The Russian wilderness... Shrouded in secrecy and totally unexpected.
Unseen by the outside world for years, now finally explored.
In the east, a mysterious place called Ussuriland.
Here bizarre turtles dodge the soup dish.
In temperate forests, bears hang from the trees.
And two of the worlds rarest cats slip through the shadows.
This is Ussuriland- The Secret Forest.
The Secret Forest
Russia- the world's largest country, almost twice the size of the United States
but with less than half the population.
One of Eurasia's last great wildernesses, few know its true wealth...
In the southeast corner, deep forests dissolve into fast-flowing rivers.
The countryside is home to the rare and unusual...
This is Ussuriland.
Ussuriland is dominated by the Sikhote Alin forest
stretching from the mountains to the sea.
At its Northern reach lies one of Russia's best known rivers.
The Amur.
The world's eighth longest waterway forms a 3,000 km-long border with China.
In April ice blocks the size of boats sail down to the Sea of Okhotsk.
They drift past trees that hide one of the rarest animals on the planet.
Few people have ever seen one- or ever will.
The Amur leopard.
About 30 remain in the wild, making it the most critically endangered big cat.
This male checks on a deer he killed a few days ago and stashed under a tree for safekeeping.
A creature of the night, he finds daytime unsettling.
He'll return to it later.
Nothing in the forest goes unnoticed.
Tonight, a keen eyed flying squirrel spies the secretive creature.
It's dangerous for him to overeat- it will slow him down.
By caching food he can return again and again.
A carcass like this can sustain him for two weeks.
A male Amur leopard can grow to three meters and weigh 48 kg.
They have been systematically hunted for their coats and bones.
and as the forest declines, so does their natural prey.
The world's rarest big cat slinks back to his den.
He's safe for one more night.
The Sikhote Alin is one of the richest temperate forests in the world, and is already in the midst of the cold spring.
This vast woodland spans 1 and a half million hectares, half the size of Belgium.
Flanked to the East by the Sea of Japan, it cuts a central band through Ussuriland.
Ridges, valleys and waterways create a patchwork of temperate and subtropical climates,
allowing an abundance of creatures to thrive.
In a calm river pool, frogs play the dating game.
even giant, bloodsucking mosquitoes can't break the amorous mood.
To avoid a plague of frogs, different species stagger their breeding throughout the Spring.
Already a tadpole army shimmers in the backwaters.
Safety in numbers means some of the mass must survive.
On the shore, sandy footprints expose a family of woodland assassins.
Blakiston's fishing owls.
By day, they enjoy the view, and wait for cover of night.
Their fluffy chick secures itself in a broken treetop and waits for attention.
Its parents send a reassuring message:
We'll eat at sundown.
With so many frogs, chipmunks are low on the menu.
After winter hibernation, they've got their own dinner to think about.
They bury food all the time- but chipmunk memory span is only three days.
So they forget where the previous hoards are and have to search relentlessly,
hoping to find something.
Some look for an easy meal, it's quicker to raid another's full pantry.
In spring, when food is abundant they spend more time resting and sleeping in between meals.
As light fades, the night shift begins.
The adult Blakiston's owls, stalk the river near their nest,
close enough to keep an eye on the chick.
This allows the chick to watch and learn from the masters.
Adults may stare for hours before pouncing.
Highly effective strategy.
Having waited all day, the greedy chick gobbles down the fish.
And demands more.
His parents, which mate for life, take it in turns to feed him during the night.
Time for the adults to hunt in earnest.
He needs up to four fish per night-
every night- so he'll grow strong enough to fledge after fifty days.
Plus, the parents have to fill their own bellies too.
They'll be at this 'til dawn.
The lifeblood of the Sikhote Alin forest is its untouched and hidden rivers.
These secluded water ways hide many secrets.
Tucked within the dense greenery, another dedicated mother cares for her young ones.
A female Asiatic Black Bear raises two lively cubs.
Highly adapted to climbing trees, their five centimetre long claws provide a good grip.
It's believed that Asiatic black bears became tree-huggers after thousands of years sharing the forest with tigers.
Today, fewer tigers mean less of a threat.
But the bears aren't out of the woods yet:
World population has declined by forty nine percent over the last thirty years.
They're hunted for their gallbladders, in demand for Chinese medicine.
