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NARRATOR: Teams of international film crews
are traveling all over China
to film a unique Disneynature movie.
Born In China is an ambitious natural history film
never attempted before.
These rare creatures are hard to film.
(MONKEYS CHIRPING)
Located in remote corners of this amazing country.
Notoriously camera shy.
They show up.
(CHUCKLING)
NARRATOR: This is the story of the film crews
as they travel around China.
The amazing animal cast they are privileged to film.
The next dust storm is coming, it makes our work really hard!
NARRATOR: The extreme conditions they face.
I can't see a road anymore.
NARRATOR: And how the teams discover a country making
great strides to protect
remote landscapes and wildlife found nowhere else on earth.
Disneynature's Born In China follows the early life
of the country's rarest creatures.
To succeed, the crews must capture the first
faltering steps of a cast
of endangered animals seldom filmed and then follow
them as they grow up.
From the wetlands of the North East,
through the central mountains and up to the highest
plateau in the world,
filming crews head out to remote corners of China.
The first behind-the-scenes documentary,
Ghost Of The Mountains,
focused entirely on finding the elusive snow leopard.
(WHISPERING) That's a big cat. Damn.
NARRATOR: One of the biggest challenges ever faced by
a wildlife film crew.
(PANTING)
It's really difficult for us
to climb the mountains around here.
NARRATOR: Over 250 days in the field using the very
latest camera technology
from drones to camera traps...
- MAN 1: Cubs! Yes! - MAN 2: Oh, man!
Oh, there we go!
NARRATOR: ...led to filming
snow leopard cubs in the wild for the very first time.
Months of relentless searching gave the crew
the unique opportunity
to film the life of the cub's mom,
Dawa,
and revealed her struggle hunting
blue sheep to provide for a growing family.
A very difficult task,
even for the top predator here.
Thanks to the protection of this boundless remote area,
China now has the largest population of snow
leopards in the world.
Helped by monks,
working with conservationists
to protect the cats and the other animals
that live here.
(PUPPIES WHIMPERING)
For the other film crews, life is just as tough.
Oh, disappointing, difficult, frustrating,
anything you can think of really.
NARRATOR: Working in remote locations in search
of endangered animals,
this is their story.
The expeditions begin with a journey
to north-east China
in search of one the country's rarest and most iconic birds.
The red-crowned crane.
PAUL: If in Beijing you were to go
to the Imperial Palace,
you would see a lot of amazing fantasy animals represented.
But you can't help but be struck
that one of the commonest animals you see
is the red-crowned crane.
(CAWING)
NARRATOR: The heaviest crane in the world
is hugely significant in China.
It represents faithfulness and longevity.
The effort put into protecting it by China,
is a testament to its value as a cultural icon.
For the Born In China team, it's their first big
challenge.
Very little footage exists of these birds in the wild.
Paul Stewart is one of main directors of photography
on this film.
The clever thing is to get something that stands up here,
and that stays standing vertical. That could be
quite hard actually.
NARRATOR: A multi-award winning cameraman.
For over 20 years, he has filmed wildlife all over
the world.
Paul's knowledge of birds, especially rare
ones hardly filmed
makes him the perfect cameraman to lead the team.
The crew's ambition is to film crane chicks,
and so they arrive at the start of the
birds' hatching season.
At 810 square miles,
almost twice the size of Los Angeles,
this is the largest wetland in China,
home to one of the biggest nesting populations
of these wild birds.
PAUL: This place is really, really flat.
And at first I thought that would be great,
but the flatness of this place is deceptive.
It's flat but it's marshy, so it's still actually quite
a challenge
to get anywhere.
And even a bird as tall as the red-crowned crane
with a red mark on top
is actually quite hard to find when they're spread out
in a few pairs across the marshes.
NARRATOR: Their best chance to film
chicks is to find a nest.
Even if they find one, it won't be easy to get close.
That's because the crew are being watched.
These birds have astonishing eyesight.
PAUL: If you put a group of cranes together you've
got a united front
that's almost impossible to creep up on.
NARRATOR: The team will have to outsmart the birds.
PAUL: When we wanted to get very close
and very intimate
with birds and their chicks,
what we needed to find was somewhere where birds
would allow that approach
because the last thing you want to do
with a rare species like this is disturb
it at the nest.
NARRATOR: Then, amongst the reeds,
two eggs.
A tiny movement suggests they are ready to hatch.
Paul spends every daylight hour, eyes and camera,
focused on the nest.
A few days later, his patience is rewarded.
Two fragile chicks.
Paul and the team now filming an event rarely witnessed.
We felt actually very lucky
to find that there were two tiny chicks that had
just hatched,
and realized that we were at the right time
to film something that really hasn't been seen
before.
NARRATOR: Very little footage of wild red-crowned crane
chicks exists.
Partly because of their rarity,
but also because they don't stay on the nest
very long.
PAUL: We knew that as well as having
to get close,
we didn't have a huge amount of time,
just a few days.
