Beneath billowing clouds,in China's far southwestern Yunnan province,lies a place of mystery and legend.Of mighty rivers and some ofthe oldest jungles in the world.Here, hidden valleys nurture strangeand unique creatures,and colourful tribal cultures.Jungles are rarely found thisfar north of the tropics.So, why do they thrive here?And how has this rugged landscape come to harbour the greatest natural wealth in all China?In the remote southwest corner of China,a celebration is about to take place.Dai people collect water forthe most important festival of their year.The Dai call themselves the people of the water. Yunnan's river valleys have been their homefor over , years.By bringing the river water to the temple,they honour the two things holiest to them - Buddhism and their home.The Dai give thanks for the rivers and fertile lands which have nurtured their culture.Though to some it might seem just an excusefor the biggest water fight of all time.Dai lives are changingas towns get bigger and modernizebut the Water Splashing Festivalis still celebrated by all.The rivers which lie at the heart ofDai life and cultureflow from the distant mountains of Tibet, southward through central Yunnanin great parallel gorges.The Dai now live in the borders of tropical Vietnam and Laos,but their legends tell ofhow their ancestors came hereby following the rivers from mountain landsin the cold far north.Lying at the far eastern end of the Himalayas, the Hengduan mountains form Yunnan'snorthern border with Tibet.Kawakarpo, crown of the Hengduan range,is a site of holy pilgrimage.Yet, its formidable peak remains unconquered. Yunnan's mountains are remote,rugged and inaccessible.Here the air is thin and temperaturescan drop below minus degrees.This is home to an animal that's foundnowhere else on Earth.The Yunnan snub-nosed monkey.It's found only in these fewisolated mountain forests.No other primate lives at such high altitudes. but these are true specialists.These ancient mountain dwellershave inspired legends.Local Lisu people consider them their ancestors, calling them "the wild men of the mountains". During heavy snowfalls,even these specialists cannot feed.It seems a strange place for a monkey.Between snows, the monkeys wasteno time in their search for food.At this altitude,there are few fruits or tender leaves to eat.% of their diet is made up ofthe fine dry wisps of a curious organism.Half fungus, half plant -it's lichen.How have monkeys,normally associated with lowland jungle,come to live such aremote mountain existence?This is not the only remarkableanimal found within theseisolated high peaks.A Chinese red panda.Solitary and quiet, it spends muchof its time in the tree tops.Despite its name,the red panda is only a very distantrelative of the giant panda.It's actually more closelyrelated to a skunk.But it does share the giantpanda's taste for bamboo.Southwest China's red pandas are known for their very strongfacial markingswhich distinguishthem from red pandas foundanywhere else in the Himalayas.Like the monkeys, they wereisolated in these high forestswhen the mountains quiteliterally rose beneath themin the greatest mountain-building event in recent geological history. Over the last million years,the Indian subcontinent has been pushing northwards into Eurasia.On the border between India and Tibet the rocks have been raisedeight kilometres above sea level, creating the world's highest mountain range, the Himalayas.But to the east,the rocks have buckled into a series of steep north-south ridges,cutting down through theheart of Yunnan,the parallel mountains ofthe Hengduan Shan.These natural barriers serve to isolate Yunnan's plants and animals in each adjacent valley.While the huge temperaturerange between the snowy peaksand the warmer slopes belowprovides a vast array ofconditions for life to thrive. Through spring,the Hengduan slopes stage one of China's greatest natural spectacles. The forests here are among the most diverse botanical areas in the world. Over , plant species grow here,of which , are foundnowhere else.Until little more than a century ago, this place was unknown outside China. But then news reached the Westof a mysterious, hiddenworld of the orient.Hidden among the mountains,a lost Shangri-la paradise.Western high society, in the gripof a gardening craze,was eager for exotic speciesfrom faraway places.This gave rise