07x05 - Endangered Angel Sharks + IMAX Filmmakers

[bunniefuu]

- [Narrator] Today on "Blue World",

Jonathan joins world
renowned IMAX filmmakers,

Howard and Michele Hall,
for lunch with sea turtles.

But first, a quest to find
the endangered angelshark

off California.

[bright upbeat music]

Meet Jonathan Bird,

one of the world's top underwater
nature cinematographers.

Traveling the world on assignment

for all the major networks,

he is an Emmy Award-winning authority

on the underwater world.

In freshwater, or salt,
reefs, wrecks, or caves,

Jonathan documents the
world beneath the waves.

Welcome to the "Blue World".

[bright upbeat music]

[shark knocking]

[bright exciting music]

- As you probably know, I love sharks,

and over 30 years of diving,

I've traveled the world
in search of adventures

with as many species
of sharks as possible.

One species which has alluded me so far

is an odd looking shark
known as the angelshark.

[bright music]

Today, my quest for the
angelshark is taking me and Zach

on a trip to California.

[bright acoustic music]

With perfect weather and a beautiful view,

Santa Barbara is many
people's idea of heaven.

It's not just popular for boating,

it has a rich history of scuba diving,

dating back to the
early days of the sport,

as a result, it's home to the
Santa Barbara Maritime Museum.

Today, I'm getting a
personal tour of the museum

from famous diving
historian, Leslie Leaney.

The museum curates a large collection

of full-face commercial dive gear,

as well as numerous other collections

of rare and fascinating diving history.

It's well worth a visit

for anyone interested in maritime history.

Later, we board the Truth Aquatics Vision

live aboard dive boat
for five days of diving.

Ooh, I can't wait, this
is gonna be so much fun!

We travel through the night

and wake up in the
shadow of Anacapa Island,

one of the northern Channel Islands

and part of the Channel
Islands National Park.

These islands are uninhabited by people,

and home to lots of seabirds
and sea lion rookeries.

[waves crashing]
[bright music]

Our captain navigates
towards our destination,

Santa Cruz Island, as some fog rolls in.

As we eat breakfast, we approach
our first dive of the day.

In our protected anchorage
in the lee of Santa Cruz,

conditions are calm, and
we start getting suited up.

The water here is around

which isn't too cold,
but it's not warm either,

so I'm wearing my dry suit.

With all the weight I'm wearing,

I'm a total klutz trying
to get into the Zodiac.

- Nice.
- There we go.

[Jonathan grunting]

[Jonathan laughing]

- My good friend, Ed Stetson,

a local diving expert, is coming with me.

He knows how to find the angelsharks.

Well, you did a better job than I did, Ed.

[engine humming]

- Two, three, go.

[water splashing]

- We hit the water and head to the bottom.

As I descend, getting my camera turned on,

I'm completely oblivious to
a sea lion checking me out.

[bright cheery music]

Juvenile sea lions are
very curious and playful,

they have no fear of divers

and make a game out of
challenging our video skills.

[bright cheery music]

[water bubbling]

[bright cheery music continues]

In the sea lion's social scene,

blowing bubbles can be a sign
of aggression or playfulness,

I wonder if our exhaled
breaths are a subtle sign

that we want to play.

[bright cheery music]

[bright cheery music continues]

[bright cheery music continues]

Sometimes it's impossible to
even pan the camera fast enough

to keep the sea lion in the shot!

Once our new friend gets
bored with our lack of energy

and moves on to some
other unsuspecting divers,

we get back to our mission.

[bright music]

[water bubbling]

I follow Ed through the
surge-y, murky conditions,

Ed tells me that it's
usually not this murky

and I just got unlucky with the weather.

[water bubbling]

Soon we swim into a kelp forest.

[bright music]

In search of clearer
water, we descend deeper,

reaching 90 feet.

The water's much clearer down
here, but also much colder,

so we don't stay too long.

Shallower, it's warmer, but the surge

makes filming difficult.

