All language subtitles for aaf-australia.land.of.parrots.2008.1080p.bluray.x264

COLIN FRIELS: Outback Australia...

.. it doesn't get much harsher
than this.

(BIRDS SQUAWK)

Yet in the middle of the desolation,

thousands of cockatoos fly together
in a raucous, defiant mob.

They don't just survive -
they thrive.

Stretching across the continent.

From the heat of the desert interior
to gum tree country...

.. and snow-covered mountains...

.. these outrageously colourful
and cocky parrots

have defied the odds...

.. making Australia
the land of parrots.

Before Australia had deserts,
rainforests covered the continent.

Today, just a few isolated patches
remain.

These lush pockets survive

thanks to the tropical monsoons
that sweep along the far north coast,

bringing torrential rain.

In these forests,

a brilliant array of parrots
adapted crafty beaks

and dexterous toes

to crack the rich bounty
of seeds and fruit.

The tiniest of all, the fig-parrot,
gorges on fruit bigger than its head.

The general rule for the blokes here

is to be as colourful
as needs be to attract a mate

without becoming
a neon lure to predators.

The king-parrot is brash.

While the green feathers
of the red-cheeked parrot

blend into the foliage.

He relies on his sexy red head
and bright beady eyes to get the girls.

But one of the most amazing birds
in the world is the eclectus parrot,

because it breaks virtually every
rule in the evolutionary rule book.

The male is green,

and the female, red.

So strikingly different are they

that for a long time

people thought that the two
must be separate species.

Scientist Rob Heinsohn

set out to discover the secrets
of this rare creature.

ROB: Eclectus parrots are
the pinnacle of parrot evolution.

Their colouration
has gone into uncharted waters.

They are so different,
and I just needed to know why.

(BIRDS SQUAWK)
OK.

Well, I've disturbed them now,

but I had to do that just to see
if they were occupying the hollows.

And one did indeed
come out of one of the hollows,

so that's a very good sign
at this stage.

And it does mean that
it's worth putting a line up

and climbing the tree
and having a closer look.

FRIELS: But there was
just one problem...

ROB: I have a terrible,
terrible fear of heights.

I was getting dizzier by the moment,

but I was also driven by
an incredible desire

to see what was
inside those hollows.

So I overcame that fear.

I forced myself to stay steady
on the rope and to keep climbing.

Hey, Lindsay, we've got eggs.

MAN: Oh, fantastic.

That's absolutely fantastic.
It means they're breeding again.

I'll just go up to the other hole
and see how they're doing.

I went up 15m, 20m, 25m,

and finally I reached
the nest hole I was looking for.

I reached inside, had a look inside,

and there were
two beautiful little chicks.

(PARROT SQUAWKS LOUDLY)

Yeah, we've got chicks in here.

Oh, they're beautiful too.

FRIELS: For the last eight years,

Rob has studied the female and all
her chicks that live in this hollow.

He measures and marks each one
and monitors their growth.

This doesn't seem to upset the chicks

or stop their mum
from nurturing them.

ROB: Our number one female,
our star performer,

she's just done what she typically does,

is produces healthy little guys like this.

They get a very good start for
their long life in the rainforest.

FRIELS: A good hollow is hard to find.

And the female guards hers fiercely.

ROB: We've spent a lot of time just
watching her at the nest hollow.

We built hides
in neighbouring trees

and we spent a lot of time
in the treetops.

And we just watch
the female's behaviour.

(BIRD SQUAWKS )

FRIELS: Rob's favourite female is
not taking any chances with her hollow

and doesn't budge for the entire
9- month breeding season.

She is totally reliant on the male
to bring her food.

ROB: A bit like Meals on Wheels.

She's acting like an invalid,
staying at home.

The males are out there
doing all of the work.

Coming and going all day long,

purely for the right
to regurgitate some food to her.

And, of course, they're hoping
to get sex in return.

FRIELS: But this female wasn't
just being attended by one male.