to a newbreed of celebrity adventurers, intrepid botanist-explorersknown as "the Plant Hunters".Yunnan became their Holy Grail. Indiana JonesThe most famous was Joseph Rock,a real life Indiana Jones. Remarkable film footage captured his entourage on a series of expeditions, as they pushed into thedeepest corners of Yunnan.In glorious colour he recordedthe plant life he foundon special photographic glass plates. Sending thousands ofspecimens back to the West,the Plant Hunters changed the gardens of the world forever.Rock's success was bornof a massive effort.For, to find his Shangri-la,not only had he to traverseendless mountain ranges,but some of the deepestgorges in the world.The Nujiang is calledThe Angry River.This -kilometre stretchof raging rapidsis as much a barrier to lifeas are the mountains above.WAVES CRASHBut the plant hunters weren't the first people to travel here.Along the Nujiang,less than rope crossings allow locals passage across the torrents. Tiny hamlets cling to the slopes. This morning, it's market day, drawing people from upand down the valley.PIG OINKSGOAT BLEATSHanging from simple rope slings, people have been using the crossings for many hundreds of years.In such narrow, precipitous gorgesit's by far the easiestway to get around.Once across, the steepsides mean it's still a hike.Many trek for hours byfoot before they get to the market. The immense valley ishome to over a dozen ethnic groups. Some, like the Nu people,are found only here.The markets bring themountain tribes together.To continue his expeditions,Rock had to get his entire entourage across the giant Yunnan rivers.He commissioned especially thick ropes made from forest rattanand filmed the entire event.With yak butter to smooth the ride, men and mules made the journey. Not all made it across.On the far side of thegreat Nujiang gorge,the Plant Huntersmade a remarkable discovery.Far from the tropics,they seemed to be entering a steamy,vibrant tropical jungle,the forest of Gaoligongshan.The flora here is unlikeanywhere else in the world.Next to subtropical species,alpine plants grow in giant form. Crowning the canopy, rhododendrons, up to metres high.In April and May, their flowersturn the forests ruby red,attracting bird speciesfound only here.Constant moisture in the airmeans that the branches are laden with flowering epiphytes,fiercely guarded by tiny sunbirds, unique to these valleys.Nectar feeders, these are the humming birds of the Old World tropics.The forests of Gaoligongshan are home to some of China's rarest wildlife. This is a female Temminck's Tragopan. She has a colourful male admirer.He's hoping to woo her with his peculiar peekaboo displaybut she's not about to be rushed.His colourful skin wattlereflects more light than feathers do. To her, this is like a neon sign. Seeing his chance,the male makes his move.Constant moisture inthe Gaoligongshan forestsmeans that throughout the yearthere are always fruits on the trees. Such abundance of food encouragesa high diversity of fruit eaters more commonly found in the tropics. The black giant squirrel is found only in undisturbed rainforest.At close to a metre in length, it's one of the world's largest squirrels. The mystery is that these forestsare growing well outside the tropics.By rights, none of this jungle,or its animals, should be here. These are bear macaques.They're found only intropical and sub-tropical jungle. With a tiny home range ofjust a few square kilometres,they depend on the abundant fruit that only true rainforestscan provide all year round.To the European plant hunters,these northern rainforests must have seemed a fantastic andmysterious lost world.Yet, when they came here, they would have found beautifully constructed ancient stone pathwayson which the forestcould be explored.Winding westwards into the hills, these were once some of the most important highways in Asia,the southwestern tea and silk road. Built thousands of years ago,the southwestern tea and silk road gave access to the worldbeyond China's borders,carrying tradesmen and travellers from as far away as Rome.Wars were fought over accessto this tiny path,the only sure route inor out of China,that was guaranteed tobe clear of snow all year round. So, what causes Gaoligongshan's strange and remarkable climate?In late May, gusts of wind arrive, bringing with them the key to Gaoligongshan's mystery.The winds