Episode 1

Meet the remarkable members of this 37-strong family.

5000 metres up on the Tibetan plateau, the Tibetan fox makes up for her small body with her extraordinary oversized, oversquare face. The shape is for camouflage: she can blend amongst the rocks but still spy on her prey. She doesn’t eat the meal all at once: she has a family to feed, and both she and her mate are on hunting duty. Thanks to care from both parents, their tiny pups will have the best chance of survival up here too.

The smallest canid of all – barely eight inches tall – goes head-to-head with the Sahara desert. The fennec fox must survive against the odds. Despite her tiny size, she makes up for it with serious hardware. Her oversized ears are for cooling: as temperatures reach high forties degree centigrade, the network of veins in her ears reduce her body temperature. And unlike all other desert-living carnivores, the lack of water in the desert doesn’t faze her either: her kidneys conserve water gleaned from the food she eats. This tiny dog has tamed the desert!

In the forests of southern India, dholes are surrounded by intimidating and hostile creatures – including elephants and tigers. Even if they’re lucky enough to catch a deer it might be stolen by a leopard. Dholes must rely on their wits to survive, and they do it by banding together and talking to each other. They have eleven different calls – yaps, whistles, barks, squeals, screams, and whines. This programme follows a pack, tunes in to their chat, and sees how they thrive in the forest.

Every family has an unusual cousin, and canids are no exception: the Maned Wolf looks nothing like a wolf, more like a fox on stilts. Standing 3ft tall, the tallest of all dogs, this strange creature is definitely out on a limb. He is, in fact, neither wolf nor fox, but a distinct species evolved to live in the grassy savannas of South America. 50 percent of his diet is fruit, with a penchant for lobeira berries – aptly named ‘fruit of the wolf’.

The latest scientific revelations provide fresh perspectives on characters who constantly surprise us with their diversity and their unusual behaviour. These are the world’s ultimate canids.