The chicks are very quickly ready to leave the nest once
they've hatched.
The very first glimpse we saw of a crane chick
I was amazed at
how small they are.
The adult bird is really imposing
and in contrast to that the chicks are
absolutely tiny,
and just seeing the adults on the nest with their huge
feet walking around
their chicks you couldn't help but be worried for the chicks.
(CHIRPING)
NARRATOR: Paul and the team
are so much closer
to the nest than they dared to hope.
By moving very slowly and very quietly towards
the birds,
they're able to film without causing them
any disturbance.
Despite their rather elegant beauty, they're actually quite
aggressive,
and so if they are not happy with you they
make it very clear.
But we've been delighted that actually
the red-crowned cranes
have very much accepted our presence,
and allowed us a real privileged glimpse of
the life of the chicks.
NARRATOR: The chicks have an amazing ability.
Shortly after being born, they are able to walk,
run, and even swim.
These tiny little chicks, small little balls of fluff,
are able to follow their parents
through the marshes as they look for food.
As Paul films the birds,
he notices the crane's doing something he's
never seen before.
When the chicks were firstborn,
the adults were trying to feed them bits of fish,
and that was clearly too much for the chicks to swallow,
but something seemed to have clicked in the adult's mind,
perhaps these were relatively inexperienced birds
we were dealing with,
and so very shortly, they were going off
into the reeds
and picking the tiniest
little insects,
insects that clearly the adults themselves
wouldn't eat,
they don't represent a meal.
But they'd bring those back one at a time to the chicks,
and that was something the chicks could swallow.
So I was quite impressed how the adults
adapted to their choosy-eating chicks.
NARRATOR: For the team, it's amazing
to film the next generation
of such a rare bird growing up in the wild.
Much work has gone into studying the birds
breeding biology,
and the preservation of their habitats
that the birds need to survive in greater numbers.
The expedition is seeing this work directly
contributing
to the survival of the birds.
PAUL: This is a special place for the red-crowned cranes
because it's one of their
breeding sites and more importantly
probably it's one of their breeding sites
that's being conserved and actively managed
for their benefit.
So it's a place where the red-crowned cranes
can feel safe
and where they can bring up chicks with a really good
chance of success.
NARRATOR: Paul and the team have filmed a cultural icon
and are left with precious
memories.
The chicks are growing well,
preparing for their long migration south
later in the year.
A journey of thousands of miles across China.
Encouraged by the success of the crane team,
another Born In China crew are starting their filming
1,600 miles to the south west.
They're also in search of babies,
but of a different nature.
Thanks to conservation efforts within China,
these mountain forests harbor
a colorful endangered primate full of character.
(MONKEYS CHITTERING)
These are golden snub-nosed monkeys.
Amongst the rarest of primates and only
found in central China.
The crew hope to get a privileged look into
the life of a wild monkey
that lives at an elevation almost as high as any
primate on Earth.
The challenge for this team is to keep up
with these agile,
tree-swinging monkeys living on wild steep-sided
slopes.
JUSTIN: The area we've been principally filming
the golden snub-nosed monkeys in has been
in the highest mountains in central China.
They are very dramatic steep mountains,
forested, and incredibly beautiful.
NARRATOR: China has set aside a number of wild forest
areas to protect the monkeys.
The filming location is over 1,200 square miles
in size,
as large as the state of Rhode Island.
Justin Maguire has filmed on all seven continents.
He's a multi-award winning cameraman
with many years of experience in the field.
In order to film the monkeys in a way
that we didn't disturb them,
we tried to film with as few people
as possible,
which involved my crew carrying a very large tripod,
and me having to carry the camera.
The ground is incredibly steep,
there's lots of branches and brambles and thorns.
It can be cold and wet and miserable,
and those were our biggest physical challenges
on the location, it's just carrying all this heavy
gear up and down,
and keeping up with the monkeys
who move much faster than us with ease,
and we are sort of flopping around just
trying to stay steady.
NARRATOR: Jess Tombs is a primatologist
who's spent many years working with primates,
but none as cute as this.
JESS: Golden snub-nosed monkeys were chosen
because they are the only character in the film that
is a social animal
so you've got lots of interactions between
individuals going on.
They're beautiful, they're amazing, they're
charming, they're funny.
They're very entertaining.
NARRATOR: Jacky Poon is a Chinese Emmy-nominated
wildlife cameraman.
He's filmed all over China, specializing in primates.
JACKY: What is very amazing and fascinating is
that we frequently
see that the father would carry
a young baby and try to keep him warm
by huddling together and grooming each other,
and that's something that a lot of males don't do
to their younger juveniles in other primate societies.
JUSTIN: What people really relate to with these monkeys
is that they'll see
themselves in the monkeys.
They'll see the monkeys being cold and miserable,
and they'll see them happy with the first sign of spring
and be pleased when they're groomed
by a family member,
and ecstatic when they get to play with their friends,
and I think we all relate to that.
