1 00:00:05,372 --> 00:00:10,105 From the fiirst dawn of creation to the end of time 2 00:00:15,081 --> 00:00:17,345 our world, our lives, 3 00:00:17,484 --> 00:00:21,887 and every living thing are attuned to a cosmic song 4 00:00:24,290 --> 00:00:27,589 a celestial cadence of light and dark 5 00:00:34,067 --> 00:00:37,036 of ebb and flow 6 00:00:42,809 --> 00:00:45,141 of heat and cold 7 00:00:47,047 --> 00:00:52,451 all set into motion by the epic dance of the sun, moon, and earth. 8 00:00:52,585 --> 00:00:55,645 These are the rhythms of life itself. 9 00:01:38,198 --> 00:01:40,666 Before there could be day or night 10 00:01:40,800 --> 00:01:43,462 before there was a spring or fall 11 00:01:43,603 --> 00:01:47,562 a star, our sun, had to flare into life. 12 00:01:49,843 --> 00:01:52,107 From the seething stuff of stars, 13 00:01:52,245 --> 00:01:56,545 over time, the planets of our solar system took shape. 14 00:02:03,056 --> 00:02:08,392 Four billion years ago, or more, one such place was born 15 00:02:09,562 --> 00:02:13,020 the planet called, Earth, our home. 16 00:02:24,911 --> 00:02:26,776 But for nearly a billion years, 17 00:02:26,913 --> 00:02:31,350 it would be a home inhospitable to any form of life 18 00:02:35,688 --> 00:02:37,918 a red and angry globe 19 00:02:38,057 --> 00:02:43,222 a churning mass of fiire, poison gas, and molten rock 20 00:02:45,465 --> 00:02:49,094 At the core of the planet raged an inferno. 21 00:02:59,112 --> 00:03:01,740 For thousands upon thousands of centuries, 22 00:03:01,881 --> 00:03:06,443 this infant planet suffered the violent pains of growth and change, 23 00:03:06,586 --> 00:03:10,647 as it formed and reformed itself. 24 00:03:18,965 --> 00:03:22,765 From the very beginning, the earth knew night and day. 25 00:03:22,902 --> 00:03:26,804 But a night and day not like any we know now. 26 00:03:32,545 --> 00:03:35,013 Fueled by the forces of creation, 27 00:03:35,148 --> 00:03:37,343 the earth raced through its daily cycle, 28 00:03:37,483 --> 00:03:41,385 spinning fiive times as fast as it does today. 29 00:03:49,929 --> 00:03:52,090 A few brief hours of starlight. 30 00:03:52,232 --> 00:03:54,223 A few brief hours of sun. 31 00:03:54,367 --> 00:03:57,859 Day followed night at a dizzying pace. 32 00:04:05,545 --> 00:04:08,537 Earth and sun were not alone in their orbits. 33 00:04:08,681 --> 00:04:12,515 But cosmic visitors rarely came to stay 34 00:04:14,454 --> 00:04:16,547 until one cataclysmic encounter 35 00:04:16,689 --> 00:04:20,682 transformed the heavens and earth forever. 36 00:04:24,264 --> 00:04:26,732 One theory tells of a cosmic accident 37 00:04:26,866 --> 00:04:29,596 a huge asteroid on a collision course. 38 00:04:29,736 --> 00:04:31,795 It may have been the birth of the moon 39 00:04:31,938 --> 00:04:35,203 and so many of the rhythms of life. 40 00:04:36,909 --> 00:04:40,208 But fiirst, the moon would have been a cloud of fragments, 41 00:04:40,346 --> 00:04:43,440 circling the planet like the rings of Saturn 42 00:04:43,583 --> 00:04:48,077 before coming together into a huge, barren satellite. 43 00:05:00,633 --> 00:05:03,261 Too small to hold a protective atmosphere, 44 00:05:03,403 --> 00:05:08,363 the moon itself has long been bombarded by debris ever since. 45 00:05:09,309 --> 00:05:12,403 Without wind or rain to smooth the scars, 46 00:05:12,545 --> 00:05:18,711 its face bears everlasting witness to the violent nature of outer space. 47 00:05:24,490 --> 00:05:25,718 On the earth below, 48 00:05:25,858 --> 00:05:29,817 an atmosphere was brewing from endless clouds of poison gasses 49 00:05:29,962 --> 00:05:31,190 and water vapor, 50 00:05:31,331 --> 00:05:34,323 expelled from beneath the crust. 51 00:05:36,936 --> 00:05:41,032 Closer to the sun, the precious water might have boiled away. 52 00:05:41,174 --> 00:05:45,372 On a colder planet it would be locked into eternal ice. 53 00:05:46,479 --> 00:05:49,414 But on the earth, water vapor condensed 54 00:05:49,549 --> 00:05:52,450 falling back as rain upon the land. 55 00:05:54,987 --> 00:05:58,013 And so the fiirst oceans were born. 56 00:06:04,130 --> 00:06:08,396 Over millions of years, the seas rose to flood the earth. 57 00:06:11,337 --> 00:06:15,330 But these were not the cool, life giving waters we know today. 58 00:06:24,016 --> 00:06:27,281 The primal atmosphere provided little protection. 59 00:06:27,420 --> 00:06:31,914 It had no blanket of ozone to fiilter out lethal radiation. 60 00:06:41,634 --> 00:06:43,158 Virtually unobstructed, 61 00:06:43,302 --> 00:06:47,671 the sun's unforgiving rays seared whatever they touched. 62 00:06:52,745 --> 00:06:56,806 Much closer than now, the moon also played a violent part 63 00:06:56,949 --> 00:07:01,886 tugging at the seas with a force countless times greater than today. 