Original subtitles

NARRATOR: A flamboyance...

that's what you call a group of flamingos.

Elephants herd in a parade.

A group of zebras is called a dazzle.

Whatever the name,

being part of a group has advantages.

Hanging with the herd fends off predators,

helps with mating,

and sometimes it makes it easier to bring up baby.

(♪♪♪)

(Chirping)

Forget privacy.

From day one,

the world for a Chilean flamingo is a busy place.

The same goes for flamingos at a zoo.

And a two-week-old chick like Tweedle

might get lost in the shuffle.

He lives at Reid Park Zoo, in Tucson, Arizona.

RAMSEY: When flamingo chicks first hatch,

they're white little puffballs

and they've got black legs and black bills.

As they get older,

that down gradually starts to turn grey.

At about 40 days, they start getting feathers.

NARRATOR: It'll be a while before Tweedle turns pink

but right from the get-go, he's displaying his personality.

RAMSEY: So this chick is a little more apprehensive

about coming off the nest

than our previous chicks have been.

It took Tweedle over a week before it felt comfortable

coming off the nest and exploring,

but this one's gonna stick closer to mom and dad

than our previous chicks did.

NARRATOR: That cautious attitude should suit

both of Tweedle's protective parents just fine.

RAMSEY: With flamingos, both mom and dad help take care of the chicks.

So they both help to build the nest,

they both sit on the egg.

NARRATOR: The parents pile up a mound of mud

to raise it above the water level

to protect the egg.

There's no risk of flooding here at the zoo,

but the behavior is instinctive.

A female flamingo will only lay one egg a season,

so the male and female go to great lengths to keep it safe.

With so many flamingos around, that's not easy to do.

RAMSEY: They like to live in very large flocks

and they stay very close together

but they're constantly squabbling.

They're always kind of chirping at each other

and kind of just giving little knocks on the head

to each other.

NARRATOR: While a crowded group life may lead to squabbling,

the flamingos' mating ritual, especially in the wild,

is a striking display.

It's truly flamboyant.

RAMSEY: For flamingos to have successful breeding,

they have very weird behaviors that they do as a flock.

So they march around, they do these wing salutes,

they do thing called head flagging

where they all turn their heads at the same time.

NARRATOR: Flamingos really have the hang of group living,

which is as essential at the zoo as it is in the wild.

If there are fewer than 15 flamingos in a zoo,

it's a problem.

RAMSEY: If they don't have enough of them,

they won't build nests and they won't lay eggs.

So it's really important to have enough flamingos

in order to make them feel comfortable enough to breed.

NARRATOR: Once a chick is born,

flamingo parents share other duties, like feeding.

Adults produce what's known as crop milk

and pass it into a youngster's beak.

RAMSEY: Tweedle, as you can see, has a very different bill

than the parents have.

His is much smaller and pointier.

But as he gets older, at about 40 days,

that bill's gonna start to curve down

so he has the same type of bill as mom and dad.

NARRATOR: When Tweedle is an adult,

that banana-shape will pay off at meal time.

RAMSEY: Flamingos have a unique way of eating

where they'll stick their head in the water

and it's upside down.

NARRATOR: Their beaks are like big scoops

and gather in everything, including muddy water.

When their beaks close, the morsels of food stay in,

but their tongues move quickly to push the water out.

This filtering technique lets them eat tiny crustaceans

and insect larvae, which are the reason

behind the flamingo's distinctively colored feathers.

The shrimp and mollusks are loaded with beta-carotene -

the same stuff that makes carrots orange.

That makes its way through the flamingos' bloodstream

and into their feathers.

The zoo can only give them some of the same food

they'd find in the wild, so they also have a supplement.

RAMSEY: There's a very special diet that we buy

that's specifically for flamingos.

This has all the nutritional things that they need in it

as well as the same type of pigments in it

that will help keep them pink.

NARRATOR: Becoming, and staying pink, are important,

especially for the males.

Pale flamingos are not as attractive to females

as really pink flamingos.

Tweedle won't turn pink for at least a couple of years.

But he is developing another hallmark of flamingos...

the one-legged pose.

RAMSEY: It's mostly for comfort.

If you think about how when a person stands,

when they're just standing in one place for a long time,

they usually put their weight on one leg or the other.

The only difference is that flamingos lift that leg up.

NARRATOR: Other research suggests it helps the birds conserve body heat.

