- 4 days ago
Follows the famous zoologist as he ventures into the steamy jungles of the Xishuangbanna Reserve in southern Yunnan to track down massive local wildlife, including China's largest remaining population of wild Asian elephants....
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AnimalsTranscript
00:00China is vast, covering 7% of the planet's land surface.
00:07In this series, I'll explore the country's mountains,
00:11I feel on top of the world, and grasslands.
00:16I'll cross China's greatest deserts and jungles.
00:21China is the only country with elephants in the south and reindeer in the north.
00:28I'll go in search of them and many other extraordinary and rare creatures.
00:36Join me on my adventures in untamed China.
00:47Jing Hong, a tropical paradise in the far south of China.
00:52I'm here to meet some of the superb creatures
00:55that live in the jungle, surrounding the city.
00:58In this land of giants, I'll meet a huge python...
01:03There's a camera.
01:05...an enormous rat,
01:07world's largest species of moth...
01:10And...
01:11A giant lizard...
01:13...and a most peculiar mammal.
01:19But my main mission is to meet in the wild one of untamed China's rarest and unexpected animals.
01:28The Asian elephant, another giant.
01:38Around 300 elephants remain in China.
01:43Their stronghold is the Shishuan Banar Reserve.
01:47At two and a half thousand square kilometres, it covers an area larger than London.
01:52But this isn't a pristine wilderness.
01:57A highway and many smaller roads cut right through the reserve.
02:06Elephants can be so close to the roadside, drivers are warned not to beep their horns in case they startle
02:14them.
02:19Elephants' crossing can be a hazard here.
02:24With young calves to protect, they've been known to charge at vehicles.
02:33Elephants should always have right of way.
02:42With just two weeks here, I can't rely upon a chance encounter with wild elephant.
02:49I'll go into the jungle to search for them.
02:54But before I begin my quest, I'll learn about how elephants in China spend their time in the jungle...
03:02...by bending the ear of a very special one.
03:06Oh, they're much rarer than giant pandas, which is why every one is precious.
03:12So the forestry department go to any lengths to save them if they get into trouble.
03:18This is Jan Jan.
03:19When she was a calf, she was caught in a snare.
03:25A rescue team entered the forest to save her.
03:29While they worked, her distraught mother attacked them and had to be scared off.
03:37The wire had bitten deep into the little calf's leg.
03:44It took five hours to cut her free and treat the terrible wound.
03:55It was touch-and-go if she'd pull through.
04:01But the plucky calf wasn't going to give up easily.
04:05With first-rate medical attention, Jan Jan survived that terrible wound.
04:11Now you can just see a scar on her back leg.
04:18Now Shosham, a forest ranger, is assigned to look after her every knee.
04:25Walking with Jan Jan is such a privilege.
04:28I don't mind being muddied by an elephant's ear.
04:32You've made me really dirty.
04:39Jan Jan was rescued when she was two and a half years old.
04:43Too young to have learnt about life in the wild.
04:46So she can never be safely returned there.
04:51Now eight, she's a calming influence for other rescued elephants.
05:02Jan Jan Jan's companionship has helped the recovery of 14-year-old Ping Ping.
05:09Taken in sick and underweight a few months ago,
05:12she'll soon be fit enough to be returned to the wild.
05:22She's an expert at finding forest foods, and needs to be.
05:28Adult elephants eat over 130 kilos of vegetation every day.
05:36In China, bamboo is a favourite food.
05:43Ping Ping pushes one of the giant grasses to the ground.
05:50Now she curls her trunk, rolling the giant grass against her foot.
05:59She dexterously strips away anything that doesn't take her fancy,
06:04and swallows the rest.
06:12Ping Ping and Jan Jan have given me a privileged view
06:16of Chinese elephants in their jungle home.
06:20Now, though, I must find a wild herd.
06:26They've been seen in Elephant Valley at the heart of the reserve.
