The Mating Game (2021): Season 1, Episode 5 - Against All Odds - full transcript

All life is driven by the need to breed.

Though, for a few, the odds of doing so
are overwhelmingly against them.

The deep ocean.

The largest and least populated habitat
on Earth.

Those that live here
appear to come from another world.

Much of their lives are spent alone,
in the blackness.

So finding any potential partner
ls hard,

and getting the timing right
ls even harder.

Such an extreme game of chance

has led to one of the most
bizarre strategies of all.

A fanfin anglerfish.



On her belly,

she has what seems to be
on odd-looking fin.

It is, in fact, a tiny, parasitic,
male anglerfish.

When he met her,

it was his once-in-a-lifetime
opportunity to secure a mate.

So he bit into her.

His blood system fused with hers.

Now, he is entirely dependent on her.

So much so that when she dies,
he will die too.

Until then, his sole function in life
is to fertilise her eggs.

This extreme commitment ensures
that both can succeed

in their bizarre version
of the mating game.

Most creatures that play the mating game
must solve major problems

if they are to succeed.



But among these sand dunes in Russia,

where howling winds
can transform an unstable landscape,

the challenge for one animal
ls almost overwhelming.

A male toad-headed agama.

He spends his entire life on this dune.

Once a year, he'll try to find a mate.

She will only be interested
if he has a suitable burrow

in which she can lay her eggs.

But in his world of shifting sands,
good burrows are hard to come by.

And when the wind is strong,

they can be lost in a matter of minutes.

So he's keen to attract a female
as quickly as he can.

And his black-tipped tail
is his way of doing so.

He's been noticed.

Now he must entice her
back to his burrow.

Instead, she replies
with an invitation of her own.

He tries again, with more vigour.

She still doesn't move.

It turns out she already has a burrow

and is not about to abandon
such a valuable property.

Which presents him with a dilemma.

Accepting her invitation
may mean he gets to mate,

but leaving means he risks
losing his burrow to a rival male.

What to do?

Desire gets the better of him,
and he hot-foots it over to her place.

But after a closer look...

she decides he's not for her.

And while his back is turned,
the worst has happened.

A rival male has spotted his
unguarded burrow.

But he won't give it up without a fight.

Each flanks the other and tries
to make themselves look bigger.

The intruder is seen off.

But it's a hollow victory.

The wind picks up,
and sand engulfs the contested burrow.

As it disappears,

so do his chances of success,

until the wind dies down
and he can try again.

Territory may be important for some,

but the need to find a mate
is vital for all

One solution is to devote
a lifetime to just one partner,

but that only works
when there are enough to go around.

A Laysan albatross.

For over half the year,
she has scoured the vast Pacific alone,

searching for food.

Now she's returning
to her breeding grounds in Hawaii.

Laysans pair for life.

Repeated displays cement
their long-term relationship.

It takes two adults
to raise just one chick.

So a partner willing to share
the burden of parenthood

ls the difference
between success and failure.

But this female is on her own.

She was seduced and then abandoned
by an unfaithful male.

Adulterous males play no further part

in looking after
their extramarital eggs.

She cannot raise her chick alone.

She must find a partner.

All the available males here
are already taken,

but she hasn't exhausted
her options just yet.

A new arrival catches her eye.

But she needs to discover whether
this is a partner she can rely on,

and she does so by suggesting a dance.

They seem a perfect match.

But it's a match with a difference,

because her dance partner
ls another female.

This duet confirms their commitment
to raising a chick together.

Within a few days,
she lays a single, large egg.

The effort drains her of energy.

To recover,
she must head back to sea to feed.

And, while she's away,
she is totally reliant

on her new-found partner
to incubate her egg.

She must put all her trust in her,
if they are to succeed.

Three weeks later, she's back well fed,
and ready to take her turn.

But something is wrong.

Her precious egg
has been pushed out of the nest.

It seems she couldn't
trust her partner after all.

Worse, still, while she's been away...

her partner has also laid an egg.

It turns out she too had mated
before entering this relationship.

But two eggs create a problem.

They can only incubate one...

because both must take turns to feed.

The urge to incubate her own egg
ls overwhelming.

But the chick within
has grown cold and died.

So she devotes herself
to the only egg left alive...

her partner's.

Two months later...

her decision pays off.

