Rockies Mountain: Life at the Extreme

High above the clouds...

..there are lost worlds.

Unexplored...

..unforgiving...

..wildly unpredictable.

But on the great mountain ranges of our planet, life does exist.

Against all odds,

a few extraordinary animals

and remarkable people

make their home in the highest places on Earth.

WIND WHISTLES

In the Rocky Mountains,

you can sit all day and watch the world go by...

..without seeing a soul.

Slap bang in the middle of busy North America...

..for as far as the eye can see,

it's just wilderness.

In the Rockies, the weather can change on a dime.

It can shift from scorching

to Arctic in a few hours.

To make it here,

it's vital to know

when to act

and when to wait.

In the Rockies, it's all about picking that perfect...

..moment.

The Rockies are the spine of North America.

They rise up in the South West,

travel north through Colorado, Wyoming,

Idaho, Montana, and up into Canada,

to the edge of the frozen Yukon.

The Rockies are 3,000 miles long.

Five times the length of Britain.

There's so many mountains,

many don't even have names.

This is a world of unknown peaks

and hidden valleys.

The last great sanctuary of the iconic animals of North America.

Buffalo still roam free...

..and grizzlies raise their young.

It's winter.

Minus ten.

The days are short.

But before the animals go into lockdown,

one event is about to stir the Rockies.

It's all down to Bighorn sheep.

Normally docile, but today,

a scent is in the air.

And it's turning the males into warriors.

It's the most important moment in their year.

All the males are picking up the scent...

..drawing it up into the roof of their mouths.

Analysing the smell.

The females produce this particular perfume only when they're in heat.

Each female is fertile for just two days.

Not a chance a red-blooded ram wants to miss.

But to get to mate, they first have to fight the other males.

It begins

with pushing and shoving...

..but quickly goes below the belt.

Goading each other, seeing who's strongest...

..who's up for it.

And then the fight is on.

This is their one chance.

They've got to take it.

The horns can weigh 30 pounds.

As much as the rest of their bones.

It's the biggest rumble in the Rockies.

It echoes for miles around the mountains.

Clashing horns with eight times the

force that would fracture a human skull.

Other creatures would get brain damage.

But Bighorns have double-thickness skulls to soak up the shock.

The losers are left with a sore head.

They'll have to wait a whole year for another shot at mating.

The victors get the females.

They've seized their chance, and won.

And choosing that perfect moment

is the secret to success throughout the Rockies.

And that's for one simple reason -

the weather here is more changeable than

any of the other great mountain ranges.

The greatest daily temperature swing in the world

was recorded in the Rockies,

dropping 56 degrees Centigrade from one day to the next.

But the seasonal swing is even bigger.

The summers are scorching and dry.

Every year, 700,000 acres go up in smoke.

Temperatures soar to 40 degrees.

But in the winter, avalanches rip down at 80mph.

There's 100,000 every year.

Temperatures plummet to minus 40 -

cold enough to freeze the mercury in a thermometer.

By midwinter, the world is frozen solid.

WIND WHISTLES

BIRD CALLS

Diamond dust.

Ice crystallised by the frozen air.

Winter can be beautiful.

But brutal.

Winds reach 200mph.

ANIMALS GRUNT

It can snow six feet in a day.

For most, winter is a time of hardship and suffering.

But here in the far north of the Rockies,

it's the perfect moment for one creature.

The Wolverine.

Most people spend a lifetime here and never even glimpse one.

He feeds on the frozen bodies of animals killed by winter...

..and preserved in nature's freezer.

His nose can detect food buried 20 feet deep.

Other animals follow him around hoping to steal a meal.

But carcasses are few and far between.

Each day, he must scour the mountains for scraps.

Determination pays off.

The frozen remains are as hard as iron,

but specially adapted teeth tear them open.

Ravens sound the dinner bell.

And it brings the mountains' top predator.

HOWLING

The Wolverine has to act fast.

A hungry wolf pack could kill him.

It doesn't take long for wolves to devour a carcass.

He melts back into the wilderness,

always searching for another chance.

Seizing the moment is crucial for

all creatures that live in the Rockies.

And that's especially true of one unique animal.

The mountains call us,

but we're not built to live above the clouds.

We, most of all, must gauge the conditions perfectly.

For those with the courage and the judgment,

the prize is the freedom of these mountains.

For some, the draw of the Rockies is so strong

they need to go further and higher.

I mean, ALL mountains have a moodiness to them,

have a personality.