06:31Home to massive reptiles, and giant creepy crawlies too,
06:36it seems a perfect base for my quest.
06:43But animal acrobats, not giants, are the first to attract my attention.
06:54White-cheek-hibbon.
06:58Moving so beautifully through the trees.
07:02He's in search of fruits, leaves, flowers, and insects too.
07:11Perfect view of the male there.
07:13The fur on the crown sticks right up.
07:16The female is a different colour, brown, but with much flatter fur on the head.
07:25There you are, there's the female and baby.
07:28These are extremely rare in China.
07:31There's only about 60 of them left.
07:35These beautiful animals have declined because of forest destruction and hunting.
07:39But now, they're fully protected.
07:43Climbing superbly.
07:48The way they move.
07:49Arm over arm like that.
07:51Brachiating is the technical term for that way of moving.
07:57Gibbons are the masters at it.
07:59In a single swing, they can cover over three metres.
08:05The female did a spectacular jump.
08:07There's the baby clinging to her tummy.
08:10With luck, this infant could live for 30 years.
08:16He has an older brother who is three now.
08:19His world will soon be turned upside down when he has to leave his family and find a mate of
08:26his own.
08:31Pairs of white-cheeked gibbons are faithful and can be together for up to 25 years.
08:43Beneath the gibbons' playground, lurking somewhere on the jungle floor, are the giants I'm searching for.
08:52Coming up, evidence of elephants and a giant snake.
08:58Stay there.
09:00They're all striking at the camera.
09:06I'm in Shushuan Benar Reserve in southern China.
09:10I've been joined by two forest rangers who are helping me track down wild elephants, giant reptiles and creepy crawlies.
09:21We're heading to an area where the rangers last sighted a herd.
09:25It was some time ago, but it seems like the best place to start.
09:30Oh, look at this.
09:30Nearly trod on it.
09:32A fantastic caterpillar.
09:35Wonderful eye spots.
09:36This is a hawk moth.
09:37And then...
09:39Ah!
09:42Yanjinsha is Mandarin for cobra.
09:45As the rangers say, that stance is exactly like a cobra.
09:49The caterpillar rears up when you touch it, flashes these eye spots.
09:53By mimicking a snake, it startles predators.
09:58You can tell this is a hawk moth caterpillar by the spike at the end of the body.
10:04Great thing.
10:05Beautiful creature.
10:08Great.
10:10This is where the elephants were last seen.
10:13So we look for clues to their presence.
10:22That is Chinese for elephant.
10:25It's obvious what this is, but it's certainly not fresh.
10:29This must have been dropped two or three months ago.
10:32We need fresher dung than that.
10:35Thanks, though.
10:36Shushany.
10:36As we search for more recent evidence, an elephant's footprint or trees that have been damaged,
10:43we notice something strange overhead.
10:46Oh, shushany.
10:48It looks like this tree trunk has been carpeted.
10:53This is a mass of moth caterpillars that you do not want to touch.
10:57They're covered in hairs that will cause extreme irritation.
11:01They cluster together like this so the irritating hairs form an impenetrable defensive shield.
11:13We're nearly at the end of our first day.
11:16We've found proof of elephant activity, but no fresh signs.
11:20I'm not disappointed, though.
11:22This is an extraordinary forest, and you never know what's just round the corner.
11:30Here's another of Shishwambunars.
11:33Extraordinary creatures.
11:36This is a great bamboo rat, only found in the far southwest of China.
11:47Lives almost entirely on bamboo, which is why I'm crawling on my hands and knees through a bamboo thicket.
11:54This is the biggest bamboo rat in the world.
11:57Weighs in at four kilograms, 50 centimeters long, about the size of a Jack Russell.
12:05This one would have just come out for its nocturnal feeding session.
12:09They normally sleep in burrows during the day.
12:13And now it's looking at me.
12:16What a face.
12:18What teeth.
12:21Looks like you need to trip to the dental hygienist for a scale and polish.
