All of the Planet Earth series is worth watching, if a bit depressing sometimes IMHO, the making of bits at the end of most episodes is informative as well.
It’s so common. Amazing nature documentaries filled with the wonder of life, cute animals, interesting science…and a long parade of grim warnings about ecological destruction and catastrophe.
I know why they do it, and I am already deeply concerned about that stuff, but outrage leads to fatigue.
It absolutely leads to fatigue and really keeps me from watching those shows. Like I get it… I do… but it is preachy and annoying. It feels like “buddy you are preaching to the choir but there absolutely nothing I can do”
The issues surrounding almost all of that are incredibly complex and are deeply tied to socioeconomic, political, and god knows what other factors. In all honestly they are probably unsolvable.
Show me the cute animals and let me form my own judgments. Don’t make me feel like an asshole for existing. I didn’t cause that shit and I am powerless to stop it. And even then, I don’t want to hear it in the context of that show.
Two of the glider pilots raise the chicks for months at a time. So when we have something that can not only fly but hand raise chicks to full grown and also nurture that bond while on stops on the journey to teach the ibis the path.
It might be possible, they do minimize human contact with other some other animals we are trying to raise in captivity or only have the same humans wearing a fur/feather suit/puppet to lower the animals' acclimation to other humans, so the animals stay wilder, and in this instance got the loons to associate a shade of yellow with their handlers/gliders, but definitely a hurdle to get over.
If you read the article, you will realize that the flying itself is the least problematic part.
It's sensing when the birds' mood is right, nutrition of the birds, sensing distractions and dealing with them, regrouping when the birds decide to not follow along,...
It's a really difficult and complex undertaking that isn't solvable with technology.
