0:00:02 > 0:00:04# Wormy fish-killers Convoys of caterpillars
0:00:04 > 0:00:06# Super-clever, brainless slime! # Yuk!
0:00:06 > 0:00:08# Bunny rabbit swarms Whizzing storms
0:00:08 > 0:00:10# And pigs that swim at dinner-time
0:00:10 > 0:00:12# Tornadoes of fire Starfish going haywire
0:00:12 > 0:00:15# Algae balls from space! # What?!
0:00:15 > 0:00:17# Prairie dogs that chat Birds going splat
0:00:17 > 0:00:19# And fish slapping in your face
0:00:19 > 0:00:21# They're wild and weird, wild and weird
0:00:21 > 0:00:23# Really, really wild and really, really weird
0:00:23 > 0:00:25# They're wild and weird, wild and weird
0:00:25 > 0:00:27# They're really, really wild
0:00:27 > 0:00:29# They're really, really wild and weird. #
0:00:29 > 0:00:31On today's show -
0:00:31 > 0:00:34strange explosions in the sky.
0:00:34 > 0:00:36How the sun changed the course of musical history.
0:00:36 > 0:00:39And we reveal a shocking new discovery -
0:00:39 > 0:00:40spider goats!
0:00:40 > 0:00:43They're territorial, they're cannibalistic.
0:00:43 > 0:00:46So if you put a lot of them together, they'd kill each other.
0:00:52 > 0:00:56Ah, Naomi - come and make the most of this heat wave!
0:00:56 > 0:00:58Whoo!
0:00:58 > 0:01:00Ah!
0:01:00 > 0:01:02This is the life!
0:01:02 > 0:01:04Sun's out, guns out... Mwah! Mwah!
0:01:04 > 0:01:07Yeah, you might need to work on those a little bit.
0:01:07 > 0:01:08What are you talking about?
0:01:08 > 0:01:11Oi, oi, oi - you're in my rays, man!
0:01:11 > 0:01:13Did you bring the ice that I wanted?
0:01:13 > 0:01:15- Certainly did...- Yes! - ..Your Lordship!
0:01:15 > 0:01:16He-he-he.
0:01:18 > 0:01:20What was that for?
0:01:20 > 0:01:23Oh, sorry. Are you worried it's going to wash off your fake tan?
0:01:23 > 0:01:26Er, this is not fake tan.
0:01:26 > 0:01:29Besides, why are you dressed like it's the middle of winter?
0:01:29 > 0:01:32Er, do I really need to point out the dangers of the sun?
0:01:32 > 0:01:33What are you talking about?
0:01:33 > 0:01:37That pretty little yellow thing in the sky isn't dangerous!
0:01:37 > 0:01:38Oh, really?
0:01:41 > 0:01:42So, if I were to tell you
0:01:42 > 0:01:45it was exterminating life all over the desert,
0:01:45 > 0:01:50blowing things up left, right and centre, that wouldn't concern you?
0:01:50 > 0:01:51Close the roof! Close the roof!
0:01:51 > 0:01:54GRATING NOISE
0:01:57 > 0:01:58Let me explain.
0:02:00 > 0:02:06Nevada, 2013, and Norman Rogers, a local photographer,
0:02:06 > 0:02:08captured these strange explosions.
0:02:11 > 0:02:13Fireworks - bet it's fireworks.
0:02:13 > 0:02:15What, in the middle of the day?
0:02:15 > 0:02:19I saw these objects going across the frame of the video.
0:02:19 > 0:02:21Sometimes, they would change direction.
0:02:21 > 0:02:24Sometimes they'd go up, sometimes they'd go down.
0:02:24 > 0:02:27I didn't know at first what they were.
0:02:27 > 0:02:30I examined the videos closely,
0:02:30 > 0:02:34and I was able to see a little flapping motion, which was...
0:02:34 > 0:02:37Their little wings were flapping.
0:02:37 > 0:02:41- Flapping? As in...birdies?- Yep.
