Ticks and Vampires

Ticks. Yuck. Among the most unpleasant of all the bloodsuckers - they make mosquitos look like angels.

We are being plastered in ticks as we stumble through thick viney forest looking for the thin yellow lines left by the crossbow arrows. Eventually these lines will all be joined and we’ll be able to start the long process of pulling the big cable across the valley. If the ticks don’t suck all our blood before we can finish the job.

The presence of so many ticks isn’t as bad as it seems. It means there are plenty of animals around - which means that there will be predators such as the dry forest cats; jaguars, pumas, ocelots, margays and jaguarundis - one of the crew even saw a puma yesterday.

On the other hand, the vampire bats are missing. In a place where a year ago we filmed vampires sneaking up on deer with the thermal camera, now there are none. An evening’s wait revealed no more than a mouse and two rabbits (which of course in their own way are just as interesting.)

How To Fling Something Far: Plan B

The Crossbow Method:
The crew have arrived and discovered most things ready to go. There is a slight problem in that the trees are still leafy. We expected the dry season to be well under way by now but we are hoping that by the time we start filming the leaves will have detached themselves to give the camera a clear view through the trees to the ground below ... if we can get the cable up...

Some time was spent on catapult-making but that idea didn't really work out.

Luckily, We also took some crossbows with us to Costa Rica, one of the crew had the idea that we could shoot thinnish line across the trees and use that to draw a heavier cable through - this method is showing promise.

Night of the Hunt showing in USA

If you haven't already caught it, Night of the Hunt is showing on the National Geographic Channel in the US at the moment - next airing on Sunday.

How To Fling Something Far: Plan A

We have been racking our brains on the subject of how to get a very long cable across the top of the forest.

Plan A involves putting a camera boy attached to one end of the cable in the flinging bit of a big catapult

Bracing Ourselves

Ammonite has been busy preparing for the next trip to Costa Rica where among other things we are hoping to film jaguars. We have discussed many cunning plans for this project, jaguars are notoriously good at hiding. One of our schemes is to thread an immensely long cable through the forest and hoist it up above the canopy between two points so that various bits of kit can be set up to glide above the trees (a sort of death-slide for cameras), giving us a monkey’s eye view of the action taking place on the forest floor.

How will we achieve this very difficult task?

We're not quite sure yet - but we have sketched out some ideas that we will be telling you about, meanwhile if you have any brainwaves please let us know.

Happy Christmas Everyone

This was the face of Ammonite this morning, some of us went on to do a bit of all night dancing - a full album of the evening's activities are available on our Facebook page.


Have a great Christmas everyone - some sort of service will resume early in 2011

Love from Ammonite xxxxx

Getting In Training For Costa Rica

Ammonite will shortly be embarking on a search for the elusive jaguar. The first trip sets off next month, they are heading into inaccessible territory and one of the many challenges will be how to thread a cable high up through a large section of forest.

Part of the preparations involved a weekend recently with MTF, where Ian Shacklock taught the crew how to use an All Terrain Vehicle safely. That's Howard Bourne with the proof that he passed the course with flying colours

The Edit Marathon Begins

The indomitable Jimmy Taggart is back at Ammonite - currently turning reams of hyena footage into pure spun gold.... next up leopards!

Ammonite Loose In The Country

An Ammonite crew drove out east to meet Paul and Ryan Edwards yesterday. These two talented young cameramen have been filming the barn owls that live near their Suffolk home. If you are in the UK, catch Autumnwatch tonight on BBC2 at 8.30 to see what they've been up to.

Ants In Their Pants

Ants can be a pain - apparently

Hitting The Headlines

Martin Dohrn's stunning starlight images can be seen in online versions of Metro and The Daily Telegraph, they're also in today's Daily Mail,

Regal Monarchs

Ammonite sent a crew to Mexico and Wisconsin last March to film Monarch butterflies for the National Geographic series Great Migrations - it's finally on telly.

Ammonite Goes To Hollywood

It's finally ready and winging its way over the pond to star in a Hollywood feature film alongside a raft of Oscar winners...

For weeks we've been preparing a custom starlight rig for a super-sensitive, Mega-A-list film, an undercover operation so ultra-secret that if we reveal any names, large black-suited men will take us away and feed us to their pet piranhas.

Does My Bum Look Big In This?

The filming crew went back to Kenya three weeks ago and we haven't heard from them since - not so much as a tweet.

