"An eastern sun rises on a world of magic" "Like restless spirits flying foxes return with the dawn to their roost in Indonesian forest" "Dense tropical jungle covers more than half this land of 17,000 islands a land where elemental forces are still at work" "For millions of years this has been a turbulent corner of the planet" "New islands rise from the seabed" "Older islands are worn down and destroyed by water and by fire" "This is the most volcanic region in the world" "Indonesia has 155 active volcanos" "But when the volcanos sleep conditions are ideal for the growth of forest" "Here on the equator high rainfall, tropical heat and fertile soil nurture a jungle unrivaled in its luxuries" "There are literally thousands of different kinds of tree here and they support a variety of animal life to match" "Indonesia has a greater range of animal species than any other country in the world" "Most of them live here in the tropical rainforest" "It's not just variety that makes the jungles of Indonesia so exceptional" "There's an extraordinary mix of plants and animals some are Asian, others would look more at home in Australia" "That's because the island chain links the 2 continents like a line of stepping stones that runs all the way from northern Australia to Asia" "At the western end of the chain the giant islands of Sumatra and Borneo carry much of Indonesia's forest" "It's a forest that's home to giants" "Amorphophallus, the titan arum" "Its erect flower spike can rise to the height of 2 men" "It's the tallest flower in the world" "It stinks of rotting meat a feature that it shares with another giant flower - the rafflesia" "Both are pollinated by flies" "Rafflesia flowers can be 1m across" "This extraordinary plant has no leaves, stem or root" "It lives as a parasite on lianas and flowers just once in its life" "Some of the world's tallest trees are here the dipterocarpus, named after their 2-winged seeds" "They can grow to 60m" "This forest of giants has gigantic animals too, elephants" "There's even a rhinoceros" "The hairy Sumatra rhino is the smallest of the world's 5 kinds" "but it still weighs a ton" "Animals like rhinos and elephants came here from Asia" "Many times in the past the sea level was much lower than it is today" "So islands that are now surrounded by shallow sea were linked to the mainland" "The Sumatran rhino is one of the world's rarest animals fewer than 1000 survive" "Like all rhinos, it's persecuted for its horn" "Along with undisturbed forest rhinos need mineral salt licks and also mud" "Wallowing keeps their skin in good condition and brings relief from biting insects" "The Asian elephant is endangered too" "Sumatra has 3/4000 and Borneo barely 1000" "They used to live on Java as well, the next island to the east but rising human populations and intensive agriculture leave no room for giants like this" "Giants they may be but these elephants are actually smaller than their mainland relatives" "The same is true of many other island animals but no one knows why" "A herd of elephants needs a lot of forest to support it" "Each adult can eat 150k of greenery a day" "The age-old drama of hunted and hunter still plays on this jungle stage" "Sumatra's forest still has tigers" "Like elephants and rhinos they came from mainland Asia during the Ice Ages when the sea levels were lower" "A litter of cubs like this is a rare and privileged sight" "Fewer than 500 Sumatran tigers still survive" "The Sumatran is the smallest of the 5 surviving races of tiger and the darkest in color" "Perhaps that makes it better suited to life in the dense tropical rainforest" "As a top predator, the tiger needs a large area to feed itself especially in forest where prey like deer and pig seldom live in great numbers" "Java and Bali once had tigers but they were killed off by a rising tide of people" "As populations grow and the forest shrinks" "Sumatra's tigers also face an uncertain future" "Even at their peak tigers never spread far along the island chain" "Deep channels between the islands were always a barrier" "At the eastern end of archipelago on the giant island of New Guinea their place is taken by a very different hunter" "This is New Guinea's nearest rival to the tiger the quoll" "It's the island's largest predatory mammal but it's no bigger than a domestic cat" "It hunts insects, lizards, rats and mice and it raids birds' nests" "The quoll is marsupial, a mammal with a pouch like the kangaroo and that's a clue to its origins" "Its ancestors came from Australia" "The forest of the quoll is a world away from the jungles of Sumatra with their tigers, rhinos and elephants" "As little as 10,000 years ago" "New Guinea was part of Australia its wildlife reflects that link" "The quoll is not the only marsupial here" "Sugar gliders" "They spend the day huddled in their nest high in a hollow tree emerging only at night" "Perhaps because of their secretive nature they are regarded with great suspicion by some of New Guinea's tribes" "People believe they are sorcerers assuming animal form so they can spy on their victims" "In fact, the sugar glider's nocturnal habits have a simpler explanation" "They eat sap and insects and nectar from flower in forest trees so they often have to climb right up to the ends of the branches" "If they were out on a limb during the day, they'll be very exposed to predators like hawks and eagles" "Under cover of darkness, the risks are less" "And they reduce them even more by never going down to the ground" "Using folds of skin between their limbs they glide from tree to tree" "New Guinea is a very rugged island well into the 20th century, much of the interior was still unexplored" "The mountain forests were slow to give up their secrets" "Among them is one of the most extraordinary creatures on the planet" "The long-beaked echidna" "This remarkable animal is a mammal but a very primitive kind" "It's warm-blooded and feeds its young with milk but it lays eggs like a bird or a reptile" "It's another relic from New Guinea's past" "Its only living relatives are in Australia" "The echidna eats earthworms electrical sensors in its snout