64 00:07:04,524 --> 00:07:08,654 The fiirst tides were mountains of water, miles high. 65 00:07:14,700 --> 00:07:20,229 Torn by sun and moon, the surface waters offered no hope for life. 66 00:07:21,974 --> 00:07:25,603 Still, there was sanctuary below. 67 00:07:26,345 --> 00:07:31,214 In the ocean, the fiirst building blocks of life amino acids emerged. 68 00:07:31,350 --> 00:07:35,252 They incubated in water heated by the planet's internal fiires 69 00:07:35,388 --> 00:07:37,982 and fed on a bubbling broth of nutrients 70 00:07:38,124 --> 00:07:40,991 straight from the heart of the earth. 71 00:07:49,902 --> 00:07:55,670 But even the ocean's depths were not safe from a cataclysmic universe. 72 00:08:00,980 --> 00:08:04,279 In a galaxy still littered with the debris of genesis, 73 00:08:04,417 --> 00:08:10,413 asteroid strikes may have vaporized the oceans, laying the seabed bare. 74 00:08:11,090 --> 00:08:15,356 More than once, life on earth may have been snuffed out. 75 00:08:17,830 --> 00:08:21,459 Yet the fiire and rains of creation kept their hold on earth, 76 00:08:21,601 --> 00:08:24,502 and the oceans rose again. 77 00:08:25,872 --> 00:08:28,466 Life has proven stubborn here. 78 00:08:31,644 --> 00:08:36,411 Some three billion years ago, as the earth cooled and calmed once again, 79 00:08:36,549 --> 00:08:42,419 new forms appeared, the heralds of life as we understand it. 80 00:08:45,958 --> 00:08:49,394 In quiet, sheltered pools, algae spread. 81 00:08:49,529 --> 00:08:51,963 Colonies of single celled organisms, 82 00:08:52,098 --> 00:08:55,727 they thrived off abundant sunlight and carbon dioxide. 83 00:08:55,868 --> 00:09:02,068 And in their waste they left behind oxygen, the precious breath of life. 84 00:09:02,208 --> 00:09:04,574 This was the birth of photosynthesis 85 00:09:04,710 --> 00:09:08,908 a new, life giving cycle that transformed the earth. 86 00:09:11,083 --> 00:09:12,243 For countless millennia, 87 00:09:12,385 --> 00:09:16,549 algae flourished in the brief days so bright with sun. 88 00:09:20,560 --> 00:09:24,360 And now the cosmic rhythms were changing. 89 00:09:25,798 --> 00:09:29,962 Gradually, the moon and its tides slowed the earth's mad spinning 90 00:09:30,102 --> 00:09:36,200 and the forces that bound planet and satellite together loosened their hold. 91 00:09:38,911 --> 00:09:41,505 The moon retreated to where she stands today, 92 00:09:41,647 --> 00:09:45,447 still slipping imperceptibly away over time. 93 00:09:50,790 --> 00:09:53,725 With the moon more distant, the tides fell. 94 00:09:53,859 --> 00:09:57,818 Calmer waters bred more algae and more oxygen. 95 00:09:57,964 --> 00:10:00,296 And with the oxygen came ozone, 96 00:10:00,433 --> 00:10:04,267 protection from the sun's most lethal rays. 97 00:10:15,381 --> 00:10:20,216 At last, the stage was set for the next phase of creation. 98 00:10:25,157 --> 00:10:30,686 Like the fiire of a new sun, the spark of new life appeared in the waters. 99 00:10:31,697 --> 00:10:33,995 Still just single celled plants, 100 00:10:34,133 --> 00:10:39,036 but organisms far more complex than any that had come before. 101 00:10:40,640 --> 00:10:42,369 Within each was a genetic code 102 00:10:42,508 --> 00:10:45,341 that reflected the rhythms of earth and heaven, 103 00:10:45,478 --> 00:10:49,608 a biological clock to guide their lives. 104 00:10:52,351 --> 00:10:56,185 Daytime would be the time to feed on the power of the sun. 105 00:10:56,322 --> 00:11:00,156 Reproduction would be saved for the shelter of night. 106 00:11:05,498 --> 00:11:06,897 Millions of years later, 107 00:11:07,033 --> 00:11:14,132 this clock still synchronizes almost all life to the very spin of the planet. 108 00:11:21,647 --> 00:11:23,615 From the depths of a steep walled lagoon 109 00:11:23,749 --> 00:11:25,910 in the South Pacifiic island of Palau, 110 00:11:26,052 --> 00:11:30,751 a herd of underwater farmers rises to meet the dawn. 111 00:11:36,529 --> 00:11:41,262 A swarm of jellyfiish, tens of thousands strong. 112 00:11:45,271 --> 00:11:49,173 Without eyes, the jellyfiish do not use the light to see. 113 00:11:49,308 --> 00:11:52,766 They need it to grow their food gardens of brown algae 114 00:11:52,912 --> 00:11:56,541 that flourish within their transparent bodies. 115 00:12:02,888 --> 00:12:06,847 Denied sunshine, they would starve. 116 00:12:15,568 --> 00:12:17,900 As the sun arcs overhead, 117 00:12:18,037 --> 00:12:22,633 shadows of the surrounding walls darken the surface of the lagoon. 118 00:12:22,775 --> 00:12:26,506 Just below, the jellyfiish ferry their microscopic passengers, 119 00:12:26,645 --> 00:12:29,773 keeping them always in the light. 120 00:12:33,052 --> 00:12:36,385 When the sun sinks, so do the jellyfiish, 121 00:12:36,522 --> 00:12:38,114 dropping down to the ocean floor 122 00:12:38,257 --> 00:12:42,023 where the algae can fiind their own nourishment. 123 00:12:47,967 --> 00:12:53,337 Even without sight, the jellyfiish will know when the sun returns again. 