Indonesia is a land of creatures
lost in time
Castaways from two continents settle the island chain of Indonesia
the greatest archipelago on earth
Marooned on this scatter of islands
their descendants were cut off
from the outside world
Many became unique
Today, these thousands of islands
have a wider diversity of life
than anywhere else on the planet
Both above and below the water
creatures that live only here
rub shoulders with new colonists from east and west
Indonesia lies on a ring of fire
and the land still bears the scars of its violent birth
15 million years ago, seas stretched unbroken from Asia to Australia
but deep below the waves
huge pieces of the earth's crust were on the move
Where these giant fragments collided
molten lava spewed from the seabed
New land was born
Over millions of years
what was once open ocean became an archipelago of more than 17,000 islands
Today, these islands form a line of stepping stones
running 5000 km along the equator
from northern Australia to Asia
Some of the islands were built by volcanos
others are fragments of the continents
like Borneo
Borneo was once part of Asia
so Asian animals colonized its forests
They've been isolated so long
that some are now quite different to their relations on the mainland
They've become new species
like the proboscis monkey
Proboscis monkeys are found only here in Borneo,
along rivers and in coastal mangrove forest
They get their name from the male's enormous nose
He has a gut to match
Proboscis monkeys eat leaves
that huge stomach has full of bacteria to help digest them
Though the monkeys can deal with old leaves
they much prefer tender young ones
To find them, they often have to cross rivers
and that can be dangerous
The murky water hides a stealthy hunter
Crocodiles eat proboscis monkeys
Is that a crocodile or just a floating log?
Crocodiles home in on any splash in the water
The monkeys strain every sinew
to clear the danger in a single leap
They can't afford to put a foot wrong
For some, the river is just too wide
Every crash could be a dinner bell for the crocodiles
Even now an unseen killer could be homing in
The crocodile was just too late
but its time will come
crocs kill more proboscis monkeys
than any other predator
Close to the sea,
the mangroves are flooded by the tides
the creeks here are too wide to jump
so as the best of the food is on the other side
the monkeys have to swim for it
They paddle across as quietly as they can
the slightest splash could bring disaster
These unique animals even have partly webbed feet
ideal for life in Borneo's mangroves
Borneo is an old island, a fragment of mainland Asia
others in the archipelago are much younger
A new island appeared as recently as 1928
that eruption was just one chapter in a long story
Krakatau
In 1883, one of the greatest explosions
the earth has ever known ripped Krakatau apart
But just 45 years later,
a new island burst from the sea
the child of Krakatau
Today, the child is still growing
this is island building in action
This is just one of 155 active volcanos in Indonesia
Every day sees an eruption somewhere in the archipelago
this is the most violently volcanic region on earth
Within a year of its birth
Krakatau's child received its first colonists
Plants came
their seeds carried by wind and waves
volcanic ash is a fertile seedbed
Animals arrived too
spiders on the wind
birds and bats on wing
This is a story that's been repeated all over Indonesia
when the volcanos sleep, the colonists float in
Rich volcanic soils attracted another kind of immigrant
people
Fertile ash, ample rainfall and tropical sun
make volcanic slopes like these
the bread basket of Indonesia
People have been farming here for countless generations
Terraces in Java date back 2000 years
The mountain gives but it can also destroy
Living in the shadow of the volcano is dicing with death
remind us the fire beneath the surface never far away
These are soils so rich that yield 3 crops in a year
and they need to
for Java is the most densely populated island in the world
With almost 115 million people
it has half Indonesia's total
Java's terraces have been feeding people for 20 centuries
and feeding them well enough to support elaborate civilizations
The ruins of Borobudur date from the 8th century
only a society that knew where its next meal was coming from
could have afforded such flowering of art and craftsmanship
Borobudur is the largest Buddhist temple in the world
Indonesia's peoples are as diverse as the wildlife
and for much the same reasons
Over the centuries, waves of immigrants colonized these fertile islands
they came from many different lands
each with its own cultural heritage
Isolated on remote islands,
old cultures flowered in new ways
beauty blended with bizarre
Masks like these perhaps inspired
by the strange creatures that shared these island homes
And few could be stranger than this
the babyrussa
It lives on just one island
It's a pig, but a pig with a difference
Only the males have these extraordinary tusks
no one knows what they are for
An early explorer suggested they were hooks
so the animal could hang its head from the branch when it was resting
but then why doesn't female have them?
