How Bear Grylls the Born Survivor roughed it - in hotels

But it has emerged that far from roughing it in brutal environments, the former SAS man actually spent nights in hotels during filming of his Channel 4 show.

The Eton- educated 33-year- old is also alleged to have choreographed parts of Born Survivor, with many of his spectacular stunts carefully set up by the production crew.

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Channel 4 last night began an investigation into the claims, which follow a number of embarrassing incidents in which programmes screened by the station were found to have misled the public.

Grylls's show attracted 1.4million viewers when it was shown in March and April, with audiences enthralled as he demonstrated gruesome survival tips that included sucking the fluid from fish eyeballs and squeezing water from animal dung.

But an adviser to Born Survivor yesterday claimed that many of his other escapades were not exactly as they seemed on TV.

In one episode filmed in California's Sierra Nevada mountains he was shown biting off the head of a snake for breakfast and boasting that he was living on 'just a water bottle, a cup and a flint for making fire'.

Viewers were not told that he was actually spending some nights in the Pines Resort hotel at Bass Lake, where the rooms have Internet access and is advertised as 'a cosy getaway for families' complete with blueberry pancakes for breakfast.

In another episode when Grylls declared he was a 'real life Robinson Crusoe' stuck on a desert island, he was actually on an outlying part of the Hawaiian archipelago and retired to a motel at nightfall.

Mark Weinert, a survival consultant brought in for the programme, said one show also wrongly gave the impression that the adventurer built a Polynesian- style raft using only materials around him, including bamboo and palm leaves for a sail.

Mr Weinert had in fact led a team that built the raft, which was then dismantled so that Grylls could be shown constructing it on camera.

In another episode, Grylls was filmed attempting to lasso 'wild' mustang in the Sierra Nevada, when the horses were actually tame and had been brought in by trailer from a nearby trekking station.

'If you really believe everything happens the way it is shown on TV, you are being a little bit naive,' Mr Weinert told the Sunday Times.

Channel 4 confirmed that Grylls had used hotels during expeditions and ordered the production company that made the programme to investigate the other claims.

A spokesman said: 'We take any allegations of misleading our audiences seriously.

'Bear does do all his own stunts and does put himself in perilous situations.

'But Born Survivor is not an observational documentary series but a "how to" guide to basic survival techniques in extreme environments. The programme explicitly does not claim that presenter Bear Grylls's experience is one of unaided solo survival.'

Grylls had earlier told how Channel 4 bosses had pitched the series to him, saying: 'We just drop you into a lot of different hellholes equipped with nothing, and you do what you have to do to survive.'

Last week Channel 4 had to apologise after it emerged that when Gordon Ramsay was shown appearing to spear a sea bass off the English coast for an episode of The F Word, the scene had been faked.

This month, the operators of the Richard & Judy premium rate TV quiz were hit with a record fine of £150,000 for a phone-in scandal.

Viewers had been urged to call in to the competition even though the shortlist of winners was closed.