'First Animals' - A New Documentary On Early Life From CBC's "The Nature of Things"

CBC's The Nature of Things is airing its documentary 'First Animals', a look into early life Friday, October 25th, 2019 at 9 PM on CBC-TV.

- First Animals episode description on CBC's website.

Here are links to several of their blog posts:


Meet the weird, wacky and wonderful creatures that lived in Cambrian seas over 500 million years ago - by Graham Duggan

High in Canada’s Rocky Mountains, the animals of an ancient ecosystem can be seen battling for life. The fossils of the Burgess Shale offer a glimpse at the incredible diversity of early life on Earth, frozen in time and locked in stone — you just have to go digging to see it. (Click here for more...)

The ROM quarry site
The ROM quarry site high up in the Rocky Mountains.


Paleontologist scales the Rocky Mountains to uncover Earth’s very first animals - by Jean-Bernard Caron, Richard M. Ivey Curator of Invertebrate Palaeontology at the Royal Ontario Museum

It’s 6:53 a.m. on Aug. 19, 2019. My body is primed to wake up — I beat my alarm clock by a couple of minutes. All is peace and quiet. The air inside the tent is cold, and it takes some conscious effort to abandon my cozy sleeping bag. As I step out of my tent, I am taken aback by the breathtaking mountainous scenery. Enchanting! What new secrets will these mountains reveal today? (Click here for more...)

Paleontologist scales the Rocky Mountains to uncover Earth’s very first animals
Royal Ontario Museum basecamp, Kootenay National Park, B.C. Elevation: 2,500 metres.


Uncovering Mother Nature’s crazy experimental phase over half a billion years ago - by Maydianne C.B. Andrade, presenter of First Animals

Last summer, among the high peaks of the Rocky Mountains, I joined Jean-Bernard Caron, curator of invertebrate paleontology at the Royal Ontario Museum, and a crew of experts and volunteers as they picked their way up the sharply angled slopes to a small quarry. There, evolutionary history was being unearthed from some very special rocks. (Click here for more...)

500-million-year-old fossils from the Burgess Shale


- Airing Friday, October 25, 2019 at 9 PM on CBC-TV (Episode available within Canada only - CBC)

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