12:26Away you go.
12:29Females have three to five babies in an underground nest.
12:33This one's a little boy.
12:35I can tell from this rear view.
12:42Not moving that fast, but fast enough for me.
12:46I can't keep this up.
12:48Look at the state of me.
12:50But that was a great experience.
12:52Never seen one of those before.
12:54An extraordinary bamboo rat.
12:56This certainly is a land of giants.
13:01I hope tomorrow we'll track down some more of them.
13:13The next day, we continue our search for wild Asian elephants.
13:22We've been joined by another tracker, so we decide to split up.
13:27Two of the rangers will climb to a high viewpoint,
13:30while we look for fresh footprints along the river bank.
13:38There's no elephant tracks here, but we still come up trumps.
13:44Python!
13:45See you there.
13:48This is a big one.
13:51Get you out in the open.
13:53Get a good idea of the size of you.
13:57I reckon she's about five metres long.
14:00This is a Burmese python.
14:02This is the largest snake in...
14:05Whoa!
14:06Largest species of snake in China.
14:10Ooh, striking at the camera.
14:13There.
14:20Ooh, dear.
14:21They've got a hundred to a hundred and fifty recurved teeth.
14:28And then, oh yeah.
14:30In Shishwambana, these pythons would feed on mice and rats when they were small.
14:36At this size, they could eat prey as large as a monkey or a small dog.
14:42And they really are an impressive predator.
14:48Pythons, like the pit vipers, have a heat-sensing mechanism.
14:53They can detect warm objects with heat-sensing pits just behind the nostrils.
14:58So, ooh, when she strikes like that, she is seeing my body heat.
15:03I'm saying a she because this is such a huge snake.
15:07This is definitely a female.
15:10The males are much smaller.
15:13Ooh!
15:14I'll tell you what, dodging striking pythons certainly hones your reactions.
15:19I'm not very good at football, but I'm okay at doing this.
15:25Her hiss is much quieter now.
15:27Those few strikes tired her out.
15:30Reptiles fatigue much more easily than mammals.
15:33So, I'm going to lift her up.
15:35Ooh!
15:37She's not that tired.
15:39Now I'm going to help her on her way.
15:45Come on.
15:46Come on.
15:48Perfect habitat.
15:49Here for these beautiful pythons.
15:53Off you go, darling.
15:55Beautiful snake.
15:58I've now found two of Shishwambana's resident giants,
16:02but I still have an Asian elephant to find.
16:07The police are helping me with my enquiries.
16:12There's been reports of elephants raiding crops,
16:15and an officer escorts me to the scene of the crime.
16:25But we arrived just too late.
16:28The culprits have melted back into the jungle from where they came.
16:33I search for any clues they've left behind.
16:37You can see the elephants have been here very recently.
16:42They don't like eating the leaves of tea plants,
16:45but they've certainly been in this corner of the plantation.
16:49These puddles of water here are elephants' footprints.
16:53Impressive.
16:54Each footprint is over 30 centimetres across.
17:01If only I'd got here earlier,
17:03I could have witnessed the raiding party.
17:07Elephants find crops a great temptation,
17:10especially corn.
17:14They can cause devastating damage,
17:17and in the past they were shot.
17:20Thankfully, today they're fully protected,
17:24and the government compensates farmers for crop losses.
17:27In return, villagers don't harm the elephants,
17:31and just scare them away.
17:41In an attempt to make the fields less of a temptation,
17:45the park authorities now grow crops in the reserve,
17:48especially for the elephants.
17:54It's hoped this experiment will keep them from visiting gardens too.
18:07Despite the occasional scare,
18:10most of the locals are proud of their elephant neighbours.
18:14And with a jungle on their doorstep,
18:16they contend with many other animals too.
18:19Snake!
18:21Peppy!
18:23I know what this is.
18:25You're going to think I'm mad picking this up.
18:28This is called a false cobra.