124 00:12:57,309 --> 00:12:59,243 In the surface waters of the oceans 125 00:12:59,378 --> 00:13:02,108 most creatures take their cue to feed or rest 126 00:13:02,248 --> 00:13:04,512 from the rhythm of light and dark 127 00:13:04,650 --> 00:13:08,586 Now, members of the night shift hurry to take the stage. 128 00:13:17,029 --> 00:13:21,193 Roused by light sensitive cells that announce the return of darkness, 129 00:13:21,333 --> 00:13:24,598 these prickly browsers set out to graze. 130 00:13:24,970 --> 00:13:26,597 Sea urchins fiind their prey 131 00:13:26,739 --> 00:13:31,142 and their way around by touch and by taste. 132 00:13:36,982 --> 00:13:40,884 Each night clouds of plankton rise from the deep to feed 133 00:13:41,020 --> 00:13:45,354 drawing out the coral who fiish the waters with feathery nets. 134 00:13:51,764 --> 00:13:56,963 A few, sharp eyed fiish operate by sight in the dim light before dawn. 135 00:13:57,937 --> 00:14:02,704 Like a cat in the dark the lionfiish can pick out its prey. 136 00:14:07,913 --> 00:14:11,940 The lionfiish will slip into a crevice to hide from the daytime; 137 00:14:12,084 --> 00:14:17,818 eyes sensitive enough for half light may be too delicate for bright sun. 138 00:14:23,796 --> 00:14:27,323 Daybreak brings the morning rush hour to the reef. 139 00:14:33,205 --> 00:14:36,174 Far more complex than jellyfiish or sea urchins, 140 00:14:36,308 --> 00:14:39,402 most fiish depend on sight to survive. 141 00:14:39,545 --> 00:14:42,946 Without the sun they are virtually blind to navigate their world, 142 00:14:43,082 --> 00:14:47,075 to fiind their food, or signal to their kind. 143 00:14:53,993 --> 00:14:58,453 A kaleidoscope of colors enhances the play of daylight on the reef. 144 00:15:02,635 --> 00:15:06,969 For the fiish, stripe and hue holds clues and communications 145 00:15:07,106 --> 00:15:09,233 helping them to identify mates, 146 00:15:09,375 --> 00:15:13,243 predators, and prey in the busy rainbow of the reef. 147 00:15:18,050 --> 00:15:21,611 Trailing twilight in its wake, a manta ray flies in, 148 00:15:21,754 --> 00:15:25,713 to harvest plankton when again they rise with evening. 149 00:15:34,833 --> 00:15:38,530 Sunlight fades, taking with it the world of color, 150 00:15:38,671 --> 00:15:43,608 and the day shift streams off the reef for the safety of deeper water. 151 00:15:47,846 --> 00:15:52,283 And once again, the great earth wheels round. 152 00:15:54,520 --> 00:15:58,320 The line between light and darkness divides those that live by land 153 00:15:58,457 --> 00:16:01,017 as well as the creatures of the sea. 154 00:16:03,629 --> 00:16:05,494 And even the land and sea themselves 155 00:16:05,631 --> 00:16:08,964 breathe with the rhythms of day and night. 156 00:16:15,074 --> 00:16:18,703 Given off by day, water vapor now rises, cools, 157 00:16:18,844 --> 00:16:21,312 and condenses in the night air. 158 00:16:28,120 --> 00:16:30,850 From earth, through plants, into the air, 159 00:16:30,990 --> 00:16:32,958 and back to the earth again 160 00:16:33,092 --> 00:16:37,188 the endless cycles of replenishment and renewal. 161 00:16:46,839 --> 00:16:49,171 The plants of this Australian rain forest 162 00:16:49,308 --> 00:16:53,404 have been in tune with the rhythms of the sun for eons. 163 00:17:01,487 --> 00:17:05,583 Here, an acacia tree wakes up and stretches for the dawn. 164 00:17:16,802 --> 00:17:20,135 Like a sundial in the trees, the play of light and shadow 165 00:17:20,272 --> 00:17:24,800 across the forest floor marks the turning of the planet. 166 00:17:29,581 --> 00:17:34,609 A shifting pool of light holds treasure for plants and animals alike. 167 00:17:38,257 --> 00:17:40,521 Sunbathers under the leafy canopy, 168 00:17:40,659 --> 00:17:45,358 many plants collect much of their energy during brief interludes of light. 169 00:17:51,837 --> 00:17:55,170 A boastful bird takes this spotlight for a stage. 170 00:17:55,307 --> 00:17:58,640 In the dark his fiinery is invisible, meaningless. 171 00:17:58,777 --> 00:18:04,374 Only by day can the male riflebird capitalize on his gaudy attire. 172 00:18:08,520 --> 00:18:11,921 His appearance, like a feathered, black and white rose, 173 00:18:12,057 --> 00:18:17,188 has been calculated by evolution to entice females to his side. 174 00:18:26,705 --> 00:18:30,300 A vibrant, sunlit display, all about sex, 175 00:18:30,442 --> 00:18:33,536 as crisp as the snapping of a fan. 176 00:18:42,421 --> 00:18:47,085 The last hours before sunset often inspire a flurry of movement. 177 00:18:47,226 --> 00:18:48,523 Once the sun fails, 178 00:18:48,660 --> 00:18:53,029 most birds will lose their powers of sight and of flight. 179 00:18:53,365 --> 00:18:56,823 They gorge in preparation for the fast to come. 180 00:19:01,773 --> 00:19:05,334 Color and flair are an advertisement for plants too. 181 00:19:05,477 --> 00:19:08,173 Their brightly hued fruit attracts birds, 182 00:19:08,313 --> 00:19:13,546 and with the feast the cycle of life and rebirth will continue. 