- (Narrator): At the southern
edge of the Pantanal,
sightings of this small wild cat
have hit a new high.
The ocelot is making
a major comeback.
Howler monkeys, toucans, and
deer all call this place home.
Yet none of them is prey
for this stealthy hunter.
(grunting)
So scientists struggle to
understand the ocelot's success.
The Pantanal is
a tropical wetland
where all life is defined
by the seasons.
From October to March
it's the rainy season.
By April, 80%
of the land disappears
under more than
three feet of water.
Come the dry season,
the water recedes.
Late September.
It hasn't rained
for months.
The landscape is parched
and the food is scarce
for the animals
that live here.
Yet, the dramatic ebb and flow
of the seasons help wildlife.
It's prevented the development
of large-scale industrial
agriculture.
The Pantanal is ten-times larger
than the Everglades
and spans three countries,
mostly in Brazil.
It's a pristine place where
wildlife still rules.
But here, at its southern edge,
a relatively small farm has
carved a slice
out of the wetlands and turned
it into a rice plantation.
Most environmentalists don't
believe that conservation
and agriculture
are a good mix.
But ecologist Henrique Concone
noticed the local wildlife seems
to have embraced the change.
- What is a very interesting
thing about the irrigation
rice process here
is that most of this water
that is irrigating the rice
on the ranch is exactly
on the dry season.
So you have a very
unique situation where,
during the dry season,
most of the Pantanal is dry,
but here you can see
some portion of land
with a lot of water, which
will attract a lot of wildlife.
- (Narrator): Henrique
is working on a Ph.D.
And his focus is the ocelot.
Also known as the dwarf leopard.
It's South America's
fiercest small cat.
Like all wild cat species,
ocelot populations are declining
due to habitat loss.
But on this farm, the species
seems to be thriving.
(Enrique): In Brazil there are
nine species of wild cats,
of those nine species,
seven are considered small cats.
Among those seven species
of small cats,
the ocelot is the largest one.
They can attain a little bit
more than one meter in length.
From tip of the nose,
tip of the tail.
And big males will
weigh up to 15 kilos.
It's a cat that's heavily
spotted with stripes
also on the side,
so for many it's considered one
of the most beautiful cats
in the world.
- (Narrator): The best time to
spot an ocelot is at night,
when the small cats use
the cover of darkness to hunt.
Two years ago,
on a similar nocturnal survey,
Henrique nicknamed
the area Cat Country.
- (Narrator): Finding out why
this was an ocelot hotspot
is the focus of
Henrique's doctoral research.
It seemed counter intuitive
but could manmade landscapes,
if done well,
actually help wildlife?
His goal is
to understand if,
and how humans and wildlife
can co-exist.
A family of capybaras is caught
in the headlights.
Traffic is unusual
in these parts!
They're all safely across
the road and disappear
into the darkness.
Just down the road,
the spotlight reveals
a female maned wolf and
her three playful pups.
At about three feet tall,
the mother looks like
a fox on stilts,
but they are neither
foxes nor wolves.
They're the tallest
wild canid in the world,
a family that includes
domestic dogs.
Their hunting grounds are
Brazil's grasslands,
known as the cerrado, where
their long legs give them
a distinct edge.
The team continues into
the heart of Cat Country.
And it's not long before they
find what they're looking for.
It's a young female.
And she does not care much
for the paparazzi
that have invaded
her territory.
The white fur around her eyes
reflects light into her pupils,
and enhances
her powerful night vision.
She quietly withdraws
into the bush.
Henrique goes on these
night-spotting missions
once a week.
The more sightings,
the more data he can use
to prove his theory.
Deeper in the forest,
the glare of the spotlight
catches another ocelot.
A male this time.
Ocelots mark their territory
by rubbing against
trees and bushes.
In this region, their home range
is up to three square miles.
Females have
smaller territories
and he likely has
several living in his.
He patrols his entire
home range every few days,
in search of prey.
Ocelots don't stalk their prey.
They either patiently wait
and ambush whatever happens
to pass by.
Or they follow
scent trails.
This male seems
to be onto something.
He doesn't know it
but he's being observed
by another male.
This one has been lucky
and carries the bloody traces
of a fresh kill on his fur.
A yellow anaconda.
The hungry cat ripped off
the snake's head
to avoid a deadly embrace.
And he's not about to let
another cat claim his prize.
Ocelot males, like females,
are fiercely territorial.
The anaconda is
a prize worth defending.
It will feed a hungry cat
for several days.
The intruder moves in.
(grunting)
(grunting)
(grunting)
The message is loud and clear,
and the intruder moves on.
The successful hunter drags his
unwieldy dinner into the forest
to dine in peace.