We hope the silence means that they are so busy filming exciting things (warthogs eating lions, crocodiles dancing on ice...) that they haven't the time to talk to us. They're supposed to be getting back at the weekend so we'll be posting news of the latest trip when we see the rushes.


Meanwhile the crew that stayed in the office got down to some needle craft - this is Elliot and Laura turning a baby-carrying backback into a computer-carrying backpack for the next field trip.

Settling Down

Still working out where to put everything but we're getting used to our new home...


The filming crew are all back home and the whole team are together for a brief week before the next leg of filming starts. While the boys were away, the home of Ammonite was moved from it's rather cramped quarters in Cotham to a fantastic building designed by one of the world's most astonishing men Isambard Kingdom Brunel.

The building has been neglected over recent decades this summer our offices looked a bit like this





and there was quite a lot of work to do to achieve first this



and then this



It's been an amazing project: in an attempt to be as green as possible our furniture and fittings have all come from salvaged/recycled/reclaimed sources with a minimal use of new timber. Planted right next to the railway station we will be arriving for work by bike, train, bus and Shank's pony and hoping that our visitors will do likewise. But most of all this is the most beautiful place to be, we're hoping that the spirit of one of the world's greatest inventors will inspire Ammonite to design equipment that will lead us to uncover even more of the wonders of the natural world ...

It's A Wrap In Yala

The Sri Lankan team finished filming in Sri Lanka. They have packed up and just arrived home with several drives stuffed full of the most extraordinary footage of leopards, sloth bears, crocodiles, elephants and a whole lot more from this beautiful country. We'll be spending the next few months editing the material and meanwhile the shooting in Africa continues, expect more news from the Masai Mara soon...

Monsoon So Soon

As we approach our final days of filming here in Sri Lanka we've entered the start of the monsoon rains. We came to film at the peak of the drought when we had the best chance of filming leopards and we've not been disappointed. After two and a half weeks of blistering sunshine the clouds have been building over the park. Finally they gave way with an enormous thunderstorm and several inches of rain. Good news for the wildlife but not so great for a car full of computers and and car batteries.

We spent last night parked by a waterhole filming crocodiles in a torrential downpour that lasted hours. Our car is protected by some rudimentary plastic sheeting that when combined with almost 100% humidity becomes more like a mobile steam room. We did the best we could to film through the rain but nothing prepared Howard or I for the mind blowing curry the chefs had prepared for our dinner. Already sweltering in the car the kitchen staff have been ever increasing the heat of our evening meals. The result was an inevitable near paralytic meltdown of embarrassing proportions. Further fuel was thrown on the curry fire by our smiling driver encouraging us to drink hot chai to relieve the burn. Much to the amusement of our local trackers and driver it only added to the curry carnage and halted filming until our senses were in some way restored.

With only a few nights remaining we're hoping the rain holds off just a few more days but with black clouds overhead it seems unlikely. The monsoon has come and soon it will be time to pack up and leave this amazing place to replenish for next year.

Rhino Ridge

Rhino on Rhino Ridge

Rhino Ridge is hardly a ridge, more a huge gentle hill sitting between the northern boundary of the Mara reserve and the valley carved by the Mara river as it flows south then east towards Tanzania. The 'ridge' got its name for the fact that once it was a good place to see (and previously to hunt) rhino. Twenty years ago, I saw one there, shortly before a Mara ranger was arrested for colluding in the killing of one of the eight remaining rhinos in the Mara - and thereafter Rhinos were presumed more or less extinct in the Mara as a result of poaching for their horn.

Two days ago, there was a rhino strolling nonchanantly across the top of Rhino Ridge after an absence of twenty years Incredulous topi and zebra, who may have never seen a rhino before, watched. Nobody seems to know how many rhino there are in the Mara today (-or they’re not saying), but last night we saw yet another wandering around among Maasai villages in the dead of night, a hopeful sign that rhinos really are returning.

Grass

Tasting the grass

It’s all about grass. The reason the wildebeest are here (the Maasai Mara)
is because of the grass. The combination of soil, grazing patterns and rainfrall
have now carpeted huge areas with short neatly clipped, emerald green
grass, a lawn that any Englishman would be proud of. This is
exactly the kind of nutritious sward that the wildebeest like - and they
are now here in greater numbers than ever.

Do wildebeest like the taste of grass and savour the differences in
flavour between the different species? Do they live for the taste of
fresh, green shoots? Perhaps, but a taste test revealed that our tiny
(compared to a wildebeest) taste and smell receptors can't tell one kind
of grass from another - and that humans aren't really that keen on the taste of
grass.

