There is a place on earth ...
where it is still the morning of life,
and the great herds run free.
Life streams across a land ...
suspended in time.
The last refuge of the greatest concentration of wildlife ...
remaining on earth ―
the Serengeti plains of East Africa.
Long before human memory,
the mountains to the east emptied themselves into the skies.
A sea of ash settled across the Serengeti ...
leaving only scattered summits ...
as stone markers of a buried world.
Across four million years,
time and the elements turned ash to rich soil,
yielding vast grasslands,
today preserved as the most important animal sanctuary on earth.
In a land as fertile as it is beautiful ...
dwell millions of diverse creatures.
Yet a single species predominates,
a million and a half strong ―
wildebeests affect the lives of all around them.
Ungainly in appearance,
they have been called the clowns of the African plains,
and an animal assembled by committee from spare parts.
But wildebeests are superbly endowed ...
for a life of endless migration in search of grass and water.
Alongside, an array of other herbivores coexist,
all accommodated by the rich ...
and varied vegetation of the Serengeti,
each seeking out a different niche of the food supply.
Some may spend 2/3 of their lives grazing.
Some are fortunate enough to live in their own salad bowl.
The equation of life on the Serengeti is simple:
herbivores eat plants,
carnivores eat herbivores.
Lions hunt with both might and stealth ―
a decoy distracts ―
while others stalk.
Although the lioness has made the kill,
it is the much larger male of the pride who eats first.
The hungry wait by rank.
Lionesses and cubs are second in line.
Hyenas, jackals and vultures ...
quarrel to be next.
On the Serengeti, nothing is wasted.
Through the plenty of the wet season,
the wildebeest herds have grown strong ...
on the short grass plains of the southern Serengeti.
Now in late May, drought approaches imposing a deadly ultimatum ―
migrate or starve.
For more than 2 million animals,
it is a marathon race against thirst and hunger.
Like living streams and rivers,
the herds, accompanied by zebras and gazelles,
flow toward the north and west,
drawn by the ancient promise of water and grass.
The great migration has begun.
The epic journey takes place ...
within the two East African Nations of Tanzania and Kenya.
The wildebeest herds migrate north ...
toward the "Maasai Mara Game Reserve" in Kenya.
There, they range for months ...
until the rains resume,
and the herds return again to the southern plains.
The migration runs a deadly gauntlet of more than 500 miles.
The first weeks of the migration ...
coincide with the frenzy of the rutting season.
Bulls engage in constant battles ...
over females and territories.
In a few frantic weeks, 90% of the cows are impregnated.
Early in the migration northward,
herds move through the region ...
of ancient granite outcroppings called "kopjes".
Now, they are vantage points for waiting predators.
From a litter of four, only this lone cheetah cub has survived.
To nourish it, the mother must kill almost daily,
but she has not eaten for 2 days.
The herds have passed, but a few straggling gazelles appear.
From this distance, there is no contest.
The cheetah is the fastest land animal on earth,
achieving short bursts of speed up to 70 miles per hour.
There is neither malice nor remorse on the Serengeti.
A hunter kills to eat and to feed its own ―
nothing more.
To the migrating herds, wooded savannas now offer refuge ...
from the drought-stricken plains.
But here, the migration becomes an invasion,
for the woodlands are a permanent home to others.
Yet most of the residents go about their own daily affairs,
little disturbed by the trespassing multitude.
Unlike wildebeests, Maasai giraffes need not migrate.
They feed on a hundred species of woodland foliage,
a food supply resistant to drought.
Vervet monkeys find in trees both sustenance and safety.
Savanna baboons roam the woodlands in troops, roosting in trees by night.
Omnivores, like us, they feed on almost anything edible.
Occasionally, adult males will even feast on young antelope.
Feeding on grasses adjacent to the woodlands,
grazers come under an ever watchful eye.
Yet there is one herbivore even the lion gives wide berth.
The adult elephant is one of the few Serengeti animals without an ...
enemy in the wild.
Protective of their young, elephants form extremely close bonds.
The relationship between mother and daughter lasts up to 50 years.
Herds sometimes push on through the night despite risk of attack,
under cover of darkness.
Drawn by lightning distant thunder or the smell of rain,
they may travel 50 miles by dawn.
Now adversities multiply.
Drought has parched the plains tinder dry.
Grass fires sweep the Serengeti.
Scoured by fire and wind,
the vegetation will regenerate in the rains to come,
but for the moment, herds seeking sustenance find only dust.
Now the enemies are thirst hunger exhaustion ...
and, as ever, predators.
So powerful is the urge to migrate,
the herd will push on even when confronted by a lion ...
crouched in open ambush.
The hunter has only to pick the moment.
In this endless contest,
nothing is guaranteed.
In daytime, only one lion hunt in five succeeds.
Finally, after months of migration,
the forward ranks ...
surge into the bounty that has drawn them northward ―
the rich pastures of the Maasai Mara in Kenya.