But the Rockies, the Rockies might take the cake.

Hillary O'Neil is a professional mountaineer and skier.

She's climbed Everest and led expeditions

to mountains around the world for 15 years.

But her home is Colorado,

in the southern Rockies.

It's not for the beginner, they're steep mountains, they're rugged.

It keeps you on your toes.

I think I could spend ten lifetimes here

and probably not do everything I would like to do in these mountains.

There's one mountain in particular she wants to climb.

And now, in late winter, it's the perfect moment.

Mount Sneffels.

The highest peak for miles.

At 4,300 metres high,

the air's 40% thinner than at sea level.

And the winds can blow over 100mph.

She's set herself a task to climb it,

and then, for the very first time,

she will ski down the treacherous north side,

down a steep gully called The Snake.

I mean, there's, you know, lots of catchphrases

about the Rocky Mountains.

And the one that always kind of sticks in my head is, you know,

"If you don't like the weather, wait five minutes and it'll change."

For me, it makes me want to go out in the mountains every day,

because I think it's going to be different every day. And sometimes,

sometimes I think the mountains around here

are warm and welcoming, and other times you're like,

"God, I just hope they let me go and let me out of their grasp,

"and I can go home!"

It's a long slog to the summit.

With the air getting thinner.

And the snow getting deeper.

I often feel threatened when I'm up here.

I think it's a good thing to feel fear cos that means you're pushing

yourself a little bit. And that makes you feel alive

and, yeah, I would take that any day.

There's no time to stop at the summit.

She quickly abseils down to the start of the gully.

Every minute, the wind is picking up.

There's no time to waste.

SHE PANTS

These mountain gullies act as funnels for avalanches.

As she approaches the bottleneck...

..the snow is getting more and more unstable.

Oh...

Woo!

The hard work done,

now she can claim her prize.

When I go and do something new in these mountains,

it feels pioneering,

in a modern way.

And I think that is a lot of the spirit of the people

that still live around these mountains.

The Rockies have always attracted pioneers.

Thousands flocked here in the 1800s.

Some made fortunes.

For others, the timing was wrong.

Mining towns,

abandoned after the gold and silver ran out.

Farmers were also lured west with the promise of cheap land.

Early March,

and the last snow of winter falls on an abandoned ranch in Montana.

The home, reclaimed by nature.

Mule deer.

They have been forced down from the mountains in search of grass to eat.

But they're nervous.

And rightly so.

Something here is very wrong.

Each barn is littered with corpses of other deer.

A predator is close by.

Magpies feed on the latest victim.

But the mule deer have a terrible choice.

If they go back to the mountains, they'll starve.

If they stay here,

the predator may get them.

During the daylight, they're safe.

But as night falls...

..the ranch becomes the realm of the phantom killer.

Under the cloak of darkness,

catching sight of this silent killer is almost impossible.

In some Native American myths, this is a creature of the underworld.

A harbinger of death.

The mountain lion.

Secretive, silent, and smart.

She uses these buildings to hide her kills

from the prying eyes of other animals,

so she can feed unnoticed, undisturbed.

The mountain lion is the top ambush predator in the Rockies.

Powerful back legs for lightning-fast leaps,

huge front feet for catching prey

and a long, heavy tail for balance.

With a full stomach, she slips into the dark.

And the herd is safe.

Until tomorrow night.

It's the end of March.

Across the Rockies, billions of tonnes of water

have been locked up all winter as snow and ice.

But today, for the first time this year,

the sun is in the sky for more than 12 hours.

And, at last, spring has arrived.

The mountains are waking up,

the tap is being turned on.

3,000 waterfalls appear across the Rockies.

Hundreds of billions of gallons are released from the mountains.

A thousand frozen lakes are unlocked...

..and filled with meltwater.

The Rockies nourish 900 million acres across America.

The good times are coming.

Spring grass is rich and wholesome.

Everyone is hungry...

..including the predators.

BIRDS CHIRP

In the mountain meadows of Wyoming,

an elk calf has just been born.

The timing of her birth was impeccable.

Any earlier, and frosts would have killed her.

Any later, she would miss the spring grass.

But it's also the most dangerous time.

Hungry predators are all around.

When she's just born, her legs are too weak to hold her weight.

The calf can't run to save herself.

Instead, she has to hide.

Her mother has a strong scent.

A beacon to predators.

The only way to protect her baby is to leave her.

The first night of her life will be the longest.