She's not related to the chick,

but this seemingly selfless act
is part of her long-term strategy.

This female couple may be together
for half a century or more

and will take turns
raising each other's chicks.

Adulterous males will always
take advantage when they can.

But by alternating
whose egg is incubated,

both these females have found a way
to achieve lifetime success.

Long-term relationships
can increase the chances of success,

but some animals only get
one opportunity to breed,

and that creates the highest-stakes game
of all.

In the Son or an Desert,
the earth is starting to move.

A male digger bee.

He's spent his entire life underground,

waiting for this moment to arrive.

It's the breeding season,

and he's emerged
with just one purpose...

To find a mate.

This is his only opportunity to do so,

because in a few days' time,
he will be dead.

To give him an edge,

his sense of smell
ls among the best of all bees.

The female he's looking for
Is still buried beneath the desert sand.

Her intoxicating perfume seduces him,
even before she emerges,

and it drives him crazy.

But a bigger rival
Is quick to displace him.

The odds are stacking up against him.

More males are arriving by the minute.

Like him, each needs to mate,
and they will die trying.

If he is to succeed,
he must also do whatever it takes.

Once again, he picks up
the scent of a female.

And once again,
his rivals aren't far behind.

Just as he digs her out, they pounce.

As yet more join in, he risks
being trapped at the centre of the ball

and cooked alive by their body heat.

No longer able to defend her, he flees.

He's forced away from the battleground

where there is little competition
but far fewer females.

He picks up a scent no one else has.

This is his last chance.

They mate immediately,
and he passes his sperm to her.

But this is far from
the end of his story.

As long as her perfume lingers,

rivals will be attracted
to mate with her,

and he can't risk that happening.

He's already inseminated her,

yet it is only now
that he starts to court her.

He must convince her
she needs no other than him.

And to do that he seduces her
with a rasping call...

...and may anoint her
with his own scent.

Only when she shows
no further interest in mating,

and her heady perfume has gone,

can he be sure that he is the only one
she will ever breed with,

and he releases her.

For both of them,
their mating game is over.

She now devotes all her time
to being a responsible mother,

gathering pollen and nectar
for their offspring.

As for her seductive partner,

he will play no further part
in their lives.

He's fathered the next generation
and ensured no rival will replace him.

Time to die.

Living long enough to mate
is a challenge faced by all animals,

but one creature is forced to travel
extraordinary distances

to have any chance of doing so.

North America in late summer.

Beneath the leaf of a milkweed plant,

a male monarch butterfly
ls completing his final transformation.

As an adult, he's driven by
a single goal...

The need to mate.

But he cannot do so yet,

and he cannot do so here.

His mating game is bound
to the only plant

on which monarchs lay their eggs...

milkweed.

Without it monarchs cannot breed.

But winter is coming.

The milkweed here won't reappear
until next summer,

and he cannot survive
winter's extreme cold.

So he is forced to undertake
one of the greatest migrations on Earth.

Driven ever southwards, it's a gruelling
Journey of nearly 3,000 miles...

and takes two months to complete.

His destination
is a small mountain hillside in Mexico.

Hundreds of millions of monarchs have
made the same journey to this refuge.

They are all here because
only this forest

has exactly the right conditions
for waiting out the winter.

Smaller males like him
only just make It.

All must rely on their remaining
reserves of energy

to survive until next spring.

So, for those that arrive
already exhausted,

the odds of doing so are against them.

A winter storm spells disaster.

Those already on the edge
do not make it.

In spring, the sun's warmth brings
the survivors cascading back to life,

and, among them, the small male.

All are now ready to breed.

Many will head north in search of
milkweed that is starting to re-appear.

But not all are still capable
of making that journey.

The smaller male is almost spent.

So, to have any chance of breeding,
he resorts to a desperate strategy.

A drink gives him
Just enough for his final act.

Among those leaving their winter refuge,

he's looking for a large,
healthy female,

one with enough strength to survive
longer than him

and find the fresh milkweed.

He's spotted her.

Grabbing her, he clings on
with all his remaining might

as he forces her to the ground.

Here, he mates.

It's a violent act, born of desperation,

but he has survived long enough
to breed.

And, in doing that,
he has beaten enormous odds.

Grabbing any chance to mate

may be the difference between winning
and losing the mating game.

