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20 years ago, my good friend Douglas Adams spent a year tracking down endangered animals

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together with the zoologist Mark Carwardine.

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Now it's my turn.

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Mark and I are heading off to find out exactly

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what happened to those species that he'd seen

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dangling on the edge of extinction two decades ago.

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It promises to be exhausting, exhilarating and exasperating.

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But I wouldn't miss it for the world.

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Mark Carwardine, how are you?

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How very good to see you. How are you?

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Thanks for waiting. I paid extra to go business so that my luggage would be out last.

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A little privilege you get. I see you've come dressed for the jungle.Well, not exactly, no.

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Welcome to Manaus at last. Thank you.

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My travelling companion is to be Mark Carwardine,

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an internationally-renowned zoologist and photographer.

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In the pursuit of the weird and the wild,

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he's travelled to almost every country in the world,

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encountering pretty much every conceivable creature,

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and several of the inconceivable ones.

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We're starting our adventures in the Amazon,

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the biggest river system in the world.

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We've arranged to set out from Manaus, on the banks of the Rio Negro,

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where Mark has a fast boat waiting to take us up river.

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That's not the Amazon. No, that's the Rio Negro.

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Goodness me. There we go.

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Two things, I think the most important bit of kit, binoculars...

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Oh, thank you. Sorry they're not wrapped.

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No, no that's wonderful, that's wonderful.And a hat.

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Oh, they're good. Oh!

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We're hunting for the lugubrious Amazonian manatee,

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a large seal-like mammal that once swam these waters in vast herds.

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What are our chances of seeing a manatee?

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Pretty slim, to be honest. They're here, we're going to go to the right areas where they occur,

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but the fact that it's murky water

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and the fact that when they rise to the surface to breathe,

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they have two little nostrils at the top of the snout,

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and all that breaks the surface is just enough for the nostrils to blow out,

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take a breath, and they disappear below again.

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So not only are they rare, you could be on top of one and you still might not see it.

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They were confused with mermaids in the early days, weren't they?

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Yeah, although you had to be quite drunk as a sailor.

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I think the reason they were called mermaids is cos the females

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have mammary glands in the same position as female humans,

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and I think that's how the term originally came about.

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In fact the name "manatee" is taken from the word in Carib,

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one of the old Brazilian tribal languages, meaning "breast".

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Though not noticeably breasted to the casual observer,

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the manatee is a large, fully aquatic mammal, sometimes known as a sea cow.

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Manatees are spectacular only in their single-minded devotion

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to doing everything as slowly as possible.

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Unfortunately, when escaping from hunters,

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they have also been inclined to do it rather slowly

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and the species is now classified as vulnerable to extinction.

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'To begin the hunt, Mark has brought us to a lodge

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'aimed at fulfilling the every need of the 21st century jungle tourist.'

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You've taken me to the middle of the jungle, and we're sitting on golf carts.

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I'm sorry about that.

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So they've got electricity for charging them. I notice a phone signal.

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I know, it's like an out of body experience. Oh, dear.How unusual.

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'Whilst I admit to being a fan of the 21st century's little luxuries,

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'I must admit that this isn't entirely what I'd expected of the Amazon.'

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See the macaws?

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Hello. Thank you.

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Oh. Thank you very much, very kind.

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The Lodge is comprised of seven towers,

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linked by a five-mile network of walkways.

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Mark first came here exactly 20 years ago together with author Douglas Adams.

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I became friends with Douglas in the early '80s and we decided we wanted

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to do something for wildlife and travel together as well,

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and we came up with this idea of Last Chance To See.

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We got a world map and Douglas stuck pins in where he'd like to go,

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and I stuck pins in where the endangered animals are and we came to a compromise,

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and strangely enough, the first place we came to was here.

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We started off in the towers here and went off into the jungle looking for the Amazonian manatee.

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By 1988, Douglas Adams was the celebrated author

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of The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy, and a personal friend.

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While he trotted the globe with Mark,

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I lived in his house, fielding requests for lenses and guidebooks

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to be sent to exotic locations,

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and I came to know jealousy on an inter-stellar scale.

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Douglas, as we know, died very sadly almost what, five-and-a-half years ago now,

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and I never spoke to him about this, but did he express a desire to go back and look 20 years on?

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He became really passionate about conservation. He'd done a lot of good work

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for conservation after Last Chance to See,

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and we were both very keen to go back and see what had happened in the years in-between,

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and, very sadly, I was talking to him about that very thing the night before he died,

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and we were planning the next trip and planning to go back

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around the world and review all those projects,

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so, very sadly, he missed out on that.

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After Douglas died, Mark asked me if I would be interested

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in accompanying him on the journeys they'd been planning.

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Though Mark and I have never travelled so far as to the corner shop together,

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for better or for worse, our fate is sealed.

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I have to confess I'm quite nervous about this whole enterprise.

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I like my creature comforts rather more than I like my creatures.

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I must say, standing next to him, he's so tall as well. He's so brown

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and so bright and knowledgeable,

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it makes me feel really short and white and stupid, to be honest.

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I'm quite nervous of Mark. I don't know him that well. I've met him before,

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but he's such an all-round expert on all living things

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and I shall feel very foolish if I say, "What's that?"

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and he gives me a long, burning look as if he cannot believe

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there is a sentient being on the planet who is unaware of what a capybara is.

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Mark has been telling me of a local legend in which the Amazonian manatee

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is guarded by a most peculiar bright, pink dolphin,

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known locally as the boto.

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It is said that if you want to find manatees,

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then you must first make your peace with the dolphin.

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Unlike the manatee it shares its waters with,

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the boto is a fast-moving predator, living on fish and small crustaceans.

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The boto is typically eight feet long, becoming pinker as it becomes more excited.

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It should be noted that the boto is only found

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in the Amazon basin and is recognised as an endangered species in its own right.

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It should also be noted that dolphins are Mark's most favourite thing in the whole wide world.

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We're going to see a lot of animals on our adventures,

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but you're particularly excited about today. Why is that?

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You know how some people need a cigarette or a drink

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every so often to survive normal daily life?

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I have to see a whale or a dolphin at least once every couple of weeks to survive.

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I lay awake last night thinking about today. I know it's sad. How wonderful!

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I love it. It's fantastic.

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I had heard that there was a legend that at night,

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the pink river dolphin turned into a gentlemen with a black top hat -

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it's very specific -

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and an Edwardian waistcoat,

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and ravished the local women, and it was explained to me

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that this was probably missionaries

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justifying the arrival of rather surprising pink babies in Indian tribes.

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One of the things I want to try and do today is to get some underwater shots of them

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because they're so hard to approach normally and the visibility is so bad.

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There are very few pictures of them underwater.

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My dream is by the end of the day at least have one great underwater shot.

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'In an attempt to increase visitors' chances of glimpsing the rare dolphin,

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'staff of the lodge have been feeding the boto from a floating platform in the river.'

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Thank you.Did you have a pee before you left, by the way?

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No, I didn't. I could get into the water, I'm sure it's big enough to accommodate my urine.

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You mustn't pee in the river.

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There's a fish here called a candiru fish. Have you heard of that?

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That's an urban myth, isn't it? No, no, it's true.

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It's about this long and if you pee in the water,

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which I'm serious that you mustn't do, it swims up your urine and into your willy.

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Basically, it's designed to go into the gills of a fish,

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so it gets into the gills and the spines come out, it lodges itself in there,

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drinks the blood and then when it's full, it lets go and drops to the bottom and digests it.

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But if you get one up there it's apparently unbelievably painful, and you have two choices,

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you chop your willy off or you have to get to a hospital,

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and given that we're nowhere near a hospital, there's only that first choice.

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I've got a couple pieces of string, actually, so if you just tie a knot in it.

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Please!I've done mine.

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Don't be...

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Which size do you need?Oh...

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Sorry! Wicked. But the fish does exist?

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No, no, the string's a joke. But the fish is real.

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Then I'll be extra careful with my family package. Gracious.

