Speaker 1: Welcome to Creature feature production of iHeartRadio. I'm your host
Speaker 1: of Many Parasites, Katie Golden. I studied psychology and evolutionary biology,
Speaker 1: and today on the show, we're talking about glam rock animals.
Speaker 1: Animals who are glamorous and glitzy and on occasion also
Speaker 1: tough as a rock. From the shiny and splendiferous scale
Speaker 1: worms of the deep to scuba diving lizards, these animals
Speaker 1: all have one thing in common. They are one hundred
Speaker 1: percent glam Discover This Morris answer to the angel question
Speaker 1: was that Rainbowfish children's Book of Body Horror. Joining me
Speaker 1: today is friend of the pod podcast person frequent voice
Speaker 1: on Fake Doctor's Real Friends, DJ and twitch Man Dan L. Goodman.
Speaker 2: Hi, how's it going good?
Speaker 1: Do you mind if I call you Twitchman?
Speaker 2: Twitch Man? That is perfect? Twitch Man is excellent. I'm
Speaker 2: honored by the title.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I'm a pod woman. I feel like I
Speaker 1: missed the times where it's like like Blacksmith or you know,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean, Like when we have these
Speaker 1: these names like Lamplighter or they you know, like like
Speaker 1: we have podcaster, but like what about Podsmith.
Speaker 2: I was just thinking, how fun Podsmith would be psmith.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it sounds like real work, which it's not.
Speaker 2: I go to the kilns of pro tools and craft
Speaker 2: strong by hand.
Speaker 1: Had handblown podcast technically true because you know, you breathe
Speaker 1: out with your mouth as you make mouth sounds. Anyways,
Speaker 1: we are talking about glam rock animals, animals who are glamorous,
Speaker 1: incredible looking. The rock stars of the natural Kingdom and
Speaker 1: their glitzy and glamorous appearance have probably red reasons for it,
Speaker 1: actual survival reasons, which we will discuss. What do you
Speaker 1: think of when you think of glam rock in general?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, you know, there was definitely I'll tell
Speaker 2: you a very short story. The very first vintage T
Speaker 2: shirt that I ever got at this place on Lobra
Speaker 2: I called jet Rag was an old Poison T shirt,
Speaker 2: a Poison Tour T shirt, and on the back I
Speaker 2: think it said rock the fuck Out. And my mom
Speaker 2: didn't see that at the time, so she let me
Speaker 2: buy this shirt that said fuck on it, and I
Speaker 2: was like, wow. So I think of that shirt, but
Speaker 2: I think of hair, I think of Neon, I think
Speaker 2: of Sparkles, I think of like yeah, so I think
Speaker 2: of a lot of you know, we're talking wall of sound.
Speaker 2: We're talking big, So I thought's that's what I think of.
Speaker 1: I think everything big, hair, big, eyeliner big, yes, you know,
Speaker 1: mega big, the hole in the ozone from the Hairspray big.
Speaker 2: I'm perfect, yes, but yeah.
Speaker 1: So the first animal we're going to talk about is
Speaker 1: the Elvis war which has is named after the King
Speaker 1: of rock Elvis, because it is iridescent and glitzy and
Speaker 1: glamorous and also kind of an asshole.
Speaker 2: Oh really, yeah, I mean it's not I don't think.
Speaker 1: I don't think they named it after Elvis because it's
Speaker 1: an asshole. But I think it's fits right because he
Speaker 1: was kind of an ass wasn't he.
Speaker 2: That is my understanding.
Speaker 1: Yes, you know, I'm look, I'm keeping it real. I'm
Speaker 1: not saying Elvis. It's not cool to like Elvis, but
Speaker 1: you know, yeah he had he had a big sound,
Speaker 1: but also a big ego.
Speaker 2: That is what I hear. Is my understanding as well.
Speaker 1: Shout out to listener Vincent Jorgensen for this idea that
Speaker 1: I don't know why I have not talked about these
Speaker 1: on the show before, because they are incredible. They have
Speaker 1: this rainbow and purple shimmer. Now Daniel, I want you
Speaker 1: to look at this, this little little cutie.
Speaker 2: I have it pulled up right here, and this is
Speaker 2: a shimmery, a shimmery looking little worm. How big is
Speaker 2: this worm there?
Speaker 1: You know, I'd say about like palm sized.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, that's that's big.
Speaker 1: I guess, so not that big.
Speaker 2: Well, okay, fair fair play, but this is and this
Speaker 2: is truly an error on my part. But looking at
Speaker 2: this image just on the just on the raw, just
Speaker 2: like stark black of it, it almost felt like a slide.
Speaker 2: I was ready to be looking at like a microscopic
Speaker 2: worm here. I was ready for you to say, yeah, oh,
Speaker 2: you could fit about a thousand on your hand right now.
Speaker 1: I'd be like, you know, not not not super huge.
Speaker 1: But yeah, they are definitely like not. They are not microscopic.
Speaker 1: They can see them with the naked eye. Hold them
Speaker 1: in your hand, you know, let them crawl all over you.
Speaker 2: I would get the I would get the willies. I
Speaker 2: believe it is the willies. I'd get the willies very quickly.
