All language subtitles for BBC Blue Planet UK (2019) - 02 Eng

The oceans are places of wonder.

Blue Planet II showed us the beauty
and extraordinary behaviour

of marine life whilst highlighting
how fragile and threatened

our seas have become.

Now, as Blue Planet Live carries out

a health check on the world's
oceans,

we are staying closer to home.

Our British seas are rich, varied
and key to our island heritage,

but how are our lifestyles
affecting them?

Whoa!

We'll meet the unsung heroes
dedicated to protecting our waters

and the wildlife that relies
on them.

If we don't look after nature,
nobody else will.

And celebrate the scientists
striving for solutions

to the challenges.

Oh!

Plus, we'll meet the crabs
with a flair for style...

They're dressing up in seaweed as a
means of camouflage. Yes.

..and delve into our very own
deep-sea coral reefs.

This is the most important deep-sea
coral, I think, in the whole world,

and this is just off Scotland.

So dip into our UK waters
and see them like you've never

seen them before.

BOTH: Welcome to Blue Planet UK.

Hi, and welcome back
to the beautiful St Abbs

on the east coast of Scotland.

Now, all week, Blue Planet Live
teams are around the world

monitoring the state of the world's
oceans,

but we are here focusing on our
home patch -

what's living in British seas
and how it's all doing.

But, Steve, it's not just what's
in the sea, is it?

What are you looking at?

I'm looking along here at all
the marine birds

and there's so many here.

You can see they've even
painted the cliffs white.

Oh, yeah. Now, these cliffs,
they're made of old volcanic rock

and they create all these ledges
and nice little nooks and crannies

for the bird not just to be
protected in, but also to nest in.

You think he's busy now? You come
back May, June, July, August -

the place is going to be alive
while they're all up on these rocks

here, all nested.

You can see a cormorant out there,
enjoying itself, basking in the sun.

It's nonstop and they're not
just here for the protection,

also for the fishing
and these clear waters.

And that's right, the waters here
are clear and they're clean,

and divers come from not just around
the country

but around the world to enjoy
this beautiful, rich marine life.

And with a long history of fishing,
this little Scottish port

is all about the fish.

And there's plenty of those coming
up on today's programme,

but that's not all.

We join the very first
winter survey of Scotland's

whales and dolphins.

Sighting! Coming up!

Chris finds out about a fish
that is both house-proud

and camera shy.

It wouldn't be uncommon for us
to come back and find the cameras

face down... Right. ..in the seabed.

Because they've knocked it over?
Because they knocked it over.

The towering cliffs of the Yorkshire
coast are steeped in both

sea birds and history.

Gannets, guillemots and puffins

all harbour here throughout the
summer months,

attracting visitors
from across the nation.

And we discover how building
on the seabed affects the creatures

that call it home.

Oh, my goodness. I can tell you that
is a feisty lobster.

Now these pots are a dead giveaway
that crabs and lobsters

are the heart of the fishing
industry in St Abbs,

but that wasn't always the case.

The harbour of St Abbs was founded
in 1885,

and for nearly 100 years,
one fish was king.

The herring.

In those days, boats thronged our
coastline all around Britain,

chasing vast shoals.

Young women would follow, earning
eightpence an hour gutting

and sorting the fish.

In Scotland alone, 10,000 women
earned their living this way.

Whole communities depended
on this fish.

OLD VOICEOVER: Here's a drifter
which has been out

in search of fish, and now it's
returning to Stornoway

to unload the catch...

..which is a welcome sight.

So there are willing hands to get
this slippery cargo on to the quay.

Catches would even make the news.

At dawn on a chilly autumn morning,

another herring drifter
sails into port.

Its return marks the
virtual end of the herring season.

And another bit of golden news
about the silver harvest - a vessel

had come home to Yarmouth
with a bigger catch than had ever

been recorded in 50 years.

But the good times didn't last.

Unfortunately,
overfishing saw the demise

of the British herring
fishery in the 1970s.

This year, landings from those
usually well-stocked seas

around the Minches are down by 70%.

Only 50 boats are now catching
herring -

half the strength of last year's
fleet.