When adults are killed, the orphans become easy prey for tigers and leopards.
The vast forest extends east to the coast, running right down to the sea's edge.
Here, the rocky shores are home to a different community.
Sika deer have adapted to an unusual kind of environmental problem.
The constant rain, snow and mist wash away sources of minerals in the forest.
To boost their diet, they come to the shore to eat salty kelp.
With the rare but deadly Amur tigers lurking in the forest breaking cover is dangerous.
They must stay on the alert.
Sika deer have elaborate ways to communicate, using scent, postures and ten different sounds...
With one of the world's largest predators roaming nearby, they can't be too careful.
A wake of vultures indicates that death has already paid a visit.
While they squabble, a phantom slips down to the rocks.
Among the most critically endangered animals in the world-
It's thought about four hundred Amur Tigers remain in the wild.
They're the largest and heaviest of the five tiger subspecies,
weighing up to three hundred and sixty kilograms.
Unlike Indian tigers, Amurs are usually nocturnal.
A day at the beach needs caution, even for this top predator.
He must be desperately hungry to venture out.
Normally, these graceful giants are hunters not scavengers, but they won't pass up an opportunity.
Vultures have already ripped it open.
He'll eat up to forty kilograms in one go- over a tenth of his body weight.
But he's nervous in broad daylight.
Heckling crows call unwanted attention.
He eats with growing discomfort. Something's not right.
Perhaps it's the camera, although it's hidden eight hundred metres away.
Amur tigers have no natural predators, except man,
who has driven them almost to extinction.
Up to thirty tigers are poached in Russia every year for their skins and for Chinese medicine.
Increased logging and agriculture threatens their home.
Not surprisingly they are shy and secretive.
It's not easy turning down a free lunch. especially to crows.
They can take down a fully grown bear, but reluctantly, the master predator slinks away.
Two hundred and fifty kilometres inland, where Ussuriland borders China, the landscape transforms.
Rivers leave the woods and drain into open wetlands.
Lake Khanka, the largest freshwater lake in east Asia, spans four thousand square kilometres.
The rare Komarov lotus and over three hundred and forty bird species make their home here.
Once affected by agricultural pollution,
the collapse of the Soviet Union led to reduced impacts on the lake and a steady recovery.
Sharp eyed herons search for fish.
With over seventy species to choose from, they won't go hungry.
The waters hide fish weighing up to six hundred kilograms. far too much for a heron.
But something else lurks below the surface...
And it has this heron in its sights.
With a nose used like a snorkel,
this strange denizen of the depths is a Chinese soft-shelled turtle.
Lake Khanka is one of their last remaining refuges in the wild.
The border with China runs through the lake-
and on the other side, they are a prized delicacy for the cooking pot.
After seven months hibernating in the mud they emerge to make the most of a five month growth spurt.
To an ambitious turtle, that means sunbathing.
When summer comes to Ussuriland, it brings a surprise.
Monsoons.
From July until September, up to a metre of rain pours down on the Sikhote Alin forest.
The weather is almost as threatening as the predators.
The owl chick is drenched.
His hollow-tree hideout has filled to the brim- he is homeless.
Beating his wings helps fluff and dry his feathers.
but it's tricky.
He retreats under leaves to wait for the rain to stop.
Young birds are at risk of hypothermia before their feathers are fully formed.
The rain brings little concern to Asiatic Black Beas.
A pair shrug it off, focusing on the all-important business of feeding.
Unlike other Russian bears that depend on seasonal salmon,
the Asiatics are mainly herbivores.
They usually eat fruits and roots, but are known to take almost anything-
including insects, mammals and carrion.
If their diet becomes deficient, they get extra nutrients by stripping tree bark.
During the times of lush green plenty they must spend many of their waking hours feeding.
They'll spend summer building up a fat store to see them through the dark time of hibernation.
After rain, water seeps from the hills.
Small streams swell into raging rivers, trees topple like dominoes.
Massive poplars and elms get dragged by strong currents and dumped as waters recede.
Storm debris is dropped all around the owl nest.
The young Blakiston's Fish Owl's front garden has changed,
but he's dried out and ready to explore.
As he gets closer to fledging, he must master the use of his huge talons and powerful wings.
He's also learning to preen his feathers.
It's essential to prevent clumping after rain, vital for his warmth and insulation.
