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These are the user uploaded subtitles that are being translated: 1 00:00:06,000 --> 00:00:12,074 Advertise your product or brand here contact www.OpenSubtitles.org today 2 00:00:18,354 --> 00:00:23,144 The ability to move through the air in any direction you wish, 3 00:00:24,167 --> 00:00:26,307 to cross continents and oceans, 4 00:00:26,507 --> 00:00:30,160 to range over forests and deserts and mountains, 5 00:00:30,480 --> 00:00:35,951 all this birds have been able to do for 150 million years. 6 00:00:36,272 --> 00:00:41,340 But they weren't the first or indeed the last, in the skies. 7 00:00:43,788 --> 00:00:49,308 We are setting out to explore one of the most astonishing stories in the natural world. 8 00:00:50,736 --> 00:00:55,088 The way in which animals manage to rise up from the surface of the Earth, 9 00:00:55,318 --> 00:00:57,818 and colonise the air. 10 00:01:00,058 --> 00:01:03,296 From the dazzling aerobatics of the insects... 11 00:01:06,623 --> 00:01:10,567 to the majesty of ancient winged reptiles. 12 00:01:17,522 --> 00:01:20,419 The splendour and agility of birds... 13 00:01:24,979 --> 00:01:29,850 and the sonar guided precision of night flying bats. 14 00:01:34,239 --> 00:01:37,163 Flight has been the key to the success 15 00:01:37,249 --> 00:01:40,944 of some of our planet's most remarkable inhabitants. 16 00:01:47,848 --> 00:01:53,057 To analyse their spectacular skills, we will use the latest technology. 17 00:01:55,967 --> 00:01:58,817 And we will travel around the world. 18 00:02:00,019 --> 00:02:04,674 From the jungles of Borneo, to the fossil-filled rocks of China, 19 00:02:06,153 --> 00:02:08,653 and the Cloud Forests of Ecuador. 20 00:02:12,963 --> 00:02:15,561 We will take you into the air... 21 00:02:17,938 --> 00:02:21,216 and travel with animals as they fly. 22 00:02:49,105 --> 00:02:52,924 Evidence for the very beginnings of this astonishing story 23 00:02:53,197 --> 00:02:57,653 can be found close to home in The Fens of Cambridgeshire. 24 00:03:00,405 --> 00:03:05,953 Here live creatures that have an ancestry stretching back millions of years. 25 00:03:08,168 --> 00:03:13,609 Nobody knows exactly how the first flying animals in the world evolved, 26 00:03:14,161 --> 00:03:17,717 but there are creatures alive today, that can take us back 27 00:03:17,815 --> 00:03:21,014 to those far-distant, remarkable times, 28 00:03:21,368 --> 00:03:25,078 and they live - surprisingly - under water. 29 00:03:30,934 --> 00:03:34,100 Looking down through the surface to the riverbed, 30 00:03:34,324 --> 00:03:40,038 is like traveling back in time, over 320 million years. 31 00:03:42,329 --> 00:03:46,689 It was then, in an age long before even the dinosaurs evolved, 32 00:03:46,939 --> 00:03:52,017 that creatures like this, first appeared in the waters of the Earth. 33 00:03:56,264 --> 00:03:58,764 It's an insect. 34 00:03:59,740 --> 00:04:04,122 A ferocious predator with jaws like a mechanical grab. 35 00:04:16,847 --> 00:04:20,070 It seems unlikely that this animal's ancestors 36 00:04:20,145 --> 00:04:23,609 were among the first creatures ever to fly. 37 00:04:28,536 --> 00:04:32,730 But this one is not yet adult, it's a larva, 38 00:04:32,991 --> 00:04:35,781 and it doesn't spend all its life in the water. 39 00:04:37,305 --> 00:04:42,514 It has another life, and another body above the surface. 40 00:04:44,672 --> 00:04:48,007 Early one morning, it climbs up a reed. 41 00:04:52,039 --> 00:04:58,282 A split appears in its skin, and a very different-looking creature begins to emerge. 42 00:05:01,631 --> 00:05:05,757 It has four lumps on its back, that might perhaps ancestrally 43 00:05:05,995 --> 00:05:10,242 have become either gills, or protective armour plates. 44 00:05:11,912 --> 00:05:15,926 But now they develop into something very different. 45 00:05:21,090 --> 00:05:23,590 Wings. 46 00:05:25,245 --> 00:05:27,745 It has two pairs of them. 47 00:05:29,112 --> 00:05:34,791 Liquid from its body is pumped-down along veins, to stretch them tight. 48 00:05:37,222 --> 00:05:40,869 As they dry in the sun, they harden. 49 00:05:49,985 --> 00:05:54,366 The water-living dragon has become the dragonfly. 50 00:05:54,848 --> 00:05:58,980 And the four-winged apparatus that he uses to get into the air, 51 00:05:59,131 --> 00:06:01,631 is the earliest that we know. 52 00:06:07,211 --> 00:06:10,947 Imprints of such wings have been found in rocks that were laid down 53 00:06:11,033 --> 00:06:14,200 on the bottom of ancient lakes and streams. 54 00:06:17,099 --> 00:06:21,765 This specimen is about 150 million years old. 55 00:06:23,360 --> 00:06:28,945 And this wing is double that age at nearly 300 million years old. 56 00:06:33,639 --> 00:06:38,560 Ancient and modern wings share a structure that is strikingly similar. 57 00:06:41,303 --> 00:06:46,726 So today's dragonflies are amazingly, living fossils that can show us 58 00:06:46,805 --> 00:06:53,328 how the very first flyers overcame the pull of gravity, and took to the skies. 59 00:07:20,401 --> 00:07:24,475 Their wings are marvels of natural engineering. 60 00:07:25,881 --> 00:07:29,035 But to see how they lift the dragonfly into the air, 61 00:07:29,319 --> 00:07:32,222 we need to slow the action down. 62 00:07:33,424 --> 00:07:37,539 In principle, it looks fairly simple, each wing beats down, 63 00:07:37,739 --> 00:07:41,705 pushing on the air below, so lifting the dragonfly up. 64 00:07:42,904 --> 00:07:46,215 But each beat also creates another air current 65 00:07:46,436 --> 00:07:49,505 that lifts the dragonfly in a very different way. 66 00:07:50,855 --> 00:07:55,892 And I can demonstrate it, using this strip of paper to represent a wing. 67 00:07:56,109 --> 00:07:59,936 If I blow across the top of it, it'll rise. Watch. 