But sometimes, those that are defeated
still find a way to pass on their genes,

despite the impossible odds
stacked against them.

It's spring in South Texas...

...and wild turkeys are coming together
at their traditional breeding grounds.

Each year, colourful adult males,
known as toms,

compete for female attention.

Calling lets them know they've arrived.

The toms have a strict pecking order,

and this male
is at the very bottom of it.

So is his brother.

And at the top, their dominant brother.

As long as he is around,
the other two won't get a look in.

But that doesn't mean their
mating game is over.

Instead, their strategy
ls to abandon their own desires

and support their high-status sibling,

creating a formidable band of brothers.

It's the females that choose
who they mate with.

They're all looking for the best male,

and they assess them
on the splendour of their display.

With enough flamboyance,
the band of brothers

can woo not just one female,
but all the hens here.

And their chances are greatest
when they display together.

With his two wing men by his side,
the dominant tom is out to impress.

But they aren't the only males
that use teamwork.

A rival band of toms.

They, too, are looking to win over
all the hens.

With so much at stake,
the band of brothers cannot give way.

But it's not the dominant tom
who takes the lead.

It's his low-ranking brothers
that peel off to intercept them.

As the feathers fly,

the high-ranking brother
takes full advantage.

They try to keep their rivals at bay
so their brother can get on with mating.

It's all for one,

and one for all.

Because each time he mates,

he also passes on many of the genes
he shares with his brothers.

So, through the success
of the dominant tom,

the siblings at the bottom
of the pecking order

also succeed in the mating game.

And all without ever mating themselves.

Waiting for the right moment to breed
is vital in any mating strategy...

and many choose to do so in spring
when food is readily available.

But mating during this period
poses a sizable challenge,

especially if you are the menu.

Periodical cicadas.

About four centimetres long,
they don't bite or sting.

For many forest inhabitants,
that makes them the perfect meal.

Hundreds of cicadas perish
before their mating game has even begun.

But millions more do survive,

overwhelming the predators
as they gather in the canopy.

Here, they form
the greatest mating choir on Earth.

Only the males sing.

A female ls enticed by a male's call

and responds with a wing flick.

Each one lets him know she's interested

and draws him a little closer.

As they meet, his serenade changes.

If it's still to her liking,
he'll get the chance to mate.

But this is only part of the strangest
and longest mating game of all.

Once she's mated,

she bores into a tree
and lays up to 500 eggs.

Two months later, newly-hatched nymphs
drop to the ground,

bury themselves,
and attach to tree roots.

These cicadas won't be seen again
for 17 years.

This remarkable strategy ensures
that when they do re-emerge to breed,

their predators have
long given up waiting.

And, what's more,
they all emerge at the same time,

to once again overwhelm
any predators that are around.

Their first instinct
Is to climb the nearest tree.

They cannot mate yet.

For that
they must take their adult form.

It takes time
for soft white flesh to harden.

Until then,
the newly-formed adult cicadas

are especially vulnerable.

Though, for this brood,

it isn't predators
that they need to be most wary of,

it's their own kind.

In the 17 years they have lain hidden,

the forest above them
has been transformed.

Many of the trees
have been chopped down.

As a consequence,
tens of thousands of cicadas

are forced to climb
the few trees that remain.

In the crush, nymphs clamber
over the emerging adults

and puncture newly-formed skin
with their needle-sharp claws.

The wounds are fatal.

Soon the trees are surrounded
by mountains of the dead and the dying.

All have been prevented from mating
by odds they could not overcome.

Their failure to breed is a result
of rapid changes in their habitat,

'caused by the one species
that rivals any animal on Earth

in its ability to breed successfully...

us.

In the last 17 years,

our population has increased
by over 1.4 billion.

We have overcome
most of life's challenges.

And, as a result

we have become the most dominant species
on the planet.

But our success has come at a cost.

We have converted wild habitat
to suit our needs

and have done so
on an unprecedented scale.

One consequence of our actions

is that we have destroyed the ability
of other species to breed.

And now, we face
a mass extinction of animals,

like no other in human history.

If we are to help those that remain,

we must figure out exactly
what they need to play the mating game.

And, until we do that

we are creating an insurance policy,
should the very worst happen.

Cryobanks.