They entertain themselves all the time, particularly
the youngsters,
and that's what they spend a huge portion
of their day doing,
is having fun.
Swinging, chasing each other, you know just
doing silly things.
NARRATOR: The crew quickly become
attached to the monkeys,
and are now in the right place at the right time
to capture a special event.
It's baby time.
Only once every two years in the spring, there's
a flurry of newborns.
Most arrive between April and June.
A time when the forest explodes with color
and new life.
At this time of year, there are babies everywhere.
The newborns won't leave their mom's side
for at least three months.
But it's not a time of celebration for everyone.
This is Tao Tao,
a two-year-old male whose mom has just
given birth.
At first, he welcomes the arrival of a baby.
But this little one takes up mom's entire time.
Tao Tao feels left out.
JESS: He's the center of his family's attention
until his mum has a little baby sister.
His world is about to change forever and he's gonna have
to grow up,
and we follow him on this journey.
NARRATOR: Tao Tao finds himself no longer the apple
of his parents' eye.
It's a tough lesson at such a young age,
and while Tao Tao's sister is being nursed,
there's little room for him within the family.
But there's a safety net.
The all-male troop.
A gang of Lost Boys,
the perfect place for Tao Tao
and other young males to hang out as they grow up.
It's a boisterous, adventurous, and fun crew.
With the emphasis on fun.
And Tao Tao is getting into the swing of things!
By making these adorable golden snub-nosed monkeys
a conservation priority,
it's the Chinese themselves who are discovering
the amazing wildlife
their country has to offer.
Ultimately the understanding
and appreciation and enjoyment,
of the natural world and wild animals
is one thing that will
hopefully lead to the preservation
and protection.
NARRATOR: As the seasons change across China,
the freshness of spring turns to summer,
and with it comes a unique filming
opportunity,
to film the birth of a very special antelope
on China's high plateau.
Fourteen hundred miles to the north west
of the monkey location,
the next Born In China expedition is underway
into one of the remotest and highest corners
of the country to find this antelope.
It's called a "Chiru."
Decimated by poaching in the 1980s and '90s
for its warm fur to make luxurious shawls known
as "Shatoosh,"
the chiru are now recovering from the brink of extinction
thanks to its protection
and the establishment of a vast wild area.
Weeks ago, the pregnant females left the males behind
to begin a migration to their birthing grounds.
The challenge is to be the first international crew
to film a chiru birth.
STEVEN: Because of the remoteness of it,
we couldn't access any local facilities.
We had to take all our stores with us.
From fuel to food to bedding. You name it, we took with us.
NARRATOR: Steven Ballantyne is an expert
in remote location filming.
He's managed crews from the jungles
of Papua New Guinea
to the vast grasslands of Mongolia.
Above 8,000 feet, altitude sickness,
which can be fatal,
is the biggest threat to the expedition's safety.
The team's final destination is nearly twice as high.
To minimize its effects,
the crew must rest after every 1,600 feet
they climb.
Already at Camp 1, the team are nearly 10,000 feet
above sea level.
The thin air making the crucial and simple
task of breathing difficult.
Any physical work on top of that, even setting up
a tent, is really tough.
The crew must stay here for 24 hours
to allow their bodies to get used to the thin air.
The chef insists on wearing his best whites.
He knows how important he is to the welfare of the team.
A high-calorie diet is crucial at these altitudes.
The food is a huge hit.
They journey on.
Beyond the last gas station,
the team have to fill the trucks by hand.
Rolf Steinmann is the director of photography
for the chiru expedition,
specializing in filming skittish, endangered
animals
in remote corners of the world.
He's used to cold conditions,
but sub-zero temperatures inside the car
is something else.
I just wanted to drink a little bit of water and...
this happened.
So... it's getting pretty cold.
NARRATOR: Camp 2 at over 12,000 feet
is even more remote.
The crew will be here for 48 hours to get fit
enough for the final stage.
It's a chance for Rolf to brush up on his wildlife
knowledge
as he waits for dinner.
(WHISTLING)
He's not the only one.
All are eager for essential calories.
The last day of the journey.
Today the team will push inland to where they hope
to find the chiru.
Once we actually got to the entrance of the reserve
of which there is no actual entrance, it's just like this
huge open plateau,
you then turn off the tarmac road
and enter the plateau region.
NARRATOR: From here, it's another 120 miles
off-road driving
across the highest plateau on Earth.
This is Kekexili.
A place where few Westerners have traveled
and one of the most sparsely populated
regions on the planet.
The overwhelming sense of space
was the first impression that really struck me and always
stayed with me.
There's no trees, there was literally
no mountains
except way off in the distance.
I come from a city, so to suddenly have
acres of land
with these massive beautiful vistas was just breathtakingly
beautiful.
NARRATOR: This area is over 17,000 square miles in size,
larger than the state of Maryland.
Over 15,000 feet above sea level
higher than the Rockies
with only a few human inhabitants,
it protects the unique plants and animals that live here.