68 00:08:10,972 --> 00:08:15,462 That is because the faster air moves, the lower its pressure. 69 00:08:15,588 --> 00:08:18,418 So I created a lower pressure above the wing, 70 00:08:18,574 --> 00:08:21,969 and in consequence it was sucked upwards. 71 00:08:22,177 --> 00:08:28,317 The problem for a flying animal, is to recreate that difference in air-speed. 72 00:08:36,711 --> 00:08:40,346 The way the dragonfly does this is remarkable. 73 00:08:46,953 --> 00:08:53,003 As it moves through the air, we can see that it twists its wings at different angles. 74 00:08:55,340 --> 00:09:00,785 On the powerful down-beat, it holds them at a slight upwards angle to the air flow, 75 00:09:01,471 --> 00:09:05,500 and this produces an extraordinary effect above the wing. 76 00:09:06,382 --> 00:09:11,894 It creates a swirl behind the leading edge, which spins the air round, 77 00:09:11,965 --> 00:09:16,399 increasing the speed of the air current over the top of the wing, 78 00:09:16,497 --> 00:09:22,963 and just a tiny increasing speed generates a significant upwards force, 79 00:09:23,656 --> 00:09:27,513 lifting up the wing, and the dragonfly. 80 00:09:30,689 --> 00:09:34,661 The dragonfly can then change the direction of its wing beats, 81 00:09:34,953 --> 00:09:38,082 to propel it forwards, as well as upwards. 82 00:09:44,267 --> 00:09:49,643 Remarkably, a dragonfly can beat each of its four wings independently. 83 00:09:52,736 --> 00:09:57,763 And that enables it to perform an astonishing variety of manoeuvres. 84 00:10:00,173 --> 00:10:02,673 It can hover. 85 00:10:05,623 --> 00:10:08,123 It can glide. 86 00:10:09,320 --> 00:10:11,855 It can even fly backwards. 87 00:10:16,727 --> 00:10:20,744 For maximum power, it beats both pairs together, 88 00:10:21,188 --> 00:10:23,932 and can make really sharp turns. 89 00:10:26,521 --> 00:10:29,725 So the very first dragonflies were able 90 00:10:29,858 --> 00:10:33,761 to extend their territories far and wide. 91 00:10:36,249 --> 00:10:39,653 And as more insects joined them in the skies, 92 00:10:40,800 --> 00:10:45,504 the dragonflies had the skills to be deadly aerial hunters. 93 00:11:00,419 --> 00:11:04,521 The ability to fly brought great advantages to those early insects. 94 00:11:04,788 --> 00:11:09,237 It enabled them to find food, to escape from predators, 95 00:11:09,538 --> 00:11:14,989 and particularly important, to travel to new territories in search of a mate. 96 00:11:19,498 --> 00:11:23,191 Damselflies like their close relations dragonflies, 97 00:11:23,301 --> 00:11:27,113 have remained virtually unchanged for millions of years. 98 00:11:28,531 --> 00:11:32,662 Mating can be quite complicated when both partners can fly, 99 00:11:33,712 --> 00:11:38,413 and these were among the first kind of animals that had to deal with that problem. 100 00:11:40,330 --> 00:11:43,693 The blue colour of this one, shows that it's a male. 101 00:11:45,533 --> 00:11:50,350 To attract a female, a male must have something to offer her. A territory. 102 00:11:54,529 --> 00:12:00,375 He chooses a stretch of water, that is likely to contain plenty of food for his offspring. 103 00:12:02,383 --> 00:12:06,045 Then he guards this territory against any rivals. 104 00:12:08,301 --> 00:12:11,884 Until a female flies in and joins him. 105 00:12:14,272 --> 00:12:19,219 He must now grab her before she changes her mind, in mid-air if necessary. 106 00:12:22,095 --> 00:12:27,381 He uses claspers at the tip of his abdomen, to grip her behind her neck. 107 00:12:28,232 --> 00:12:33,518 Amazingly, the pair are able to coordinate the beats of their eight wings. 108 00:12:35,332 --> 00:12:41,363 They may mate in the air, or choose a secluded perch where they'll be safe from predators. 109 00:12:43,406 --> 00:12:48,270 They then fly around the territory, laying their fertilized eggs. 110 00:12:59,405 --> 00:13:03,223 Flight enabled insects to invade part of the planet 111 00:13:03,283 --> 00:13:07,543 that until then, had been uninhabited: The air. 112 00:13:08,951 --> 00:13:11,451 And they flourished. 113 00:13:13,387 --> 00:13:19,964 So, 320 million years ago, the skies thronged with flying insects. 114 00:13:20,603 --> 00:13:24,775 But those early four-wing forms were destined to produce 115 00:13:25,014 --> 00:13:30,265 a whole range of spectacular, highly specialized flyers. 116 00:13:32,020 --> 00:13:36,230 The need to lay eggs in water, tied the first dragonflies 117 00:13:36,363 --> 00:13:39,273 to streams and ponds like these. 118 00:13:39,673 --> 00:13:43,966 But then, around 20 million years after their arrival, 119 00:13:44,106 --> 00:13:48,936 a new kind of flying insect appeared with no such ties to water. 120 00:13:51,375 --> 00:13:55,862 Proof of their success can be found almost wherever you look, 121 00:13:56,040 --> 00:14:00,090 and few places more abundantly than in Borneo. 122 00:14:17,433 --> 00:14:20,526 The very first flyers had two pairs of wings, 123 00:14:20,912 --> 00:14:23,742 now we're looking for their successors. 124 00:14:25,721 --> 00:14:28,888 One group of creatures adapted that original 125 00:14:29,125 --> 00:14:32,698 four-wing design with such success, 126 00:14:32,954 --> 00:14:36,119 that they diversified into the most numerous 127 00:14:36,197 --> 00:14:39,583 and widespread group of animals on the entire planet, 128 00:14:39,861 --> 00:14:45,958 and you can find some of the most spectacular examples, down there in the rainforest. 