# Our Planet | From Deserts to Grasslands | FULL EPISODE | Netflix

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XmtXC_n6X6Q

[00:20] [David Attenborough] Just 50 years ago,
[00:23] we finally ventured to the moon.
[00:40] For the very first time, we looked back at our own planet.
[00:53] Since then, the human population has more than doubled.
[01:04] This series will celebrate the natural wonders that remain
[01:09] and reveal what we must preserve
[01:12] to ensure people and nature thrive.
[01:30] The Earth still has sanctuaries,
[01:35] and, on occasion, they hold spectacular gatherings of wildlife.
[01:47] They provide vital space, but they're disappearing fast.
[02:00] [wildebeest lowing]
[03:08] A fifth of the land  on our planet is covered by desert.
[03:19] The driest of all is the Atacama in South America.
[03:27] There are places here where rain has never been recorded.
[03:44] Deserts may appear to be barren and empty,
[03:51] but they are of crucial importance to life.
[04:11] For those that can overcome their challenges,
[04:14] they provide a vital refuge.
[04:20] [wind whistling]
[04:32] Socotran cormorants,
[04:34] emerging from a dust storm in the Arabian desert.
[04:46] It is the very emptiness of this landscape that has brought them here,
[04:55] and they have come in immense numbers.
[05:01] [birds squawking]
[05:06] Fifty thousand of them.
[05:13] A quarter of the total population.
[05:24] They have come because here they can breed...
[05:28] undisturbed.
[05:45] But nesting in a desert is difficult.
[05:50] Temperatures can reach 40 degrees Celsius.
[05:56] Yet, both the adults and their white chicks
[05:59] are ready for this challenge.
[06:01] [birds panting]
[06:05] They cool themselves  by panting.
[06:16] Any adult that appears to have food in its crop is mobbed.
[06:24] An adult will only give food to its own chick,
[06:29] which must be here somewhere.
[06:43] The chicks chase an adult out into the desert.
[06:54] No luck.
[06:56] Now, they must get back quickly to the safety of the colony.
[07:09] This desert provides the cormorants
[07:12] with more than just a secure refuge.
[07:31] Every morning, a mass movement begins.
[07:47] It's the rush hour.
[08:14] A shallow arm of the sea, right beside the colony,
[08:18] is full of food.
[08:21] [cawing]
[08:23] This richness comes from the desert itself.
[08:28] Dust, blown from the land,
[08:30] contains nutrients that fertilize the surrounding waters.
[08:44] So, it is the desert itself that enriches the sea.
[09:16] In Oman, during the summer monsoon, fogs roll in from the sea,
[09:23] billowing over the Dhofar mountains.
[09:34] The mists bring just enough moisture to sustain a little vegetation...
[09:47] and this sparse greenery becomes a focus for life.
[09:59] Ibex must cross the near vertical cliffs to reach one of the few springs.
[10:09] But they're nervous...
[10:13] and with good reason.
[10:22] An Arabian leopard,
[10:25] one of less than 200 that survive in the wild.
[10:33] This male's territory
[10:35] extends over 350 square kilometers of high mountains and deep wadis.
[10:51] The southern edge of the Arabian Peninsula
[10:54] is one of the few places left where there is enough prey
[10:58] to sustain a population of these leopards.
[11:07] But even so, there are probably less than 60 individuals
[11:13] in over 15,000 square kilometers.
[11:23] These leopards have always been rare,
[11:29] but now conflict with people
[11:32] is causing their numbers to decline still further.
[11:37] [bird chirps]
[11:49] Few leopards are left,
[11:52] so what our hidden cameras now capture verges on the miraculous.
[12:05] A female leopard,
[12:08] and she is tracking a male.
[12:26] Such meetings are becoming increasingly rare.
[12:50] [growling]
[12:55] This briefest of unions
[12:58] may ensure the short-term future for these leopards.
[13:08] But in the longer term,
[13:10] their fate will depend on their territory being protected.
[13:22] To the north of the Dhofar mountains
[13:24] lies a place of almost unimaginable emptiness.
[13:30] The Rub' al Khali,
[13:34] the Empty Quarter.
[13:45] The very name of the place
[13:47] resonates with the romance of these desert lands.
[13:59] This is the largest sand sea in the world.
[14:07] There are parts where human beings never venture.
[14:16] Only the greatest desert specialists can survive here.
[14:27] Arabian oryx.
[14:33] Their ranges are vast,
[14:36] extending for over 3,000 square kilometers.
[14:43] This is one of their last refuges.
[14:52] Once hunted close to extinction,
[14:55] they have now reclaimed their ancestral territory.
[15:02] With the help of conservationists, they have returned home.
[15:10] But reintroduction cannot save all desert animals.
[15:16] [elephants huffing]
[15:28] Desert elephants.
[15:34] Less than 150 survive, here in Namibia.
[15:43] This oldest of deserts is scarred by dry riverbeds,
[15:48] carved by water that flows for only one or two days in a year.
[15:58] An adult elephant
[16:00] must find up to 200 kilos of food each and every day if it's not to starve.