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'Having been distracted by Mark's "hilarious" joke,

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'we fail to notice that while we haven't found the dolphins, the dolphins have found us.'

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Oh, look at that. Fantastic, it came right out of the water.

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Yay!Oh, they're fantastic.

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Aren't they beautiful?

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They're so lovely.

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You notice when they're swimming around,

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they can do sort of handbrake turns. Most dolphins, all the neck vertebrae

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are fused, and it's designed for swimming fast

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so when they turn they don't break their necks.

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But these dolphins are designed for swimming in the flooded forest

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and weaving in between all the trees and roots,

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so when you watch, they can turn on a sixpence

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and they can bend their necks and they're very different to marine dolphins.

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Really interesting. Yeah. Yes!

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Astonishing.

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Very beautiful, and unmistakeably dolphinous.

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That obviously isn't a word, but you know what I mean.

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'As a creature more at home on the land than in the water,

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'I am more than a little uncertain about joining Mark in the river to get his shot.'

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I would be a lot more uncertain if I knew what Mark told me later.

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Not only is this water home to the candiru fish,

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it's also popular with piranha fish

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and frequented by passing bull sharks,

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the most deadly shark in the world.

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The sediment in the water means that one simply has no idea what, if anything, is down there.

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And suddenly out of the murky darkness, the unmistakable shape of a dolphin appears just inches away.

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Oh, they're very soft.

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They feel like an old vinyl Lilo.

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One of those little paddling pools or something you used to blow up.

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They've got that sort of vinyl feel.

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Sorry.

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The lodge has provided everything we had hoped for,

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with one noticeable exception - a manatee.

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Amazing.

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We decide to leave the tourist trail

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and fly in search of a man who spends his life tracking manatees,

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if only the rain would ever stop.

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My God, I'm glad we didn't take off in this!

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Whether or not we get to take off depends on the only man with the skill,

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and the plane, to get us there.

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Captain Wilson, a Christian missionary pilot.

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But even with God on his side, he's taking no chances with the elements.

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So if you get caught in this when you're flying, do you just have to land somewhere and wait?

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Yes, on a river. Isn't that dangerous?

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Not with experience, you still.. You can't be sloppy.

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You still need to respect. We always respect water,

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fire and wind, always, you know?

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I don't think Stephen quite realises what we're in for now

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because we're going to do some serious searching for the manatees

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and to do that you have to go much deeper into the jungle

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and we've got a boat which I hope is going to be waiting for us,

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I'm not sure if it's going to be there,

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but we're going to search for it from the plane.

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Right, Stephen?Yes?We're off.

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Are we really?Yep.Blimey. The rain's pretty much gone.

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Let me grab your...

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Oh, thank you so much.

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..The weather and other things, give us a safety flight in Jesus' name.

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Amen.What did he say?I just heard "in Jesus' name" at the end.

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May the Lord help us.

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It's perhaps only in flight that you begin to get a sense of the scale of the Amazon rainforest.

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It's a place of extremes.

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The Amazon basin contains the biggest rainforest in the world

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and a network of rivers containing a fifth of all the river water on the planet.

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This forest contains a tenth of all the species known to science

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and we're on the lookout for just one of them.

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Are you excited? I'm extremely excited.

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Is that your excited face?

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It is.

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What do you expect me to look like?

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No, it's thrilling. It is.

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I genuinely am astonished that I'm doing this. I've never come anywhere close to anything...

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'But before attempting to spot manatees,

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'first we have to spot the boat that should be waiting for us.'

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It should be around here somewhere.

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We've spotted it? Fantastic. That's a relief.There it is.

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Pumas and jaguars don't swim on the boats, do they?

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Very rarely.

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Don't tell me there's mobile reception. Please!There's no signal.

235
00:17:06,360 --> 00:17:07,760
Of course there isn't.

236
00:17:09,560 --> 00:17:14,320
We've flown two hours south of Manaus, deep into the rainforest,

237
00:17:14,360 --> 00:17:16,800
to find a boat called the Cassaquiari.

238
00:17:16,840 --> 00:17:18,960
Don't forget to come and get us, will you?

239
00:17:19,000 --> 00:17:20,720
No, exactly. Goodbye, Captain.

240
00:17:20,760 --> 00:17:25,440
Thank you so much. That was a very memorable and enjoyable flight.

241
00:17:25,480 --> 00:17:27,920
After you.Thank you very much.

242
00:17:27,960 --> 00:17:30,080
Hey, bon dia.

243
00:17:31,760 --> 00:17:34,520
'With luck, the Cassaquiari should be able

244
00:17:34,560 --> 00:17:39,000
'to take us to the manatee-hunting scientists that we've come to find.

245
00:17:40,160 --> 00:17:43,440
'As our last link with civilisation departs,

246
00:17:43,480 --> 00:17:47,480
'before any hunting can take place, we must make ourselves at home.'

247
00:17:47,520 --> 00:17:51,440
Power. No, that was working perfectly before.

248
00:17:51,480 --> 00:17:53,520
Bugger. You actually touched the switch.

249
00:17:53,560 --> 00:17:57,320
It was working perfectly, you complete swine.

250
00:17:57,360 --> 00:18:02,600
Right, let's get this in here. Oh! No power.

251
00:18:02,640 --> 00:18:05,520
Right, we're going back, that's it. That is it!

252
00:18:05,560 --> 00:18:08,360
Oh, well, never mind. It was worth a try.

253
00:18:08,400 --> 00:18:10,840
There's no "never mind" about it.

254
00:18:10,880 --> 00:18:13,760
Where are the other plugs? I cannot go for four days without power.

255
00:18:13,800 --> 00:18:16,520
Oh, I despair.

256
00:18:17,680 --> 00:18:20,720
You may well despair, but not as much as I do!

257
00:18:21,840 --> 00:18:26,760
'While I attempt to resolve the complex technicalities essential to the expedition...'

258
00:18:26,800 --> 00:18:27,960
Oh, well.

259
00:18:28,000 --> 00:18:34,320
'..Mark is distracted when one of the crew spots something in a nearby tree.'

260
00:18:34,360 --> 00:18:38,480
Well, they're saying it's a cobra, which is very unlikely here

261
00:18:38,520 --> 00:18:41,840
and they're saying it's venomous, so...

262
00:18:41,880 --> 00:18:44,880
I can't quite see it yet... Oh, wow!

263
00:18:44,920 --> 00:18:48,920
It's right here. It's an emerald tree boa,

264
00:18:48,960 --> 00:18:52,600
which is one of the most spectacular snakes in the Amazon,

265
00:18:52,640 --> 00:18:57,920
probably about a metre above where we're going to be, hopefully.

266
00:18:57,960 --> 00:18:59,560
Can we go under?

267
00:18:59,600 --> 00:19:04,600
I think he's a bit worried about going underneath. Look at that.

268
00:19:06,800 --> 00:19:09,400
Can you keep the boat steady to get a photograph?

269
00:19:21,600 --> 00:19:24,480
That's it. If you can hold it there.

270
00:19:24,520 --> 00:19:26,720
I'll try and take the picture one-handed.

271
00:19:32,480 --> 00:19:36,640
It's not Mark, it's the extremely valuable camera I'm worried about.

272
00:19:36,680 --> 00:19:39,760
OK, this is perfect. Oops.

273
00:19:39,800 --> 00:19:42,040
LAUGHTER

274
00:19:42,080 --> 00:19:44,800
So this is a boa, so it's not venomous at all, it's...

275
00:19:44,840 --> 00:19:49,680
It's a constricting snake and it feeds mainly on bats and small birds,

276
00:19:49,720 --> 00:19:52,200
and this is how you'd typically find it.

277
00:19:52,240 --> 00:19:55,600
I've never seen one in the wild before. I've seen them in captivity,

278
00:19:55,640 --> 00:20:01,120
so it's a really special moment, and it is one of the most attractive snakes.

279
00:20:01,160 --> 00:20:08,120
God, this is impossible. The snake wonders what the hell we're trying to do.

280
00:20:08,160 --> 00:20:10,360
Look out, mind that branch.