18:32This little snake flattens its neck,
18:34makes a hood so predators think it's a cobra.
18:39The only difference is the false cobra is totally harmless.
18:43The teeth can barely break the skin.
18:46A snake like this would chase down small lizards and eat mice too.
18:52He's a feisty little fellow,
18:54common around cultivation like this,
18:57near to water, near to rice fields,
18:59and small streams.
19:01This one's just about to shed its skin.
19:03You can tell that by the milky eyes.
19:06You are great, aren't you?
19:09The false cobra.
19:12Come on, then.
19:14Away you go.
19:24Snakes will slither into cornfields after mice and rats,
19:28but there's another crop-braiding rodent that's hard to swallow.
19:33I come across one of its calling cards.
19:37Look.
19:38Elephants aren't the only animals that come down from the forest to feed in the fields.
19:42No prizes for guessing what animal this came from.
19:47It comes into crop fields at night.
19:50The Malayan porcupine.
19:53The whole family's here.
19:54The parents have twin babies in tow.
20:01With all those sharp quills,
20:03how does a porcupine have babies?
20:06Well, the quills of newborns are soft.
20:10They harden with age,
20:12so the birth is not too painful.
20:17About the size of a Labrador,
20:19porcupines eat leaves, fruits, nuts and insects.
20:26Corn on the cob is a delicacy,
20:28but it grows out of reach.
20:30But a nibble and a gnaw...
20:33cracks the conundrum.
20:42After the break, there's another emergency call.
20:46This time, it's a deadly house guest.
20:50And I'm still hoping to meet some of China's last elephants.
21:00I'm in Shishwambana Reserve in southwest China.
21:04It's a land of giants.
21:09I've already met a record-breaking rodent.
21:12This is a great bamboo rat.
21:16This is the biggest bamboo rat in the world.
21:20Python!
21:21As well as a huge Burmese python.
21:23Ooh, striking at the camera.
21:26There.
21:26But another giant, the Asian elephant,
21:29is proving to be elusive.
21:33I arrive just too late to see them raiding crops,
21:37but I'm hot on their trail.
21:44The forest police are giving me a ride back to Elephant Valley,
21:48where I'll continue my search.
21:53But on route, there's an emergency call
21:56about a dangerous squatter.
21:59Isn't what it seems.
22:01I've taken a ride with a forest policeman
22:03to meet China's Mr Snake Man.
22:09These people have got a snake.
22:10It was in the kitchen, actually,
22:12and it slithered out here.
22:15People are obviously worried about having a snake in the house.
22:21We're not sure what species it is.
22:24Could be a common rat snake.
22:26Could be a cobra.
22:27And for once, it's great to be a spectator.
22:31This man, he loves snakes as much as I do.
22:35There's the snake.
22:37It's not a rat snake.
22:42It is a cobra.
22:47That hissing there.
22:49Difficult manoeuvring the snake
22:52amongst all this kitchen stuff.
22:55It's a monocled cobra.
22:58You see the monocle on the back of the neck?
23:07And he's warding it off with the stick.
23:10Unlike the false cobra I found earlier,
23:12this is the genuine article with a deadly bite.
23:16And Mr Yang has done this many times.
23:19Well done!
23:24Fantastic!
23:29That's great.
23:30And that snake won't be killed.
23:31Mr Yang will check it's okay medically
23:33and then release it back into the forest
23:35where it can survive in the wild.
23:38Okay? Great stuff.
23:41I'm pretty certain there'll be cobras around my base
23:45in Elephant Valley.
23:47But just like wild elephants,
23:49they're wary and elusive.
23:52Melting into the jungle at the slightest hint of a human.
24:03Other creatures are confident in their camouflage,
24:06and it takes a lot to get them to budge.
24:11What a peculiar caterpillar.
24:14And it's one that I can identify.
24:17I used to rear these from eggs when I was a kid.
24:20They're bred under artificial conditions in Europe.