It's more likely they're used for some male chauvinistic pig activity
like fighting or attracting a mate
These extraordinary creatures
live only in the forests of one extraordinary island
lying at the very heart of the archipelago
Half of it was once part of Borneo
the other half fragments of Australia
Some 15 million years ago they collided
to form Sulawesi
Sulawesi's animals are the castaways of two continents
It's now isolated so they have been left alone
to evolve in their own way
Sulawesi's forests have masses of fruit trees
especially figs
So there's plenty of food for fruit eating animals and birds
like hornbills
The ancestors of these enormous birds
came from the forests of southern Asia
This is the red-knobbed hornbill
It's found only in Sulawesi
one of 88 bird species unique to the island
With so many fig trees in the forest
there's always one in fruits somewhere
figs make up most of their diet
Fig trees need hornbills as much as
hornbills need figs
They rely on the birds and animals to disperse their seeds
When a fig tree's in fruit
it's a focus of activity for all kinds of creature
Crested black macaques
are one of 7 kinds of monkey on Sulawesi
like red-knobbed hornbills
all 7 are found nowhere else
Their ancestors originally came from Borneo
more than 100km to the west
During the last Ice Age
sea levels were lower
and the straits that separated the island
much narrow
The movements of the earth's crust that assembled Sulawesi
triggered volcanos too
One of the island's most remarkable birds
uses volcanic heat to hatch its eggs
It's the maleo
its ancestors came from the east - from Australia
another legacy from Sulawesi's mongrel past
These chicken-sized birds nest in colonies
they bury their eggs in hot volcanic sand
The eggs are huge
5 times the size of a hen's egg
The chicks will need those reserves of energy
because their parents play no part in their upbringing
The eggs are buried and abandoned
In 3 months, they'll hatch
incubated only by the heat of the sand
The red-knobbed hornbill
takes parental devotion to the opposite extreme
These giant birds pair for life
This is the male
the female has a yellow knob on her beak
Hornbills nest in holes in tree trunks
but females are walled up inside for safety
most kinds narrow the entrance with mud
but volcanic soils don't bind well
so this one seals herself in with her own droppings
Fig seeds make good glue
For the next 3 months, she'll depend on her mate
to bring food for herself and the growing chick
He carries fruit in a pouch in his throat
He can hold as many as 250 figs
Even when his mate breaks a way out
the male's task isn't over
The chick won't fledge for another month
He'll feed it until it leaves the nest
Sulawesi's beaches of black volcanic sand
hold a special attraction for the monkeys
There're often the one place where they can find freshwater
Volcanic soils are very porous
during the dry season many streams disappear
but the water still flows beneath the surface
The monkeys have learned to reach it
by digging in sand
The first westerners to visit Sulawesi's shores
thought these creatures were apes
Misled by the apparently lack of a tail
they christened them the black ape
In fact, they are monkeys
with a typically monkey way of life
They live in troops of 30 to 100
Each with its own range
a tract of jungle big enough to support them throughout the year
Most of their diet is fruit from the forest
but beach combing can bring all kinds of delicacy
and the sea makes a great playground
As evening falls, the monkeys will retire to the trees
The night belongs to another world
One of Sulawesi's strangest creatures serenades the moon
with its unearthly cries
The tarsier
These tiny gremlins of the night
are the monkey's distant cousins
They live in pairs each with its own patch of forest
At dusk and dawn couples state their territorial claims
with a piercing duet
Though they weigh no more than an apple
tarsiers are perfectly formed hunters
They catch insects, small reptiles and amphibians
Huge eyes help them see in the dark
sensitive ears pinpoint their prey
and long hindlimbs make them prodigious leapers
They can jump nearly 20 times the length of their body
the human equivalent of 4 times the world long-jump record
Tarsiers may be tiny
but 40 million years of evolution
have honed their hunting skills to perfection
East of Sulawesi over the sea towards the sunrise
lies the least explored of all the islands in this mysterious archipelago
New Guinea is a giant fragment of continental crust
only 10,000 years ago it was part of Australia
Rising sea levels after the last Ice Age cut it off
Though it's separated only by shallow sea
it's a world apart
Well into the 20th century
few visitors ventured far into the interior
New Guinea has an incredible range of habitats
from coral reefs to coastal mangroves
dense tropical jungle to high mountains
The interior is so rugged
that even today, parts of it are almost unknown
This impenetrable landscape
has a far-reaching effect on the wildlife
Neighboring valleys are virtually cut off
Islands of forests separated not by sea,
but by mountains
Just as islands in the ocean develop a distinct form
so these islands within an island
have their own unique inhabitants
Some time in the distant past
a drab crow-like bird settled in New Guinea's forests
Over the years its descendants were isolated in separate valleys
Today, there are many different kinds
among them some of the most spectacular birds in the world
They're the birds of paradise
This tiny jewel is the king bird of paradise
the smallest of all
like the rest, he has a dozen courtship display
The king's range overlaps with another bird of paradise
the magnificent