281
00:20:16,880 --> 00:20:21,360
Poor thing, it's looking completely baffled. Oops!

282
00:20:24,520 --> 00:20:27,400
OK, this is the one, this is perfect.

283
00:20:37,000 --> 00:20:42,640
Mark Carwardine is not just a photographer, he's also an environmentalist.

284
00:20:45,200 --> 00:20:50,520
As the heavens open and manatee hunting is quietly shelved for the day,

285
00:20:50,560 --> 00:20:52,560
I discover another side of Mark

286
00:20:52,600 --> 00:20:56,000
when he reveals that the risk of falling into the Amazon

287
00:20:56,040 --> 00:21:00,080
is not the greatest danger he faces in the line of duty.

288
00:21:01,120 --> 00:21:03,160
A lot of it is quite dangerous.

289
00:21:03,200 --> 00:21:08,200
The trouble is that a lot of endangered animals are being threatened by people

290
00:21:08,240 --> 00:21:10,400
who are prepared to do anything to get at them.

291
00:21:10,440 --> 00:21:16,120
There's a lot of money in wildlife trade and skins and horns and ivory

292
00:21:16,160 --> 00:21:20,200
and so on, and the poachers who are killing the animals are armed.

293
00:21:20,240 --> 00:21:25,080
A lot of them carry around AK47 sub-machine guns, Kalashnikovs,

294
00:21:25,120 --> 00:21:27,640
which they are prepared to fire,

295
00:21:27,680 --> 00:21:30,840
and so when you go out on patrol with these people,

296
00:21:30,880 --> 00:21:33,520
you have to expect that you could get into serious trouble.

297
00:21:33,560 --> 00:21:36,800
And I was also working in Cambodia just recently

298
00:21:36,840 --> 00:21:38,440
and the week before I got there,

299
00:21:38,480 --> 00:21:42,640
five of the people who I was going to be working with were killed

300
00:21:42,680 --> 00:21:44,360
by poachers in their sleep.

301
00:21:44,400 --> 00:21:46,800
They were in hammocks in the rainforest,

302
00:21:46,840 --> 00:21:49,120
fast asleep in the middle of the night.

303
00:21:49,160 --> 00:21:52,560
And poachers turned up and killed them all with machetes.

304
00:21:52,600 --> 00:21:54,800
And this kind of thing is not unusual,

305
00:21:54,840 --> 00:21:57,520
it's all part and parcel of conservation these days.

306
00:22:11,600 --> 00:22:14,080
Right, come on.

307
00:22:14,120 --> 00:22:16,840
A little bit further back,

308
00:22:16,880 --> 00:22:18,720
a little bit more like that,

309
00:22:18,760 --> 00:22:22,240
how's that? Well, it's a bright light but it'll have to do.

310
00:22:24,080 --> 00:22:27,880
Well, here we are in the middle of a rainstorm in the tropical rainforest.

311
00:22:27,920 --> 00:22:31,960
I'm hot and sweaty and I want so much to be in a hotel

312
00:22:32,000 --> 00:22:36,800
that's got air conditioning and Wi-Fi and cellular coverage

313
00:22:36,840 --> 00:22:39,760
and things like that, but what am I moaning about?

314
00:22:39,800 --> 00:22:42,000
I'm in one of the most extraordinary parts of the world,

315
00:22:42,040 --> 00:22:43,960
and I'm in the company of an extraordinary man.

316
00:22:44,000 --> 00:22:50,240
He knows so much generally about zoology but of course particularly about marine mammals

317
00:22:50,280 --> 00:22:54,800
and river mammals like dolphins and manatees which he's so sweetly passionate about,

318
00:22:54,840 --> 00:22:56,600
he just can't see enough of them.

319
00:22:56,640 --> 00:23:01,080
And he's prepared to put up with all kinds of hardship in order to go and see them.

320
00:23:01,120 --> 00:23:05,880
Anything that nature can dream up, anything that could feast and gorge on other animals...

321
00:23:05,920 --> 00:23:12,760
Crikey, there's thunder. ..It's around the place and it wants to crawl up one's bits, you know?

322
00:23:12,800 --> 00:23:16,640
Mark told me to close the door last night because vampire bats had come in.

323
00:23:16,680 --> 00:23:20,360
Listen to that thunder. We're all going to die.

324
00:23:35,160 --> 00:23:39,640
Fortunately, we are in the safe hands of a captain who knows these waters well.

325
00:23:42,360 --> 00:23:45,000
The river we have come to, the Rio Aripuana,

326
00:23:45,040 --> 00:23:51,440
is a tributary of the Madeira, which is in turn a tributary of the Amazon.

327
00:23:51,480 --> 00:23:56,040
This would be one of the biggest rivers in England if it were in England, wouldn't it?

328
00:23:56,080 --> 00:23:58,360
The one we're on now. Oh, it would be, yes.

329
00:23:58,400 --> 00:24:01,240
A tributary of a tributary of a tributary of a tributary.

330
00:24:01,280 --> 00:24:04,680
The Madeira is one of the biggest rivers in the world and it's a tributary.

331
00:24:04,720 --> 00:24:06,960
When you think of the scale of the whole place,

332
00:24:07,000 --> 00:24:10,120
this is just half of the Amazon that you can see on the map here.

333
00:24:10,160 --> 00:24:13,280
The whole area is about twice the size of Australia.

334
00:24:13,320 --> 00:24:18,080
And there may be 10,000 manatees spread out.

335
00:24:18,120 --> 00:24:20,040
So talk about needle in a haystack,

336
00:24:20,080 --> 00:24:23,520
we've got a task for ourselves.

337
00:24:23,560 --> 00:24:29,160
A century ago, these waters were said to be home to great herds of manatees.

338
00:24:29,200 --> 00:24:31,560
Today, they are few and far between.

339
00:24:31,600 --> 00:24:36,600
We are heading out to meet the one man who may be able to lead us to a manatee in the wild.

340
00:24:38,400 --> 00:24:40,880
I think this must be Marc and Ivano up here.

341
00:24:40,920 --> 00:24:45,800
Thank you very much. Oh, that's great.

342
00:24:47,360 --> 00:24:50,640
Hello, you must be Marc and Ivano.

343
00:24:50,680 --> 00:24:53,280
Marc van Roosmalen is a self-styled naturalist

344
00:24:53,320 --> 00:24:58,640
who has dedicated many years to this otherwise unstudied stretch of river.

345
00:24:58,680 --> 00:25:02,840
He claims to have discovered several species unknown to science,

346
00:25:02,880 --> 00:25:06,800
and while the scientific establishment treats those claims with caution,

347
00:25:06,840 --> 00:25:11,880
we are still hoping he will be the person who can help us on our quest.

348
00:25:11,920 --> 00:25:15,160
Hey, hello. Shake hands?

349
00:25:17,080 --> 00:25:20,440
Marc has made this remote village his base

350
00:25:20,480 --> 00:25:21,960
while working on the river.

351
00:25:23,400 --> 00:25:29,400
His secret of success is employing Francisco, a man who grew up in the village, to track animals.

352
00:25:29,440 --> 00:25:32,280
Could you ask Francisco if he's ever seen any manatees?

353
00:25:34,960 --> 00:25:37,800
He saw.Oh, really? Recently?

354
00:25:37,840 --> 00:25:39,480
When was the last time?

355
00:25:44,000 --> 00:25:46,120
He has seen it a week ago.

356
00:25:47,400 --> 00:25:49,360
And where was that?

357
00:25:53,360 --> 00:25:55,800
Here, very close here, in the lake.

358
00:25:58,560 --> 00:26:05,160
He's telling me now that he just saw them feeding in these lakes behind the...

359
00:26:05,200 --> 00:26:07,520
Just over here.

360
00:26:07,560 --> 00:26:13,800
It's really close so we could go there and he says you can see them feeding on the floating vegetation.

361
00:26:13,840 --> 00:26:15,360
Would he be willing to take us?

362
00:26:20,200 --> 00:26:22,920
Yes, we can go anytime.