Stocks of herring have been so
depleted

that these fishermen in the Clyde
have imposed their own limits.

It means some of them only
put to sea one day a week.

They're practically at the point
of no return.

We have asked for a ban on all
herring fishing for two to three

to even four years.

Now there are virtually no herring
left in the North Sea at all.

Despite various
conservation measures,

the herring population
has never recovered.

Blue Planet UK went to the
north-west coast of Scotland

to check out reports that may offer
a ray of hope.

Alasdair Hughson is a high-end
seafood supplier.

Last year, some of his scallop
divers made a surprising discovery.

The seabed was not as they would
normally see it.

The whole seabed was a carpet of
green.

The herring had spawned in vast
shoals, carpeting the sea floor

in a layer of eggs.

They were just amazed at the extent
of this herring spawn

all over the seabed.

I've been diving around this area
for over 30 years now and I've never

seen anything like this.

No-one knew whether this was a
one-off event or if the herring

would return to spawn again,

so we sent marine cameramen
Andy Jackson to Gairloch to see

if he could find out what the
herring were up to this year,

and, if possible, film the actual
spawning.

Find out on Friday how he got on.

It is great to hear that herring
populations are recovering or seem

to be recovering, and it's not
just here in Scotland.

There have been reports of them
spawning in Cornwall as well.

Now, herring, it's a great news
story for them,

but it's also a great news story
for the animals that feed on them,

like minke whales,

and there have been more and more
reports of sightings

here in Scottish waters.

And there may be another good news
story, this time from Wales.

One of the world's rarest sharks,
the angel shark, is on the verge

of being declared extinct for all
sorts of reasons -

there's pollution, bycatch,
habitat loss and disturbance,

but that might not
be the end of the story.

At a museum in Swansea, researchers
are on a marine mission to locate

one of the world's rarest fish.

The angel shark.

An angel shark is one of the most
incredible species of shark

in our oceans.

It's a flat shark, which means
it spends most of its time

on or near to the seabed.

This species used to be common
across the East Atlantic

and Mediterranean Sea.

Over the last century, their numbers
have plummeted and the species

is now classed as
critically endangered.

There are few places around the
world where they're regularly found.

The Canary Islands is one
of the only remaining strongholds.

But now, signs are pointing
to a forgotten pocket of resident

angel sharks that have been living
off the Welsh coast,

unnoticed for decades.

When we were working on
Angel Shark Project Canary Islands,

we started to see on social
media some sightings

of angel sharks in Wales.

A surviving population of
angel sharks would be a lifeline

for the species,

so Joanna and the team travelled
to Wales to investigate...

..where they stumbled across a
goldmine of potential information.

Members of the public.

We were actually in Barmouth,
at a tackle shop, where the mother

of the tackle shop owner... And we
were talking about angel sharks.

She says, "I know these.

"I saw them all the time.
I've got a photo of one."

And she had the photograph, dated,
timed, and it was her nephew

with an angel shark and we realised
that there was possibly quite a lot

of information just stored
in people's houses.

These days, it's illegal to catch
an angel shark, but historic photos

and sightings can provide vital
clues as to where to start looking

for this secretive species.

The idea of a travelling
road show evolved

that called on people to come
forward with their memories,

photos and combined
community knowledge

of the angel shark.

I didn't recognise them as being
a shark because they looked

more like a ray
cos they were flatter.

They weren't my normal idea
of what a shark would look like,

so it was nice to know
that they are now starting to find

a little home near us.

As the day in Swansea draws
to a close,

there's a surprise in store
for Joanna and the team.

Amazing. Number one,
what's your name?

Graham Maddick.

So who's in this photo?

Is this one you? That's me.

Did you catch him? Yourself?
Yes. Rod and line? Rod and line.

Do you know what it was or...?

No. You didn't know what it was?
I didn't have a clue.

All I knew, it was big.

I was told later on in the day

by a trawlerman that the fish
was a monkfish,

so as far as I was concerned, it was
a monkfish for the next 58 years

until I saw the article
on the BBC browser page.

These photos are like
gold dust to us.

They provide so much information.

