his own.

He absolutely rules the roost with an iron fist.

[narrator] Aggressive competition within the same troop

can be 10 times more intense than fights with intruders.

And sometimes you'll actually see subordinate animals,

literally fighting trying to scrounge enough food to eat

and they have to fight the dominant just for access to it.

[narrator] This dinner party has a strict seating plan.

Not only does the dominant male get to eat first,

he gets to eat his fill.

[narrator] It's dinner time at this fruit tree,

and the alpha is hungry.

That's when he throws his weight around.

Makes sure that he eats first,

he eats as much as he can possibly eat.

The subordinates will have to wait.

And he almost weaponizes food.

These alpha males can be really big bullies,

and pick on these subordinate males

to keep them in their place.

So that even when there's plenty of food around,

the dominant alpha male will eat up to 20-25 % more

than all the other animals below.

And because they're eating more, they're healthier,

they're stronger. Ensuring that he stays top dog

or top monkey.

But there's a curious thing.

Being at the very bottom of the dominance queue,

you're a little bit better off

than being higher, but not the top.

That's who he takes his aggression out on the most.

[narrator] But sometimes the alpha can find a monkey

on his back or his front...

Despite being quite small, they're really powerful.

They've got a very high strength-to-weight ratio

and they're really incredibly muscular.

When fights break out, first of all,

they can be very, very loud.

They're beginning to wrestle,

they're standing on their hind legs.

Which means they can use their front legs for fighting

and wrestling and throwing their opponent down to the ground.

And almost using that prehensile tail as a prop.

They use that long tail for counterbalance

to help keep them safe up in the trees.

There's some scuffling. There's pushing.

You'll see them open up their mouths

and kinda nash at one another.

[narrator] But these fights can end up being deadly.

They're tussling, and they can injure each other.

These injuries can lead to fatalities.

Whether falling through a tree branch or falling

and crashing to the forest floor.

Those are the things that really harm them.

[narrator] Even if they do survive,

it's best not to hold a grudge.

The rest of the group may demonstrate

affiliative seeking behaviour.

In other words, they want things to get back to being smooth and nice.

[narrator] But what if the alpha isn't around?

They find that this is more egalitarian.

So, they all eat about the same.

Which is a really interesting take on this social interaction.

[narrator] With this chatty food fight done

and all friends again,

finally there's time to eat.

[♪]

From loud family food fights to scolding mothers.

Unique sounds can sometimes be heard

in the waterways of Europe, Asia and North Africa.

The chatter of the Eurasian River Otter.

The most widely distributed otter on the planet.

The Eurasian river otters are really vocal animals.

They make a whole range of different

squeaks and chirps and clicks.

They use them in mating and signalling,

in parental care, when they're in pain,

when they're excited.

[narrator] They're also really playful.

Most of the time.

But if a mother feels her pups are in danger,

vicious is more like it.

She will fight like an alley cat.

Otters make fabulous mums.

They will do absolutely what they need to protect their kids.

[snarling]

[narrator] River otters are semi-aquatic.

Spending time on land and in the water.

River otters are incredible swimmers,

as they will spend most of their time foraging in the rivers.

[narrator] You could say this free-flowing seafood buffet

is their happy place.

And their safe zone.

If any danger comes

and it could be a land-based predator like a fox,

for example, or a badger,

they will head straight for the water.

[narrator] But they can't stay in their safe zone forever.

Especially if they're pregnant.

They have to come to dry land to actually give birth.

And that represents a really vulnerable time

for both the otter and the baby cubs.

[narrator] Brits call them cubs, others call them pups,

either way, if a male finds some that aren't his own,

he may kill them.

Now, this killing of the baby otters is brutal.

But for the male that wants to sire the next generation,

it makes perfect sense.

Because if those otters are dead and out of the way,

that female will come into season more quickly.

[narrator] She has to protect her young,

but she can't be with them 24/7

she's got to catch food.

Before she heads out, she marks her territory.

One of the classic signs that you're in an otter's territory

is something we call spraint.