The night is still young
for the nocturnal ocelots.
But for Henrique,
it's time for bed.
Not a record-breaking night
for the most ocelot sightings,
but some amazing behavior!
Dawn returns
to Cat Country.
The night crowd retreats.
And the forest
awakens to the calls
of its diurnal inhabitants.
(forest sounds)
The loudest of them all
is the howler monkey.
(howler monkey calls)
They're the loudest land animals
in the Western Hemisphere.
Their booming calls
can be heard three miles away.
Both sexes call.
(howler monkey calls)
But today it's the dominant male
that notifies other groups
of their position.
A mother and her infant start
their day dining on flowers.
They're called
black howler monkeys
even though they're all
born a golden brown.
Only the males turn black
when they mature.
This young juvenile will be
covered in black fur
by the time he's
two and a half years old.
Unlike most
South American monkeys,
both male and female howler
monkeys have color vision.
So if it's not the scent
of these Ipe flowers,
it may be their
bright pink color
that attracts
these primates.
One thing's for sure,
it's quite a treat.
One that only happens in
the middle of the dry season.
Right after it drops its leaves,
the Ipe tree produces large
clusters of beautiful flowers.
The flowers are nutritious
and much sought after.
Howlers have a prehensile tail
that has no fur underneath.
It makes a great
fifth limb.
The youngster strikes out
on his own.
He soon finds out plucking
flowers is not as easy
as it looks
even with the help
of his tail.
Especially at the end
of the flowering season,
when the bright pink prize
is hard to reach.
A few branches away,
a southern crested caracara
eyes the young howler
with interest.
Luckily for the young howler
this raptor is a scavenger.
The rest of the troop is always
on the lookout for predators
especially for raptors.
The opportunistic caracara
has spotted an easier target.
On a nearby tree, a savanna hawk
enjoys the catch of the day.
The caracara tries to force
the hawk to drop its food.
These winged bullies
are fiercely territorial.
And aren't afraid to tell
other birds to take a hike.
Especially at this time of year,
when farm workers prepare the
fields for new rice crops.
As the plow churns up the soil,
it unearths worms, lizards
and insects, living underground.
Lined up at the banquet table,
the steely-eyed
raptors stand watch,
ready to sweep
in for a quick meal.
The seasonal flooding
in the Pantanal means
that the land isn't
very productive.
That and the scarcity of roads
keep the human population low.
Farms are large
and widely dispersed.
On this farm, some of
the land has been set aside
as an official
natural preserve.
And that's the part
Henrique calls "Cat Country".
- (Narrator): Henrique sets the
camera traps up at many
different locations.
- (Narrator): The snapshots he
collects will help him establish
ocelot density
in the area.
- (Narrator): Henrique's
research could provide a glimpse
of what can be done to help
wildlife in farmed areas.
- (Narrator): The GPS data will
help Henrique determine the
ocelots' home range,
how long and how far they travel
and, more importantly,
how they use the native forest
compared to the rice fields.
For now, he's still busy
collecting hard evidence.
- (Narrator): Ocelots have
to eat about two pounds
of food a day.
Usually only fifty per cent of
an ocelot's diet is rodents.
- (Henrique): Ocelots,
they have a very broad diet,
they can prey upon birds,
lizards, snakes
and small and
medium-sized mammals.
I've been able to check that
they can prey upon also
brocket deer
and rheas, but most
of their diet,
through the analysis of scat
we have found that
up to eighty percent or more
of their diet is composed
by small rodents.
- (Narrator): The ocelots here
are eating 30% more
small rodents in their diet.
That's a big difference.
It's because they live near
a rice plantation.
That's what
Pedro Estrela suspects.
He's a rodent expert.
- (Pedro): One of the first
things we want to study
is the diversity of rodents
in agricultural systems,
or agro-ecosystems.
The diversity can be measured
by the number of species
that are found, but also
by their abundance,
which means the number of
individuals of each species
that are found, so these can be
a good measure of how
an agricultural ecosystem has
impacted a natural ecosystem.
- (Narrator): Even native
species of rodents
have a downside. They make
great hosts for parasites.
And that's why Fabiana Lopes
Rocha is interested
in the project.
She's a parasitology expert.
- (Fabiana): Parasites,
they are part of the ecosystem,
they act as a force of
population regulation.
The problem is when
we alter the environment,
so we change the relationships
between parasites
and their hosts, and this can
lead to an increase
of the prevalence of some
diseases and cause outbreaks.
- (Narrator): For ocelots, one
of the most dangerous parasites
is Trypanosoma cruzi which in
humans causes chagas disease.
If an ocelot eats a rodent
that carries this parasite,
it gets infected.
