Where toads and Third Reich meet
There are many words to describe Adolf Hitler.
Calling him a toad is one of the milder ones.
So I was intrigued when Sir David Attenborough suggested a link between the midwife toad and the Third Reich.
In his Natural Curiosities (Choice, Mondays), Sir David explored the mating habits of slimy amphibians.
Now, most male toads slosh about in the water and grab their mates Harvey Weinstein-style using the pads on their front feet. But the midwife toad doesn’t have that luxury.
It’s enough to give the midwife a midlife.
Instead, he mates on dry land and, like a qualified midwife, looks after about 50 eggs until they become tadpoles.
He gathers them around his legs and hides them under a rock, looking like someone trying to put their pants on without using their hands.
Now, Paul Kemmerer, a German biologist in the 1920s, decided to experiment with the midwife.
If he could get it to mate in the water, would it develop arm pads like the rest of the slimys?
If it did, then environmental influences could change the way some genes behave and be passed on to the next generation.
According to Attenborough, some Third Reich geneticists took an interest and wondered if the next generation of Ayran males could be adapted to spawn the superior race.
They could already frog march, so all they needed to do was become toadish, grow bodily grappling hooks and scale the Brandenburg Gate and any blonde who looked like Eva Braun.
Tragically, Kemmerer was accused of fraud and, in despair, took his own life.
The Third Reich geneticists did enough damage without him.
In the final years of his life, David Attenborough is extraordinary and his volume of work incredible. Could he be cloned?
I’ve never been more interested in a toad since I lost control of a Bunsen burner in third form biology.
If you like tanks, titles and troop carriers, then try Pawn Stars: UK (Sky 5, Mondays), but probably only once. Three guys, Mark, Big Mark and Marco, buy and sell crazy stuff, but there seems to be enough eccentric people in England who want a 1972 British tank in their front allotment.
Mark and Big Mark take off from Regal Pawn and visit Bruce, who has a warehouse of the stuff. The tank has a few bullet holes, doesn’t fire and the bidding starts at £18,000.
The three Ms aren’t interested. Instead, they’re drawn to a 1969 multi-fuelled troop carrier that trundled around the streets of Belfast scaring the locals.
They all have a ride in it and Big Mark decides it should feature in his showroom as long as the foundations can cope.
While they’re away, Marco and his sister, Vicki, turn down an offer to buy some bagpipes – sadly in working order – that were crafted in the 1920s, about the time muesli overtook porridge and an American colleague is duped into becoming landed gentry.
He buys a title to a small plot of land and a tree in Scotland for £85. Apparently, he can call himself the Laird, but it doesn’t come with a seat in the House of Lords.
Pawn Stars: UK is one of those programmes that sits in TV’S sock drawer and appears in January each year with other curiosities when they run out of repeats.
A further curiosity is Harry Potter: A History Of Magic (Prime, Tuesday). In it, author JK Rowling goes behind the scenes at the British Library to explore the exhibition that celebrates the 20th anniversary of the first Harry Potter book.
Yes, it was absorbing, but the degree of separation from the book was too great. If you haven’t read the novel, then view the movie and, if you can’t do either, go to the exhibition. But to see a documentary about an exhibition, celebrating a movie, inspired by a book, left me underwhelmed.
It reminded me of the days when cask wine was watered down so it could fill the cardboard.
Instead, Lost And Found (Living Channel, Fridays) gave me more satisfaction.
It’s a variation of Secret Santa when you don’t know if the episode comes from the United States or Great Britain or is a repeat.
In it, Sheryl finds Joe, her son, and Joshua is reacquainted with his brother, Garrick. These are small, intimate stories, but hugely satisfying, both to families and viewers.