Life – 04 – Fish – BBC Earth

Posted by Samuel Walters

BBC Earth’s Life heads under the waves with the aptly titled episode, “Fish.” The focus is on some of the more exotic adaptations and behaviors of fish as they try to procreate and survive in an environment that is as hostile as it is beautiful. The result is, as usual, an informative and entertaining installment.

This is one of the few episodes of the series that lacks a strong overall narrative structure. However, the individual sequence are strong enough to provide some indelible moments — particularly from the flying fish, sea dragon and gobi rock climber sequences. The flying fish — aside from leaping out of the water to escape predators — have a fascinating approach to laying their eggs in the open ocean. The sea dragons, apart from being exotically beautiful, engage in a graceful mating dance. And the gobi rock climbers actually figure out how to scale Hawaiian waterfalls to reach their mating grounds.

Key sequences include:

Sailfish in Mexico feeding on sardines
Adult Convict fish in the South Western Pacific burrow underground and never out of their homes — though thousands of younger Convict fish do, every night.
The Sarcastic Fringehead uses its immense, and disjointed, jaws to defend its home from an Octopus and rival Fringeheads.
In Japan, the Mudskipper literally lives on (and in) mud. Not only do they burrow their homes with their mouths, they have an odd mating ritual on the mud itself.
The Barbels of East Africa literally live off the wastes of hippos.
The lives of Clown Fish are portrayed in exquisite detail.
Sardines are once again prey, this time for the Ragged Tooth Shark near South Africa.