Darwin's Swindlers

Consider the tree lobster, the Haleakala silversword or the Kakapo bird. The Irimote cat, the Amami rabbit or the Wollemi pine. Each of these unassuming species has a superpower, an ace up their sleeve, that has helped them break the rules of evolution as we know them. We expect successful, long lived species to be like us humans - dominant, numerous and shaping large habitats to our will. But hiding in far flung corners of the world are Darwin's swindlers - species that ought to have lost out in the game of natural selection but survive by subverting the usual tactics. Against all odds, they endure, even flourish, in splendid isolation. Tracing Darwin's footsteps from New Zealand to South America and beyond, ecologist Martinho-Truswell seeks out the places where animals and plants, like evolutionary tricksters, have evolve cultures, strategies and populations that are defying extinction, shedding fresh light on the universal struggle for life.