may help it sniff them out" "Its tongue is armed with horny spikes that impale the worms and transfer them to its toothless mouth" "The long-beaked echidna lives only in New Guinea's high cool mountain forests as well as worms, it eats termites hence its other name - the giant spiny ant eater" "The female lays just one egg a year" "When the infant hatches, she carries it in a pouch like a kangaroo until it gets too spiky for comfort" "The mountains of New Guinea's central spine rise to more than 5000m" "They are a barrier to the movement of both animals and people" "Even on the equator, their summits are crowned with perpetual ice and snow" "There's nothing higher between here and the Himalayas" "To the south of the mountains the land falls steeply" "Below lies a tract of swampy lowland forest so poor and hostile that people call it - the death zone" "The ground is flooded for much of the year, little lives here but fish and frogs" "and remarkably - people" "The Korowai tribe had learnt how to rest a living from these unpromising surroundings" "To catch fish, they seal off a section of stream with dams" "Then they scoop out the water with paddles made from part of a local palm tree" "This is very much a team effort" "Every ablebodied member of the group takes their share of the work both men and women" "When the water is drained the stranded fish can be picked out of the mud but they're a meager reward for all that effort" "With food so hard to come by it's no surprise that this forest supports so few people" "If the Korowai's fishing methods are unusual their houses are even more so" "These must be the ultimate in tree houses some are 15m above the ground" "The Korowai say that living in the trees they can see the birds in the mountains and it's harder for demons and sorcerers to climb their stairs" "It also keeps them safe from floods and there're fewer mosquitoes and it's a defense against people too" "Until very recently, blood feuds and head hunting raids were part of everyday life here" "With their intimate knowledge of the forest the Korowai can live in a land where most people would starve" "Sago from the pith of a palm tree is their stable diet along with lizards and insects, fish and frogs and the occasional - pig" "Well into the 1970s, war between neighboring tribes was a way of life in New Guinea" "Few people could travel far beyond their tribal boundaries" "Isolated by strife and rugged terrain each tribe develops its own culture" "New Guinea has more than 1000 languages" "Half of them spoken by less than 1000 people" "The people of New Guinea's interior seem lost in time" "Only in the last few decades, has contact with the outside world brought the beginnings of change" "In much the same way, New Guinea's mammals are locked in a time warp isolated from other kinds, the marsupials flourished" "In New Guinea, even the kangaroos climb trees though not very well" "Tree kangaroos are sluggish animals" "Perhaps because their diet of leaves is low in nutrients and high in poisonous toxins" "They have an extremely slow metabolism and that is reflected in their movements" "There are several kinds of tree kangaroo like the ones that live on the ground they carry their young in a pouch but they are very different in other ways" "Their fore and hide limbs are of equal length to make it easier to climb" "Their wide paws have roughened pads to stop them slipping and their feet have powerful claws to grasp the branches" "The many kinds of tree kangaroo make a good living in the forest canopy" "But none of them look as if they are entirely at home in the trees" "Climbers like these couldn't compete against more agile tree livers" "Like the ones at the western end of the archipelago" "In the forests of Borneo and Sumatra monkeys and apes take the place of tree kangaroos" "Gibbons, fueled by a diet of fruit, these little apes are the supreme arboreal athletes" "They live in small families and every morning, male and female mark their territory by singing a swinging duet" "Up in the tree tops, nothing can match the grace of a gibbon in full flight only the birds move faster" "Gibbons spend their whole life up in the tree tops" "They never come down to the ground as the forest canopy provides all their needs" "It's a world all of its own" "Monkeys and apes are the defining elements of these magical forests" "Indonesia has a greater variety than any other Asian country" "The orangutan the 'man of the forest'" "This great ape lives only in Borneo and here in Sumatra" "20,000 years ago, it was found on the mainland too but now these islands are its last refuge" "Orangutans are fruit eaters but prolific fruiting trees like figs are widely scattered so they have to cover a lot of forest to find enough food" "Few trees have enough fruit to feed more than one or two animals as big as these so these apes can't live in large groups" "Young animals stay with their mothers for several years but full-grown males are solitary" "Despite their weight orangutans in Sumatra spend most of their time up in the trees" "They travel on the ground only when there's no alternative and this is one reason why" "Sumatra still has tigers" "A tiger could kill an orangutan especial a young one" "500km across the sea on the neighboring island of Borneo it's a different story" "Here, there are no tigers so the orangs are safer on the ground" "Bornean orangutans are much heavier than their Sumatra cousins" "Some of the males are so huge that the trees can scarcely bear their weight" "Males grow twice the size of females" "A full-grown male can weigh 100k, so swinging through the forest canopy is hardly an option" "It's easier to walk" "With their greater size males have to wander much more widely than females in their search for fruit" "But that search is far from random" "It seems they can remember the location of fruiting trees from year to year and arrive just as the fruit is ripening" "Although fruit is their staple diet they are not averse to a snack of animal protein if the opportunity arises" "Termites inside a decaying tree trunk" "now the male's colossal strength comes in handy" "Few other