The Changing Face of Nature Documentaries

When I was a kid, I remember looking forward to watching the weekly program Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom. This show brought me into the world of animals in distant lands... at a distance. It showed lions interacting with other lions, or perhaps chasing down a zebra on the Sahara.

The documentary was always presented in voice over, with a sedate narrator telling you facts about the animals, or what was going on. There was no interaction between the human and animal kingdoms.

I remember the first time I saw Steve Irwin of Crocodile Hunter fame. He was up close and personal with the animals, shouting outrageously and telling you what a beaut the creature in question was. After Steve's untimely death due to a close encounter with a sting ray, I thought perhaps we would view this as a cautionary tale and return to a more hands-off style of documentary. Wrong.

It seems like like lately there are a host of other Irwin-wannabes on the scenes, picking up the wildlife for a closer view. In the show Dangerous Encounters, herpetologist Brady Barr enters the lairs of various creatures to show the audience how and where they live. Of course, the entertaining value of this show is that Mr. Barr seems to scream like a little girl whenever  danger is a little too dangerous. Tonight's episode featured him wading in a waist (waste?) deep river of liquid bat guano to catch a giant reticulated python. Which he did.. and it promptly bit him. Amid much flailing and swearing (and the cameraman backing off really quick) , it became clear that this was a serious bite - three huge gashes that were (like everything else in the area) covered in bat poo. Barr took off his pants to display the wound to the camera, then limped on out of there. The snake was released. After a month of antibiotics and rabies shots, he returned to the cave to do it all over again. You can watch / read about it on the National Geographic site for the show. Prior to being bitten by this snake, Barr and the team picked up another, smaller python - who was so distressed by being caught that it regurgitated up its dinner (two bats).

  I must admit there was a certain sick entertainment value in watching a man choking back vomit while wading through feces who then got bitten by a huge snake. But.. is this science? Yes, I learned that giant reticulated pythons lived in liquid batpoo caves in Indonesia to regulate their temperatures and to eat bats. I also learned that poking giant reticulated pythons in liquid bat poo caves in Indonesia is a Bad Thing. Actually, I'm pretty sure I already know that part...

In previous episodes, he goes into the dens of sleeping bears and displays their cubs, gets up and personal with alligators, and so on.  If there's an animal in its home, viewers can be sure that this guy is going to come along and poke it or pull it out to show the cameras. But... is this really necessary? Don't the animals deserve a little privacy and dignity? What if someone came along and pulled us out of home while were taking a nice nap and held us up on display?

Has our desire for up-close-and-personal with nature footage gone too far?