Russia- a vast secret once inaccessible to outsiders,
now dazzling the world with its untamed treasures.
In the west, on a landscape pocked by swamps and bisected by mountains,
nature's drama plays out in endless variation...
where Woods shelter half tonne leviathans...
And tiny adventurers...
while backwaters conceal the bizarre.
All within Russia's Primeval Valleys- the Urals.
Russia's seventeen million square kilometres form a country so complex
it almost defies description.
In this immensity, one feature stands out...
2 and a half thousand kilometres of mountains and forests
jutting out of the wilderness... The Urals.
Deep forests form the heart and soul of the Urals.
Broadleaf and pine trees, Asian and European species
patiently watch the seasons roll by.
Some trees are two-hundred years old.
Miraculously sheltered from the intrusion of loggers,
parts of the forest have regenerated themselves for thousands of years.
Even in the dead of winter, life trudges forward.
Eurasian elks, the largest of the deer family,
make seasonal journeys to find more favourable conditions.
Unlike other deer, these elk are normally solitary,
and the stress of meeting can lead to fighting.
They can travel up to three-hundred kilometres on their search for food.
The cold weather fuels their appetite.
They'll eat around twenty kilos of woody material a day.
The quest for food keeps them on the move... sometimes into harm's way...
A hungrybrown bear, woken from hibernation.
A bear could easily catch and kill an elk.
But not in deep snow... and not today.
Its fumbling footsteps alert the group.
It's a stiff start after months of hibernation.
Until the snow goes, it's hard times for the bear.
Pristine pines, spruce and broadleaf trees create this quiet and mysterious forest
four times the size of Denmark.
While many residents hide in the shadows, others come out to play.
As spring approaches, love is in the air...
Half metre tall black grouse start looking for mates...
Males woo the ladies with a bubbling sound called rookooing.
This early bird has the display arena, and a female, to himself...
Almost...
His love song attracts the unwanted attention of a wolverine.
It breaks the amorous mood.
They'll continue their courtship elsewhere.
The wolverine, the largest of the weasel family looks like it's throwing a tantrum...
But this larking about, actually scent marks its territory.
They remain active throughout Winter.
This is a warning for others to stay away.
In April, as the spring melt begins, streams cut fresh paths through the forests.
The waters feed the Urals' hundreds of rivers.
The weather may be improving, but the thaw creates an obstacle for the travelling elk.
Their journey takes them across swollen, fast-flowing rivers.
Over the course of ten days, around two hundred will take the plunge.
Despite weighing as much as a small car, they are strong swimmers.
But swift, rising water drags many to their death each year.
By the time a straggler reaches the river, the treacherous current threatens to sweep it far off course.
Safety at last...
Despite the icy water, the elk keeps warm,
thanks to a fine wool undercoat covered by twenty-five centimetre long hair.
With spring lasting only two months,
the Urals' residents make the most of it.
As the sun heats the rocks, it ignites the passion of spotted red bugs.
The orgiastic pairs join end to end for up to twenty-four hours, even foregoing food.
Eventually females signal the end with a rocking motion.
The gnarled ancient forest is swampy to begin with,
and the big melt only makes things messier.
As the snow retreats, scavengers advance...
to feed on winter's victims.
This wolf might have travelled several kilometres, following its nose in search of a meal...
but a bigger brown bear gets there first.
The bear claims ownership of a moose carcass it cached several days ago.
Brown bears will often stash large remains under earth for safe-keeping
until the next meal.
If he wants any share of the meat, the wolf must be patient.
But an adult bear can consume up to forty kilos a day and won't be leaving in a hurry.
The wolf, realizing a meal isn't coming, retreats in search of better options...
guided by a sharp nose and empty belly.
Down in the Ural valleys dampness floats like a phantom
over the saturated ground.
It chokes out the sunlight, concealing the largest swamps on earth.
As trees die here, their partially decomposed corpses
add to peat bogs up to seven meters deep.
And despite the poor soil, low temperature and grim conditions,
these forests strangely manage to thrive.
Deeper in the wetlands, things grow stranger still...
Making its film debut, the unique Russian Desman is ready for its close-up.
Semi-aquatic and social- up to eight desmans
may share a riverside burrow with an underwater entrance.
Scent glands at the base of the tail gives it a musky, unappetizing smell
that discourages predators.
