Nature (1982–…): Season 39, Episode 10 - Big Bend: The Wild Frontier of Texas - full transcript
Roam the Wild West frontier land of the Rio Grande's Big Bend alongside its iconic animals, including black bears, rattlesnakes and scorpions.
On the southern border
of the United States
lies a remote desert kingdom,
home to staggering landscapes
and a remarkable
world of wild creatures.
This is Big Bend... where
the legendary Rio Grande river
has cut deep canyons
between Texas and Mexico...
But the wildlife
knows no borders
in this truly special place...
♪
Here, the most talked-about
frontier in the world
is a wonderland
of serene beauty...
Where mountain lion
and black bear roam.
Where bats stalk the
desert floor at night.
A land of blazing
skies and tortured rock,
and home to one of
America's great national parks...
The road ends at Big Bend.
♪
♪♪
♪
The exact details are unknown,
but some 30 years ago, a
female black bear set out
on a remarkable journey
from northern Mexico.
She was heading for Texas.
♪
Human borders meant
nothing to this bear;
she was on a mission.
She was looking for a new
home, a place free of competition...
where she could bring
up her cubs in peace.
Far on the northern horizon,
there was such a place.
♪
Mountains reaching for
the sky with flanks of green
hinting at unseen treasures.
A wonderland for
a pioneering bear.
Bears had been wiped out
of Texas many years before.
Some had since
strayed over the border,
but she was the
very first to stay
and raise a family...
and what a place she picked.
Surrounded by blistering desert,
Big Bend hides a mountain
kingdom of sparkling streams
and hidden canyons,
bursting with forests and life.
♪
Here, she'd be in
good company...
For Big Bend is
home to a national park
with more kinds
of wild creatures
than almost any other
park in the United States.
♪
In Big Bend, she had found
America's wildest frontier.
♪
It is fall in Big Bend,
and this acorn
woodpecker is busy.
For just a few weeks,
these oak trees will
be laden with acorns...
Perfect food for the
long winter ahead.
If only he can find a
safe place to store them.
♪
The tallest dead
tree in the valley
is as good as he'll get.
High above thieves
in the forest below,
he and his family can
concentrate on the work in hand.
♪
It's a laborious business,
each hole must
be drilled just right:
too big, and the
acorns fall out;
too small, they
just won't fit in.
♪
As the weeks go
by the larder grows,
a bonanza for the
long months ahead.
But their stash is
just too tempting.
♪
While he's off hunting,
a young female moves in
with less than noble intentions.
♪
Maintaining this winter stash
takes up a huge amount
of time and energy,
well worth the effort if they
can keep it safe and secure.
♪
But life can be very cruel
to a Big Bend woodpecker.
♪
There are many reasons
Big Bend is good for bears,
and this is one of them.
Many months have passed,
and fall is a distant memory...
But there are still
acorns to be found...
and bears love acorns.
This bear is skin and bone...
He's had a tough winter.
Nothing is going to stop him.
♪
For six days in a row,
he keeps returning to
this fountain of food...
Much to the disgust of
the acorn woodpecker.
But there's nothing he can do
except watch months of hard
work being dismantled in minutes.
Most adult bears would
think twice before climbing
so high in a rotten tree,
but the fear of falling seems
to be the lesser of two evils.
If there's more food higher up,
this bear will do
whatever it takes.
♪
♪
♪
Acorns are full of
protein and fat...
Lifesavers for a
desperate Big Bend bear.
♪
Now he just has to get down.
The name Big Bend
was born of a river...
The legendary Rio Grande.
♪
For over 1,000 miles,
the Rio Grande
carves a giant arc
around the wild lands
of southern Texas.
♪
To the 18th century settlers,
the remote country cradled
by this giant curve in the river
became known as the Big Bend.
♪
Today the river and its
bend marks the border
between Texas and Mexico.
♪
The Rio Grande is one of
the youngest river systems
in North America,
its story freshly written
in the stone it has carved
along its three
million year journey.
To a thirsty desert,
water brings the gift of life.
♪
Big Bend is hummingbird heaven.
Some 15 different kinds
have been spotted here,
out of barely 30 in all
of the United States.
Many are just passing through...
Tiny birds on huge journeys.
But some are born of Big Bend.
These are lucifer hummingbirds.
For the lucifers, it's
breeding season...
And they must build
up their energy reserves
for the challenges ahead.
♪
The male lucifers have
dazzling purple throat feathers,
which need to be
in peak condition
to impress the
less-colorful females.
But first the field
must be cleared...
Even other hummingbird
species are not tolerated.
There's only room for one
male lucifer in this town.
♪
After all his
territorial battles,
you'd think the female
would give in easy.
But she herself now
needs to be chased,
for him to prove he's
worthy her attention.