Speaker 1: I call it. Call it the Jimmy skin. But yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean that.
Speaker 2: Works too, that's very funny.
Speaker 1: But yeah, so they are absolutely beautiful. They look like
Speaker 1: holographic nail polish or you know, the most the glittery,
Speaker 1: most glittery glam that you can find. They were discovered
Speaker 1: by a team of researchers at Script's Institute of Oceanography
Speaker 1: at UCSD. Shout out to my dad who works at
Speaker 1: Scripts Institute of Oceanography. He's actually in the ocean Physics group,
Speaker 1: so they deal with the physics of waves, not necessarily
Speaker 1: the critters, but yeah, you know.
Speaker 2: Got it.
Speaker 1: Good, good job, guys. Can't wait to see y'all for
Speaker 1: a beer and I'll say, hey, good work on that worm.
Speaker 2: You know, good, good work on that worm.
Speaker 1: Good good warming you guys.
Speaker 2: Oh you got me. I'm looking at this worm also,
Speaker 2: and it reminds me. You remember the book The Rainbow Fish.
Speaker 1: Yes, yes, oh oh man, I love that book as
Speaker 1: a kid.
Speaker 2: Just very similar color scheme of just like that, you know,
Speaker 2: super iridescent glowy but also like some solid color but
Speaker 2: also looks like there's just like super flex of rainbow everywhere. Yeah,
Speaker 2: just trying to paint as as vivid stone a picture
Speaker 2: as I possibly can of this world. I'm like cat
Speaker 2: I right now, you know, man, it's like that book
Speaker 2: The Rainbow fish.
Speaker 1: Yeah, because it's like they had this like iridescent glittery
Speaker 1: scales on this fish. It was so fun as a
Speaker 1: kid because you could like touch it and like feel
Speaker 1: like embossed are fun. Yes, it was also I feel
Speaker 1: kind of sorry for the rainbow fish because it was
Speaker 1: like he's got all these rainbow scales on him, right,
Speaker 1: and like his fish friends who don't have those are jealous.
Speaker 1: So he it's a book about sharing, like you share
Speaker 1: this with others and generally speak, I'm very pro sharing,
Speaker 1: you know, pro sharing sure, yeah, or resources with others.
Speaker 1: But it's part of his body.
Speaker 2: So yeah, it's different, a little.
Speaker 1: Strange, right of a weird message. It's like if you
Speaker 1: are hanging out with friends and you're like, oh, I
Speaker 1: really like your hair, and you're like you do it
Speaker 1: and then you just like cut off a big trip
Speaker 1: here you go rip it off.
Speaker 2: And that's the thing. And that's the thing with kids
Speaker 2: that are unpredictable. It's like they'll take the note to
Speaker 2: the letter. So it's like, I know the story of
Speaker 2: the room. It's about sharing. They're like, okay, so I
Speaker 2: like rip off my skin for my friends, like no, no, no, no, no,
Speaker 2: no no, no, no, not quite that.
Speaker 1: Well, you know, that is a horrible kindergarten scene that
Speaker 1: I do not want to see. But so yeah, these
Speaker 1: do look these do look like the rainbow fish. They
Speaker 1: are They are in fact a worm, I know, like
Speaker 1: sometimes we call things worms, but they aren't really, but
Speaker 1: they are. They are warm. They're actually a type of
Speaker 1: scale worm, uh and which is actually related to very
Speaker 1: distantly related to earthworms, a little more closely related to
Speaker 1: bristle worms. You may know some bristle worms, like there
Speaker 1: is We've talked about some of them on the show,
Speaker 1: like the bobbit worm. This horrifying tremors. Like did I
Speaker 1: were you on the show and I.
Speaker 2: Talked about the bottom I think I was, Wow, I
Speaker 2: love it.
Speaker 1: I love how somehow that worked out. But I did
Speaker 1: not plan for that.
Speaker 2: I was gonna say, I feel like we talked about
Speaker 2: like a I remember you described something as a tremor's
Speaker 2: like worm, and I was like, wait a minute.
Speaker 1: Well I'm flattered either way, but like if it was
Speaker 1: if it's a worm that lives under the sand at
Speaker 1: the bottom of the sea, it lunges out of the
Speaker 1: sand and will grab onto an unsuspecting fish and pull
Speaker 1: them back down, sort of like a tremor's worm or
Speaker 1: like a sarlac. But it's also very shiny and iridescent.
Speaker 1: Now it's it's not super closely related to this one,
Speaker 1: but fairly it's it's a bristleworm. So they they are,
Speaker 1: you know, so scale. But this the Elvis, it's actually
Speaker 1: called p elvis. I gotta gotta have it sound scientific.
Speaker 2: I was gonna say it's got sound though, sound good.
Speaker 2: That's so funny.
Speaker 1: But yeah, they did name it that because of its
Speaker 1: sort of glittery, glamorous look that they thought looked flashy
Speaker 1: like Elvis. And so here's what it looks like. So
Speaker 1: it's not it doesn't actually look super like a worm
Speaker 1: like you think of an earthworm. It has a series
Speaker 1: of interlocking scales on its back that are shiny like that.