That photo is actually
a really important record

cos it's the first we've got
from central Swansea,

so it was caught off Swansea
pier in the 1960s,

so we're going to have to go
and add another sighting to our map

and definitely look into the area
further.

Would you look at that, Gillian?

It's not just on the Antiques
Roadshow where you might find

something valuable in the attic.

That's right. Who'd have thought it?

And, of course, if you've got
any evidence of angel sharks,

then the project would love to hear
from you,

and all the details are on our
website.

There's a really surprising number
of species of shark found

in British waters.

And, you know, it's like an amazing
experience

to be able to encounter them.

Sometimes you can actually swim
with blue sharks at certain times

of the year off the coast
of Cornwall,

and even if it's just catching
a glimpse of a basking shark

from the coast path, just the tip
of that fin reminds us how big

these animals are.

Megafauna visiting our shores.

And, you know, it's more than a
buzz -

you can actually add to the science.
That's right,

and there's a retired couple that
are doing just that,

and before Chris headed off to
Mexico,

he caught up with them.

I'm pleased to say that more
and more of Britain's naturalists

are contributing to citizen
science projects.

They're allowing us to learn
a lot more, a lot more quickly,

about the wildlife that we love,

so, in its simplest form, we send
in records of birds we see or plants

we find, normally in
cosy environments,

perhaps our back garden.

But today, I've come to meet three
people - Matt Doggett,

Sheilah and Martin Openshaw,

who are citizen science working in
an environment

which is a little bit more hostile.

Today, we call it the Cruel Sea.

Sheilah, Martin and Matt, how did
you meet?

How did you get together?

Because you come from very
different walks of life.

Fuel engineer. Now you're in there,
studying rays.

We're all scuba divers.
I see. Yeah.

So we met through an interest in
scuba diving and, more particularly,

through an interest in the
marine life and Seasearch,

which is sort of monitoring the
sea life along the coast of the UK.

He was meant for me to say go.

He behaved just like any other man,

didn't do as he was told!

During their monitoring,

Sheilah and Martin fell in love
with the graceful undulate rays,

and they began to focus
their research on them.

Their dedication to these rays
has inspired a scientist

at Manchester University, who's
using their findings to better

understand how the populations
are doing off the Dorset coast.

You're contributing significantly to
some what we call citizen science.

You're gathering data on these
undulate rays, which is being sent

off for analysis and everyone's
learning a lot about it.

Yeah, it's happened
almost accidentally.

Tell me about your swabbing,

because you're collecting material
from them directly as well.

Well, we talked to Sam about
a methodology and she said,

"I'll need the DNA."

We said, "Well, what do we do? Do we
go and say, 'Please, Mr Ray, can you
open your mouth while I stick

"this cotton bud in?'"

And we ended up with a bit
of stuff that you scrub pans with

on a plastic tube and then
we just rub it down its back,

but what we found was that they
were...

..they were bending the other way
and they were going, it was, like,

"Oh, do it again! Oh, do it again!"

So this is ray back massage?
This is ray massage!

But your combined passion
is not all about these rays.

There's another species
you're interested in

and, Matt, this is black bream,

and I know nothing of black bream,

so tell me about this fish.

That's right. I mean, black bream
is an amazing species,

And it's something that most
divers have never seen,

never heard of, yet each spring,

tens if not hundreds of thousands
of these fish arrive

off our shores to spawn,
build huge nests,

completely changing the seabed.

What they like is bedrock covered
by a thin layer of gravel or sand,

and the male fish will push
that away with their tails and shove

it with their mouths and create
these big, wide-open spaces of

bare rock, which they then keep
very clean.

They're very meticulous
about their nest.

They like to keep it
absolutely spick and span.

The other problem is, though, is
that black bream are very
territorial.

Because they're so meticulous
about their nests,

they hate foreign objects,

so it wouldn't be uncommon for us
to come back and find the cameras

face down... Right. ..in the seabed.

Because they've knocked it over?
Because they knocked it over.

We mount these things...

Five minutes after you left. Yeah.

We mount them on two,
three kilos of lead

and they'll shove those out
the way and get rid of them.

So, has the thing
that you've uncovered,

identifying the spawning areas,

how long it takes, productivity
and all that sort of thing,

is that able to influence future
conservation efforts when it comes

to these sorts of species?

