Patagonia (2022) s01e01 Episode Script

1
First time I saw orca was quite unexpected.
the quite large group was hunting.
It was this combination of feeling awe
and at the same time a little bit of horror and shame.
It goes into your heart and into your mind,
and it doesn't leave you.
At the ends of the earth is a land of extremes.
Home to spectacular wildlife. for centuries,
people and enemies have battled for supremacy,
but now enemies are becoming allies.
together they face new challenges in our rapidly changing world.
You are at the mercy of the elements.
This is the story of what it takes to survive on the edge of the world.
the land along Patagonia's eastern coast is barren.
but the sea is rich with life. the Andes cut through Patagonia
blocking moist air flowing from the pacific,
creating the eighth largest desert in the world
but off the atlantic coast,
a cold southern current mixes with a warmer brazilian
producing the perfect conditions for marine life.
on land a wild patchwork of desolate beaches,
rocky outcrops and towering cliffs
overlook one of the most important marine reserves on the planet.
the top predator patrolling these waters,
orca. also known as killer whales,
the largest members of the dolphin family.
This pod of ten is a close-knit group
that will stay together their entire lives.
The leader of this family is wise old grandma known as Maga.
It's high tide,
and the 40-year-old matriarch leads her family towards shore.
their target, unsuspecting seals and sea lion pups,
but how to get to them on the beach.
The family has perfected an ingenious way to hunt here.
first they swim sideways to hide their telltale dorsal fins.
the seals have no idea that these six-son killers are so close.
then the orca do something extraordinary.
They beach themselves.
It's a remarkable technique.
beaches are death traps for whales and dolphins.
It's too easy to get stranded, but not for this family.
They have learned how to expertly maneuver back into the sea.
Maga and her pod are one of only two orca families in the world
known to pull off this dangerous feat.
ever since she first laid eyes on them,
Orca expert Maria Leone has been fascinated by these predators.
I was born here in Patagonia quite close to the peninsula of Valdes.
always quite a strong experience to see them for the first time, especially,
you know, hunting in this mapper,
and I guess that's when they started to exist for me.
Maria Leone was determined to understand their behavior.
She decided to camp out along this desert coastline for three months a year
when the orcas hunt the most.
for 20 years She's observed Maga and her family
and can identify individuals by their unique markings.
You can take photos of their fins, of their patches.
The idea is for the observation of these population and of their behavior
Maria Leone realized their hunting technique was not instinctive by learned.
They start teaching the calves
when they are really tiny,
you know. they start to bring them to shore slowly and safely.
and until eventually they can do it on their open.
It's an incredible skill taught by one generation to the next.
this morning Maga's hunting class is in session.
She's working with her grandchildren on their stranding technique.
She's a great teacher. She's really proficient and professional.
Today's challenge, the young calves are to swim into the shallows,
grabbing clumps of seaweed.
a practice run like this is critical.
If they master this skill,they will never go hungry,
but one wrong move,and they could beach themselves and die.
Maga leads her class up to the breakers daring them to grab some seaweed,
and one bold student goes for it launching into the shallows.
success.
Maria Leone has discovered
It takes four years for each new generation to master this behavior.
allowing this orca pod to thrive
along the desert coast. while Maga and her family return to open water,
on land a real estate dispute is about to get bloody.
----
beaches along Patagonia's desert coast are wild and exposed.
It's not an easy place to raise a family.
just ask some of its more iconic residents.
madelanic penguins.
each spring these migratory wadlers return from their feeding grounds up north to breed.
under the watchful eye of conservationist Poppy Garcia.
the first time I heard about something called a penguin
it was through my grandmother.
She used to tell me very, very warm and nice stories about penguins when I was a small boy.
When Papi finally saw them, he was captivated.
I was 19, 19 years old. I came to one of the colonies here in Patagonia
and that was an epiphany moment
because I had the feeling that I had to dedicate my life to their conservation.
Today the beach is busy,
but it wasn't always like this.
The first time I came,
there were only six pairs of nests. this place was a real mess.
there were a lot of reckless people and careless fishermen
coming here throwing garbage everywhere.
We needed to protect this colony
because otherwise they would leave and they would never come back.
It took several years of clearing trash and getting local support
to turn this polluted beach into a protected area.
Papi's efforts paid off.
and the penguins returned.
The colony grew from those six original pairs of penguins
to over 3,000 pairs now, so that was a home run.
