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00:30For 40 million years, the plains of South America have been ruled by an awesome group
00:52of predators. The aptly named terror birds. But recently, all this has changed. A new breed
01:18of killer has arrived, one fierce enough to terrorize the terror birds. Smilodon, the fabled
01:37saber tooth. The most powerful big cat of all time.
02:00There is no such thing as a saber tooth tiger. The correct name for these beasts is saber
02:05tooth cats, and there have been many different species. The largest, at over 300 kilograms,
02:11is this one. Smilodon, which means knife tooth. Originally from North America, they came to
02:17South America two million years ago. The balance of life here changed as they took over the
02:22role of top predators. They live in tightly knit clans, and this is the story of three
02:28dramatic months in the life of one particular group, led by a seven-year-old male called
02:34Half Tooth. Right from the beginning, Half Tooth has problems. Recently, a pair of rival males
02:41have appeared. And they want Half Tooth's crown.
03:02Half Tooth's territory spans several hundred square kilometers of grassland on one of the strangest
03:08continents on Earth. Since splitting from Antarctica 30 million years ago, South America has been
03:14isolated from the rest of the world, and as a result, its animals are unique. Oddities
03:19thrive here, like Didacurus, a spiky-tailed relative of the armadillo, the size of a car.
03:28Even the large herds of herbivores are exotic. These Macrochinia are unrelated to any modern mammal.
03:35And then, of course, there are the native predators, the flightless terror birds. These are three meters tall, and called Foros rachos.
03:46But the isolation of these animals came to an end when the movement of the South American
03:50continent caused it to collide with North America. Across a land bridge came new groups of mammals
03:57to colonize this exotic world. Life here would never be the same again.
04:06Cats were among those colonists. No cat had ever set foot in South America before. But now Sabre Tooth's rule the grasslands.
04:16Half Tooth took over this clan three years ago, breaking one Sabre in the process. The group is now made up of four adult females and their offspring.
04:26All the youngsters are Half Tooth's. During his reign, Half Tooth has seen off many challenges from rival males.
04:38But none as serious as this one. Two rival males have wandered deep into Half Tooth's territory. As usual he is quick to respond.
04:50But these are brothers, and they are working together. Even by Smilodon standards, Half Tooth is a very large male. But he has never before faced two opponents at once. The odds this time are stacked against him.
05:08The females read the signals and start to retreat. Their only concern is to protect their offspring.
05:27These fights can be brutal, and Half Tooth has the most to lose. Not only control of the clan, but possibly his life.
05:39No match for the brothers, Half Tooth is quick to back down.
06:05He has at least escaped serious injury, but his problems are just beginning. Life for a lone male is a grim battle for survival.
06:17Half Tooth hasn't had to feed himself for three years, because it was the females in the clan that did the hunting.
06:31Outcast from the rich grasslands, now controlled by the brothers, he heads into the scrub forest on the edges of his old territory, where he must learn to scrape out a living.
06:42With many of the creatures here, he stands no chance.
06:47Didicurus, for instance, are not only well armoured, they are huge.
06:52These are ancient relatives of the armadillo, yet they weigh almost 300 times as much.
06:58Their spiked tail clubs alone can weigh 40 kilos, as much as a cannonball.
07:10Although fearsome defensive weapons, the males mostly use their tails on each other to batter rivals into submission during hormone-fueled jousts for a mate.
07:20The loser ends up with more than just his pride dented.
07:35In the clan, tensions are running high.
07:39The females will not accept the brothers while they still have young.
07:50Defeating Half Tooth was only part of the battle.
07:54If the brothers are to gain authority over the clan, they'll have to kill the cubs.
08:09Meanwhile, Half Tooth has pushed deeper into the scrub forest in search of food.
08:14But if anything, his task is getting more difficult.
08:17The dense undergrowth harbours another colossus, a sloth.
08:23But this is no ordinary sloth.
08:28This is megatherium, a giant ground sloth.
08:33It has huge claws, is six metres from nose to tail, and weighs more than an elephant.
08:40A very different beast from its distant relatives, the gentle tree sloths.
08:44Half Tooth moves cautiously.
08:50The sloth also boasts impressive defences.
08:55Small bones beneath his skin act like chain mail.
08:59Adults are virtually indestructible.
09:04Half Tooth wisely gives them a wide berth.
09:14Half Tooth.
09:19Weeks pass, and the wet season is in full swing.
09:27The females have done their best, but only two of Half Tooth's cubs survive.