183 00:19:16,622 --> 00:19:17,782 For after eating, 184 00:19:17,923 --> 00:19:22,383 the birds will spread the seeds of new plants far and wide. 185 00:19:29,735 --> 00:19:32,795 While most creatures of the air depend on the bright of day, 186 00:19:32,938 --> 00:19:38,274 others like fruit bats, are tuned to more nocturnal rhythms. 187 00:19:49,621 --> 00:19:53,421 All day they had been invisible, sleeping in the shadows, 188 00:19:53,559 --> 00:19:56,790 saving their energy against the hot sun. 189 00:19:59,831 --> 00:20:03,528 Now twilight signals to them, a silent summons. 190 00:20:03,669 --> 00:20:08,504 The bats scramble and take control of the air the birds have left behind. 191 00:20:33,966 --> 00:20:39,700 Millions crowd the sky, ever graceful, never colliding. 192 00:20:54,152 --> 00:20:55,676 Foraging in darkness, 193 00:20:55,821 --> 00:21:00,417 the bats have turned to senses other than sight to fiind their way. 194 00:21:04,062 --> 00:21:06,087 They navigate the night by sound, 195 00:21:06,231 --> 00:21:09,564 until they fiind a likely spot for a meal. 196 00:21:12,838 --> 00:21:15,136 By moonlight, plants need a different lure 197 00:21:15,274 --> 00:21:18,300 to attract visitorsperfume. 198 00:21:18,443 --> 00:21:20,343 Little is more savory to these bats 199 00:21:20,479 --> 00:21:23,539 than the scent of ripe blossoms and fruit. 200 00:21:24,983 --> 00:21:27,315 And once they take their fiill, like birds, 201 00:21:27,452 --> 00:21:30,080 they carry seeds everywhere they fly 202 00:21:30,222 --> 00:21:33,521 assuring the future of their favorite foods. 203 00:21:44,069 --> 00:21:46,663 The rising moon offers a gentle promise 204 00:21:46,805 --> 00:21:49,774 cooling relief from the heat of the day. 205 00:21:50,309 --> 00:21:54,541 And many creatures bide their time until the evening hours. 206 00:21:59,951 --> 00:22:01,282 Other mammals have also learned 207 00:22:01,420 --> 00:22:06,858 to maneuver through the midnight air like Australia's sugar gliders. 208 00:22:33,852 --> 00:22:35,444 With their built in parachute, 209 00:22:35,587 --> 00:22:39,683 a sugar glider can span the length of a football fiield. 210 00:22:41,426 --> 00:22:44,020 It may seem a bold leap of faith, 211 00:22:44,162 --> 00:22:47,256 but they're only following family footsteps. 212 00:22:49,234 --> 00:22:51,464 By smearing their scent upon the branches, 213 00:22:51,603 --> 00:22:56,006 they blaze invisible trails for their kin to follow. 214 00:22:59,644 --> 00:23:02,010 Their search for insects, sap, and nectars 215 00:23:02,147 --> 00:23:04,775 carries the gliders into the night. 216 00:23:06,118 --> 00:23:10,452 Like bats, they survey the dark with sensitive noses. 217 00:23:17,496 --> 00:23:20,397 This evening harvest keeps these squirrel like creatures 218 00:23:20,532 --> 00:23:23,057 safe from the predators of day. 219 00:23:23,201 --> 00:23:26,295 Instinct warns them to be back in their nests by dawn, 220 00:23:26,438 --> 00:23:30,431 before sharp eyed hawks and eagles take to the skies. 221 00:23:34,146 --> 00:23:37,843 For millions of years, mammals were the masters of the night. 222 00:23:37,983 --> 00:23:42,420 In prehistoric days dominated by dinosaurs, smaller, warm blooded animals 223 00:23:42,554 --> 00:23:46,923 took advantage of the relative safety of the darker hours. 224 00:23:57,135 --> 00:23:58,796 But the days when mammals were forced 225 00:23:58,937 --> 00:24:02,771 to hide from the coning of the light are long since over. 226 00:24:07,779 --> 00:24:12,478 Now, in rain forests round the world, near the top of the evolutionary ladder, 227 00:24:12,617 --> 00:24:14,778 you'll fiind agile tree toppers ready 228 00:24:14,920 --> 00:24:18,481 and willing to celebrate their place in the sun. 229 00:24:18,623 --> 00:24:21,888 These proud primates, central American howler monkeys, 230 00:24:22,027 --> 00:24:24,723 inaugurate each day with a morning chorus, 231 00:24:24,863 --> 00:24:29,664 staking their claim to the trees and life at the top. 232 00:24:41,179 --> 00:24:45,673 Higher still cling their smaller cousins, the spider monkeys. 233 00:24:48,053 --> 00:24:51,511 With few natural enemies they rule the roost. 234 00:24:51,656 --> 00:24:56,252 Grasping hands and feet give them confiidence to live life out on a limb. 235 00:25:00,632 --> 00:25:04,090 And evolution has given them a whole new point of view 236 00:25:04,236 --> 00:25:06,204 stereoscopic vision. 237 00:25:06,338 --> 00:25:10,240 It gives them the ability to judge distance preciselyan. 238 00:25:13,945 --> 00:25:15,037 And invaluable skill 239 00:25:15,180 --> 00:25:19,344 when hurtling through the treetops 80 feet above the ground. 