And this is essentially the faeces of the otter,

and it is left behind to say,

"This is my territory. Don't enter."

[narrator] This male ignores the "no trespassing" sign.

He creeps closer and closer to her den.

Once she spots him, she snaps into attack mode.

The only reason why a male is in her territory

is to kill her cubs.

So she will immediately go on the offensive.

It's attack, attack, attack.

[narrator] Eurasian river otters have 36 razor-sharp teeth.

And strong, pointed claws on their webbed feet.

Usually, they use them to catch and slice prey,

but in a fight, they're weapons.

It's gloves off. She may only be

potentially half the weight of the big male otter,

but that doesn't stop her.

She kind of makes up for her lack of size by feistiness.

They will bite and roll and twist and writhe.

And this may well go back and forth

because the female is much more lithe.

So she may well be able to slightly outmanoeuvre him

and use her speed as opposed to his bulk.

[narrator] Both sexes learn to fight from a young age.

Play-fighting is a great way for the cubs

to learn behaviours and to build muscles

and to just enjoy themselves.

[narrator] Siblings will chomp at each other's heads

and cheeks and try to rough up Mom too.

Sometimes the kids think they can rough and tumble with the big dogs

and it's actually encouraged by the mother

because it teaches those young cubs important skills

and it gives them confidence as well.

[narrator] Confidence for moments like this.

As the brawl between Mom and intruder rages on,

she uses every shred of energy she's got.

It's everything, no holds barred.

She will bite, she will scratch,

she will look to body slam him, whip him with the tail.

Anything goes because if she loses this fight,

her cubs could die.

[narrator] Suddenly, the male backs off.

Did she deliver a bite that sent him packing?

Outlast him?

His quick retreat is a mystery,

one of many in the world of otter aggression.

The Eurasian otter is a really well-known animal in Britain.

But there's still plenty more that we don't know.

What we certainly do know is a female with cubs

will be wary and, if necessary, aggressive

towards a neighbouring male.

However, in the Mediterranean,

otters seem to be a bit more peaceful.

They quite often roost together or lay up together.

So why this might be is for the researchers to uncover.

[narrator] With all the shouting done,

the triumphant Mom heads back to her babies.

She's a good Mum. She's a good Mum.

[narrator] Leaving the battleground behind for now

[♪]

While angry mothers cause an uproar,

others flap like a bat out of hell.

In Australia, one animal loves nothing more

than to just hang around...

The fruit bat.

These sociable animals live in colonies or "camps".

Home to a few hundred, or a sometimes,

a few hundred thousand.

Most bats are really small, but flying foxes,

the fruit bats are big and conspicuous.

Great big things hanging from the branches,

and it looks like total chaos.

It's not haphazard at all.

Each bat will have its own specific branch

that it's very particular about.

Males are looking for places that increase

their chances of finding the right girl.

And if anybody else tries to take its branch,

then there's trouble.

[narrator] In breeding season,

he's even more protective of his patch.

So there he is hanging over,

checking out the females and that is Position A-one.

This is a very important territory

where the mating is going to happen

and so the stakes are very, very high.

But if someone's stolen their spot,

that's when it really starts to kick off.

[intense music]

[narrator] He reinforces it with a scent fence.

The bats can't exactly put up a little sign that says,

"Save this spot for me." So they do the next best thing.

A lot of these bats have scent glands that are around their shoulders,

and they'll rub those on the branch

to make it smell just like him.

[narrator] Familiar smell of neighbours and relatives

reduces aggression in the colony.

However, unwanted guests have the opposite effect.

[♪]

And when they get mad, that's when the vocalizations happen.

And these are loud bats.

[screeching]

We're talking shrieking, screaming, cackling.

He will make it really apparent

he's very unhappy in a noisy way.

[narrator] Before attacking,

he has another warning shot up his sleeve.

Spreading his wings wide.

These are big bats, the biggest flying mammals in the world.

The wingspan can be a meter to even two meters.

[narrator] But some bats just don't take the hint.

That's when it's time to take the trespassing joker in hand.