Tweedle's a quick study.

But he's still timid.

While another flamingo waits for her egg to hatch,

little Tweedle stays close,

under the watchful eye of his parents.

As close as Tweedle can get.

They're just a couple of weeks old,

so these three reindeer calves,

named Daisy, Aster and Sawyer,

are still getting comfortable moving about.

They're not ready to pull a sleigh from the North Pole.

But it won't be long until they can try.

STEPHANI: When reindeer are first born, they weigh about 10 pounds

and, within their first hour,

are able to walk around and keep up with mom,

and then after a day, they're able to outrun a human.

Reindeer are found in many northern countries.

The ones at the Assiniboine Park Zoo

in Winnipeg, Manitoba, are Eurasian tundra reindeer.

In North America, they're also known as caribou.

One of the most important instincts

Daisy, Aster and Sawyer will develop

is to shadow their mothers.

STEPHANI: In the wild, the babies need to learn herd mentality

so that they know to stay with the herd

since there is safety in numbers.

They'll go between cycles of walking around

to look for a different grazing area

and then they'll switch into a resting mode.

And they all tend to follow one leader.

NARRATOR: Reindeer or caribou herds head north in the summer.

That's when they're drawn to the tundra,

which is lush with grasses and plants.

It's a massive migration, a journey of hundreds of miles.

Reindeer stand out in the deer family

for other reasons too.

They are the only species of deer

in which females can have antlers.

STEPHANI: Both male and female babies will start developing their antlers

within two to three weeks of being born.

And when they first start out, they'll just be little nubs

that's on the tops of their head.

It might be hard to tell,

but little bumps are starting to emerge on Daisy's head.

You won't need to squint at those nubs long.

Reindeer have the second largest antlers of any deer,

after moose.

STEPHANI: Antlers are made of bone

and they grow from the top of the skull.

They grow forward from the tips

and to help them grow, they get a velvet skin layer

that helps deliver blood and nutrients to them

as they grow.

NARRATOR: Male reindeer lose their antlers at the beginning of the winter.

They regrow later that same season.

And by the time summer comes,

they can measure up to three feet long

and weigh 50 pounds.

Female reindeer, on the other hand,

keep their antlers through winter until spring.

So those big, brave reindeer guiding Santa's sleigh,

like Donner, Dasher and Rudolph, are all females!

Reindeer shed more than their antlers.

When the weather turns warm,

they don't need the protection of their heavy winter coat,

so off it comes.

A shorter, darker coat will come through for the summer months.

Living in such large herds can sometimes lead to confusion.

STEPHANI: Sometimes the babies will go to the wrong mom

and they'll try and nurse off her

but often the mom will shoo them off

so she has enough milk for her calf.

The calves will stay with the mom

and drink milk for the first month almost exclusively

and after that, they'll start to graze.

NARRATOR: Sawyer is a hungry little thing.

Reindeer milk will take care of that.

It's one of the richest milks of any land mammal.

It's got 22%butterfat, compared to cow's milk at 4%.

After these babies are weaned, it's on to solid food.

In the wild, that means lichens.

STEPHANI: The snow will cover the lichens that they eat

and they have to be able to detect where they are

in order to dig down to get to them.

NARRATOR: A very good sense of smell

helps the reindeer find the buried food.

But there is another helpful adaptation

that scientists believe is unique to this mammal.

Reindeer have special vision,

which allows them to better see lichens

in the dim light of an Arctic winter.

STEPHANI: Recently scientists have discovered

that reindeer can see UV light.

NARRATOR: Their keen eyesight also helps them avoid competition.

STEPHANI: The UV light will help them see traces of pee

or fur, which will allow them to see

if there are other reindeer in the area

that might be competing with them for food

or it'll help them better pick out predators such as wolves

that are camouflaged in the snow.

(Honking)

NARRATOR: Daisy, Aster and Sawyer are happy just to see mom.

STEPHANI: When they wake up

and they notice they're a little bit further from mom,

they'll start crying for mom

and making a honking sound to get her attention.

(Honking)

NARRATOR: These little calves will grow up quickly.

Until then, sticking with mom is a wise step.

It might not be obvious at first,

but elephants and humans have a lot in common.

They're emotional, intelligent,

and highly social.

Like humans,

elephants also take a long time to grow up,

and growing up means constantly learning.

