Why are only popular animals shown in most wildlife documentaries?

Their purpose is not necessarily to inform, it’s to make money. They do this by producing entertaining programming that draws viewers so they can sell more commercial ads. Popular, cute, charismatic animals attract viewers and help make money. Unpopular animals, by definition, will be less popular, and you can see how this is at cross-purposes to the goal of making money.

The same is true of the news industry, which entertains, inflames, and titillates, but seldom actually informs anymore, because becoming informed is hard. It’s easier to be mad or scared or holier-than-thou, so that’s what they pander to, to draw viewers and make money.

@laureth Good point! but those channels don’t show any economic commercials other than their regular showtime schedules.

Its because people love megafauna like that and never get tired of watching it. I, like you would rather learn about the random weird things too.

While you wont learn a whole lot from it as there is no narration, if you want to see a truly awesome documentary on insects that arent the usual featured creatures I highly suggest you check out microcosmos. Absolutely beautifully shot movie. Its on netflix instant view right now too

There are so many species, that they do have to make choices on what will appeal to the market. I am certain they have so much footage to choose through that include some of those that you listed and more.
It is about what they compress into a show and time that will do best and return the highest view numbers.

ohhh yea it also has one of the funniest scenes ive ever seen in a documentary

@Your_Majesty – When choosing which channels and time slots to buy for commercial time, companies will look at how many people are viewing, to make sure they get a good number of eyeballs looking at their ads. This is why commercials during the Super Bowl are like millions of dollars for half a minute, and why air time on weird channels late at night is so cheap that it can be bought in half-hour blocks to present “infomercials” (which are like half-hour long commercials for products).

The more popular shows, perhaps featuring trendy animals, can command more money from advertisers, since the advertisers are getting more audience, who in turn run out and buy the product (they hope), thereby paying, indirectly, for the programming.

Because we live in a capitalist society and popularity sells.

Hmm… Can you say Meerkat Manor? Many animals don’t get to become “popular” until they’re well known.

Here’s the Honey Badger too.

We are biased in our preference for animals. Expect more stories about mammals than fish or reptiles. Do not expect any time soon to see a show about naked mole rats

@CWOTUS I don’t like to watch Meerkat Manor. I think they choose meerkat merely because they’re more good-looking than other animals. Meerkat aren’t that tough and they will avoid conflict with cobra when they meet one. I prefer banded mongooses(they need to put a show about these creatures) since they’re fiercer and will kill cobra for daily meal.

I don’t watch AP that much anymore since it’s designed for kids now. NGW is more wild and hardcore for wildlife channel.

Charismatic megafauna, Flagship species and Keystone species do seem to get most of the attention, but it’s like how many characters can you introduce before people stop caring. Snow leopards are not economically viable to try and get video of, because they are so rare. Of course scientist would love to document all these creatures, the rare, the unpopular and the elusive—but where do you think they get the funding? If you want to see African pearl quails ante up.

It’s hard to study rare animals or species going extinct [they are preserved by laws and it’s annoying to disrupt them just so we can see them more often].

david attenborough to the rescue.

@CWOTUS never saw that honey badger thing before. That was hilarious :P

Yeah, I found it via a friend’s Facebook wall. He finds some offbeat shit, for sure. The honey badger was a hoot. I’m glad you liked it.

A great series for things not usually seen is Planet Earth or another one is Life. Also, I haven’t found any DVD copies of if, but Weird Nature has some fun clips on youtube.