PEOPLE-BRITAIN-DAVID ATTENBOROUGH Veteran nature broadcaster, David Attenborough, reflects on nature's curiosities

Record ID: 190105

  • Title: PEOPLE-BRITAIN-DAVID ATTENBOROUGH Veteran nature broadcaster, David Attenborough, reflects on nature's curiosities
  • Date: 26th January 2015
  • Summary: LONDON, ENGLAND, UNITED KINGDOM (JANUARY 26, 2015) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF PENGUINS AT LONDON ZOO CAMELS AT ZOO CLOSE OF CAMEL TIGERS AT ZOO CLOSE OF TIGER
  • Embargoed: 10th February 2015 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Topics: General
  • Reuters ID: LVA6UFAM02NUHNOO20ASU8OMZ0J9
  • Story Text: The veteran nature documentary broadcaster, Sir David Attenborough, was at London Zoo in Regent's Park on Monday (January 26) to discuss the new series of his television show, "David Attenborough's Natural Curiosities."
    The popular natural history series sees Attenborough showcasing some of nature's most extraordinary species, and dispelling myths and exaggerations about different creatures.
    "The cheetah's legendary 70 miles per hour speed record is just a myth but their true top speed of 58 miles an hour is still extraordinary. A body that is fine-tuned for hunting helps them run in a really remarkable way. But the cheetah's real impossible feat, so called, is the ability to change speeds so extremely quickly and that makes it one of the most maneuverable animals alive" he says in a clip from the series.
    A similar exaggeration applies to fleas, he told Reuters. "Now fleas, everyone knows, they can jump very high and indeed they can and they have to in order to get onto the body of their, of the animals they are going to infect or suck the blood of. But people will happily tell you that they can jump the equivalent, the equivalent of a human being jumping over St Paul's. It isn't true either."
    Attenborough's career has spanned sixty years. At 88-years-old, he is best known for his wildlife documentaries such as "Life on Earth", "Frozen Planet" and "Africa". He was knighted in 1985. He is also a former senior manager of the BBC, as a controller of BBC Two and director of programming for BBC Television in the 1960s and 1970s. When asked what he would choose as the most treasured moment of this career thus far, Attenborough told Reuters: "If you dive on a barrier reef or a coral reef and you suddenly see the most extraordinary pageant of fabulous creatures, the most wonderful colours, the most extraordinary shapes, absolutely unlike anything you see on land, at all - it's a revelation, so yeah, that's the one moment that I would mention, yeah."
    However, despite his expansive career, there are still many animals left that Attenborough hopes to film. "I don't know what the latest number of different animals there are in the world - but something of the order of 10 million I should think. So we've got quite a few to go," he told Reuters. "I mean I've been at it for 60 years but I'm still not got anywhere near my first million, let alone my first thousandth so there's a lot to go."
    Reflecting on his favourite species of the natural world, he explains that the fascination lies in how varied it is. "Everybody thinks, and quite rightly you know, chimpanzees - fascinating. But so are snails you know. Slugs are amazing. The mating of the leopard slug is one of the most sensuous film sequences you'll ever see in your life. It's true." He continues to joke that if he were to be an animal, he would be a leopard slug.
    On a more serious note, Attenborough went on to point out that the most serious issue affecting the natural world at present is the planet's increasing population. "If we don't do something about limiting our number, the numbers of human beings on the planet, the natural world will do it for us," he explained. "And of course it has been doing that. What about all the famines that we hear about in Africa and elsewhere. That is the natural world reacting to this huge increase in numbers of this one particular species."
    David Attenborough's Natural Curiosities will air on Watch on Mondays at 9pm from February 2.
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