Just like their terrestrial mole relatives, desmans are almost blind...
They compensate with their flexible snout and long whiskers, hunting for food along the muddy riverbed.
Oversized incisors crush snail shells with ease.
Underwater, webbed feet and a flattened muscular tail
propel them like little torpedoes in search of fish and crustaceans.
They can hold their breath for about five minutes.
But these hunters were themselves hunted for fur and musk,
leaving fewer than fifteen hundred surviving along the Ural river.
In contrast, brown bears do well here.
Russia has the world's largest population- around 100,000.
Normally solitary, when bears meet they use careful body postures
to signal their level of discomfort or aggression.
This male has been following the female, hoping to mate.
He must approach with caution. If she's not in the mood,
she might use her eight centimetre long claws to let him know.
But she's receptive-
he may follow her for days or weeks, fending off advances from others.
The females have an amazing adaptation-
they can delay pregnancy for five months until the winter returns.
This ensures she will give birth in the safety of the hibernation den.
But it's a rough affair and she decides enough is enough.
The mating game has a more frenzied set of rules in the wet forest interior.
From March, usually dull coloured Male Moor frogs
turn an enticing shade of blue to impress females...
although they're not that choosy.
Mosquitoes love them regardless of colour.
In their passion, males jump anything with a heartbeat...
even mis-matched toads.
Thankfully enough get it right and spawn fills the water.
Around these pools of life, the Urals extend like a long finger,
in places 145 kilometres wide.
In the North west, Europe's largest primeval forest expands to the distant mountains.
One hill is known as Manpupuner- the Little Mountain of the Gods.
Weather-beaten limestone columns lining the ridge rise over forty metres high.
Local legend calls them the seven strong men.
The story tells of a beautiful girl coveted by an evil man
who pursues her and her seven brothers into the mountains.
In desperation she prays for a miracle,
and they are all turned to stone.
Not everyone's idea of a happy ending.
As night falls over the seven brothers,
a Ural owl comes out to hunt down below...
and this enchanted forest brings a curse upon a hapless frog.
Ural Owls prefer voles, but with two chicks to feed,
they can't afford to be finicky.
The young family trusts the male owl to bring home whatever he can find.
The morning sun doesn't catch the owls napping.
At around four weeks, the owlets grow eager to explore the world...
All in spite of the fact they can't fly yet.
They master the slow plummet...
and the graceful hop...
But the wing-assisted tree climb still needs some work.
While the smaller sibling stays safe in the nest hole,
the adventurer searches for a new feeding post.
As long as the chicks stay out of trouble, the parent pays little attention to their antics.
And in twelve more weeks they'll be on their own.
Nearby, another parent takes a more paws-on approach to raising youngsters.
A young mother, who had her litter in the winter,
keeps her two cubs very close.
They'll suckle for up to two and a half years and stay under her wing for three.
Playtime ends when the mother catches the scent of another bear.
Taking no chances she and the cubs move on.
With six-hundred kilo males prowling the forest for mates,
she's right to be wary...
they will sometimes kill young bears to bring mothers back into oestrus.
An older, more experienced female also spends the day here;
her three cubs trailing behind...
Three is a typical litter size, with four usually the maximum.
The cubs show concern as another bear comes close,
but the mother barely flinches-
it's a male, but she has the size advantage...
The cubs can get on with their antics.
But threats are never far off, and when mother smells another male nearby,
she and the cubs practice their tree-climbing drill.
While the male busily rubs his scent on branches he passes,
she and the cubs slip undetected into the woods.
The animals tell only half the Urals' story...
they live in a place like no other.
The North holds some of the most intact conifer forests in Western Eurasia
and the south has a wealth of biodiversity.
These primeval forests, their trees left to rise and fall at nature's own pace,
have attained great age.
While the untouched woodlands thrive, some Northern Urals residents struggle.
On hidden riverbanks, endangered European mink make their last stand.
Once widespread across Europe,
their range has shrunk more than eighty percent since the mid nineteenth century.
This is one of their last refuges.
This female mated about eight weeks ago,
well-timed for giving birth during days of plenty.
Now, she pads her burrow preparing for her litter.
Outside, the Urals' fickle weather takes a turn for the worse.
It defies prediction.
Squall winds can blow through at ninety kilometres per hour. Snow can follow a heat wave.