129 00:15:07,009 --> 00:15:13,817 Not all insects are hunters, some are strict vegetarians like this one. 130 00:15:14,069 --> 00:15:18,760 This it is the land living equivalent to that underwater monster, 131 00:15:19,039 --> 00:15:21,272 the dragonfly larva. 132 00:15:21,372 --> 00:15:27,966 But this larva instead of catching little fish and water fleas, munches wood pulp. 133 00:15:28,654 --> 00:15:32,491 The trouble is, that wood pulp is not very nutritious, 134 00:15:32,905 --> 00:15:36,834 and this creature has to eat it for at least a year, 135 00:15:37,031 --> 00:15:40,157 before it's this size, which is full grown. 136 00:15:40,599 --> 00:15:46,581 But then this larva will turn into an adult, which is equally monstrous. 137 00:15:52,439 --> 00:15:58,736 Emerging from beneath the ground, where it is lived and fed as a larva, is a beetle. 138 00:15:59,745 --> 00:16:04,854 One of the biggest in the world. The Atlas beetle. 139 00:16:10,487 --> 00:16:13,844 Males like this one are armed with long horns, 140 00:16:13,935 --> 00:16:17,946 powerful weapons with which to compete with rivals for a mate. 141 00:16:20,035 --> 00:16:23,625 It now spends most of its time above the ground, 142 00:16:23,777 --> 00:16:29,775 barging its way through the undergrowth, where it feeds on tree-sap and fallen fruit. 143 00:16:34,262 --> 00:16:39,110 This hefty, powerful creature may not look as if it could fly. 144 00:16:41,313 --> 00:16:43,813 But it can. 145 00:16:45,684 --> 00:16:48,984 At key moments in its life it takes to the air 146 00:16:49,347 --> 00:16:55,550 to look for new sources of food, and of course, a female. 147 00:17:02,051 --> 00:17:08,125 All this burrowing and munching around, could injure delicate flight wings. 148 00:17:08,387 --> 00:17:12,032 So beetles have hardened the front pair 149 00:17:12,232 --> 00:17:16,074 to form this pair of protective covers, 150 00:17:16,523 --> 00:17:21,566 and the delicate flight pair, are stowed away in safety, underneath. 151 00:17:30,800 --> 00:17:36,455 To see how the wings are folded away beneath their covers, we need to wait for take-off. 152 00:17:47,668 --> 00:17:54,587 As it flaps, sprung hinges click-open and the wings are stretched to their full size. 153 00:18:16,015 --> 00:18:21,359 The working wings create lift in just the same way that the dragonfly wings do, 154 00:18:22,369 --> 00:18:27,117 and the front wings, which have now become covers, are held out to the side. 155 00:18:27,854 --> 00:18:31,064 And their shape does give a little extra lift. 156 00:18:31,795 --> 00:18:35,499 But it's clear that this is really, rather a clumsy flyer. 157 00:18:42,992 --> 00:18:45,559 Landings can be clumsy too. 158 00:18:47,587 --> 00:18:53,064 And now those fragile wings must be carefully packed away, beneath their covers. 159 00:18:54,420 --> 00:18:59,054 They're guided by a line of tiny hairs at the base of the abdomen. 160 00:19:02,766 --> 00:19:06,749 These grip the wings and help push them into position. 161 00:19:09,686 --> 00:19:12,833 The beetle does it with all the care and precision 162 00:19:13,030 --> 00:19:16,818 that a skydiver uses when packing away his parachute. 163 00:19:21,141 --> 00:19:25,617 Once in a new territory, it will stake out a fresh source of food, 164 00:19:26,057 --> 00:19:29,461 and then defend it until a female arrives. 165 00:19:32,742 --> 00:19:36,526 The beetle way of life proved astonishingly successful. 166 00:19:36,947 --> 00:19:42,670 There are over 370,000 different species of beetle, so far discovered. 167 00:19:42,906 --> 00:19:45,406 Unbelievable figure. 168 00:19:46,977 --> 00:19:51,959 So early on, the beetles managed to fly as much as they need to, 169 00:19:52,254 --> 00:19:55,228 with just one pair of wings. 170 00:19:58,608 --> 00:20:02,182 And then, around 57 million years ago, 171 00:20:02,333 --> 00:20:05,904 came another key development in the history of flight. 172 00:20:11,139 --> 00:20:15,044 A new type of insect appeared, with two pairs of wings 173 00:20:15,239 --> 00:20:18,621 that became in effect, huge billboards. 174 00:20:19,814 --> 00:20:24,104 Wings that are perhaps the most dazzlingly beautiful of all. 175 00:20:26,027 --> 00:20:28,527 Butterflies. 176 00:20:34,538 --> 00:20:40,239 To create these extraordinary wings, the butterflies evolved a complex life cycle. 177 00:20:41,199 --> 00:20:46,272 They hatch from eggs, as little worms with legs - caterpillars. 178 00:20:48,359 --> 00:20:53,662 But, unlike many beetle grubs, caterpillars find their food above ground, 179 00:20:53,749 --> 00:20:55,991 where they're very vulnerable to predators. 180 00:20:56,191 --> 00:20:58,788 So they have evolved several strategies 181 00:20:59,087 --> 00:21:04,073 to accumulate all the body mass they will need, to become flying adults. 182 00:21:05,693 --> 00:21:09,744 The first is to eat as much as they can, as quickly as they can. 183 00:21:10,550 --> 00:21:14,486 Many are able to reach full size, in just a matter of weeks. 184 00:21:18,125 --> 00:21:23,473 Of course, a little thin-skinned, fat-filled sausage 185 00:21:23,877 --> 00:21:27,530 is a tempting morsel for any bird or reptile. 186 00:21:27,714 --> 00:21:31,048 So caterpillars have to have ways of defending themselves. 187 00:21:31,763 --> 00:21:36,025 This one, which is the caterpillar of a lovely swallowtail butterfly 188 00:21:36,385 --> 00:21:40,361 has disguised itself, as a bird dropping. 