by Thinus Ferreira
Want to watch an "extreme, high-risk project" from the BBC? Well, in the fascinating new natural history series Waterhole: Africa's Animal Oasis starting on BBC Earth (DStv 184) this Sunday, 6 December, at 16:00, the BBC's Natural History Unit worked with the Mwiba Wildlife Reserve in Tanzania to literally build the world's first waterhole, with a built-in specialist camera system.
In this compelling documentary series viewers now get to see some of Africa's most iconic animals up-close over three dramatic periods - the middle of the dry season, the hottest time of year and the heights of the first rains.
Of course it's much easier said than done to do a "Big Brother Bush" version in the middle of nowhere in Africa when you need half-submerged and
weather-proofed remote cameras to try and capture the behaviour of warthogs, giraffes, monkeys and big cats that all jostle for position at a new waterhole in Africa as its wildlife faces the growing impact of climate change.
Chris Packham and biologist Ella
Al-Shamahi are the presenters of Waterhole as the series uncovers some of the complex dynamics of an African waterhole for the
very first time.
Filming for Waterhole took place over 6 months with over 1 400 hours of camera footage that was captured. The producers managed to record 105
species, including 26
different mammals after over 100 tons of soil were excavated to dig the trenches of the waterhole.
Besides 4km of
fibre-optic cable used, 20
specialist cameras were installed to capture every angle, with over 60 000
litres of water used to fill the two pools which make up the waterhole.
It took
just 45 minutes for the first animals - you have to watch to see which! - to find and use the
new waterhole!
TVwithThinus spoke to Anwar Mamon, Waterhole: Africa's Animal Oasis series producer to find out more about the making of this eye-popping series.
Where did you find the water and how did you decide where to build the 2 pools?
Anwar Mamon: Good question and it's one that took nearly a year and a half of research and the key thing to mention with this project is that the waterhole was build in conjunction with Mwiba Wildlife Reserve.
They were looking to put in a waterhole and we were in touch with them. The idea came to fruition in the sense of at BBC Studios Natural History Unit, two of our core goals are to give a voice to the natural world and also to film things in new and innovative ways.
When we heard that they're putting in a waterhole, we approached them to partner with them to see if we could put in this specialist camera system. Part of the research that they had done, and we brought on conservationists and scientific advisors, to look into the sustainability and practicalities of how this would work.
The water itself comes from a groundwater supply that is pumped using a wind turbine and solar energy. That groundwater supply is replenished every rainy season and is an existing well.
The 2 pools were created obviously to encourage more animals to use the water.
The location of the waterhole was chosen specifically because it was in a location that would maximise the number of species that would benefit from it but also it was in a location that was near existing water springs which is quite important because that means it wouldn't alter animal behaviour too much.
We should be open and honest and say that putting in waterholes is not a straight forward process and without controversy and something that needs a lot more scientific research and so we were very keen to make sure that we got the right location.
This location was chosen so that it would hopefully have a minimal effect on the ecology and the animal behaviour but would also benefit the maximum number of species.
I wanted to ask whether you had to fill up the waterhole afterwards but then clearly it's a permanent addition. Did you find that there was initially any trust issue with the animals because suddenly there's water where there was nothing before? Were they reluctant or more careful to approach or just immediately accept it?
Anwar Mamon: Yes, this is a permanent water source and it is there now hopefully to benefit the animals forever.
Mwiba Wildlife Reserve is a tourist destination and they use the money they make to keep the waterhole running. When we first put it in, it was classed as an "extreme, high-risk project" by the BBC.
We really had no idea what would happen. We had quite a short production time. We were advised at the beginning that we should allow for the waterhole to be there for at least a year before we start filming but obviously that wasn't practical from a TV scheduling point of view.
So we took a leap of faith. It should be noted that waterholes haven't been that studied that much before because they tend to be far out way in the bush, you could spend maybe 24 or 48 hours. Nobody is going to watch them for the length of time we did which was over a 6-month period.
A lot of what we discovered was new in terms of how do animals find a new water source; how do they approach it? We were very lucky - within the first hour, we had our first visitors which you see in episode 1. I won't tell you what they are just so that BBC Earth viewers can discover that for themselves.
We chose an area that does have water in it for part of the year, so they were used to having water there for instance during the rainy season, just not in the dry season. So I think they were sceptical of the water mainly because they were not sure whether it had any predators in it which is something that we were not sure how they would react.
At the beginning they approached very cautiously - they didn't know if there were crocodiles in there for instance. The other thing: Because we were filming a documentary there, we put in a substantial filming hide to enable us to capture unique animal behaviour and also to help run the specialist camera system.
