Did you know - there is a dragonfly that migrates non-stop across the Indian Ocean every year? A journey fifty million times its body length. The common swift flies two million kilometres in its lifetime, around the same distance as two and a half trips to the moon and back. And hippos can’t breathe underwater but can sleep there.
These creatures all feature in a new BBC Radio 4 series, A Carnival of Animals. It’s written and voiced by author Katherine Rundell. BBC Bitesize caught up with Katherine to find out more about these remarkable living things, their hidden stories, and why the series is so important to her.
Wooed by wildlife
From owls to orangutans, giraffes to glow-worms, as Katherine explains each episode of the series is “an exploration of a living creature”. Crucially, they are all linked by a common theme - each species, or sub-species, is endangered. You might think that this would make it difficult finding creatures to feature, but Katherine says in reality we are “living in an age of extinction.” She says: “We have in the last 50 years lost more than half of all wild things, and Britain is one of the most nature depleted countries on Earth.”
The writer’s aim for the series is to “do a sort of wooing…a bid for enchantment” so that people can learn more about some remarkable animals at risk. She says: “As a species, humans aren’t enormously well educated about the other species with which we share the extraordinary planet on which we stand.”
“Making the familiar strange”
But how do you make people care more about these animals that are at threat? Katherine explains: “The plan was to make the familiar, like pigs and chickens, strange and make the strange vivid and fresh.” She hopes that this will help us love these animals because in her words love is an “urgent first step on the road to preservation”.
Image caption, Rufous Hummingbird
Some humming birds beat their wings at least 50 times per second. The rufous hummingbird has lost more than two-thirds of it’s population in the last fifty years.
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“It is such a joy to do the research”
The series is full of amazing facts and remarkable stories. There’s the pot-bellied pig that effectively saved its owner’s life. The pet owl of artist Picasso, and the glow-worms used by WW1 soldiers to read maps. But how do you collect such a huge amount of awe-inspiring information? Katherine tells us she started by reading texts one on specific subject, like a particular species of snake. Then her search would extend to looking through archives for relevant news articles and speaking to scientists.
This often led to having a lot of information to cut down, and as Katherine explains “sometimes one of your favourite stories just has to go.” One story Katherine had to cut was about elk. She can’t help but tell us though: “It was believed that as a defence mechanism, elk used to suck in water through their mouths then boil it in their stomachs, keep it at boiling temperature, and then spew the boiling water back out as a form of defence.” What a story to have to leave out of the series, but we’ll take the exclusive!
Fact meeting fiction, and it’s no fantasy
Katherine is the author of various books including the fantasy fiction Impossible Creatures, and its 2025 follow up The Poisoned King. Both feature mythical animals like griffins and phoenix. She says: “I have often stolen the behaviours of real life creatures to make more real mythical creatures… when I write about mythical birds like the phoenix, I think about the swift. I think about the ways that it moves through the sky, in ways that would almost seem impossible to us.”
On the other hand, animals that are already extinct take on a certain mythical quality - like the dodo for example. Does Katherine worry the amazing animals in this Radio 4 series could actually become extinct?
“The onus is on us to make sure that doesn’t happen, because we have lost so much already. I think it is very possible that 50 years from now some of the creatures I’m talking about in the series will be gone,” she says.
Image caption, Orangutans
The endangered orangutan is one of Katherine’s favourite animals. However, she says it is better for the planet and for them, that she views them only from a far.
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“No one person can save everything, everyone can save something”
Katherine has to carefully balance the delight and wonder of the animals in the series, while also making the danger they face very apparent. But that can leave people feeling powerless.
Katherine has some advice for young people who feel that way when they hear about endangered animals:
“You can take small actions because small actions are contagious. Our hope must be active hope. Refuse to give up, talk to each other. Make it clear to people around you that this is important… even if you think you’re just talking to people who already agree with you, in a hard world we need to reassure each other… when it looks hard, that is a great chorus to have singing.”
A Carnival of Animals begins broadcasting on Radio 4, weekdays from October 6th at 10:55am, and is available on BBC Sounds. There are also 3 online only episodes, featuring sharks, hedgehogs, and lemurs.
This article was written in October 2025
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