HOWLING

Wolves.

HOWLING AND BARKING

Coyote.

Even cougar.

On that first night, the sounds of hunting are all around her.

Instinctively, she knows to stay still.

Dawn is a long time coming.

The calf has survived the night.

But the chatter of magpies signals not all newborns were so lucky.

Scavengers bicker over the remains of a calf killed overnight.

And now there's a new threat.

During the spring, one third of all newborn calves

are killed by one highly specialised deer-hunter.

This grizzly bear has just come out of a five-month hibernation,

and she's famished.

The grizzly's sense of smell is 2,000 times better than a human.

But this calf has a trick to avoid being sniffed out.

She has been born almost without scent herself.

The bear's nose is no use.

But grizzlies are smart, and have other tactics.

She methodically combs through the meadow.

The calf must stay absolutely still.

The worst thing to do now is run.

The bear ambles away, unaware of the meal that was under her nose.

The mother returns to her calf.

Her legs are growing stronger.

Her mother can now lead her back

towards the mountains and the safety of the herd.

In the Rockies,

sometimes the bravest animals come in the smallest sizes.

It's late spring.

And the sun heats the mountain rocks...

..which warms the surrounding air, making winds,

which are forced up the valley sides.

Winds made by the mountains.

It's the perfect place to be a bird.

I dreamed about flying when I was a kid.

I've always had a fascination and a curiosity

with the freedom that birds have.

Just not being attached to earth.

Jeff Shapiro lives in the heart of the Montana Rockies.

Every other day in the spring and summer,

he climbs into these mountains.

I've always wanted to be in places that were bigger than me,

to show me how insignificant I am.

You could spend a lifetime in the Rockies and not see another person.

They just go on for miles and miles and miles.

And that gives me a feeling like there's still adventure.

The conditions must be perfect before he flies.

As I'm approaching the jump,

I try and pay attention to what the birds are doing.

I try and pay attention to how the leaves on the trees are moving.

It all gives me information that will help me stay safe.

One of the most important factors is timing.

The moment I choose to jump off the cliff

is the most important moment in my life.

Because I've committed.

The valley floor is 3,000 feet below.

HE EXHALES SHARPLY

Three, two, one.

See ya!

The first time I stepped off the ground and escaped from gravity...

..that sense of speed and you're connected to the mountain,

you're connected to the terrain...

I guess it could be described as, like, pure joy.

To have that sense that anything's possible...

..that, to me, feels like freedom.

Summer has arrived.

The mountain peaks are now bare.

The melting snow has made temporary ponds in the mountain meadows.

They're full of life.

But in the heat of the summer sun, they won't last long.

In ponds like this...

..young salamanders are growing.

Just three inches long.

But the biggest beasts in this tiny kingdom.

The manes around their heads are gills.

The feathery fronds soaking up the oxygen from the water.

Their small mouths are just big enough to swallow their lunch.

But with microscopic teeth,

eating is a slow process.

At first, all is well.

But in the summer heat, the pond starts to shrink.

The salamanders

become a little too close for comfort.

Soon, the cupboard starts to run dry.

And the salamanders are hungry.

And it's now that the mood starts to darken.

The biggest salamander in the pond starts transforming...

..into something more sinister.

His mouth has grown wider.

He's developed hundreds of needle-sharp teeth.

They'll stop his new victims from wriggling away.

The other salamanders may well be his brothers and sisters,

but they're starting to look quite tasty.

He has transformed into a cannibal.

The mountain sun keeps shrinking the pond.

So there's no escape from Big Brother.

But then the victims start to fight back.

The other salamanders also start to turn into cannibals.

Everyone wants to eat everyone else.

Soon, in this pond, there's just a single, very plump salamander.

Everyone else has mysteriously disappeared.

But it's an empty victory.

The mountain sun has turned the pond into a puddle.

Eventually it will dry out completely

and he too would die...

..except he has performed another even-greater trick.

His gills have disappeared,

reabsorbed into his body.

Inside him, he has grown a pair of lungs.

Then, as the mountain sun dries up the last of the puddle,

this Houdini steps out

and fills his lungs with the cool mountain air.

The ultimate transformer.

Midsummer.

But even now, autumn is around the corner.

Everyone's in a hurry to make the most of nature's gold rush.

And no-one is busier than this creature.

A Rufous hummingbird.

The tiny master of the Rockies weighing less than a penny,

and with a pulse rate of 1,000, no heart beats faster.