She was getting lots of attention.

In fact, seven males
were lining up to feed her.

And she was mating with all of them.

ROB: And we worked out that this was,
in a way, a form of trickery.

She was trying to give them the idea

that they all had a chance
of being the dads.

And that would give them
extra incentive

to go off and find the food.

FRIELS: But the DNA tests
on the chicks' feathers

reveal something astonishing.

Of the 24 young she's produced
in the last eight years,

19 are from the same superstud male.

To complete the picture,

Rob wanted to know how far the males
were going on their feeding trips.

ROB: We captured a whole lot of males and we put
transmitters on their tails.

We mounted aerials
on the wings of the plane,

and we set out and followed them
across country from the sky.

FRIELS: Incredibly, the lovesick male
gathered food

from a home range of up to
100 square kilometres.

ROB: It also turned out that he was
attending more than one female.

And some of them had
three or four different females

that they were visiting and feeding,
and, indeed, mating with.

So, by following them
around the landscape,

we actually caught them out playing
a little mating game of their own.

FRIELS: After visiting their girlfriends,

the males fly back
to Rob's favourite female.

ROB: The males often come back
to the nest tree at the same time.

And when that happens,
there's a lot of argy-bargy.

(BIRDS SQUAWK)

FRIELS: With such different lifestyles,

the huge colour difference between
the sexes makes a lot of sense.

ROB: The male's green -

very important for them
to remain camouflaged

when they go across country getting
food from the fruiting trees.

Males seem to use the red
under their wings very judiciously

to get the female's attention.

In contrast, the female's red

is the very conspicuous,
long-distance signal.

She shines like a beacon,
but screams at other birds,

especially females -

“Keep away, this hollow is occupied.

“Don't bother coming near
because I will beat you up. ”

FRIELS: No other bird in the world
mates like this.

It's a sex strategy

that's been perfected
over an incredibly long time

in these ancient forests.

While the eclectus
were doing their thing,

elsewhere on the continent
dramatic changes gave rise

to a whole new range of parrots.

Millions of years ago,

most of Australia's rainforests
gradually dried

and became open woodlands.

Many parrots were able to adapt
to the new and tougher conditions.

To survive on the desert edge,

red-tailed black-cockatoos stick to
the few tree-lined watercourses.

As the sun drops,
the birds arrive from all directions.

With breeding hollows scarce,
most of these cookies are single.

The local watering hole
is their pick-up joint,

and the evening quickly turns into
a boisterous party.

(BIRDS SQUAWK)

Younger birds flirt by displaying
the colour banding on their tails

and erecting their crests.

These fancy pop-up crests

are what distinguish cockatoos
from the other parrots.

(BIRDS SQUAWK)

These opportunistic cookies
thrived

and spread out
as the continent dried.

During the last ice age,

winds lashed the land
and heaped sand into vast dunes.

Grasses and shrubs
spread across the desert,

producing an abundance of seeds.

The galahs were quick to
take advantage of the new foods.

They were not fussy eaters,

and went just about everywhere
eating almost anything.

Today, there's barely
a patch of Australia

without these extroverted cookies.

But the opportunistic galahs were
not the only ones to try new foods.

The less common
Major Mitchell cockatoos

have recently acquired a taste
for paddymelons.

These inquisitive birds
have little trouble

working out some fancy footwork
to break into the fruit.

Their new cuisine arrived as part of
an exotic smorgasbord.

150 years ago, cattlemen pushed
their way to the desert centre.

And wherever they went,

they brought a whole range of new
opportunities for parrots to exploit.

Paddymelons were introduced to feed
the camels of the Afghan traders

as they travelled the outback
supplying the isolated properties.

It was a tough life
for the early pioneers.

And frequent droughts
made it hard to make a living.

Adding to the farmers' woes,

the cockatoos soon worked out
that where there was stock...

.. there was stockfeed.

All this free fast food

made life pretty cushy
for generations of cockatoos

and their numbers boomed.