Winning over this lady truly
is an exhausting business.
However, she still seems unsure.
But he has one final
trick up his sleeve...
some hummingbird flamenco.
♪
Who could resist such
perfection and poise?
♪
All the hard work is paying off.
It's "take me home, darling."
♪
The human story in Big Bend
goes back around 10,000 years.
Stone Age pioneers hunted
and gathered across the region
but left only the
faintest traces.
In the last 1,000 years,
several Native American
tribes came and went...
The Chiso and Apache.
The very last were the Comanche,
who journeyed across these
lands just 150 years ago.
♪
The greatest challenge
to Big Bend's wild world
came, of course, from
more recent settlers
as they pushed into the
remotest corners of wild America.
Until 1848, Big Bend
was part of Mexico.
Since then, waves of
Mexican and American settlers
have moved all
across the region...
To ranch, or mine
precious quicksilver.
That mix of cultures and
people live here to this day.
♪ It never took money
to feel like livin' ♪
♪ Never can try for me... ♪
♪
For the wild
inhabitants of Big Bend,
it mattered little
what tribe or creed
were the human
settlers of the region.
What mattered to them
was how many humans came
and how they treated
their wild neighbors.
♪
♪
In the decades after
the last Native Americans
were pushed out,
Big Bend was the
end of the road...
A place to escape the law.
If in real trouble,
you could head south to
Mexico across the Rio Grande.
Once you made it to the river,
it was rarely deep
enough to slow you down.
♪
Today in Santa Elena Canyon,
a unique resident of Big Bend
crosses from the
United States to Mexico
dozens of times a day.
With deserts in every direction,
this is one of the last places
you'd expect to find beavers.
♪
At sunrise, one of
the most talked about
international
borders in the world
is also a peaceful
place to find breakfast.
The second-largest
rodents on Earth,
beavers spend their
nights foraging for food
along the Rio Grande.
Early morning
means a final snack
before they head for bed.
Young willow trees and cane
make up the
majority of their diet.
Each beaver must eat between
two and three pounds of vegetation
a day to keep going.
The sound of chewing beavers
has echoed through these canyons
for thousands of years.
Another exercise beavers
devote their time to is fur control.
To keep their coat
in top condition,
beavers spend long
hours grooming their fur
and oiling it from special
glands under their tail.
♪
♪
After a big feed,
nothing seems to make a
beaver feel quite so good.
♪
From the mid-1600s,
America's beavers
were heavily hunted
by the new European settlers.
They were as good as
cash in the Wild West.
But hidden in this
remote backwater,
Big Bend's beavers
managed to survive
these centuries of
wildlife extermination.
The Texans behind
the national park here
dreamed of connecting Big Bend
with the neighboring
protected lands
across the river in Mexico...
Choosing to let
these natural treasures
unite the two countries
in a place where the
wildlife knows no borders.
♪
Big Bend sits in the
Chihuahuan Desert,
the largest in North America.
Come spring, small corners
explode in a blizzard of blue.
These are Big Bend's
famous bluebonnets.
Growing up to three feet tall,
the flowers dwarf
their famous cousins
across the rest of Texas.
♪
Another desert plant
that defines Big Bend
is the Ocotillo.
For much of the year,
Ocotillos look like a burnt
clump of dead branches.
But come spring... And
the right conditions...
These gray stems
deliver a bounty
of blood orange flowers.
♪
Shared by the United
States and Mexico,
the Chihuahuan Desert is one
of the most biologically diverse
on the planet.
And while the big
critters get all the glory,
it's the little creatures that
make this region truly special.
Thousands of different
kinds are the backbone
on which all of the wildlife
of Big Bend depends.
Big Bend is one of the
hottest corners of Texas.
Even in spring, temperatures
can rise to 100 degrees.
Not that some of Big Bend's
residents seem to mind too much.
Rattlesnakes, like this
western diamondback,
and most other reptiles,
do need external heat
to warm their muscles
and get moving.
But some spring
days can be too hot
even for these
cold-blooded creatures.
♪
But sunbathing is
a particular specialty
of this Big Bend resident.
Texas horned lizards
need a lot of sunlight
to produce healthy
levels of vitamin D.
Hard to spot with their
remarkable camouflage,
it takes a lot to get one of
these characters moving...
even when dinner
delivers itself.
♪
♪
Night brings a whole
new world to Big Bend.
♪
Temperatures can drop 60
degrees from daytime highs.
The darkness and
chill evening breezes
bring out a whole
new cast of characters.
This is their time.
♪
♪
More than 20
different kinds of bats
roam the night sky here.
♪
And this is one of
the most remarkable...
The pallid bat...
So called because
of their light coloring,
pallids are almost
unique among bats...
because of their
hunting strategy.