The team are heading to a camp on the shores of Zhuonai Lake.
A beautiful remote 60 square mile body of water.
Just 15 years ago,
this area was discovered to be the key birthing
ground of the chiru.
So difficult to access, it remains seldom visited.
After 48 hours driving off road,
this team are the first international film crew
to reach the lake.
The heart of what was the chiru poaching area.
STEVEN: We were able to use a ranger station
which had been near enough abandoned really.
It was surrounded by a 14-foot steel fence.
NARRATOR: As the crew unpacks,
an immediate reminder of how wild this place is.
A bear.
The reason for the fence is clear.
The Himalayan Blue Bear is one of the rarest bear
subspecies in the world.
It is thought by some to be the origin
of the legendary Yeti.
A creature rarely seen, let alone filmed, in the wild.
It's just very amazing to see the bear
in this vast beautiful landscape.
It's a very special moment.
NARRATOR: An early sign for the team of the amazing
and rare animals
who call this huge wild reserve "home."
This area became a sanctuary just over 20 years ago
at the peak of the chiru being poached,
and when their population had collapsed
from around 1 million to less than 100,000.
Their numbers have increased since then,
but the chiru are still wary of humans.
Their shyness is a problem for Rolf and the crew.
It's pretty intimidating because...
if you use binoculars you can see
these groups of chirus all over the place, but...
the question will be how to get close to them
because I have to be like 20, 40 meters close
to get good shots.
NARRATOR: The team decide their only option
is to position several hides at strategic points
from which Rolf can film.
Okay.
NARRATOR: Dug into the hard ground
and designed to blend
into the landscape as much as possible,
these will give the team a fighting chance
to get a camera close to the chiru
without disturbing them.
But setting up a number of hides on the plateau,
doesn't go unnoticed by curious bears.
Well, we actually just wanted to inspect
our hide here on the calving grounds
or the potential calving grounds,
and we recognize the bear has visited our hide.
And yeah, bears are powerful animals
so if he inspects a hide like that,
he leaves his tracks
so...
But you know you always have
to consider
these bears out here they don't have TV,
they don't have computer games,
so a hide like that is something really
interesting.
And that's why I have no problems to forgive him
and we just have to repair the little stuff here.
NARRATOR: Alone in a tiny hide in the middle
of bear territory
it's a nerve-wracking time for Rolf.
He's spending days on end hoping the chiru will turn up.
(COUGHS)
There is absolutely no sign of life out there.
Not a chiru, not a yak, no nothing.
And the weird thing is this is an open grassland.
I can see really far, but there is absolutely
nothing.
NARRATOR: All this at 15,000 feet
on the largest and highest plateau in the world.
For most of us this would be punishing,
but Rolf's sense of humor hasn't been dented yet.
He's come to appreciate the simple things in life.
Well, after
12 hours
in the hide
at, yeah, kind of serious sub-zero temperatures,
it's quite nice to be back in the open
and heat up
and have hot water.
Yeah, it's the...
little things which are the biggest things
out here.
NARRATOR: Even with changes of brutal
and unpredictable weather,
the team aren't giving up.
ROLF: If I was a mother I wouldn't
give birth to a baby in these conditions.
There's no grass, it's really cold,
it's snowy, it's not a good start in life.
NARRATOR: Then at last...
Rolf has something to film.
One by one,
thousands of female chiru
are arriving at the lake after a journey of nearly 200 miles
over the last three weeks.
The highest mammal migration on Earth.
The lake is the perfect place to have their young.
Temperatures are pleasantly cool
and the grasses and water abundant.
As more and more expectant moms arrive
and the numbers swell,
this is the moment Rolf has been waiting for.
The birthing begins.
Hundreds are born within days of each other.
It's a remarkable achievement for the Chiru team
and one of "the" defining moments of the
Born In China film.
An endangered skittish antelope
confident enough to give birth right in front
of the team's hide.
To see new life
come into this world
was just breathtakingly beautiful.
NARRATOR: The babies are extraordinary.
Within just 15 minutes of being born,
they can already stand
and feed themselves almost immediately.
Although clearly, it takes a little practice.
But even the straddlers are soon up and confident
on their feet.
All the young staying close to their moms as they
learn their way around.
As soon as the birthing is over
and the females and young are strong enough,
the herd begins the long 200-mile journey home
to reunite with the males.
The film crew will meet them there later in the year
as the 100,000 strong chiru herds
complete their high-altitude migration.
Over 900 miles away,
another Born In China crew
are traveling through the steep-sided valleys
of Sichuan
to find a very special and famous animal.
The panda.
The task for this team is to film the intimate
relationship
between a mother panda
and her cub for the first time.
As a symbol of good luck,
friendship, peace,
and invincibility,
the panda holds a special place in Chinese culture.
One of the rarest creatures on Earth,
largely due to habitat loss,
it lives in the forest,
surviving almost exclusively on bamboo.