240 00:25:23,221 --> 00:25:25,382 Somewhere deep in the prehistoric past, 241 00:25:25,524 --> 00:25:29,483 the human line diverged from that of monkeys and apes. 242 00:25:32,063 --> 00:25:35,157 And even if we no longer get to work vine to vine, 243 00:25:35,300 --> 00:25:38,394 we still share common genes and heritage 244 00:25:38,537 --> 00:25:42,029 and an attachment to the daytime hours. 245 00:25:42,173 --> 00:25:46,337 It's programming imprinted on us both by the ever circling sun 246 00:25:46,478 --> 00:25:49,379 and its cold celestial partner. 247 00:25:57,255 --> 00:26:02,124 Lunar rhythms cast long shadows over daily life on earth. 248 00:26:04,195 --> 00:26:08,791 Though the mile high tides of creation have shrunk to swells of mere feet, 249 00:26:08,934 --> 00:26:13,997 the rise and fall of the oceans still exerts a powerful force. 250 00:26:19,678 --> 00:26:24,445 From 240,000 miles away, the moon's pull wields power 251 00:26:24,583 --> 00:26:29,486 enough to carve the coastline and buoy up the polar ice. 252 00:26:46,438 --> 00:26:49,100 Four times a day, the sea scours the coast 253 00:26:49,240 --> 00:26:53,040 always retreating, always returning. 254 00:26:58,883 --> 00:27:02,819 It's a force both destructive and life giving. 255 00:27:09,861 --> 00:27:15,663 Many creatures thrive here, on the shifting boundary between sea and land. 256 00:27:19,204 --> 00:27:22,571 On gentler shorelines, each time the tide retreats, 257 00:27:22,707 --> 00:27:27,269 it leaves behind a feeding ground replenished by the sea. 258 00:27:30,115 --> 00:27:34,051 The lull between high tides sees a race for survival 259 00:27:34,185 --> 00:27:36,915 a race against the lunar clock 260 00:27:37,055 --> 00:27:40,582 These scavengers must feed their fiill now. 261 00:27:44,195 --> 00:27:47,392 Sand bubbler crabs pick food from the net of the sand, 262 00:27:47,532 --> 00:27:51,832 sorting out trapped particles of seaweed and other plants. 263 00:28:00,445 --> 00:28:03,346 They leave behind delicate spheres of sand. 264 00:28:03,481 --> 00:28:06,939 It's a temporary testament to their labors. 265 00:28:18,663 --> 00:28:20,688 Combing the territory around their burrow, 266 00:28:20,832 --> 00:28:23,266 they scar the sand with their tracks 267 00:28:23,401 --> 00:28:27,599 each lone scavenger attending to its own hunting ground. 268 00:28:41,720 --> 00:28:46,953 Other creatures march boldly forward with the strength of numbers. 269 00:28:47,459 --> 00:28:51,520 Soldier crabs sweeping the shore in battalions. 270 00:28:55,300 --> 00:28:58,201 Mostly males, they work together by the hundreds, 271 00:28:58,336 --> 00:29:02,500 exhausting each plot of land before moving on. 272 00:29:07,579 --> 00:29:12,448 An army of crabs a living tide of hungry hunters. 273 00:29:37,742 --> 00:29:41,610 But no army can defend against the moonand they know it. 274 00:29:41,746 --> 00:29:43,714 The crabs' parade grounds will be deserted 275 00:29:43,848 --> 00:29:47,511 by the time the tide marches back to claim it. 276 00:30:03,802 --> 00:30:08,296 As water replaces land, those that cantake to the air. 277 00:30:11,810 --> 00:30:13,368 Here the moon is mistress. 278 00:30:13,511 --> 00:30:16,378 She sets the rhythm of life at all hours 279 00:30:16,514 --> 00:30:21,884 low tide is time to eat; high tide, the time to rest. 280 00:30:26,758 --> 00:30:29,556 Wading birds make the best of life at the shore. 281 00:30:29,694 --> 00:30:35,223 Stilts for legs let them follow the waters' edge as it ebbs and flows. 282 00:30:44,142 --> 00:30:46,906 Beyond the sandy shore, the tide floods up 283 00:30:47,045 --> 00:30:51,709 through the clutching fiingers, the roots, of mangrove trees. 284 00:30:57,355 --> 00:31:01,018 Here in the muddy flats, the fiiddlers dig their wells, 285 00:31:01,159 --> 00:31:04,026 preparing for the tide's return. 286 00:31:10,368 --> 00:31:13,428 For these engineers, the last act before the flood 287 00:31:13,571 --> 00:31:17,905 is to batten down the hatches with a fresh cut plug of mud. 288 00:31:23,982 --> 00:31:28,009 They'll wait out the flood submerged in underground burrows. 289 00:31:35,760 --> 00:31:40,697 Like wading birds, the mangroves will weather the waves on stilts. 290 00:31:55,013 --> 00:31:59,450 The rhythm of the tides beats both night and day. 291 00:32:06,925 --> 00:32:08,688 For whenever the tide is low, 292 00:32:08,826 --> 00:32:11,488 the shore's inhabitants will come out to feed, 293 00:32:11,629 --> 00:32:16,692 by sunlight, moonlight, or in the glimmer of stars. 294 00:32:20,305 --> 00:32:24,674 Behind this constant ebb and flow beats a second, slower tidal rhythm 295 00:32:24,809 --> 00:32:30,145 a cadence that for many, spurs the times of mating and of birth. 296 00:32:34,886 --> 00:32:36,581 This is the lunar cycle, 297 00:32:36,721 --> 00:32:40,122 the month long dance of earth, satellite, and sun 298 00:32:40,258 --> 00:32:43,694 that paints the changing faces of the moon. 299 00:32:46,197 --> 00:32:47,323 Twice each month, 300 00:32:47,465 --> 00:32:51,697 the sun and moon conspire to raise the level of the tides. 