(BIRDS SQUAWK)

And the good times kept on rolling
for the cockatoos and parrots...

.. when the settlers found underground
water and pumped it to the surface.

Man-made waterholes helped parrots
spread and survive

where they couldn't have done before.

Ringneck parrots...

.. budgerigars...

.. pale-headed rosellas all come in
to drink in family groups.

Mulga parrots can live in
waterless areas

but no-one in the outback
turns down a free drink.

Rain rarely falls
in the Australian deserts.

Droughts can last for over a decade.

Waterholes turn to mud...

.. leaving a freshwater crayfish
exposed...

.. and an easy target.

The wildlife has adapted
to survive the times

when the rivers
vanish into puddles...

.. and the dams are turned to
cracked and useless crusts.

The air crackles in the heat.

Crops are wiped from the earth.

And the parched interior waits
for rains that never seem to come.

The first sign that
the drought might break

can be a warming
of the western Pacific Ocean.

Cyclones form by sucking up
heat and moisture from the sea

as they power in towards the coast.

Winds of up to 250km/h
shred the shoreline.

As the cyclone heads inland,

it weakens and turns into
a huge rain depression.

The deluge sweeps
thousands of kilometres

across the centre of the continent.

And cockatiels celebrate
with a rain dance.

(BIRDS SQUAWK)

Within hours, every riverbed
fills with life-giving water.

The torrent charges through
the narrow gorges of the ranges

eroding the land.

Ribbons of nourishment
snake across the continent

towards the parched centre.

In the Channel Country,

the creeks fan out across
previously barren flood plains.

And for a brief time
the desert is given the kiss of life.

In a flash, desert plants
produce vast quantities of seed.

Somehow waterbirds
sense the transformation

and travel vast distances.

Fish breed up
in the newly formed lakes

providing a feast
for growing cormorants.

Brolgas arrive in Search of
the roots of sedges.

(BIRDS SQUAWK)

And when native grasses
start to seed,

the scene is set for the arrival of
the stars of the Australian desert...

.. the budgerigar.

We keep them in cages,

but in the wild,
budgies roam the vast outback.

When it rains, flocks swoop in
from everywhere.

No-one knows how they navigate.

Perhaps they home in on

the low-frequency sounds
of thunderstorms

thousands of miles away.

Their aim is to breed furiously
while the conditions are right.

Along the gorges of
the Central Ranges,

every tree hollow is alive with
the flutterings of courtship.

(BIRDS cl-CHIRP)

The river bank is perfect
for a dinner date.

In the budgie mating game,

you need to be camouflaged
while feeding on the ground,

but still spunky enough
to impress a potential mate.

And the way budgies see
each ether's feathers

is different to the way we see them.

We see in red, green and blue.

But budgies have
a fourth cell in their eye

that enables them to see ultraviolet.

When UV rays hit some parts
of the budgie's plumage,

they give off a reflective glow.

It's a fair bet the female will
choose the brightest, sexiest male.

Especially if he can fight too.

(BIRDS SQUAWK)

With his rival dispatched,

the male can now get down
to the serious business

of wooing the female.

Not only do budgies have highly
reflective UV markings...

.. some parts of their plumage
actually become fluorescent.

Their necks and heads in particular.

The feathers don't lie.

To make sexy feathers, the male
must be healthy and parasite-free.

These markings announce,
“My genes are great. Choose me. ”

And if she does,
he treats her to a slap-up meal

by regurgitating food into her mouth.

Over a few days,
she'll lay about six eggs

that will hatch
in just a couple of weeks.

She feeds her blind, naked chicks
a rich milk-like liquid.

They grow rapidly.

Within 12 days
their wing feathers come through.

And after only four weeks,

they're almost ready
to leave the nest.

Incredibly, these chicks
will be ready to breed

in just 60 days after hatching.

It's a superquick turnaround

to get the young out of the nest
while the going is good.

But it could all be over
in an instant.

