Episode Information

Join us in the vast wilderness of Alaska. For eight months of each year the land is locked in the icy grip of winter – temperatures can plunge to -60C, deep snow carpets the frozen ground, and lakes and rivers lie sealed under a mantle of thick ice. The film explores how the plants and animals have evolved to cope with the unrelentingly harsh climate.

During the short warmth of spring, an explosion of plant life races to exploit the short growing season and spectacular numbers of migrant birds and animals move in to breed and feed during this brief time of plenty. But soon the animals sense that they must prepare for the onslaught of winter.

Birds become restless and start to leave in huge numbers heading for warmer climate, caribou abandon the bleak tundra plains and trek south to the shelter of their forested wintering grounds, and grizzly bears fatten themselves prior to their long winter sleep. Once again the Arctic Wilderness becomes rigorously cold and inhospitable as the long dark winter sets in...