apes and monkeys have males so much larger than the females perhaps male competition for mates is more intense or perhaps for female orangutans, size matters" "Several times a day, these bigger males declare their presence from the tree tops" "Their calls can be heard from a great distance lesser males keep out of the way" "The calls of monkeys and apes are the signature tune of these western forests" "Far to the east in New Guinea, the orchestra has very different players" "No primates sing in this dawn chorus" "This is a land of birds" "The most spectacular of New Guinea's birds are the birds of paradise" "There are 38 different kinds here" "The ones in this tree are red birds of paradise" "They are found only in a few small islands off the coast of New Guinea" "Males flaunt their flamboyant plumes to attract the more drably colored females" "Several males perform together competing for the attention of prospective mates" "They make their dance easier to see by stripping leaves from the branches" "These colorful displays can be seen from a great distance" "They attract females from far and wide" "Red birds of paradise always display up in the tree tops" "Deep within the forest, visibility is much poorer so birds that live in the undergrowth must adopt a different strategy" "The Wilson's bird of paradise uses its penetrating calls to attract females" "Each adult male has its own display ground and its plumage is intricate rather than flamboyant designed to be admired up-close in a dance of courtship" "but that bird beside him is a younger male the dance has to be learnt" "Young males acquire the skill by watching an older male and copying his every move" "He tolerates them because they look just like females" "Learning the dance can take 7 years" "The novice's disguise is so effective that an adult male can be deceived into courting the wrong sex" "That's not a female at the top of the twig but another young male" "When the eager male discovers his terrible mistake all hell breaks loose" "The undergrowth of the forest floor hides one of New Guinea's most feared creatures" "one that can kill" "The cassowary this flightless giant is New Guinea's largest bird" "It can grow to the height of a man" "Even these brown youngsters are no chickens" "Like so many of New Guinea's animals the cassowary has Australian affinities" "Being flightless here is no disadvantage" "New Guinea has no tigers only the palm-sized quoll and a cassowary is far from defenseless its powerful feet are armed with a lethal claw it can disembowel with a single kick" "Unusually among birds it's the male that looks after the young" "After mating, the female lays her eggs and disappears leaving her partner to incubate them and care for the chicks" "Cassowaries spend most of their time searching for food on the forest floor" "They eat seeds, insects and especially fruit" "These enormous birds consume a huge amount of fruit every day" "Surprisingly, enough has dropped by other birds feeding up in the trees to give them all their need" "Cassowaries help to spread the seeds of many forest trees" "By the time they've passed through the bird's gut they can be well away from their parent tree" "Local people in New Guinea hunt cassowaries for their meat and sometimes keep young ones in captivity to fatten them up" "There has been a trade in these birds for hundreds of years" "A cassowary can be exchanged for 8 pigs or even a wife" "New Guinea at the eastern end of the island chain has very different animals to Borneo and Sumatra in the west" "Although this forest ride across the archipelago very few creatures have made it from one end to the other" "Deep channels between the islands limit their spread" "But some animals have made their journey" "They're found at the full-length of the 5000km of Indonesia's island chain" "Bats" "These are fruit bats, flying foxes with a wingspan of 1.5m they're the largest bats in the world and they are great flyers" "They can travel 60km in a night searching for food so to them, island hopping is no problem" "At dawn they return to a communal roost that during the breeding season can number hundreds of thousands" "This female already has a youngster" "She'll carry it with her for the first month, but as it gets heavier she will leave it behind at the roost when she goes foraging" "Mature male fruit bats have territories in their roosting trees" "Branches that they mark with scent and defend against other males" "The females decide where to roost and who to mate with" "The males are remarkably well endowed" "Each morning the male checks out all the females roosting on his branch" "Courtship can be lengthy and intense 20 minutes of deep grooming licking the female's nether parts with a long rough tongue, perhaps to arouse her or perhaps to remove any rival male's sperm" "Mating is vigorous, noisy and repetitive" "Bat male looked violent but the female can always let go of the branch and fly off when she's had enough" "Fruit bats are among the most successful of Indonesia's creatures and the most widespread" "Right across the country, sunsets are patterned with silhouettes of their departing hoards as they leave their roosts on their nightly search for food" "Fruit bats are found throughout the archipelago wherever there is forest" "But what is most striking about Indonesia is its variety" "Its 17000 islands separate 2 oceans and unite 2 continents" "They're set in some of the richest seas in the world" "That natural variety is matched by a human diversity" "This is a meeting point for cultures - old and new" "Over the centuries, Indonesia's peoples have developed their own unique ways of life" "In much the same way, many of the animals here are unique" "Isolated on remote islands the castaways of two continents went their own way to become creatures found nowhere else on earth" "Throughout the natural history of Indonesia the only certainty has been change" "Over millions of years, volcanos built new islands in what was once open ocean islands of opportunity for new life to conquer" "The story of wild Indonesia has been written in fire and that fire still burns today"