At two metres, the perentie
is Australia's largest lizard.

(BIRDS SQUAWK)

A tireless predator, it covers
great distances in search of food.

The perentie tracks its prey by sight

and by detecting scent molecules
that it picks up on its tongue.

(BIRDS SQUAWK)

In the air,
they're not nearly so vulnerable.

Synchronised squadrons fly low
between the mulga trees.

The colours on their backs
camouflage them against the grasses.

Where the budgies go,
the birds of prey follow.

What the hunter is looking for
is a weak link.

But it's not always life and death
for Australia's parrots.

Galahs seem to have plenty of time
for clowning around.

In some years, budgies breed up
into such numbers

that they become, for a time,
Australia's most numerous parrot.

Accounts by early settlers
tell of flocks so big

that they blackened the sky.

But the good times
can only last for so long.

And as the country dries out again,
breeding comes to a halt.

Having raised several generations,
the budgies disperse,

resuming their nomadic life
in the desert

waiting for the next big rains.

Whenever that may be.

In contrast to the unpredictable
droughts of the interior,

the seasons along the southern edge
of Australia are far more regular.

In winter, Antarctic blasts
of cold air

bring snow to Australia's
highest mountains.

Wombats can forage in any weather.

But it's not great weather
for parrots.

There is one that manages
to survive above the snowline.

Green rosellas fuel up on alpine
berries against the winter blizzards.

Down at sea level, the cold fronts
bring gale-force winds.

Great for surfers...

.. treacherous for
almost anything else.

If you're a rock parrot,

you must learn to like your plants
heavily salted.

Living in the salt-spray zone
is not an easy life,

but these hardy parrots are battlers.

Things get a little easier
in the nearby coastal heath.

This environment is richer,
attracting gang-gang cockatoos.

Like most cockatoos,
gang-gangs are left-footed,

gripping onto their wind-blown perch
with their right leg,

while holding the seed pod
with their left.

Yellow-tailed black-cockatoos
also favour their left foot

when tackling the large seed-bearing
cones of the banksia tree.

It's a tricky operation
that combines brute force

to slice through the tough exterior,

and a delicate touch to extract
and shell the seeds that lie within.

But the very plants
that these parrots need to survive

must be burnt in order to regenerate.

All this takes is a thunderstorm.

(THUNDER RUMBLES)

And the Australian bush
burns astonishingly fiercely.

Banksia fruits need intense heat
to release their seeds.

Hakea cones split.

Gumnuts drop to the forest floor.

Oil in the eucalyptus leaves
is as explosive as petrol.

No other continent burns
so dramatically as Australia.

Some fires consume
millions of hectares.

But within hours...

.. currawongs are poking through
the ashes.

And crimson rosellas
that survived the inferno

are feasting on
roasted eucalypt seeds.

Just a few days later
eucalypts sprout green shoots.

Within a few years
the forests recover.

And there's plenty of food.

So it's time for crimson rosellas
to start breeding again.

With their bright plumage,

parrots seem to be screaming out
to potential predators,

“Free food - come and get it. ”

But whether you're a budgie,
an eclectus, a rosella,

or just about any other parrot,

you have to take colourful risks
in the mating game.

Sometimes you can have
the best of both worlds.

These gaudy birds are, in fact,

safely camouflaged by their
leaf-like shape and green backs.

Although they haven't
quite mastered a disguise

for the Australian suburbs.

Ever since Australians

started planting native trees
in their cities,

food is laid on.

And parrots happily accept
the invitation.

Some overstay their welcome.

With too much time on its hands,

this cockatoo gets stuck into
an electric insulator.

While the maniacal corella
will attack everything in its path.

Even bitumen road.

And then the neighbour's lawn.

But such destructiveness is minor

compared with
what they do to farmers.

And the cockatoos love
the modern cropping practices.

A generation ago, Lakeland
was open to intensive farming.

It was ideal country
for maize and peanuts.

And as the crops grew,

the sulphur-crested cockatoos
moved in.

