5 Inspirational Wildlife Conservation Shorts

Spring has arrived at last. And just as the blooming flowers signal the change in seasons, so too does the emergence of one beautiful little creature. Meet the European ground squirrel. They have been hibernating for the last six months, sleeping blissfully through winter's chill. They're finally awake. Naturally, there is only one thing on their mind. It's breakfast time. And the meadow where they live has everything a ground squirrel needs. After a couple weeks, empty bellies are finally satisfied. And the flower feast slows down. Now the squirrels have a new priority. To find a mate. This couple will stay together for the whole mating season, working together to prepare for their new arrivals. A female ground squirrel will only give birth to a single litter a year, having anywhere from two to nine newborns. Everything must be perfect. Using paws, teeth and belly, adjustments to the burrow is easy work for the male. Whilst his female mate works tirelessly to create the perfect nest. She gathers grass each morning and takes it to her underground chamber. Where she will give birth in less than 25 days. European ground squirrels are endangered, primarily due to the widespread conversion of grasslands to agriculture and buildings. And large colonies like this one in Austria are becoming increasingly rarer. Ground squirrels are such a fierce and adorable species that play a vital role in the ecosystems they inhabit. We must give them the opportunity to thrive. It is only just before sunrise that there is respite from the heat. And the birds leave the safety of the forest to quench their thirst at the waterhole. But the magpies hesitate. They are wary. In their minds, scenes of danger are playing out. Raptors are the essence of fear. But over generations, these brave magpies have learned to know their enemies well. Today, however, there is a different mark on the wet map. After generations of absence, a silent shadow has returned to these forests. One that the magpies are learning to fear again. The Iberian lynx. Brought to the brink of extinction by human persecution, lynxes are making a slow comeback. This young female is over a year old. At this age, she should have been expelled to search for her own territory. But she is lucky. Her mother, called Odrina, who rules this forest, still allows her to make use of the waterhole. It is only a matter of minutes before the heat returns to the plains. And the sun beats down, unforgiving. As it nears the western mountains, clouds begin to gather above. And the magpies sense that their new biggest fear is on the move. Odrina, the undisputed owner of the territory. She isn't alone. Following close behind are her three female kittens. Odrina lives there, focused and determined. To the water's edge, the magpies can relax. Odrina won't be ambushing them today. But they have got someone else's attention. The young cub may be only four months old, but she already has the stealth of a true lynx. Or almost. Thanks to unprecedented conservation efforts, the Iberian lynx is back from the brink. And with successful mothers like Odrina, the complex ecosystem of the central plains is slowly reforming again. As the ancient battle of weeds resumes between magpies and lynxes. The love life of a European garden spider has a deadly side. If this male isn't careful, the female will be taking him out on a not-so-romantic dinner. It's common for female spiders to eat their mates. But every autumn, this male has an urge he simply can't resist. Luckily, a spider's web is for more than just catching flies. An elaborate dance would be wasted on her poor eyesight. He spins a mating thread and plucks the silk to let her know he's there. These vibrations are his attempt at courting. But specific frequencies tell her he's more than just dinner. He tries to get her in the mood, but it's a big risk to take. Even if he is successful, he may still be on the menu. But his body contains the perfect nutrients for producing eggs. Perhaps another go. One wrong move and it could all be over. He makes contact, but he needs to work on his game. One last attempt. Passing the sperm to her with his appendages called pedipalps, he seals the deal with minimal contact. Success and a quick getaway. She'll have to find her meal elsewhere, but she leaves carrying with her the next generation. I think when anyone hears orcas for the first time or whales for the first time, it transports them. And this has always been the case for myself, that when I'm in the lab, this is when I get re-energized. I get, I still get excited after 40 years of listening to their calls because it's so intimate. You're there with the whales, whatever they're doing. We can't always interpret what they're doing. We definitely do not know exactly what they're communicating. And that just adds to the mystery. Suddenly you get to be in the water and you're carried along with whatever they're doing. You know, when we hear distant calls, I think that's when it's the most exciting because we know that they're coming. They're coming closer to us. In the 1980s, we started to expand our hydrophone network to include areas that we could not immediately see. This really fulfilled our mission of being able to understand what a day in the life of a whale was all about. Each orca family unit has their own specific sound and it's inherited from the mother. So it goes through the generations and it's almost perfectly transmitted from the mother to her daughters, to the daughter's offspring. Recognition of that gave us the ability to track the whales throughout their day. It was an exciting moment to be able to discriminate the different family groups. And since then, we have just fine-tuned that over the years, depending on the experience we have with which families come in. When I get the chance to be in the lab by myself late at night or early in the morning, I think that is really one of the most exciting times. Everything else is stripped away. It's a very intimate moment. It's just you and the sound and the whales. When Sitika, age 30, died, she left her acoustic heritage that she had inherited from her mother, Nikola, to her two daughters, Cleo and Minstrel. They inherited her sound. Cleo and Minstrel both now have large families of their own. And the challenge we're going to face in the future is whether or not they have inherited flawlessly the acoustic heritage from their mother, Sitika, or whether or not there are differences that we can discriminate these two families. In between the bustling city, surrounded by tall buildings, there lies a freshwater ecosystem. Every morning in this small water body, some extraordinary behaviors take place. The day starts by pecking, flipping and wadding in these waters. But some species make this water even more fascinating. The cormorants. Hundreds of them arrive at this lake for their first meal of the day. They all gather together. Once the flock is strong in numbers, they're all set for the big hunt. They form a tight-knit array that leaves no fish on their way. And they're not the only one fishing in these waters. The lake is about to get dramatic. Hunt like this won't go unnoticed. The troop of pelicans starts marching towards them. With the pouch as an advantage, pelicans scoop away as many fish as they can. And cormorants struggle to grab their share. Even in this chaos, a few are successful. Competing with a species three times larger than them is exhausting. Cormorants moved away from pelicans, but it didn't seem to work. Pelicans followed them everywhere. Only a change in strategy can aid the cormorants. To be ahead in this game, they have to reach the prey way before the pelicans get there. This is a struggle between size and speed. With their quick-drive feathers and a streamlined body, cormorants were able to keep a gap from pelicans. Their struggle is rewarded. Today, water bodies are shrinking at an alarming rate. And yet it is surprising to see how different species sustain with what is left.