♪
Unlike almost any other bat,
pallid bats stalk their
prey on the ground.
♪
But they wouldn't take the
risk if it wasn't worth the reward.
♪
One theory about their
unusual hunting strategy,
is that pallids are much
better able to hear their prey
from ground level.
♪
But as many hunts
fail as are successful...
Prey can give off toxic
chemicals or simply fight back.
♪
But their unusual survival
strategies don't stop there.
Unlike almost any
other insect-eating bat,
pallids also drink
nectar from cactus
and other desert flowers.
Because they have to burrow
so far to get to the nectar,
the pallids get
covered in pollen.
And they'll deliver
great quantities
of this precious cargo
to the next flower they visit
on their lifelong journeys
through the desert night.
Depending on your disposition,
Big Bend has been called both
a geologist's paradise
and nightmare,
so complicated are its
landscapes and their stories.
♪
Some 140 million years ago,
this was one vast,
shallow, salty sea,
dumping layers of sand
across the entire region.
♪
Huge pressures
within the Earth's crust
then forced up the mountains,
and later, magma burst through,
forming these volcanic
islands in the sky.
♪
And all of these
stories in stone
have been constantly
scraped and sculpted
by sun, wind and water.
♪
In spring, visitors might
just catch a flash of crimson
in Big Bend's skies.
These are vermilion
flycatchers...
And while common
all over Mexico,
are in the northern limits
of their range in Big Bend.
This male's dazzling
colors advertise his success
as a hunter.
In peak condition,
he's positively radiant
compared to his female partner.
♪
The couple have three
newly hatched chicks
and for the next few weeks
the youngsters will demand
all of their parent's
time and energy.
Both mom and dad
feed the new arrivals,
but when they need to
be kept warm or quiet,
it's usually mom who
steps in to protect them.
♪
Not far away,
in a nest barely the
size of a golf ball,
this Anna's hummingbird
has two healthy chicks
almost ready to leave the nest.
♪
This is unique footage...
The first time these birds
have ever been seen nesting
in Big Bend.
♪
Though the chicks hatched
barely two weeks ago,
they've already grown
most of their adult feathers.
They're keen to
leave their tiny home,
but their first
attempts at freedom
can be a little clumsy...
and dangerous.
If this chick falls
to the ground
its life is over.
There's little the
panicked mother can do.
♪
After five agonizing minutes,
the youngster is back
where it should be...
Hopefully with a lesson learned.
Not far away, the flycatcher
dad is still hard at work
hunting for his offspring.
♪
Barely two weeks after hatching,
the chicks leave
their nest for good.
But they haven't yet learned
proper flying
and hunting skills,
so the two parents
are still flat out
keeping up with their demands.
♪
And then one day,
the parents don't return.
Barely three weeks
out of the egg,
they're all on their own
in a hot and hostile desert.
Summer has arrived in Big Bend.
When the sun
climbs high in the sky,
almost nothing stirs...
♪
Only mad dogs and Englishmen
go out in the midday sun...
So an old song goes.
Neither are common in Big Bend.
Their place is taken by
one of the region's
most colorful characters.
A heat specialist, this
male great earless lizard
seems to relish the midday sun.
Earless lizards
don't live very long,
so this mature male
must hook up with a mate
as quickly as possible.
Unfortunately, there are
plenty of other males about.
Maybe showing off his splendid
colors will send them packing.
♪
Males are territorial
and try and guard their
patch from all comers.
It's an exhausting business.
♪
He's spotted a female...
so he tries some moves
that wouldn't be out of
place in a city gymnasium.
♪
How many push-ups can you
do... when it’s 100 degrees?
♪
His masculine
maneuvers pay off...
The female is on her way.
Mating is brief.
She'll go off and lay four
or five eggs in the sand,
while he gets back to
the important business
of looking good for
the next lucky lady.
While summer brings
extreme heat to Big Bend,
it also brings rain.
Clouds roll in from
the Gulf of Mexico,
laden with water
sucked off the surface
of the Caribbean Sea.
In the very hottest
months of the year,
Big Bend gets most of
its annual ration of rain.
At first it almost seems
the desert creatures
are stunned by its arrival.
♪
But there's no time to
waste, for it won't last long.
♪
The water holes are magnets
for some of Big Bend's
most elusive creatures,
usually almost
impossible to find
in its vast desert landscapes.
♪
Some 700,000 years ago,
the ancestors of an
iconic desert animal
reached North America
across what is today
the Bering Straits.
They had evolved in North Africa
and their journey into America
took them as far south as
Texas and northern Mexico.
♪
These are desert bighorn sheep.
Countless numbers
of this ram's ancestors
once roamed America
until centuries of settlement
and hunting almost
wiped them out.
