Planet Ant: Life Inside the Colony

Shown as part of BBC4’s insect-examining ‘Alien Nation’ season, this lavish hour-and-a-half nature documentary goes deeper underground than Jamiroquai (yup, we made that reference). Typically, the closest we can get to seeing an ant colony at work is by observing what happens above ground.

The sell here is that entomologist Dr George McGavin and Professor Adam Hart bring us into the fabulous organisational processes that bind a million ants by recreating a colony in a lab. The incumbent leafcutter ants who populate this recreated subterranean network of tunnels are the stars, but this isn’t simply the insect version of ‘Big Brother’ (appealing though that may sound). There’s plenty to marvel at – from the division of labour and the many caste systems at work, to worship of the queen ant, and most remarkably, watching a whole colony come together after an Amazonian flood to form one tight and unsinkable raft.