A global network freezes
and stores the DNA of many species,

including those
on the brink of extinction.

These blueprints for life
are a vital resource

for both research and conservation,

and are already being used
to help those struggling to survive.

A male black-footed ferret.

He is searching for a mate

in the last remnants
of the North American prairies.

But his chances of success are slim.

He is one of less than 400
left in the wild.

And all are descended
from just seven individuals.

So, even if he does find a mate,

they may be too closely related
to have healthy young.

But thanks to science,

one very special ferret
may change his mating game forever.

Meet Elizabeth Ann.

She really is one of a kind,

because Elizabeth Ann is a clone.

She has been created
from the frozen cells of a ferret

that died over 30 years ago.

She isn't closely related
to any of the other ferrets,

so the chances of producing
healthy offspring with her

are much higher.

Should we wish,

we now have the ability
to breed any animal,

or at least save its tissues
until we discover how.

But in the world we have created,

there is more that is needed

to ensure long-term success
in the mating game.

In China, scientific breakthroughs
with captive breeding

have led to a remarkable success story

and a vital lesson.

A baby giant panda.

He is the first in 40 years
to be born into a world

where giant pandas
are no longer endangered.

He's the product
of a captive breeding program me

that began over half a century ago

and has now increased their population
by more than 600.

But, in spite of that success,
there was a problem.

The young pandas were
completely dependent on their keepers.

III-equipped to survive in the wild,

they didn't have the experience
they needed to breed naturally,

and that was all
because no one fully understood

what giant pandas needed
to play their mating game.

For decades, we assumed
that we could breed captive-born pandas

by simply becoming matchmakers.

All we had to do was put a female panda

together with a male panda
and let nature take its course.

But nature didn't take its course.

It turns out that giant pandas
are extremely fussy

about who they mate with.

If a female is paired with a male
who just doesn't do it for her...

then the date fails completely.

Yet, giant pandas have been
on the planet

for a least two million years.

Surely, they can't be
that bad at breeding.

Clearly, we were missing something.

Field research revealed
that female pandas

need to choose a mate for themselves.

And to do that, they need trees.

Adult giant pandas lead solitary lives,

and only come together
when it's time to breed.

Up here, a female can advertise
when she's ready to mate...

...pick the best of the males
she attracts,

and avoid any she doesn't fancy.

These lessons are now changing

how we help captive-bred giant pandas

to play a more natural mating game.

This mother was raised by keepers.

Her chances of going back to the wild
have gone.

But, for her spirited cub,

there is a brighter future.

By being raised by her mother
in a more natural environment

away from keepers,

she's learning the skills she will need

to survive in the wild.

It will be a least two years
before she's ready.

But, if she shows enough independence,

she will be released into
a native forest nearby

and have a fighting chance

of entering into the mating game
on her own terms.

And now, her odds of doing so
have never been better.

In the last 40 years,
the Chinese authorities

have doubled the amount of
protected panda habitat,

and have even more planned.

And, remarkably,

in the same time,

the wild population has increased
by nearly a thousand.

All without a human matchmaker in sight.

Left alone,

wild pandas have created
almost twice the number

that the very best artificial
breeding program me could have created.

It turns out, giant pandas
aren't that bad at breeding after all.

If we are to reverse our impact
on the natural world,

the solution is simple and very clear.

We must protect and regenerate
natural habitats.

If we can do that, then the mating game

can be relied upon
to create future generations.

To film animals' mating behaviour,

camera teams need to be
in the right place at the right time.

Most mating behaviours are infrequent,
fleeting, and often unpredictable.

Perhaps the rarest breeding event
the Mating Game team attempted to film

only happens once in every 17 years.

Starting next week, billions,
if not trillions, of tiny invaders

will begin their assault

on nearly all of the country
east of the Mississippi River.

We are talking about Brood X cicadas.

They've been laying in wait
for 17 years,

until the time and temperature is right

to begin their deafening descent
upon millions of Americans.

There was a gazillion of them.

They were just swarming crazy.

And the noise, it's just fascinating.

They are so thick around the tree
in my front yard that the...

The odour, the stench is

to the point where it's
almost unbearable, at least for me.

And when they first was coming out,
I thought they were disgusting,

but now I kinda like them.