In summer, they live at the very north of the Rockies,

using the long days to raise their family.

These tiny newborns are the size of a sugar cube,

in a nest so light it's held together with spider silk.

Their busy mother feeds them 60 times a day

on a mix of regurgitated nectar and insects.

Hummingbird rocket fuel.

She can raise a whole family in just 18 days.

Soon, there's only one chick left.

But she's reluctant to fly the nest.

She's still getting used to the big, wide world.

But the biggest moment of her life is about to begin.

The flowers here are dying.

She must fly south in search of food.

She's the smallest creature on the greatest journey in the Rockies.

3,000 miles from the very north to the very south.

Less than a month old, totally on her own,

she must race down the Rockies to catch the blossoming flowers.

She crosses the border, from Canada to the USA.

And then flies south...

..over mountain lakes...

..over five states...

..over great peaks...

..and down through huge mountain passes.

At the very south of the Rockies,

the mountain meadows have just a moment

when every flower is full of nectar.

It's hummingbird heaven.

And she's arrived at the perfect time.

Here, she has a pit stop to refuel.

But not a moment to relax.

She's off again,

further south,

chasing the sun.

The tiny hero of the Rockies

with the most epic journey of all.

Summer is all too brief in the Rockies.

As soon as it arrives, it's gone.

The hot summer nights begin to lengthen,

and the stars put on a spectacular show.

High above, the Milky Way drifts by.

PEOPLE SQUEAL

Down below, the people of the Rockies

celebrate the end of summer in county fairs.

The first frosts will soon be here.

For most, this is a time to relax.

But not for everybody.

Oliver Pakotas is about to face the toughest race in the Rockies.

Months of practice have led to this one moment.

CHEERING

The Indian Relay -

a Rocky Mountains speciality of bravery and split-second timing.

Each rider must complete three laps of the track.

At the end of each lap, they must jump from one horse to another.

And it's all done bareback.

It's a speciality of Native American Indians,

different tribes competing for the honours.

The winner is the first past the post.

Keep him going, keep him going. Push it on and make him work.

Give him the work.

Holy cow!

That's pretty good.

Judging the perfect moment to jump bareback onto the horse

takes Oliver months of training.

There's a team of four involved.

All family.

Brother Winfred holds the horses in the race.

So does his father, John.

Father-in-law Carey is the trainer.

And Oliver is the jockey.

You always represent where you come from.

And that's where Grizzly Mountain comes from -

it's the biggest mountain on our reservation.

So I represent my home people,

so when I go on the road,

I let people know that this is where I come from.

This is my mountain, and this is our mountain, my family's mountain.

In all the years since I've ever been a kid, we've always had horses.

And they're like brothers and sisters to us.

These horses need specialist training.

And that means getting deep into the mountains.

I like to take them in the mountains and it's just you and the horse,

you know, and you almost become one.

And that's how it feels, too, it's like their legs become my legs.

You know, a bird could fly up or a coyote could run by or something.

Once they get used to that, then I know they're ready

to go do some relay racing.

We develop a trust with each other out there with them

that you can't get on a racetrack.

Indian Relay is the oldest sport in the Rockies.

It grew from the life of the Native American tribes.

The horse was so important to us

when they were out hunting and gathering,

and even when you went out to chase your buffalo,

you had to have a second horse or a third horse.

The family has special ways to prepare their horses.

Their local mountains have a salt lake

that cools the horses' aching muscles, and heals any cuts.

Oliver burns mountain sage in a ceremony

to protect horse and rider from injury.

You're putting a shield over your horses.

I don't know how many people really believe in it,

but I believe in it.

That's how come we're here,

is because our ancestors did the same thing.

# ..the land of the free

# And the home of the brave. #

It's the day of Oliver's big race.

The evening starts with a Rocky Mountain rodeo.

When I walk out onto the track, you almost...

I guess I'd call it getting into a warrior mode.

Nothing else matters in the world.

HEARTBEATS

When you're bareback, horses can feel your heartbeat.

So if I'm staying calm, you know,

they know there ain't nothing to worry about.

Oliver's primed.

The other horses, ready.

The moment has come.

CHEERING

You almost get this sense of invincibility.

All that matters is that next three minutes.

Almost like you're going to go into battle.

CHEERING

Oliver's won. Timed to perfection,

all that Rocky Mountain training has paid off.

Oliver is back in the land belonging to his tribe.

It takes a certain spirit to make it in the Rockies...

..of determination...