That's certainly the case with Nandi,

a 14-month-old elephant that lives with her family

at the Reid Park Zoo in Tucson, Arizona.

Just a few months earlier,

when Nandi was about 8 months old,

she stuck close to her mom, Semba.

TYGIELSKI: Nandi was staying a little closer to mom.

So she was a little less confident,

more concerned with how close she was to her mom.

She would frighten a little more easily

and run back to mom and check in with her.

NARRATOR: Nandi was learning how to be an elephant...

experimenting with her trunk,

timidly stepping into the pool,

and figuring out her place in the family.

In the wild, Nandi might be part of an all-female herd,

led by an experienced matriarch.

The herd would nurture her

and eventually teach her how to raise calves of her own.

In the zoo,

she's getting both the nurturing and education

from all of the members of her family.

There's dad, Mabu.

Mom, Semba.

And three siblings:

Eight-year-old Punga,

4-year-old Sundzu,

and of course Nandi.

Lungile is another adult female who helps with the youngsters.

It's a big family,

and each of the elephants has a role to play.

TYGIELSKI: We can see how our herd works together in that the kids,

the young elephants, play all day

but when they get really rowdy,

oftentimes one of the adults will come,

and often it's mom, who might discipline one sibling

or one of the brothers for being too rough on Nandi.

NARRATOR: Nandi doesn't seem to mind.

As she gets older,

she wants to play with her big brothers

and doesn't want to be left out of the fun...

even if it means pushing herself.

TYGIELSKI: The pool's a little bit frightening

to a baby elephant initially

and so she's becoming brave, curious and independent

swimming on her own.

NARRATOR: Her family's showing her the ropes.

She's learning from them, just like human babies do.

TYGIELSKI: So Nandi's learning how to interact with her environment

in part from her siblings and her mom,

so she does watch them and she mimics them.

And then the other thing that's interesting is

because she's curious, she tries new things

and sometimes they work.

And sometimes they don't.

NARRATOR: Playing increases her confidence,

but she's also just more sure-footed.

TYGIELSKI: She runs more smoothly, flaps her ears more confidently,

and some of that is just growing into her body.

NARRATOR: Nandi can also use her feet to communicate.

Researchers know that elephants in the wild

can send and receive messages

through very low frequency sounds.

These also travel as vibrations through the ground.

So an elephant across the savannah

might send a warning call, and another might hear it,

but also get the news through a rumble it feels

through its feet or trunk.

At the zoo, Nandi and her family are close together

but they still communicate in the same way.

TYGIELSKI: They also do have lots of vocalizations

that we can't hear

so sometimes we'll watch their behavior

and we suspect that they're rumbling

at these low frequencies that we can't hear

and they're saying something to one another

based on their body postures.

NARRATOR: Just as human babies

become more nimble with their fingers,

elephants become more agile with their trunks.

TYGIELSKI: Nandi's trunk when she was a very young elephant,

it was as though she had a spaghetti noodle hanging from her face

when she would run, it would just flop around

where now she really is becoming quite skillful at using it.

NARRATOR: Nandi's trunk is now less spaghetti

and more of a fine tool

that can help her get what she wants.

That's because a network of muscles

gives her incredible control over her trunk's movements.

Nandi and her mom use their trunks to stay in touch.

Sometimes, Semba gives Nandi a friendly nudge.

Other times, they share food.

So, Nandi's trunk is a nose, a hand,

a voice, and a straw, all in one.

And her mom's is still an occasional blanket.

Nandi still has a lot of learning to do,

but now that she's 14 months old,

it's easy to see the changes.

TYGIELSKI: She's become much more independent and curious,

and charges right ahead of mom

and doesn't worry about how close her mom is following her.

NARRATOR: But she's still a toddler.

And, like all toddlers,

she knows exactly where mom is when she needs her.

This baby zebra, Graham, looks all right now,

but 4 months ago, his handlers at Newquay Zoo

in Cornwall, England, were concerned.

MEEK: The baby had just been born and still wet,

and they take a few hours just to get up on their feet

but he slipped a little bit.

NARRATOR: It could've been the handlers who were wobbly,

after all, it was all new to them.

Graham was the first zebra calf ever born at the zoo.

MEEK: So it was a little bit dramatic

but we managed to get him up and stand him up

and as soon as he was on his feet,

he was bright eyed and bushy tailed.

NARRATOR: Graham was fine.

