The Beeb do wildlife shows like no one else. Exciting, informative and easy watching. Secret Life of Elephants was an entertaining way to pass the time. I got to watch as the elephants went about their day, doing elephanty things and was kept interested for the most part. Almost enough to forgive its failings.

After a recent drought, the Save The Elephants team were anxious to make sure all of them were safe. Luckily, most of them were fine and the babies were all OK (I have to admit, I was pretty worried – those baby elephants are cute!) Everyone seemed fine except poor little Mirrow who’d hurt her leg. She was limping and couldn’t keep up with everyone else.

So, it was down to the elephant team to save her. Hurrah! Except that this wasn’t any normal wildlife show rescue. It appeared to be produced by the Eastenders team. So instead of seeing what happened to the poor little tyke, the story switched completely and focused on a bull elephant and whether or not he was going to get laid. Hang on just a second, BBC! I was watching the story about the cute baby! Bring her back! I didn’t appreciate the soap opera style filming at all.

When they finally did pan back to Mirrow, it was all very dangerous and her tranquilised mother managed to fall onto her chest and stop breathing. Everyone was very worried indeed, but then with the help of a car to pull her over, it was all fine. Some anti-biotics for baby and she was out of the woods too. Her broken leg should heal just fine. Although she was stupid and thought a truck was her mummy when she came around. That was quite funny. They were about the same size. Female elephants weight about three ton apparently. Wow.

It’s clear to see that without people to help them, these elephants would be in even more danger. You never get to see the people who help when you watch David Attenborough. Seeing poached elephants, and the teams of people who live in Kenya and save the elephants lives was a great insight. If only I could have got past the soap opera feeling I’m sure I would have enjoyed it much more.

Oh, in case you were wondering, the bull elephant did get laid in the end. It was a bit like when Scott and Charlene finally got together in Neighbours.

Flickr image from exfordy’s photostream.