National Geographic: Panama Wild - Rain Forest of Life

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It appears out of the dawn of time...

...a creation of the sun,

caldron of life.

This is the tropical forest

nature at her most extravagant.

Sustained by the partnership

of animal and plant,

it has produced more than

half the species on earth.

It is a sea of green... seemingly

spellbound... changeless.

But look again.

Behind the green curtain are

countless battles for survival.

Into this complex world has come

a rare breed of adventurer.

Scientific knowledge is the treasure

they seek,

and to find it, they're not afraid

to go out on a limb.

This is a place unlike any

other in the world.

Panama's Barro Colorado Island,

known as BCI to the scientists

who journey here.

A protected realm in the middle

of the Panama Canal,

BCI is home to the Smithsonian's

Tropical Research Institute.

Scientists come to this island

from all over the globe

to unravel the mysteries of life

in the tropical forest.

It is an adventure beyond

the reach of one person,

or one lifetime.

BCI's a very special place for me

just because the more I come here,

the more familiar I get

with the island.

It's just home, it's comfortable,

it's exciting.

I think Barro Colorado Island

offers for me a lot of things

that I would not find

in any other place.

It's a really highly diverse forest,

the research facilities are

just fantastic,

you come there, you go out and

do the work,

and Barro Colorado Island

is protected

so that your work is not

destroyed at all.

I discover things.

In the tropics you may be a person

who's discovered something

that not a single human being

in the history

of the world has bothered to notice.

Here unfolds one of nature's

great puzzles.

How does the tropical forest

manage to support

such a remarkable community of life

and sustain itself at the same time?

One thing is certain,

at the heart of it all are the trees

A single tree, as it drives

towards the light,

affects the lives of countless

creatures.

But life is a struggle here

for every creature

and the odds that any one seed

will grow into a Titan are

astronomical.

It takes luck and strategy to

make it to the top.

For people, getting to the top

always requires some special

precautions.

Biologist Deedra McClearn

has learned to seek

the forest's answers on

its own terms.

Even if it means following her

slingshot all the way up...

...into the crown of one

of the forest's giants.

This is a dipteryx,

one of the great ones.

It rises head and shoulders above

the ocean of leaves around it,

more than a hundred feet tall.

From its majestic flowers will

come fruit,

and from the fruit,

perhaps an offspring

that will survive to take the place

of its parent among

a procession of giants.

Climbing has taught Deedra to

respect trees as individuals.

Since I've started climbing

I like dipteryx,

because it's a beautiful tree,

it's emergent,

it comes above all the rest

of the trees,

they often have great views,

and the wood is really hard

and solid.

I feel safe climbing a dipteryx,

chain saws won't cut down

a dipteryx.

I have a lot of different emotions

associated with actually

climbing a tree.

One of them is familiarity.

If it's a tree that

I've climbed before,

I feel comfortable,

it's a very satisfying sort of

feeling to make a good assent.

If it's a tree that

I haven't climbed before or

it's given me troubles,

or I'm worried about a branch,

then it can be very nerve-racking.

Deedra climbs into the canopy

to release a coati

a tropical cousin of the raccoon.

I know you.

She captures coatis just to let

them go.

I have caught you 15 times and

you always thrash around.

Just wait a second.

She's curious how an animal

who isn't a born climber manages

to survive ten stories up.

I think coatis are really

interesting

as climbing mammals because

they're not perfect.

They're kind of clumsy,

they're not graceful leapers,

they can't hang by their tail,

they don't have exclusively

manipulative hands

to grasp onto branches,

but they do really well.

One of the things that really

surprised me was that

they actually will jump quite

a far distance going down.

It'll launch itself into a tree

and it doesn't really know

where it's going to grab on,

it just, I think, assumes that

it'll be able to find something

when it hits that...

The coati has a lot of company

up here...

...with good reason.

The canopy is the forest's

powerhouse.

This is where leaves transform

light into the stuff of

life itself.

The canopy creates its own world,

with lands and waters,

prey and predators.

It overflows with flowers,

greenery, and fruit

food for all who can live

at these heights.

Earthbound for years,

scientists could

only guess what went on up here

- until now.

The canopy is the last frontier

on earth

and it's only been the last

that people have really gotten

up into the trees

and started looking at the insects

and looking at the leaves,

and actually there still hasn't

been that much mammal work up

in the canopy,

but it's a different life zone.

It's like going to the bottom

of the ocean.

You can't tell what's up here

from working on the ground

and it's different.

Bold researchers like Deedra

are proving how different

the tropical forest is from our

preconceptions of the jungle.

For one thing,

it is not always steamy and wet

Like many tropical forests,

BCI has a long dry season.

Food is now becoming scarce.

Even coatis,

who will eat just about anything

are hard pressed to

fill their bellies.

They gather under the majestic

dipteryx, waiting.

Now, when they need it most,

the tree will bear its fruit.

For dipteryx this is the beginning

of the long struggle to reproduce.

Howler monkeys gather in its crown.

Here is a banquet that will

stave off hunger for many.

The timing is crucial.

By fruiting during the dry season,

the dipteryx guarantees that

many will gather for the feast.

Oddly enough, the tree wants

its fruit to be eaten

even though each fruit contains

a seed

that could bring forth

the next generation.

But why?

All these capuchin monkeys know

is that food is nearly at hand.

And if enough of them arrive,

they could drive the howlers

from this nutritious meal.

What scientists have discovered

is the fruit is actually

an expensive bribe.

If animals take it,

they may carry the seed locked

inside far from the parent tree.

The further away the seed gets,

the better its chance of surviving.

With ripening fruit all

around them,

the canopy animals can now

afford to be finicky eaters.

Once they've had the ripest bit,

they simply drop the fruit

and move on to the next.

But this rain of half-eaten fruit

is of no help to the tree in

its quest to reproduce.

Its seedlings have little luck

of thriving here

in the shadow of the parent's crown.

Still for the animals waiting below,

it's manna from heaven.

The coatis eat only the sweet flesh,

they leave the seed intact.

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