[16:12] So, for these last survivors, life is an endless trek.
[16:23] The herd is guided by a single old female, the matriarch.
[16:32] She is leading her family
[16:34] to a special place where food should be available
[16:38] even in a drought.
[16:46] She learned of its existence from her mother,
[16:49] many years ago.
[16:53] Now, she's teaching her own calf how to get there.
[17:05] The elephants are not alone in their search for food.
[17:14] Desert lions.
[17:17] They are just as rare as the elephants.
[17:30] The calf is protected by its mother.
[17:40] So the lions let them pass.
[17:48] Distant trees are a sign of water.
[17:53] [brays]
[18:15] The riverbed is dry.
[18:23] The ana trees, however, are still green.
[18:34] But there is a problem.
[18:38] At this time of year,
[18:39] seedpods from the ana trees usually litter the ground.
[18:47] Rich food for elephants.
[18:53] But this year, the crop has failed.
[19:01] The matriarch has led her herd here for nothing.
[19:15] Even the trees' leafy branches are out of their reach.
[19:21] The family has no option but to move on.
[19:45] A bull, standing nearly four meters tall.
[19:50] He can reach into the canopy,
[19:55] and he could be the solution to their problem.
[20:02] The old female has known him all her life and turned to him for help before.
[20:18] Elephants can only survive here
[20:20] because of knowledge passed down over generations.
[20:26] But less than 20 matriarchs still survive,
[20:32] and if their knowledge is lost,
[20:35] elephants may no longer be able to live here.
[20:47] Deserts cannot support large numbers of animals the year round,
[20:55] and even those specially adapted to these conditions
[20:59] can only survive in small numbers.
[21:04] But on very special occasions,
[21:08] deserts are transformed.
[21:10] [thunder rumbling]
[21:17] Once in a decade,
[21:20] there may be a cloudburst.
[21:33] A single one can turn the desert green.
[21:46] In southern California,
[21:48] the change is visible from space.
[22:03] Hundreds of square kilometers suddenly bloom.
[22:24] If such transformations become regular,
[22:28] a new habitat may develop.
[22:33] Grasslands.
[22:35] One of our planet's most productive landscapes.
[22:45] They support the greatest aggregations of large animals on Earth.
[22:53] The Serengeti sustains herds of over a million wildebeest.
[23:03] They follow the rains to crop the newly sprung grass.
[23:21] These vast herds attract predators.
[23:37] Five male cheetahs.
[23:40] One of the largest coalitions ever observed.
[23:49] They dominate a territory of 450 square kilometers.
[23:59] They patrol it together,
[24:04] and that attracts attention.
[24:06] [birds chirruping]
[24:39] [braying]
[24:55] A change of strategy is needed
[24:59] if they're to hunt successfully.
[25:10] They need cover.
[25:44] An adult wildebeest is a formidable opponent.
[26:05] Four of the cheetahs start the stalk,
[26:09] walking directly towards the prey.
[26:15] The fifth creeps around the side.
[26:50] They need to get really close before making their final sprint.
[27:07] They're nearly there.
[27:44] All five break cover,
[27:47] each cat chasing a different target.
[28:05] It's chaos.
[28:12] A single cheetah is not strong enough to defend its prize.
[28:30] They must work together.
[29:14] These dramas only continue because the Serengeti is protected,
[29:20] and has been for over 65 years.
[29:26] But the Serengeti is an exception.
[29:31] Across the planet, space for grasslands has been steadily disappearing.
[29:38] [huffs]
[29:43] A hundred and eighty years ago, herds of bison, millions strong,
[29:48] grazed the Great Plains of North America.
[29:55] They roamed across a prairie a hundred times larger than the Serengeti.
[30:07] This was the true wild west.
[30:24] [roaring]
[30:26] Every summer, the males roared their challenges
[30:31] and fought for possession of the females.
[30:55] As the rut intensified, the fights became more brutal.
[31:34] Today, however, most of the prairie is silent.
[31:44] Humans slaughtered the great herds.
[31:51] Less than 30,000 wild bison remain,
[31:57] and 90 percent of the prairie has been lost,
[32:03] most of it to agriculture.
[32:29] What we eat, and how we produce it,
[32:33] will determine the future of our planet's grasslands.
[32:45] Our past could show us how we can feed ourselves
[32:49] and still leave room for nature.
[32:55] The ancient hay meadows of Hungary, still farmed in the traditional way,
[33:01] provide habitats of extraordinary richness.
[33:17] Butterflies are abundant.
[33:22] One species has an almost unbelievably complex life cycle.
[33:32] The Alcon blue.
[33:36] Each female must mate and lay eggs on just one species of plant,
[33:42] the marsh gentian.
[33:50] The eggs soon hatch into caterpillars.
[33:55] High up on the plants, they're safe from predators below.
[34:10] But then, the caterpillars do something seemingly suicidal.
[34:18] They abseil down on threads of silk to the ground below...
[34:25] and into danger.
[34:35] They have no defense against the marauding ants,
[34:38] which carry them off.
[34:44] But this is exactly what the caterpillars need to happen.