are hotand saturated with water.They come all the wayfrom the Indian Ocean.Channelled by Yunnan'sunique geography,they bring with them themoisture of the tropical monsoon. The giant river valleys,created millions of years ago,act like immense funnels.The gorges are so deep and narrow, that the moist warm air is driven right up into the north of Yunnan. The result is rain, in torrents! Four months of daily rainstorms sustain luxuriant vegetation.The arrival of the monsoonawakens one of the forest'smost extraordinarymoisture-loving inhabitants.The crocodile newt is one ofthe most unusual of the many amphibian species found here.As the rains arrive,they emerge to mate.The newts are said toleave an odour trail thatpotential mates can follow.The crocodile newt gets its name from the bumps along its back. These are its defence.If grabbed by a potential predator, the tips of its ribs squeeze a deadly poison from the bumps.The deluge wakesanother forest inhabitant.This one is particularly astounding in its vigour!It can grow up to a metre a day, fast overtaking the otherplants around it.The taller it grows,the faster its growth rate,so that in a matter of days it towers above the undergrowth,and continues reaching for the sky. Not bad for what isessentially a grass.It's bamboo.Given the chance,bamboo will create immense forests, dominating entire areas.Bamboo forests occuracross southwest China,all the way to Shanghai.But probably the highest diversityof bamboos in the worldis found on the hillsand valleys of Yunnan.Though incredibly strong,bamboos have hollow stems,a perfect shelter for anycreatures which can find a way in. This entrance holewas made by a beetlebut it's being used by avery different animal.A bamboo bat.The size of a bumblebee, it's oneof the tiniest mammals in the world. The entire colony, up to bats,fits into a single section of bamboo stem, smaller than a tea cup. It's quite a squeeze!Half the colony are babies.Though barely a week old, they are already almost as big as their mums. Feeding such a fast-growingbrood is hard work.The mums leave to huntjust after dusk each night.Back in the roost,the young are left on their own. Special pads on their wings help them to grip on the bamboo walls -most of the time.The young bats use the extra space to prepare for a life on the wingby preening and stretching.Packed in like sardines, they would make an easy target for a snake.But the snake has nochance of getting in.The entrance is thinnerthan the width of a pencil.When the mothers return,they can push through the narrowentrance only because oftheir unusually flattened skulls.But it's still a squeeze.Bamboos are exploited in a verydifferent way by another forest dweller.Fresh bamboo shoots arean important forest crop.Ai Lao Xiang is of the Hani tribe,from the mountain village of Mengsong. Roasted, the tender shoots hegathers will make a tasty dish.The Hani have many uses for thedifferent bamboos they growand find in the forest around.Though flexible enough to be woven,bamboo has a highertensile strength than steel.Succulent when young,in maturity it's tough and durable,ideal for making a tableand strong enough for a pipe to last a lifetime. The people of southwest Chinahave found an extraordinary number ofways to exploit this mostversatile of plants.THEY SPEAK IN NATIVE LANGUAGEPart of bamboo's phenomenal successis that it's so toughthat few animals can tackle it.Yet, bamboo does come under attack.A bamboo rat.Feeding almost exclusively on bamboo,they live their entire lives intunnels beneath the forest.The thinner species of bambooare easy to attack and pull below.She has a fantastic sense of smelland can sniff out the freshgrowth through the soil.Bamboo spreads along underground stems. By following these, new shoots are found. Once a shoot is detected,she snips it free and dragsit down into her burrow.This female has a family.At just a few weeks old,the youngsters can already tacklethe hardest bamboo stemsand are eager to try.Bamboo's tough reputation is such,that another bamboo specialist wasknown by the Chinese as,"The Iron Eating Animal".The giant panda is famousfor its exclusive diet.Giant pandas are thought tohave originated in southwestChina, millions of years ago,but they are no longerfound in Yunnan.Recently, their specialiseddiet has had dire consequences.Bamboo has a bizarre life cycle, flowering