New ABC wildlife documentary series The Kimberley captures rarely seen animals and locations

West Australian

20-05-2025

When it comes to ambitious wildlife documentaries, you'd be forgiven for imagining sweeping vistas of the Serengeti, with its massive herds in a daily dance of life and death with big cats.
You might be surprised to learn there's an untamed ecosystem 30 times as big as the Serengeti, and exponentially more diverse, right on our doorstep – the Kimberley.
The 400,000sqkm of this biological ark, stretching from turquoise coast to searing desert, is the subject of a groundbreaking three-part documentary series.
The ABC series captures never-before-seen behaviour of animals that are found nowhere else on the planet, in locations that have previously only been seen by the Traditional Owners of the land, making this must-see TV for nature lovers.
It's story takes place over a full year, following the six seasons observed by the Nyikina people, starting in Lalin, the peak of the dry season, when parched wallabies risk ending up as lunch for crocs to get a drink of water.
After the build-up of Jirrbal, flooding rains eventually come during Wilakarra, transforming the landscape and bringing new challenges for its inhabitants, before the calendar turns to Koolawa, which reveals the region at its most bountiful.
A cool change arrives with Barrkana, heralding the appearance of humpbacks from Antarctica to give birth in warmer waters, although the mercury soon rises again with Willbooroo, shrinking the vast wetlands once more.
Hosted by Mystery Road: Origin star and Nyikina man Mark Coles Smith, The Kimberley series combines local knowledge from the Traditional Owners with scientific experts to give viewers a rich understanding of the region's significance.
Filmmaker Nick Robinson dragged $80,000 worth of camera equipment through some of the most inaccessible wilderness on Earth to create the series, and said pulling off such an ambitious project took 40 per cent planning and 60 per cent getting lucky.
Perhaps the best example of getting lucky is a scene in Episode 1, in which a crocodile stalks a wallaby. Unbelievable footage that was made possible by a chance encounter with a local fisherman.
'I've been filming crocodiles my whole life, for the last 20 years, because television just can't get enough of them,' Robinson said.
'So I've been to film crocodiles everywhere, and I feel like I've been to the best places … and I've spent months just trying to get that kind of behaviour and never got it.
'(In the Kimberley) we shot that in five days, and I've never shot anything like that.'
While it's hard for Robinson to narrow down the flora and fauna he's most proud of capturing in the series, there is one animal that does stand out – the critically endangered nabarlek.
The marsupial is so rare that it had never been caught on broadcast-quality cameras before, something Robinson's team achieved after camping for a week on the beach of an uninhabited island with ecologist Ian Bool.
'It's almost a mythical creature if you're a biologist because it doesn't exist on the mainland anywhere, you never see them,' Robinson said.
But, in the end, the mythical nabarlek came to them.
'A wild nabarlek, just hopping around the tents,' Robinson laughed.
'I think it took five days of being there before the nabarlek showed itself.
'And on that fifth day, a couple of nabarleks, a baby and an adult, came out and sat and hopped around in front of the camera.'
Robinson hoped the series will make Australians realise the Kimberley is every bit as deserving as the Serengeti when it comes to the world's greatest natural wonders.
'The Kimberley is probably the last, great, tropical, wild land on Earth,' he said.
'There'd be nowhere on the planet that's as wild and has the potential to remain wild like that place.'