189 00:21:40,966 --> 00:21:44,646 And if that doesn't deceive a bird, and a bird goes for it, 190 00:21:44,985 --> 00:21:47,485 it has another form of defence. 191 00:21:55,025 --> 00:21:58,438 It's emitted a rather unpleasant smell as well. 192 00:22:07,273 --> 00:22:11,213 In the struggle to survive long enough to become winged adults, 193 00:22:11,367 --> 00:22:16,557 other caterpillars have developed other equally ingenious forms of defence. 194 00:22:18,339 --> 00:22:24,072 Concealed within these fluffy strands are short stinging spikes. 195 00:22:27,053 --> 00:22:32,309 And this one is armed with long spines which have really painful stings. 196 00:22:32,717 --> 00:22:36,015 Not only that, it has these bright warning colours 197 00:22:36,301 --> 00:22:40,938 to tell any potential predator that they'll be in trouble if they attack. 198 00:22:44,581 --> 00:22:50,195 This caterpillar may appear to be dangerous, but it is in fact a fraud. 199 00:22:50,728 --> 00:22:53,228 The spines don't sting at all. 200 00:22:53,430 --> 00:22:57,952 It's relying on its disguise to make a potential predator think twice, 201 00:22:58,494 --> 00:23:00,994 and leave it alone. 202 00:23:06,505 --> 00:23:09,620 Or... you can simply hide. 203 00:23:10,914 --> 00:23:17,267 These little tents, have been made by the caterpillars of a Skipper butterfly. 204 00:23:18,064 --> 00:23:23,619 Each caterpillar's started by making a circular cut in the edge of the leaf, 205 00:23:23,809 --> 00:23:28,536 but it's left one segment uncut, so it can act as a hinge. 206 00:23:28,918 --> 00:23:32,122 Then it pulls over the whole segment 207 00:23:32,486 --> 00:23:37,757 and hides beneath to munch away at the tissues of the leaf. 208 00:23:38,459 --> 00:23:44,083 And if I just pull it up.. There's a caterpillar. 209 00:23:48,734 --> 00:23:51,775 Caterpillars that survive this hazardous stage, 210 00:23:51,997 --> 00:23:55,821 can now build their wings and turn into adults. 211 00:23:56,208 --> 00:23:59,556 They undergo a truly radical transformation. 212 00:24:00,280 --> 00:24:04,259 Instead of shedding a final layer of skin as the dragonfly does, 213 00:24:04,658 --> 00:24:08,703 a caterpillar first surrounds itself, with a protective shell 214 00:24:08,790 --> 00:24:11,258 to act as a sort of changing room. 215 00:24:11,458 --> 00:24:15,497 Within which it dismantles and then completely reconstructs its body. 216 00:24:17,244 --> 00:24:21,788 After around 10 days, it emerges as a butterfly. 217 00:24:23,689 --> 00:24:29,908 Now fluid pumps along veins and the wings, to stretch them out to their full size. 218 00:24:32,810 --> 00:24:35,390 And then, it is ready to fly. 219 00:24:45,437 --> 00:24:49,985 Butterflies live on nectar which they collect from flowers. 220 00:24:51,246 --> 00:24:56,345 Like dragonflies and beetles, they also fly to find a mate. 221 00:24:56,642 --> 00:25:01,472 But the way they beat their colourful wings is significantly different. 222 00:25:15,766 --> 00:25:19,917 This lovely creature has two pairs of wings, 223 00:25:20,219 --> 00:25:23,898 but it has in effect, turned them into one. 224 00:25:24,915 --> 00:25:31,734 It's done that quite simply, by overlapping the larger front pair, over the smaller hind pair, 225 00:25:31,819 --> 00:25:37,505 so that when the front pair beat-down, they automatically press down the lower pair. 226 00:25:38,278 --> 00:25:42,202 The lower pair themselves don't have the muscles to beat-down, 227 00:25:42,441 --> 00:25:45,965 but just enough strength to return up. 228 00:25:48,641 --> 00:25:54,719 A butterfly's overlapping wings, compared to the size of their bodies, are enormous, 229 00:25:54,877 --> 00:25:58,972 around 10 times the size of other insect wings. 230 00:26:09,003 --> 00:26:14,343 Because the wing is larger, each beat can generate a huge amount of lift. 231 00:26:16,204 --> 00:26:21,969 So to stay airborne, a butterfly needs to flap less often than other insects. 232 00:26:23,958 --> 00:26:30,870 But that slow wing-beat also enables it to make rapid and unpredictable changes of direction. 233 00:26:33,205 --> 00:26:37,475 And that allows butterflies to fly in that zigzag, erratic way, 234 00:26:37,810 --> 00:26:41,445 which makes them so difficulty to catch, if you're a butterfly collector, 235 00:26:41,578 --> 00:26:44,094 or more importantly, a predator. 236 00:27:02,748 --> 00:27:06,926 The combined front and hind wings of a butterfly, not only constitute 237 00:27:07,013 --> 00:27:11,542 very effective flying mechanism, they can also carry messages. 238 00:27:11,983 --> 00:27:16,361 In fact, they carry some of the loveliest advertisements in the whole of the animal kingdom. 239 00:27:16,715 --> 00:27:21,453 Like for example, this beautiful Golden Birdwing butterfly from Borneo. 240 00:27:26,867 --> 00:27:31,029 The butterfly's huge wings provide a spacious canvas 241 00:27:31,167 --> 00:27:34,962 on which they display fantastically elaborate designs. 242 00:27:36,926 --> 00:27:40,542 So, how are these flying advertisements created? 243 00:27:42,742 --> 00:27:47,507 The secret lies in the microscopic structure of the wing surface. 244 00:27:52,371 --> 00:27:56,568 These overlapping scales, lined up like tiles on a roof, 245 00:27:56,761 --> 00:28:00,809 have evolved from bristles that were once tiny sensors. 246 00:28:04,493 --> 00:28:09,186 Some contain tiny packets of pigment, that give the wings colour. 