He creates a special arena to show off his display
a patch of forest floor
he clears of every fallen leaf and twig
He'll use it for several years
In both species the females are drab and brown
only the males flaunt flamboyant plumage
It's the females who decide to which mate with
and the males will go to ridiculous length to impress them
Although they look different
these two species are actually very closely related
close enough to interbreed if a female picked the wrong mate
If you take away the colors these dancers are almost identical
Both species use similar movements
a sign of their common ancestry
The males dazzling in distinctive plumage
helps the female pick a mate of her own kind
The mountains of New Guinea's central spine
rise high above the tree line
to over 5000 meters
These barren highlands are a barrier to birds
form the forest below
There's no reason for them to cross
Cut off in their jungle valleys
the birds of paradise flowered in splendid isolation
There're just 42 kinds of bird of paradise in the world
New Guinea and its offshore islands
have 38 of them
all descended from that one crow-like ancestor
With their magnificent plumes
birds of paradise attract more than a mate
The feathers that are so vital to their courtship
can also be their undoing
People prize them for their own displays
and the locals are expert hunters
New Guinea is more sparsely populated
and better forested than other islands in the chain
It still has room for birds of paradise
Further to the west
in the heart of the archipelago
it's a very different story
People have been clearing the jungle to grow food for centuries
When the trees go
so do many of the unique creatures of these island forests
The Bali starling
the last census found only 14
still live in the wild
All across Indonesia,
people are replacing the island's natural inhabitants
So many of these creatures are unique
It's almost impossible to live here without destroying something
But the human cultures that displace them
have a beauty of their own
The Barong dance of Bali
tells a story of the age-old struggle between good and evil
an echo of another timeless conflict
between people and the natural world
The dance came to Bali from India
more than 1300 years ago
Over the centuries it developed in its own way
now like the Bali starling it's unique
Right across the archipelago
Indonesia's cultural diversity
is matched by the many ways that
people exploit wildlife
Here on the southern coast of Java
they reap a strange and hazardous harvest
What these men are after
is worth more than its weight in gold
To gather it, they will risk their lives
It's hidden deep in the cliffs below
in caves guarded by a turbulent sea
Suspended from flimsy ladders of rattan and bamboo
they brave cliffs that tower 100m from the waves
If the men fall here
their bodies are never recovered
People have been doing this for centuries
the techniques have changed little across the years
Skills handed down from father to son
over the generations
There're no safety ropes,
a fall would bring certain death
This is what they are after - bird's nests
The birds are cave swiftlets
They build their nests off saliva
The nests are used to make bird's nest soup
To us, warmed up swiftlet's spit may not seem very appetizing
but in Chinese cuisine it's a highly prized delicacy
There's been a trade in bird's nests for hundreds of years
they're so valuable that people even try to sell fake bird's nests
counterfeits, woven from noodles
Collecting rights in every cave
are owned and jealously guarded
Nests are gathered early in the season
when the birds have just finished building
Most pairs will make another nest
and breed successfully
so the harvest can be sustained year after year
Where people share the islands with wildlife
they seldom leave it untouched
but not all of Indonesia's 17000 islands
are densely peopled
Some are still primeval wilderness
lost worlds that time has passed by
On these distant islands even the animals look like something
from the age of the dinosaurs
The fabled island of Komodo
it's home to a creature that could have stepped
straight from pages of myth and legend
the Komodo dragon
In reality, it's not a dragon
nor even a dinosaur
but a gigantic lizard
These 3m monsters
live only on Komodo
and a few islands nearby
They are scavengers and hunters
big enough to kills pigs, deer even people
It's the breeding season
the formidable males must battle for the right to mate
Komodo dragons are the heaviest lizards in the world
A full-grown male can tip the scales of 250 kilos
He'll try to use that massive weight
to throw his opponent and pin him down
If the contestants are evenly matched
these contests can last an hour
Weight wins these wrestling matches
the smaller male is defeated
leaving his rival free to pursue the female
but she'll give him the run-around
before deciding whether to accept him
For most of the year males dominate the smaller females
driving them off as they compete for food
so he has to convince her that he's not just trying to attack her
Eventually his scaly caresses
will reap the reward
Next year, there'll be a new generation of dragons
10000 years ago an even larger lizard lived in Australia
a 7m monster
10 times the weight of these
Could it have been the dragon's ancestor?
Komodos now isolated by ferocious currents
that are hard to cross
The dragons are island castaways
like so much that came here from cross the sea
Right across the archipelago
the ocean carried colonists to this scattered isles
It's the ocean that created their rich variety
and the ocean has life of its own
It's there we'll go on our next program
The Underwater Wonderland of Indonesia
Transcription by Andrew and Hattie www.mvgroup.org