No man's land.
The Australian outback place too barren for human to cultivate
leaving that clear for the massed for insects.
At certain times
Australia locusts breed in unthinkable numbers.
Out here, though, they have little impact on the human world
the two dominant forces on the planet just each other by.
But when the young locus hoppers get their wings
head for places are at cultivated they clash with humans.
It's a plague... a war two very different world.
Army worm caterpillars of march in East Africa
that 'army' is too small for them.
Army worm moths reproduce in their billions
when conditions are just right.
The problem is that when humans plant crops
they create perfect conditions.
And when they've ravaged one field
they march to next a relentless tide eating machines.
African farmers suffer for years of drought alternant
with years of plague for it seems just can't win.
And it's not just farmers
insects have invaded city
since cities first exist
people have always fought back.
One of the longest running feuds has been with cockroaches.
They contaminate food, cause diseases and generally of human sensibilities.
Whenever and wherever humans have built homes
cockroaches have moved in with them.
Humans have invested much time
effort and technology into the ideal of a clear cockroach free world
but cockroaches appreciate human technology.
They live just as happily rigs
and nuclear submarine as in hotel basements.
Humans spend billions of pounds each year on this problem.
They've manufactured deadly chemicals
that can exterminate millions of but millions aren't enough.
Some always survive the few that are resistant
they and spawn whole new population of poison proof insects.
The war escalates more and more money
is spent on creating new
and ever more lethal chemicals.
Some of most dangerous substance ever known are insecticide.
In trying to live insect lives
humans saturate the homes
their fields the world with toxins.
Perhaps, after all
sophisticated chemical engineering can never be final solution.
Despite all human ingenue
there's still only one guaranteed method of kill cockroach.
Some of the worst insects problems of all are create
when humans take insects places they shouldn't be
Tiger mosquitoes, for example
have been accidentally introduced the United States from Asia
They breed in still water.
Any still water
And the small pools that collect in old tires are perfect
So perfect, that old tyre dumps in the southern can swarm
with tiger mosquitoes and their larvae
It's a problem that human scientists take very seriously.
Tiger mosquitoes carry Dengue fever.
It doesn't in the United States now
someone brought the disease into the country
there've shortage of mosquitoes waiting to create an epipvamp
They identify their human victims by the carbon die in their breath
and they're programme with frightening efficient
to lock onto their target.
The solution to the timosquito problem isn't chemical on
that's been tried it's biological
Its another mosquito 'toxorhynchites' 'tox' short.
It's also from South East an ancient enemy of the tiger mosquito.
Released into the tyre they perform an aerial
as they scatter their're the water surface.
This graceful dance is prelude to underwater carnage.
The 'tox' eggs hatch in voracious larvae devour other mosquito larvae.
They're insatiable.
But they'll never complete wipe out tiger mosquito
a few will always survive.
The need for biological control is becoming more urgent
gypsy moths will introduced into North America from Europe.
Will no enemies, no competitor no diseases
there was nothing to hold them back
Their caterpillars eat foliage
any foliage
and can straight forest bare a drastic solution was needed.
In this laboratory
four million gypsy moth caterpillars bred every year
and deliberately infected with virus
live only to this kind of caterpillar.
They're living incubator
the virus multiplies inside then
When this virus eventual kills them
the bodies pulped to make a concentrated virus sprae
a biological weapon to use
against the caterpillars stripping the trees.
It's a continuous process
every day containers of artificial receive yet gypsy moth eggs.
It's a race between the power of insects and the ingenuity of humans.
The insects have the power to destroy entire commercial plantations.
Humans have the power to destroy the insects.
Helicopters soak the form with the viral spray.
But technology works two ways.
As plague rains down from one human invention
another one offers gyps moths the chance to escape
Guided by scent adult moths find females
wherever they are.
Females can't fly
they cool until they find a vertical surface.
Normally they their eggs on tree trunk but a car is even better.
The car can take this new generation far away from plague zone
into a new virus free forest.
Another outbreak begins
but it's not always worms when humans meet insect.
Sometimes
insects can be used to human advantage.
This is a plague of mopane worms
big African caterpillars that devastate mopane bushes.
Humans can't eat mopane bushes but they can eat mopane worms.
At certain times of the year
they're harvested by the bucketful by the sackful
Charcoal grilled
they're instant packets of protect people in parts of Bots.
In fact so many are drive and stored
that they pick up to a third of the protect the human diet.