Speaker 1: It's like it looks like plate armor, and it's kind
Speaker 1: of flat, very shiny and eardescent. And underneath it it
Speaker 1: has these gold shiny bristles jutting out of it that
Speaker 1: you might mistake for legs, but aren't actually legs. They're
Speaker 1: just these these bristles. And at its head it has
Speaker 1: these things that look a little bit like pincers. They're
Speaker 1: actually not quite pincers. They're called pelps. So pelps are
Speaker 1: these appendages at the heads near the mouths of arthropods.
Speaker 1: You can see them in spiders and insects as well,
Speaker 1: So those are its pelps. And so yeah, it's it's
Speaker 1: kind of but it's it's rather flat looking and it's
Speaker 1: kind of oval shaped and so like you know, it's
Speaker 1: kind of alien and bizarre looking. But it gets way
Speaker 1: weirder than what you can just see at a glance.
Speaker 2: So being on this show, you know, I will say
Speaker 2: I wasn't entirely surprised by that potential, but like I'm excited,
Speaker 2: please go on. I had to drop when you said that.
Speaker 2: I was like, you know, I had a feeling you
Speaker 2: were gonna say, yeah.
Speaker 1: Well, you know, there's always something hidden underneath the surface
Speaker 1: for these animals. So like these are found in the
Speaker 1: deep sea near like hydrothermic vents, as well as on
Speaker 1: the carcasses of fallen sea creatures, including whales. So when
Speaker 1: whales die, it's certainly sad for the whales, but it's
Speaker 1: a great boon for all of these underwater arthropods, these
Speaker 1: deep sea creatures that will feed on the whale's carcass,
Speaker 1: and it can feed a hell of a lot of
Speaker 1: animals in life.
Speaker 2: I have a question, isn't there a term for like
Speaker 2: the kind of like minor or like micro ecosystem created
Speaker 2: by a whale carcass? Am I thinking, am, I could
Speaker 2: be I may, I may just be this. I could
Speaker 2: be pulling this all the way out of my ass
Speaker 2: right here. But I felt like there was some word
Speaker 2: for like the micro ecosystem created ecro micro ecosystem created
Speaker 2: by a dead whale in the ocean, because like, yeah,
Speaker 2: you're right, feel that.
Speaker 1: I feel that, I feel like there is I mean,
Speaker 1: I thought it had a specific I mean I think
Speaker 1: it's called like whale fall action whale fall.
Speaker 2: I think that's it. Yeah, I think you're right. Whale fall.
Speaker 2: That's it. You're right, whale fall. That's it. Nice. Yeah
Speaker 2: that was the whale fall.
Speaker 1: Well, thank you for reminding me that that term exists.
Speaker 1: It is a cool like whale fall. Yeah, so, I
Speaker 1: mean it's pretty straightforward. I guess it's what a whale
Speaker 1: falls to, but yeah, it is. It's something where there's
Speaker 1: something kind of grim and ghoulish about it, seeing this
Speaker 1: decaying whale but it's also incredible how much life that
Speaker 1: can support. It's kind of like when a tree falls,
Speaker 1: a huge tree falls in the forest. There's something sad
Speaker 1: about that, right, this ancient tree falling and decaying, But
Speaker 1: then that tree feeds so many animals. In fact, an
Speaker 1: animal we're gonna talk about later on the show. A
Speaker 1: lot of these glamorous animals like to feed on dead things,
Speaker 1: but hey, look, you know it's a living so they
Speaker 1: will feed on things like whale carcasses. I know that
Speaker 1: the research team that collected some of these specimens actually
Speaker 1: found them on a whale carcass, so that must have
Speaker 1: been a fun treat. You're like zooming around looking at
Speaker 1: this whale carcass all it's all strange and kind of creepy.
Speaker 1: And then you see this like glitterus glamorous little scale
Speaker 1: where I'm going like, hello, I'm here, and here I
Speaker 1: am eating a dead whale. I don't know how Elvi sounds.
Speaker 2: You know, just like you, I was transported, you know
Speaker 2: what I'm saying?
Speaker 1: Dead? Who that's a little better.
Speaker 3: Okay words, But like I said, like Elvis, not only
Speaker 3: in appearance, but a little bit assholely.
Speaker 1: They like to bite each other when they're not biting
Speaker 1: on some delicious whale fall carcass. So they that is
Speaker 1: one of the reasons that they have these scales is
Speaker 1: for protections. Protection not only from other animals and predator,
Speaker 1: but from their.
Speaker 2: Competition literally from each other.
Speaker 1: Yeah, from each other, and when they bite each other.
Speaker 1: It's fascinating. So I want you to, before I say
Speaker 1: anything else, just take a look at that picture that
Speaker 1: I've provided for you.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, I'm horrified. Obviously, this is a terrifying
Speaker 2: picture of a dean. I'm seeing a demon of the
Speaker 2: suit with it's almost like I want to say, I mean, okay, okay,
Speaker 2: it looks like a faceless worm with a with a
Speaker 2: like a bird's beak coming out of the center, but
Speaker 2: it's surrounded by like a statue of liberty of like
Speaker 2: it's just outward appendages, Like I know they're not horns,
Speaker 2: but it looks like a wreath of horns sticking out
Speaker 2: around a bird's mouth coming out of an eyeless worm. Demon.
