BBC series reveals how each continent shapes life
• David Attenborough brings us new species, new stories and more conservation with the aid of drone technology
There is something soothing about Sir David Attenborough’s voice. It transports you to the grass plains of Africa and dives you into the deepest ocean trenches where you swim among fish. It reminds you of the call of a hyena and the solemn stare from a gorilla in the thicket of Rwanda. It is the voice many grew up with and a voice that still rings clear through the waters of Antarctica.
Fans of the 93-year-old natural historian have no doubt already started indulging in his latest offering: Seven Worlds, One Planet, the new BBC Earth documentary from executive producer Johnny Keeling. The series, which premiered on Sunday, is a celebration of the diversity of life on each of the planet’s seven continents. It reveals how each continent shapes the animal life found there but also highlights the challenges these animals face in a modern world dominated by humanity — or lack thereof.
Seven Worlds, One Planet
differs from other projects that Keeling has worked on such as Planet Earth and Planet Earth II.
Apart from breaking up the series into continents, he’s added a geological element and more conservation issues. It has new species, new stories, new locations and each episode also features filming firsts.
To film the first episode featuring Antarctica, the team travelled for 10 days and sailed through 10m-high waves. But the journey paid off: they filmed leopard seal and orca hunting gentoo penguins using drone technology.
“One of the things that I really enjoyed about this is we had some new technology,” says Keeling. “In the last few years drones have really come on. We took them absolutely everywhere — we took them down caves, we took them into volcanoes, we flew them at night, we flew them off ships, in Antarctica — everywhere.”
During the last episode, which focuses on Africa, the team filmed the last two northern white rhinos on earth, flanked by armed guards as
IN THE LAST FEW YEARS DRONES HAVE REALLY COME ON. WE TOOK THEM DOWN CAVES, WE TOOK THEM INTO VOLCANOES
they always are. Standing next to them, still moved by the work he does, the steadiness of Attenborough’s voice falters ever so slightly. Unless the artificial insemination scientists are attempting works out, these two rhinos will be the last of their subspecies.
Reflecting on this shoot, Keeling says he didn’t know at first how emotional this would be. “Who ever gets to meet an animal that’s about to go extinct? I just didn’t realise. They’re noble and they’re peaceful and the only reason that they’re disappearing is because of us. And there’s this sort of lack awareness from them — they don’t know that they’re the last ones there. We stood there really choked up watching them.”
Injected with snippets of humour, the seven brilliantly shot episodes will stir a sense of wanderlust. I’m sure the crew had no idea at the time that the wonders they were recording will be needed more than ever in a time of global lockdown, even if the tragedy of human action on the natural world leaves you feeling hopeless.
But this is exactly what Keeling wants to diminish. “What we tried to do in the series was to inspire people and show interesting and wonderful wildlife but also not shy away from telling some of the stories of despair. We can’t feature an episode on Antarctica without talking about climate change. You can’t feature an episode on
South America without talking about deforestation.”
But he remains hopeful. He wants people to watch the series and fall in love with the natural world and then desperately want to do something about it. “I’m really optimistic. By making small changes we can make a big difference. There are 7-billion people on the planet … if 7billion people decide to do something or if 1-billion people decide to make a change, that can make a change so quickly.”
‘Seven Worlds, One Planet can be viewed every Sunday at 4pm on BBC Earth’, DStv channel 184.