We've had a very good response
to the project from anglers and some

anglers are e-mailing us
to actually say,

you know, I'm going to start putting
the male fish back now when I catch

them so they can go back to their
nests.

So what's next, then?

You're on your rays
and your black bream.

Any more plans for more
good citizen science?

The thing I want to find is,
where do the rays lay their eggs?

If you walk along the beach,

you find these things
called mermaid's purses,

which are actually the eggs
for rays and cat sharks,

but there are very few reports
of where ray eggs

are found underwater.

Now, we've got a site
that we've got 200 rays on.

Now, where... But you never
see any eggs?

We've never seen the eggs
underwater,

so we're going to try and find them.

By the sounds of things, then,

retirement's just going
to get busier and busier.

I don't think it can get any busier!

It's every day, you know,

there's another idea, another thing
we could go and do, something else

we could go and look at.

Well, thanks so much for all
of you taking the afternoon off

to tell us about this
extraordinary,

absolutely extraordinary stuff.

Well, look at that.

It just goes to show how valuable
we can all be in increasing our

knowledge and understanding of UK
marine life and I, for one,

love a good news story. Absolutely.

Well, all week, Blue Planet Live
have been carrying out

a health check on
the world's oceans,

and there's some species
that are especially useful

in measuring the state of the seas.

That's right, and orcas - or killer
whales - are just one of them,

and when the team headed out to
Iceland to try and film them,

we got a special glimpse of what
was going on behind the scenes.

The seas west of Iceland are one
of the best places in the world

to find killer whales.

Fish shelter in the fjords,

and this is where the whales
come to hunt.

Blue Planet Live researcher
Ellis Roberts

is meeting marine
scientist Filipa Samarra.

She's been studying the effects
of pollution on the whales.

But to gather data, first, you have
to find your whale.

I've seen them once before,

which was an absolutely amazing
experience.

But they're so elusive, you just
never know.

They've only got two days and today,
wind chill is minus seven.

Unfortunately the conditions
are too rough to go out to sea.

But we've just had a
stroke of luck -

Filipa had a phone call about 15
minutes ago saying that a pod

of killer whales have been spotted
just off the tip

of the peninsula that we're heading
to now.

Well, we've just arrived on the
peninsula where we had the

killer whale sighting reported.

We're with Alexa,
a colleague of Filipa's,

who got the call through about
an hour ago.

Haven't seen them yet.

Alexa managed to spot them
so we're just waiting for them

to come up again.

Despite the conditions,

the team's patience is rewarded with
a sighting.

We have killer whales.

I wasn't even looking for it, then,

and just behind, the huge black
dorsal fin just went...

But it was such a fleeting glimpse,

they didn't manage to capture
it on camera.

Two of us saw them, so not going
crazy, but they're just too far away

and the conditions are too rough
to make them out with the camera,

so on the boat tomorrow, hopefully
we'll have better luck then.

Day two, and hopes are high.

We woke up this morning to this.

It's like an absolute mill pond
here today.

When the sea is smooth, it's much
easier to spot a whale.

The telltale signs are a dorsal fin
or a breath from the blowhole.

An adult killer whale has a huge
appetite,

and salmon, herring and seal
are all on the menu.

However, little is known
about their range,

so they can be difficult to find.

After seven hours' searching,
and with the light fading,

the boat has to turn back.

So we've been out on the water
for hours now. And, um...

..still no luck.

Filipa, is that normal?

Actually, we used to see them
here very regularly

and it's only recently,

because of the herring
changing its distribution,

the whales are found further
and further offshore,

and it's much, much rarer
to see them inside these fjords.

We knew it was a long shot.
They haven't seen them in two weeks.

It wasn't our day.

We got our hopes up this morning.

You know, woke up, was flat calm,
beautiful, but...

..yeah, wasn't our day.

Trying to get a shot of a creature
as elusive as a killer whale

is always a challenge.

Although unsuccessful this time,

the trip still provides
valuable data for Filipa.

Killer whales are an apex predator,

and their movements are a clue
to the health of the seas.