Just a few thousand
individuals survived...
and none in Texas.
But then began one of America's
great wildlife
reintroduction stories.
It started with just seven
animals released in 1973.
Today more than 1,000 run wild
in some of the most
spectacular landscapes in Texas.
♪
Desert Bighorns are
fantastically well adapted
to Big Bend's
parched landscapes.
Supreme climbers,
they rarely stray
more than a few hundred
yards from a cliff or steep slope...
Safe zones where no predator
can match their speed or agility.
Male bighorns usually
keep to themselves
in small bachelor groups...
Until breeding season.
Then all the rules change.
Hormones are loose
on the desert wind.
Before all-out war,
the bachelors start
honing their combat skills.
Who will do final
battle for the females?
And it's not all
noble jousting...
They have plenty in the
dirty tricks department...
some of it below the belt.
♪
This provocative behavior
helps to narrow the field:
Who is truly willing
to take on who?
Weeks of this minor warfare
finally sort out who is
up for the ultimate fight.
♪
These massive collisions would
shatter most animals' skulls,
but everything about the
bighorn is built for battle.
♪
The winner has won the
right to mate with the females...
This year's youngsters
will carry his genes.
Finally, it's time for some
rest and recuperation.
He's played his part in
the return of bighorn sheep
to Big Bend country.
Summer is fast
becoming a memory.
But the summer rains
have left their legacy.
One third of the year's rain fell
between July and September.
In the mountains, it's a
gift that keeps on giving.
♪
This is not New
England in the fall,
but a canyon in the middle
of the Chihuahuan Desert.
♪
Stands of Douglas Fir,
quaking aspen,
and big tooth maple
have survived in
the Chisos Mountains
since the last Ice Age.
And outposts of oak...
And oak means acorns.
♪
♪
For Big Bend's pioneering bears,
fall is a time of
peace and plenty.
Long afternoon
naps in the leaf litter
have some downsides.
But few itches will
survive a good stretch
and a favorite tree trunk.
This female's pregnant
and building up
precious layers of fat
for the lean months ahead...
And with luck, some
new arrivals in spring.
♪
Big Bend's bears
don't hibernate,
but do go into long periods
of low activity, or torpor,
to conserve energy.
For this mother-to-be,
her fat reserves
will be her lifeline.
♪
Winter in Big bend
is a brief affair.
If the north winds blow and
the snow queen does visit,
warm southerly breezes
soon send her packing.
♪
♪
By late March,
temperatures are climbing.
And under the cover of darkness,
a voracious predator is
closing in on Big Bend.
♪
Flying through the night
he has come from the south,
where he spent
the winter waiting...
and preparing for
his journey north.
♪
For the next five months,
he will bring a swift
and silent death
to countless creatures
of the Big Bend night.
He is an elf owl...
The very smallest
owl in the world...
barely five inches high
and weighing less
than a tennis ball.
But for elf owls, size
truly doesn't matter.
They'll tackle prey almost as
big and powerful as themselves.
♪
♪
This male elf owl
now has a partner.
She's moved into their nest...
An old woodpecker hole
in a giant agave stalk.
Sitting on eggs, for
the next few weeks
she'll need him to do
most of the hunting.
And when she's hungry
she lets him know all about it.
♪
From dusk to dawn,
the male scours the surrounding
desert for fresh supplies.
♪
After all his efforts,
he seems tempted to have
a quick snack on the job.
But Mom is not impressed.
Sitting on three
ravenous chicks,
she's not tolerating
that kind of behavior.
Every scrap of
food is precious now.
And with another
three or four weeks
before the young leave the nest,
this extraordinary little father
is facing many more
hunting missions
through the long desert nights.
For the acorn woodpeckers,
spring has been uneventful...
So far.
But trouble is on the horizon.
♪
And this time
it's a family affair.
♪
♪
The woodpeckers can
only look on in anger.
♪
But there is some consolation:
this mother bear is
both healthy and heavy,
and not desperate
enough to risk climbing to
the very top of the tree.
♪
The woodpecker's
stash up there is safe...
For now.
♪
But there are two
other thieves in training.
♪
Still too young
for the taller trees,
it won't be long before
these student climbers
want to push their limits...
And they'll be light
and strong enough
to go wherever they want.
♪
But that is some
months away yet.
For now, there is so
much to see on the ground.
Over the next year they'll
depend on their mother
to feed and protect them...
and show them
around the new world
they have been born into.
♪
These cubs are truly special.
Bears born in Big Bend,
who will call this place home...
♪
A mountain and desert kingdom
that for so long was
missing their kind.
♪
They carry on the legacy
of that pioneering female
who came across the
desert barely 30 years before.
If nothing blocks their way,
these cubs may come and go
from their ancestral
lands in Mexico.