09:32And the brothers are a constant danger.
09:33They spend much of their time patrolling their new territory.
09:37Spraying the boundaries with scent, as a warning to other males.
09:41They will not attack the cubs while the mother is present, but she must abandon them to go hunting.
09:45This is when they are most at risk, and so this mother protects them by hiding them in the dense undergrowth.
10:03While the females are absent, the brothers are spotted dangerously close to the hiding place.
10:17The cubs' lives hang by a thread.
10:22Now their only hope is to remain motionless.
10:25Now their only hope is to remain motionless.
10:28Out on the plains there are large herds of macrochaemia.
10:53Unique to South America, this species is the last of their kind.
11:00They are prime targets for Smilodon.
11:03Macrochaemia are fast, wary animals, and getting close enough to kill one takes endless patience.
11:25The females hunt together as a pack, inching forward to set the trap.
11:30They have been closing in on this herd for two hours now.
11:34Gradually they fan out with the lead female moving wide, trying to encircle their prey.
11:41Smilodon are powerful killers and able to accelerate explosively.
11:46But they are not built for long chases.
11:49Unless they get close, they don't stand a chance.
12:00One false move, and they will have to start all over again.
12:16The lead female drives the herd towards the other females.
12:39But there are still females.
12:44So he is ready for always.
12:49Now, we all know how that is.
13:03Having chosen their target, the cats close in.
13:20Macrokinia have outstanding manoeuvrability.
13:36The victim jinx, completely wrong-footing her pursuer.
13:42But that's why Smilodon hunt in groups.
13:44A second cat brings her down.
13:50Surprisingly, as the cats fight to restrain their prey, they do not use their infamous
14:08teeth in case they break them.
14:15First they work together to pin down the struggling animal under the weight of their bodies.
14:26Only when the prey is totally subdued are the famous sabres drawn.
14:36They are extraordinarily precise and accurate tools for killing.
14:39Their teeth simultaneously sever the blood supply and strangle the windpipe.
14:44One bite and the prey is dead.
14:46But these are the original double-edged swords.
14:49The lethal 20-centimeter sabres are actually quite fragile.
14:54They cannot bite into bone and so Smilodon can only eat the fleshier parts of a carcass.
15:00This is very wasteful.
15:02Something that hasn't gone unnoticed by other carnivores on the grasslands.
15:15The terror birds are supreme opportunists.
15:18They may have been replaced as top predators, but they have quickly found new ways of surviving,
15:24thanks to the cats.
15:27Eventually the Smilodon have eaten as much as their sabres will allow them.
15:44They leave the kill for the birds to pick over.
15:50South America is not the only place terror birds are doing well.
15:54Once the land bridge opened to North America, they were one of the few creatures to spread
15:58north successfully.
16:00While these terror birds eat Smilodon's leftovers, their cousins are running riot in Texas and Florida.
16:10They only died out just before modern humans appeared.
16:20After the hunt, the mother returns to where she hid the cubs, as she has done several times
16:25over the last weeks.
16:30She calls to them, but her calls go unanswered.
16:38Half Tooth is soon spotted nearby, roaming on the fringes of a territory that used to be his own.
16:56But where he once sprayed, he can clearly smell the scent of the brothers.
17:09That is not the only signal they have left.
17:15With the death of his cubs, his last tie with the group has been severed.
17:28The takeover is complete.
17:34Sightings of Half Tooth have started to become rare, and it is clear from his physical condition
17:51he is not thriving in the scrub forest.
17:54It is dawn, and Half Tooth is exploiting his sensitive vision to hunt in the low light.
18:03Male Macrochaenia live separately from the herds, and often wander into the scrub forest
18:08to browse, using their long noses to strip fresh leaves.
18:19Half Tooth waits, and allows the Macrochaenia to wander ever closer.
18:25There must be no mistakes this time.
18:36But a giant ground sloth is about to ruin everything.
18:39As he crashes through the undergrowth, Half Tooth's quarry starts moving away.
18:44It is now or never.
19:01Half Tooth is too weak to follow.
19:04The longer he goes without a kill, the smaller his chance of making one.
19:14Half Tooth's quarry starts moving away.
19:19Increasingly desperate, he is seen still patrolling the same area later that morning.
19:33He spots a Macrochaenia mother and young close to the forest edge.
19:37They have wandered away from the main herd.
19:40Maybe this time.
20:00With a lightning strike of its massive beak and claws, a terror bird comes from nowhere to kill the youngster.
