Okay.
This is just way too cool in order not to show it to you.
Watch this super close up of a crocodile resting in its cave.
It's scary.
So why am I showing you this?
Because Okavango’s crocodiles are incredible,
but they're also one of the most ferocious animals in the region.
And they have hardly ever been filmed like this before.
This is really unique footage. And the reason is
that it's simply too dangerous to get that close to them.
The nile crocodile is the largest crocodilian in Africa
and the second largest in the world right after the saltwater crocodile.
These reptilian giants primarily feed on fish, but they also
prey on antelope, risking a drink at the shores of the river.
The crocodile is, in fact, massive.
It can grow up to six meters and weigh up to 1000 kilograms.
It has a powerful bite force of over 5000 PSI.
Enough to crush the bones of its prey
and the size of a crocodile is determined by age.
The older a crocodile, the larger it is,
and they can get really old with a lifespan of up to 100 years.
There's a general animosity against nile crocodiles,
which stems from their reputation as Maneater.
Which is not entirely unjustified.
Despite most attacks going unreported,
the nile crocodile is estimated to kill hundreds of people each year,
which is more than all other crocodilian species combined.
And nile crocodiles aren't particularly more likely to behave
aggressively to humans.
Unlike other men eating crocodiles
it lives in close proximity to human populations through most of his range.
So conflict is simply more frequent.
But what makes the Nile crocodile truly remarkable is its ability
to adapt to all different environments and situations.
It's the most common crocodilian in Africa, and it's distributed throughout
much of the entire continent, from several pockets along the Nile
and its tributaries to the heart of Africa
around Lake Victoria, all the way down to the South African coast.
Its most peculiar behaviors and movements, however, can be seen in the Okavango delta
but it's a super difficult terrain, so it's incredibly hard to film them there.
And our crew tried the easier way, setting up camera traps
and putting out GoPros across the river.
Almost all of them got lost, most of them claimed by the crocodiles themselves.
So yes, that's when we knew we have to find another, more challenging, way
for these perfect underwater close ups.
But what makes the Okavango crocodile so special?
Why is it so hard to film the crocodiles below the surface?
For this, one has to understand what the Okavango is and how it works.
It's not a regular delta, as in a river that simply discharges into the sea.
It's a unique wetland that forms when the river flows
into a landlocked basin, in northern Botswana.
The water comes as rain and its source over
700 kilometers upstream in the highlands of Angola.
It starts with a massive flood pushing in over
11 trillion liters of water each year.
It takes a single raindrop six months to travel the full course
of the Okavango River, and the water spreads over an area of over 15,000 square
kilometers, creating a mosaic of channels, islands, lagoons and swamps.
The water level is moving constantly, depending on seasonal rainfall.
But the designers of this river are these gentle giants -
the elephants.
As they glide through the vast beds along the river,
they smash open paths and eat their way through the soft vegetation
carving channels that the water flow follows.
Their constant movement leaves behind them bigger and bigger highways in the reeds,
creating a mosaic of paths and a complex river system in the Okavango.
It's landscape architecture on the grand scale,
and the nile crocodile has learned to live with these changes
by adjusting its activity, patterns and movements.
They use this complex system of murky waters, channels and underwater tunnels
to hide and simply wait for their food to be served.
Because quite like above,
below the surface the Okavango is full of life and exactly this underwater biosphere
and a crocodile in the midst of it is what we wanted to get on camera.
And since the Go-Pros didn't work, we knew we had to get our crew in there,
at least the brave ones.
The underwater view of the Okavango is mostly unknown, same for our camera crew.
And distractions in these waters can be fatal.
We chose mid-winter to shoot the crocs
in the hope that the cold water will make them lethargic.
But that didn't really work out as planed.
See this guy here?
This is Sven. He did a PhD on crocodiles
and he was not happy at all.
He thought it was just too dangerous in there.
So he decided to get the crew out of the water and push on.
See, the real quest was to find the perfect spot with all boxes checked.
Sandy, bottom water for clarity.
Not fast flowing for steady camera control, but deep enough
so it's cold - for safety - you know to make them lethargic.
And obviously the lead actor in it.
So with crocodiles, not an easy task at all since spots like these can only be
found in the mostly uncharted channels, which are obviously hard to reach.
The ever-changing swamp can open and close channels on a daily basis.
So we need the help of some inventive methods
like drone navigation and some extra pushes by force.
At some point, Sven, our croc specialists, thought to have identified the ideal spot.
So the crew went in. There were caves
and underwater labyrinths used by gigantic crocodiles.
They could just suddenly appear like battleships above you.
Some of them were over six meters long and three times
the size of the diver, you would never know when one of them would show up.
And as soon as one of them was spotted,
the crew had to wait and see in order to find out how lethargic it is.
This one was not lethargic enough. Our crew had no choice
but to get in deeper and carefully scan the labyrinth underwater.
And they had to do this again and again, each time getting closer
to the perfect shot.
Every single movement, every shadow.
or drifting leaf can scare you to death down there.
It took months and a lot of courage, but over time
our crew managed to get some and amazing scenes of crocodiles
and other life of Okavango’s underwater world.
And believe me, some outstanding ones from above.
Because even the apex predator here has to watch his back.
But that's a different story.
Watch our video here and subscribe to stay tuned.
There are so many videos to come.