Speaker 1: That's about right. They actually have a proboscis that they
Speaker 1: can avert. So a proboscis is basically like a fleshy probe.
Speaker 1: It can mean like a nose. It can mean a
Speaker 1: variety of different things, but it's basically a flesh probe,
Speaker 1: which is flesh probe. It's not really that's not really
Speaker 1: a gl rock name is.
Speaker 2: It could be a song though, could be a song.
Speaker 1: I feel like this show is good at producing metal
Speaker 1: names more than glen Rock names like flush probe. So
Speaker 1: they can evert it, which means basically like pushing it
Speaker 1: out from inside of them. And then in this proboscis,
Speaker 1: what you're seeing is a set of jaws, set of
Speaker 1: sharp jaws that they can use to snap at their
Speaker 1: food source like a dead whale, or each other if
Speaker 1: they if they're feeling feisty. Okay, so just you know,
Speaker 1: like in Aliens, like how the alien shoots out a
Speaker 1: smaller alien tongue with the set of jaws. It's just
Speaker 1: like that. It's like boop, I'm gonna snap you up.
Speaker 1: Another similar feature of the of the bob At Warmer.
Speaker 1: They can just basically shoot out a thing and like
Speaker 1: snap up. So do check out this video. I'm also
Speaker 1: including all this in the show notes as always, But
Speaker 1: there is a cool video of them.
Speaker 2: Okay, oh there they are, Oh well, yeah, they are
Speaker 2: pretty their sizable. Oh yeah, you'd see them. They're they're real.
Speaker 2: Oh oh, you just stuck his tongue out one of
Speaker 2: the other ones, gonna do it, I bet Oh my gosh,
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, he's so patient. Ooh goodness, he got
Speaker 2: a grip.
Speaker 1: Mm hmmm.
Speaker 2: Whoa.
Speaker 1: In fact, their fights can be so violent that they
Speaker 1: can rip the scales off of each other. So a
Speaker 1: pretty like dark reboot of The Rainbow Fish where it's
Speaker 1: just violently ripping off each other's scales.
Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly, my scale, No, my scale.
Speaker 1: But yeah, that thing that looks like a tongue like
Speaker 1: it's going like boop, that's actually it's proboscis. And it
Speaker 1: has that gnarly set of jaws in the center of
Speaker 1: it that it's using to bite that other elvis worm.
Speaker 2: That is a lot. Yeah, that's a lot right there.
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh.
Speaker 1: I bet you're wondering why they're so iridescent and shiny
Speaker 1: and beautiful.
Speaker 2: That's that's I mean, that's you know, that's on the
Speaker 2: list of questions mostly I'm I I.
Speaker 1: Wonder it too, but I don't know, and nobody knows.
Speaker 1: Isn't that fun When I'm just like, hey, you wonder
Speaker 1: this thing. Sorry, nobody knows.
Speaker 2: It's literally don't you wish you could just ask them, like, Hey.
Speaker 1: What's up? Why are you guys so angry all the time?
Speaker 1: What's with that weird like mouth boop thing that you do? Yeah?
Speaker 1: I mean, so they are actually blind. There's no reason
Speaker 1: for them to need this aridescence for like conspecific communication,
Speaker 1: So like it's probably not for sexual selection or anything
Speaker 1: like that because they can't see it. Uh, It's possible
Speaker 1: it's for some some way of crypsis, I suppose. Seems unlikely.
Speaker 1: It seems like it would just make them stick out. However,
Speaker 1: in these deep sea and ronments, you never know, Like
Speaker 1: how that I wonder, like maybe it interacts strangely with bioluminescence.
Speaker 1: That's a possible thing, Like the refraction of bioluminescence may
Speaker 1: have some advantage. My suspicion is that it actually serves
Speaker 1: no purpose the actual visual of it. Rather, it's just
Speaker 1: a byproduct of forming these tough scales. So like having
Speaker 1: these very tough maybe crystalline structures in its scales, the
Speaker 1: nature of having them really tough at this molecular level
Speaker 1: also affects like how light is refracted off of the
Speaker 1: surface of these scales, so that would be sort of,
Speaker 1: my guess, is just a byproduct of making sure that
Speaker 1: these scales are really tough. Yes, okay, I mean, like
Speaker 1: you think about how like a diamond is really tough
Speaker 1: and it's beautiful and it's hiering glittery.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it makes sense absolutely. I by one thousand percent.
Speaker 1: I'm with you, And I also like that, you know,
Speaker 1: it's it's really subverting expectations, like to be tough, you
Speaker 1: have to be glamorous. I like that.
Speaker 2: To the first first you must shine.