363
00:26:22,960 --> 00:26:25,720
MUSIC

364
00:26:50,880 --> 00:26:54,680
The place where Francisco suggests we hunt is a few miles up the river.

365
00:26:54,720 --> 00:27:01,680
While we travel, Mark discovers that Ivano's taste for endangered species developed at an early age.

366
00:27:01,720 --> 00:27:06,680
When I was a child, we ate manatee a lot.You loved to eat manatees?

367
00:27:06,720 --> 00:27:08,920
I thought you loved to watch manatees.

368
00:27:08,960 --> 00:27:16,360
Because the meat of manatee is not like a fish, it's different.

369
00:27:16,400 --> 00:27:18,280
The taste is like a cow.

370
00:27:18,320 --> 00:27:20,520
Really, like beef?Yes, like beef.

371
00:27:20,560 --> 00:27:22,480
Have you had it in the last few years?

372
00:27:22,520 --> 00:27:28,880
No, no, I think the last time I ate manatee was like 10, 12 years ago.

373
00:27:28,920 --> 00:27:30,440
Do you miss it?

374
00:27:30,480 --> 00:27:32,880
A lot.Do you really? It was really that tasty?

375
00:27:32,920 --> 00:27:36,600
Yes, lovely, very lovely.So you can't get manatee meat anymore?

376
00:27:36,640 --> 00:27:42,640
No, no, it's illegal. We cannot eat, we cannot find because nobody wants to sell, because it's illegal.

377
00:27:42,680 --> 00:27:45,040
Is there not a black market for manatee meat?

378
00:27:45,080 --> 00:27:48,640
Maybe sometimes you can get, but it's not easy.

379
00:27:50,520 --> 00:27:53,120
The boat's cook, Grassa,

380
00:27:53,160 --> 00:27:56,160
even recalled manatee recipes from her own childhood.

381
00:28:00,160 --> 00:28:02,000
Her father, hunters.

382
00:28:15,520 --> 00:28:17,320
Sounds like a complicated recipe.

383
00:28:17,360 --> 00:28:22,320
No, it's very easy. She said that they first kill the manatee

384
00:28:22,360 --> 00:28:26,200
and you've got the back of manatee, cos the meat's much better.

385
00:28:26,240 --> 00:28:32,920
They boil it first. The meat, boil it, and put to dry and after dry,

386
00:28:32,960 --> 00:28:39,480
you fry it and you put in a can with the fat of manatee. That's the way.

387
00:28:41,520 --> 00:28:45,480
But for us, Grassa is sticking to one of her less controversial recipes.

388
00:28:46,640 --> 00:28:51,400
I gather there's a lake just behind the trees here with the manatees hang out.

389
00:28:51,440 --> 00:28:55,400
So Mark has gone with Francisco

390
00:28:55,440 --> 00:28:57,960
and they've taken a boat through all the foliage

391
00:28:58,000 --> 00:29:00,000
to find a way through for us later on

392
00:29:00,040 --> 00:29:02,920
and see if the manatees are there. I think this is probably

393
00:29:02,960 --> 00:29:07,160
going to be the most challenging part of the trip for Stephen because we have to be quiet.

394
00:29:07,200 --> 00:29:09,960
BUZZING

395
00:29:10,000 --> 00:29:13,280
Shh, flies making a noise.

396
00:29:14,360 --> 00:29:16,640
We have to lower our voices from now on

397
00:29:16,680 --> 00:29:19,040
because the manatees aren't that far away,

398
00:29:19,080 --> 00:29:21,640
and if they hear us, we're never going to find them,

399
00:29:21,680 --> 00:29:26,120
so it's silence until the others come back and we just keep our fingers crossed.

400
00:29:29,720 --> 00:29:36,600
(Special non crunchy vegetables. Shh.)

401
00:29:39,200 --> 00:29:44,160
Finding the creek to be overgrown, Marc van Roosmalen and Francisco

402
00:29:44,200 --> 00:29:47,040
resort to dragging their boat overland

403
00:29:47,080 --> 00:29:51,440
to get to the hidden lake where Francisco believes the manatee live.

404
00:31:07,320 --> 00:31:09,720
(That's where Francis was saying that they got in

405
00:31:09,760 --> 00:31:13,480
(through a little channel off the river, off the main river.

406
00:31:13,520 --> 00:31:16,560
(And there's now a bunch of them inhere, with a bit of luck.)

407
00:31:25,280 --> 00:31:29,000
Oh, look. That was a flying fish or something.

408
00:31:29,040 --> 00:31:32,160
I think it was, yeah. It leapt out and swam across.

409
00:31:34,760 --> 00:31:38,800
You can really feel that this is the right place, can't you?Yeah.

410
00:31:38,840 --> 00:31:41,560
It's got a sense of being cut off. Absolutely.

411
00:31:41,600 --> 00:31:45,960
If you're gonna see manatees, this is the place it's gonna be.Right.

412
00:31:46,000 --> 00:31:50,320
This is a sign that there are manatees.

413
00:31:50,360 --> 00:31:54,160
They were feeding on these maybe this morning.

414
00:31:54,200 --> 00:31:58,200
And it's floating all over the place.

415
00:31:58,240 --> 00:32:00,840
So we know for sure that there's manatees here.

416
00:32:00,880 --> 00:32:03,240
So there's lots of manatee food here.

417
00:32:03,280 --> 00:32:06,080
It's all looking promising.

418
00:32:06,120 --> 00:32:11,120
These lilies, they're the kind of thing that the manatees like to feed on.

419
00:32:11,160 --> 00:32:15,800
They might lift their mouths and the top of the snout out of the water to get a good grip on those.

420
00:32:15,840 --> 00:32:20,760
One of the best things about manatees is that they're eating plants

421
00:32:20,800 --> 00:32:24,200
that have lots of silica in them, so it wears down their teeth a lot.

422
00:32:24,240 --> 00:32:26,800
And they have this fantastic conveyor belt system

423
00:32:26,840 --> 00:32:31,800
where their teeth are all molars, and they move forward about a millimetre a month.

424
00:32:31,840 --> 00:32:34,080
And as they cometo the front, they drop out

425
00:32:34,120 --> 00:32:36,880
and then they're replaced by the next lot.

426
00:32:36,920 --> 00:32:40,520
It's a sort of anti-manatee device by the plants

427
00:32:40,560 --> 00:32:42,960
to stop them eating by having lots of silica,

428
00:32:43,000 --> 00:32:46,080
and the manatees overcome it by just replacing their teeth!

429
00:32:46,120 --> 00:32:47,880
That's fantastic!

430
00:32:47,920 --> 00:32:53,440
That is extraordinary. Over how many millions of years would that take place?

431
00:32:58,080 --> 00:33:05,320
Locally, the manatee is known as the "ghost of the Amazon", and we're beginning to see why.

432
00:33:05,360 --> 00:33:07,640
In spite of hunting now being illegal,

433
00:33:07,680 --> 00:33:13,720
sightings of the Amazonian manatee are getting more and more infrequent.

434
00:33:13,760 --> 00:33:18,800
And increasingly, we're wondering if here, in these far-flung lakes

435
00:33:18,840 --> 00:33:22,400
and rivers, illegal hunting still goes on.

436
00:33:25,960 --> 00:33:28,920
Good tip apparently is to wear the hat,

437
00:33:28,960 --> 00:33:31,000
and then the hood over it.

438
00:33:31,040 --> 00:33:36,520
Cos then you can move your head freely.Are you sure?

439
00:33:36,560 --> 00:33:38,480
Now I see more.

440
00:33:38,520 --> 00:33:40,040
Now move your head freely.

441
00:33:40,080 --> 00:33:45,360
Free movement of head? I may have got that wrong.

442
00:33:45,400 --> 00:33:47,240
I can't hear a word you're saying.

443
00:33:47,280 --> 00:33:50,280
Do you not like it?It's good!

444
00:33:51,960 --> 00:33:55,080
Maybe I've got it the wrong way round.