[bright music]

As we emerge on the other
side of the kelp forest,

we reach our destination, the sand.

This is where angelsharks live,

but in this low visibility,

it will be difficult to find one,

so we spread out and
start searching a grid.

[bright playful music]

I can't find anything,

but soon, Ed calls me over,

his experienced eagle eyes
spotted a familiar shape,

an angelshark hiding in the sand.

[bright music]

I have no idea how he ever saw that.

The angelshark buries
itself for camouflage,

only its eyes protrude
from its sandy blanket.

The angelshark is so confident
in its camouflage, in fact,

that I can gently wave the sand away

to reveal the shape of the shark,

and it's not a small fish.

[bright music]

There are 24 different
species of angelsharks

around the world, and this
one, the Pacific angelshark,

can grow to five feet
long, almost two meters.

[bright music]

In my attempt to reveal the shark's face,

I frighten the animal by accident.

But now we can see her swimming,

and this is how you know she's not a ray,

because she has a dorsal
fin, two of them in fact.

[bright music]

And she swims with the familiar shark-like

swishing of the tail.

[bright music]

Without her sandy camouflage,
she's a lot easier to see,

and she knows it.

So, she demonstrates
for me how she digs in.

[water bubbling]

[bright playful music]

Perfect.

Angelsharks are ambush predators,

they don't swim around a lot,

mostly they just lay very still

and wait for prey to come
to them, and when it does,

lunch.

An angelshark may go
a week without eating,

but that's plenty when
you're not that active.

[bright music]

A long dive, however, has made me hungry,

so it's time to head back
to the boat for lunch.

Fortunately, I don't have
to ambush my sandwich.

[playful music]

[ladder clanging]

Woo!

Man, after 30 years, I finally
got to see an angelshark,

and they don't look like a shark at all,

but man, they are cool.

[water splashing]

Heavily fished in the 1970s and '80s,

Pacific angelshark populations plummeted

and sightings by divers
became extremely rare.

But in the last 30 years,
with protections in place,

they're slowly making a comeback,

and divers are starting to
see them more regularly,

especially in the waters

around the Channel Islands National Park.

These strange and unique sharks
are one of the highlights

of diving in California,

certainly one of the wildest
sharks in the "Blue World".

[bright music]

[bright upbeat music]

- [Narrator] When we come back,

it's lunch with the sea turtles.

[bright music]

[bright upbeat music]

- [Jonathan] Howard and Michele
Hall are a world renowned

underwater filmmaking team.

[bright upbeat music]

For more than 30 years, they've
traveled around the world

making animal behavior documentaries.

They're most famous

for their incredible
underwater 3D IMAX films,

which are made using an
enormous camera system

that weighs more than 1,000 pounds.

It uses two rolls of 70 millimeter film

and costs more than
$2,000 per minute to run,

[bright upbeat music]

but the image quality is amazing

on the giant screen of an IMAX theater.

[bright upbeat music]

Howard and Michele are my heroes,

their films inspired me to
become an underwater filmmaker,

so imagine how excited I am

to be on a dive trip in the
Philippines with my heroes.

Howard and Michele have
come to Busuanga, Palawan

to work on a segment
about dugongs with me.

But, we're also going
to explore a dive site

famous for sea turtles.

It's a long trip from North
America to the Philippines,

but this is one of the
best places in the world

to scuba dive.

[upbeat music]

Our captain sets a course
for Dimakya Island,

then it's time to suit up.

[bright gentle music]

[hands slapping]

[bright gentle music]

Michele hits the water first,

[bright gentle music]

then Howard,
[water splashing]

and I.
[water splashing]

[bright gentle music]

There's no reef here, just a sandy bottom.

At first, it doesn't look very promising,

but our dive master has
already found a sea turtle.

[water bubbling]

[bright music]

This green sea turtle
is foraging for food.

[bright music]

She has a freeloader in the form

of a huge remora sticking to her.