For over half a century, the panda has been a flagship
for conservation,
a global ambassador for China,
and a bear that's had millions of dollars spent on it
to restore its numbers in the wild.
This is Ya Ya.
She's pregnant, against all the odds.
Female pandas are fertile for just three days a year,
and can only have one cub every second year.
Each birth is precious.
Ya Ya's now at the end of her five-month gestation,
and is looking for a den in which she can
give birth safely.
But pandas don't do anything in a hurry.
One last drink,
a scratch,
a sniff.
(SNIFFING)
And in she goes.
A quiet safe den,
the floor covered in grasses and branches to keep her warm.
PAUL: The panda's story in Born In China
seeks to follow a mother bear
as she seeks to find a place to give birth to her young.
And then get a privileged glimpse of that young
really when it's quite recently born.
They're born incredibly tiny
and then they are kept in that den for quite
some time.
NARRATOR: A tiny cub.
(CUB SQUEALING)
Just seven inches long.
A thousand times smaller than her mom,
this is Mei Mei.
She can hardly move
and it's eight weeks before her eyes open.
A baby panda that will, hopefully
in a few years' time,
boost the population of pandas that remain in the wild.
For almost 80 years,
China's been working hard to protect the panda,
and establish areas of habitat where they can roam free.
As an animal out there in the wild, kind of
on the edge,
physically and metaphorically in terms of conservation,
it's not an animal we want to disturb too much.
NARRATOR: Pandas are found in large wild mountain
reserves
in the central southern part of the country.
Access to these areas is tightly managed.
Designed to be as wild as possible,
there are some zones where any human entering
has to permanently wear a full panda costume.
This is how serious the Chinese are about
panda conservation.
It's a way for us to get a little bit closer
without worrying that we're disturbing
an animal.
NARRATOR: Paul and the team will spend the next few
months dressed as pandas
hoping to get close and intimate footage
of a very rare bear.
It's a conservation program that's working.
Logging was banned in panda habitats
almost 20 years ago
and their numbers are increasing.
But China's ambition doesn't stop there.
There are plans for a wild reserve three times
the size of Yellowstone.
Linking almost 70 panda habitats,
it will allow more pandas to mingle and mate
in the hope of boosting the panda's population.
This is conservation on a truly epic scale.
In the mountain range above Paul,
a second filming unit led by cameraman Jacky Poon
is about to experience first-hand how large
these wild reserves are.
People sort of nodded when we said we were looking
for wild snow leopards.
They nodded "yeah, sure" with red-crowned cranes.
The monkeys "no problem,"
but when we said we wanted to film pandas,
everybody sort of had a slight intake of breath,
and wanted to assure us that that was not going to be easy.
Pandas live in the most remote,
thickest, densest, highest sort of habitats you
could hope to find,
and to track down a panda really takes
a lot of perseverance
and a lot of luck.
NARRATOR: At the last official count,
there were nearly 2,000 pandas living in the wild,
almost 20% more than a decade ago.
Although locating them remains extremely hard,
Jacky and the team are determined to film
the country's most iconic creature.
PAUL: Going to try and find pandas
is physically very tough.
They live on mountain sides that are kind of vertical.
And at the sort of altitudes
where oxygen is noticeably thin,
so actually getting your breath is quite difficult.
Add to that, in the times that you might meet them,
it can be very cold in those habitats.
Big snow storms, freezing weather can come in
at any time
and you're pretty exposed on those mountains
and you're likely to be cut off.
JACKY: The terrain is extremely difficult.
What we have to do is ascent from camp
every single day to go in to a hide,
waiting for a panda to approach us.
And there's essentially no path, no trails,
we have to make our own trails to look for pandas.
It just makes the whole operation extremely hard.
NARRATOR: The only way Jacky can haul himself up
is to grab the sharp bamboo.
So he has to wear gloves to prevent his hands
from being cut open.
He climbs this route every morning at first light
to reach a filming hide
placed in the only clearing he can find.
It's over 10,000 feet above sea level,
higher than the Appalachians.
Today on the way up,
he discovers a tunnel in the bamboo.
These paths can only be made by pandas.
JACKY: These are scratch marks by pandas.
And...
you can see here there's also some fresh droppings.
NARRATOR: Moments later, further signs.
So we've got panda's poo three to four days old.
NARRATOR: Exciting news for the team.
Pandas are definitely here.
But even with promising signs on the ground,
the ever-changing weather is not helping filming.
Visibility is reduced to less than 30 feet.
JACKY: I got here five hours ago this morning, early.
And I've been sitting in a hide looking
to hopefully spot a panda and be able to film it.
It's proving to be very difficult though,
especially with the weather condition now.
Filming pandas in these conditions is almost
impossible.
NARRATOR: Nothing left to do, but to head back
over the ridge to camp.
A three-hour scramble home.
Oh, oh, I'm wet through.
Soaked through.
Oh man.
(THUNDER RUMBLING)
NARRATOR: Another day.
Another early start.
