Florida Naomi's Nightmares of Nature

-Welcome to my nightmares of nature.

-HOWLING

I'm Naomi Wilkinson. Argh!

And I'm coming face to face with the nightmares of the animal world.

The ones that make your spine tingle...

your heart beat faster...

Argh! Ha-ha!

..and your blood run cold.

Are they truly terrifying?

Or is there a twist in the tail?

Come with me as I shine a light

on wildlife's deepest, darkest secrets.

And see if you can guess which will be my worst nightmare.

Welcome to Florida in the USA.

Known around the world as the Sunshine State.

Every year, millions visit to enjoy the tropical weather,

the beaches, the theme parks and the...nightmares of nature?

I'll be touring this southern state from top to bottom

in search of another batch of nightmare contenders.

I'll meet the mysterious mammal behind a maritime myth.

It's absolutely enormous!

Catch a whiff of Florida's smelliest resident.

Eurgh!

And witness the power of a prehistoric predator.

It's broken your pole.

LAUGHTER

Just snapped the end off!

The first animal I'm hoping to see on my Florida odyssey

is much-loved around the world.

One which conjures up images

of a peaceful and placid aquatic wanderer.

So, what exactly is it doing on a show about nature's nightmares?

I've always thought of turtles as graceful,

gentle ocean drifters.

But the majority of these reptilian water specialists

actually live inland in our rivers and lakes.

And apparently, there's a species here in central Florida

that may not be quite as graceful and gentle as I expected.

I'm heading into turtle territory with wildlife expert

Jerry Johnstone.

Right, Jerry, just before we get into the water,

turtles aren't dangerous, are they?

-I don't think they're dangerous.

-Good!

LAUGHTER

No, actually, we've got 11 different types of turtles here

and each one has its own way of living.

And there's one in particular that's really cool.

It won't mess with you unless you harass it.

So therefore, we probably shouldn't harass it.

-I won't be harassing any turtles.

-Perfect.

Jerry is talking about the charmingly named

alligator snapping turtle.

And he's left some traps out to tempt them in.

Ooh!

Oh, my gosh! Oh, perfect, perfect, perfect!

What is that?

A juvenile alligator snapping turtle.

-I could have trodden on one of those.

-Yeah!

Or his big brother.

Yeah, yeah! Oh, check this out, check this out.

Look at his tongue, look at his tongue!

Look at its mouth!

Do you see his tongue?

It looks like a worm right there. See that?

So, what's he doing?

That's a lure. Like it's his fishing lure.

So, the little pink thing in his mouth is part of his tongue?

Yeah. And that's what they're famous for.

This is like the only reptile that has a tongue that is a fishing lure.

These turtles are definitely not gentle.

They're top predators with this devious tongue trick

to lure prey into those lethal jaws.

So because they're a reptile, they have to come up for breath.

How often do they need to do that?

They can stay down for hours.

But they do get a lot bigger than this.

They get a lot bigger. This is just a tiny one.

Jerry has already tracked down the biggest turtle in this river,

so he knows exactly where to look.

But nothing can prepare me for the shock of seeing my first

fully-grown alligator snapper.

I thought that was a turtle, but that's its head!

This is what we were talking about.

Oh!

His head is as big as mine!

This is at least 50kg.

So that's...that's nearly as much as me.

-Yep!

-Good grief!

-Look at that!

-Goodness me!

-Oh, my gosh!

-Wow! He is so prehistoric!

And like a big dinosaur.

Angry one who's looking at me quite meanly.

I'm going to back off a bit.

So, do you have any guesses how old one this size might be?

This? He's definitely older than us. Yeah.

I've never seen anything like him before.

There are very few turtles this big left.

I can't get over the size of his head. It's like a football!

So big!

What would his typical diet be?

Everything. There's, like, nothing they can't eat.

-The head is huge.

-I'm not surprised. Look at the size of that mouth!

-I think he wants to eat our cameraman.

-Look at that!

These turtles will snap at anything that moves.

Fish, birds, reptiles, mammals.

There's really nothing they won't get stuck into.

We caught one of these a couple of years ago

and he pooped out a whole armadillo skeleton.

We could put together the whole armadillo.

-He has no enemies.

-I'm not surprised.

-He's the king. He is the king.

-I am not surprised.

-What damage can he do with this beak?

-He could take your hand off.

-Are you serious!

-I'm dead serious.

-Wow!

-But here's what's awesome. Here's what's so cool.

Where we are,

there's thousands of people who go swimming all around here.

These turtles are all around, people don't know it.

There's never been anybody attacked by one.

-They're not looking for people?

-Never.

They just mind their own business.

Whenever people come to a place, they leave.

-He's great, isn't he?