Insects make good eating it's only Western culture
don't recognize their value
In Thailand
succulent bamboo worms another kind of caterpillar a harvested
from inside a bamboo shoot.
They'll be steamed
and so then in the market alongside water bugs
that are drive like little turkeys them be biting back.
And if the mole cricket still kicking
they must fresh.
Hornet grubs, about the same size as prawns, are steamed in the nest.
Insects are eaten in the world over except in the West.
This is strange
as lob crabs and prawns are no much different from insect
and snails and mussels expensive delicacies.
Yet insects are easier to have and healthier to eat.
Despite the increase in foreign holidays
and cotact between different cultural the West
has yet to real that insects are delicious.
And Westerners don't of gamble on insects either.
But in Thailand
male role beetles are set on special logs
and encouraged to fight
They do fight
because there's a female sealed inside the log.
The winning beetle is the one of
that throws his opponent the log.
Insects here are part of entertainment business
champion beetle can provide a nice profit for his owner.
But these are even more profitable
the basis national industry
Silkworms
Silkworms eat nothing but mulberry leaves
so the factories are surrounded by huge areas of mulberry bushes
where humans labour like slaves to the caterpillars.
These insects are as domesticated as cows
they're totally depended humans.
And the human economy here depends on the insects
an ancient partnership has shaped human culture
for over a thousand years.
Once they're fully grow caterpillars spin their precious strands
as the build their cocoons
this balls of silk threads a sole reason
for such devotion to the caterpillar.
The cocoons are unwound by hand
each is made single unbroken silk up to half a mile long.
Then the strands are spin again
this time to human specifications
and finally
they're into something everyone recognizes as silk.
Human insect partnership do more than just support industries
they support entire ways of life.
In the United States
team of farm workers are truck to the fields.
Leafcutter bees as much part of the cattle induce cowboys.
These are solitary bees
Each lives iown tsunnel
which it stocks with pollen feed its own family.
As they set out to find provisions
they polling vast fields of alfalfa as a diet of cattle.
Alfalfa was the biggest crops in the United States
this in could not continue with bees.
And when they've finish this field
they'll be travel on to the next one.
The bees are just as have to occupy
of these artificial apartment blocks as any natural holes and crevice
especially as they're prepare with bright patterns
cocoons codes to help each bee its own nest.
Leafcutter bees are receive patterns
humans have destroyed
so many wild populations of insects with their chemical sprays
now having to forge new relationships.
But there's one insect the humans have admired
cultivated even worship from before the dawn history.
Honeybees.
Until recently
honeybees sweetest thing humans have ever tasted
it seemed like a gift from the gods.
Honeybees are big business now a multi million ponds industry.
But honeybees very well out of this partnership.
They're giving homes, are transported round the world
they've more abundant now than they would ever be with humans.
This respectful, caring relationship is how it should be
how has to be, with most insects.
Humans do realize how much they need insects.
Even so
the human attitude to insects is shaped
more by the few that are pests hostility
and indifferent than by the knowledge the humanity relies on insect
It can't survive without them
The problem is that human know so little about insects
most of what they do know about anything
is represented in the world universities and museums
those monuments to human knowledge
and belief in dominance over the nature world.
Billions of specimens far drawers and on shelves
stored in basements and vaults.
Almost every one of the world's birds or mammal, for example
is represented somewhere by a specimen in some museum.
It might seem that all nature has been classified and labelled
but nothing could be further from the truth.
In all the cabinets, in all museums in all the world
there are some one million different kinds of insects
maybe thirty million are yet undiscovered.
Quite unknown.
They live out their live oblivious to science
supporting the human race ways people can't yet comprehend.
Even in the depths of a museum
insects have no respect for science
museum beetles feed on dead matter
and neatly arranged specimens are sacred.
Unchecked, these beetles can destroy knowledge itself.
Some insects it seems can survive anywhere on anything.
But the majority of inssects are fragile creatures
Even it's destroyed.
As humans eliminate wilderness in their drive dominate the planet
the of them and the dread of them are on every beast the Earth.
Hundreds, if not thousand of insect species
become extinct each year.
Tragically, most of the have never been glimpse by human eyes
and now that privilege is gone ever.
Yet, if all insects were destroyed tomorrow
human could not hope to survive without them.
They break down waste matter
pollure crops and keep the human race from starvation.
Insects, though, would scarcely notice
if human disappeared tomorrow
into of the world, their planet.