In just a week the birds can inflict
tens of thousands of dollars damage

to the maize of farmer
Darryn Hoskins.

(Darryn whistles) Suzie.

DARRYN: The numbers have
bred up over the years.

The main reason for that is
'cause in their natural habitat

they haven't got a good amount
of food all year round.

Where, in the valley here
in Lakeland,

even in the driest part of the year,
in August, September,

when it's extremely dry, there's
still crop residue on the ground.

And the birds have
got a feed all year round.

With that they can continue to breed
12 months of the year,

no problems at all.

There's food and there's water here
on hand, so they've got it laid on.

They think it's terrific.

FRIELS: When they've finished
with the maize,

the cookies head for
the peanut fields

where they pick apart the hay bales.

(BIRDS SQUAWK)

Red-tailed black-cockatoos
join in the fun.

So, how does the farmer
try and control them?

DARRYN: Basically,
just driving around

and shooting at 'em
with a high-powered rifle.

Just the noise alone is enough to
scare 'em, or even toot the horn.

But it's a full-time job for two,
three months of the year nonstop.

Basically, all you're doing is
just driving around

following the cockatoos
from one paddock to another

until the day warms up.

It gets too warm for 'em, so they
go back and roost in the trees.

Then they come back again
and commence their feeding.

Then we commence to chasing again.

Which is bloody annoying.

(Cocks gun and fires)

(BIRDS SQUAWK)

FRIELS: Further south,
in the wheat country,

it's a different cockatoo.

But it's the same story.

In small doses, little corellas are
a delightful and entertaining bird.

But when flocks of
up to 30,000 marauding birds

descend on your harvest,

well, you can understand why
a farmer might be a little upset.

The grain is stored in giant bunkers
and protected by thick canvas.

But the canvas is no match
for their sharp beaks.

And having feasted on
the main course,

it's off to the nearest vineyard
for a spot of dessert.

For lychee farmers,
rainbow Lorikeets are the enemy.

The farmers spend every daylight hour
patrolling their orchard

to keep the birds at bay.

Like children with cupcakes,
they take a bite from each one,

spoiling them for everybody else.

For the farmer, it's a race to see
who gets to the ripest fruit first.

And the birds are winning.

But not all farmers
are at war with parrots.

A Queensland cattle station

has become an unlikely refuge
for a rare turquoise beauty...

.. the golden-shouldered parrot.

Last century, bird fanciers
trapped these prized parrots

and robbed their nests.

This plunder left the species
hanging on by a thread.

To make matters worse,

these picky parrots have very
particular lifestyle requirements.

For a start, a broody couple
need an airconditioned termite mound

to burrow into and make a nest.

They've made Sue Shephard's
cattle property home.

And every breeding season
for 30 years

she's been riding
hundreds of kilometres

checking every mound for chicks.

In half the occupied mounds,

Sue has found the nest floor
covered with a grub

that is unique to the nests
of golden-shouldered parrots.

The grub belongs to a moth

that synchronises the hatching of
her babies with that of the chicks.

The grubs eat the chicks' poo,

which seems to suit everyone.

Meanwhile, the chicks' parents
go looking for food together.

When they return, Dad flies to
the mound to check that all is safe.

(Chirps)

And to let the young ones know
that it's mealtime.

He stands guard while the female
comes down to feed the chicks.

(CHICKS SQUAWK)

An exhausting schedule when your
chicks need four or five feeds a day.

Dad's job is to coax
the 5-week-old chicks

out of their cosy nest
and into the big, bad world.

It's the dry season,

which means it's hard
for the young birds

to find food in the thick grass.

So Sue helps nature along,

burning the bush
and exposing the next meal.

Sue's property is a haven
for the golden-shouldered parrot,

and her efforts may be the only thing
standing between them and extinction.

Even further north, in the remote
woodlands of Cape York Peninsula,

there's a parrot that's
intrigued scientists for a century.

