I'll have nightmares

 

One of the things that I decided to do this year was watch more wildlife programs on TV. Actually for more, read any. I've never been a fan of these really for a variety of reasons, chief amongst them the fact that I'm not  all that interested in the natural world. ( So? Come shoot me. And while we're on the topic of things that don't interest me, add food. If all there was to eat in the world was bread butter cheese and chocolate my heart would not be broken.)

 

Anyway it occurred to me recently that I'm a bit ignorant of all the species that we share the planet with and given that we pass this way but once etc etc it maybe behoved me to find out a bit more about plants, animals, birds and so on.

 

Which explains why I didn't hit the Off button when BBC1 showed a repeat of the first episode of David Attenbrough's new series Africa this eveninig. There you go I thought, a chance to watch a wildlife documentary. Just what you were wanting.

 

I watched it and almost every minute of it reminded me of the reasons why I don't watch these things. First of all I didn't actually see manty species of which I had been previously unaware. Some red beaked birds and a blind golden catfish. That's not much for an hour's viewing is it?

 

Secondly there were huge swathes of it which reminded me of every other wildlife documentary I have ever been obliged to sit through before. A leopard loped about. He couldn't find food. Life was difficult for young leopards when their mother ceased to provide. I knew that was what the commentary was going to say before it was said. And why? Because every program about big cats you ever saw in your life does the thing about how difficult it is for them to find food. In fact the only surprising thing about big cats in wildlife documentaries is that they haven't all already died of starvation leaving wildlife documentary makers with no big cats to film.  

 

And thirdly, I don't care how brilliant almost everyone else in the world says he is, the breathy tones and relentless anthropomorphism of David Attenborough really get on my nerves. As does the cheese-y choice of music on the soundtrack. 

 

And finally there are the gory bits. What do you mean, which gory bits? There are always gory bits in this sort of thing. In this instance an attack on baby birds lying blind and helpless in their nest by a convoy of some fearsome looking insects called something like the armoured  ground cricket. Now imo blind featherless baby birds are some of the ugliest, most revolting creatures on the planet, but this does not mean that I want to watch them swarmed over and consumed by some equally repulsive insectoids. Just as I reached for the remote the voice over jauntily remarked that the parent birds were flying over the horizon in the nick of time to rescue their offspring, so I heaved a quick sigh of relief and left the program running. In the event the adult birds duly rescued their offspring, but not before one of them had been squirted in the eye by a foul smelling and slightly acidic secretion from the cricket. Self same cricket was then despatched to the desert floor by the other parent bird, where it  was promptly consumed by its fellows. So, an attenpted massacre of the innocents followd by parental sacrifice, treachery and cannibalism. And people say nature programs are relaxing!

 

On the upside, the socialising rhinos were quite endearing, the landscapes of the Kalahari and Namib deserts were breathtakingly beautiful and I learned that dung beetles push their little balls of dung backwards and with their back legs. What little acrobats they are to be sure!!

 

 

 

 

Inverness? Don't even ask!