Available online
Description
In this series from the BBC and the Open University, naturalist Chris Packham reveals the natural world in a way that you've never seen it before. For him, what is really beautiful about nature, is... not the amazing animals and plants that we share the planet with - but the hidden relationships between them. These relationships may sound bizarre but without them, no life would be possible. In this episode Chris travels to the savannah of Kenya, the grasslands of Australia and the Cerrado of Brazil to witness how one of our most important ecosystems work - grasslands. The secret of how grasslands is not what they have, but what they don't have and how they cope. Grasslands are lacking in one crucial nutrient. Nitrogen is the element necessary for all proteins, the building blocks of life. You can't grow without it, yet nitrogen-poor grasslands around the world support some of the world's largest animals. Something that's only possible, thanks to the ways that these ecosystems 'manage' their nitrogen.
In this series from the BBC and the Open University, naturalist Chris Packham reveals the natural world in a way that you've never seen it before. For him, what is really beautiful about nature, is... not the amazing animals and plants that we share the planet with - but the hidden relationships between them. These relationships may sound bizarre but without them, no life would be possible. In this episode Chris travels to the savannah of Kenya, the grasslands of Australia and the Cerrado of Brazil to witness how one of our most important ecosystems work - grasslands. The secret of how grasslands is not what they have, but what they don't have and how they cope. Grasslands are lacking in one crucial nutrient. Nitrogen is the element necessary for all proteins, the building blocks of life. You can't grow without it, yet nitrogen-poor grasslands around the world support some of the world's largest animals. Something that's only possible, thanks to the ways that these ecosystems 'manage' their nitrogen.
| Series: | Secrets of our living planet |
|---|---|
| First transmission date: | 24-06-2012 |
| Original broadcast channel: | BBC2 |
| Published: | 2012 |
| Rights Statement: | |
| Restrictions on use: | |
| Duration: | 00:58:59 |
| + Show more... | |
| Producer: | Paul Bradshaw |
| Screenwriter: | Chris Packham |
| Presenter: | Chris Packham |
| Contributor: | Chris Packham |
| Publisher: | BBC Open University |
| Link to related site: | BBC Website: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01k73zy Website: http://www.open.edu/openlearn/whats-on/tv/ou-on-the-bbc-secrets-our-living-planet |
| Subject terms: | Biotic communities |
| Master spool number: | BOU50941 |
| Production number: | FKAW862P |
| Videofinder number: | 82995 |
| Available to public: | no |
