Polecat
Planet Doc
Another day is coming to an end. The temperature starts to fall, and the different species that live on the peninsula take advantage of the final minutes of light before returning to their burrows.
The beaches of the Valdés Peninsula are steeply sloped, so just a few metres offshore the killer whales can swim quite freely. This characteristic allows the predators to patrol the coast, and use a hunting technique which is unique in the world. The killer whales localise the sea lions on the shore and, once they have chosen their target, launch themselves onto the beach. They will be stranded on the sand, but with the slope it won’t be too difficult to return to the water.
Young and adults practice the manoeuvres several times on the deserted beach. If they don’t become expert in the technique, the risk of becoming stranded forever on land is very high.
The young also have to learn that this technique only works at high tide. At low tide, the beaches are not sufficiently sloped to be able to successfully carry out an attack. If they try, they will almost certainly get stuck long before reaching the shore.
Little by little, the family of killer whales moves away from the coast, closely watched by the penguins and the sea lions, who finally can return to the water. The young, like those of any species, take advantage of the rest to play together, while the group moves off into the sea.
Another day is coming to an end. The temperature starts to fall, and the different species that live on the peninsula take advantage of the final minutes of light before returning to their burrows.
Slowly, calm returns to the waters of the peninsula. Penguins, sea lions and elephant seals have returned to the shore to spend the night. Only the whales break the silence of the dusk.
The Valdés Peninsula is today a unique and irreplaceable refuge for the wildlife of South America. Human presence, the first signs of which date back 3,200 years, has not managed to destroy this natural paradise. After many years of hunting and cattle farming, the Argentinean government decided to protect the Peninsula, and turned it into a Wildlife Reserve. Another Eden had been saved.
Today, the whaling ships have been replaced by boats carrying tourists from all corners of the world. Tourist who come here to see this remote peninsula, which in the past the sailors called the refuge of the monsters.