Land of the Tiger (1997–…): Season 1, Episode 5 - Mountains of the Gods - full transcript

In the beginning,
there was a great sea.

Legend tells that the God Vishnu
swallowed up the sea,

and so released Mother Earth

But as Vishnu slept,

a demon leaped upon the earth
and ravished her with such force

that her limbs were thrown up
into the sky.

And so were born the Himalayas.

The truth is even stranger than the legend.

A few million years ago,

the rocks around me
were part of the bed of an ancient sea.

India was then an island,



and it drifted north,
and crashed into Asia's shore.

With such force that the collision
crumpled the earth's crust,

and thrust up this great range of mountains

In both ancient legend and science,

violence was the midwife
of the mountains.

But whatever their origins,

the Himalayas today form a huge frozen wall,

stretching right across
the northern borders of the subcontinent.

Beyond that great barrier
lies the high, cold desert of Ladakh.

A ghost-like presence
still haunts this realm of ice.

Rare, elusive, shadowy,

the snow leopard still has
a few strongholds amid the high peaks.

One of them is here, in Ladakh.

In this harsh and savage moonscape,



every crag seems crowned with monasteries.

Over a thousand years ago,

Buddhism enveloped these mountains,

and reached into every corner
of people's lives.

Each winter,

festivals draw people
to the monasteries from all around

As Buddhism spread across Ladakh and
the plains of the high Tibetan plateau,

it embraced elements
of far more ancient beliefs.

In those older times,

animals were living embodiments
of a spirit world.

The rigours of the climate
bound people and animals together

in a fragile and delicate interdependence,

where man worshipped nature
and respected the right to life.

Today, those many layers of belief live on,

in the dances of monastic festivals

These are perhaps the equivalent
of mediaeval mystery plays.

History legend and belief...
handed down across the generations

Dancers celebrate and tell the tales
of the spread of Buddhism

and those ancient links
with the natural world

Deer, snow lion and bull.
Myth and reality intertwined.

People share the mountains
with majestic animals like these

Himalayan ibex

Ibex are sure-footed,
on the steepest of icy slopes.

Their agility is essential
to their survival.

Just as ibex attain sanctuary
on the cliffs,

so all animals gain protection
from the monasteries.

To Buddhists, all life
is linked in an endless cycle
of death and rebirth.

Every turn of the wheel
releases the power of prayer

With this belief
comes respect for all living things,

so the surroundings of the monasteries
are often a haven for wildlife.

Safe from human persecution,

chukor partridge
shelter below the walls of the monastery

From the monasteries,

the word reaches
far into the mountains

Every gust of wind carries
the message of a thousand prayer flags

Mantras carved in stone
are a constant reminder of the faith

In the high mountain village of Ladakh,

animals are vital to survival

In each home,
there's a small herd of sheep and goats.

Each morning, they're let out
with the rest of the village stock

People take it in turn
to drive this larger flock out to graze.

The youngest and most vulnerable animals
are kept at home.

Wild birds
share the life of the village

People use the flat roofs of their houses
to store firewood, and fodder

food and shelter for small birds
like these robin accentors.

And red-billed choughs.

All are a constant reminder
of the one-ness of life.

Ladakh's winters
are frozen and relentless.

There's not much snow,

but temperatures can plummet
to minus thirty or below

As the sparse grazing near the village
is exhausted,

sheep and goats are taken deeper
into the heart of the mountains.

Each year,

the hunter of the high snows
takes its toll of village livestock.

But it's shy and kills mostly at night.

If the herders are vigilant,
it can be driven off.

Over much of the Himalayas,

the snow leopards' natural prey
are animals like bharal or blue sheep.

For them too,
winter is a testing time.

The scattered greenery of summer
has long gone,

and they must dig in the scree,
for the roots of herbs and grasses.

Some animals even climb trees
to find food

Far to the west of Ladakh,
on Pakistan's border with Afghanistan,

we find the magnificent markhor.

December is the time of the rut.

Males battle for the females' favours.

With his tongue,
he tastes the females' scent

This is a rare and privileged glimpse.

Markhor can't withstand exteme cold,

so they have to winter
on the lower slopes.

That can bring them
into conflict with people.

Only a few hundred survive

High in the mountains,
rivers seem locked in ice.

But below the surface,
water still flows.

Warm springs ensure
that this stream never feezes solid.

A dipper waits to feed
through a hole in the ice

The promise of water
lures blue sheep down from the cliffs

In the desiccating cold winter,

the sheep get virtually no moisture
from their food,

so they seldom pass up a chance
to quench their thirst.

But the river is a dangerous place.

Frozen streambeds are easy walking
for a prowling snow leopard.

The remnants of a blue sheep.

The feast is over.

the great grey cat has moved on

Winter lingers long in the mountains,

but by May,
the snow is beginning to melt.