445
00:34:00,560 --> 00:34:02,520
That looks really good, actually.

446
00:34:02,560 --> 00:34:06,320
It's quite comfortable!

447
00:34:13,360 --> 00:34:14,840
Ah.

448
00:34:16,720 --> 00:34:20,240
It's an absolutely beautiful little lake.

449
00:34:20,280 --> 00:34:23,960
We didn't see any manatees, but we saw a lot of evidence of manatees.

450
00:34:24,000 --> 00:34:27,960
Or at least evidence it's the kind of place they'd live.

451
00:34:28,000 --> 00:34:31,720
Yeah, I really thought we might see one, actually. It's disappointing.

452
00:34:31,760 --> 00:34:34,560
Quiet as we were, they certainly would have known we were here.

453
00:34:34,600 --> 00:34:37,040
Relatively quiet!Yeah.

454
00:34:37,080 --> 00:34:39,360
I think you have to be absolutely silent.

455
00:34:39,400 --> 00:34:41,520
We did make a fair amount of noise.

456
00:34:41,560 --> 00:34:46,760
We can either try again or we do know places where there are captive manatees, of course.

457
00:34:46,800 --> 00:34:50,960
We won't leave Brazil without seeing an Amazonian manatee.

458
00:34:51,000 --> 00:34:54,800
Yeah, I really, really wanted to see one in the wild, though.

459
00:34:54,840 --> 00:34:56,960
That would have been the thing. I know.

460
00:35:03,880 --> 00:35:08,800
The next two days, we searched rivers and lakes...

461
00:35:08,840 --> 00:35:10,640
There is a movement, isn't there?

462
00:35:10,680 --> 00:35:12,400
I thought it was a reflection.

463
00:35:12,440 --> 00:35:16,520
We ploughed tributaries of the tributary.

464
00:35:18,840 --> 00:35:25,280
But if there are manatees in the Aripuana, then they chose to stay concealed in the murky waters.

465
00:35:25,320 --> 00:35:26,960
Some might think that to be outmanoeuvred

466
00:35:27,000 --> 00:35:32,080
by one of the slowest-moving creatures on earth is embarrassing, but not us.

467
00:35:32,120 --> 00:35:39,120
Marc has an old tracker's trick to increase our chances of finally outfoxing the wily manatee.

468
00:35:39,160 --> 00:35:41,440
He's taking us to a zoo.

469
00:35:46,880 --> 00:35:51,240
Manaus is home to over 1.5 million people, and, I'm assured,

470
00:35:51,280 --> 00:35:54,840
a handful of obliging manatees.

471
00:35:58,200 --> 00:36:02,880
INPA is the Brazilian research institute tasked to study life in the Amazon.

472
00:36:02,920 --> 00:36:09,360
It's one of the few places in the world that keeps captive Amazonian manatees for scientists to observe.

473
00:36:09,400 --> 00:36:16,080
With a hard luck story and natural charm, Mark has talked his way in to the manatee centre of study.

474
00:36:16,120 --> 00:36:19,160
Ah, look, look at this!Oh, my!

475
00:36:25,680 --> 00:36:28,760
Oh, look. I love their whiskers and faces!

476
00:36:28,800 --> 00:36:30,720
They look so gentle, don't they?

477
00:36:30,760 --> 00:36:31,920
Completely harmless.

478
00:36:37,960 --> 00:36:40,920
They are a bit like seals, aren't they?

479
00:36:40,960 --> 00:36:44,040
There's a great description I read where somebody said

480
00:36:44,080 --> 00:36:49,120
they're a bit like seals but they're more like travelling cases for putting seals in.

481
00:36:49,160 --> 00:36:52,120
I think it says it all. They're not related to anything else.

482
00:36:52,160 --> 00:36:55,440
They're extraordinary animals, unlike anything else.

483
00:36:55,480 --> 00:37:00,880
They're not quite like seals, they're not quite like dolphins or whales.

484
00:37:00,920 --> 00:37:04,440
You see those flippers, their very long flippers?The front ones.

485
00:37:04,480 --> 00:37:07,760
Obviously adapted from the forearm and the hand.

486
00:37:07,800 --> 00:37:09,000
But they use them.

487
00:37:09,040 --> 00:37:10,720
It's like walking, exactly.

488
00:37:10,760 --> 00:37:14,560
They do use them to walk on the bottom of the river.

489
00:37:14,600 --> 00:37:16,680
I think I'm in love.

490
00:37:16,720 --> 00:37:21,360
They've got that slow grace that big animals have, like elephants,

491
00:37:21,400 --> 00:37:24,200
which are so surprisingly graceful when you see them.

492
00:37:24,240 --> 00:37:28,680
Yeah, actually the Brazilian name is peixe boi, which means fish cow,

493
00:37:28,720 --> 00:37:31,760
or ox fish. And they're basically underwater cows.

494
00:37:31,800 --> 00:37:37,120
There's no better way of describing them - just munch away at aquatic grasses all day long,

495
00:37:37,160 --> 00:37:41,800
and don't do very much. Just move around slowly - fairly quiet, peaceful sort of life.

496
00:37:42,840 --> 00:37:44,600
Marvellous.

497
00:37:45,880 --> 00:37:49,600
Vera De Silva is in charge of INPA's manatees.

498
00:37:49,640 --> 00:37:56,240
She immediately takes us away from the main tanks to see something neither Mark nor I had expected.

499
00:37:56,280 --> 00:38:00,320
Tucked around the back, Vera has a number of orphaned manatees

500
00:38:00,360 --> 00:38:06,880
with tell-tale rope marks and machete cuts, typical of the marks left by hunters.

501
00:38:06,920 --> 00:38:09,520
The people hunting them use the calves as bait.

502
00:38:09,560 --> 00:38:11,640
They get the little one and not the mother.

503
00:38:11,680 --> 00:38:15,880
They will tie the little one and make them call. They make a sound

504
00:38:15,920 --> 00:38:20,840
and they will call the mother, and the mother, she won't stay, and she comes.

505
00:38:20,880 --> 00:38:22,440
Cos they do help one another.

506
00:38:22,480 --> 00:38:26,120
If there's an injured one, they might help to bring it up to the surface.

507
00:38:26,160 --> 00:38:29,040
I don't know. In captivity, we notice this.

508
00:38:29,080 --> 00:38:33,560
In the wild, I don't know if there is a record of this.

509
00:38:35,560 --> 00:38:38,920
Human activity has resulted in the manatee

510
00:38:38,960 --> 00:38:44,640
being one of almost 17,000 species currently on the endangered list.

511
00:38:44,680 --> 00:38:49,920
We're inclined to think of periods of extinction as naturally-occurring pre-historic events.

512
00:38:49,960 --> 00:38:55,800
But the greatest mass extinction the world has ever seen is happening right now.

513
00:38:55,840 --> 00:39:00,480
Human activity is causing it, and human activity alone can put it right.

514
00:39:00,520 --> 00:39:04,160
You need to hold...Under there. Yes. So he can...

515
00:39:04,200 --> 00:39:07,920
These young manatees are now receiving round-the-clock attention

516
00:39:07,960 --> 00:39:13,360
to nurse them back to health so that scientists can study them before releasing them back into the wild.

517
00:39:13,400 --> 00:39:15,040
Mmm.

518
00:39:15,080 --> 00:39:20,600
See he's got that prehensile lip, all the hairs on the lip.? He's slipping away! Oh!

519
00:39:20,640 --> 00:39:22,600
I've got to grip him quite hard.

520
00:39:22,640 --> 00:39:26,160
He's got his eyes closed, look at that.

521
00:39:26,200 --> 00:39:27,840
He's enjoying himself so much.

522
00:39:27,880 --> 00:39:29,400
And also the nose here.Yes.

523
00:39:29,440 --> 00:39:32,240
Yeah, got the skin-flaps closing the nostrils.

524
00:39:32,280 --> 00:39:34,320
It could be done underwater.

525
00:39:34,360 --> 00:39:38,840
Presumably it would be with the mother, obviously.Yes.