..of patience...

but above all,

knowing when to seize the moment.

Take a chance and win

in these ever-changing mountains.

For the bold and the brave,

their reward -

the freedom of the Rocky Mountains.

To film the most mysterious animal in the Rocky Mountains,

the team relied on the expertise of cameramen Casey Henderson.

Casey is mountain-lion mad and spends his life

tracking them around the mountains.

Of all the animals out there,

the one that I'm the most obsessed with is the mountain lion.

And if you can get, like, just one moment of watching this animal,

who's almost impossible to watch,

yeah, it's really the biggest path,

for me, the greatest gift ever.

Casey's tracking skills led him to an abandoned ranch,

which he suspected may be visited by a female mountain lion.

I was walking here and it was just

ten times more than I could ever believe.

I mean, every one of these buildings has a dead deer in it.

So she's been using these buildings,

killing outside of them, caching these deer in here,

calling this place home.

And really kind of a dream come true,

even though it's kind of nightmarish.

Casey wants to catch her red-handed

as she drags her kills into these barns.

But first he will need to learn her movements in this vast wilderness.

Casey and fellow cameraman Brad Orsted

go into the mountains every day.

They search for prints she may have left behind.

I can see her tracks right here.

Watch your head.

They put cameras where she may be sleeping.

Look at that angle.

Having the opportunity to follow this cat around for such a long time

and really start to develop her patterns and movement...

If I know she's been in here, I know where she's going next.

And if she goes here, she's going to go down to the drainage,

she's going to go hunting down towards the ghost ranch.

Even at night, they're on the mountain lion's trail.

After months of patience, the evidence trickles in.

CAMERA CLICKS

True detectives, Brad and Casey log every sighting, movement, and track.

It's starting to pay off.

We're really connecting the dots and being rewarded

for all that knowledge that she's given us into her life.

Her pattern is to go that direction, so the ranch could be next.

But their good luck is about to change.

In the Rockies, hunting is a way of life.

And a mountain lion is a top prize.

Hunters use specially trained dogs

to force mountain lions out into the open.

From his house, Casey hears the sound that he fears the most.

HOWLING AND BARKING Hunting dogs.

The mountain lion could be in danger.

Yeah, in America, you're allowed to hunt mountain lions.

Predator control.

And they're always worried about their livestock,

and their livelihood and

they think that the predators are going to make their lives worse.

It's the mountain lion Casey has been tracking.

Hang tight. Real quick.

He sets off to talk to the hunters,

leaving the camera behind, so as not to antagonise them.

The mountain lion is cornered on the cliff face,

with dogs blocking her every move.

The only chance the mountain lion has

is if Casey can persuade the hunters not to shoot.

The cat's life hangs in the balance.

She's in danger of becoming one of

the 400 mountain lions shot in Montana each year.

Casey eventually wins the hunters over.

And they call off their dogs.

DISTANT SHOUTING AND WHISTLING

I laid it all on them as chummy as I could.

Now they heard me out. And they basically

made up their mind that they're not going to kill a cat today.

If we didn't come up here, they easily could have shot her.

Yeah, I feel like, I feel pretty...

..I don't even know the right word.

Emotional about it, for sure.

Because it is life and death.

You know, in the wild, there's so much to worry about.

And she's out here dodging wolves and...

You know, living a crazy life.

And then these guys come up here and that could have just...

One little moment could have been over.

And to be involved in that, somehow getting embedded in that today,

to make that not happen...

..so thankful that that happened,

that it worked out this way.

Yeah, pretty heavy stuff.

You know, like all things, you know,

I wish I had a long lens and a tripod.

But the good news is that, at last, Casey has concrete evidence that the

mountain lion is close by.

Guess who's back!

It's her.

You know, getting this footage back and having, you know,

all that hard work and all that speculation that was happening,

and then having it pay off right here to prove that it is our girl,

it is our mountain lion,

and she's doing this very cool thing in a very cool place,

utilising this old ghost town to thrive.

This is amazing. This is exactly what

we've been busting our butt for, to see this stuff.

See here, she's walking over and giving the camera a sniff.

Yeah, it's me!

Yeah, this is the first time that anybody's ever documented

a mountain lion in a ghost town.

But I think, most importantly, she's back.

And that proves that she's OK.

And that's the biggest reward of this, by far.

The highest mountain range on the planet.

A magical world, where the strangest animals,

ancient cultures, and extraordinary people all make a home.

It can only be the Himalaya.