MUMBAI: Animal Planet will air the show Equator every Tuesday at 9 pm.

The Equator is the climatic and evolutionary powerhouse of the world. The sun burns at its most intense and for animals this is both a blessing and a curse. This show examines animal and plant life in six of the world's equatorial 'hot zones'.

These are the Rift Valley in Africa, the Amazon Basin, the peaks of the Andes, Southeast Asia, Indo Pacific and the Galapagos Islands.

Equatorial animals live constantly in warm, humid surroundings. The downside of living in a tropical paradise is that animals have to share it with half of all the species on earth.

This means that the chances of being eaten are big. At the Equator animals and plants grow faster and bigger and more bizzarely than anywhere else.