♪
Big Bend's bears were
the first to return to Texas...
and with luck, they
will not be the last.
♪
♪
♪
♪
♪
of the United States
lies a remote desert kingdom,
home to staggering landscapes
and a remarkable
world of wild creatures.
This is Big Bend... where
the legendary Rio Grande river
has cut deep canyons
between Texas and Mexico...
But the wildlife
knows no borders
in this truly special place...
♪
Here, the most talked-about
frontier in the world
is a wonderland
of serene beauty...
Where mountain lion
and black bear roam.
Where bats stalk the
desert floor at night.
A land of blazing
skies and tortured rock,
and home to one of
America's great national parks...
The road ends at Big Bend.
♪
♪♪
♪
The exact details are unknown,
but some 30 years ago, a
female black bear set out
on a remarkable journey
from northern Mexico.
She was heading for Texas.
♪
Human borders meant
nothing to this bear;
she was on a mission.
She was looking for a new
home, a place free of competition...
where she could bring
up her cubs in peace.
Far on the northern horizon,
there was such a place.
♪
Mountains reaching for
the sky with flanks of green
hinting at unseen treasures.
A wonderland for
a pioneering bear.
Bears had been wiped out
of Texas many years before.
Some had since
strayed over the border,
but she was the
very first to stay
and raise a family...
and what a place she picked.
Surrounded by blistering desert,
Big Bend hides a mountain
kingdom of sparkling streams
and hidden canyons,
bursting with forests and life.
♪
Here, she'd be in
good company...
For Big Bend is
home to a national park
with more kinds
of wild creatures
than almost any other
park in the United States.
♪
In Big Bend, she had found
America's wildest frontier.
♪
It is fall in Big Bend,
and this acorn
woodpecker is busy.
For just a few weeks,
these oak trees will
be laden with acorns...
Perfect food for the
long winter ahead.
If only he can find a
safe place to store them.
♪
The tallest dead
tree in the valley
is as good as he'll get.
High above thieves
in the forest below,
he and his family can
concentrate on the work in hand.
♪
It's a laborious business,
each hole must
be drilled just right:
too big, and the
acorns fall out;
too small, they
just won't fit in.
♪
As the weeks go
by the larder grows,
a bonanza for the
long months ahead.
But their stash is
just too tempting.
♪
While he's off hunting,
a young female moves in
with less than noble intentions.
♪
Maintaining this winter stash
takes up a huge amount
of time and energy,
well worth the effort if they
can keep it safe and secure.
♪
But life can be very cruel
to a Big Bend woodpecker.
♪
There are many reasons
Big Bend is good for bears,
and this is one of them.
Many months have passed,
and fall is a distant memory...
But there are still
acorns to be found...
and bears love acorns.
This bear is skin and bone...
He's had a tough winter.
Nothing is going to stop him.
♪
For six days in a row,
he keeps returning to
this fountain of food...
Much to the disgust of
the acorn woodpecker.
But there's nothing he can do
except watch months of hard
work being dismantled in minutes.
Most adult bears would
think twice before climbing
so high in a rotten tree,
but the fear of falling seems
to be the lesser of two evils.
If there's more food higher up,
this bear will do
whatever it takes.
♪
♪
♪
Acorns are full of
protein and fat...
Lifesavers for a
desperate Big Bend bear.
♪
Now he just has to get down.
The name Big Bend
was born of a river...
The legendary Rio Grande.
♪
For over 1,000 miles,
the Rio Grande
carves a giant arc
around the wild lands
of southern Texas.
♪
To the 18th century settlers,
the remote country cradled
by this giant curve in the river
became known as the Big Bend.
♪
Today the river and its
bend marks the border
between Texas and Mexico.
♪
The Rio Grande is one of
the youngest river systems
in North America,
its story freshly written
in the stone it has carved
along its three
million year journey.
To a thirsty desert,
water brings the gift of life.
♪
Big Bend is hummingbird heaven.
Some 15 different kinds
have been spotted here,
out of barely 30 in all
of the United States.
Many are just passing through...
Tiny birds on huge journeys.
But some are born of Big Bend.
These are lucifer hummingbirds.
For the lucifers, it's
breeding season...
And they must build
up their energy reserves
for the challenges ahead.
♪
The male lucifers have
dazzling purple throat feathers,
which need to be
in peak condition
to impress the
less-colorful females.
But first the field
must be cleared...
Even other hummingbird
species are not tolerated.
There's only room for one
male lucifer in this town.
♪
After all his
territorial battles,
you'd think the female
would give in easy.
But she herself now
needs to be chased,
for him to prove he's
worthy her attention.
Winning over this lady truly
is an exhausting business.
However, she still seems unsure.
But he has one final
trick up his sleeve...
some hummingbird flamenco.