0:02:41 > 0:02:43Oh, strap yourself in -
0:02:43 > 0:02:46it's going to get a bit gruesome from this point on.
0:02:46 > 0:02:48Oh, really? Oh, hang on, then.
0:02:51 > 0:02:54Thanks for the heads-up. OK, I'm ready.
0:02:54 > 0:02:58Wildlife officials found the bodies of birds -
0:02:58 > 0:03:01birds that had fallen to their death from clear skies.
0:03:01 > 0:03:06Now, mass bird deaths, although shocking, are not that unusual.
0:03:06 > 0:03:09Poisoning and collisions like this plane strike,
0:03:09 > 0:03:12can bring down flocks of birds.
0:03:13 > 0:03:14Whoa!
0:03:16 > 0:03:19But the reports from Nevada were different.
0:03:19 > 0:03:22A bizarre collection of different species,
0:03:22 > 0:03:24but with one thing in common.
0:03:25 > 0:03:27The feathers were sort of melted.
0:03:27 > 0:03:30They were in fragments.
0:03:30 > 0:03:33The birds were all burned alive.
0:03:33 > 0:03:36Sorry - did you say burned alive?
0:03:36 > 0:03:38I know, shocking, isn't it?
0:03:38 > 0:03:41Shocking? It's downright gruesome, is what it is.
0:03:41 > 0:03:44- Told you!- And this has got something to do with the sun?
0:03:44 > 0:03:48It does. Here's a clue from somewhere a little closer to home.
0:03:48 > 0:03:50Remember this?
0:03:50 > 0:03:53September 2013, central London.
0:03:53 > 0:03:56We've had temperatures of up to 50 degrees Celsius
0:03:56 > 0:03:58in the last few minutes.
0:03:58 > 0:04:00If I just look at the current temperature, well,
0:04:00 > 0:04:02it's still 42 degrees.
0:04:02 > 0:04:05People have been trying to cook eggs.
0:04:05 > 0:04:08My colleague realised there was a smell coming out - he smelled it.
0:04:08 > 0:04:11We looked - the carpet was on fire.
0:04:11 > 0:04:14Melted bicycles, burned cars...
0:04:14 > 0:04:16We realised it was from the big building.
0:04:16 > 0:04:18# It's gettin' hot in here... #
0:04:18 > 0:04:21And all fingers pointed at the building above
0:04:21 > 0:04:24that was burning a hot spot on the pavement below it.
0:04:24 > 0:04:28Let me demonstrate with this magnifying glass and an old bus.
0:04:28 > 0:04:31By channelling the sun's rays through it, you can burn an object.
0:04:31 > 0:04:34Hey, hey, hey, hey, what are you doing?
0:04:34 > 0:04:36Sorry! I was just trying to prove it is hot enough
0:04:36 > 0:04:38to damage stationary objects.
0:04:38 > 0:04:41Not with my miniature London double-decker bus, it's not.
0:04:41 > 0:04:44Besides, stationary objects are one thing -
0:04:44 > 0:04:46surely it can't set fire to birds in flight?
0:04:46 > 0:04:49You say that, but imagine the magnifying glass effect
0:04:49 > 0:04:51on an industrial scale...
0:04:55 > 0:04:56Damaged now.
0:04:59 > 0:05:04This is Ivanpah, a power plant with a difference.
0:05:04 > 0:05:08300,000 mirrors reflect the desert sun onto a central tower,
0:05:08 > 0:05:12boiling water to create steam, which then generates energy.
0:05:12 > 0:05:15Turns out, though, this engineering masterpiece
0:05:15 > 0:05:17had an unexpected, deadly side-effect.
0:05:18 > 0:05:21Allow me to demonstrate.
0:05:21 > 0:05:24Just need some tape, a piece of wood...
0:05:24 > 0:05:26Oh, and my lab coat.
0:05:29 > 0:05:32Just turn the light on, have a stretch.