[screeching]

The bat wing is astonishing. In many ways,

it's identical in anatomy to a human arm.

But the main part of the bat's wing is from the wrist.

So, you've got all four elongated fingers,

and you've got the thumb that sticks out

quite literally like a sore thumb.

Now that is the main weapon.

They'll drop and shiver their wings

and project those thumbs directly forward.

And they can use them almost like a dagger

to stab and attack.

It's not easy to fight when you're a bat. I mean, you're hanging upside down, dangling like a pendulum,

and you've got to swing your arms and hit with your thumbs.

[narrator] They may attack with their thumbs,

but the claws on their feet play a crucial role.

There's this really neat thing inside the toes of bats

that's called a "tendon-locking mechanism"

where they actually have a ratchet around the tendons

so that once they hook onto the branch,

it just is attached as long as they don't release it.

So they can save their energy for the punching at the front end.

[narrator] It's not just their claws that are sharp.

These bats also have a nice set of teeth

that work very well on fruit

and will also work perfectly well on an opponent.

[narrator] They may be ready to tussle at any time,

but not with everyone.

Sometimes you'll find different species of flying foxes hanging out together, literally.

And they're fine with that.

Because another species isn't going to compete with you for females or for the same foods.

They have their own thing going on.

It's members of the same species

that inevitably end up having a big clash. [screeching]

[narrator] It may be species-specific,

but even when the fight is won,

there can be a bigger battle to overcome.

She might not fancy him that much.

She might be more interested in his next-door neighbour.

So he has to woo her.

Because if he doesn't manage that,

then all that fighting will have gone to waste.

They're not all about the fighting. They're lovers.

And there aren't many animals that do it quite as nicely

as the fruit bats. Because a big part of mating

for fruit bats is licking each other's genitals.

It isn't a guarantee that the mating is going to happen,

but give him an "A" for effort.

[narrator] For their size,

bats are the slowest reproducing mammals on Earth.

Most only bear one offspring a year.

So, if the female isn't interested,

it's not a subtle let-down.

She's got weapons too and she can fend him away. No problem.

Don't forget she might have four or five males

all-around their particular branches

attempting to woo her as well.

So she might just push him away and say,

"No thanks, I fancy him more."

[narrator] Once the male takes the hint,

he moves on until he finds a willing mate.

The mating season isn't just one day, it goes on for a while.

So if all this wooing in this courtship works,

then he gets to mate. Which actually is quite a brief affair,

to be honest, before he goes back to his own branch,

decidedly satisfied with himself.

[narrator] After all the kicking and screaming

he just has to hang in there, until he's up to bat again!

All species fight their own kind.

But for the top of every food chain, there is no contest

this is an apex alpha.

Found in every ocean around the world.

These marine megastars are truly number one.

Killer whales, hands down,

are the scariest animals on the planet. Hands down.

If there really was a king of kings,

it's the orca.

Killer whales are the things that great white sharks have nightmares about.

[narrator] Though its name can be deceptive.

It's not a whale, it's a dolphin.

[narrator] Camouflaged from all angles,

these giants approach unseen.

They're black on top.

If you're looking down on them,

they will blend in with the deep water below.

And if you're underneath looking up at them

with that white belly,

they're going to blend in with the sky above. It's called counter-shading.

[narrator] But they don't just look smart...

The thing that makes orca the ultimate apex predator

is that they've got weapons

and they've got this incredible brain.

[narrator] The key to their hunting prowess is their bond,

their family.

It's ruled by a big all-knowing Mum.

She'll teach them behaviours and communications

that that pod specifically has learned during its travels.

The thing that opens up the entire ocean to them as a menu

is their ability to communicate.

[narrator] This is a family that likes to chat.

They will even have regional dialects.

Because they learn noises from their environment.

You could consider an orca to have as much grasp

of its language as we do of ours.

[narrator] Like other dolphins, they use echolocation to hunt.

That ability to fire out these ultrasonic bursts of sound,

which, when they hit something, reflect back.

It knows how far away that object is.

It can even tell that it's a rock,

that it's another orca, that it's prey.