247 00:28:17,277 --> 00:28:21,536 Others have a complex structure which splits the light, 248 00:28:21,675 --> 00:28:27,201 so that when viewed from a particular angle, it reflects a brilliant iridescence. 249 00:28:40,046 --> 00:28:44,147 There are over 18,000 species of butterfly around the world, 250 00:28:44,359 --> 00:28:48,658 and each has wings with their own distinctive design. 251 00:28:50,004 --> 00:28:54,362 These ravishing colours and delectable patterns, of course, 252 00:28:54,510 --> 00:28:57,990 enable a male butterfly and a female butterfly, to know 253 00:28:58,146 --> 00:29:00,678 whether or not they belong to the same species. 254 00:29:01,185 --> 00:29:04,600 And a mature adult ready to mate, 255 00:29:04,800 --> 00:29:09,051 can identify a suitable partner from surprising distances. 256 00:29:17,784 --> 00:29:24,492 When a male and female eventually meet, they flutter around each other in a ritual dance. 257 00:29:27,032 --> 00:29:31,163 Each is checking out the flying skills and wing-patterns of the other. 258 00:29:39,693 --> 00:29:42,568 If both pass the test, they mate. 259 00:29:52,828 --> 00:29:58,739 The sheer size of butterfly wings might seem to condemn their owners to a slow, 260 00:29:59,019 --> 00:30:01,519 almost dawdling flight. 261 00:30:02,246 --> 00:30:06,713 But they can be much more efficient aeronauts, than you might suppose. 262 00:30:08,881 --> 00:30:14,046 Butterflies may not be able to fly very fast, but astonishingly, 263 00:30:14,172 --> 00:30:19,952 for such frail looking creatures, they can travel for hundreds of miles in search of food. 264 00:30:22,792 --> 00:30:28,070 New discoveries are revealing that butterflies make immense journeys, 265 00:30:28,470 --> 00:30:30,934 and one of the most exciting of these studies, 266 00:30:31,100 --> 00:30:36,538 is taking place 7,000 miles west of Borneo, in Europe. 267 00:30:42,352 --> 00:30:46,142 I am joining a research project in Central Spain, 268 00:30:46,348 --> 00:30:50,263 to look for one of the greatest of all butterfly travellers. 269 00:30:52,113 --> 00:30:54,613 The Painted Lady. 270 00:30:58,267 --> 00:31:02,839 Every spring, Painted Ladies appear in Spain in great numbers. 271 00:31:04,982 --> 00:31:07,810 But Spain is just a stopover. 272 00:31:11,336 --> 00:31:15,250 An international team of scientists are uncovering evidence 273 00:31:15,322 --> 00:31:19,787 of an astonishing journey right across Europe and beyond. 274 00:31:24,719 --> 00:31:30,722 This hugely ambitious project, is the brainchild of Dr. Constantise Stefanescu. 275 00:31:42,156 --> 00:31:45,944 Detailed records of when and where Painted Ladies appear, 276 00:31:46,130 --> 00:31:49,776 have revealed an extraordinary mass migration. 277 00:31:50,227 --> 00:31:54,937 We were able to collect a huge number of observations 278 00:31:55,020 --> 00:31:58,541 from ah.. more than 60 different countries, 279 00:31:58,930 --> 00:32:04,861 and.. maybe 35,000 records... - Really? 280 00:32:05,068 --> 00:32:08,927 ..many people contributing ah.. their observations, 281 00:32:09,363 --> 00:32:13,248 and for the first time it was possible to understand 282 00:32:13,314 --> 00:32:17,269 the general pattern of migration all around. 283 00:32:18,709 --> 00:32:23,266 By combining this wealth of data, the team are revealing a route map 284 00:32:23,442 --> 00:32:25,942 that spans incredible distances. 285 00:32:27,034 --> 00:32:29,896 And it begins in North Africa. 286 00:32:31,693 --> 00:32:36,724 Large numbers of Painted Ladies breed in Morocco over the winter, 287 00:32:37,524 --> 00:32:41,559 before setting out across the Mediterranean to Europe. 288 00:32:42,008 --> 00:32:45,476 They then follow the spring bloom north, as the plants 289 00:32:45,539 --> 00:32:49,914 that they and their young feed on, sprout leaves and flowers. 290 00:32:50,866 --> 00:32:54,717 In summer, they appear in Britain and Scandinavia. 291 00:32:56,499 --> 00:33:02,244 But no individual butterfly lives long enough to achieve this huge journey by itself. 292 00:33:02,685 --> 00:33:06,649 Each step is taken by a new generation. 293 00:33:09,835 --> 00:33:13,306 So, this Painted Lady in Britain is the grandchild 294 00:33:13,389 --> 00:33:16,635 of a butterfly that set out from Morocco. 295 00:33:19,572 --> 00:33:23,576 But then, in autumn, all the Painted Ladies vanish. 296 00:33:25,919 --> 00:33:31,129 Do they simply die out? Or could there be a return leg to their epic migration? 297 00:33:33,701 --> 00:33:37,087 Searching for an answer to this mystery, has given the project 298 00:33:37,181 --> 00:33:40,286 its most astonishing revelation yet. 299 00:33:41,770 --> 00:33:44,253 And it comes from a part of the team based 300 00:33:44,301 --> 00:33:48,560 at Rothamsted Research Institute, just outside London. 301 00:33:50,098 --> 00:33:55,957 The key discovery emerged from a surprising source. Radar. 302 00:34:00,133 --> 00:34:05,620 Our radar has a vertical pointing beam, and it illuminates a narrow column of the sky above, 303 00:34:05,690 --> 00:34:08,193 like shining a powerful spotlight up into the sky, 304 00:34:08,413 --> 00:34:12,358 and we're able to detect individual insects as they fly through that beam. 305 00:34:13,765 --> 00:34:18,499 The signal is so detailed, it can even help identify the species. 306 00:34:20,304 --> 00:34:22,512 And during the autumn disappearance, 307 00:34:22,692 --> 00:34:26,190 the radar picked up large numbers of Painted Ladies. 308 00:34:27,349 --> 00:34:30,499 They won't dying out, they were on the move, 309 00:34:30,712 --> 00:34:33,841 and they were flying at astonishing heights. 