Like other foals,

he was able to walk about 20 minutes after birth.

Graham's arrival was a happy surprise

for someone else: his mother!

Typically, a zebra mare is able to reproduce

from age 2 until 15.

Graham's mother is already 14 years old,

but Graham is her first foal.

MEEK: I think zebra will produce up to 20 years old

but probably in the wild,

an older animal like that, anything beyond 15

is probably getting a little bit too old to reproduce

and they would have already produced four or five youngsters

by then.

NARRATOR: Graham is a Chapman's zebra, a subspecies of the plains zebra

that's found in the grasslands of southern Africa.

It's a wide-open habitat with a range of animals,

including large predators.

So zebras stay in herds

because there's greater safety in numbers.

Mares must separate to give birth

but rejoin the herd as quickly as possible.

Even at the zoo,

Mom is very protective of the latest addition to the herd.

MEEK: She is quite defensive.

If you watch her, she'll very often stand

between the other two zebra and the foal

and she does exactly the same with us.

She looks upon them as the same she does with the keepers,

so she can be quite defensive over him

but only if you get a little bit too close.

NARRATOR: Graham's safe here.

And he's healthy too.

MEEK: Well, this is an interesting thing

on the growth rate of the zebra.

Because this is the first one we've bred at the zoo,

we were quite surprised on how quickly he grows

and they appear to grow very quickly at an early stage

to become big and strong

and be able to get away from predators

and then it seems to slow up.

NARRATOR: Graham will mature quickly.

He might head a tightly-knit family group of female zebra

and their foals, called a "harem".

For now, Graham is getting along just fine

with the other zebras in the zoo.

MEEK: Zebras are very sociable.

He's mixed very well with the other girls,

the other female zebra in there.

NARRATOR: He's also getting used to other species

that he would encounter on the savannah.

MEEK: We have wildebeest and the other antelope

but so far we haven't mixed them.

We're very careful when they're very young

to actually be--

not to mix them too much with the other animals.

Uh, he has actually mixed with the Nyala antelope

which are quite calm

but the wildebeest can be-- can be difficult

so, so far, we're just holding back a little bit.

NARRATOR: Graham will eventually mix with them.

Wildebeest are a natural partner in the wild,

essentially traveling companions.

MEEK: Large herds will actually migrate

with wildebeest and other antelope,

um, and they follow the rains, as the rains

go and the rich grass is ahead of them,

then they graze all the way and then they turn back again.

NARRATOR: For zebras, wild or captive,

eating grass or hay is about quantity, not quality.

MEEK: Zebra actually graze constantly.

They don't eat lots and lots of rich food.

In the wild, it's very seasonal,

you've got a dry season and a wet season

and they'll put a little weight on

and the foals are often born in the wet season.

Uh, in captivity we have to try and replicate that.

Certainly this time of year,

this is in the austere time of year

when there isn't a lot of great grazing

so we basically feed them on good quality hay

and very little else.

NARRATOR: At two weeks of age, Graham started to chew grass.

MEEK: The grazing with the youngster actually surprised us

because at two weeks old,

we noticed that he was picking at grass

and starting to eat a little bit.

And this was a little bit of a concern

because from the keepers' point of view,

they had to ask the vet, you know is this normal?

Because is he getting enough milk,

is he looking for other food?

And apparently all equines, including domestic equines,

they do start to pick at grass from 2 to 3 weeks old.

Doesn't mean to say

they're getting a lot of nutrition from it,

it just means that they're starting to pick it

out of the ground.

NARRATOR: And what about Graham's stripes?

There are many theories about why zebras are striped.

The most common one is that

they act as a type of camouflage.

MEEK: In basically large herds of zebra, who all run together,

and it's very difficult

to distinguish one end of the zebra from the other

in a large herd.

NARRATOR: But in fact, new research suggests

that a zebra's stripes might be a deterrent to biting flies,

which can spread diseases.

Scientists have found

that hungry flies find them unappealing to land on.

They think it has to do

with the way the flies' eyes see the tight striped pattern.

Researchers may never get to the bottom of this mystery,

but Graham's stripes will continue to dazzle anyone

who sees him.

These baby animals all need to live within large groups

in order to survive.

Sometimes it's essential for mating.

Other times, it's a good defense strategy.

Big families can also help to raise little ones.

For these animals, social living is simply second nature.

(♪♪♪)

(♪♪♪)