0:05:32 > 0:05:36OK, let's start. Just stick that there.
0:05:37 > 0:05:39Ivanpah in miniature.
0:05:41 > 0:05:43The mirrors are perfectly angled.
0:05:43 > 0:05:47It's a parabolic curve, focusing the light onto a centre point.
0:05:51 > 0:05:53Now, where did I put that stick?
0:05:53 > 0:05:54Oh, there it is.
0:05:54 > 0:05:57Now, let's turbo-charge that light.
0:05:58 > 0:06:01Whoa! That's impressive!
0:06:01 > 0:06:06Now it's hot enough to roast wood, even melt lead.
0:06:06 > 0:06:09Feathers? Well, they simply don't stand a chance.
0:06:13 > 0:06:15- Enjoy yourself?- Yeah.
0:06:15 > 0:06:18- Great fun!- Where did you go?
0:06:18 > 0:06:20- The lab.- The lab?
0:06:20 > 0:06:22- Yeah.- Didn't realise we had a lab.
0:06:22 > 0:06:25- Yeah, it's just out there.- Cool!
0:06:25 > 0:06:29- Can I carry on? - Oh, yeah, please do. Yeah.
0:06:29 > 0:06:32As the desert sun hits Ivanpah's 300,000 mirrors,
0:06:32 > 0:06:35the light is reflected towards the towers,
0:06:35 > 0:06:39creating temperatures of up to 1,000 degrees Centigrade.
0:06:39 > 0:06:42The experiment in green energy had created
0:06:42 > 0:06:45a solar death ray!
0:06:45 > 0:06:48A solar death ray - brilliant!
0:06:48 > 0:06:49Maybe not for the birds.
0:06:49 > 0:06:51Yeah, good point.
0:06:54 > 0:06:57You know, as cool as a solar death ray is,
0:06:57 > 0:07:00it's not the only thing the sun is responsible for, you know.
0:07:00 > 0:07:02- No?- No. You see,
0:07:02 > 0:07:05that bad boy up there also changed
0:07:05 > 0:07:09the course of musical history, my friend.
0:07:09 > 0:07:11OUT-OF-TUNE SQUEAKING
0:07:11 > 0:07:13Which is more than you ever will.
0:07:13 > 0:07:15Just rude!
0:07:18 > 0:07:23In the 1600s, Antonio Stradivari, a famous violin maker,
0:07:23 > 0:07:26took a piece of spruce and made a violin.
0:07:27 > 0:07:31Stradivari's instruments are the most famous on the planet.
0:07:31 > 0:07:33Every musical collector wants to own one,
0:07:33 > 0:07:36and every dealer wants to get their hands on one.
0:07:36 > 0:07:38When I pick up one of these instruments,
0:07:38 > 0:07:41there's always something a bit special and magic about it.
0:07:41 > 0:07:43And rise...
0:07:43 > 0:07:45..and rise...
0:07:45 > 0:07:47- ..and rise...! - OK, great stuff. Yep.
0:07:47 > 0:07:50- No, that's not really what he meant by magic.- Oh.
0:07:53 > 0:07:56An instrument from the golden period,
0:07:56 > 0:07:58which this instrument is from,
0:07:58 > 0:08:02could be worth from a few million dollars to 12 million dollars,
0:08:02 > 0:08:04or 15 million dollars.
0:08:04 > 0:08:06Ah!
0:08:06 > 0:08:0915 million dollars?!
0:08:09 > 0:08:13- I know!- My one at school only cost 15 quid!
0:08:13 > 0:08:14Why so expensive?
0:08:14 > 0:08:18I've no idea. But I know a man that does.
0:08:19 > 0:08:21- Do you want some water?- Yes, please.
0:08:28 > 0:08:31It was a thrilling moment for me when they took it out of the case,
0:08:31 > 0:08:34and I have gloves on, and they put it in my hands and said,
0:08:34 > 0:08:37"Here's a musical instrument worth millions of dollars,
0:08:37 > 0:08:40"Grissino-Mayer, do what you want with it!"