310 00:34:35,014 --> 00:34:38,225 What we found was that in fact the Painted Ladies were highly abundant 311 00:34:38,303 --> 00:34:41,513 at heights of three, four, five hundred metres above the ground. 312 00:34:45,083 --> 00:34:49,708 At this great height, they were invisible to observers down below. 313 00:34:50,346 --> 00:34:52,846 This explained their disappearance. 314 00:34:53,879 --> 00:34:59,131 But the butterflies had their own very good reasons to travel at such altitudes. 315 00:35:00,938 --> 00:35:03,886 One of the benefits of flying at three or four hundred metres above the ground, 316 00:35:04,083 --> 00:35:06,977 is that the wind speeds there are much faster than they are at ground level, 317 00:35:07,043 --> 00:35:09,938 so the insects are able to get a lot of assistance from the wind, 318 00:35:10,018 --> 00:35:13,142 and travel much faster than they would, under their own powered flight, 319 00:35:13,321 --> 00:35:17,784 and we see these Painted Ladies traveling at 50 or even 70 km an hour. 320 00:35:21,835 --> 00:35:25,000 As well as measuring the phenomenal speed of their flight, 321 00:35:25,208 --> 00:35:28,107 the radar also revealed its direction. 322 00:35:28,621 --> 00:35:31,121 They were heading south. 323 00:35:32,677 --> 00:35:35,177 So where were they going? 324 00:35:36,771 --> 00:35:42,300 The astonishing answer came from Constantise� far-flung network of observers, 325 00:35:42,786 --> 00:35:46,549 and the crucial piece of data was gathered in Africa. 326 00:35:47,076 --> 00:35:50,757 Some expeditions in Africa, in October, November, 327 00:35:50,826 --> 00:35:55,543 have shown that there is a huge arrival of butterflies at that moment. - Really? 328 00:35:55,706 --> 00:36:00,908 So, by the end of the summer, the newborn butterflies in Europe, 329 00:36:01,098 --> 00:36:04,890 start to migrate way back to Africa. 330 00:36:05,063 --> 00:36:07,563 Really? - Yeah. 331 00:36:07,857 --> 00:36:13,729 A final generation riding on high altitude winds makes an immense journey 332 00:36:13,788 --> 00:36:18,925 of up to 3,000 miles to West Africa, in just a matter of days. 333 00:36:22,301 --> 00:36:25,336 Observers on the ground, and radar in the air, 334 00:36:25,502 --> 00:36:29,123 had found proof of an amazing migration cycle. 335 00:36:30,517 --> 00:36:34,073 Just in one year the whole cycle is made, 336 00:36:34,464 --> 00:36:38,295 and is the succession of these six generations moving about 337 00:36:38,692 --> 00:36:44,911 5,000 kilometres in one direction, and 5,000 in another direction. 338 00:36:47,322 --> 00:36:50,153 This migration is in fact the longest made by 339 00:36:50,238 --> 00:36:53,084 any insect on the planet so far discovered. 340 00:36:54,240 --> 00:36:56,509 But that raised another question. 341 00:36:56,708 --> 00:37:00,581 How did each generation know which direction in which to fly? 342 00:37:03,241 --> 00:37:07,142 The Rothamsted scientists once again set out to find an answer, 343 00:37:08,446 --> 00:37:13,052 by tracking the behaviour of Painted Ladies much closer to the ground. 344 00:37:21,444 --> 00:37:23,944 This is our flight simulator experiment. 345 00:37:24,404 --> 00:37:28,404 What we are done is we've tethered our butterflies to a very fine rod, 346 00:37:28,723 --> 00:37:31,378 and we've put them inside these flight simulators. 347 00:37:31,540 --> 00:37:35,508 They are ridged up to the computer, and the butterflies are free to turn. 348 00:37:35,931 --> 00:37:38,813 And as they're turning, we're recording that turning, 349 00:37:39,010 --> 00:37:43,436 and we can actually draw out the flight path that they would've taken if they free flying. 350 00:37:46,230 --> 00:37:50,080 The barrel blocks the butterfly's view of the surrounding scenery, 351 00:37:50,208 --> 00:37:52,884 removing any possible distractions. 352 00:37:53,874 --> 00:37:57,688 The only reference point they have, is the sky above. 353 00:37:59,955 --> 00:38:04,747 Remarkably, the butterflies consistently choose a common direction. 354 00:38:07,768 --> 00:38:12,695 These are the flight headings, so each spot is one individual butterfly 355 00:38:12,935 --> 00:38:15,544 and the overall direction that they went in. 356 00:38:16,062 --> 00:38:20,007 So you can see that on average my butterflies were flying South. 357 00:38:21,359 --> 00:38:26,165 What we found, when we put the lid on the simulator so they couldn't see the sky, 358 00:38:26,493 --> 00:38:30,270 is, as you will see, they didn't know which direction to go in, 359 00:38:30,367 --> 00:38:33,524 they weren't able to maintain the southwards heading. 360 00:38:35,385 --> 00:38:38,930 Rebecca concluded that their ability to choose this heading 361 00:38:39,094 --> 00:38:42,539 must depend on the one thing they can see in the sky above: 362 00:38:43,572 --> 00:38:46,072 The sun. 363 00:38:47,661 --> 00:38:52,920 Actually the sun is a really good cue, it's very predictable in its movements across the sky, 364 00:38:53,281 --> 00:38:57,103 and butterflies will be flying in the middle of the day when it's warm, 365 00:38:57,357 --> 00:39:02,895 when the sun is out, and the sun will be in the south at that time of day. 366 00:39:03,074 --> 00:39:07,694 So that's a really clear cue for the butterflies to know which way is south. 367 00:39:11,035 --> 00:39:14,250 This inbuilt compass allows Painted Ladies 368 00:39:14,344 --> 00:39:17,894 at high altitude, to select a wind that's heading south, 369 00:39:18,282 --> 00:39:23,226 and so hitch a free ride on the long return journey, all the way to Africa. 