♪
Who could resist such
perfection and poise?
♪
All the hard work is paying off.
It's "take me home, darling."
♪
The human story in Big Bend
goes back around 10,000 years.
Stone Age pioneers hunted
and gathered across the region
but left only the
faintest traces.
In the last 1,000 years,
several Native American
tribes came and went...
The Chiso and Apache.
The very last were the Comanche,
who journeyed across these
lands just 150 years ago.
♪
The greatest challenge
to Big Bend's wild world
came, of course, from
more recent settlers
as they pushed into the
remotest corners of wild America.
Until 1848, Big Bend
was part of Mexico.
Since then, waves of
Mexican and American settlers
have moved all
across the region...
To ranch, or mine
precious quicksilver.
That mix of cultures and
people live here to this day.
♪ It never took money
to feel like livin' ♪
♪ Never can try for me... ♪
♪
For the wild
inhabitants of Big Bend,
it mattered little
what tribe or creed
were the human
settlers of the region.
What mattered to them
was how many humans came
and how they treated
their wild neighbors.
♪
♪
In the decades after
the last Native Americans
were pushed out,
Big Bend was the
end of the road...
A place to escape the law.
If in real trouble,
you could head south to
Mexico across the Rio Grande.
Once you made it to the river,
it was rarely deep
enough to slow you down.
♪
Today in Santa Elena Canyon,
a unique resident of Big Bend
crosses from the
United States to Mexico
dozens of times a day.
With deserts in every direction,
this is one of the last places
you'd expect to find beavers.
♪
At sunrise, one of
the most talked about
international
borders in the world
is also a peaceful
place to find breakfast.
The second-largest
rodents on Earth,
beavers spend their
nights foraging for food
along the Rio Grande.
Early morning
means a final snack
before they head for bed.
Young willow trees and cane
make up the
majority of their diet.
Each beaver must eat between
two and three pounds of vegetation
a day to keep going.
The sound of chewing beavers
has echoed through these canyons
for thousands of years.
Another exercise beavers
devote their time to is fur control.
To keep their coat
in top condition,
beavers spend long
hours grooming their fur
and oiling it from special
glands under their tail.
♪
♪
After a big feed,
nothing seems to make a
beaver feel quite so good.
♪
From the mid-1600s,
America's beavers
were heavily hunted
by the new European settlers.
They were as good as
cash in the Wild West.
But hidden in this
remote backwater,
Big Bend's beavers
managed to survive
these centuries of
wildlife extermination.
The Texans behind
the national park here
dreamed of connecting Big Bend
with the neighboring
protected lands
across the river in Mexico...
Choosing to let
these natural treasures
unite the two countries
in a place where the
wildlife knows no borders.
♪
Big Bend sits in the
Chihuahuan Desert,
the largest in North America.
Come spring, small corners
explode in a blizzard of blue.
These are Big Bend's
famous bluebonnets.
Growing up to three feet tall,
the flowers dwarf
their famous cousins
across the rest of Texas.
♪
Another desert plant
that defines Big Bend
is the Ocotillo.
For much of the year,
Ocotillos look like a burnt
clump of dead branches.
But come spring... And
the right conditions...
These gray stems
deliver a bounty
of blood orange flowers.
♪
Shared by the United
States and Mexico,
the Chihuahuan Desert is one
of the most biologically diverse
on the planet.
And while the big
critters get all the glory,
it's the little creatures that
make this region truly special.
Thousands of different
kinds are the backbone
on which all of the wildlife
of Big Bend depends.
Big Bend is one of the
hottest corners of Texas.
Even in spring, temperatures
can rise to 100 degrees.
Not that some of Big Bend's
residents seem to mind too much.
Rattlesnakes, like this
western diamondback,
and most other reptiles,
do need external heat
to warm their muscles
and get moving.
But some spring
days can be too hot
even for these
cold-blooded creatures.
♪
But sunbathing is
a particular specialty
of this Big Bend resident.
Texas horned lizards
need a lot of sunlight
to produce healthy
levels of vitamin D.
Hard to spot with their
remarkable camouflage,
it takes a lot to get one of
these characters moving...
even when dinner
delivers itself.
♪
♪
Night brings a whole
new world to Big Bend.
♪
Temperatures can drop 60
degrees from daytime highs.
The darkness and
chill evening breezes
bring out a whole
new cast of characters.
This is their time.
♪
♪
More than 20
different kinds of bats
roam the night sky here.
♪
And this is one of
the most remarkable...
The pallid bat...
So called because
of their light coloring,
pallids are almost
unique among bats...
because of their
hunting strategy.
♪
Unlike almost any other bat,
pallid bats stalk their
prey on the ground.
♪
But they wouldn't take the
risk if it wasn't worth the reward.