24:22But this is the first time I've seen one in its native country.
24:29This is the caterpillar of the largest moth in the world,
24:34the Atlas Moth.
24:39It's a pretty thing with sky blue on the tips of the legs.
24:43Because we're in the tropics where conditions are good all year round,
24:47insects can breed continuously.
24:48You can find all the generations at any one time.
24:54If we're lucky, we may be able to see one of the adult moths.
25:00I'll have to wait for nightfall to have the best chance
25:03of showing you one of those.
25:05But now we've got our eyes skinned for giants
25:08that are out and about in broad daylight.
25:13Monitor lizard!
25:26Just got the tail!
25:28And there!
25:30Yahoo!
25:31Another one of Shush...
25:34Another one of Shushuan Banal's giants!
25:37The water monitor is China's largest lizard.
25:41It can grow to nearly three metres.
25:44In fact, only the Komodo dragon gets larger than this lizard.
25:48A beautiful specimen.
25:50It's pretty cool in the water and a pretty cool morning,
25:53which is why it isn't thrashing about as much as I expected.
25:57Ooh!
25:59Ha-ha!
26:00These are tough, durable, go-anywhere lizards.
26:04Ooh!
26:05Strong claws for climbing trees,
26:07but they're always found near water.
26:09And they are superb swimmers.
26:11Look at this big, flattened tail.
26:13They can stay submerged for over 30 minutes.
26:17I'm glad this isn't warmed up and trying to get me.
26:20A bite from one of these would be much worse than a python's.
26:24Both have sharp teeth,
26:25but it's because of the monitor's diet that you've got to watch out.
26:29They can run down monkeys, rats, they eat fish, they eat frogs.
26:33But they also eat a lot of carrion.
26:35They've even been known to dig up human corpses and scavenge the flesh.
26:40So they haven't got the cleanest of mouths.
26:42If they bite you, you can get septicemia,
26:45and a wound that takes a long time to heal.
26:49So please, don't bite me.
26:51You are magnificent.
26:53Let's let him go now.
26:59After trekking for many kilometres,
27:01I've still not laid eyes on a wild elephant.
27:06But I'm not downhearted.
27:08There's always something to see here.
27:18Lovely splash of colour in the rainforest.
27:20There's a yellow-vented flower pecker.
27:25And a crimson sunbird.
27:32These little birds eat nectar and insects.
27:35The flower pecker relishes mistletoe berries, too.
27:44At dusk, I'm back in the forest, preparing to attract winged beauties,
27:50with the help of my bedsheet.
27:53Done and dusted, the trap is set.
27:56Remember that magnificent caterpillar we saw earlier?
27:59I would love to show you the record-breaking moth that it changes into.
28:05This light should lure them in.
28:10While I wait for the moths to gather,
28:12I'll take a look for other creatures of the night.
28:30Slow Loris.
28:33The Chinese name for this delightful creature is Lang Ho.
28:37That literally means lazy monkey.
28:41That's very appropriate.
28:43The slow Loris certainly lives life at a leisurely pace,
28:47and it is a primate.
28:50I can see the dark stripe down the back,
28:55which identifies this as a Bengal slow Loris.
29:02How did he get into that position?
29:05He's like a slow-motion gymnast.
29:15He's stalking an insect.
29:38With stops for snacks, he'll travel just 30 metres in a night.
29:47Delicious.
29:52Wonderful.
29:55The trap should be teeming with life by now.
30:02It's 10pm.
30:03There's a cicada.
30:05A few nice moths.
30:10But there's not the giant moth I want you to see.
30:13That's not unexpected, though.
30:15They're late risers,
30:16and usually fly in the early hours of the morning.
30:22I'll wait some more and see what else is out and about.
30:34And there.
30:35This is one of China's most peculiar mammals,
30:41the Chinese pangolin.
30:43As you can see, the body is covered in these brown scales,
30:47just like the overlapping tiles on a roof.