- (Fabiana): Trypanosoma cruzi
cause heart failure,
which can affect
the life expectancy
and also capacity of locomotion
and capacity of predation,
which can be a huge problem
for a predator.
- (Narrator): As night falls
upon Cat Country...
...swarms of mosquitoes
take to the dark skies.
It's time for Pedro and Fabiana
to set out their traps.
They use peanut butter as bait.
Fabiana notes the trap
locations with a GPS.
- (Narrator): They'll be back in
the morning to check out
the traps.
What they find may shed
new light on what makes
this place Cat Country.
- (Narrator): Back on the road,
Henrique looks for more clues.
A crescent moon barely
lights up the night sky.
A perfect night for ocelots to
hunt and for ocelot sightings.
But it's a giant anteater
that Henrique sees first.
These peaceful and exotic
looking creatures
have the lowest body
temperature of any mammal,
about 91 degrees Fahrenheit.
They're active mostly
at dawn or dusk.
And feast on insects.
Next, a marsh deer steps
into the spotlight.
They graze on aquatic plants.
But they'll also browse
the shrubbery.
It's a pair of crab eating
foxes that really catches
Henrique's attention.
Foxes and ocelots compete for
some of the same kinds of prey.
They do eat a lot of crabs,
as their name suggests,
but this one has a rodent
that it probably caught
in the rice paddies.
A little further into the bush,
a female ocelot is on the prowl.
She's spotted
something off the ground.
It could be a bird nest
with some tasty eggs
or chicks inside.
No luck this time.
It's a termite nest!
It's the start
of the mating season.
A crucial time
for ocelots.
Females only have one or two
kittens every other year.
This one leaves a message.
Her pungent urine warns
other females to stay away.
And lets males know
she's ready to mate.
Another female is lactating
and has left her kittens
in a safe place
while she hunts.
She'll nurse them
for only six weeks,
but will continue to provide
them with food for a few months
before teaching them to hunt.
For Henrique, all this female
activity is a good omen,
a sign that a new generation
of ocelots
will soon make
its home in Cat Country.
As the sun rises
over the Pantanal,
the howler monkeys once again
gather for breakfast.
By now, there are no more
flowers on the trees.
So they settle for
the green leaves.
Although howler monkeys are
one of the largest monkeys
in the Americas,
they mostly subsist on leaves.
Older leaves are not
that nutritious
so they have to spend
most of the day foraging.
In another tree,
a toucan is considering
a breakfast of fruits.
There are 20 species
of toucans in Brazil
and this toco toucan is
the largest of them all.
The bill can sometimes grow
as long as the bird's body.
And although it looks massive,
the bill is hollow and light.
It isn't just beautiful,
it's also works as
an adjustable thermal
radiator that a toucan can use
to warm and cool itself.
Although these toucans spend
a lot of time in trees,
they are not very good
at flying.
They travel among trees
by hopping.
When they do take flight, they
flap their wings vigorously,
then glide,
traveling only short distances.
This toucan spots a jenipapo
tree, full of ripe fruits.
The beak does all the work.
Its sharp saw-like edges tear
the fruit's shell right off
and expose the juicy flesh.
On the ground,
the rice fields undergo
a dramatic transformation.
Now that the soil has been
tilled, and the seeds sown,
water from the nearby
Miranda River begins to flow.
Channeled by a series
of man-made dikes
into the parched fields.
Turning an arid plain...
...into a shimmering wetland.
The water attracts
a flock of waders.
The bare-faced ibises are
eager to feast on the insects,
worms and other small
invertebrates forced out
of the ground by the water.
But they dine
at a leisurely pace.
It's a gregarious species,
unlike its cousin
the plumbeous ibis,
which prefers the bare-faced's
company to its own kind.
Elegant black-necked stilts
and lesser yellow legs
delicately probe the mud
for smaller prey.
A snail kite snatches-up
an apple snail shell...
...but soon drops it.
Someone else has already
eaten the snail!
Caracara are here too.
Always first in line
for a free meal.
Even a jabiru, one of
the world's largest birds,
has joined the feeding waders.
The manufactured landscape
of the rice fields
doesn't deter
the wildlife here.
This yellow anaconda
takes advantage of
the irrigation channels.
It prefers to be in water so the
farm dikes are like highways.
This cold-blooded predator is
almost fifteen feet
of pure muscle.
It's built to crush
the life out
of its victims
and swallow them whole.
Its tongue picks up microscopic
particles from the air
to track its next meal.
Although it's large, it has
an appetite for small rodents.
A fieldworker breaks down
levees to create
new pathways for the water.
A process that has changed
little over centuries.
