David Attenborough Quotes

Today we're living in an era in which the biggest threat to human well-being, to other species and to the Earth as we know it might well be ourselves. The issue of population size is always controversial because it touches on the most personal decisions we make, but we ignore it at our peril. m0s50-m1-13

This is the Earth - our planet, home to millions of different species, but only one species dominates everything - human beings. There are nearly seven billion of us living on the Earth, and the human population is increasing by more than two people every second; two hundred thousand people every day; nearly eighty million people every year. Each additional life needs food, energy, water, shelter, and hopefully a whole lot more. m0s0-m0s43

Reptiles and amphibians are sometimes seen as simple, primitive creatures. That's a long way from the truth. The fact that they are solar-powered means that their bodies require only 10% of the energy that mammals of a similar size require. At a time when we ourselves are becoming increasingly concerned about the way in which we get our energy from the environment and the wasteful way in which we use it, maybe there are things that we can learn from "life in cold blood."

Reptiles and amphibians are sometimes thought of as primitive, dull and dimwitted. In fact, of course, they can be lethally fast, spectacularly beautiful, surprisingly affectionate and very sophisticated.

If we and the rest of the backboned animals were to disappear overnight, the rest of the world would get on pretty well. But if they were to disappear, the land's ecosystems would collapse. The soil would lose its fertility. Many of the plants would no longer be pollinated. Lots of animals, amphibians, reptiles, birds, mammals would have nothing to eat. And our fields and pastures would be covered with dung and carrion. These small creatures are within a few inches of our feet, wherever we go on land – but often, they're disregarded. We would do very well to remember them.

An eye from another world; a smell-detector, investigating the path ahead. We don't often see a snail that way, and that's because we've only recently had the tiny lenses and electronic cameras that we need to explore this miniature world. But when we meet its inhabitants face to face, we suddenly realise that their behaviour can be just as meaningful to us as the behaviour of many animals more our own size.

Three and a half million years separate the individual who left these footprints in the sands of Africa from the one who left them on the moon. A mere blink in the eye of evolution. Using his burgeoning intelligence, this most successful of all mammals has exploited the environment to produce food for an ever-increasing population. In spite of disasters when civilisations have over-reached themselves, that process has continued, indeed accelerated, even today. Now mankind is looking for food, not just on this planet but on others. Perhaps the time has now come to put that process into reverse. Instead of controlling the environment for the benefit of the population, perhaps it's time we control the population to allow the survival of the environment.

Warm-bloodedness is one of the key factors that have enabled mammals to conquer the Earth, and to develop the most complex bodies in the animal kingdom. In this series, we will travel the world to discover just how varied and how astonishing mammals are.

Sensing the approaching danger, the snail flees. But in a world of snail paces, the conch is something of a Ferrari. It calls for desperate measures. Exhausted by the effort of its last-ditch attempt, the tulip snail is slowly... gunned... down.

Birds were flying from continent to continent long before we were. They reached the coldest place on Earth, Antarctica, long before we did. They can survive in the hottest of deserts. Some can remain on the wing for years at a time. They can girdle the globe. Now, we have taken over the Earth, and the sea, and the sky. But with skill and care and knowledge, we can ensure that there is still a place on Earth for birds in all their beauty and variety, if we want to, and surely, we should.

All over the world, birds [...] manage to survive in the most hostile of places. A century ago, a completely new kind of environment appeared on Earth. Nothing like it had faced birds before in their entire 200 million year history. Yet some species began to adapt to it almost immediately... The modern city.

[African Rift Valley soda lakes]. Steaming-hot water comes from volcanic springs and is so loaded with soda that around the margins of the lake it solidifies into white curds. Yet flamingos come here in thousands. [...] The fact that so few creatures can tolerate these conditions means that any animal that can, has the place to itself and so can proliferate in vast numbers.

No sooner has one been pushed out of the nest then a second will follow, until there is only one left. And that's what happens nearly always in a pelican's nest. That being the case, it seems rather inefficient, not to say heartless, that the pelican should always lay three eggs. But the reason is that it's partly an insurance policy, in case something terrible happens to one or two of the chicks, there's always a third left to carry on. And partly because, very rarely, when the fishing is very good, it is possible to raise more than one chick.

Each [pelican] has already survived many perils in its young life. As a chick, it fought battles with its brothers and sisters and won.

The battle between cuckoos and other birds is a continuing one. The cuckoos developing new stratagems and perhaps finding new victims, and the victims finding new defences.