Speaker 1: Speaking of the bobbit worm, twenty million year old fossilized
Speaker 1: tunnels have been discovered beneath the ocean floor, over seven
Speaker 1: feet or two meters long, but only a couple centimeters
Speaker 1: wide in diameter. It's thought that these were once home
Speaker 1: to an incredibly long worm, perhaps the ancestors of the
Speaker 1: bobbit worm, as there's fossilized imprints made by these worms
Speaker 1: that seem to indicate they use these tunnels to drag
Speaker 1: their prey to an extra deep and watery grave. When
Speaker 1: we return, we're going to talk about a thought provoking
Speaker 1: intersection of fashion and entomology, though Daniel. You know that
Speaker 1: animals and humans have a weird relationship sometimes, Yeah, totally.
Speaker 1: I mean, for instance, like my dog, I think only
Speaker 1: sees me as like the peanut butter provider.
Speaker 2: You know, at least a peanut butter warm blanket.
Speaker 1: Right, that's true, a warm blanket.
Speaker 2: Peanut butter human radiator, a butt.
Speaker 1: Scratcher and peanut provider, peanut butter provider.
Speaker 2: Oh, I'm king butt scratcher. I'll tell you what I
Speaker 2: feel like. That's it. I feel like that, if I'm
Speaker 2: being real, Everybody's like, oh, that's a trick with dogs.
Speaker 2: They love getting scratched on the butt. Like, at what
Speaker 2: point is it not a trick anymore? It's like, oh,
Speaker 2: of course a dog loves a good butt scratch right there. Right,
Speaker 2: that's just you know, that's it. That baseline baseline dog knowledge.
Speaker 1: Are they sing? It's like a Konami code for a dog.
Speaker 1: I feel like I feel like the dogs are fair
Speaker 1: really obvious about one. I mean, like my dog Cookie,
Speaker 1: Cookie will literally walk up to She does this every
Speaker 1: day all day, like this is her favorite thing to do,
Speaker 1: not joking, walk up to you, turn around so her
Speaker 1: butt is near you, and then look over her shoulder
Speaker 1: as you know, like kind of look between you and
Speaker 1: the butt like exactly you're doing it. Yeah, eh eh,
Speaker 1: thinking about this.
Speaker 2: Yeah, gotch And you can like.
Speaker 1: Hold your hand out and start wiggling your fingers and
Speaker 1: she will come over and sort of like dock her
Speaker 1: butt under your fingers and then so you can scratch it.
Speaker 2: Wow, that is a smart that's smart Cookie you got
Speaker 2: raised there.
Speaker 1: Yeah, she's smart whenever it serves her own insist.
Speaker 2: I love that. A purpose like a purposely smart and
Speaker 2: stupid dog. That's like, Cookie, we need you to do
Speaker 2: this right now. I don't know. I'm a dog. I
Speaker 2: don't speak.
Speaker 1: And then they say you want to get your butt scratched?
Speaker 1: She knows that. She knows what that means.
Speaker 2: Oh, I want to get my butt scratched.
Speaker 1: You got hearing? That's what she knows. What a CHICKI
Speaker 1: pill is. When I she has these like chicken flavored,
Speaker 1: chicken flavored hip point supplements and if you want to
Speaker 1: you want a chicky pill, she knows what that means.
Speaker 1: When I say you gotta sit, she doesn't know what
Speaker 1: that means. That suddenly doesn't know what that means.
Speaker 2: Have you seen that since this episode. It's like the
Speaker 2: thing that translates baby talk, but or like translates animal talk. Oh,
Speaker 2: like what is your animals saying? It's like this leash
Speaker 2: demeans us. Both great. I wait for that day. I
Speaker 2: wait for that day where we get that where we
Speaker 2: get the translation device. And Cookie was just saying, look,
Speaker 2: I sit on my own schedule.
Speaker 1: Okay, right right, that you shall provide me with butt scratch,
Speaker 1: cheese and peanut butter. Your services for anything else are
Speaker 1: not required.
Speaker 2: Not required. That's funny.
Speaker 1: But so that's all to say that I want to
Speaker 1: talk about something that it's both really interesting and it
Speaker 1: provokes a lot of thought in conversation. I think about,
Speaker 1: like our relationship to animals, because we're talking about insects,
Speaker 1: and our feelings toward insects as a species can range
Speaker 1: from like they are delicious food to they are gross
Speaker 1: and I don't want anything to do with them, to
Speaker 1: their beautiful jewelry. So I think one case that really
Speaker 1: exemplifies this complex relationship we have with insects are the
Speaker 1: beautiful bejeweled living beetle jewelry originating from the Yucatan Peninsula
Speaker 1: in Mexico. So these living brooches are called makesh So
Speaker 1: they are beetles of the Zoferis genus, which is a
Speaker 1: group of species of beetles who are kind of long
Speaker 1: with this very like thick exoskeleton. They're kind of shaped
Speaker 1: like bowling pins a little bit. In fact, their exoskeleton
Speaker 1: is so tough. There is a species called the ironclad beetle.
Speaker 1: And if you're trying to mount them as a specimen,
Speaker 1: you know how like you have like a butterfly specimen
Speaker 1: where you stick a pin in it. They do that
Speaker 1: for all all sorts of insects. You actually have to
Speaker 1: drill a hole into them because you can't just push
Speaker 1: a pin through it there. They're oh yeah, they're They're
Speaker 1: exoskeleton is that tough? So they are flightless. They have
Speaker 1: this little stubby head around thorax, so the thing that
Speaker 1: actually kind of looks like their head is actually their thorax.