[34:51] They're producing a scent like that emitted by an ant larva.
[35:00] The ants respond by taking them back to their nest.
[35:11] There, they deposit them in the colony's brood chamber.
[35:17] The purple-colored caterpillars, lying among the ants' own white larvae,
[35:22] give off just the right signals.
[35:29] And the nurse ants rush to feed them.
[35:35] But there is more.
[35:38] The caterpillars now start to mimic the sounds made by the queen ant,
[35:46] and, as a result, the ants treat them like royalty.
[35:53] If food gets short,
[35:55] the ants will even feed the caterpillars instead of their own young.
[36:01] They give them such quantities of food that the caterpillars grow hugely.
[36:14] And there, underground, the caterpillars feed and grow for nearly two years.
[36:21] Until, one day, there is nothing for the ants to feed.
[36:30] The caterpillars have pupated.
[36:41] But a few weeks later,
[36:43] out crawls an Alcon blue butterfly.
[37:07] Now, they begin to leave the nest
[37:09] that has been their home for the last 23 months.
[37:31] The young adult makes its way out of the nest
[37:34] and clambers up a grass stem.
[37:36] Its wings expand as it prepares to fly off and find a mate.
[37:46] This complex life may be laborsaving for the butterfly,
[37:50] but it's risky.
[37:54] If anything happened to the ants or to the gentian,
[37:58] the Alcon blue would become extinct.
[38:16] Only tiny fragments of these ancient meadows
[38:19] are left in Europe.
[38:24] But beyond them to the east,
[38:27] once stretched grasslands that extended for a fifth of the way around the world,
[38:33] from Romania to China.
[38:58] Here, there are places where, for mile after endless mile,
[39:03] there are no roads or fences.
[39:11] Here, where there are no trees, eagles nest on the ground.
[39:24] Once, these eagles would have preyed on antelope that numbered in millions.
[39:35] And some are still here.
[39:38] These are saiga, antelope that live nowhere else in the world.
[39:46] Their extraordinary noses are specially adapted
[39:49] to filter out the dust kicked up by the immense herds
[39:53] that once lived here.
[39:58] Now, they're critically endangered.
[40:01] Poaching and the loss of habitat have had a devastating impact on them.
[40:09] But conservation efforts have recently started to make a difference.
[40:16] There is still hope for these extraordinary plains dwellers.
[40:28] And the proof of this can be found further east, in Mongolia,
[40:33] where the grasslands still remain largely intact.
[40:43] These are Przewalski’s horses.
[40:47] Fifty years ago, they were extinct in the wild,
[40:51] but a few adults survived in captivity.
[41:00] Careful breeding from 12 of them increased their numbers
[41:03] until there were sufficient to release on the plains.
[41:09] These are their descendants.
[41:22] A stallion protects each harem.
[41:29] They must be vigilant, and they race to defend their herd...
[41:43] or chase off bachelors trying to lure away a mare.
[42:01] With their numbers now topping 300,
[42:05] the future for these wild horses looks more secure.
[42:12] Their recovery was only possible
[42:15] because the vast Mongolian steppe still remains largely untouched.
[42:33] These grasses are some of the tallest to be found anywhere on our planet.
[42:42] They're so tall they can conceal elephants.
[42:56] They make the giants that live among them seem small.
[43:19] A last hiding place
[43:21] for the highly endangered greater one-horned rhino.
[43:36] This is India,
[43:39] one of the most populous countries on Earth.
[43:45] Yet here there is a great determination to protect these crucial grasslands.
[44:06] What must it be like
[44:08] to live in this dense, claustrophobic world?
[44:21] Just moving about could mean walking into danger.
[44:41] The grasses conceal tigers.
[44:57] Stripes and shadows blend.
[45:14] Long grass may hide a tigress from her prey,
[45:24] but it also hides the prey from her.
[45:37] She must get within 20 meters of it.
[45:46] And she must always know exactly where the prey are hidden.
[46:42] She may have lost them.
[47:06] She risks a look.
[47:12] [bleats]
[47:17] [bleating resonates]
[47:38] Every deer around now knows exactly where the tiger is.
[47:58] Others have heard the signal that announced her failure.
[48:11] Her cubs.
[48:22] She had left them hidden in the grass.
[48:28] [growling]
[48:39] In the last hundred years,
[48:42] the number of wild tigers has declined by over 95 percent.
[48:51] But here in India,
[48:53] despite the enormous pressure from poaching,
[48:57] and a growing human population,
[49:01] tiger numbers are actually increasing.
[49:13] Protect the precious space that grasslands and deserts provide,
[49:21] and the animals will bounce back.
[49:40] Please visit ourplanet.com
[49:43] to discover what we need to do now to protect wild grasslands.
[49:49] ♪ I can hear the whole world Singing together ♪
[49:58] ♪ I can hear the whole world Say it's now or never ♪
[50:07] ♪ 'Cause it's not too late If we change our ways ♪
[50:11] ♪ And connect the dots to our problems ♪
[50:15] ♪ I can hear the whole world Say we're in this together ♪
[50:21] ♪ We're in this together ♪