blue planet seas of life episode summary

It is unthinkable to have a world without a healthy ocean.”ĭaniel Pauly, who leads the Sea Around Us programme at the University of British Columbia in Canada, and was not involved in Blue Planet 2, endorsed its stark conclusion. Quinn says the oceans are of vital importance for the whole world: “The oceans provide us with oxygen, they regulate temperature, they provide us with food and energy supplies. But his work to end turtle hunting and encourage tourism has seen numbers rise from 30-40 to more than 500. “I grew up in a house where turtle meat was normal,” says Peters. Photograph: Audun RikardsenĪttenborough also visits Trinidad, where the conservationist Len Peters has transformed the prospects of the giant leatherback turtles who come to the island to lay their eggs and whose numbers have fallen catastrophically in recent decades. Herring now draw in humpback whales and orca. Strict management of the herring fishery in Norway has saved it from collapse. But the programme also highlights some success stories, such as the revival of sperm whales off Sri Lanka and herring stocks off Norway after bans or restrictions were put in place.

“Every night thousands of miles of fishing lines laden with hooks are set – there is enough, it is said, to wrap twice around the world,” says Attenborough. Overfishing, which remains prevalent around the world, is also addressed. There, Lucy Quinn from the British Antarctic Survey says many chicks are killed by plastic fed to them by their parents, including one young bird whose stomach was punctured by a plastic toothpick. The Blue Planet 2 team found plastic everywhere they filmed, even in the most remote locations such as South Georgia island, an important breeding site for wandering albatrosses. You hear pops and grunts and gurgles and snaps.” He shows the noise of motorboats distracting saddleback clownfishes from warning against a predator attack. They use sound to attract a mate, to scare away a predator. Steve Simpson, at the University of Exeter, who works on coral reefs in southeast Asia, says: “There is a whole language underwater that we are only just getting a handle on. The noise from shipping, tourism, and fossil fuel exploration is also revealed as harming sea life. The reefs could be gone by the end of the century.” “The shells and the reefs really, truly are dissolving. Prof Chris Langdon, at the University of Miami, says it is “beyond question” that the problem is manmade. We’re headed into uncharted territory”Ĭarbon dioxide from fossil fuel burning also dissolves in seawater, making it more acidic. “What shocks me about what all the data shows is how fast things are changing here. Jon Copley, from the University of Southampton and one of many scientists appearing in the final episode, says. The programme also filmed on the Great Barrier Reef in 2016, witnessing the worst bleaching event in its history.Ĭlimate change is causing ocean temperatures to rise, bleaching the corals vital as nurseries for ocean life, and waters are warming rapidly in Antarctica too. Photograph: BBC NHUīrownlow said much of the footage shot of albatross chicks being killed by the plastic they mistake for food were too upsetting to broadcast. A bleached section of the Great Barrier Reef in Australia.

Blue planet seas of life episode summary