526
00:39:38,880 --> 00:39:41,400
Though he specialises in underwater photography,

527
00:39:41,440 --> 00:39:45,920
Mark has never yet been able to get a picture of an Amazonian manatee.

528
00:39:45,960 --> 00:39:48,640
This is an opportunity heisn't going to pass up.

529
00:39:48,680 --> 00:39:50,920
Vera, I don't suppose Icould ask a huge favour?

530
00:39:50,960 --> 00:39:56,840
Would it be possible to get in the big tank with the adults?Er...

531
00:39:56,880 --> 00:39:59,960
Please.Yes, I will let you try.

532
00:40:00,000 --> 00:40:05,800
But because the animals are not used to have people swimming with them,

533
00:40:05,840 --> 00:40:09,240
I don't know how they will react. Has anyone been in with them before?

534
00:40:09,280 --> 00:40:15,520
Er, a long time ago when our oldest female had her first calf.

535
00:40:15,560 --> 00:40:19,720
And she was very aggressive towards the diver.

536
00:40:19,760 --> 00:40:24,920
And she put him towards the wall, so she didn't let the person approach the calf.

537
00:40:24,960 --> 00:40:27,480
It will be an experiment for everybody!

538
00:40:27,520 --> 00:40:31,320
OK! This is the first time I've ever done this -

539
00:40:31,360 --> 00:40:36,720
swimming with Amazonian manatees, it's a big life tick for me. Do you mind passing me the camera?

540
00:40:36,760 --> 00:40:38,720
There we are, I've got it.

541
00:40:38,760 --> 00:40:41,040
Thanks a lot. Great, thank you.

542
00:41:01,680 --> 00:41:05,680
Not only did Mark not seem to be in any danger from the manatees,

543
00:41:05,720 --> 00:41:07,800
but they barely seemed to notice him.

544
00:41:23,240 --> 00:41:26,720
I'm struck by the quiet peacefulness of these big animals,

545
00:41:26,760 --> 00:41:30,480
and the thought that back when great herds moved in these rivers,

546
00:41:30,520 --> 00:41:34,720
they would have been ridiculously easy prey.

547
00:41:44,840 --> 00:41:48,440
I can't help thinking of the many creatures, like the iconic dodo,

548
00:41:48,480 --> 00:41:53,560
whose placid temperaments made them all too easy to chase into extinction.

549
00:41:53,600 --> 00:42:00,000
In an area as vast as the Amazon, a law to stop hunting can never be enforced.

550
00:42:00,040 --> 00:42:04,520
So the challenge is to change attitudes that have been held for generations.

551
00:42:19,040 --> 00:42:22,520
We have heard of one team who are trying to do exactly that.

552
00:42:22,560 --> 00:42:27,480
We've travelled 400 miles west of Manaus to the city of Tefe.

553
00:42:32,560 --> 00:42:36,360
At first, one is struck by an almost complete absence of cars -

554
00:42:36,400 --> 00:42:41,840
the result of Tefe being a city still unconnected to the rest of the world by road.

555
00:42:41,880 --> 00:42:45,400
Though founded as a base for missionaries in the 17th century,

556
00:42:45,440 --> 00:42:51,000
these days, Tefe is best known as the town closest to one of Brazil's biggest reserves.

557
00:42:57,320 --> 00:42:58,560
Whoa! Sorry!

558
00:43:02,000 --> 00:43:03,960
It's the home of rhythm!

559
00:43:04,000 --> 00:43:10,480
The reason we're here is to meet Dr Miriam Marmontel and her team from the Mamiraua Institute,

560
00:43:10,520 --> 00:43:12,880
who have a novel approach to ending hunting.

561
00:43:12,920 --> 00:43:16,200
This is Mark. Hi, pleased to meet you, hello.

562
00:43:16,240 --> 00:43:20,040
We've come to the right place, I can see, cos you've got manatee earrings.

563
00:43:20,080 --> 00:43:21,480
Amazing!How wonderful!

564
00:43:22,760 --> 00:43:25,600
Though no-one knows for sure, it is thought

565
00:43:25,640 --> 00:43:29,840
there may now be only a few thousand manatees living in the Amazon.

566
00:43:29,880 --> 00:43:33,520
Miriam is draining a tank in preparation for releasing Piti,

567
00:43:33,560 --> 00:43:36,000
an orphaned manatee, back into the wild.

568
00:43:36,040 --> 00:43:37,400
Oh, there he is!

569
00:43:37,440 --> 00:43:42,160
While this will have a marginal impact on numbers, the hope is that

570
00:43:42,200 --> 00:43:44,920
by involving traditional hunting communities,

571
00:43:44,960 --> 00:43:49,720
the release will have a significant impact on attitudes to manatees.

572
00:43:50,880 --> 00:43:53,440
So where did he come from?

573
00:43:53,480 --> 00:43:58,320
He got entangled into a fishing net, or so the locals told us.

574
00:43:58,360 --> 00:44:02,360
But when we got him, he had a harpoon wound through his back.

575
00:44:02,400 --> 00:44:05,360
So they harpooned him at somepoint,

576
00:44:05,400 --> 00:44:10,680
either to take him out of the net or intentionally.

577
00:44:10,720 --> 00:44:14,080
Has he exhibited fondness for you or any particular humans?

578
00:44:14,120 --> 00:44:17,240
For Michelle, who got him.

579
00:44:17,280 --> 00:44:22,360
She went up and brought him in a speedboat.

580
00:44:24,120 --> 00:44:27,480
Before the team can transport Piti, he has to be moved

581
00:44:27,520 --> 00:44:30,560
and measured to see if he's big enough to be released.

582
00:44:47,720 --> 00:44:50,000
Oh, they're so strong.

583
00:44:57,320 --> 00:45:00,400
Oh, he's very good. He's so trusting, isn't he?

584
00:45:00,440 --> 00:45:02,160
He obviously loves you.

585
00:45:03,920 --> 00:45:06,440
He does. You can tell.

586
00:45:06,480 --> 00:45:09,000
It's all right, it's OK.

587
00:45:11,720 --> 00:45:15,320
Lots of water I suppose now he needs, yes?

588
00:45:15,360 --> 00:45:19,840
You're going to measure...?We're going to obtain all measurements.

589
00:45:19,880 --> 00:45:24,240
Piti has been puttingon several centimetres every week,

590
00:45:24,280 --> 00:45:27,360
after spending six months in a tank.

591
00:45:27,400 --> 00:45:32,800
Miriam confirms that he is, at last, ready to begin his journey back to freedom.

592
00:45:32,840 --> 00:45:34,080
Will you miss him?

593
00:45:38,240 --> 00:45:40,800
You can have all the science and expertise in the world

594
00:45:40,840 --> 00:45:43,440
and it only works if you have somebody like Michelle,

595
00:45:43,480 --> 00:45:47,400
who the manatee trusts, who spends all day, every day with him.

596
00:45:47,440 --> 00:45:50,360
We may give ourselves six kicks up the backside

597
00:45:50,400 --> 00:45:52,840
for what we do that causes the extinction of animals,

598
00:45:52,880 --> 00:45:55,200
but we have to give ourselves the odd pat on the back

599
00:45:55,240 --> 00:45:59,280
for at least being aware of animals in a way that no other animals are aware of animals.

600
00:45:59,320 --> 00:46:02,960
As a human race I think we're terrible, we do terrible things.

601
00:46:03,000 --> 00:46:07,360
But thank God we have this relatively small number of people

602
00:46:07,400 --> 00:46:09,640
who do devote their lives to it.

603
00:46:09,680 --> 00:46:12,720
Yeah. You were telling me the other night

604
00:46:12,760 --> 00:46:15,560
that in the world conferences, people are giving up.

605
00:46:15,600 --> 00:46:19,840
When I do things like this, it just gives me hope again.

606
00:46:19,880 --> 00:46:24,960
I love animals. I mean, you can't help but be moved by things like this.