As the days and weeks progress,
Jacky and the team repeat the climb, determined
to succeed.
Come on, pandas. Where are you?
Almost May.
It's meant to be like 20 degrees Celsius.
Oh, gosh.
NARRATOR: Instead, it's colder than an icebox.
And getting around is treacherous.
Oh, man...
Again?
Still waiting.
NARRATOR: A month passes
without a single sighting.
Yeah, it's quite frustrating, to be honest.
I guess this is wildlife film-making.
You get lucky or you don't.
I don't know what, what we can do really,
just a...
Yeah.
NARRATOR: But then, some news reaches the team.
A panda's been spotted.
The first confirmed sighting Jacky and the team
have heard about in four weeks.
They relocate as fast as possible.
And sure enough hidden amongst the greenery.
(WHISPERING) We are finally able to film
a panda in a wild environment.
NARRATOR: Amongst the thick undergrowth,
a very special bear.
Still remarkably rare to see,
China is working tirelessly to increase their numbers.
This panda, the next step in that success story.
PAUL: A panda bear is really special
in so far as they're probably the most iconic
endangered species that we have.
If you preserve the panda,
you preserve these amazing forests over huge swathes
of China.
And with the panda, all the species that
are in those forests.
So it seems only right that these wonderful,
remarkable, amazing animals
are guaranteed a place by our conservation efforts.
NARRATOR: As summer turns to autumn,
Ya Ya and Mei Mei venture out.
PAUL: The main thrust of our story
is the first year of that baby panda's life.
And to witness the really very special relationship
that mother panda bears have with their cubs.
NARRATOR: As Mei Mei grows up,
the crew follow her adventures.
Panda bear mothers and cubs have
a, I think genuinely unique relationship.
I've never filmed an animal where the bond seems as strong
as between a mother panda bear and her cub.
And it's a really fun bond.
Mum really seems to see her cub
as this fantastic play partner,
and sometimes I have to say almost seems
to treat it as this toy.
The cubs for their part are incredibly boisterous,
very roly-poly.
They get into all sorts of trouble.
And the incredible thing about a panda is
it seems to be able to fall huge distances,
to roll into rocks, to bounce off trees,
and it's almost like they're made of rubber,
there's a little moment of shock,
and then they're straight back into the play.
I just think that's a, that's a wonderful thing
about pandas.
We've been filming panda cubs since the beginning,
since they were really young
and follow their livelihood until they are grown up.
So you know every part we've seen, every part
we've filmed
is always ultimately we get an "ahh" out of it.
They are pandas.
They are just beautiful, cuddly and adorable.
I think it's hard not to look at a mother animal
to see the sheer effort
she puts in to bringing up her young
and to not feel a little bit of that care yourself.
So if by showing these species' first year
in their journey towards adulthood,
we make people care a little bit about them
as individuals
and hence care about the species as a population,
then it won't be a bad thing.
NARRATOR: The autumn leaves are in full display.
The trees as colorful as any New England fall
in North America.
Across the country,
the Born In China crews stay with their stars,
following their every move.
Tao Tao is thriving outside the family group.
(DRUMBEAT)
But every day is a lesson in survival.
The goshawk is a proven hunter of golden snub-nosed monkeys.
All must be careful here.
These are amongst the fastest and most agile birds
of prey on the planet.
Armed with the best eyesight in the animal kingdom,
eight times more powerful than a human's.
The goshawk is capable of tucking in its wings
during flight
to pass through the smallest gaps in pursuit of prey.
Fortunately, there are enough eyes on him today
to keep Tao Tao and the other monkeys
out of danger.
The chiru herds are also keeping an eye
out for predators
on the long walk back from the birthing grounds.
And for good reason.
The herds are relentlessly pursued by wolves.
But these young chiru are already strong enough
to outrun their predators.
Again safety in numbers
wins the day.
And Mei Mei, well,
she's just a danger to herself.
But she'll be okay.
Mom knows that falling down for a young panda
is all part of growing up.
All is well with the Born In China characters.
And as winter approaches, the filming expeditions
become more frequent
as the animals prepare for the cold.
At the monkey location, the crew are hoping
to film a battle
over a seasonal delicacy.
Pine cones are a prized source of energy before
winter sets in.
And it's one of Tao Tao's favorite foods.
His gang are making the most of an autumn bonanza
at the edge of their territory.
But there's tension amongst the monkeys.
(TENSE MUSIC PLAYING)
With the cones such a precious resource,
everyone wants in on this patch.
(MONKEYS SQUEALING)
Grazing rights for the pine cones
will only be sorted out one way.
The main fight is between Tao Tao's dad
and the leader of the Lost Boys.
Loyalties divided between his family
and the gang,
Tao Tao looks on anxiously.
It's a fight of tooth and claw.
Tao Tao's dad emerges victorious
and the Lost Boy's leader is defeated.
Tao Tao survives another drama.
Back up on the high plateau,
it's the turn of the chiru crew
to find their stars.