Speaker 1: And then they have a long oval abdomen and they
Speaker 1: range in color from black to sort of a black
Speaker 1: and white pattern, lots of other different colors. They also
Speaker 1: come in this like really pretty gold color, not not
Speaker 1: a shiny gold, but kind of a matte gold. And
Speaker 1: it's this species, this kind of gold sofitera species that
Speaker 1: is often used for mkesh jewelry. So the jewelry is
Speaker 1: made by taking a living beetle and gluing like rhinestones
Speaker 1: on it or a variety of jewels or decorations on it,
Speaker 1: or something like colorful thread or other ornaments. So there's
Speaker 1: like some adhesive is used, like some kind of glue, uh,
Speaker 1: and then like you you bedazzle the beetle, and then
Speaker 1: they attach a gold chain to the beetle just by
Speaker 1: gluing it. And then that's attached to like a pin
Speaker 1: that you pin to your blouse, and the beetle crawls
Speaker 1: around on your blouse. It's it's still alive and just
Speaker 1: kind of like crawls around with all of this this
Speaker 1: sort of bedazzlement, and it's hard to know like when
Speaker 1: the tradition started. There's a lot of like, uh, sort
Speaker 1: of mixed information on it, and it's you know, I
Speaker 1: don't think that I'm comfortable, you know, saying anything definitively
Speaker 1: because it doesn't seem like it's been studied definitively in
Speaker 1: terms of like the order of the cultural practice. This
Speaker 1: particular beetle them cash is actually the name of the jewelry,
Speaker 1: but the zofers beetle chosen because it's got this kind
Speaker 1: of slow, sluggish nature. It's pretty chill, it's got that
Speaker 1: pretty exoskeleton, but it can also survive for months without
Speaker 1: food or water. So ah man, yeah, I know, so,
Speaker 1: I mean it's it's like, it sounds pretty creepy. So
Speaker 1: we'll get to more of that, but first I want
Speaker 1: to talk about the beetles in the wild. So in
Speaker 1: the wild, the beetles live in dry forests and feed
Speaker 1: on rotting wood starches. So we're talking about earlier. You know,
Speaker 1: like the whale fall, well with tree fall it gets
Speaker 1: tree fall is great for a lot of organisms and
Speaker 1: forest environments. These beetles are one of them. They have
Speaker 1: a metabolism that allows them to survive on small amounts
Speaker 1: of starch in very little water. So in theory, if
Speaker 1: you treat a mkesh beetle righte like you have a terrarium,
Speaker 1: and you provide them with some starch and just like
Speaker 1: a little bit of water like a moist sponge, you
Speaker 1: can keep them alive for their whole lifespan of about
Speaker 1: three years. But of course there's a few catches to this,
Speaker 1: as there are for most things. When we when we
Speaker 1: were talking about using animals for our own purposes, first
Speaker 1: and foremost is that they can spew formic acid out
Speaker 1: of their anus.
Speaker 2: Great.
Speaker 1: I mean actually to me, that's like a benefit, Like
Speaker 1: I want to broach that, like you know, like I
Speaker 1: kind of poke it and it just like sprays out
Speaker 1: formic acid. That's that's a great James Bond weapon.
Speaker 2: That is a great James Bond weapon. Very like, right now,
Speaker 2: what are the what are the effects of that kind
Speaker 2: of acid on your skin? Or is it smelly? Is it?
Speaker 2: Is it? It's unpleasant?
Speaker 1: It gives you, Yeah, it could give you a bad
Speaker 1: skin rash, like wow, not a fun time. Yeah, you shouldn't,
Speaker 1: you know, try not to get it. Yeah, you don't
Speaker 1: want to get it on you. Traditionally, that issue has
Speaker 1: been sold by making the beetles very tiny diapers, like
Speaker 1: a little cloth Yeah, like a little cloth diaper that
Speaker 1: goes near their backside and just sort of absorbs up
Speaker 1: that thing, the formic acid. Unfortunately, I was reading something
Speaker 1: that seemed to indicate I don't know how true this is,
Speaker 1: but there was some like rumor about like how some
Speaker 1: vendors will use glue to actually seal up the anus,
Speaker 1: and then that's bad, like you can't do that, it's
Speaker 1: it'll it'll kill the beetle. And so of course, I
Speaker 1: think the issue that is probably on a lot of
Speaker 1: people's minds is like, well, is this cruel? Is this
Speaker 1: cruelty towards these beetles? And I think it's really it's
Speaker 1: a really complex issue. And I think whenever there's like
Speaker 1: a different cultural practice than our own, it's really easy
Speaker 1: for us to go like, oh, this is cruel or
Speaker 1: this is this is strange. It's like sure too strange
Speaker 1: because you know, it's like it's not normalized in our society,
Speaker 1: so like right, like in the way that a lot
Speaker 1: of our practices towards animals are like you know, so
Speaker 1: I think that the fact like it's living jewelry is
Speaker 1: so such an unusual concept that I think it's easier
Speaker 1: to think of it as like, oh, man, that's unnecessary
Speaker 1: and kind of cruel. But then you think about a
Speaker 1: lot of the things that we do in our culture.