-Yeah.

He's prehistoric!

Wow!

LAUGHTER

Your heart's doing the same as mine, Rich.

That's exactly how I feel.

Well, when I said I was coming to find turtles,

I never thought I'd leave checking to see

if I still have my fingers and toes.

But after coming face to face with this big brute,

I'd definitely say that turtles have real nightmare potential.

The next stop on my tour couldn't be more different than the last.

I'm here in the suburbs of Miami,

where I've heard reports of mysterious, marauding monsters

known locally as GALS, rampaging through the city.

In fact, the situation is so bad

that the government has set up a special taskforce,

led by scientist Richard Gaskalla.

Right, Richard, we're here on the trail

of a destructive alien invader. What exactly are GALS?

Well, GALS stands for Giant African Land Snails, which is...

Snail? It's a snail?

Yeah, it's a snail.

It doesn't sound like much, but it's a giant snail.

It gets up to 20cm and can do a lot of damage.

Yes, it might sound like a science-fiction B movie,

but these super-sized African snails are escaped pets,

leaving a slimy trail of destruction wherever they go.

They can spread deadly diseases, devour entire fields of farm crops,

they'll even munch the plaster right off your walls!

-Safe, let's do this.

-Let's do it.

Richard and his team

have been battling these unwanted foreign invaders

for over two years and I'm joining them on the front line.

When you move around like that, it kind of disturbs them

and they become more active, so they're easy to see.

So, moving around on the grass is quite good?

Yeah. You can shuffle around or dance around a little bit

and the snails will, er...maybe become more evident.

Not hearing any crunching at the minute.

Here, here, here, here, here!

Here, here, here, here, here.

Snail! My first...find.

Ooh, and there's another one!

Tiny little one hiding in there.

So I've just found my first few snails.

They don't look giant to me, they look tiny.

Those are probably weeks to maybe a month old at best.

But in six months, it can become this.

But it can get to be three or four times as big as that.

-So, they'd be bigger than my hand?

-Yes.

No.

Oh, look, look, look! Big one here. Big, big, big one.

Ooh!

If they were just left alone, how much damage could these snails do?

One snail can lay up to 1,200 eggs.

If you figure half of those make it to maturity

and they lay 1,200 eggs, you can do the math and it becomes...

I don't think I could do the maths. That's a lot of snails.

Got one!

So it seems that one hungry snail can quickly become thousands,

stripping plaster off walls, spreading disease

and devouring every plant in sight.

Which explains why Richard and his team are taking this so seriously.

If we can collect this many on one property

in a very short space of time,

it's easy to see how this problem can get out of hand.

But what I want to see is one of the giants.

I'm heading back to snail defence HQ to meet this mammoth monster.

Richard, is this as big as they get?

No, that's an adult snail, but they get about twice that size,

-so they get very large.

-Double that?

I am very glad to be wearing these gloves because,

he/she is making a lot of slime.

They are definitely slimy

and leave a trail of slime and excrement wherever they go.

Oh, so it's not just slime,

it's also their poo that's getting everywhere?

-Yes. And, um...nobody likes snail poo.

-No.

Question is, are you winning the battle against this giant invader?

We have collected over 133,000 snails

on 600 properties in two years.

We are winning the battle, but it'll take us probably

three to four years to ultimately be successful.

A slow-moving vegetarian might not be your obvious nightmare of nature,

but try to imagine 10,000 of these super-slimy giant snails

invading your town and eating your house.

Sounds like stuff of nightmares to me.

My next destination is the Everglades,

a massive expanse of swamps and wetlands in southern Florida.

And around here, there's really only one way to travel.

These airboats are ideal for the Everglades.

You can see they have a flat base

and the fan is up here, out of the water,

which makes them perfect for moving across shallow water like this.

But I'm glad I've got these because they don't half make a racket.

Listen!

WHIRRING

It may look like we're just having fun,

but I'm riding with local scientist Raf,

who is here to solve a very serious problem.

And it's all to do with water.

Essentially, the Everglades is a large flowing river

of fresh water from central Florida

down to the southern part of the peninsula.

And since human population has grown,

they've tried to divert the water out of the Everglades

into neighbouring cities.

And essentially, it became a plumbing disaster here.

And that plumbing disaster

has had a devastating effect on the local wildlife.

To help put things right,

Raf needs to give the Everglades a regular health check.

But how on earth do you measure the condition of a giant swamp

and all the animals that live in it?

Well, surprisingly, the solution to that puzzle

may be one of Florida's most notorious nightmare inhabitants.

American alligators have been around for 150 million years.

They're right at the top of the food chain

and will eat just about anything

they can get their massive pointy teeth stuck into.