♪
One theory about their
unusual hunting strategy,
is that pallids are much
better able to hear their prey
from ground level.
♪
But as many hunts
fail as are successful...
Prey can give off toxic
chemicals or simply fight back.
♪
But their unusual survival
strategies don't stop there.
Unlike almost any
other insect-eating bat,
pallids also drink
nectar from cactus
and other desert flowers.
Because they have to burrow
so far to get to the nectar,
the pallids get
covered in pollen.
And they'll deliver
great quantities
of this precious cargo
to the next flower they visit
on their lifelong journeys
through the desert night.
Depending on your disposition,
Big Bend has been called both
a geologist's paradise
and nightmare,
so complicated are its
landscapes and their stories.
♪
Some 140 million years ago,
this was one vast,
shallow, salty sea,
dumping layers of sand
across the entire region.
♪
Huge pressures
within the Earth's crust
then forced up the mountains,
and later, magma burst through,
forming these volcanic
islands in the sky.
♪
And all of these
stories in stone
have been constantly
scraped and sculpted
by sun, wind and water.
♪
In spring, visitors might
just catch a flash of crimson
in Big Bend's skies.
These are vermilion
flycatchers...
And while common
all over Mexico,
are in the northern limits
of their range in Big Bend.
This male's dazzling
colors advertise his success
as a hunter.
In peak condition,
he's positively radiant
compared to his female partner.
♪
The couple have three
newly hatched chicks
and for the next few weeks
the youngsters will demand
all of their parent's
time and energy.
Both mom and dad
feed the new arrivals,
but when they need to
be kept warm or quiet,
it's usually mom who
steps in to protect them.
♪
Not far away,
in a nest barely the
size of a golf ball,
this Anna's hummingbird
has two healthy chicks
almost ready to leave the nest.
♪
This is unique footage...
The first time these birds
have ever been seen nesting
in Big Bend.
♪
Though the chicks hatched
barely two weeks ago,
they've already grown
most of their adult feathers.
They're keen to
leave their tiny home,
but their first
attempts at freedom
can be a little clumsy...
and dangerous.
If this chick falls
to the ground
its life is over.
There's little the
panicked mother can do.
♪
After five agonizing minutes,
the youngster is back
where it should be...
Hopefully with a lesson learned.
Not far away, the flycatcher
dad is still hard at work
hunting for his offspring.
♪
Barely two weeks after hatching,
the chicks leave
their nest for good.
But they haven't yet learned
proper flying
and hunting skills,
so the two parents
are still flat out
keeping up with their demands.
♪
And then one day,
the parents don't return.
Barely three weeks
out of the egg,
they're all on their own
in a hot and hostile desert.
Summer has arrived in Big Bend.
When the sun
climbs high in the sky,
almost nothing stirs...
♪
Only mad dogs and Englishmen
go out in the midday sun...
So an old song goes.
Neither are common in Big Bend.
Their place is taken by
one of the region's
most colorful characters.
A heat specialist, this
male great earless lizard
seems to relish the midday sun.
Earless lizards
don't live very long,
so this mature male
must hook up with a mate
as quickly as possible.
Unfortunately, there are
plenty of other males about.
Maybe showing off his splendid
colors will send them packing.
♪
Males are territorial
and try and guard their
patch from all comers.
It's an exhausting business.
♪
He's spotted a female...
so he tries some moves
that wouldn't be out of
place in a city gymnasium.
♪
How many push-ups can you
do... when it’s 100 degrees?
♪
His masculine
maneuvers pay off...
The female is on her way.
Mating is brief.
She'll go off and lay four
or five eggs in the sand,
while he gets back to
the important business
of looking good for
the next lucky lady.
While summer brings
extreme heat to Big Bend,
it also brings rain.
Clouds roll in from
the Gulf of Mexico,
laden with water
sucked off the surface
of the Caribbean Sea.
In the very hottest
months of the year,
Big Bend gets most of
its annual ration of rain.
At first it almost seems
the desert creatures
are stunned by its arrival.
♪
But there's no time to
waste, for it won't last long.
♪
The water holes are magnets
for some of Big Bend's
most elusive creatures,
usually almost
impossible to find
in its vast desert landscapes.
♪
Some 700,000 years ago,
the ancestors of an
iconic desert animal
reached North America
across what is today
the Bering Straits.
They had evolved in North Africa
and their journey into America
took them as far south as
Texas and northern Mexico.
♪
These are desert bighorn sheep.
Countless numbers
of this ram's ancestors
once roamed America
until centuries of settlement
and hunting almost
wiped them out.
Just a few thousand
individuals survived...
and none in Texas.
But then began one of America's
great wildlife
reintroduction stories.
It started with just seven
animals released in 1973.