She really likes the sea
grasses that grow here.

There isn't a ton of
nutritional value in the grass,

so she spends a lot of her time eating.

[bright music]

[turtle munching]

And she digs down to get to
the more nutritious roots.

[bright music]
[turtle munching]

[sand whooshing]

[turtle munching]

[turtle munching]

[sand whooshing]

[turtle munching]

[sand whooshing]

[turtle munching]

[sand whooshing]

[turtle munching]

[sand whooshing]

[turtle munching]

[sand whooshing]

[turtle munching]

[sand whooshing]

[turtle munching]

Divers come here fairly often,

so she's not afraid of us at all.

[bright music]

[turtle munching]

[sand whooshing]

[turtle munching]

[sand whooshing]

[turtle munching]

I have to be honest, I never
thought I would have Howard

and Michele Hall as "Blue
World" cinematographers.

[bright music]
[turtle munching]

Like land turtles, sea
turtles breathe air,

they hold their breath underwater

and they need to rise up to
breathe every few minutes.

A quick breath, and it's back to feeding.

[water bubbling]

[water bubbling]

Michele demonstrates just
how close we can get.

[bright playful music]

Maybe the sea turtle
could use a little help.

[sand whooshing]

[turtle munching]

[sand whooshing]

[turtle munching]

[sand whooshing]

Michele notices that the
sea turtle eats an awful lot

of sand while feeding,
so maybe she can assist.

[bright playful music]

This sea turtle is no dummy,

she knows an easy meal when she sees it.

[bright playful music]

Now, this looks like fun to me.

[bright playful music]

Nearby I find another sea turtle

and see if she will accept a handout.

[bright playful music]

Pretty soon the sea turtles
are following us around

like a bunch of puppies.

[bright playful music]

We can even get them to do tricks.

[bright playful music]

All this eating is making me hungry,

so I decide to give the sea grass a taste.

[water bubbling]

Salad isn't my favorite
food, but sea salad?

[bright playful music]

Disgusting, ugh.

[bright playful music]

[bright music]

Michelle likes healthy foods,
though, and she loves it.

[bright music]

If only we had a nice vinegarette.

[bright music]

[water bubbling]

Meanwhile, the turtle has her eyes

on a thick ring of sea
grass around an anemone,

but as she inches
closer, she finds out why

nobody's eating that sea grass,

the anemone fish are
protective of their home

and drive away intruders.

[bright playful music]

They even attack Howard
as he sets up for a shot.

[bright playful music]

Soon, we notice that the anemone
fish are working very hard

to move a piece of waterlogged bamboo

closer to their anemone.

[bright playful music]

The fish are very persistent.

[bright playful music]

[bright playful music continues]

Once they get it in
position, we look closer

and realize what's going on,

they've laid their eggs on the bamboo.

[bright music]

The largest male aerates
the eggs constantly

by swishing water over them with its fins.

[bright music]

With anemone fish, it's the
males that care for the eggs.

Go, dads!

[bright music]

Once we've been watching for a while,

the little fish decide
we're no longer a threat

and stop attacking.

[bright playful music]

[water bubbling]

[bright playful music]

Nearby, another anemone,

this one harboring a different inhabitant.

Michele coaxes it out to play.

[water bubbling]

A tiny cleaner shrimp
looking for fish to clean.

[bright music]

Michele is an odd customer
at this cleaning station.

[bright music]

I can't believe how long
she can hold her breath,

and I think the sea turtle
is feeling a little left out,

so I go back to helping
her harvest some sea grass.

[bright playful music]

But her meal ticket has
a finite air supply,

and it's time for us to
head back to the boat.

I'm so excited that I got to dive

with Howard and Michele Hall,

and we were lucky to find
such cooperative subjects.

[bright music]

Sometimes even a shallow sandy
sea floor that looks boring

can turn out to be an
amazing wild animal encounter

in the "Blue World".

[bright music]

[bright upbeat music]

[bright music]