301 00:32:55,239 --> 00:32:57,503 At the new moon and at the full, 302 00:32:57,642 --> 00:33:01,237 the gravity of both our star and our satellite align 303 00:33:01,379 --> 00:33:04,906 lifting the tide to its greatest height. 304 00:33:07,018 --> 00:33:10,647 In between, the tides are at their weakest. 305 00:33:14,625 --> 00:33:17,788 This monthly cycle of tides touches creatures of the sea 306 00:33:17,929 --> 00:33:22,423 in a place deeper then the daily rhythms of feeding and rest. 307 00:33:23,968 --> 00:33:28,962 A pair of male parrot fiish swirl around each other, jockeying for supremacy. 308 00:33:29,107 --> 00:33:34,340 Their competition is a sure sign that the full moon is on the rise. 309 00:33:35,947 --> 00:33:38,438 This dance heralds the spawning season. 310 00:33:38,583 --> 00:33:44,579 When the full moon tide begins to ebb, the females will release their eggs. 311 00:33:47,525 --> 00:33:51,461 With the tug of the ebb tide, the mating frenzy begins. 312 00:33:51,596 --> 00:33:55,589 Thousands of fiish, male and female, dash through each others' wakes, 313 00:33:55,733 --> 00:34:00,136 casting clouds of eggs and sperm together into the tide. 314 00:34:09,680 --> 00:34:12,410 One breed's spawn is another's feast. 315 00:34:12,550 --> 00:34:16,714 Predators join the tumult, to feed their fiill on eggs. 316 00:34:17,021 --> 00:34:19,751 But the spawning fiish know how to play the odds. 317 00:34:19,891 --> 00:34:23,019 They have fertilized tens of millions of eggs. 318 00:34:23,161 --> 00:34:28,656 Millions will escape pulled out to deeper waters by the outgoing tide. 319 00:34:31,402 --> 00:34:34,838 At high water, the surf storms back over the reef, 320 00:34:34,972 --> 00:34:38,635 sweeping schools of tiny fiish into the lagoon. 321 00:34:43,147 --> 00:34:47,140 A silvery cloud flashing on a watery wind. 322 00:34:53,157 --> 00:34:57,150 For many, this will be the last moment in the sun. 323 00:35:02,133 --> 00:35:04,397 Trapped in quiet, shallow waters, 324 00:35:04,535 --> 00:35:08,767 they make easy prey for hunters circling above the surface. 325 00:35:16,914 --> 00:35:22,511 Moon, fiish, and birds all whirling in their own perfect harmony. 326 00:35:24,288 --> 00:35:29,385 This black naped tern lives a life scored to the music of the tides. 327 00:35:30,628 --> 00:35:34,621 On the shore, females have laid claim to nesting sites 328 00:35:34,765 --> 00:35:38,394 and some have already begun to lay eggs as well. 329 00:35:39,804 --> 00:35:44,935 While one bird minds the nest, its mate fiishes the shallows. 330 00:35:52,116 --> 00:35:56,280 These seabirds time their breeding cycle to coincide with the easy prey 331 00:35:56,420 --> 00:36:00,322 washed into the lagoon by the full moon tides. 332 00:36:04,629 --> 00:36:07,257 Now is the time to eat heartily. 333 00:36:19,076 --> 00:36:21,408 Soon the chicks will hatch. 334 00:36:28,586 --> 00:36:31,316 And soon the moon will come full circle 335 00:36:31,455 --> 00:36:35,186 the tides again fiilling the shallows with tiny fiish. 336 00:36:35,326 --> 00:36:38,727 All in time to feed newly hatched chicks. 337 00:36:42,300 --> 00:36:43,995 Although barren herself, 338 00:36:44,135 --> 00:36:47,229 the moon prompts the sexual life of many animals 339 00:36:47,371 --> 00:36:50,829 both above and below the surface. 340 00:36:57,081 --> 00:37:02,542 Just after the full moon, the corals of the Great Barrier Reef begin to spawn. 341 00:37:14,031 --> 00:37:17,330 In a week the tides will reach their slackest point. 342 00:37:17,468 --> 00:37:19,868 And over 200 different species of coral 343 00:37:20,004 --> 00:37:24,771 will launch their seed into a galaxy of eggs and sperm. 344 00:37:38,889 --> 00:37:42,655 In the still water, there is time to drift and mix, 345 00:37:42,793 --> 00:37:46,627 time for eggs and sperm of the same species to mingle 346 00:37:46,764 --> 00:37:49,824 and create a new generation. 347 00:37:49,967 --> 00:37:52,265 Sea worms, who live imbedded in the coral, 348 00:37:52,403 --> 00:37:56,134 cast off their tails, adding to the blizzard. 349 00:38:03,080 --> 00:38:05,048 Writhing bags of sex cells, 350 00:38:05,182 --> 00:38:10,176 the castoffs dance among a veritable Milky Way of new life. 351 00:38:13,791 --> 00:38:17,852 These celebrations are orchestrated by the music of the spheres, 352 00:38:17,995 --> 00:38:22,022 the distant dance of the solar system. 353 00:38:33,844 --> 00:38:36,438 Like the moon, the sun also sings to us 354 00:38:36,580 --> 00:38:40,914 in rhythms slower than the everyday of rise and set. 355 00:38:43,988 --> 00:38:48,254 Around this star journeys the earth at a stately, year long pace, 356 00:38:48,392 --> 00:38:52,726 initiating the cycle of the seasons, ferrying winter and summer 357 00:38:52,863 --> 00:38:56,390 from south to north, and back again. 