Snowmelt waters a fleeting flush of green.

This is when the blue sheep
drop their lambs.

The fresh grass will be vital nourishment
for the few weeks that it lasts.

The melting snow
reveals the casualties of winter.

Crows arrive first.

A Himalayan griffon
chooses its moment carefully.

It's decided it's safe to join the crows.

This is the signal
for other vultures to follow

Himalyan griffons
are the heaviest of the scavengers.

They dominate the carcass.

Others wait their turn on the sidelines.

Like this golden eagle.

And a king vulture.

In minutes,
the giffons strip the carcass bare.

It's now that the bone breaker arrives.

The lammergeyer.
They're also called bearded vultures.

These are young birds.

It will take them three years
to assume adult plumage.

These bearded vultures will exploit
the remnants of the carcass.

Remarkably, they carry the bones away

and will drop them on the rocks

shattering them
to expose the marrow within

Just as the melting snow
reveals food for the scavengers

and waters grass for the blue sheep,

so it's the lifeblood
of the villages below.

The fields are transformed
by the alchemy of water.

There's almost no rain here.

Crops are totally dependent
on meltwater channelled
from the snows above.

Elaborate rules
ensure that each field
gets its fair share of water.

These ancient techniques of water
harvesting make the desert green.

The staple crop here is barley.

It's the only grain
that will grow at this height.

At well over four thousand metres,

Ladakh has some of the highest fields
in the world.

West of Ladakh lies
the high plateau of the Deosai Plains.

This natural oasis
is marmot country.

The young of the year
emerge from their burrows

to explore the world outside.

This wrestling match
will be good practice for adult life.

At the height of summer,
the grass is alive with insects.

For everything that lives here,

this is a time to breed,
feed and fatten.

But the bounty will be short-lived.

For more than half the year,
this high plateau is deep in snow.

Yellow-headed wagtails
come here to take advantage
of the brief profusion of insects

But it's a race against time.

They must fledge their young
before the snows return.

Marmots have many natural enemies.

Not just snow leopards
and birds of prey,

but even bears.

They can dig marmots from their burrows

But for now,

the bears have easier ways
of fattening up
after the winters' hibernation.

The Deosai Plains
are one of the last strongholds
of the Himalayan brown bear.

This mother bear
is wary of a male foraging nearby

Apart from people,

the only thing likely
to threaten her cub is another bear.

Ladakh may be a desert,

but it has a few scattered lakes
and marshes.

Bar headed geese overwinter on
the wetlands of the Ganges floodplain.

Each spring
they make an incredible journey

right across the Himalayas
to reach their breeding grounds.

And the very rare black-necked carne

Just a few nest here.

These shallow lakes warm quickly,

yielding plenty of insects
for newly hatched goslings.

They must grow fast to escape
the chill of the winter to come

Wild ass gather on the grasslands
around the lakes

By August,
the mares have dropped their foals,

and almost at once,
they come on heat

Stallions taste the air,

and the hills echo to the thundering
hooves of ardent chases

Wild ass span the climatic extremes
of the subcontinent,

from fifty degrees
in the hot desert of the Rann of Kutch

to minus forty here
in the cold desert of Ladakh

A stallion can be given
the run around all day.

As the shadows lengthen into evening,
the mare finally yields

Ladakh lies in the rainshadow,

north of the great Himalayan divide.

On the southern side of the mountains,

the sun rises
on a very different land.

In the shadow of the sacred peak
of Shivling,

a sadhu meditates
by the source of the holy river Ganges.

Gaumukh, the cow's mouth

from the snout of the Gangotri glacier,

India's most sacred river
starts its long journey to the sea.

For Hindus,

the Ganges' icy beginnings are among
the holiest places in the Himalayas.

These sacred waters cleanse the soul,
and wash away the sins

From all over India,

pilgrims flock to shrines and temples
among the high snows.

For them, these sublime peaks
are truly the Mountains of the Gods.

Up here where the river is young,

its banks are cold, stony and austere....

but as it cascades down
towards the foot-hills

it enters a world
vibrant with life and colour.

On their southern face,
the mountains are thickly forested.

Why is this so different
to the dry lands beyond the snows?

I'm at three thousand metres,

in the great Himalayan forests
of northern India.

Some of the peaks behind me
are enveloped by clouds

and rise to above seven thousand metres.

This great Himalayan barrier
intercepts the moisture-laden winds
of the monsoon,

forcing them upwards
to release their burden of rain and snow,

creating a carpet of lush vegetation.

Grey langurs feast on the young shoots
of Indian horse chestnut.

These are the same langurs
that we find over much of India,

but more thickly furred,
to withstand the cold of the mountains.

In winter
these forests are deep in snow,

but in spring
they burst into a new growth...

a banquet of opportunity
for leaf eaters like langurs

As you climb up the mountains
the forest changes.