Tank, Brick and Bison

Billie and Ben playing

Giving the animals names could be seen as frivolous and unnecessarily anthropomorphising them. But without giving them names, we have difficulty understanding who's who, and in a complex society like that of hyenas, we need to be able to describe individuals with a quick shorthand - names.

There's one who likes to rip the cables off the front of the car (he's called Cable Biter), and youngster who whines a lot at feeding time (you guessed it, Whiner) - probably because his mother is cutting off his milk supply.

But there are unforgettable hyenas who's stature and demeanour inspire names like Tank, Brick, and in the clan we are following now, Bison. These are the matriarchs of the clan, mothers and grandmothers to quite a few of the females in the clan. As they rarely need to hunt they have been able to dispense with the usual lithe and fast hyena bodies for sheer bulk and muscle. They are the huge testosterone filled monsters, who have created in observers the mistaken impression that the (smaller) male hyenas have only low status in the clan (as they have lower testosterone counts and do sometimes get beaten up).

Today, we witnessed Billie and Ben romping about playing, chasing and generally jumping on each other despite the fact that they are adults - in Ben's case, and probably almost so in Billie's case. Billie was trying to excavate a burrow, presumably in readiness for the time she will give birth (clearly not yet). Meanwhile, Ben was acting as sentinel, while also trying to mate as she was digging. He didn't seem serious, and she seemed to be enjoying the attention. We watched and filmed for an hour as they romped across the plains. What energy - but no sign of dominating behaviour from Billie. Perhaps in another 10 years or so, Billie will become like her grandmother - and need another name should we ever meet her again. 'Hulk' perhaps.

Raining Leopards

We were just getting set to leave this evening when the sky’s opened and it started to pour with rain. Apparently it’s the dry season here but after a scorching day the thunderclouds built up and the storm started. Our car is now protected with a combination of plastic sheeting and bin liners against the torrential elements.


We’re working double night shifts at the moment in an attempt to outfox the leopards and possibly film one hunting. Very few people have ever seen a leopard make a kill here but no one has really driven in the park at night, let alone observe the leopards. After 5 weeks of filming we think that they may be making their kills in the early hours of the morning.

So for the past 3 days we’ve set our alarm clocks for 3am and headed off into the park. After 6 hours or so we return to refuel with a largely waffle-filled breakfast and plenty of coffee. Then after downloading our footage 3pm rolls around and we head out again for another 6 hours. It’s a rather strange (and painful) time scale to work in but you can’t argue with the results, we’ve found leopards every day but sadly we’re still waiting to catch an elusive hunt. Who knows, if it ever stops raining we might just film one!

Leopard Family Life

Last night was an absolute highlight of our filming in Sri Lanka so far. We are now on our second leg of night filming leopards and last night we found an adult male, 2 cubs and their mother all taking it in turns to feed on a kill. It was amazing to see this giant male playfully ignore the relentless gnawing of his tail by a very persistent cub.

The males here are some of the largest leopards in the world and absolutely dwarf the adult females let alone foolhardy cubs. But last night we filmed this incredible family share some very rare quality time. It has been observed in the past that males do occasionally socialise with their own cubs but has it ever been filmed? We're not sure, so rather than declare a world first we're just thrilled to have documented such an amazing interaction. We're off filming crocodiles now so best filming trousers, cake safely stowed (and bug spray) and getting loading that night car.




report via: Tom (Cake Boy) Stephens

Too Many Gnus Are Spoiling the Broth

The only gnus coming through from Africa is in truncated phone calls as their email links aren't working. From Ammonite HQ we can report that there are unprecedented numbers of wildebeest on the Mara plains this year.

We are currently filming for two projects in the Mara; one is about hyenas and they have been performing marvelously, however the crocodiles that the crew are trying to film for the other project have scoffed so many wildebeest that they are bloated and sleepy and are lying around in a state of torpor.

However Tom (cake boy) Stephens has a great internet connection and has taken some stunning images of leopards which will be posted very soon.

Hyena PR

When the public relations skills were handed out to the animals, the hyenas must have been somewhere else - and the lions got the hyena share of human popularity.

Male lions, despite usually being greedy thieving thugs, have lovely long manes and charismatic looks. They inspire awe and respect among humans. Male hyenas on the other hand, are often seen wallowing in mud, or the excrement of other animals, perhaps hanging round lions as they feed, apparently hoping for scraps left by the king of beasts. The male hyena has a reputation for cowardice and submission in front of the more powerful females.