Speaker 1: We kill insects all the time, yes, and not super
Speaker 1: nice ways. We also you know, just in our homes,
Speaker 1: like we kill pests all the time. Look I'm not
Speaker 1: above killing, you know, ants who try to eat all
Speaker 1: my cereal.
Speaker 2: I would be lying if I said I hadn't killed
Speaker 2: a bug before. That's it's foolish. I do my best
Speaker 2: to be, you know, sympathetic, especially to our spider friends
Speaker 2: who do a lot of the bug killing for us.
Speaker 2: But like, look, I've smashed them flies. I've smashed them bugs.
Speaker 2: That's just fast matter. I'm not it is.
Speaker 1: I try to relocate spiders whenever I find them, but
Speaker 1: I have to admit, like a few weeks ago, I
Speaker 1: saw a pretty big spider and just instinctively stomped it,
Speaker 1: like I didn't even think, and then immediately after something's like.
Speaker 2: Oh, I'm so sorry that immediate up, I don't It's okay.
Speaker 1: So you know, we we kill insects all the time,
Speaker 1: and so you know, I feel like this aspect of like, oh,
Speaker 1: it's really cruel to do this is somewhat relative. The
Speaker 1: other argument would be like, well, but you know we
Speaker 1: kill insex maybe out of necessity. Keeping them as an
Speaker 1: ornament in this way like seems sort of unnecessary. It's like, well,
Speaker 1: we also have things like we have state fairs where
Speaker 1: we have food animals. There for you know, entertainment purposes,
Speaker 1: and like we'll we'll have like petting zoos with animals
Speaker 1: that will eventually go and be used for food. So
Speaker 1: I guess my point is, like, there are certainly complaints
Speaker 1: you can have about certain cultural practices when it comes
Speaker 1: to animals, but I'm always hesitant to like point the
Speaker 1: finger at another culture where it's like, ah, see this
Speaker 1: this thing that they do that we don't do, like
Speaker 1: that that's super that's super weird.
Speaker 2: You know what I mean, Yeah, absolutely, and I think
Speaker 2: that's I think that's completely fair. My only complaint would
Speaker 2: be that I think the I mean, maybe it's you know,
Speaker 2: and as I explore the culture of this a little
Speaker 2: bit more and I see in your picture down here,
Speaker 2: there's definitely Katie. But by the way, for all the listeners,
Speaker 2: Katie has provided excellent resources for the for the guests
Speaker 2: to look at it and and get familiar with and
Speaker 2: just like see what is what what we're talking about.
Speaker 2: I'm surprised these people aren't going further with the bug itself.
Speaker 1: Like you know, I mean, like add a little top
Speaker 1: hat or yeah, or just like it.
Speaker 2: Maybe it may it might just be the video, but
Speaker 2: it's like this seems pretty like Ryan Stones on some
Speaker 2: gold chains kind of shit when we could get some
Speaker 2: real like I mean, you know, if this is a
Speaker 2: cultural thing here, I could see some like Swarovsky ass
Speaker 2: like really glitzed up, glitzed up bugs crawling around on
Speaker 2: your chest, premium bugs. Premium bugs.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean I think that. I mean, these aren't
Speaker 1: necessarily super super fancy things like they you know, they
Speaker 1: often sell them for not that much money, like it
Speaker 1: could be like chin us dollars or something. And you know,
Speaker 1: it's also often sold to tourists, so I'm not super
Speaker 1: clear on how much of it is directed towards tourists
Speaker 1: to the area, and like how much of it is
Speaker 1: that locals do just sort of as a local tradition.
Speaker 1: So it's you know, I can't pretend to be a
Speaker 1: cultural expert on this, and I couldn't quite sus that
Speaker 1: out in my research. But there is one thing that
Speaker 1: the artists who do this do seem to try to
Speaker 1: do is they don't like inhibit the Beatles movement, so
Speaker 1: they keep it like to the backs of the Beetles,
Speaker 1: so they don't like put it, you know, like on
Speaker 1: their actual heads, like it looks like it's on their heads,
Speaker 1: but that's actually their thorax. Yeah, and they don't like
Speaker 1: put it on their legs or anything, so they can
Speaker 1: because like the point is for them to still be
Speaker 1: able to move around as long as they're not putting
Speaker 1: glue on the butt. I don't think. I mean, I'm
Speaker 1: sure that like the bejeweling of the Beatles isn't great
Speaker 1: for the beetles, but I don't think it necessarily is
Speaker 1: that all that harmful again, because they have that really
Speaker 1: thick exoskeleton. The harmful thing would be, of course, if
Speaker 1: you don't like feed it or you know, like you know,
Speaker 1: actually keep it in a terrarium, if you just kind
Speaker 1: of like keep it in a drawer for a few
Speaker 1: months until it dies like that, then the beetle will
Speaker 1: not survive that. For me, I guess like the main uh,
Speaker 1: the main issue I think that needs to be explored
Speaker 1: by ecologists, which I mean as they are doing. I'm
Speaker 1: not scolding them like a cologists get on this, but
Speaker 1: is whether or not like this is sustainable for the
Speaker 1: beetle population, because like on a local level it's probably fine,
Speaker 1: but if it gains a huge amount of popularity with
Speaker 1: tourists collection of the beetles may exceed their ability to reproduce.