358 00:38:57,702 --> 00:39:00,398 Even at the poles, the sun makes her mark 359 00:39:00,538 --> 00:39:05,134 with the shimmering aurora, the wake of the solar wind. 360 00:39:06,177 --> 00:39:07,144 In the Antarctic, 361 00:39:07,278 --> 00:39:11,738 the cycle of the seasons becomes one with the rhythms of the day and night. 362 00:39:11,882 --> 00:39:16,216 Here six months of sunlight are followed by six months of dark and dusk 363 00:39:16,354 --> 00:39:19,380 summer followed by winter. 364 00:39:20,725 --> 00:39:24,889 Even in the extremes of Antarctica, life is tenacious. 365 00:39:26,063 --> 00:39:28,293 Throughout the dark of the polar night, 366 00:39:28,432 --> 00:39:32,562 each male emperor penguin guards a single precious egg. 367 00:39:32,703 --> 00:39:37,367 Hardly moving, never hunting, they've not eaten since autumn. 368 00:39:44,081 --> 00:39:48,575 In temperatures reaching 70 below, winds up to 50 miles an hour, 369 00:39:48,719 --> 00:39:54,624 they huddle together for warmth and protection, and wait for the sun. 370 00:40:01,298 --> 00:40:07,362 In a land where evening lasts for six months, dawn can seem to take forever. 371 00:40:08,005 --> 00:40:11,839 Finally the penguin chicks will hatch, and like their fathers, 372 00:40:11,976 --> 00:40:14,570 they will be desperate for food. 373 00:40:19,984 --> 00:40:24,284 Males can lose nearly half their body weight during this incubation time. 374 00:40:24,422 --> 00:40:26,720 But help is on the way. 375 00:40:27,024 --> 00:40:28,616 Mother's coming. 376 00:40:32,062 --> 00:40:35,998 For months, they have been feeding on the bounty of winter seas. 377 00:40:44,074 --> 00:40:47,168 Nature's biological clock is at work here, too. 378 00:40:47,311 --> 00:40:51,873 The females seem to sense the exact time to leave for the nesting grounds, 379 00:40:52,016 --> 00:40:55,952 for they have a huge trek across the ice to get here. 380 00:40:56,086 --> 00:41:00,887 Even tired and hungry, the males may be slow to give up their chicks. 381 00:41:01,025 --> 00:41:03,391 Temperatures on the ice can be killing. 382 00:41:03,527 --> 00:41:07,486 Babies left exposed too long will die. 383 00:41:19,844 --> 00:41:23,405 The guard successfully changed, males are free, at last, 384 00:41:23,547 --> 00:41:26,778 to head to the sea and to feed. 385 00:41:29,687 --> 00:41:31,245 The chicks will be fed by mother 386 00:41:31,388 --> 00:41:35,449 and kept warm until the sun climbs high into the sky. 387 00:41:45,503 --> 00:41:47,767 Ever and always, the coming of summer 388 00:41:47,905 --> 00:41:51,363 depends on the swing of the earth as it circles the sun 389 00:41:51,509 --> 00:41:55,138 and as it reels on its tilted axis. 390 00:42:03,654 --> 00:42:05,485 As the earth spins through the year, 391 00:42:05,623 --> 00:42:11,220 the sun's strongest rays sweep across the globe, bringing change in its wake. 392 00:42:15,533 --> 00:42:16,500 Near the equator, 393 00:42:16,634 --> 00:42:20,331 the angle of the sun's rays varies little through the year. 394 00:42:20,471 --> 00:42:24,669 Still, it's enough to give the tropical regions their own seasonal rhythm 395 00:42:24,808 --> 00:42:30,246 the cycle of drought and flood, the wet and the dry. 396 00:42:31,715 --> 00:42:34,445 September in Australia. 397 00:42:36,086 --> 00:42:39,852 The air above the baking northern plains rises with the heat. 398 00:42:39,990 --> 00:42:45,292 With it comes cloud banks full of moisture, pulled inland from the coast. 399 00:42:45,429 --> 00:42:50,765 The wheeling clouds bring drama, but no relief to a thirsty land. 400 00:42:55,506 --> 00:42:59,169 They are not rainmakers, but sky painters. 401 00:43:05,649 --> 00:43:08,550 The monsoons are still months away. 402 00:43:16,493 --> 00:43:18,552 Even so, deep in their nature, 403 00:43:18,696 --> 00:43:22,496 plants and animals seem to feel the rains coming. 404 00:43:33,677 --> 00:43:39,206 A new cloud stirsplant suckers rising with the rhythms of the spring. 405 00:43:46,724 --> 00:43:50,626 What looks like the bark of a tree breathes with life 406 00:43:50,761 --> 00:43:53,753 a frill necked lizard, waiting out the drought. 407 00:43:53,897 --> 00:43:58,925 For months it rations energy, moving little, feeding less. 408 00:44:12,049 --> 00:44:14,108 Wallabies are rainy day lovers. 409 00:44:14,251 --> 00:44:19,188 While they wait for the wet season, males joust for the chance to mate. 410 00:44:30,868 --> 00:44:34,634 Now even the plants take a chance that the drought is on the wane, 411 00:44:34,772 --> 00:44:37,434 greening with fresh leaves. 412 00:44:40,644 --> 00:44:43,977 Soon, all their preparations will be rewarded. 413 00:44:49,753 --> 00:44:54,053 The wet, the season of the rains is coming at last. 414 00:45:28,225 --> 00:45:30,090 From deep in their shadowy castles, 415 00:45:30,227 --> 00:45:33,788 colonies of termites rouse to the reveille. 