The 'Trilogy of Life': 'Walking with Beasts' Quiz

Answer: Gastornis

Depicted as a carnivore, Gastornis was two meters tall and made mince meat of the early mammals, easily towering them. In this episode, a mother Gastornis is taking care of a single egg. Being such a large creature, her nest was on the ground instead of the trees, leaving it vulnerable to attack, by giant killer ants.

A victim of Gastornis was the early horse called Propalaeotherium, a horse the size of a house cat. Unfortunate as the horse got intoxicated by eating fermented grapes, thus making it a victim of alcohol and the bird.

Recent fossil evidence has changed the perception of Gastornis, with the creature having no clawed feet and a beak similar to parrots, Gastornis is now considered a herbivore that can tackle tough vegetation.

Answer: 'Walking Whale'

As amazing as it seems, Ambulocetus was the precursor to all whales, despite being able to walk on land. The episode showed the Ambulocetus living like a crocodile, feeling more at home in the water than on the land.

'New Dawn' focused on the lives of a family of Leptictidium, small shrew-like mammals that hunted insects. They would dodge many calamities, such as Gastornis and Ambulocetus. The biggest case was of a huge carbon dioxide explosion from geysers under the lake the Ambulocetus resided in. It would kill many animals, and while the family of Leptictidium survived, they would face extinction. In the final scene, lies the dead Ambulocetus, but his descendants would breathe life, as they would become the mighty whales.

Answer: Basilosaurus

Basilosaurus was a long and slender primitive form of whale. This whale didn't have blubber and had a long jaw full of meat shearing teeth. It's name means 'King Lizard', due to early paleontologists classifying the bones as that of a sea serpent due to its long serpentine skeleton. We follow a pregnant Basilosaurus as she struggles to find food for her unborn calf.

Her desperations would force her to the shallow mangroves of Pakistan in search of a meal, before finally grabbing a bite out of Dorudon, a smaller species of whale.

Answer: Andrewsarchus

Andrewsarchus was the largest mammalian predator on the land, but with it's hooves, it wasn't a type of dog, wolf or fox, but it was closely related to sheep. Andrewsarchus was seen combing the beach for carrion, before venturing deeper inland for prey. It would find it in a primitive rhino called Brontothere, with its unusual paddle like horn.

By the end of the episode, Basilosaurus would give birth to her young offspring, but despite the new life, her future was bleak. The ocean famine she faced was caused by the freezing of the North and South poles, and her normal forms of prey would vanish from the warmer waters she's use to. Her kind would starve to extinction, while other toothed whales would move to the Arctic regions to thrive.

Answer: Rhinoceros

With a long neck and no horn, Paraceratherium was the largest mammal ever. A relative of rhinos, this beast towered over the competition, and was built strong enough to tackle the drought of the dry season. We follow a mother and her young calf as she raises him in the Mongolian badlands. Many terrors await the young family, from monstrous pig relatives called Entelodon, to even their own kind.

As the calf grows up, a threat in the form of a male Paraceratherium arrives, and he is in heat. After mating with the calf's mother, she begins to show aggression towards her calf, as she now must focus on her new offspring within. A parental bond shattered, but the young calf would survive, even headbutting a poor cameraman. Other magnificent beasts in Mongolia include the Calicotherium, a knuckle walking tree browser that lived like a panda, and yet is a close relative to horses, and the Hyaenodon, a large predator related to modern hyenas.

Answer: Hercules

In this episode, we follow a tribe's many ups and downs in the African Savanna. After being thrown out of their territory by a rival clan and their numbers dwindle due to malaria, Grey and his clan find a new home out in the open, but he is constantly pestered by Hercules, who shows his youthful strength and attitude against Grey.

After Hercules took first bite of a zebra carcass, Grey decided that he's had enough and attacked him, only for Hercules to overpower him with a stick to his head. Hercules would take over the clan and turn things around for them.

Answer: Blue

Blue had it rough, as his mother didn't teach him the social skills needed for living in the clan. At times he tried to socialize by grooming Grey, but when Hercules picks a fight with the old leader, Blue's attempt would be wasted. In the end, when Blue became vulnerable to attack by the big cat Dinofelis, the clan came together with stones to fend the predator away, saving the youngster. Blue finally felt like he belonged.

Along with the clan, the savanna was filled with many of our modern animals like zebra, vultures and rhinoceros, but other prehistoric creatures roamed, like Deinotherium, an odd ancestor to elephants, only much larger, with a short trunk, and tusks that grown from the lower jaw and face down. Occasionally tagging with the clan are Ansylotherium, a relative of the knuckle walking horses that are on the brink of extinction.

Answer: Half Tooth

Their leader is Half Tooth, an old male who has dominated this pride of Smilodon for years. But, a pair of rivals would come to try and take over his position, and they are brothers. They outnumber Half Tooth and he is forced to leave. The Brothers would then kill Half Tooth's cubs to gain favour from the females to mate, while Half Tooth struggled to scrape a living in the vast Brazilian plains.

Half Tooth also had to face competition in the form of a terror bird, Phorusrhacos, who is forced to scavenge the leftovers of Smilodon kills.

Answer: Megatherium

Megatherium was an elephant sized sloth that lived on plants and occasionally meat to augment its diet. In this case, after a successful hunt by the Smilodon, a lone Megatherium wanders to the corpse. Half Tooth would scurry away in a similar situation, but the Brothers did the unthinkable to face off against the sloth, and lose. With one powerful swipe, the sloth downs one of the Brothers and Half Tooth would seize the moment to take back his territory and his pride.

Doedicurus was a car-sized relative of the armadillo, with a massive spiked club at the end of its tail. Macrauchenia is a strange antelope-type mammal with a weird trunk-like nose. It was the most common form of prey for both Smilodon and the terror birds. Though, the thought of a Macrauchenia killing a Smilodon is somewhat funny if humiliating to the big cat.

Answer: Fire

Using fire to their advantage, the Neanderthals took their hunt of Mammoths by scaring them with the bright flames and throwing spears at them, before either succumbing to their injuries, or falling off the cliff. The thick fur, meat and bones of the Mammoths would be used for warmth, nourishment, and construction of new homes.

Other creatures roamed the cold ice age world, with Megaloceras, the largest deer ever existed with antlers over six feet long, and the Wooly Rhino, who gored a Neanderthal in one scene. But the world won't belong to the Neanderthals, it would be Homo Sapiens, our ancestors who reign supreme over the world, but as the series has shown, no species last forever.