I think the animals were also warier of that structure that what they were of the actual waterhole.
Did you find that building a waterhole created a whole other - I don't want to use the word unintended - but unexpected micro-ecosystem? So beyond the animals that showed up did you suddenly lets say, had more insects there?
Anwar Mamon: Exactly that, and it was a really lovely, unintended consequence.
I think that we always expected - you know water is the source of all life - we always expected any ecosystem to grow and expand around the waterhole. We didn't expect it to happen in the timeframe that it happened because it happened quite quickly.
Within a couple of weeks, we had lots of insect life, we had lots of mammals, we had lots of birds. What's exciting is how that waterhole will evolve in future. Within a year it should have fish which obviously will then support another element of the ecosystem.
Even within the first 2 weeks which is in the programme, Chris Packham spots in our filming control centre which is about 250 metres away from the actual waterhole, a parasitic wasp. These wasps build nests in the mud.
Obviously there isn't a lot of mud during the dry season and actually that parasitic wasp was only there and only able to nest because of the mud from our waterhole.
I want to ask about the timing since you filmed through 3 seasons. Was it a conscious decision and what influenced it, or were you forced to just start at whatever time of year it was - I want to understand whether you could choose narratively during what season to start, like start dry and end with rainy, or start rainy and end dry?
Anwar Mamon: A growing issue that the world and Africa are facing is a shortage of water.
In our minds, we always want to start in the dry season to tell that story, which would be harder to tell in the rainy season. This was a unique opportunity for us. Chris Packham and co-presenter Ella Al-Shamahi filmed across 6 months and that filming period enabled us to focus on 3 really very dramatic periods: the peak of dry season, the hottest time of year, and the rains.
That, coupled with our specialist cameras, really gave an intimate view of Africa's flora and fauna that is actually quite hard to do in other natural history shows. It was a conscious decision to always try and have 3 distinct episodes and to follow the lives of whatever animals came to the waterhole for as long a period as possible.
Did the animals see people and you guys at all or never? I'd think some animals would be less perturbed from seeing humans that others, or were none of them fazed by humans being present?
Anwar Mamon: They did see us on occasion but we tried to stay hidden.
Our main filming control centre was 250 metres away and that was separated away from the waterhole with a bit of a treeline and bushes so that they wouldn't necessarily see us coming and going. We controlled numbers on location so that we kept noise to a minimum.
It's actually noise that was the bigger issue rather than their sense of sight. The reserve has a large population of leopards for instance, so most of the ungulates were extremely skittish and it was noise that they were most skittish.
When most of them are drinking they have to put their head down and they're in their most vulnerable position so they don't necessarily see what's around them and they have to really rely on their sense of hearing.
Can you possibly talk a bit about the camera technology and what you were able to do that wasn't possible just a few years ago?
Anwar Mamon: This was a combination of existing technology and marrying it with new technology.
Also the other element of that was putting it into the African savannah - into the bush - and that in itself was a big undertaking because we used a specialist fixed-rig camera system. We had to put in 4km of fibre-optic cable, we had to move over 100 tons of soil.
And the specialist cameras themselves: It should be noted that these cameras were not made to be put around a waterhole in the African savannah either. We were also on-location so we had to work with local carpenters and also local people to build specialist "pyramids" actually.
These cameras are attacked by elephants or pushed over by buffalo so we made them pyramids and covered them in canvass - those are the "tents" that visitors often stay in in the bush and that animals know to avoid. We were very lucky - we had over 20 cameras rolling and I think we only lost 2 in the end. We definitely expected to lose a lot more.
What about the undertaking of the whole project maybe surprised you or made you happy?
Anwar Mamon: Well it made me happy that animals benefitted from it and also benefitted from it so quickly.
It also made me happy that we got a real insight into natural history dynamics. I think that what this was a really unique opportunity. Often when we watch natural history television we focus on the big animals, and Waterhole on BBC Earth has that as well - it has lions, it has leopards.
But the great thing about Waterhole is that nearly every species needs to come to a waterhole at some point and we were able to look at how different species use the waterhole at different times of day, how when new predators discover the waterhole it affects the dynamics of the ecosystem.
Those were the exciting things because we never knew what was going to happen. Each time we came back and each time we turned on the cameras we were not sure what we're going to see and how things were going to change.
Waterhole: Africa's Animal Oasis is on BBC Earth (DStv 184) on Sundays at 16:00 from 6 December 2020 with episodes of the series that is also available on DStv Catch Up after broadcast