20:06But all is not lost for Half Tooth.
20:16He seizes his chance.
20:19Scavenging is now his best hope.
20:36But after finishing this kill, Half Tooth disappeared from this scrub forest.
20:42Not far away, the brothers have completely usurped Half Tooth.
20:57With the last of the cubs dead, the clan has now accepted them.
21:01The remaining adolescents are tolerated by the brothers because they are female and will soon be old enough to mate.
21:14And with no cubs to suckle, the older females come into heat again.
21:20Killing Half Tooth's cubs was not just a pointless act of violence.
21:25With the cubs out of the way, the clan can now concentrate on raising the brothers' offspring.
21:30And passing their genes on to the next generation.
21:42All in all, the clan is returning to normal.
21:45The young females practice their hunting skills.
21:49Although the didacurus they have picked on has little time for their games.
22:11The rainy season has come and gone, and Half Tooth has not been seen for weeks.
22:16His old clan, however, is very much in evidence.
22:19They have been making a kill every few days.
22:22And today they are once again feeding well.
22:29As usual, the terror birds are not far away.
22:32But on this occasion there is another scavenger.
22:35A megatherium.
22:37They might be herbivores, but they will occasionally go for carrion to supplement their diet.
22:42And when they do, nothing gets in their way.
23:03One of the brothers has been killed.
23:05The rest of the Smilodon quickly abandon the kill to the giant.
23:14In the blink of an eye, the megatherium has changed everything for the clan.
23:20Now there is only one brother left.
23:23Within days, Half Tooth suddenly reappears.
23:35He must have been closely monitoring his old territory.
23:38So sensitive is the sense of smell in cats that he can tell the identity and even the health of a male who has left his scent.
23:47In this case, the marks are easy to interpret.
23:50Where there were once two males, now there is only one.
23:53Within the clan, things are going badly for the remaining male.
24:08He was not the dominant of the two brothers.
24:11And the females appear to have become unsettled again.
24:15But it is not the females that the lone brother is worried about.
24:27It is only a matter of time before other males come looking for trouble.
24:31He continues to patrol his territory, but a challenge will come sooner than the brother expects.
24:50Half Tooth is back.
24:56Encouraged by the signals, he is wasting no time in trying to reclaim the clan.
25:06A fresh scent trail leads him on.
25:20Three months after losing to the brothers, Half Tooth is once again about to fight for this territory.
25:47The odds this time have evened up.
25:50Yeah, let's go.
25:52It is a fire that has been dangerous to the others.
25:53Let's go.
25:55We'll help you.
25:56Awe!
25:57Have fun.
25:58Awe!
25:59Awe!
26:00Awe!
26:01Awe!
26:02Awe!
26:03Awe!
26:04Awe!
26:05Awe!
26:07Awe!
26:09Awe!
26:10Awe!
26:11Awe!
26:12Awe!
26:13Awe!
26:14Awe!
26:15Awe!
26:16Awe!
26:17Awe!
26:18Awe!
26:19The fight is brief and brutal, but Half Tooth triumphs.
26:35The brother is defeated and fatally injured.
26:46Unlike Half Tooth, this cat will get no second chance.
26:57The short, violent reign of the brothers is over.
27:16A year later finds Half Tooth surrounded by new arrivals of his own.
27:25He is king of the grasslands again.
27:32Smilodon were very successful predators and survived up until as recently as 10,000 years
27:38ago.
27:40But eventually the world around them changed too much.
27:44The climate became cooler and drier.
27:47The larger prey they specialized in killing disappeared.
27:50The saber-toothed world came to an end.
28:02In our final episode things will get much, much colder as we visit our ancestors in an
28:07ice age 30,000 years ago.
28:11It was the toughest of times and gave rise to one of the most awesome mammals of all.
28:19The Mammoths.
28:20The Mammoths.
28:21The Mammoths.
28:26The Mammoth.
28:27The Mammoth.
28:28The Mammoth.
28:29The Mammoth.
28:30The Mammoth.
28:31The Mammoth.
28:32The Mammoth.
28:33The Mammoth.
28:34The Mammoth.
28:35The Mammoth.
28:36The Mammoth.
28:37The Mammoth.
28:38The Mammoth.
28:39The Mammoth.
28:40The Mammoth.
28:41The Mammoth.
28:42The Mammoth.
28:43The Mammoth.
28:44The Mammoth.
28:45The Mammoth.
28:46The Mammoth.
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