Throng

Friday 23 February, 20.00–21.00 on FIVE

Ending its run this evening is the fascinating wildlife documentary series in which naturalist Nick Baker scours the world for the strangest creatures in the animal kingdom. In this final programme, Nick is on the trail of the fastest – and strangest – nose in natural history.

The creature in question is the star-nosed mole and, as ever, Nick first heads to the Natural History Museum to find out more about its background and lifestyle. He learns that its strange ‘nose’ actually has more to do with touch than with smell, allowing it to assess and devour a small food item in less than quarter of a second. The mole eats many thousands of such morsels a day, fuelling a rapacious metabolism.

To see the creature in its natural habitat, however, Nick must travel to Manitoba, Canada – one of the world’s greatest wildernesses. The first step of his trip entails stocking up on mosquito repellent, mesh ‘bug jackets’, anti-bear pepper spray, and waders – purchases that hint at the unpleasantness of the environment he will be working in. He also picks up 500 earthworms to use as bait.

Friday 16 February: 20.00–21.00

Continuing this evening is the fascinating wildlife documentary series in which naturalist Nick Baker scours the world for the strangest creatures in the animal kingdom. In this programme, Nick is on home territory on the trail of the basking shark, the second-largest fish in the world.

Statistically, the best place to spot a basking shark in the UK is off the coast of Cornwall, so it is from the Lizard peninsula that Nick sets off, along with local shark expert John Nightingale and boat captain Barry Mundy. Although initially promising, the weather soon takes a typically British turn, and the hunt is called off. Not only does such rough weather limit visibility, but it churns and disperses the plankton, prompting the basking shark to head for deeper water in its relentless search for food. The day is not a complete washout, however – at a secluded inlet, Nick has a chance to swim with a grey seal. At up to three metres long and three hundred kilos, the grey seal is Britain’s largest native mammal – not a bad substitute for the recalcitrant shark… for now.

Friday 9 February: 20.00–21.00

Continuing this evening is the fascinating wildlife documentary series that sees naturalist Nick Baker scour the world for the strangest creatures in the animal kingdom. In this programme, he travels to India to meet Romulus Whitaker, an American expatriate who is a world authority on crocodiles, and where he comes face to face with some 2,500 crocs.

Despite having been on the planet for many millions of years, relatively little is known about the gharial, and its numbers are dwindling. There are possible references to the creature in Hindu mythology and Roman writing, and it was first officially described by science in 1789. As recently as the 1970s, however, a scientist suggested that such a beast existed only in the human imagination. The gharial has made it onto Nick’s list because of its relative rarity and because it stands out among all other crocodiles. While it is still very large – adults can grow up to six metres in length – the gharial has developed very long, narrow, and highly specialised jaws. Weirdest of all, however, is the fleshy growth – named the ‘ghara’, after an Indian water pot – which sits on the end of the snout in adult males.

Friday 2 February: 20.00–21.00

Continuing this evening is the fascinating wildlife documentary series in which naturalist Nick Baker scours the world for the strangest creatures in the animal kingdom. In this programme, Nick embarks on an expedition to the roof of the world to find the giant saggy-skinned frog of Lake Titicaca.

Nick begins his research at London’s Natural History Museum, where director of science Richard Lane looks after a veritable “treasure trove of oddity”. Among the huge range of animals in the museum are some 80,000 amphibians. It is to these creatures that Nick looks today, hoping to find one that can breathe in high-altitude conditions. But while locating this animal in the museum is relatively easy, spotting one in its natural habitat will be more of a challenge. Lake Titicaca, the setting for the real adventure, is situated some 7,500 miles away from London, two miles high in the Bolivian Andes.

Following in the footsteps of explorer and ecologist Jacques Cousteau, who visited the area in the early 1960s, Nick and his crew travel to La Paz in South America. Here the air is so thin that just walking proves exhausting for Nick. With the whole crew seemingly suffering from altitude sickness, Nick suspects that this may be something of a ‘go-slow’ mission. As the team head out onto the water for the first time, the true extent of their suffering becomes apparent and they are forced to abandon their search early and return to the hotel.

Friday 26 January: 20.00–21.00
Naturalist Nick Baker continues to scour the globe for the strangest creatures on the planet. Tonight he is on the trail of an elusive armour-plated mammal that gets its name from its pale rose colour.

Nick first heard about the pink fairy armadillo as a young boy visiting London’s Natural History Museum. Now, before setting out on his quest, he returns to the museum to find out what little is known about the creature. Director of science Richard Lane tells Nick that armadillos are descendants of glyptodons, tank-like creatures that became extinct thousands of years ago. Like glyptodons, armadillos have an armour of bone but this is arranged in bands rather than the hexagon formations of the glyptodon. Another key difference is size: while glyptodons were the size of small cars, the pink fairy armadillo is just a few inches long.

The rarely seen animal is found in parts of Argentina, where it inhabits dry grasslands and sandy plains. Nick and his crew travel to Mendoza province in western Argentina in the hope of glimpsing one. In a whistle-stop off-road tour of Mendoza’s furthest reaches, they follow in the footsteps of Charles Darwin, who came here on an inland leg of his Beagle voyage 172 years ago. Even locally there are few people with knowledge of pink fairy armadillos, but Mendoza resident and armadillo researcher Mariella Superina is among those who lend their expertise to Nick’s search.