10 fun facts about how Spy In The Wild deployed animatronic animals across the globe
The show captures never-seen-before footage
1 After the success of 2013’s Spy In The Huddle, which sent animatronic penguins into colonies, producers spent three years putting together this series featuring ‘spy creatures’ such as an orang-utan,a crocodile, a tortoise, a wild pup and a baby langur monkey getting intimate with their real-life counterparts.
2 The spy creatures take between three and nine months to make. The crocodile was a particularly industrious process, as it had to walk and swim like the real thing. “The spy crocodile is made up of three different layers,” explains producer Rob Pilley. “There’s the robotic layer, the waterproof layer and the aesthetic layer. The engineers X-ray the skeleton of the animal they’re trying to emulate and then rebuild it in carbon fibre before creating the muscle layers.”
3 The cameras in the eyes are ultra high-definition 4K resolution and are bespoke for every spy creature. “They’re not just cameras in the eyes any more, we’re literally making eyeballs out of cameras now,” says Rob. “You strip the camera down and build the eyeball around it. It’s a fascinating process.”
4 The animals’ ‘voices’ are recordings that are played back through a small speaker. Producers must ensure the spy creature is programmed with the correct call, as an alarm call could be catastrophic for the animals.
5 Producers scented the spy creatures so the animals could acclimatise. Meerkats, especially, are very driven by scent. “We got meerkat poo and anointed it,” says producer Philip Dalton. “That made
a big difference to its acceptance.”
6 Deploying the spy creatures in the wild can be risky. “It’s nerve-racking,” explains Rob. “You have to think about your physical safety without upsetting the animals. You have to get in as quickly as you can and make sure nothing is disturbed.”
7 The spy baby monkey roused suspicion among a colony of 120 langur monkeys and their curiosity caused it to topple over. The monkeys believed the spy monkey had died and the outpouring of grief was astonishing. “You suddenly see this silence come over them,” says Rob. “They hug each other to try to calm the situation down. It’s extremely touching and an amazing thing to experience.”
8 The first episode focuses on what is a typically human emotion: love. But we learn that animals have feelings too. “You can’t spend time with animals without realising so much of what they do is so similar to us,” says series director John Downer.
9 John says his favourite footage is of an adult chimpanzee – who are not known for their empathy – playing with a wild kitten in the way humans would play with a pet. “It was so unexpected,” he says. “It’s never been filmed before – it’s a revelation.”
10 We also see a wild orang-utan in Borneo that has learnt to use a saw. The intelligent animal has copied the behaviour of humans and is surprisingly dextrous with the tool.
NEW! Spy In The Wild Thursday 8pm BBC1