Oak and chestnut
give way to spruce and fir,

and on the edge of the alpine meadows,
to birch

One group of plants extends over
that whole range of altitudes

the rhododendrons

In the forest,

they're massive trees
Higher up they are large bushes,

and high still, dwarf shrubs
clinging to the ground

From March through into May,

a rainbow wave of colour
sweeps up the mountains

Where the forest givers way
to alpine meadow,

a yellow-throated marten
rubs shoulders with Himalayan tahr.

Each level has its own animals;

tahr live on steep grassy slopes
just above the forest.

Birds can bridge these different worlds,

soaring at will from cliff
to meadow to forest.

With their three metre wingspan,

lammergeyers are masters of the air

They nest early in the year,

taking advantage of the casualties of winter.

By rhododenron time,
the young are well grown,

almost ready to join their parents
in the air.

Lammergeyers nest
right across the Himalayas,

wherever there is carrion to scavenge.

You can find them
from the dry deserts of Ladakh

all the way to India's eastern borders.

In the forested foothills of Bhutan,

there's a very special monkey...
the golden langur

It's related to the grey langur
we saw earlier,

but it's found only here...

isolated between two rivers that carve
their way down from the Himalayan snows

It became known to science only in 1953

From Bhutan,

we soar with the lammergeyer
to the furthest end of the mountains.

I'm taking you to a hidden world
that very few have seen.

When India drifted
across the ancient Tethys sea

and crashed into Asia,

the initial impact was in the east,

where Burma, China and India meet.

This is where the mountains were born

Arunchal Pradesh,
the land of the rising sun.

Shrouded in mist,

the green mountains of Arunachal
are very special.

There's a richer variety
in these forests

than anywhere else in the Himalayas.

The great collision
created an oriental connection.

This is the gateway through which
plants and animals passed.

some spread far across the subcontinent.

Others got little further than this...

and their descendants are still here today

Birds like forktails
are just one legacy of that eastern impact

They live along forest streams
throughout south east Asia

This land crab
could be another eastern colonist...

an unlikely creature to find
in a Himalayan forest.

And the most flamboyant orientals,
the pheasants.

The red panda.

It's stronghold are in the mountains
of south west China,

but it has spread west along the Himalayas
as far as central Nepal.

The forests on the sourthern face
of the Himalayas

have been a corridor
for creatures like this.

Most of the time,
red pandas are solitary.

As they move through the forest,

they make their trails with scent
from a gland in their posterior.

This marks out their territory,

and perhaps it helps them
find one another in the mating season.

They spend most of their time in the trees

They live in dense forests
from fifteen hundred metres upwards,

and they're mainly nocturnal.

We're lucky to see one during the day

Like the giant panda
they eat bamboo shoots,

but they take a lot else besides...

fruit, insects, even birds eggs.

Rufous-necked hornbills
and Malayan giant squirrels

are eastern immigrants too.

And so is this

The Hoolock gibbon is India's only ape

Gibbons come from the tropical rainforests
of south east Asia,

but here on our borders with Burma

they've reached the foothills
of the Himalayas

The females are brown, the males black.

They live in family parties,

a pair of adults with up to
three young of different ages.

From snow leopard to gibbons.

What an amazing contrast.

We started our journey in a high,
frozen wasteland,

and here we're virtually
in a tropical rainforest.

And yet we're still in the Himalayas.

The mountains of Arunachal Pradesh
receive the full force of the monsoon.

It's the massive barrier of the Himalayas
that creates the Indian monsson

Here, ten metres of rain
can fall in just a few months.

This life-giving water determines
the survival of more than a billion people

The source of hundreds of rivers
that flow across the subcontinent

are in the high glaciers,
cradled by a world covered in snow.

Many believe that all life started
in this abode of the gods.

Our journey has taken us
over 2500 kilometres,

from one end of the Himalayas
to the other.

But I still have one final visit to make

I'm looking for a tiger.

I'm way up in the Himalayas,
at Namobuddha,

and this for me
is the pilgrimage of a lifetime.

It symbolises
how Buddhism embraced nature,

and this is where Lord Buddha
is said to have given his life

to a starving tigress and her cubs

Here in a shrine
in the mountains of Nepal,

a carved stone of great antiquity
shows how the Buddha pierced his hand

and gave his own blood so that
the tigress and her cubs could live

That so much else survives
owes much to the pervading influence
of religious belief.

In the endless cycle of death and rebirth,

man and animal are inextricably entwined

And nowhere is that more true
than in these Mountains of the Gods

This is the land of a phantom,
the phantom of the snows.

For some, it's a bridge
between heaven and earth,

a symbol of freedom

Up here, there is a deep silence,

empty of all but the wind,

another world beyond the reach of man.