It might surprise you to know
that we have resident killer whales

living off our coasts as well,

but it's with a heavy heart
that I say this

because the populations here
haven't bred for decades

and that's because
pollutants in the water

are disrupting
their reproductive cycles.

These pollutants
really affect marine mammals

because they're stored in the fats
and, of course, marine mammals

need their fats in order
to stay warm in the water.

The Hebridean Whale and Dolphin
Trust are keeping a close eye

on how these populations are doing.

They're monitoring them
from strandings on beaches

and sightings out at sea as well.

But what isn't known
is how many whales and dolphins

actually live here,
especially during the winter months.

Now that is changing
and the Blue Planet UK cameras

were invited to join them
on an early research trip.

Tobermory Harbour,
on the Isle of Mull,

is a natural bay
that provides shelter

from the worst that
the North Atlantic throws at it.

But it's also the base
for a very special vessel.

The Silurian.

Since 2002, this boat has
sailed the Hebridean seas,

surveying marine life for the
Hebridean Whale and Dolphin Trust.

It's a really special part
of the world

because we have this oceanic shelf

and a lot of the currents upwelling
there bring rich nutrients up,

so there's a lot of
important feeding

for the whales, the dolphins
in this area

and they're really key indicators
of the health of the area as well.

There are 23 species of cetacean
that can be found in the Hebrides.

Coming up!

That's a quarter
of the world's species.

The Trust monitor trends
and changes in their populations.

This is a dedicated,
long-term project,

and the researchers are helped on
every trip by groups of volunteers.

Sighting, harbour porpoise.

Harbour porpoise.

300 degrees. 300.

To provide a year-round picture
of these animals,

the team started winter surveying
for the first time this January.

But surveying at this time of year
has its problems.

It's a bit difficult because we've
got some whitecaps on the water,

which means that it's harder to see
a splash from a dolphin

or even a blow
as they come up to breathe.

To combat this, the team uses
an underwater audio recorder

called a hydrophone.

This records
a constant stream of sound,

so even if the team
cannot see the animals,

they'll be able to hear them.

So you can see here,

due to the very distinct waveform
that you see here,

it's also said
heard at a particular frequency,

so you can tell by this spike here

that it's definitely
a harbour porpoise.

Since 2002, the Silurian has
recorded over 30,000 animals.

Where possible, the team photograph
the dorsal fins and tail flukes,

allowing them to identify and track
the movements of individuals.

This here is a picture of Knobble
the minke whale.

So he's a bit of a local celebrity.

We've seen him for 16 years in a row

and, yeah,
he was seen again this year.

So shows you how important
the Hebrides are for minke whales

that he's coming back year
after year.

This long-term monitoring
has also revealed changes

in the species that are seen here.

At the start of our surveys
we didn't have many sightings

of common dolphins at all.

In fact, in 2004 we didn't
have a sighting of common dolphins.

And our sightings
increased by 20 times.

We do know that the water
temperatures in the Hebrides

have risen by half a degree.
For common dolphins

that means that their northern limit
might just be extending upwards.

But it's not just the temperature of
the sea that has changed over time.

Our seas are becoming
increasingly noisy, busy,

from increased shipping

through to fishing activity,
and that's important

for whales and dolphins,
for us to understand that,

because they rely on sound
to navigate, to communicate,

or finding where the fish are
to eat.

It's research like this that the
Trust hopes will help create

safer seas
for our Hebridean cetaceans.

Their data has already
helped establish

several marine protected areas,
with more in the pipeline.

Whales and dolphins
are really important

cos they're right at the top
of the food chain.

They're what we call
an umbrella species

so if we can put measures in place
to protect them

we can protect everything
that sits beneath them as well.

You know, it's so amazing

watching all the fishermen getting
on their business in the harbour

and the gulls picking
their way in between that.

You've got all the boats
going on over there,

I've got all the birds over here.
There's hundreds of herring gulls,

look, on that ridge -
it's so pretty and tranquil.

This is a pretty special place.

I feel doubly lucky because recently
I got to pick apart the history

of another huge Mecca for birds.

Bempton Cliffs is home to the UK's
largest mainland seabird colony.

Between March and October,
around half a million birds

gather here to breed
and raise their young.