607
00:46:25,000 --> 00:46:28,480
I think you've got to get into the field, you've got to get to see things

608
00:46:28,520 --> 00:46:30,360
just to remember what it's all about,

609
00:46:30,400 --> 00:46:33,320
otherwise it is all just facts and figures on paper.

610
00:46:33,360 --> 00:46:36,040
MANATEE FARTS

611
00:46:36,080 --> 00:46:38,280
I think he's just farted! Yeah, really!

612
00:46:38,320 --> 00:46:39,640
Seriously?Yeah.

613
00:46:39,680 --> 00:46:41,720
I know, they fart a lot, don't they?

614
00:46:41,760 --> 00:46:44,600
I'm right in the cloud of it coming up right now.

615
00:46:44,640 --> 00:46:48,480
Mmm, nice(!)Can you smell it?I'm getting a whiff now, yes.Are you?

616
00:46:48,520 --> 00:46:50,920
Mmm.Imagine what it's like here.

617
00:46:50,960 --> 00:46:56,960
Mmm, yeah. Well, at least he's not a meat-eater or it'd be worse.

618
00:46:57,000 --> 00:46:59,720
No, that's true.Oh, Jesus, yes!

619
00:46:59,760 --> 00:47:02,240
God! Holy woly!

620
00:47:02,280 --> 00:47:05,520
That's pretty rich, isn't it?

621
00:47:05,560 --> 00:47:09,760
He's allowed to, he's only one year old!

622
00:47:09,800 --> 00:47:12,200
Could have waited just a minute. Oh, my God!

623
00:47:12,240 --> 00:47:13,600
Just like that.

624
00:47:16,680 --> 00:47:18,960
Oh, yes, I see what you mean about the, um...

625
00:47:19,000 --> 00:47:21,760
He had a little bit of an old poo there.

626
00:47:21,800 --> 00:47:25,000
Watch your feet.God, he's strong.

627
00:47:25,040 --> 00:47:27,640
If you'd gone in there, there'd have been trouble.

628
00:47:27,680 --> 00:47:31,840
The nearest known group of manatees is still 100 miles away,

629
00:47:31,880 --> 00:47:37,080
which means to get there, we plan to spend the next day travelling by boat

630
00:47:37,120 --> 00:47:40,480
deep into the heart of one of the biggest reserves in Brazil.

631
00:47:42,880 --> 00:47:46,200
Oh, well done. Yes!

632
00:47:47,280 --> 00:47:50,200
OK!Yes.

633
00:47:50,240 --> 00:47:52,040
Hooray! Fantastic.

634
00:47:52,080 --> 00:47:55,600
But you know what they say about the best-laid plans.

635
00:47:55,640 --> 00:47:59,480
We should have noticed what the omens were telling us.

636
00:48:01,320 --> 00:48:04,360
The following morning, in readiness for the long journey,

637
00:48:04,400 --> 00:48:09,400
we've been asked to get to Piti's boat in time to sail at first light.

638
00:48:09,440 --> 00:48:12,720
I don't claim to be the first to fall for an animal like Piti,

639
00:48:12,760 --> 00:48:16,760
though I dare say few will have done so quite so dramatically.

640
00:48:19,200 --> 00:48:21,160
CRASHING

641
00:48:21,200 --> 00:48:24,720
Argh! Oh...

642
00:48:27,640 --> 00:48:29,160
Oh, God!

643
00:48:29,200 --> 00:48:30,440
Oh!

644
00:48:36,840 --> 00:48:42,800
I had put one foot off the side of the pontoon and fallen heavily on my right arm.

645
00:48:42,840 --> 00:48:48,080
A paramedic from the nearest hospital is shipped out to confirm my worst fears.

646
00:48:49,120 --> 00:48:50,320
It's broken, I think.

647
00:48:51,600 --> 00:48:55,640
He's asking about your spine. How is that?

648
00:48:55,680 --> 00:48:58,680
The spine is good. Feels good.

649
00:48:58,720 --> 00:49:02,520
Can you explain that it's incredibly painful?

650
00:49:02,560 --> 00:49:05,040
It's very, very painful to move or twist my arm.

651
00:49:05,080 --> 00:49:09,000
When he moves, it's intense pain.

652
00:49:09,040 --> 00:49:10,680
Well done.

653
00:49:10,720 --> 00:49:12,840
Oh! Argh!

654
00:49:12,880 --> 00:49:14,360
Ah!

655
00:49:14,400 --> 00:49:16,760
Take it easy, there's no rush. Oh! Ah!

656
00:49:20,720 --> 00:49:22,520
That's it, just...Argh!

657
00:49:25,960 --> 00:49:28,720
Ah!

658
00:49:29,920 --> 00:49:32,360
OK. Well done, well done.

659
00:49:33,240 --> 00:49:34,520
Argh!

660
00:49:37,080 --> 00:49:38,960
Thank you so much.

661
00:49:40,080 --> 00:49:41,560
Argh! Ah...

662
00:49:47,160 --> 00:49:49,240
You OK?Yeah. Argh!

663
00:49:50,920 --> 00:49:53,600
Jesus! God!

664
00:49:53,640 --> 00:49:55,120
OK, you're there.

665
00:50:07,680 --> 00:50:10,280
Two helpless creatures, side by side,

666
00:50:10,320 --> 00:50:14,080
on a small boat in the apparent endlessness of the Amazon.

667
00:50:18,680 --> 00:50:22,760
Hello.Hello, how are you guys doing? Not so good, huh?

668
00:50:29,880 --> 00:50:35,120
Captain Wilson has responded to our SOS, and I'm heading to a Manaus hospital.

669
00:50:35,160 --> 00:50:41,800
Suddenly, for me, the adventure is over, and we are all alone with our thoughts.

670
00:50:43,560 --> 00:50:46,880
Extinction happens and the world keeps turning.

671
00:50:48,840 --> 00:50:53,120
Does it matter if the Amazonian manatee ceases to exist?

672
00:50:53,160 --> 00:50:58,720
Some will argue thateach species has a crucial place in a complex eco-system.

673
00:50:58,760 --> 00:51:00,600
Perhaps.

674
00:51:00,640 --> 00:51:02,800
But this is what I think.

675
00:51:02,840 --> 00:51:08,680
I think that it's just indecent if humanity, through our actions, or through our neglect,

676
00:51:08,720 --> 00:51:14,200
should cast into oblivion an intricately perfect piece of evolutionary engineering

677
00:51:14,240 --> 00:51:17,280
millions of years in the making.

678
00:51:17,320 --> 00:51:20,680
I think that, somehow, we have to do better than that.

679
00:51:27,000 --> 00:51:30,440
What a day! Er, we've been on the go since four o'clock this morning.

680
00:51:30,480 --> 00:51:33,200
We did manage to get Stephen to Manaus in the end.

681
00:51:33,240 --> 00:51:36,560
It wasn't easy, but we gothim here and we got him checked over

682
00:51:36,600 --> 00:51:40,600
by several consultants and doctors in a couple of clinics here,

683
00:51:40,640 --> 00:51:44,240
who unfortunately confirmed our worstfears

684
00:51:44,280 --> 00:51:46,840
which are that his arm is quite badly broken

685
00:51:46,880 --> 00:51:48,720
in three different places

686
00:51:48,760 --> 00:51:53,680
and he needs an operation to put a couple of metal pins in to hold it all altogether.

687
00:51:53,720 --> 00:51:58,720
So what we've decided is we're going to fly him to Miami.

688
00:51:58,760 --> 00:52:02,600
Meanwhile, I'm going to try to charter a float plane

689
00:52:02,640 --> 00:52:06,120
really early tomorrow morning to catch up with Piti,

690
00:52:06,160 --> 00:52:09,000
the manatee who's still on that boat,

691
00:52:09,040 --> 00:52:13,240
but who will now be about 500 miles or so west of Manaus.

692
00:52:13,280 --> 00:52:15,680
Well, we thought yesterday was bad.

693
00:52:15,720 --> 00:52:17,360
Today's proving even worse.