infrequently, sometimesonly once every hundred years or so.But when flowering does occur,it's on a massive scale,and it's followed by thedeath of all of the plants.Sometimes an entirebamboo forest may die.In undisturbed habitat, pandassimply move to another areawhere a different bamboo species grows. But as human activity has fragmentedtheir forest home,pandas find it increasingly hard tofind large enough areasin which to survive.Wild pandas are now found onlyin the forests of Central China,far to the east.But in the hidden pockets of lowland jungle in Yunnan's tropical south,live one of China'sbest-kept wildlife secrets.DEEP BELLOWThe wild Asian elephant.Elephants once roamed acrossChina as far north as Beijing.But it's only in the hidden valleysof Yunnan that they have survived. Elephants are thearchitects of the forest.Bamboos and grasses are theirfavourite foodbut saplings, tree leaves andtwisted lianas are alltaken, with little care.As they move through the forest,the elephants open up clearings, bringing light to the forest floor. This has a major impact on their home. The richest forests are now known to be those which from time to time experience change.The Jinou people are incredibly knowledgeable about their forestsand claim to have uses for most ofthe plants that they find there.They have names for them all,those good for eating and some which even have strong medicinal qualities. By working here, the Jinou playa similar role to the elephants, opening up the forest,bringing space, light and diversity. Green, fast growingspecies are encouraged.Insects are in high abundance here, together with the animalsthat feed on them.Knowledge of the forest enablesthe Jinou to find not just plants,but other tasty forest food too. Forest crabs are common here,feeding on the abundant leaf litter. This will be a tastyaddition to the evening meal.Flowing through Yunnan'ssouthern valleys,the once angry riversare now swollen,their waters slow and warm.These fertile lowland valleysare the home of the Dai.The "People of the Water"live along streams whichoriginate in the surrounding hills. Each family keeps a kitchen garden modelled on the multi-layered structure of the surrounding forests, which the Dai hold sacred.The gardens are made more productive by inter-planting different crops. Tall, sun-loving species give shelter to plants which thrive in the shade. As companions,the plants grow better.Yunnan's forests are home to more than a dozen wild banana speciesand banana crops grow wellin most Dai gardens.The huge banana flowers are richin nectar for only two hours a day, but it's enough to attract a rangeof forest insects, including hornets. With their razor sharp mandibles, they find it easy to robthe flowers of their nectar.But hornets are predators too.They hunt other insects andcarry them back to their nest.An ideal target,but this grasshopper is no easy meal. There may be a price to pay.The Dai men, Po and Xue Ming, take advantage of a hunter's instincts.A hornet sting is agony.But for now it's distracted,intent on cutting awaya piece of grasshoppersmall enough to carry back home. Success!The white featherhardly slows the hornet,and, more importantly,it can be seen.Now the hunter is the hunted.So long as Po andXue Ming can keep up!Back at the nest,the other hornetsimmediately begin to cutthe feather free.But it's too late. The nest'slocation has been betrayed.The relationship between the forest animals and the people who live here was never one of harmony.Yet the fact that the Dai and other ethnic groups considered theseforests to be sacred,has ensured their survivaland now many have been givenextra protection as nature reserves. Ingenuity and hard workpays off at last.The fattened larvae areconsidered a delicacy by the Dai. Although these forests have experienced a great deal of change, they are still host to someancient and incredible relationships. Almost centimetres high,this is the immense flowerof the Elephant yam.Locals call it the"Witch of the Forest".As the stars rise,the witch begins to cast her spell.The forest temperature drops,but the flower starts to heat up.A heat sensitive camera revealsthe flower's temperaturerising by an incredibleten degrees Celsius.At the same time, a noxious stench of rotting flesh fills the forest air. As the flower's heat increases,a cloud of odour rises up.The foul perfumecarries far and wide.It doesn't