Gannets, guillemots and puffins

all harbour here
throughout the summer months,

attracting visitors
from across the nation.

SEABIRDS CALL

Rewind 150 years, and the birds
were attracting attention

for a very different reason.

Their eggs were being harvested
in a practice known as climming.

Men would hang from ropes
to harvest the seabird eggs

with nothing but hats filled with
straw to protect them.

It was a local tradition
with the eggs being both eaten

and sold as souvenirs.

I'm meeting with RSPB volunteer
Alan...

How are you? Very well, thank you.
Lovely to see you.

..who has researched the history
surrounding the cliffs.

Climming is climbing the cliffs
in local dialect.

Ah! So they called themselves

the climmers. And the eggs
that were most collected

were the large eggs
of the guillemot.

But each egg
is individually patterned

so they were highly collectible.

But there's something else
that had a big impact on the colony,

around 1830, when the first
steamer pleasure boats arrived

at Scarborough. Then the so-called
sportsmen of the age

would come from all areas of the UK,

charter the boat and bring
it under the cliff here

and shoot the birds out of the sky.

Literally thousands of them.

This bombardment must have

really put the colony
under a lot of stress.

Of course it did.
Yes, tremendous stress.

It wasn't just the seabird colony
that was devastated

by the mass shootings.

Reverend HF Barnes-Lawrence
became deeply concerned

by what was happening to both
the seabirds

and the reputation
of the community.

He gathered support

and formed The Association
for the Protection of Sea Birds.

He contacted the local MP,
Christopher Sykes,

and together,
they put together a bill

that Christopher Sykes
would put before Parliament,

and on the third
reading of that bill,

it was enshrined in law in 1869.

This prevented the birds from being
shot during their breeding season,

and it was a milestone
for wildlife protection,

being one of the very first
of its kind in the UK.

However, climming continued.

But there was a shift in attitudes
towards the seabirds

and the practice
was made illegal in 1954.

SEABIRDS CALL

And 50 years ago, the RSPB
started managing the site,

and now the seabird colony is going
from strength to strength.

Without the dedication of people
past and present,

the seabird colony
wouldn't be thriving today.

Quite a spectacular view
of not just seabirds

but the Yorkshire coast.
Oh, my word!

From the Reverend Barnes-Lawrence
in the 19th century

to the current warden, Dave Aitken.

What species have we got down there?

We have got a huge number
of guillemots today, and then

some of their closely related
cousins, we've got razorbills.

Got gannets, we've got fulmars,

and then even out to sea
we've got a few kittiwakes today.

What sort of numbers
are you expecting at the peak?

At the height of the season
there can be in excess of

half a million seabirds on this
stretch of coast. Half a million.

Yep, and you can look down
this stretch of coast

and it can look like a seabird
snowglobe.

Aww, that paints such a nice
picture!

You can see them already
courting and fighting,

and that's just going to get
more intense, isn't it?

Yep, this is the tip of the iceberg.
Wow.

The colony depends on the sea
for its food,

but diving for fish
has always been fraught with danger.

Fishing nets were historically
one of the biggest problems,

being almost invisible underwater.

Hundreds of birds were caught
and drowned in them each year.

Rex Harrison has worked
these waters his whole life,

but a few years ago,
he decided enough was enough.

He joined with local fishermen to
find ways of reducing their impact

on the seabird population,
starting with their nets.

This is a ghost net.

I don't know, you can't see it
in the sun.

It's deadly to anything
that's in the sea.

Instead of having 200 or 300 yards
of this stuff,

we've got that cut down now to 20,
25 yards a boat.

We've gone to, like,
a black netting now

which the birds can see.

The net that we will be using this
year will be 90-odd percent that.

We monitor the net all the time
it's in the sea.

It's never left alone.

If we do get a bird in it, we can
release it within minutes, alive.

Another thing is that on some
of the nets had white corks,

which are like this.
This white cork,

when it's floating in the water

it looks like a line of guillemots
and razorbills feeding.

So was that attracting them
to the net?

So we've actually started to change

the different coloured corks
on the net.