694
00:52:17,400 --> 00:52:21,200
Stephen had a sleepless night and we were up half the night

695
00:52:21,240 --> 00:52:25,360
making phone calls and receiving phone calls with last-minute arrangements.

696
00:52:25,400 --> 00:52:27,480
Then we lost Stephen's X-ray.

697
00:52:27,520 --> 00:52:29,680
We've found it again, thank goodness.

698
00:52:29,720 --> 00:52:32,520
And we lost the key to the storeroom with all the kit.

699
00:52:32,560 --> 00:52:34,640
I think everyone's just too tired.

700
00:52:34,680 --> 00:52:36,120
I've got food poisoning,

701
00:52:36,160 --> 00:52:40,360
I'm throwing up every half an hour or so and feeling really ill.

702
00:52:40,400 --> 00:52:43,000
I'm on the float plane, as you can see.

703
00:52:43,040 --> 00:52:46,040
Managed to speak to the rest of the crew on their satellite phone.

704
00:52:46,080 --> 00:52:50,600
And I've got the co-ordinates to their boat

705
00:52:50,640 --> 00:52:54,560
on the lake somewhere 500 miles away in the Amazon

706
00:52:54,600 --> 00:52:57,840
written on the back of a laundry list.

707
00:52:57,880 --> 00:53:00,120
And the plan is to try and find them there,

708
00:53:00,160 --> 00:53:02,760
and should be landing in the next hour and a half or so,

709
00:53:02,800 --> 00:53:04,800
if all goes to plan.

710
00:53:05,880 --> 00:53:10,160
For once, plans work out. And with the light beginning to fade,

711
00:53:10,200 --> 00:53:12,760
just minutes before Piti must be released,

712
00:53:12,800 --> 00:53:15,720
Mark's plane touches down.

713
00:53:18,040 --> 00:53:22,760
Hi. How's Piti?

714
00:53:22,800 --> 00:53:25,680
He's doing fine, ready to go into the pen.Fantastic.

715
00:53:25,720 --> 00:53:30,680
Half a world away, I successfully check into a Miami hotel

716
00:53:30,720 --> 00:53:34,520
to await my fate at the hands of the surgeons.

717
00:53:34,560 --> 00:53:38,080
But with all the distractions of the West at my disposal,

718
00:53:38,120 --> 00:53:41,840
all I can think about is Mark, the team from Mamiraua

719
00:53:41,880 --> 00:53:48,280
and a young manatee which has distinguished itself only by a prodigious talent for farting.

720
00:53:52,160 --> 00:53:56,640
Miriam has sent out a message inviting the children of five villages

721
00:53:56,680 --> 00:53:59,640
to be the first to come and see Piti.

722
00:53:59,680 --> 00:54:03,400
Few will ever have encountered a live manatee before.

723
00:54:03,440 --> 00:54:06,600
Nobody knows if they will respond.

724
00:54:06,640 --> 00:54:10,520
As the boat closes in on Piti's final destination,

725
00:54:10,560 --> 00:54:12,840
the news of his arrival has been spreading.

726
00:54:12,880 --> 00:54:15,680
And by boat and canoe, in twos and threes,

727
00:54:15,720 --> 00:54:19,240
and then in a flood, they come.

728
00:54:31,080 --> 00:54:34,520
The local team has built an enclosure

729
00:54:34,560 --> 00:54:37,520
where Piti can become acclimatised to the lake,

730
00:54:37,560 --> 00:54:40,360
and where local children can come to learn about him

731
00:54:40,400 --> 00:54:41,800
and help look after him

732
00:54:41,840 --> 00:54:44,920
until it's time to release him fully into the wild.

733
00:54:49,840 --> 00:54:51,880
It's OK, he's nearly clear.

734
00:55:18,080 --> 00:55:20,680
Fantastic. He's in.

735
00:55:28,920 --> 00:55:32,920
Miriam is hoping that the enthusiasm of children for one manatee

736
00:55:32,960 --> 00:55:36,000
will feed back through families and villages,

737
00:55:36,040 --> 00:55:39,600
and that manatees will at last come to be seen

738
00:55:39,640 --> 00:55:41,920
as something to be cherished, rather than culled.

739
00:55:41,960 --> 00:55:48,120
If successful, she's hoping to repeat this scene throughout the Amazon basin.

740
00:55:57,840 --> 00:56:02,040
So when the day finally comes and you feel he's ready, what do you do,

741
00:56:02,080 --> 00:56:06,600
just lift the door and say goodbye and hope for the best?

742
00:56:06,640 --> 00:56:09,680
We attacha radio tag him,

743
00:56:09,720 --> 00:56:13,440
so we can also follow him and monitor his movements.

744
00:56:13,480 --> 00:56:18,160
And be close to him, make sure there's no hunters following him.

745
00:56:18,200 --> 00:56:20,720
The locals will hopefully help us with that.

746
00:56:20,760 --> 00:56:23,400
So he'll be the best looked after manatee in the world.

747
00:56:23,440 --> 00:56:25,320
Definitely.

748
00:56:30,000 --> 00:56:33,760
Hi, Stephen. It's Mark.

749
00:56:33,800 --> 00:56:36,200
Mark, hello, how good to hear your voice.Hi.

750
00:56:36,240 --> 00:56:39,160
'Tell me about Piti - how did it go?'

751
00:56:39,200 --> 00:56:41,640
He's certainly in good hands, and a couple of the girls

752
00:56:41,680 --> 00:56:44,400
from theinstitute are staying on in the village with him.

753
00:56:44,440 --> 00:56:48,800
They're gonna look after him until he gets moved out into the middle of the lake.

754
00:56:48,840 --> 00:56:52,600
Everyone thinks he stands a really good chance, which is fantastic.

755
00:56:52,640 --> 00:56:54,520
'Oh, that's so wonderful.'

756
00:56:54,560 --> 00:56:57,080
Just sorry you couldn't see him.

757
00:56:57,120 --> 00:57:03,320
Wherever we meet next, it is firmly understood that Stephen never leads, he only follows.

758
00:57:03,360 --> 00:57:07,480
And everybody helps him onto boats, because he's a clumsy arse. That's got to be understood.

759
00:57:07,520 --> 00:57:09,600
Well, don't do it again.

760
00:57:09,640 --> 00:57:12,120
I will do my very best not to do it again.

761
00:57:12,160 --> 00:57:14,600
OK! Speak to you very soon.

762
00:57:14,640 --> 00:57:17,360
You bet, lots of love. All right. Bye.

763
00:57:19,920 --> 00:57:23,120
I wish Stephen had been here to see this. He'd have loved it.

764
00:57:23,160 --> 00:57:24,960
And it makes me feel really positive.

765
00:57:25,000 --> 00:57:27,360
You can get really bogged down and dragged down

766
00:57:27,400 --> 00:57:32,840
by all these population figures and trends and animals disappearing and declining in numbers.

767
00:57:32,880 --> 00:57:36,360
And some of us think there's no hope at all.

768
00:57:36,400 --> 00:57:39,920
Then seeing this and seeing all these people who've given so much

769
00:57:39,960 --> 00:57:42,560
for just one manatee, it really does give me hope.

770
00:57:42,600 --> 00:57:47,880
If encountering a manatee can move these children as much as it moved me,

771
00:57:47,920 --> 00:57:54,880
then maybe there is an outside chance that the greatest period of extinction the world has ever known

772
00:57:54,920 --> 00:57:58,400
will not claim the lugubrious, flatulent,

773
00:57:58,440 --> 00:58:01,680
and slightly wonderful Amazonian manatee.

774
00:58:13,280 --> 00:58:15,680
On his visit to Africa,

775
00:58:15,720 --> 00:58:20,440
there was one animal that obsessed Douglas Adams for the rest of his life.

776
00:58:20,480 --> 00:58:23,480
It weighed three tons, had a horn to die for,

777
00:58:23,520 --> 00:58:27,760
and had one of the worst tempers in the animal kingdom.

778
00:58:27,800 --> 00:58:30,160
Now it's my turn.

779
00:58:39,800 --> 00:58:42,080
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