416 00:45:37,768 --> 00:45:42,671 One storm brings another a rain of flying termites. 417 00:45:46,643 --> 00:45:48,406 They take to the air by the millions, 418 00:45:48,545 --> 00:45:53,073 in the quest to found new colonies in rain softened soil. 419 00:45:56,286 --> 00:46:02,316 And as always, the rhythms of one life mesh and turn with others. 420 00:46:04,328 --> 00:46:08,628 Wide eyed possums in the trees, and bandicoots on the ground below, 421 00:46:08,766 --> 00:46:13,635 end the fasting of the dry months with a welcome late night feast. 422 00:46:25,048 --> 00:46:30,076 At the end of their migration, termites shed their now useless wings. 423 00:46:30,854 --> 00:46:35,723 Many will fail to ever fiind a mate and burrow safely underground. 424 00:46:41,598 --> 00:46:46,035 With the coming of daylight, there will be others to join the feast. 425 00:46:48,105 --> 00:46:51,563 Conservative no more, the frill necked lizard becomes a glutton, 426 00:46:51,708 --> 00:46:55,508 storing up protein for the breeding time to come. 427 00:46:56,747 --> 00:47:00,080 But it may face competition for the spoils. 428 00:47:03,754 --> 00:47:08,350 Undaunted, the lizard takes his fiill working alone. 429 00:47:20,504 --> 00:47:25,305 The green ants do it differently, working together in groups. 430 00:47:31,281 --> 00:47:36,241 Both species tend to the harvest with a persistence that is single minded. 431 00:47:39,790 --> 00:47:42,122 Little disturbs the teamwork of ants. 432 00:47:42,259 --> 00:47:46,753 They scavenge night and day, dry or wet. 433 00:47:49,666 --> 00:47:51,190 At the peak of the rainy season, 434 00:47:51,335 --> 00:47:55,669 the storms are now more than most animals might care to see. 435 00:48:01,411 --> 00:48:05,279 But their only choice is to wait the cycle out. 436 00:48:18,228 --> 00:48:22,164 Like the rhythm of the tides, the rolling seasons of wet and dry 437 00:48:22,299 --> 00:48:26,793 shape life for every plant and animal on this land. 438 00:48:36,747 --> 00:48:40,911 Not one of them can stop the rain, or light the black of night, 439 00:48:41,051 --> 00:48:45,215 no more than the fiish command the seas to rise and fall. 440 00:48:50,193 --> 00:48:54,027 One creature only dares to fiight the night 441 00:48:59,469 --> 00:49:01,664 the bold and restless dreamer 442 00:49:01,805 --> 00:49:05,241 hunter, builder, man. 443 00:49:11,415 --> 00:49:16,478 But even in our cars and castles, we submit to the rhythms of the earth. 444 00:49:21,925 --> 00:49:25,520 Dawn and the sun summons us to work 445 00:49:29,333 --> 00:49:32,325 We swarm like schools of fiish to the cities, 446 00:49:32,469 --> 00:49:35,996 flashing to feed and mingle on the reef. 447 00:49:49,920 --> 00:49:52,013 Beneath the canopy of urban forests, 448 00:49:52,155 --> 00:49:55,522 we hunt and gather what we need to live. 449 00:50:07,537 --> 00:50:10,301 And dusk still calls us home again 450 00:50:10,440 --> 00:50:14,103 a flock of birds returning to the roost. 451 00:50:24,021 --> 00:50:25,079 But over the millennia, 452 00:50:25,222 --> 00:50:27,247 we have learned how to fiight the darkness 453 00:50:27,391 --> 00:50:29,916 with fiires of our own design. 454 00:50:31,161 --> 00:50:32,924 We strain against the boundaries, 455 00:50:33,063 --> 00:50:37,159 reshaping the border between night and day. 456 00:50:39,036 --> 00:50:41,470 We create our own complex orbits, 457 00:50:41,605 --> 00:50:44,972 drawn to the sky and the distant heavens. 458 00:50:56,753 --> 00:51:00,086 Yet fiinally, for all our powers and wisdom 459 00:51:00,223 --> 00:51:04,182 man is still just a player on a vast stage. 460 00:51:05,862 --> 00:51:08,092 Hour by hour, year by year, 461 00:51:08,231 --> 00:51:12,258 the cosmic clock marks our time on earth. 462 00:51:14,337 --> 00:51:15,804 Seasons turn. 463 00:51:15,939 --> 00:51:18,373 Tides rise and fall. 464 00:51:18,508 --> 00:51:22,000 One generation passes on to the next. 465 00:51:23,013 --> 00:51:27,882 Nothing lasts forever, not even the stars themselves. 466 00:51:30,454 --> 00:51:33,048 Night by night, over countless years, 467 00:51:33,190 --> 00:51:36,216 the earth will slow on its axis. 468 00:51:37,394 --> 00:51:40,522 The moon will drift yet further away. 469 00:51:43,667 --> 00:51:48,036 Days will lengthen, the tides grow quiet. 470 00:51:48,171 --> 00:51:49,798 Billions of years from now, 471 00:51:49,940 --> 00:51:53,569 the seemingly endless cycles will come to a close 472 00:51:53,710 --> 00:51:57,510 as the fiires of creation at last consume the sun. 473 00:51:57,647 --> 00:52:01,947 Yet ours is but one small star, in one tiny galaxy, 474 00:52:02,085 --> 00:52:04,986 in a universe beyond measure. 475 00:52:05,122 --> 00:52:06,953 Perhaps there are other rhythms of life, 476 00:52:07,090 --> 00:52:08,921 unseen by our eyes, 477 00:52:09,059 --> 00:52:12,825 yet as grand and majestic as our own.