The other thing it's working well
with is now we've got mobile phones

and we're talking to each other,

we can monitor those birds
among ourselves,

especially in the morning, and we
pass on information to each other.

"Don't bother coming here.
We're coming back in to the bay.

"There's too many birds,
there's too much feed,

"we're keeping well clear."

Thanks to new fishing methods
adopted here in Filey,

bird deaths have dramatically
reduced by around 98%

from over 700
to just 15 a year per boat,

and each boat is still
catching the same number of fish.

The fishermen in Filey want to make
the last, the littlest impact.

Just target the sea trout,

and everything else we want to
eliminate from getting in the nets.

Why are you making all this effort,
Rex?

If we don't look after nature,
nobody else will.

My grandchildren said
we can't carry on like this,

and that was one of the key things.

You should be so proud.

The changes that you're making

not just to restore
and keep the birds here

but changing the way that the people
in Filey think.

No, no, it wants to go further.

We want to change the way people
think around the world.

The story of Bempton Cliffs
is an inspirational tale

all about changes in attitude,
right from the Reverend

up to the modern day,
with people like Rex

adapting their practices
to save the seabirds.

And with the number of birds nesting
on the cliffs increasing every year,

I'm sure it's going to be a story
set to continue

for many years to come.

SEABIRDS CALL

Steve. A-ha!

You were looking at the tradition
of collecting seabird eggs,

but there's another
Victorian tradition

that's gone out of
fashion, and that's...

..eating whelks. A-ha, whelks!

Now, you know, I've never
had a whelk myself,

but what I understand
is after they've been pickled

they're very vinegary
and very tough to chew.

But nonetheless they were still
a Victorian delicacy

and around London they used to
sell 'em in wheelbarrows,

would you believe,
and everyone would have them

after they'd had a night out
on the gin,

almost like a Victorian doner kebab.

I love that!

Well, they may not be to
everyone's taste any more,

but they really have a fascinating
life history,

as The One Show's
Miranda Krestovnikoff found out.

We often find British beaches

littered with
a weird lifeless spongy debris.

You might have seen these rather
strange-looking clumps

lying on our beaches,
especially after storms,

and wondered what on Earth they are.
This is known as a sea wash ball,

because back in the day, sailors
used to use them as sponges.

But it is in fact
the beginning of a story

of a rather unusual creature
from beneath our waves.

Using a tube-shaped organ
called a siphon,

whelks sniff out their prey.

With razor-sharp teeth, they can
bore holes in a barnacle shell

and suck out their insides.

And with this large muscular foot,

they can pin down
and suffocate cockles.

But it takes up to six years
for whelks to reach this size,

and life for them begins in the
comfort of the spongy sea wash ball.

Capturing the life cycle of
the whelk in the wild

would be impossible.
But at Bangor University,

Professor Chris Richardson and
his team have been breeding them.

This offered us the chance to film
some remarkable whelk behaviour

for the very first time.

With no way of predicting

the exact moment the females
would start spawning,

we rigged a time-lapse camera
over the university's whelk tanks.

And our patience paid off.

Over the course of a couple of hours
several female whelks came together

to spawn, creating the
characteristic sea wash ball.

Three months on, the egg capsules
we filmed being laid

are almost ready to hatch.

Chris and his team have rigged
a camera to a microscope

so I can take a closer look.

I can count the baby snails
through the wall of the egg capsule.

One, two, three, four, five, six,
seven, maybe eight in there.

So how many eggs would have actually
been laid inside that capsule?

Something like 1,000,
perhaps, depending on the size

of the female and the size of
the capsule itself.

So if the female has laid
around about 1,000 eggs

in that particular egg capsule
and we've only counted eight,

what's happened to the other 992?
Where have they gone?

When the female lays the eggs
in the capsule,

those eggs or nurse cells
provide the nutrition - food -

for the developing juvenile wells.

And so you end up with
just a few developing

and then feeding on
those nurse cells.

After months of patience, the team
eventually captured the moment

when a whelk began emerging
from the egg capsule -

a chance for us to see
for the very first time

what happens when a whelk
comes into the world.

And this is what emerges
from that egg capsule,

and it's absolutely tiny,
it's barely a millimetre long.