The team are 200 miles southeast of Zhuonai Lake,
the first filming location,
to film a special event that only happens once a year.
It's the chiru courtship season.
After three weeks of walking from where
the chiru gave birth,
the moms and babies are arriving
at the courtship grounds.
Where the males, who have been alone
for many weeks,
are waiting patiently.
It's time for the antelope to start a new family again.
For the next few weeks,
the males will be thinking of nothing else
than getting together with the females.
(BELLOWING)
But unlike at the lake
where the herd was concentrated
in one place to give birth,
the females are now spread far and wide across
the high plateau.
Both film crew and male chirus are going to have
to track them down.
At least the team are in expert hands.
Jiaxi is a ranger for this wild reserve.
He knows this place and how the chiru
behave better than anyone.
JIAXI: Now the chirus are on the plateau,
the males start to try to capture the females.
They will all move to that area,
close to our camp.
- So we are actually... - ...in a good spot.
Okay.
NARRATOR: It's great local knowledge,
but actually filming the chiru courtship
is a different matter altogether.
(BELLOWING)
Especially as the males are still seeking out
the females.
But right now the male's advances aren't
impressing any of them.
(CHIRUS BELLOWING)
The best tactic for the film crew with the chiru
spread so far and wide
is to try on foot.
ROLF: And it's still before sunrise.
We try to find the chirus to get them in the nice
light in the morning.
It's minus 18 degrees, so it's quite cold.
Fingers crossed.
(WIND BLOWING)
NARRATOR: But any chance of filming
is quickly dashed.
It's amazing how chirus survive
in this plateau.
It's very windy again.
And there in the background, you can see the dark clouds,
brownish clouds, it's all dust storm.
So the next dust storm is coming,
it makes our work really hard, so...
Yeah, we have to wait it out.
(WIND BLOWING)
NARRATOR: For the next few hours,
the team will be going nowhere on foot.
And even in the vehicle,
getting around is becoming impossible.
I can't see the road anymore.
NARRATOR: The wind gradually subsides,
the dust settles,
and the skies clear bringing not only fine weather,
but also good fortune.
The courtship begins.
We have a male there with a harem of eight females
and he's pretty active trying to keep
the girls together and chasing other males away
and we start to get behavior which is really uplifting.
NARRATOR: With his harem of females in place,
this male will now do everything he can
to keep them.
He must herd his females away from other males
to give him the best chance to play his part
before the females leave for the lake again
to give birth.
Now so determined to impress the females,
he won't stop chasing them for weeks
in a bid for mating rights.
All his energies are spent on this courtship ritual
dominated by calling and prancing.
He won't even stop to eat.
There's nothing else on his mind.
Any of the other males that dare enter his space
are chased off at lightning speed.
This is his territory.
The loudest, fastest, and most imposing male
wins the day.
ROLF: The chirus were really undisturbed
and did their thing.
So, um...
it was a pretty good day
and we got the start of the males chasing
each other.
NARRATOR: Filming the chiru has been an epic effort.
Over 150 days,
the team have ventured into areas few people
have ever been,
experienced isolation and extreme cold.
My fingers are incredibly cold.
NARRATOR: But successfully filmed an animal
which lives at extremes
and is fighting back from the edge of extinction.
For the first time,
the lives of the chiru have been captured on film.
The team's achievement is unique,
to say the least.
(BIRDS CALLING)
Far to the east,
the family of cranes are ready to begin their migration.
Paul and the team are there to see them off.
Now nine months old,
the crane chicks are almost unrecognizable.
Already nearly as tall as their parents.
Before the first signs of winter hit their
birthplace,
they will leave for warmer pastures.
A migration that will hopefully remain possible
for years to come.
PAUL: Red-crowned cranes find themselves where
cities are being built,
where populations are expanding
and industry is working.
Hand in hand with that development,
there has to be, and I would say, there is a sensitivity
to preserving the wetlands and the marshes that
the cranes need.
Now that's important for the cranes,
but obviously one day, it will also be important
for the populations of people here.
Because having big cities is important,
but you also need somewhere to escape
from those big cities,
and experience the wild.
And there couldn't be a more rewarding summit
to that experience
than to see the beautiful red-crowned cranes out
in these marshes.
NARRATOR: The first flakes of winter snow arrive.
Soon vast areas of the country are covered.
Winter is here.
The Born In China film crews capture picture-perfect images
of a winter wonderland from the ground.
And from the air.
These aerial shots filmed from a state-of-the-art
stabilized camera
mounted to a helicopter,
are the first of their kind.
No crew has filmed this high over China.
Back on the ground
and baby Mei Mei continues to flourish
doing her best to become independent from mom Ya Ya.
Like all pandas,
Mei Mei is born to climb.
Under the watchful eye of Ya Ya,
she's spending her days exploring.
But Mei Mei's trying to reach too high too soon.
It will be a few more months until she is strong enough
and wise enough to survive on her own.
For now, her mom is not going to let her go.
For the monkey team, this is their most
important time of year.