Are. Papi lives nearby with his wife.
during breeding season,
They regularly monitor the penguins.
When you work with them and you visit them very frequently,
You get to know them better,
an one of the favorite penguins in this colony is called Clarita.
She is one of the original few that restarted the colony.
We know that She's about 16 years old.
She was able to raise 14 chicks, and the last two chicks are hatching right now.
Papi weighs and measures Clarita's newborns
to make sure they are in good health.
Clarita for me represents the hope for this planet.
whatever we do in terms of conservation,It's really worthwhile
because this colony is showing us that a small hacks
that we decided to do a long time ago is having a big impact.
The penguins are doing so well here
they are running now the of nesting sites
leading to a real estate crunch .
this male has decided to move in on another family's burrow.
the resident female watches on concerned.
She calls for her partner.
his gutteral squawks are a show of dominance.
but the intruder isn't taking the hint.
the two square off beak to beak.
the resident on the left gets in some good jabs.
finally, bloodied and battered,
The home invader is sent packing.
next time maybe he'll think twice about moving into someone else's burrow.
30 miles to the north on peninsula Valdez,
another colony's numbers are not doing so well.
The small settlement of Playa Elvalde has a population of about 200 people an slooirnging.
those that remain, make a hard living from the ocean.
one of them is Lucas Del Rio.
Lucas forages for shellfish on the saempt floor.
He doesn't use expensive scuba gear.
instead, air is pumped from a compressor through a rubber hose directly into his mouth
65 feet below the surface, he painstakingly collects mussels and scallops.
It's a good harvest.
Lucas can gather up to 60 pounds in just a few minutes.
but over his shoulder earl there's another creature lurking.
----
The beaches along Patagonia's peninsula Valdez
offer little in the way of sustenance,
but its rich waters teem with life.
below the surface,
Diver Lucas Del Rio is clerking mussels,
and he has company, 42 tons of it.
there's never a dull moment when you're working alongside giants.
Lucas takes his haul back to dry land, avoiding whales as he goes.
This space home to hundred dreads of them.
It's one of the largest nurseries on the planet.
Sore southern white whales.
Opinion their name is a reminder of a darker past
when the slow moving whales were considered the right ones to hunt.
they were driven to the brink of extinction.
by the end of the 1960s, less than 1,000 were left worldwide.
Researchers Mariana has been monitoring their population for decades.
MayorI don't dedicate to protecting these whales.
taking skin samples it is a key way to monitor them.
but getting one isn't easy.
his crossbow fires a special dark to penetrate a small amount of skin help.
needs to time his shot perfectly.
the single sample will provide Mariana with a wealth of data,
the whale's genetics, age and exposure to pollution,
information crucial to both understanding more about the species and helping its survival.
The southern white whales have bounced right back,
but their healthy population has attracted unwanted attention.
a mother and her calf are being tailed by a family of killers, orca.
Mom head for the safety of the shallows.
but the pork rarks pod quickly catches up with them.
the young orca is given a chance to hone its young hunting skills.
The whale twists and turns putting herself between the baby and her attackers.
in desperation, she wedges her calf on the sea floor
protecting its soft underbelly.
her defensive maneuver works.
the.. orca call off the attack.
the calf is exhausted pump and some in for a much needed feed.
he can drink up top 150 gallons of milk a day.
he'll rehigh on mom for food and protection for at least a year.
but the white whales aren't the only species making a comeback.
This corridor is a haven for some of the world's miss understand animals, sharks.
blue sharks hunt among this blue coast.
their 5,700-mile journey
around the than theic is one of the longest of any marine animal,
but there's another dangerous predator in these waters.
-----
This corridor is a haven for Ramiro
is one of the most skilled shark hunters in Patagonia.
He's fished these waters since he have was a boy.
leopard fish is used to bait the hook.
its scent will lure in any sharks in the area.
each line is attached to a float on the surface.
It's now a waiting game.
something has taken the bait.
A seven-gilled shark. they normally carouse close to the sea floor.
However, this one was tempted by Ramiro's bait.
but this shark has nothing to fear.
Ramiro is no longer in the shark-killing business.
He's now working to save them.
Sharks have been pushed to the brink of extinction by overhunting.
Ramiro didn't want to continue to be part of the problem
So teamed up with Juan Martin Cuevas from the wildlife society of argentina.
for the last five years,
Ramiro has worked with Juan catching sharks off the desert coast.
like this rare taupe shark which is critically endangered.
and then they insert an acoustic tack.