But if you look closely at the hyenas surrounding lions on a kill (for real or on TV), you will quite likely see one with blood on his neck - certainly the animal that made the kill - a hyena and not a lion.

Many people now realise that the truth about hyenas differs from the way they have been portrayed in the media. Night filming is helping us uncover more of what hyenas, and male hyenas in particular, really do.

The male hyenas do the bulk of the hunting - the feeding of the clan. They are faster and lighter than the bulky females, and can as a group out-run and bring down almost any animal they choose, healthy or not. At night it seems that hyenas are almost completely predatory, hardly bothering with carrion, while lions will steal a significant proportion of hyena kills.

The male hyenas do seem to get a raw deal. But in reality, they are valued members of the clan, acting as baby sitters at the den, giving support and reassurance to youngsters, making kills for suckling females, and generally acting as a mobile security network keeping the boundaries of the clan territory intact. And when lions threaten it's the males who dart around the lions, harrying them, getting them to run and tire, while the powerful testosterone filled females have the serious muscle ready
just in case.

Good Gnus From The Masai Mara

After an extremely busy time between here and the leopard shoot in Sri Lanka, there's finally time to write.

Arriving here a week ago, we were told that the wildebeest (gnu) migration had already returned to Tanzania a few weeks early. Although this wasn't crucial to the two films we are making here (crocodiles and hyenas) it is always disappointing to arrive at a party when everyone's gone home. There were a few herds about, but generally things were looking a bit empty.

Then, we had two days of rain and the herds piled back across the Mara River to cover the plains. It is an astounding sight, wildebeest as far as the eye can see in all directions. This scale of this spectacle never ceases to amaze me, but also saddens me to remember that until quite recently, Europe, North America, Asia, India, other parts of Africa all had similar concentrations of wildlife which have all but disappeared.

Stop Press: Transmission News

We have transmission news for the lion film that we made last year.

The film will be known as Night of the Hunt in the US and Night Of The Lion elsewhere (don't ask...)

The first transmission will be at 9pm on the 13th September on Nat Geo Wild in the UK and the rest of Europe*, for photos and a lovely trailer see the Night of The Lion website.

Night of the Lion is the first of a series of films featuring nocturnal activity. Currently in production are films discovering the nocturnal behaviour of leopards, hyenas and crocodiles.

Rescheduling

The wonderful thing about filming in a new place is that there is so much to learn...

The problem with filming in a new place is that there is so much to learn...

No matter how much research we do before we start filming, it's only when we actually get there, start filming and meet people who know the place well, then we start to get a real idea of the relationships between the animals and the landscape and how the seasons affect the whole ecosystem.

Our original plan had been to film the start of the dry season, then go back next year for the rains. Then we realised that the end of the dry season would be a time of much more interesting behaviour (in terms of the film we want to make), so we have changed all our plans around.

This is by way of an explanation for the lack of notes from the field - we've been in a frenzy of rescheduling. We all flew back to the UK to get kit cleaned, repaired and repacked. One crew is now filming hyenas in Africa - they have no internet, no phones and no electricity - no news from there yet. The other crew are scrambling together the necessary equipment to go back out to Sri lanka in three weeks time.

Flashy Geezer

Although this is supposed to be a leopard shoot, we couldn't resist taking photographs of some very interesting ants. Their shiny bodies are quite difficult to photograph, a modified flash is needed - here is Martin's ingenious diffuser involving twigs and an old plastic shopping bag.

Project leopard Commences

Chitral Jayatillake and Wari Illangasinghe from the John Keells Hotels Group with the first recipient of a leopard-proof cage.

The large animals that inhabit national parks might be great for a country's tourist industry (and marauding filmmakers), but for many of the people who live in the vicinity of the parks these animals can pose a considerable threat to their livelihoods. Around Yala National Park there have been several leopard attacks on local cattle herds and last year alone four or five leopards are known to have been killed by either the villagers or poachers in the area around Yala.

John Keells Hotel Group, which owns hotels near Sri Lanka's National Parks and organises wildlife safaris has recently embarked on Project Leopard, a scheme that will be giving local farmers several portable leopard-proof cages to protect the calves at night.

The first of these cages was handed over to a local farmer last week and we went along to film the event.

So Much To Tell ...

... we've filmed leopard liaisons, jocular jackals, beautiful birds, creepy crocodiles and food fighting, we've witnessed the donation of cattle-protecting cages and we've made some great sound recordings, none of which we can share yet because the internet connection doesn't work much - and we have to go even further into the jungle; notes from the field will continue in a week or so when communication permits.