Two meters of rain can flash flood down the mountainsides.
The Ural owl chicks are about to face their first weather test...
Though the chicks are mainly on their own now,
their parents stay nearby and still provide food.
A long rabbit's foot doesn't seem like a lucky meal choice for a small chick...
But the little bird manages just fine.
The owl's digestive system will dissolve the meat, and the bone will come back up later.
When rain rolls in, it doesn't dampen the bears' activity.
An outer coat of coarse hair repels water.
Safe inside her den, the mink mother licks a blind and naked newborn clean...
and bites through the umbilical cord.
She's already delivered one, now tucked safely in her fur.
But no time to rest...
rapid breathing suggests more babies to come.
Outside, the storm ends as quickly as it began.
The soaked owl chicks preen their soggy down to speed drying.
During the course of the storm, the exhausted mink mother has had five babies.
For one of Europe's most endangered small mammals, it's a job well done.
But she doesn't get a break.
The sound of a squirrel outside alarms her.
As she goes to investigate, she reveals her thumb-sized brood.
She can't leave them alone for long... Their lives depend on her warmth.
She will suckle them for the next ten weeks.
Mink were hunted extensively in the Soviet Union for their precious fur.
Habitat loss and competition with the more adaptable and aggressive American mink
has hastened their decline.
Outside the safety of her den,
damselflies glint in the sun.
The damp forest conditions and rich plant diversity attract
hundreds of different insect species.
The Urals have no shortage of wildlife friendly habitat.
Rivers and streams crisscross the great forests
as they flow into Europe and Asia.
The Ural river itself stretches nearly two and a half thousand kilometres
and drains an area twice the size of Cuba.
Here, even burrowing animals take to the water...
The desman's better known relative, the mole, is actually an adept swimmer.
With the Urals' precious animals, and diverse forested valleys,
the World Wildlife Fund declared it one of the most important regions for conservation.
In the North, brown bears roam through the cotton grass.
They share the territory with wild forest reindeer-
given half a chance the bears would have them on their menu.
The reindeer don't make long migrations like their relatives; instead they stay in the forests throughout the year.
They prefer breezy areas to keep the biting bugs away.
With up to twenty deer in a herd, they have plenty of eyes to spot trouble.
In the quiet of the forest interior all is peaceful,
just two bears exhibiting some unusual behaviour...
The size difference suggests a male and female...
males can be two and a half metres long and around ten percent larger than females.
Usually, the mating season is a rough and ready affair filled with biting and chasing,
but these bears are sharing tender moments of intimacy.
If the male is able to fend off other admirers, these two may stay together for weeks.
While some Urals residents focus on mating, others fixate on meals.
Like bears, Wolverines stash their food,
sometimes hiding it for several months.
This one seems shocked to find its deer carcass exposed and devoured.
Even Siberian Jays have been helping themselves.
The carcass may be old, but all is not lost.
Wolverines have immensely strong jaws,
and their cast iron stomachs can extract nutrients from almost anything.
They can eat antlers, fur and even bones.
The jay will enjoy the leftovers, if there are any.
On the river bank, the mink mother is after something a little fresher.
These adept underwater hunters chase frogs,
snails, fish and insects.
A female's home range may span five kilometers.
But she won't go that far-
her young, now old enough for more than just milk, wait back at the den...
two haven't made it, only three survive.
She must work harder for her remaining kits.
A good bite subdues a common roach,
so it's set aside while she hunts for more.
With a heart rate of three-hundred beats per minute, minks can scramble at a frantic pace.
She can't see well underwater, so she relies on a sensitive nose and whiskers to detect prey.
But coming up empty, she returns to the roach and heads home.
With a water resistant coat she is dry in no time.
A quick deposit and it's off for more...
This time she's after something for herself.
Late summer casts a warm glow over the rolling mountains to the south of the vast Ural forests...
a sea of conifers, oaks, maple, birch and linden trees.
Here the Belaya river crosses the Shulgan-Tash reserve.
Brothers Achtyam and Anis have been rangers here since the reserve was founded in 1986.
They rely heavily on their horses for covering this remote and rugged terrain.
225 square kilometres of waterways and hills make for tough going.
And they need to steer clear of some of the locals... who can be unpredictable.
This bear's more itchy than angry,
but since it weighs up to six-hundred kilos and can charge at fifty kilometres per hour,
it's wise to keep a distance.