It transmits a radio signal
which can be picked up by a network of underwater receivers. p.
These trackers help the team to protect the sharks from other hunters
and teach them about their migration patterns.
they check if the tractor is working.
the signal is loud and clear.
Back on land, thousands of elephant seals have some ashore on the beaches of peninsula Valdes.
These are massive seals spend more than 80% of the year
feeding out at sea. when they come back to land,
They have got one thing on their mind ,breeding.
This patch is the domain of one huge male.
He's master of this beach and has a tear yom of two dozen females.
He wants to mate with all of them.
but a young hot shot is trying to sneak in on the action.
the beach master keeps a watchful eye.
this new one is taking a big risk,
but it might be his only chance to breed this year.
the beach master has seen enough.
Time to show this young pretender who is boss.
----
the beach on the peninsula Valdes coast is about to become the scene of a heavyweight clash.
two 5,000-pound contenders are going head to head.
the prize, the chance to breed with two dozen females.
they jab at each other's next with their canine teeth
followed up with a two and a half ton body slam.
This fight is going the distance.
but in the end the rookie backs down.
the big male remains the master of the beach, for now at least.
When the breeding season is over,
The seals are hungry and return to the open ocean to feed.
They swim east heading hundreds of miles off the Patagonian coast to their hunting grounds
where there is an abundance of one of their favorite foods,
squid, and other worldly creature
that spends daylight hours hiding at depths of more than 2500 feet.
At night millions then rise from the deep looking for food,
guided by the light of the moon,
or so they think.
It's actually the light of a 420-foot fishing vessel
and It's not alone.
around 150 ships work these waters.
each one has 100 powerful lights.
luring the squid up to the surface where they are snagged by a long line of hooks.
desperately trying to wriggle free,
the squid squirt jets of water, but It's no use.
every day this fleet can catch 75 up tons of squid to be sold in europe and asia.
It's a brutal, efficient operation,
but these underwater creatures do have some protection.
the argentine coast guard is here in force.
Captain Jose.Rafael.Quinteros is in charge of this coast guard destroyer.
His mission is to make sure the fishing fleet doesn't stray into Patagonia's waters.
behind the border, marine life is protected from this super fleet.
the crew of the destroyer has their work cut out for them
because this indow jones industrial scale fishing is relentless,
and large support ships come to meet the fleet taking the squid away, refueling and resupplying.
the fishing boats rarely return to port and can spend years at sea.
the coast guard destroyer is not alone inside the protected zone.
nearby are two endangered ocean giants, a pair of say whales.
and closer to shore, hundreds of does ski dolphins.
but It's not just Patagonia's waters that are busy.
The skies above these cliffs are some of the region's most crowded airspace.
---
at the northern tip of Patagonia's desert coast is el condor.
Here the atlantic ocean has been carving the stand stone coastline for millennia.
these crumbling cliffs are now the last refuge of a bird
that used to be found all over south america.
The burrowing parrot. after wintering up north,
pairs return to the same nest every spring.
It makes sense given how hard they've worked to dig out these homes.
some stretch back ten feet into the cliff.
Noricio is leading the charge to understand and conserve the patient parrots' last stronghold.
Noricio first encountered these parrots while traveling around Patagonia 20 years ago.
He was smitten, and he has been here ever since.
Mauricio routinely encounters and counts the nests.
Inside most of these nests are hungry chicks.
Today It's this mom's turn to head out on the food run.
The native vegetation she depends on is disappearing as fast as the amazon rain forest.
to stand any chance of feeding her family,
She must fly three hours inland to find seeds and berries.
but the long trip isn't the only thing our mom needs to worry about.
As she returns, she must deal with a neighbor from hell.
The fastest animal in the world, a peregrine faulk. falcon.
swooping in at over 200 miles per hour,
It terrorizes the colony
our mom waits for her moment.
one parrot doesn't make it.
but our mom gets home safely
above Mauricio, the skies are full of parrots.
and future generations of these iconic birds will continue to return here to nest.
At first this desert coast may seem a barren place.
but its rich waters offer life to a vast number of incredible animals.
and the continued protection of these threatened creatures
is now more important than ever
next on "Patagonia: life on the edge of the world,"
As summer arrive, animals are gathering in Patagonia's fjords.
but these remote, rich waters