go unnoticed.Carrion beetles arrive on the scene. The beetles come in searchof a feast of warm decaying flesh, but they've been tricked.Slippery sides ensure they tumble straight into the centreof the monster flower.There's not enough room to spread their wingsand the waxy walls ensurethat there's no escape.But there's nothing sinisterin the flower's agenda.The beetles will beits unwitting helpers.Dawn arrives,but the flower remains unchanged, holding its captives through the day. As the second night falls,the witch stirs again.In a matter of minutes, the flower's precious golden pollensqueezes from the stamensand begins to fall,showering onto the captivebeetles below.Now, at last, the prisonersare free to go.The flower's wall changes texture, becoming roughto provide the ideal escape ladder.Loaded with their pollen parcels, they can now climb to freedom,just as other forest witchesare beginning to open.Seduced by the irresistible perfume, the beetles are sure to pay a visit, so ensuring pollination,and another generation of incredibly big, smelly flowers.As dawn arrives, forest birds claim their territories in the canopy. BIRDSONGBut there's one callwhich stands out among the rest - virtuoso of the forest symphony. STRANGE CALL RINGS OUTIt's a gibbon.UNDULATING CALL CONTINUESLiving on a remote mountainrange in south central Yunnanis one of the few remainingwild gibbon populations in China. The black-crestedgibbons of Wuliangshan.They are confined tothese forest mountains,so remote and steepthat few hunters ever come here. The Wuliangshan gibbons areunusual for their social structure. Most gibbons live in smallfamily groupsconsisting of a mating pairand their offspring.But these gibbons exist in troops. One male can have twoor sometimes three femalesand all of these can have young. Often even the juvenilesstay in the community.BABY SQUEAKSRarely glimpsed,this baby may be only a day old.If it survives infancy,then it has a promising futurein these few valleyswith its close-knit family.GIBBON CALLS RING OUTGibbon song once inspiredthe ancient poets of China,their glorious callsechoing far across the hills.But now, new, strangely quiet forests have come to Yunnan.These trees are here to producean important and valuable crop. When the tree bark is scored,it yields copious sticky sap,so bitter and tackythat nothing can feed on it.It's the tree's naturaldefence against attack.It's collected daily,bowl by bowl.It will be boiled and processed into one of the most important materials to a fast developing nation - rubber. The expansion of the rubberforests began in the 's when China, under a world rubber embargo,had to become self-sufficientin this vital product.Beijing turned to the only place where rubber could grow,the tropical south of Yunnan.With efficiency and speed,some of the world's richest forests were torn up and burned.Replaced with mile upon mileof rubber plantation.But there was a problemfor the rubber growers.While Yunnan's uniquenatural forestscan survive on the valleyslopes which stretch to the north... ..just one severe frost will kill off these delicate rubber trees.So Yunnan's terrain puts a limit on how far the plantations can spread, halting at leasttheir northwards advance.The jungles of Yunnanare increasingly under pressure. HORN BEEPSNew roads criss-crossthe tiny remnant forests,the infrastructure needed for trade, industry and, increasingly, tourism. It's a meeting of two verydifferent worlds.ELEPHANT TRUMPETSThat elephants still exist in China is remarkableconsidering the immense pressuresin the world's most highlypopulated country.The or so wild elephantswhich still live hereare now strictly protected.And each year youngare born to the small herds.If elephants were to survive anywhere in China,it could only have been here,in Yunnan.The same mountains which guidethe monsoon rains northand which made Joseph Rock's journeys so treacherous,also guarded Yunnan's forestsand its wildlife.ELEPHANTS GRUNT AND TRUMPETFor the moment, the mountains are still carpeted in a rich green, deceptive in its simplicity.Below the canopy lies perhapsChina's richest natural treasure. Delicate and unique,a complex world of intricate relationshipsbetween animals, plants and people,beneath the clouds.For our troubled but beautiful motherlandVCTT proundly presentsMore information:you have any questionpls feel free to let us know.。