Steve Murphy came here as
a young biologist 10 years ago.

His quest was to
unlock the secrets

of the world's
most spectacular cockatoo -

the palm cockatoo.

Few people have ever seen this bird.

STEVE: Look here. Here he comes.

FRIELS: The palm cockatoo dates back
tens of millions of years

to when Australia
was covered in rainforest.

He's the grandaddy of them all.

Little was known
of this mysterious bird

until Steve Murphy began his study.

And the only way to find them in this
rainforest is to mimic their calls.

(Calls)

(Squawks)
(Squawks)

(Mimics call)

(Calls)

(Whistles)

(Whistles)

STEVE: They've got a huge repertoire
of calls that they use in display.

(Calls)

The 'hello' call they make
is part of the display.

It seems to be made almost as if

they're saying hello
to their partner

or their neighbouring cockatoos.

FRIELS: Unlike other cockatoos,
palm cockatoos don't live in flocks.

They pair up with a mate
and seem to stick with them for life.

And they can live for up to 90 years.

One cockatoo in captivity
had her first chick at 54.

But to get the girl,

the male must be
a man of property

with a portfolio
of good nesting hollows.

And if he wants any chance of mating,

she must be persuaded
that he's strong enough

to build her
several magnificent nests.

STEVE: All the elements
of a palm cockatoo display

are designed to draw attention to
that massive beak.

The blushing of the cheek patch,
the wing spreading -

which makes them bigger -

it's all designed to show
other cockatoos that they're strong.

And the pinnacle of their strength
is in their beak.

FRIELS: Essentially, he is trying to prove
that he is a blue-chip investment,

and that she can feel comfortable
putting all her eggs in his basket.

STEVE: They join up every morning
and afternoon at these nest hollows.

And they catch up on
the day's events,

and it really does sound like
you're listening to

an old married couple sometimes.

I mean, the analogy continues.

It's just like humans

and the pride that humans have
in their houses.

Palm cockatoos are exactly the same.

But the most amazing display of all

is when males bring back to the nest
a small stick.

And they actually
drum on the side of the nest.

FRIELS: Maybe it's because
palm cockatoos live so long

that they have time to learn so much.

But it's a rare thing
anywhere in the animal world

to see a tool being used
quite this deliberately.

STEVE: I think it's very likely

that the female
watches these drumming displays

and can tell something about
either the male

or the nest tree
at which he's performing.

You know, there's something that
she's picking up

in the way that the drumming sound
resonates inside the hollow.

We don't really know, but,
I mean, she watches very intently.

FRIELS: The choosy males will try
two or three different drumsticks

before they settle on one
that they really like.

STEVE: When they actually perform
the drumming display at the nest,

it does seem to have a rhythm.

But when he's finished with it,

he'll often sit at the edge of
the hollow and splinter up the stick

and add it to the nesting platform
that's inside the hollow.

FRIELS: If the female is impressed,

she will walk down and join him
at the entrance of the nest

to see if it's good enough
to breed in.

With the hollow approved, they can
fly off to have a morning snack.

The local birds gather at trees
that are in fruit.

STEVE: That really powerful beak
that palm cockatoos have,

which is by far the biggest beak
of any of the cockatoos,

it allows them to eat foods
that other cockatoos

and other animals in general
just simply can't access.

I think palm cockatoos
are very intelligent.

You've only gotta watch a pair
courting at their nest,

or a male fashioning a drumstick

to realise that there is
complicated thought

going in that big head of theirs.

FRIELS: Of course, these regal palm
cockatoos are not the only clever ones.

All parrots are smart.

Whereas most birds
only learn when they're young,

parrots continue, through long lives,

to accumulate knowledge
and pass it on to their mob.

Combine this brain power with
their crafty beaks and agile toes,

and it's almost as though parrots

were preadapted
for this changing continent.

From the drying of the land
to the arrival of Europeans,

these brightest of birds
have thrived.

.. making Australia
the land of parrots.