As the brothers head up into the hills, they reveal the reason for their important mission:
rare Burzyan bees.
The rangers monitor and cultivate around forty hives in the area...
Which makes them very popular among the honey-loving bears.
Drips at the base of the tree make the treat all the more tantalizing.
But adult bears are too heavy to climb trees.
This one leaves hungry and frustrated...
not the sort of bear you'd want to run into.
The brothers hide the hives in isolated spots, kilometres apart.
The rangers come from a long line of bee-keeping families, going back nearly one thousand years.
The Burzyan honeybees, found only in this region,
can survive extreme cold, have a naturally high resistance to disease,
and skilfully gather nectar from linden trees,
which blossom here for just three weeks in July.
Maintaining the huge man-made hives is both a worthy and a lucrative job.
But competition is fierce...
This time a mother with young.
Brown bear cubs are light and can easily scramble up a tree.
The mother would do well to move, with a two hundred kilo hive dangling overhead.
What the little one lacks in experience, he makes up for in enthusiasm.
But he probably shouldn't sit on a log full of hot-tempered bees.
Eventually, the cub gets what he came for.
The men take a more methodical approach to bee-keeping.
Smoke masks the bees' alarm pheromones so they're less prone to stinging.
The bears enjoy no such luxury.
They opt for the smash-and-grab: break in, eat quickly and get away.
Their thick fur helps prevent stings,
but poking their exposed faces into the hive is asking for trouble.
Honey is a great source of calories for the bears which need to pile on weight before the winter...
it's worth a few stings.
Each hive should yield up to thirty kilos of honey.
With the price in Moscow of 210 Euros per kilo,
it's sweet source of income.
The brothers leave enough honey for the bees to survive winter.
At the destroyed hive, a large male takes up the second sitting.
Dagger-long claws and a jaw strong enough to crush a bowling ball
make light work of the wood.
But there isn't much here except angry bees.
It leaves one upset bear... and an empty hive.
At the beginning of September, Autumn arrives.
The changing light alerts the animals that even colder days are ahead
and food will become scarce.
Now's the time to stock up.
As the weather cools, magpies and jays fight
over seeds dropped from the bushes.
They have just two months to gather what they need before the brutal winter returns.
As maple leaves turn, it's time for reindeer
to hunt out berries as a last sugarfix before the snows arrive.
The males now sport impressive antlers for the Autumn rut...
when they'll fight each other for the females.
They compete with bears for ripe fruit- but never face to face.
Smelling one on the wind, the reindeer retreat further up the valley.
In spite of their name, some brown bears can be almost white...
or in this case jet black.
Before hibernating they must gain around seventy kilos of fat.
Berries provide an energy boost.
When food is plentiful, these usually solitary bears will tolerate each other.
Despite their voracious appetites, bears do their part for forest conservation...
spreading undigested berry seeds and fertilizer through the forest.
Not exactly elegant- but effective.
Elsewhere in the Urals, as far from the bears as possible,
this group of male elk makes a final attempt to attract mates as Autumn ends.
Bulls' antlers re-grow every year.
In just five months they can span two metres and weigh up to thirty-five kilos-
the fastest growing bone on the planet.
Though they're in competition, they keep a respectful distance rather than waste energy locking antlers.
When winter arrives in the Urals, it comes with a vengeance.
The settling snow outlines a frozen landscape haunted by an eerie sound.
A sudden drop in temperature causes tree bark to burst and split,
filling the forest with a strange percussion.
The elk pass like silent shadows
through the darkened woods on their return migration.
They'll brave the cold... and the predators.
With the big chill, the need for food increases.
Wolves can sniff out prey from a distance of two kilometres
and they can eat about four kilos of meat daily.
But the elk are on to them, putting their own keen noses to use.
Standing over two meters tall, they move gracefully across the deep snow.
Although wolves have the stamina and determination to track prey over great distances,
they simply can't keep up.
Fortunately, they can go several days without eating.
During the course of winter the incredible Ural forests and valleys
become buried in drifts up to three metres deep.
The trees will endure this freeze from November until April.
They have stood for millennia,
bearing the cycles of the seasons, and sheltering the hidden residents.
This ancient wilderness is one of Russia's most bewitching secrets.
Russia's Primeval Valleys... the Urals.