They only have one winter to try and capture on film
an extraordinary and very rare behavior.
JUSTIN: Something that's special about
golden snub-nosed monkeys
is they live right up into the snowline
and this is something we really wanted to show.
In the winter shoot, we were really hoping to
film something we were told about
that happens specifically in winter,
and that's the monkeys walking bipedally
on two feet like we do.
And it seems as if they do
this to avoid
putting their hands on to the ground
because it's cold.
This was our goal for the winter filming.
NARRATOR: What the crew need
is cold temperatures and enough snow to settle.
A few days later,
the perfect conditions arrive.
We have to go and find the monkeys now,
they're somewhere up the mountain.
NARRATOR: But for Justin and the crew,
following fast moving monkeys up steep
snow-covered slopes with heavy filming gear
isn't easy.
More than two hours into the climb,
the team eventually find the monkeys
and set up to film.
There was one particular moment
which I loved was
which I found funny as well,
we were filming our very first snow,
and I just happened to be standing right
by a tree
and the monkeys decided to use me as a perch.
Do I have two on me?
- WOMAN: Yeah, you have two. - Feels like it.
- I've got two tails anyway. - You have two monkeys now.
Oh, yeah, he's just trying to get right on your head.
(CHUCKLING)
WOMAN: So, how's filming going today?
(BOTH LAUGHING)
I've got a very good view of a monkey's
bottom right now.
(MONKEYS CHITTERING)
NARRATOR: The conditions stay perfect
for the next few days.
And the team are seeing glimpses
of the monkey behavior they are hoping for.
- JESS: Oh, my God! - JUSTIN: That is so sweet.
Oh, you are like the cutest thing.
That is just the sweetest thing you could ever
possibly see.
It happens so quickly,
and it's not necessarily in the right setting,
so getting all of the things right
to capture it is really hard.
You might, you know, we're starting to see it now,
but actually getting it on camera is
a whole different story.
Not a good angle and there's lots of scruffy vegetation.
It needs to be more attractive
and a better camera angle would be good.
It's not really working
because we are too close.
I wasn't fast enough.
NARRATOR: Finally, it all clicks into place
and the team capture the monkeys walking
on two feet.
It was definitely a moment,
the best bit is the mum with the baby attached to her.
- Running along. - MAN: There's another one.
That one in the back.
(HAPPY MUSIC PLAYING)
NARRATOR: It's been a very successful year
for the monkey team,
full of fond memories thanks to these amazing
wild primates.
A bit of warmth and the monkeys
are just so much more
relaxed and happy.
NARRATOR: And just before the crew up pack up,
a bonus.
JUSTIN: We had one that particularly
liked doing back flips
I mean he doesn't need to do back flips but...
obviously doing it for fun, I can't think
what other reason.
Oh, my goodness.
JUSTIN: We were very privileged
to be spending time
with these animals which are very habituated.
They knew us, each crew member as individuals.
And they were cheeky at times.
They would jump onto the camera,
and push bits or want to interact with us,
and mostly we were trying not to distract them
in any way,
you know we wanted to observe purely natural behavior.
But I loved the moments when they were engaged with us
and wanted to be engaged
with us.
I'm not quite happy with the position
of my camera flag.
JESS: It's really hard to pick a favorite moment
with the golden snub-nosed monkeys
because there were so many.
The thing I found probably the most entertaining
about them
was the youngsters, they just love to play so much
and they would often come and play near us and jump
on the camera bags
and the camera and us.
And I could just sit and watch them for hours.
Those were my favorite times.
(MONKEYS CHIRPING)
NARRATOR: The filming of Born In China
is a remarkable achievement.
Teams of experienced international crews
often working in little explored corners of
this amazing country,
successfully filmed rare endangered animals
and landscapes.
Tao Tao survived being pushed out,
returning happily to grow up with his sister
and his family.
The crane family completed their journey south.
Once again, the chiru herds set off on the highest
mammal migration on Earth.
And Mei Mei, finally, grew strong enough
to branch out
on her own.
These expeditions revealed a country
working to preserve its wildlife and habitats,
and those striving to make it happen.
The people we've met
in the areas that we've been filming
have been really wonderful and helpful.
Of course, we've needed their help with bags,
just the sheer amount of kit.
But more importantly, we've needed their expertise.
They know those animals so well.
They can spot an animal at distances
that frankly I couldn't see an animal through
binoculars at.
We were really lucky to find some brilliant local crew.
They were absolutely instrumental
to the footage that we were able to capture.
Without them we just wouldn't have been able to do
what we've done.
We could not have achieved what we've done
without the local support.
In fact, we wouldn't have achieved it.
NARRATOR: During the filming of Born In China,
the team spent 1,000 filming days in the country.
Alongside the biggest human population on the planet,
they filmed vast remote habitats.
Home to rare creatures unfamiliar inside the country,
let alone to the rest of the world.
The expeditions have opened a window onto the rarely seen
animals of China.