But it really is a miniature version
of an adult whelk.

If you look at an adult whelk shell,

you'll see this tiny infant shell
right at the tip,

because as it grows
the shell is laid down in whirls.

But when you're this size,
you're going to be on the menu

for all sorts of different
predators.

If this tiny whelk is lucky,

it's going to grow to
many thousands of times its size

in its lifetime
and become a formidable predator

like this one here.

What extraordinary little animals!

And whelks are even helping us
to understand

how our activity
is affecting the sea floor.

St Abbs is home to an extraordinary
laboratory that studies how

human offshore development affects
the creatures that live there.

Wow, this looks all very hi-tech.

Very, very impressive.

This contraption uses
high-voltage wires to recreate

the electromagnetic fields
experienced by the animals

living near power cables
that run along the seabed.

There's lots of tanks bubbling
around here

and I can see whelk eggs in there.
Can we take a look at those? Yes.

Wow, they're beautiful.
So why do whelks

make such good study subjects
for this experiment?

They're species where eggs
could be laid on cables

and they don't move.
And the results do show

that there is a higher rate
of defective eggs.

So we're not getting
quite as successful a hatch

as when they are not
in an electromagnetic field.

So whelk eggs don't move.
but lots of seabed creatures do.

And in fact things like crabs
and lobsters

can navigate huge distances.

And I just noticed
you have a lobster in there. Yes.

Oh, my goodness. I can tell you
that is a feisty lobster.

They'll have an internal compass.
And what we've found is

that is impacted by
these subsea power cables

and they are drawn to these cables
like magnets. Wow.

Disorientated lobsters
aren't the only species

stressed by human activity.

We're building more and more
on the seabed

and in St Abbs, scientists
are studying the effect that

that's having on our marine life.

So these nice relaxed hermit crabs
right now are what we're looking at.

At the moment.
What are we going to do to them?

So we're interested in the effect
of pile-driving vibrations.

Pile-driving is associated with the
construction of offshore wind farms.

It basically involves hitting
a steel pole into the seabed.

So this experiment here
is trying to replicate that.

A laptop has a recording
of the pile-driving

which runs through some amplifiers

and from the amplifiers
it goes to this shaker table here.

So basically
you're about to rock their world.

That's what we're about to do. OK!

PLAYS RECORDING OF PILE-DRIVING

So they were sitting still before.
We're seeing increased activity.

The hermit crabs
are sensing the vibration,

they're wondering what's going on,
basically. Is there danger nearby?

They want to get out of this area
to an area that's less disturbed.

The interesting question is if you
were to expose them multiple times,

does that response diminish?
Do they get used to it over time?

And that's what we're trying to find
out with these experiments here.

Is it a stressful experience
to them? How do you measure that?

If a crab's happy to be in one
place, it will stay in one place.

If it's not,
it will start moving around,

looking for somewhere else to be.

But there's a range of other
things that you can look at.

You can look at the flicking rate
of antennules,

between the eyes of the crab.

The rate of the flicking will reduce
if the crab's stressed.

Should we give them a break
and turn it off?

It's really fascinating
to see their reaction,

but what is the implication in the
real world?

What we're researching here

might go towards mitigation
for construction such as wind farms

and offshore industry,

but also just learning how animals
cope with these,

and hopefully use that information
to help protect our oceans and seas.

Well, that's certainly going to

make me think differently
when I look out to sea.

Now let's have a look at some
of the photos you've been taking

of what inspires you about our
British coastline.

Thank you for those stunning photos.

Weren't they great?
Weren't they just?

And tomorrow we're going to be
down on my home patch in Kent,

looking at the coastlines
along there.

We have only just begun
to dip our toes into

what's wonderful about
British waters, so don't miss it.

Tomorrow on Blue Planet UK...

Go on.

..I take my family on a mission
of prehistoric proportions.

That's a good 'un, innit?

Chris gets focused as he meets
photographer Kirsty Andrews.

Hiding underneath those waves
are just a whole cast

of the most amazing creatures.

We get under the skin
of a festering fatberg.

It's the biggest one I've seen.
It's probably about here.

And our largest bird of prey
is thriving on the Isle of Mull.