70 film
this emergence of periodical cicadas,

the crew teamed up with
lifelong cicada expert John Cooley.

So, how did I get interested in cicadas?

Well, as, as you can see,
they are a lot of fun to play with.

And they always have
some new trick up their sleeves,

and this one has really decided that
he likes this microphone an awful lot.

And so he's going to attempt
to mate with it.

7his emergence has only happened

three times in his lifetime,

so John has more reason than most
to be present at the event.

John's knowledge is extensive,

but one unique skill proves most useful

when filming their mating strategies...

That was an interference buzz.

...he can speak cicada.

Let's do it.

T7his gives the crew a great advantage

in their attempts to capture
the courtship rituals

of these remarkable insects.

I can whistle louder
and in more pure tone

than the male cicadas.

So I can give kind of
a super-normal stimulus

that would get the female to wing-flick.

And I can also duet to myself.

I can whistle and do that
to get the male to call.

So, what I did was I kind of stepped
into that interaction

to get the female to wing-flick

and also to get the male back into
a mode where he was calling.

So, that was manipulating...

There goes a bluebird.

Sorry.

Anybody who says they're not good flyers
has never watched

exactly what happened there,
where he flew right to it.

That was what we call
extremely persuasive calling.

Little stutters in the beginning,
and a little bit of abdomen waggle.

I'm sure you got that on there.

Where he's just, you know, doing that.

Yeah, I film a lot of insects,

but to get him to do something on cue,
just like that, it's pretty special.

The crew wait until nightfall,

and John takes them to the exact place

where he predicts
the cicadas will emerge.

We got a call saying this is
a really good nymph area

and they are literally
crawling everywhere.

It's like the ground
is kind of boiling up.

We can hear them crackling,
it sounds like fire.

All sorts of leaves rustling.

They are just everywhere.

And they've been climbing us.

We've had to tuck our shirts in,
they've been climbing up our shirts.

But yes, it's really cool.

I did not expect to see them
in these crazy numbers.

There are so many cicadas coming out.

Yeah, there's a lot going up me.

Cicada nymphs everywhere.

One got all the way up...

...up my pant leg,
even in my shorts.

There just must be tens of thousands,

if not hundreds of thousands
of cicadas here.

But as the crew
crack on with their filming,

John begins to notice
some unsettling details.

Look at the bubbles of lymph

that are forming there
where he just got walked all over.

This thing is just hanging by a foot.

It's a very delicate part of moulting.

Gosh.

It's just, it's losing...

a quarter of its body fluid.

This is really pretty extreme,
what's going on here.

But, you know, it's...

It isn't set up or anything.

This is just what's happening.

They're all going up this one tree.

There's nowhere else to go where we are.

We're standing on a parking lot,

and the rest of it
is sort of a backyard.

So, this is,

this is kind of one of the ways
that humans modify the landscape

that may not work out
so well for the cicadas.

This is not natural cicada habitat.

To the best of what we know,

these are species that like edges,

forest edges.

But this is a little bit different.

Kirk's house
and this setting right here,

and a lot of the places we've seen
are lawns with trees coming out.

And these trees are very good places
for the cicadas to lay eggs.

They do quite well.

A lot of eggs go in the ground here.

A lot of them survive.
But when they come out,

they only have one place to go,
and it's back to that tree.

And so these isolated trees
concentrate the cicadas

in a way that
a natural forest edge doesn't.

The cicadas' 17-year cycle
evolved during a time

when their surrounding habitat
was predictably constant.

But this he's no longer the case
in our modern world.

As trees disappear from their habitat,

so do John's opportunities
to understand their behaviours.

His lifetime of work
does help the crew piece together

the cicada's strategy,
as they create the next generation.

Yeah, let these guys go up.

We got more. It's gonna be good.

This is it, kids.

It does not get any better than that.

However, John's work is far from done.

He has already uncovered many mysteries
surrounding these amazing creatures,

but with only one chance every 17 years,

he will soon run out of time.

What's the biggest mystery
left with periodical cicadas?

Why?

Biggest mystery in my book is,

given that there are 5,000-6,000 species

of cicadas on the planet,
fewer than ten doing this,

what were the special circumstances

that caused these to have
this kind of life history?

And I think ultimately
that's going to be the question

that I will not be able to answer
in my remaining life.

So, go to it, future generations.