So it's hard to see how these ravenous reptiles

could ever help us to save the Everglades.

Despite their fearsome reputation, Raf assures me

alligators are his number-one ally.

So we're off to catch one.

And just to make it even more spooky, we're hunting in the dark

because alligator eyes reflect torchlight,

making them easy to spot at night.

So it doesn't take us long to find what we're looking for.

Oh! Got him!

Look at the size of its jaws!

Cor!

Its head is completely out of the water

and that jaw looks so powerful.

Oh! Look at it just looking at us!

Oh! It's got your pole.

It's broken your pole.

LAUGHTER

Just snapped the end off!

Handling the alligator in this way doesn't hurt it.

And getting it out of the water for a health check

will aid Raf in his research.

Basically, why we're doing this is

a lot of money is being put into Everglades restoration.

It's the biggest restoration project in the world.

So when you say restoration, you mean you're trying to

-return the Everglades back to what it was.

-Correct.

Unfortunately, it's impossible to get it

exactly how Mother Nature had it before humans were involved,

but we're trying to get it as close as possible.

And we're looking at these guys as indicators.

If they're healthy, everything under them should be relatively healthy.

Alligators need all the animals below them in the food chain

to have strong, healthy populations

because any break in that chain

means the gators at the top won't get enough grub.

If this guy is a bit skinny,

is that showing that this part of the Everglades, you know,

that he's struggling to find enough food and things?

Essentially, right. You can see this guy is a little skinny for his size.

The whole productivity of the area is not healthy.

Hence this guy is not healthy, since he's sitting at the top.

By collecting this data from a single species,

Raf can tell how healthy the whole area is,

helping to guide efforts to save both the Everglades

and all the animals that live here.

So me sitting on him is not hurting him,

it's just helping him feel maybe a bit more relaxed?

Yeah, exactly. He's not going to feel hurt at all.

These guys are pretty tough.

Didn't think I'd be sitting on a 2.5m alligator

when I woke up this morning.

So the data it offers makes the gator friend, not foe after all.

But looking at those jaws, I wouldn't want to get too friendly.

Time for you to go back into the water.

Yes!

And he's gone.

It would seem there is more to the alligator than first meets the eye.

They may be giant armoured reptiles,

but they're actually quite sensitive

to everything going on around them in the swamp.

And because of that, they can help us to understand

and protect this incredible area.

Still pretty scary, though.

So I think meeting an alligator in the dark

could still be in with a chance of being my worst nightmare.

After the jaws of the gator, I think it's time

for something a little more soft and cuddly.

But this being nightmares of nature, there's a twist in the tale.

If you ask anyone what they know about the skunk,

you will almost certainly get one answer.

That they stink!

Skunks are legendary for their powerful pong.

But surely there must be more to this animal than just a bad smell?

To find out, I've come to meet animal carer Janye Hendricks.

She has not one, but five rescued skunks living with her in her home.

So let's hope she's got plenty of air freshener.

What is it like, Janye, living with five skunks in your house?

Well, it's not bad at all.

You know, you don't have to walk them like you would a dog

and they use a litter box, they're pretty easy to take care of.

They spend so much time sleeping. Look at this! Ha-ha!

-They're very easy to take care of.

-Aw!

Everyone knows skunks have got a reputation for being smelly,

-but your house smells lovely!

-Yes. Thank you.

What is the truth about skunks?

Well, pet skunks have been de-scented

and they're very clean, by the way.

I only give mine a bath about once a year.

The skunks' famous pong is actually a smelly spray

from a gland in their bottom, used as a form of defence.

It's so strong, it can cause temporary blindness

and the stench is enough to see off almost any predator, even a big cat.

Because Janye's skunks are rescued pets,

they've had their smelly glands removed.

It doesn't hurt them and with no predators to worry about,

they've no need to spray.

So if you were to live with wild skunks that hadn't been de-scented,

-your house would smell really different?

-Yes, yes.

-Have you ever smelt skunk spray?

-Yeah, it's pretty awful.

What does it smell like?

It's, um... It's a whole lot worse than rotten eggs.

It's hard to describe, but once you've smelt it,

you'll say, "I'll never forget that smell!"

-You'll remember it forever.

-I'll never forget that smell!

So it's starting to look like skunks

aren't as stinky as everyone first thinks

because they will only use that smelly spray in an emergency.

So I reckon I can tick this one off my nightmare list and move on.

Spoke too soon!

"Before you decide whether the skunk is a nightmare of nature,

"you need to experience their pongy powers first-hand.

"To do this, you'll need to find a large open space

"a long way from any houses or people."

That doesn't sound good!

I certainly don't want to make a wild skunk angry,

so my ever-thoughtful crew have come up with an alternative.