On this farm, they average more
than 6000 pounds of rice
per acre.
To achieve this,
they stagger the crops.
Henrique and his colleagues
use this to their advantage.
They've set their rodent traps
in different kinds of habitats
found in and near
the farm fields.
Each location will give them
a sample
of the rodent population
living there.
They'll be able to correlate
the species
they find with the different
stages of rice production.
There's not much
growing here yet.
Just young small sprouts
a couple of weeks old.
- (Narrator): All the traps
here are empty.
- (Narrator): Unless you count
the ants. They seem very
fond of peanut butter!
- (Narrator): This confirms
Pedro's hunch.
- (Narrator): The next location
is a rice field that's
more mature.
Pedro and Fabiana have set the
traps at the edge of the field,
where the bush is thicker
and offers more shelter.
- (Narrator):
It's hard to identify
the exact rodent species at the
bottom of a trap.
- (Narrator): It's a species
of marsh rat.
It makes a lot of sense
to find it here.
- (Narrator): The good news
keeps coming.
- (Narrator): This healthy
specimen is a Brazilian
guinea pig.
It looks like a domestic guinea
pig and it might even be
the same species
as its wild ancestor.
Out of the 39 traps
set in this mature field,
they capture six different
rodents, a 15% success rate,
which in the world of field
science is a good day.
Best part is out
of the six rodents captured,
Pedro and Fabiana could
identify four of the species.
The other two will take
a bit longer.
- (Pedro): We can't draw any
conclusions at the present time,
but we can say that we have had
higher capture than we expected,
especially in terms of
diversity more than number
with a high capture success.
- (Narrator): The biggest
surprise comes when
the team moves across the road
to check on the traps
set in the natural habitat,
a forest.
- (Narrator): But then,
an interesting discovery.
- (Narrator): Ocelots' diets
are varied
but, except for the occasional
anaconda, brocket deer or rhea,
they usually hunt animals
that are about their size,
or smaller.
An opossum like this one
in the trap would make
a fine meal for an ocelot!
- (Pedro): We collected
one species of marsupial
of the genus Philander, two
females, the two were pregnant,
so we released them back
into nature.
- (Narrator): Of the 30 traps
laid in the native forest
of the Pantanal, Pedro only
captured two marsupials
and no rodents. It's unusual
not to find any native rodents.
Especially when compared
to the abundance of rodents
trapped closer
to the rice plantation.
Compared to the natural forest,
the habitat closer
to the rice fields
seems to have far more
for an ocelot to eat!
The forest trail cameras took
photos of a magnificent
female jaguar
but no ocelots this time!
Even when there are
"lots" of ocelots
they can still be elusive.
But on the other side
of the road,
near a bridge that leads
to the rice fields,
Henrique has better results.
It looks like it was a busy
night for this mother ocelot.
The camera shows her first
taking a rodent to her kitten.
Next she moves her kitten,
quite a large juvenile about two
months old, to a new location.
Then she goes back hunting
for more food.
It seems ocelots are quite
at home - and well fed -
in the transitional habitat
between the cultivated land
and the natural forest.
As the tropical midday sun
heats up the rice fields,
an ocelot finds shelter
in the native forest
fringing the rice paddy.
From its perch,
it surveys its kingdom.
A manmade plantation.
Ocelots are considered to be a
vulnerable and elusive species
that prefers the dense cover
of forests to open areas.
It's early days but Henrique's
findings seem to challenge that.
In this area the rice fields
seem to be providing
plenty of rodent species
that the ocelots can hunt.
Are the ocelots desperate
or adapting well to
their changing world?
- (Henrique): This really
attracted my attention
because all the literature
that you have from ocelots,
you always will see that they
need forest cover to survive,
and here you are able
to see ocelots using
very open areas
of irrigated rice fields,
even when the land
is naked, with no plants.
So it's very interesting
because it shows that
this species might be
much more adaptable
than was previously thought,
which is very important
to understand,
because you can now start
looking at human disturbed areas
and understand how different
wild species can survive and
thrive in this kind of habitat.
- (Narrator): Henrique's results
are preliminary.
They still need to know what
happened to the native
forest rodents
and whether there will be
unintended consequences
for other species if there are
more ocelots out hunting.
It will take a lot more data to
really hone in on how to achieve
the right balance
between agriculture
and the preservation
of wildlife.
But Henrique is hopeful.
- (Henrique): I have two boys
and I always think of my kids
when I'm doing fieldwork.
If they would be able
to see what I'm seeing nowadays.
For me it's very good to notice
that they're growing up
in a wild area and they're being
able to see a lot of wildlife.
Which is for me it's very, very
special and important for them.
♪♪