[narrator] A lone orca is dangerous,

a whole pod is treacherous.

Once one of the orcas locked onto a really high-value target,

they will communicate that back through the pod,

giving different orcas different roles.

It's really intricate.

It isn't just shouts of "Let's get a feed on".

It is military precision.

[narrator] All pods work together to hunt,

but what's on the menu depends on where they live.

Killer whales are successful apex predators

because they have different strategies

for different situations.

[narrator] In Norway, it's herring.

But a bountiful meal takes teamwork.

A few members of the pod will go beneath the shoal.

And they will start blowing bubbles,

to bring the herring shoal up towards the surface

where they can't escape.

The other orca will then start circling.

They herd the fish together into a tight bait ball.

And then it's just a matter of smacking that ball

with your tail. - Right in the chops.

Killing them dead as they will eat every last herring

if they can.

[narrator] With more than 40 teeth,

shaped for ripping and tearing prey, nowhere is safe.

Nowhere.

Orcas which frequent the seal-pupping beaches

of South America have developed an incredible behaviour.

Sometimes a seal or a sea lion gets up out of the water,

thinks that it's safe.

But a patrolling orca, close to the shallows, will notice that this one seal pup's

just kind of playing on the line.

They will then turn and face the shore directly

and swim as fast as they can

to beach themselves onto the seal pup

because it's not expecting a giant six-ton-orca

to land on its face. But it happens.

These whales beach themselves on purpose, take an animal,

and then pull it back into the water to eat it.

It does this kind of, you know,

fat-man-wiggle-stuck-in-a-bath routine

as it gets itself back into the water.

The scariest part of this, though,

is that they teach each other how to do this.

It's really incredible stuff watching a mother

physically force its baby out of the water

so it learns how to jiggle back.

And that's a tradition that's been passed on

through the generations in that one place.

[narrator] Always on the lookout for food,

they sleep with one eye open.

Orcas haven't got gills.

They have to decide when to breathe.

Therefore, what stops an orca just drowning

when it takes 40 winks? Well,

they have developed a method of sleep that allows them

to shut down half of their brain

while the other hemisphere stays awake and alert

and allows them to keep breathing at the surface.

[narrator] When orcas are around,

other animals might do well to sleep with one eye open too.

What makes the orca the ocean's top apex predator

is the fact that it preys on other apex predators.

Orcas kill great white sharks.

They slice them open, they eat their livers,

and they leave their corpses.

So that's impressive.

Taking on one of the greatest predators ever.

But orcas, they go that little bit further.

[narrator] Originally called "Whale Killer" by sailors,

for orcas, no whale is off limits.

Orcas can actually take down a blue whale,

the largest animal that has ever lived.

Bigger than any dinosaur.

We're talking a super-pod of orcas.

These are all different orcas from different pods

that come together to chase the whale.

Between 60 and 75 of these killer whales

take out a full-grown blue whale

by just going savage on it.

Biting its fins, pulling it underwater,

scraping their teeth against its flesh,

even biting its tongue to hold it underwater.

The orcas will work in different teams

in different shifts

and as those orca get tired,

they fall back and they're replaced by new orca.

So, the pressure never stops on the blue whale.

[narrator] As the exhausted whale comes up for air,

the orcas make their killer move,

jumping on its blowhole.

They're essentially drowning it.

And when this super-pod actually does manage

to run down this kill,

which is just incredible

in terms of behaviour, and communication,

they will only feed on the most delicious parts:

the tongue and the blubber.

So, they leave this huge carcass that they just don't need

because they're that damn good.

They killed a blue whale.

What else do you want from an apex predator?

[narrator] This monochrome matriarch

is the pinnacle of the food chain.

Killer whales are that funny place between

a thing that's terrifying and you want to vilify

and a thing that's amazing and you want to cheer for it.

[narrator] With exceptional communication skills,

for them, success is always black and white.

Truly the mother of all apex alphas.

An alpha that masters the chat,

can get a belly full,

[screeching] or an ear full.

They can succeed in the battle of the sexes.

And win in the battle of the giants.