Today more than 1,000 run wild
in some of the most
spectacular landscapes in Texas.
♪
Desert Bighorns are
fantastically well adapted
to Big Bend's
parched landscapes.
Supreme climbers,
they rarely stray
more than a few hundred
yards from a cliff or steep slope...
Safe zones where no predator
can match their speed or agility.
Male bighorns usually
keep to themselves
in small bachelor groups...
Until breeding season.
Then all the rules change.
Hormones are loose
on the desert wind.
Before all-out war,
the bachelors start
honing their combat skills.
Who will do final
battle for the females?
And it's not all
noble jousting...
They have plenty in the
dirty tricks department...
some of it below the belt.
♪
This provocative behavior
helps to narrow the field:
Who is truly willing
to take on who?
Weeks of this minor warfare
finally sort out who is
up for the ultimate fight.
♪
These massive collisions would
shatter most animals' skulls,
but everything about the
bighorn is built for battle.
♪
The winner has won the
right to mate with the females...
This year's youngsters
will carry his genes.
Finally, it's time for some
rest and recuperation.
He's played his part in
the return of bighorn sheep
to Big Bend country.
Summer is fast
becoming a memory.
But the summer rains
have left their legacy.
One third of the year's rain fell
between July and September.
In the mountains, it's a
gift that keeps on giving.
♪
This is not New
England in the fall,
but a canyon in the middle
of the Chihuahuan Desert.
♪
Stands of Douglas Fir,
quaking aspen,
and big tooth maple
have survived in
the Chisos Mountains
since the last Ice Age.
And outposts of oak...
And oak means acorns.
♪
♪
For Big Bend's pioneering bears,
fall is a time of
peace and plenty.
Long afternoon
naps in the leaf litter
have some downsides.
But few itches will
survive a good stretch
and a favorite tree trunk.
This female's pregnant
and building up
precious layers of fat
for the lean months ahead...
And with luck, some
new arrivals in spring.
♪
Big Bend's bears
don't hibernate,
but do go into long periods
of low activity, or torpor,
to conserve energy.
For this mother-to-be,
her fat reserves
will be her lifeline.
♪
Winter in Big bend
is a brief affair.
If the north winds blow and
the snow queen does visit,
warm southerly breezes
soon send her packing.
♪
♪
By late March,
temperatures are climbing.
And under the cover of darkness,
a voracious predator is
closing in on Big Bend.
♪
Flying through the night
he has come from the south,
where he spent
the winter waiting...
and preparing for
his journey north.
♪
For the next five months,
he will bring a swift
and silent death
to countless creatures
of the Big Bend night.
He is an elf owl...
The very smallest
owl in the world...
barely five inches high
and weighing less
than a tennis ball.
But for elf owls, size
truly doesn't matter.
They'll tackle prey almost as
big and powerful as themselves.
♪
♪
This male elf owl
now has a partner.
She's moved into their nest...
An old woodpecker hole
in a giant agave stalk.
Sitting on eggs, for
the next few weeks
she'll need him to do
most of the hunting.
And when she's hungry
she lets him know all about it.
♪
From dusk to dawn,
the male scours the surrounding
desert for fresh supplies.
♪
After all his efforts,
he seems tempted to have
a quick snack on the job.
But Mom is not impressed.
Sitting on three
ravenous chicks,
she's not tolerating
that kind of behavior.
Every scrap of
food is precious now.
And with another
three or four weeks
before the young leave the nest,
this extraordinary little father
is facing many more
hunting missions
through the long desert nights.
For the acorn woodpeckers,
spring has been uneventful...
So far.
But trouble is on the horizon.
♪
And this time
it's a family affair.
♪
♪
The woodpeckers can
only look on in anger.
♪
But there is some consolation:
this mother bear is
both healthy and heavy,
and not desperate
enough to risk climbing to
the very top of the tree.
♪
The woodpecker's
stash up there is safe...
For now.
♪
But there are two
other thieves in training.
♪
Still too young
for the taller trees,
it won't be long before
these student climbers
want to push their limits...
And they'll be light
and strong enough
to go wherever they want.
♪
But that is some
months away yet.
For now, there is so
much to see on the ground.
Over the next year they'll
depend on their mother
to feed and protect them...
and show them
around the new world
they have been born into.
♪
These cubs are truly special.
Bears born in Big Bend,
who will call this place home...
♪
A mountain and desert kingdom
that for so long was
missing their kind.
♪
They carry on the legacy
of that pioneering female
who came across the
desert barely 30 years before.
If nothing blocks their way,
these cubs may come and go
from their ancestral
lands in Mexico.
♪
Big Bend's bears were
the first to return to Texas...
and with luck, they
will not be the last.
♪
♪
♪
♪
♪