OK, so I've done what I was told.

I've come to a wide-open space away from everyone.

Here, I have a skunk, I'm going to call him Steve.

And in this bottle, I have some artificial skunk scent. Eurgh!

I'm going to apply a bit of this onto Steve the skunk

and we're going to see what happens.

Where are you going?

Um...I left something.

-I need a wee.

-Sorry.

-Wimps!

SIGHS

Right, deep breath before we start this.

Oh! Oh-ho-ho-ho!

Oh, that is like rotten eggs and bad feet

and imagine all your rubbish after three weeks,

sticking your head in the rubbish bag. Eurgh! It's like that.

Really over-poweringly strong.

I'm going to have to back off, that is too strong. You guys smell it.

Get in there, smell it. Hee-hee!

THEY RETCH

Smells like dog poo.

Sewage. Like sewage.

Just putrid.

Eurgh!

Sorry, Steve, going to have to leave you there.

Have a nice life.

So, is the skunk a nightmare of nature?

On one hand, they are inquisitive, really rather cute creatures,

but on the other hand,

that is one of the worst things I've ever smelt in my entire life.

The only thing I know is I need a shower.

I can still smell it, can you?

Oh, it's disgusting. Come on, let's go.

-Guys? Guys?

-ENGINE PURRS

No, wait, don't go without...! Don't go without me!

Oh, please, no! No, I mean it, it smells so bad!

Oh, come back! Don't leave me with the pong!

Oh, it's rank!

My Florida adventure is almost over,

but before I leave, I'm setting sail

in search of a mysterious maritime myth.

The mermaid.

Sailors believed mermaids were a nightmarish combination,

half woman and half fish,

who used their beauty to lure ships to their doom.

And I'm off to meet the real-life animal

who may have inspired these terrible myths.

We're in Kings Bay, west Florida, where the sea meets the land

and possibly where fantasy meets reality.

Oh! It's massive!

I'm going to keep my fingers crossed

that these terrible tales aren't true.

I'm going to grab my snorkel and go in for a closer look.

With all the talk of sea monsters and doomed sailors,

I can't help but feel a little trepidation

as I enter the watery world of these giant beasts.

Can you see it at all?

Oh, there it is, there it is!

Oh, it's massive!

Whoa!

It's absolutely enormous!

I can't quite get over the size of the thing!

These mysterious mammals are West Indian manatee.

They're air-breathers, just like you or me,

but they spend their entire life in the seas

and estuaries around Florida and the Caribbean.

It may look a like a seal or a walrus,

but it's actually more closely related to the elephant

and the scale of the animal under the water,

I'm not really surprised. They are so huge!

Now, you may wonder how on earth

somebody could mistake that creature for a mermaid.

But that massive tail, which it uses to propel itself through the water,

does bear a resemblance

to the traditional image of a mermaid tail,

so I guess if you were passing on a ship,

you may, just may think it was a mermaid.

But unlike mermaids, manatee prefer sea plants to doomed sailors,

chomping down up to 50 kilos of greens every day.

It's hard to see anything nightmarish about them at all.

After eating all of those plants, they do produce an awful lot of gas,

but I can't really call them a nightmare for breaking wind, can I?

LAUGHTER

In fact, these gentle giants

are about as far from a nightmare of nature as I can imagine.

And sharing the water with them is quickly becoming

one of the most enchanting experiences of my life.

It's rolled over for me to stroke its belly!

Oh!

This is such an honour and a privilege

to just share the water with it.

It's taken my breath away, that.

It just came up to me and rolled over and let me stroke its belly.

Oh!

That's a moment I'm not going to forget in a hurry.

Wow!

It's the perfect end to this fabulous Florida adventure.

Oh! What an incredible experience!

Such a magical animal encounter.

One I am not going to forget in a hurry.

I'm going to be talking about it for ages!

They are certainly not the malevolent mermaids of myth.

There is no way I am going to call the manatee my worst nightmare.

Nuh-huh!

It's time to pack up and leave the Sunshine State,

but which contender is going to walk or swim away

with the title of Florida's worst nightmare?

Is it sharing a boat with an angry alligator?

Getting a whiff of some seriously smelly skunk scent?

Just putrid!

Or dipping a toe into snapping-turtle-infested waters?

-Look at that!

-Goodness me!

Well, it's none of those.

My worst nightmare, because of all the damage they do,

is the creeping, slimy,

house-chomping giant African land snail.

Which just goes to show that nature's nightmares

really do come in all shapes and sizes.

I've heard reports that there are some mysterious marauding monsters,

know locally as GALS, rampaging through the city.

SAT NAV: 'Right turn...'

-Ssh!

-LAUGHTER