30:50They coil up like this to protect their soft undersides.
30:54If they're attacked by a predator,
30:56it's very hard to get teeth through this strong armour.
31:00So they're well protected.
31:01Great long tail here, which is prehensile.
31:04They can coil it around branches when they're climbing.
31:07But they spend a lot of time on the ground looking for food.
31:11Their main prey are ants and termites.
31:14They use these powerful front legs to break into termite and ant mounds.
31:19Inside the snout, there's a sticky tongue, some 30 centimetres long.
31:24Once they've broken into the insect's nest,
31:26that tongue flicks out and they catch their prey.
31:30Sadly, they're quite rare in China
31:32because these beautiful creatures are killed for their scales.
31:37In the olden days,
31:38it was believed these scales could help with stomach ailments.
31:41That's why pangolin were killed.
31:44But nowadays, hopefully, nobody believes that.
31:48And the pangolins in China should be secure.
31:52It really is a wonderful animal.
31:55If I put him down and be very quiet,
31:58maybe he'll uncoil.
32:15That long snout contains the sticky tongue,
32:18which he uses for mopping up the ants and termites.
32:24I don't think he's aware I'm still here.
32:28Pangolins have an excellent sense of smell,
32:30but their hearing and eyesight aren't up to much.
32:39away he goes, the pangolins have got a real turn of speed.
32:49I can see from a long way off
32:51that the lamp has at last lured in a lady.
32:58Well, this is what I waited into the wee hours for.
33:03Look at this moth.
33:04It is ginormous.
33:07This is an atlas moth.
33:10And the wing area of the largest individuals
33:13can be four-fifths the size of the head of a squash racket.
33:17This is a female.
33:19They grow much larger than the males.
33:21These moths are weak flyers.
33:23She won't be far from the cocoon that she hatched from.
33:26And the cocoons of these moths are so large,
33:30in Taiwan, they sometimes use them as purses.
33:34In Hong Kong, the Cantonese name for these moths is snake head.
33:38And if you take a quick glimpse at the tip of the wing,
33:42you can see it really is like the head of a snake.
33:46But I want to give you a really good idea of her size.
33:50If she'll let me.
33:51Come on, little girl. Or big girl, should I say.
33:54I'll stick her on the tip of my nose.
33:58This is an amazing view.
34:00I can see the camera right through these transparent windows in the wings.
34:07Scientists aren't quite sure why they have these translucent windows.
34:12It's probably an anti-predator device.
34:15Up close, it's such a rich mix of beautiful colours.
34:19But sadly, this lovely creature will only live for one or two weeks.
34:24She doesn't have functional mouth parts.
34:26They can't feed at all when they're adults.
34:29So they can only survive for one or two weeks,
34:32relying on the fat reserves they stored when they were caterpillars.
34:35Her only job will be to produce pheromones, a perfume, to attract a male.
34:41Once they've mated, she'll lay eggs and then die.
34:46Shivering her wings like that, it really tickles.
34:49So I'm going to take her off the tip of my nose,
34:52get her away from this moth lamp, take her back into the forest,
34:56and hopefully, she'll attract a mate.
34:59Good luck. You are gorgeous.
35:04Now, the only giant I've still to find is an Asian elephant.
35:12There's a herd on the horizon, and we're not far behind.
35:21That's more like a very fresh elephant dump.
35:25But will I catch up with some of China's last elephants?
35:34I really want to encounter a wild elephant in China.
35:39My HQ has been Elephant Valley in the heart of Shishuan Benar Reserve.
35:44But so far, the trackers and I haven't seen hide nor hair of our quarry.
35:51I've had an extraordinary few days in Elephant Valley.
35:55Giant reptiles, peculiar mammals, the biggest moth in the world.
35:59But at least for now, there's no elephants here.
36:03The rangers think that they've moved off out
36:05because there's so much water in the river.
36:10There's been a report of elephants in another part of the reserve,
36:15close to the town of Mengla County.