0:08:40 > 0:08:42Henri and his team studied the unique rings
0:08:42 > 0:08:44from the wood used on one of
0:08:44 > 0:08:47Stradivarius's most famous violins.
0:08:47 > 0:08:50We use pattern matching in the tree ring sciences,
0:08:50 > 0:08:53to determine when these tree rings were formed.
0:08:53 > 0:08:57Now, each ring represents a year in a tree's life,
0:08:57 > 0:08:59and Henri discovered the tree used to make the violin
0:08:59 > 0:09:01had very thin rings.
0:09:01 > 0:09:04That meant it grew slowly.
0:09:04 > 0:09:06Why would a tree grow slowly?
0:09:06 > 0:09:09Not enough sunlight.
0:09:09 > 0:09:13And guess what? Slow-growing trees produce dense wood,
0:09:13 > 0:09:18which in turn creates an exceptional sound.
0:09:18 > 0:09:20OUT-OF-TUNE RASPING
0:09:20 > 0:09:22A sound people would pay big money for.
0:09:22 > 0:09:24Maybe not in your case.
0:09:24 > 0:09:26Anyway, why wasn't there enough sunlight?
0:09:26 > 0:09:28Ah...
0:09:29 > 0:09:33You see, when Stradivari was making violins in the Italian Alps,
0:09:33 > 0:09:35the sun was behaving very strangely.
0:09:36 > 0:09:41Between 1300 and the late 1800s, its power was reduced.
0:09:41 > 0:09:46The lakes froze, the days darkened - it was a little ice age.
0:09:46 > 0:09:49Henri's theory was that the sun - or the lack of it -
0:09:49 > 0:09:51created super-dense,
0:09:51 > 0:09:54super-musical spruce.
0:09:54 > 0:09:58Ah, so solar starvation could be the secret to Stradivarius's beautiful
0:09:58 > 0:10:00and unique sound?
0:10:00 > 0:10:04- Absolutely. - Mmm.- Gives me an idea.
0:10:04 > 0:10:09'Mmm, if I starve this violin of light, I might sound better.'
0:10:10 > 0:10:13Naomi - turn out the light.
0:10:13 > 0:10:15Certainly.
0:10:15 > 0:10:17Wait, turn it back on.
0:10:17 > 0:10:20- I just need to get into position first.- Oh, OK.
0:10:24 > 0:10:26VIRTUOSO VIOLIN PLAYING
0:10:26 > 0:10:28Ah, yes!
0:10:28 > 0:10:31Violins really do sound better when they're starved of light.
0:10:31 > 0:10:34Er, wait a minute.
0:10:34 > 0:10:35SHE GASPS
0:10:40 > 0:10:43You know, the world's finest violin wouldn't be any good without the
0:10:43 > 0:10:46world's finest violin strings.
0:10:46 > 0:10:50And you might just be surprised where those come from.
0:10:50 > 0:10:55In 2012, a Japanese medical researcher, Dr Osaki,
0:10:55 > 0:10:59made a violin string using 300 orb-web spiders.
0:10:59 > 0:11:00No way!
0:11:00 > 0:11:02Way! Their silk fibres, combined together,
0:11:02 > 0:11:04are tough enough to be played.
0:11:04 > 0:11:08But with 15,000 strands of silk in every single string,
0:11:08 > 0:11:11it's unlikely they're ever going to hit the mass market.
0:11:11 > 0:11:14But one extraordinary scientist has discovered
0:11:14 > 0:11:17the secret of spider silk manufacturing.
0:11:17 > 0:11:20Spider silk is the strongest fibre that's found in nature.
0:11:20 > 0:11:24It has a tensile strength greater than Kevlar, and has an elasticity,
0:11:24 > 0:11:26or elongation, greater than nylon.
