Chris Morgan
BEARTREK is a conservation story wrapped in an adventure. Follow adventurer and renowned biologist Chris Morgan on an epic and entertaining journey to find the world's most elusive and endangered bears. Discover the threats facing them in the wild, meet the dedicated people racing to save them from extinction, and join the campaign to protect bears and their habitat.
Animals dance, sing, flirt, and compete with everything they’ve got to find and secure a mate. For many, the all-important bonds they share as a couple are what enable the next generation to survive. But can we call these bonds love? In this delightful, provocative look at the love life of animals, we see the feminine wiles of a young gorilla, the search for Mr. Right among a thousand flamingos, the open “marriages” of blue-footed boobies, the soap opera arrangements of gibbons, and all the subtle, outrageous, romantic antics that go into finding a partner. These are love stories all right, as various and intriguing as the lovers themselves.
Each year, far from human eyes, a remote expanse of Botswana's Makgadikgadi salt pans hosts one of Africa's last great spectacles when thousands of striped nomads wander the breathtakingly beautiful but barren landscape. It is only by the grace of isolated summer rains that the zebras can survive here at all. Family groups gather together to follow the rains, driven by a constant search for better grazing on islands of grass that dot the pans. Meerkat families watch the zebras come and go, and families of lions wait for them along their grueling trek, hoping for a chance to bring one down. Their journey is one that is sometimes limited by the fragility of new life, but always made possible by the strong family ties that help animals survive in one of Africa's most surreal landscapes. It's a tale of loyalty and sacrifice, of home and exile, of death and new life, in southern Africa's largest zebra population.
The highest mountain range in the world, the Himalayan range is far reaching, spanning thousands of miles, and holds within it an exceptionally diverse ecology. Coniferous and subtropical forests, wetlands, and montane grasslands are as much a part of this world as the inhospitable, frozen mountaintops that tower above. The word Himalaya is Sanskrit for abode of snow, fitting for a stretch of land that houses the world’s largest non polar ice masses. Extensive glacial networks feed Asia's major rivers including the Ganges, Indus, and Brahmaputra. More than a billion people rely on these glacier-fed water sources for drinking water and agriculture. The Himalayas are not only a remarkable expanse of natural beauty. They're also crucial for our survival.
The Australian pelican is built for long distance travel. One of the largest pelicans in the pelican family, with a light skeleton and a wingspan of over eight feet, it can be airborne all day and deep into the night, riding far and high on rising thermals. When rare weather systems bring heavy rains, huge numbers of Australian pelicans abandon the sea and coastal waters and embark on a mass pilgrimage to a place a thousand miles inland. It’s the last place you would look for one of their kind, the Australian Outback, one of the driest, hottest places on the planet.
Nature joins adventurer and bear biologist Chris Morgan on a year-long motorcycle odyssey deep into Alaska's bear country to explore the amazing resiliency and adaptability of these majestic animals as they struggle to make a living in five dramatically diverse Alaskan ecosystems: coastal, urban, mountain, tundra, and pack ice.
Why do some animals build structures and others don't? And how do animals decide where to build? Animal homes need to be safe and secure, protection from predators and the weather. Going above ground and under, we will investigate just what goes into making a home when you re wild and cost is not a factor.
Echo, the remarkable matriarch of a family of elephants in Kenya's Amboseli National Park, was most studied elephant in the world, the subject of several books and documentaries, including two NATURE films. For nearly four decades, elephant expert Cynthia Moss, and award-winning filmmaker Martyn Colbeck were on hand to record the trials and triumphs of Echo and her family, documenting the intense loyalties and deep caring that are so fundamental to all elephants, creating a moving record of a life we all can share.