370 00:39:31,126 --> 00:39:36,712 Some insects face a very different challenge, not flying long distances, 371 00:39:37,025 --> 00:39:39,525 but flying in the dark. 372 00:39:48,929 --> 00:39:54,416 A light trap can attract some of the most remarkable of these nocturnal flyers. 373 00:39:59,435 --> 00:40:01,935 Moths. 374 00:40:04,372 --> 00:40:08,821 Moths probably evolved to fly at night to avoid predators. 375 00:40:10,457 --> 00:40:17,175 Their eyes are adapted to low light, but they also use a second, highly developed sense: Smell. 376 00:40:21,534 --> 00:40:24,993 This is a male Moon Moth. 377 00:40:26,228 --> 00:40:31,280 Moths overlap their two pairs of wings, in just the same way as butterflies do, 378 00:40:31,848 --> 00:40:37,137 and this particular moth is very special. It has an extremely short life. 379 00:40:37,299 --> 00:40:41,529 It will only live for a week. It won't even feed. 380 00:40:42,160 --> 00:40:46,124 Its only object is to find a female. 381 00:40:46,645 --> 00:40:51,897 And it does that with these remarkable feather-like antenna. 382 00:40:54,483 --> 00:40:58,562 The female emits a particular characteristic scent, 383 00:40:58,816 --> 00:41:05,522 and with those antennae, the male can sense it from as much as a mile away. 384 00:41:05,993 --> 00:41:12,855 He then takes-off and flies upwind, until eventually it finds the source. 385 00:41:21,023 --> 00:41:26,471 Moths with their combined front and rear wings, are also excellent flyers. 386 00:41:29,700 --> 00:41:34,257 Some live longer, and so need to fly to find food. 387 00:41:35,452 --> 00:41:39,003 This Sphinx Moth's favourite food, is nectar. 388 00:41:41,313 --> 00:41:44,153 It can even hover as it drinks. 389 00:41:53,823 --> 00:41:56,833 So by overlapping their two pairs of wings, 390 00:41:57,299 --> 00:42:01,203 butterflies and moths have become very competent flyers. 391 00:42:01,574 --> 00:42:05,417 But there's one group of flying insects that has changed 392 00:42:05,693 --> 00:42:09,908 the back pair of wings into something quite, quite different. 393 00:42:10,215 --> 00:42:16,567 Something that enables them to perform the most extraordinary aerial gymnastics. 394 00:42:18,173 --> 00:42:22,986 For the final chapter in our story of flying insects, I'm returning to London. 395 00:42:30,013 --> 00:42:35,390 The urban jungle and its human inhabitants, provide plenty of shelter and food, 396 00:42:35,670 --> 00:42:40,216 for a particularly adaptable and numerous kind of insect. 397 00:42:43,760 --> 00:42:46,260 Ah, thank you very much. - Thank you. 398 00:42:48,730 --> 00:42:52,341 An inviting meal like this one, will I'm quite sure, 399 00:42:52,418 --> 00:42:57,591 very soon attract a flying diner, that is one of the most remarkable 400 00:42:57,775 --> 00:43:00,275 of all insect aeronauts. 401 00:43:02,888 --> 00:43:05,388 It is of course, a fly. 402 00:43:06,243 --> 00:43:10,684 This particular kind, a blow fly, occurs all over the world, 403 00:43:11,365 --> 00:43:17,648 and its ancestors have been buzzing around for a least 250 million years. 404 00:43:20,738 --> 00:43:25,606 Flies are so common, we tend to dismiss them as just irritating pests, 405 00:43:26,021 --> 00:43:29,522 but their flying abilities are truly remarkable. 406 00:43:30,170 --> 00:43:33,979 Watch what happen if I try and swat this one with the menu. 407 00:43:39,385 --> 00:43:45,839 Slowing down the action by 40 times, we can see how astonishingly agile flies are. 408 00:43:50,809 --> 00:43:55,238 It makes its escape in the time it takes me to blink my eye. 409 00:43:57,798 --> 00:44:02,765 The ability to twist and turn at such high speeds, and so evade enemies, 410 00:44:03,000 --> 00:44:06,314 has made flies the global success that they are. 411 00:44:13,660 --> 00:44:16,901 They are the jet fighters of the insect world, 412 00:44:17,001 --> 00:44:20,812 and they owe their manoeuvrability not to the shape of their wings, 413 00:44:21,008 --> 00:44:27,803 nor the power of their muscles, but to a set of highly advanced flight sensors. 414 00:44:30,247 --> 00:44:35,053 A fly has its own version of a fighter pilot's instrument panel, 415 00:44:38,261 --> 00:44:43,771 providing constant updates on speed, altitude and direction of travel. 416 00:44:49,104 --> 00:44:52,260 A fly gathers this flight-data through its eyes, 417 00:44:53,253 --> 00:44:56,211 and these are among the best in the business. 418 00:44:58,019 --> 00:45:03,760 They can process visual information around 10 times as fast as our own eyes. 419 00:45:05,032 --> 00:45:08,667 But in high speed manoeuvres, even a fly's eyes 420 00:45:08,759 --> 00:45:12,746 struggle with one crucial piece of flight data: 421 00:45:14,457 --> 00:45:18,554 The angle of its body in the air, and the way it changes. 422 00:45:18,894 --> 00:45:24,244 Information that a human pilot would get from an instrument based on a gyroscope. 423 00:45:26,853 --> 00:45:32,153 And that is essential if you going to pull-off a stunt like this one. 424 00:45:40,666 --> 00:45:44,850 Fortunately, flies not only have eyes to guide them. 425 00:45:45,631 --> 00:45:50,626 They also have a second, and even more remarkable set of sensors. 426 00:45:51,014 --> 00:45:55,965 One that is derived from that original four-wing design. 427 00:45:59,708 --> 00:46:03,002 A fly only has a single pair of wings. 428 00:46:07,079 --> 00:46:10,577 The rear pair have been converted into something else. 429 00:46:11,786 --> 00:46:15,876 A tiny club-like appendage known as a haltere. 