Once more, their instincts have brought them to a place of plenty.
Here, they will range and graze for months ...
until the life-giving rains return on the winds of October.
To the east, close by the Serengeti,
there is a place of even greater abundance.
One of the natural wonders of the world.
It is a microcosm of the Serengeti.
Ngorongoro crater is a huge volcanic caldera,
encompassing 100 square miles,
a remnant of the great eruptions that created the Serengeti plains.
From cloud forests along the rim to the crater floor 2,000 feet below,
a self-contained ecosystem provides ...
abundant forage and plentiful water.
Where there is water, there is life.
An object of amusement to some,
the hippopotamus can cut a crocodile or a human in half with a single bite.
Prompting an axiom of the Serengeti:
"Never come between a hippo and its territorial waters."
Tens of thousands of animals dwell here,
others come in migrations of the sky:
Flamingos from Namibia.
Storks from as far as Europe and Asia.
Like privileged cousins of the migrating herds outside,
wildebeests and zebras within the crater walls ...
need only wander from pasture to pasture.
Dangers abound here as elsewhere.
Zebras cluster together in a tangle of stripes,
confusing to predators.
The horses of Africa appear placid,
but they have never been domesticated.
The black rhinoceros, for all its formidable presence ...
and frequent marking of territory is a vulnerable giant,
poached almost to extinction for the value of its horn.
Ngorongoro crater is one of the few protected refuges ...
where the black rhino endures.
For a baboon troop much of the day passes ...
attending to young, grooming ...
and socializing.
Though the job of protecting ...
the lion pride and its territory belongs to the males,
the work of hunting and raising young falls to the females.
Play helps prepare the young for the violent encounters to come.
The vaunted power of lions is matched by a prodigious capacity for rest.
Typically 20 hours a day is spent in regal slumber.
When lions mate, however,
they do so on average ...
every 25 minutes, day and night ...
without feeding ...
for three or four days.
It has been estimated that 3,000 mating occur ...
for every cub that survives its first year.
These lands are also the cradle of humanity.
Gashed into the eastern Serengeti ...
Plains near Ngorongoro is Olduvai-gorge, one of the most ...
famous archaeological sites of earth.
It bears within its layered walls ...
a human fossil record spanning ...
almost two million years.
Today, the proud Maasai people dwell here.
They too, follow a nomadic existence ...
along the edges of the Serengeti.
Ever seeking good grazing ...
for their cattle herds.
The Maasai believe that heaven gave them,
and no other people, all the cattle on earth.
And from their treasured cattle,
they still draw a staple ...
of the Maasai warrior diet:
A mixture of milk and blood.
The age of predators still encompasses the world of the Maasai.
From this and nearby villages,
leopards have taken three infants within the year.
Once the most formidable warriors ...
in east Africa,
the Maasai still defend their cattle ...
and families with spears.
Some are born on the Serengeti,
some seek it out.
Today a growing human migration ...
from the outside world can witness ...
a spectacle of wildness ...
long vanished elsewhere.
Tanzania and Kenya have preserved ...
vast areas as national parks ...
and game reserves, proclaiming them ...
a world heritage of all mankind.
The support from tourism ...
is now indispensable to the survival ...
of this heritage, linking the ...
destiny of the Serengeti ...
with the visitors who pass in awe.
The Serengeti they behold is changing,
threatened by population growth and poaching,
but vigorously protected as well.
Elephant herds that once fled ...
poachers are returning,
now protected by an ivory moratorium.
Nourished again by the Serengeti,
and encouraged by greater safety,
The herds are multiplying rapidly.
On the Maasai Mara,
the storms of October approach.
And with the return of the rains,
the herds will resume ...
the great migration ...
toward their ancestral calving ...
grounds in the south.
But ahead they face their greatest peril.
To reach the south,
the herd must cross the Mara river ...
now swollen by the rains.
In these waters,
it is still the age of dinosaurs,
and a crocodile reigns supreme.
Many that survive the crocodiles,
fall prey to the river itself.
Some drown. Some are trampled.
some are too exhausted ...
to save themselves.
Through the year and the course ...
of the great migration,
a quarter of a million wildebeests ...
will have died.
But the migration moves on ...
through the long journey south,
returning finally to the short grass plains ...
where the miracle of the Serengeti unfolds.
The mass breeding earlier in the year ...
culminates in mass birth.
In the brief span of a few weeks,
early in the wet season,
almost half a million wildebeest ...
calves are born,
a strategy that overwhelms predators ...
and ensures the survival ...
of a new generation.
To survive in the midst of predators,
newborn calves must be able to ...
stand within minutes of birth.
Those unable to stand,
must be abandoned.
Once more on the plains ...
of the Serengeti,
life is more powerful than death.
And there remains a place on Earth ...
where it is still the morning of life ...
and the great herds still run free.