At six weeks old he is already half a metre tall- as an adult
he'll grow another 20cm.
As night falls, a serenade of mating calls fills the forest.
But tonight's romance will be short lived for some.
To the owl family, the frog calls sound like a dinner bell.
At the end of April concerts fill the air from early morning until late at night.
Even an owl can grow tired of fish.
They aren't the only ones attracted by the frog chorus.
It's a racoon dog, a tiny hunter, just fifty centimetres long.
Up above, the feast begins.
While the owls watch from their perch, the dog sniffs out its supper.
It has poor eyesight and relies on a sensitive nose.
The chick, as usual, simply waits for his parents to bring the next meal.
In the forest hundreds of unnamed tributaries and streams feed twenty three rivers
that soak a drainage area of around seventeen thousand square kilometres.
Water from here makes its way to Lake Khanka and its marshes.
Strong winds whip across the wide lake basin, stirring up waves.
Gulls feel right at home.
As waves hit the Western edge they surge over the sand banks.
Lagoons are formed and soon tracks appear.
After a storm, Chinese turtles move in to check it out.
When the lagoon formed, it trapped thousands of small fish...
Bad news for the fish... For everyone else it's a bonanza...
With such an abundance of fish, the turtle can afford to be choosy.
It only eats the head with its energy-rich brain...
The fish have more to worry about than just brain-sucking turtles...
They must also beware of the voracious Snakehead fish.
These predators aren't trapped in the lagoon.
They can breathe air so a shrinking water pool is like an all you can eat buffet.
The shallows are full of small, gasping fish, but the snakehead misses its strike.
But no problem. the air breather can easily wriggle back to the water.
After eating their fill, the turtles return to the safety of deeper waters for the night.
Although adults have few predators here, they instinctively seek safety.
On the south coast the land changes again.
Two hundred and thirty kilometres away the bays of the Rimsky-Korsakov Archipelago look like the Mediterranean.
Pines form the last stand of Russian forest as cliffs dive into the sea.
The warm Tsushima current coming from the Sea of Japan
creates one of Russia's best kept secrets-
it resembles a tropical underwater world.
Life giving waters are comparable to the Gulf Stream.
Kelp and Sea grass create miniature forests...
Here both predators and prey hide in plain sight.
In this world, camouflage is key.
The colour-changing octopus is reigning champ of hide and seek.
But this laid-back octopus's garden hides a vicious paradise...
Here stones are alive- and dangerous.
No one tangles with the Japanese fugu fish.
They carry one of the deadliest toxins in the animal kingdom.
Japanese chefs serve these puffer fish,
but only after two years of training and a rigorous exam in rendering them harmless.
Less venomous predators join gangs.
Pacific starfish rip open mussels and suck out their meat.
Soft corals gracefully receive the leftovers.
Hermit crabs hunt under a protective shell.
While day and night bizarre sea cucumbers hoover the depths.
Back at the Lake Khanka lagoons, the early morning brings out the dawn patrol.
A raccoon dog sniffing out a meal on the sand banks.
Chinese soft-shelled turtles lay eggs up to five times a year, depositing as many as thirty in one go.
There may be thousands out here, if only he could only find them.
Unlike other dogs they are not fast hunters.
instead their sense of smell turns them into relentless scavengers.
He has a strong nose but poor eyesight. so he is easily spooked.
But eventually the effort pays off.
He must rely on finding smaller food items so spends hours foraging.
The lake holds the largest breeding population in the Russian Far East.
The hatchlings lucky enough to survive flooding and predation make a mad dash to the water.
For these coin-size turtles, life is one peril after another.
Just reaching the shore is a challenge.
The shallows offer relative safety- except their relatives are cannibals.
Some young hide along the shoreline, others float like leaves.
Then they head for cover in the lotus beds.
Weighing just a few grams, they tuck into algae and spend time sunbathing like the adults.
But predators lurk in the lotus beds too.
Snakehead fish come to prowl.
The turtle, enjoying his own feast, remains oblivious to the danger.
Score one for the turtle, nil for the snakehead.
As summer ends, Lake Khanka marks the occasion with a most spectacular and beautiful display.
Mayflies have spent up to a year living on the lake bed eating algae as nymphs...
Now they transform.