430 00:46:17,564 --> 00:46:22,114 This surprisingly sophisticated organ, alerts the fly to changes 431 00:46:22,196 --> 00:46:25,305 in the position of its body in the air. 432 00:46:27,772 --> 00:46:31,660 As the fly takes-off, each haltere begins to beat up and down, 433 00:46:31,842 --> 00:46:35,378 and so fast, it immediately becomes a blur. 434 00:46:38,899 --> 00:46:44,667 But in slow motion, we can see that it swings back-and-forth like a pendulum. 435 00:46:46,875 --> 00:46:49,283 To understand how the haltere works, 436 00:46:49,386 --> 00:46:52,879 we need to track its movement in a mid-air roll. 437 00:46:56,236 --> 00:47:00,478 The weighted tip of the haltere, has a kind of moving inertia, 438 00:47:01,498 --> 00:47:06,421 so that it remains on the same swinging path as the fly banks. 439 00:47:07,390 --> 00:47:10,874 Now, the angle between the body and the haltere changes, 440 00:47:10,962 --> 00:47:13,482 and the base is put under strain. 441 00:47:13,711 --> 00:47:17,493 This triggers sensors which register the roll. 442 00:47:22,588 --> 00:47:28,314 The fly can then adjust its wing beat to correct any imbalance, however extreme. 443 00:47:31,800 --> 00:47:35,855 New studies into a second, remarkable use of the haltere signal, 444 00:47:36,081 --> 00:47:39,197 are taking place at London's Imperial College. 445 00:47:43,262 --> 00:47:48,310 In the department of Bioengineering, experts are studying Blow Flies 446 00:47:48,459 --> 00:47:52,514 to see if their natural flight mechanics can improve the performance 447 00:47:52,805 --> 00:47:55,856 of man-made flyers, like this drone. 448 00:47:59,282 --> 00:48:05,059 Flies are incredibly manoeuvrable, and if you look at their performance, 449 00:48:05,166 --> 00:48:09,097 one chasing another one, um.. it's really hardly 450 00:48:09,189 --> 00:48:12,894 any other animal that can match this sort of aerodynamic performance. 451 00:48:13,634 --> 00:48:18,210 Holger has devised an experiment to investigate an intriguing connection, 452 00:48:18,368 --> 00:48:23,848 between a fly's halteres and its other key flight sensor, its eyes. 453 00:48:30,253 --> 00:48:35,230 A tiny motor simulates a series of high speed mid-air rolls. 454 00:48:36,732 --> 00:48:40,862 The way the fly then reacts, is recorded on a specialist camera 455 00:48:41,071 --> 00:48:44,052 which can replay the action in slow motion. 456 00:48:47,311 --> 00:48:52,438 As you can see if you look closely, the head of the fly is maintained level, 457 00:48:53,127 --> 00:48:56,668 the body is rotating, and to maintain level gaze, 458 00:48:56,788 --> 00:48:59,572 they have to counter-rotate the head. 459 00:49:00,951 --> 00:49:06,125 Keeping the eyes level is vital, if they're to gather accurate flight information, 460 00:49:06,204 --> 00:49:11,447 and the halteres have been identified as the crucial sensor, that makes this possible. 461 00:49:11,996 --> 00:49:17,632 Visual system alone would just be too slow, that's where actually the halteres come in. 462 00:49:17,779 --> 00:49:21,644 The halteres are extremely fast in terms of their responses, 463 00:49:21,902 --> 00:49:28,629 and their immediate.. well signals, that are then sent to.. to the neck motor system, 464 00:49:28,696 --> 00:49:32,360 and to the flight motor system, they are the first really 465 00:49:32,432 --> 00:49:36,364 to compensate for any disturbances, and if that has happened, 466 00:49:36,871 --> 00:49:41,849 the visual system is perfectly well situated to cope with the rest. 467 00:49:45,452 --> 00:49:51,296 So flies lost a pair of wings, but gained an extraordinary new flight sensor 468 00:49:51,416 --> 00:49:55,611 that made them the most advanced flyers in the insect world. 469 00:50:02,491 --> 00:50:09,138 Flight has enabled the insects as a whole, to become an astonishing global success. 470 00:50:09,510 --> 00:50:12,079 There are twice as many insect species, 471 00:50:12,138 --> 00:50:15,547 then there are, of all other animals put together. 472 00:50:16,416 --> 00:50:19,684 Theirs is a remarkable evolutionary story 473 00:50:19,879 --> 00:50:23,635 that spans over 320 million years. 474 00:50:24,995 --> 00:50:28,688 From the first four-winged creatures that emerged from the water, 475 00:50:29,563 --> 00:50:34,611 to the armour-plated beetles which colonise land away from water. 476 00:50:36,906 --> 00:50:40,216 The butterflies with their huge colourful wings. 477 00:50:42,886 --> 00:50:47,468 And the stunningly skilful aerobatic flies. 478 00:50:49,222 --> 00:50:54,609 But skill may not be enough, sometimes sheer size counts. 479 00:50:55,068 --> 00:51:00,307 The insects had the skies for themselves, for around 100 million years, 480 00:51:00,683 --> 00:51:06,169 but then a new group of animal appeared, animals that could build bigger bodies, 481 00:51:06,398 --> 00:51:12,307 and they were to lift the techniques of flying, to even greater heights. 482 00:51:14,670 --> 00:51:17,841 As our journey through time continues, we encounter 483 00:51:17,940 --> 00:51:22,837 the extraordinary pioneers of a new wave of larger flyers: 484 00:51:25,800 --> 00:51:28,696 Monstrous winged reptiles. 485 00:51:31,821 --> 00:51:38,029 Strange feathered dinosaurs, whose ventures into the air led to the birds. 486 00:51:41,252 --> 00:51:45,576 And a group of mammals that conquered the pitch-black of the night: 487 00:51:47,464 --> 00:51:49,964 The bats. 488 00:51:50,305 --> 00:51:56,368 Support us and become VIP member to remove all ads from www.OpenSubtitles.org 47407

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