0:11:28 > 0:11:30So it means we can use it for different medical products,
0:11:30 > 0:11:34like artificial ligaments, artificial tendons, car body parts,
0:11:34 > 0:11:36for airplane parts...
0:11:36 > 0:11:40- What are you doing?- Just cancelling my Silky Jet airline ticket to
0:11:40 > 0:11:41Phoenix, Arizona.
0:11:41 > 0:11:45- There is no way I'm getting on that plane.- Silky Jet?- Yeah.
0:11:45 > 0:11:47You are spinning me a line(!)
0:11:47 > 0:11:50No, for real - I got them on the web.
0:11:50 > 0:11:52Yes, I'll continue to hold.
0:11:52 > 0:11:57So, the problem with using spider silk from spiders themselves is,
0:11:57 > 0:11:59spiders can't be farmed.
0:11:59 > 0:12:01They're territorial, they're cannibalistic,
0:12:01 > 0:12:02so if you put a lot of them together,
0:12:02 > 0:12:05they kill each other until everybody has enough room.
0:12:05 > 0:12:08So you've got to come up with another manufacture method.
0:12:08 > 0:12:11Randy, it turns out, is a goat farmer.
0:12:11 > 0:12:15And whilst they might look normal, these goats are anything but.
0:12:18 > 0:12:20The majority of these goats have
0:12:20 > 0:12:23a gene in them that came from a spider.
0:12:23 > 0:12:26- He's kidding.- He's not!
0:12:26 > 0:12:30We took the DNA for the spider silk gene,
0:12:30 > 0:12:33that DNA was then injected into an embryo,
0:12:33 > 0:12:36and we take the embryos and we implant them
0:12:36 > 0:12:40into an acceptor female, and five months later,
0:12:40 > 0:12:42she has a baby goat for us.
0:12:42 > 0:12:44So, spiders have baby goats?
0:12:44 > 0:12:47No! A goat has a baby goat that has spider genes.
0:12:48 > 0:12:50Spiders wear jeans?!
0:12:50 > 0:12:51- No!- Oh, I give up.
0:12:51 > 0:12:54Look, the point is, these real-life spider kids grow up
0:12:54 > 0:12:57to produce spider silk in their milk.
0:12:57 > 0:13:02Ah, OK. So, the question is, how do you get the silk out of the goats?
0:13:02 > 0:13:03Over to Randy.
0:13:03 > 0:13:05So, we take the milk from the goats here,
0:13:05 > 0:13:08and we purify the spider silk protein out of it.
0:13:08 > 0:13:11And then we try to mimic what the spider does,
0:13:11 > 0:13:13in terms of actually making a fibre.
0:13:13 > 0:13:17So, we try to spin it, so that we pull it, instead of pushing it out.
0:13:17 > 0:13:18And then we stretch it,
0:13:18 > 0:13:21which is exactly the same thing that a spider does.
0:13:21 > 0:13:25This year's crop of kids look cute now, but soon,
0:13:25 > 0:13:28they'll be spider goat silk-making machines.
0:13:28 > 0:13:30Spider goats! Brilliant!
0:13:30 > 0:13:32THUNDER RUMBLES
0:13:32 > 0:13:33BOTH: Ah!
0:13:33 > 0:13:34That's summer over, then.
0:13:34 > 0:13:35No sun for another year.
0:13:35 > 0:13:38My tan was starting to look so good as well!
0:13:38 > 0:13:42Look at that! The weather in this country is so unpredictable!
0:13:42 > 0:13:44Where's my brolly?
0:13:48 > 0:13:50# Why does it always rain on me? #
0:13:50 > 0:13:53See you next time! Bye!
0:13:54 > 0:13:57# They're wild and weird, wild and weird
0:13:57 > 0:13:59# Really, really wild and really, really weird
0:13:59 > 0:14:01# They're wild and weird, wild and weird
0:14:01 > 0:14:02# They're really, really wild
0:14:02 > 0:14:05# They're really, really wild and weird. #
0:14:08 > 0:14:11Wild and Weird!