For twenty minutes before and after sunset
winged adults start to rise from the lake to breed...
Thousands... then millions...
In the space of just twenty four hours they mate on the wing,
drop eggs on the surface. and then die.
They don't even stop to eat, but become a feast for others.
Then all will be quiet until next year's fleeting moment of glory.
The brief autumn starts to roll into Ussuriland.
Back in the wooded hills of the great Sikhote Alin forest, the trees turn to gold.
Time is short for the animals. They must find food and shelter before the snows arrive.
Rare musk deer make the most of the remaining leaves before they are buried under a white blanket...
The Males display short tusks rather than showy antlers.
The young Asiatic Black Bears are experiencing their first leafy autumn.
But there's no sign of their mother.
poaching orphans around twenty bears in Ussuriland every year.
Normally they would stay with her for two or three years.
Without her guidance, their first winter might be their last.
At least they've fattened up over the summer,
cubs increase weight tenfold in the first 3 months- vital to survive winter.
Right now they'd rather play.
Many hibernate for the whole winter, some only during the worst periods.
they build dens on the ground with brushwood and foliage.
At least one of them shows the right idea.
But his brother seems clueless.
He'd better wise up soon because he's running out of time.
Winter is fast approaching and with no cosy den to retire to, his chances are slim.
At the lake, the lotus fields are dead.
The frigid waters will serve as cold storage for seven months as winter throws an icy blanket across it...
Frost has already put reeds into preservation.
Nimble parrotbills hunt for insects hidden inside the stems.
They'll sustain the birds through the lean months.
Come November, winter arrives full throttle.
forest waterways transform into glassy sheets of ice.
Underneath, life gently winds down.
small fish will survive if the water holds enough oxygen.
Some Frogs and toads divert blood to the skin, pulling oxygen from the water.
Their heart rate slows and can even stop as the temperature drops.
Those that haven't developed in time miss their chance.
Winter's harsh hand reaches the coast last.
The ice slowly builds around its edges.
Harlequin ducks will endure the long winter here.
Meantime, they bob around like corks in the breakers
and dive beneath the strong currents where shrimp, snails and fish flourish.
They can stay under for up to twenty five seconds at a time.
Densely packed feathers trap an insulating layer of air to protect them from the cold.
The ducks' neighbours, the Larga seals, aren't quite so energetic.
These two meter long, blubber-clad torpedoes have no complaints about the coming winter...
except the ice disturbs sunbathing and makes getting out of the water more tricky.
They spend much of winter in the water and when that begins to freeze they lounge around on the ice floes.
They can make fishing trips hundreds of kilometres long, before returning to the coast to rest.
Soon enough, snow arrives in all its fury... and time itself seems to freeze.
But not for everything.
A young Indian Marten celebrates his first snow with childlike delight.
Another of Ussuriland's rare animals...
as their name suggests, Indian Martens are found across India and Asia.
When the novelty wears off, deep winter may come as a shock.
Ussuriland was once the secret Russia where few people went...
preserved and protected by its remoteness.
But as in so many places, man's encroachment has left its mark...
Tigers have suffered years of persecution,
with seven percent of the population poached in a year, the future does not look good.
Logging has brought more people here, impacting on the region's wildlife.
The world's largest cat still rules these woods, but the end of his reign may be in sight.
It is possible to find Amur Tigers in the wild.
But, with small breeding numbers, a life expectancy of only ten years,
and a shrinking domain, the tiger's future looks bleak.
Before long, the only way to see the king of Russia may be in protected areas like these.
In the Sikhote Alin forest, one little river runs unfrozen and undisturbed.
Its snowy banks keep a record of recent events.
As the sun goes down, a proud parent watches from the riverbank.
The Owl chick has come of age.
It may stay in its parents' territory for two years, honing its survival skills.
Tonight it's taking on the first challenge- fishing.
After weeks watching its parents from the nest, it's ready to go it alone:
the first dip in the icy waters...
As it enjoys the prize, the parent shows how easy it is with a little more practice.
The fledgling will become a master soon enough.
The secret primeval forests of Sikhote Alin are a last stand for some of the earth's rarest animals.
The rivers and wetlands of the Amur basin hold stories of nature's triumph...
and near tragedy...
In this strange and unknown part of Russia
there is much to be preserved.
The epic wilderness known as Ussuriland.
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