36:17Is this the break I need?
36:26The faces and costumes are different here.
36:30Mengla County is home to the Kino people,
36:33one of 54 ethnic groups living in China.
36:39Mr Cho from the Forest Department is my guide and driver here.
36:47The mud on his Jeep is a portent of what lies ahead.
36:52May is the start of the rainy season here.
36:56As we reach the edge of town, we hit the first of many muddy potholes.
37:02Our progress disturbs swallowtail butterflies sucking up salts from the damp mud.
37:09There's more than enough of that.
37:23This is great stuff.
37:25Mr Cho is a superb driver.
37:30It's not far to where the elephants were last seen,
37:33and we hope to get there during daylight.
37:36But the mud is slowing us down.
37:42For the buffalo we meet, mud is glorious.
37:45They're caked in the stuff.
37:47So when it dries in the sun, it will protect them from biting insects.
37:54The mud did us no favours though.
37:56We know we've run out of daylight.
38:00But at least we can have a wonderful meal,
38:03and the villagers here can give me an up-to-date report on the elephants.
38:08They seem pretty confident.
38:10I'm in the right place at the right time at last.
38:15Lovely Kino lady there.
38:17They're the ethnic group that live in this village.
38:19It's right in the heart of elephant country.
38:22Too late to go looking tonight.
38:24But my range of friends here have been keeping tabs on a herd of elephants.
38:29So fingers crossed tomorrow will be the day I at last see a wild elephant in China.
38:41I'm so excited I hardly sleep a wink.
38:45I'm up early to check out the lie of the land.
38:52Here in the Moongyang region of Shishwambana,
38:56tropical rainforest elephant country is right next to crop fields.
39:01And elephants cannot resist this stuff.
39:05Maize is a favourite food.
39:07And there's been a report of a herd of 20 or so here right now.
39:14Just 30 minutes ago, they were seen skirting the edge of the tea plantation
39:19and heading up into the hills.
39:25The tea pickers glimpsed them disappearing over the ridge
39:29and then heard trumpeting from the valley beyond.
39:38Mr. Cho and I follow in the herd's footsteps.
39:43I can barely contain my excitement.
39:46Fingers crossed, the elephants haven't gone too far.
39:54That's more like it.
39:56Very fresh elephant dunk.
39:58And you can see over here where the elephants have been in this patch of bamboo.
40:03They've smashed some down.
40:04Gone for the succulent tips.
40:09At last, I think the elephants must be close.
40:31The one standing right in the open there, moving those big ears.
40:42Ancient elephants here in China.
40:46This is fabulous.
40:50They're walking through a sea of bamboo.
40:53I could not have hoped for better than this.
40:58There's a mother and a little calf there.
41:09Wonderful.
41:16Hear this cracking sound.
41:19As they're knocking the bamboo down.
41:25One just stretched its trunk right up for some succulent bamboo leaves.
41:31China is the only country in Asia where the population of elephants is on the increase.
41:38There's around 300 here.
41:43I wouldn't swap this experience for all the tea in China.
41:54So I've seen elephants in unplanned China.
41:59Mission accomplished.
42:01Next time...
42:02I'll be in central China in the province of Sichuan.
42:06On the roof of the world.
42:09I'll meet some really colourful creatures.
42:12These are Baoxing tree frogs.
42:15Only found in a small part of central China.
42:18And there's some old friends to catch up with too.
42:26They are just superb.
42:30And in its picturesque mountain home, I'll search for a little panda.
42:37But before I head north, it's time to wallow in success with the Dai people,
42:43to whom elephants are sacred.
42:50I'm celebrating because I've seen an elephant in the wild in China.
42:56The Dai people here believe that if you get soaked to the skin,
43:02you have a life of constant happiness.
43:10I think they want me to be really happy.
43:15I'll see you show more adventures in untamed China.
43:24I'll see you next time.
43:27I'll see you next time.
43:48Bye!
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