Speaker 1: The beetles are really like they have a very slow
Speaker 1: lifespan compared to other insects like they It takes them
Speaker 1: a long time to reach sexual maturation. They don't lay
Speaker 1: a huge amount of eggs. It's hard to estimate their
Speaker 1: population size because they like to live under lugs, like
Speaker 1: underleaf litter and lugs, so like, actually finding them is
Speaker 1: kind of difficult. So getting a good sort of sensus
Speaker 1: of how many of these beetles are out there is
Speaker 1: actually quite tricky. But because they don't seem to reproduce
Speaker 1: that rapidly, there's fear that without some regulation, like, there
Speaker 1: could be over collection of the beetles and that would
Speaker 1: endanger their population, which I think just kind of shows
Speaker 1: how like it's really important for ecologists and biologists to
Speaker 1: work with people who study human culture to be able
Speaker 1: to come together and research things together so that we
Speaker 1: can figure out ways to both preserve human culture but
Speaker 1: also preserve nature.
Speaker 2: Teamwork makes the dream work.
Speaker 1: Couldn't have said it better myself.
Speaker 2: Amen.
Speaker 1: The makesh is not the only insect worn as jewelry
Speaker 1: in ancient Egypt. Scarab beetles were worn by soldiers to
Speaker 1: offer them spiritual protection, and in two thousand and six,
Speaker 1: fashion designer Jared Gold included giant hissing cockroaches in his collection,
Speaker 1: basically copying the style of the makesh brooches by bedazzling
Speaker 1: his cockroaches with Swarovsky crystals and keeping them on a
Speaker 1: golden chain. These runway ready cockroaches came with instructions of
Speaker 1: how to care for them and could live for over
Speaker 1: a year. Personally, I'm content to just admire the natural
Speaker 1: beauty of hissing cockroaches from nature photographs. When you return,
Speaker 1: we're gonna investigate a lizard. These aquatic fashion is all
Speaker 1: about function, So now I want to talk about an
Speaker 1: extremely glamorous lizard that I think gives like David Bowie
Speaker 1: a run for his money in terms of like how
Speaker 1: incredibly shiny they are and also just how I don't know,
Speaker 1: you know, how like like the Space Odyssey thing. Will
Speaker 1: these lizards like to go under the water and be
Speaker 1: little little diver diverman? Okay, what's the what's the David
Speaker 1: Bowie thing? It's like Rocketman? Right, yeah, Rocketman?
Speaker 2: Or is that Elton John That'ston John. Is he glamor
Speaker 2: the Ziggie startist. Yeah, I mean like that's very yeah,
Speaker 2: David Bowie is super super glam.
Speaker 1: Elton John glamrock not really is he.
Speaker 2: I'm going to google is Elton John glamrock?
Speaker 1: This is very important for an evolutionary biology podcast to
Speaker 1: know whether Elton.
Speaker 2: John is I would say so other performers associated with British.
Speaker 1: Glam I see, I see. I mean, I guess it
Speaker 1: depends on whether you're using the phylogenetic classification system or
Speaker 1: the linean classification system of glam rock.
Speaker 2: I mean, I'll say this. You know, look, the only
Speaker 2: people who are going to get mad at you about
Speaker 2: someone being or not being glam rock are the Yeah,
Speaker 2: exactly aggressive glam rock. British glam was very strictly different
Speaker 2: from us glamrock, and I think that needs to be noted.
Speaker 1: He actually fits more in the mod category.
Speaker 2: Thing you very much, but he's certainly glamorous and certainly
Speaker 2: a rocker. We'll go. We'll definitely go with that.
Speaker 1: Instead of spending time in outer space in a spacesuit,
Speaker 1: these lizards like to spend time underwater in a water
Speaker 1: suit or an airsuit anyways, a diver suit a diver suit.
Speaker 1: So these are water Annolly's aka scuba diving lizards. So,
Speaker 1: water nollys are a species of small lizards found in
Speaker 1: Costa Rica and Central America. They're pretty small. They're about
Speaker 1: the size of a thumb. They are brown, although males
Speaker 1: do have this brilliant yellow do lap. So what's a
Speaker 1: do lap. It's a flap of skin under their chin
Speaker 1: they can fan out, which they use to attract females
Speaker 1: and intimidate males. What I mean, have you ever seen
Speaker 1: a lizard like like kind of stunting, like, you know,
Speaker 1: flapping out its stew lap?
Speaker 2: For sure? For sure? You know, for a second I thought,
Speaker 2: so I'm, you know, not skipping out head per se.
Speaker 2: But I'm looking at this picture and I thought for
Speaker 2: a split second that its do lap was the clear
Speaker 2: thing coming out of its nose, which is an air bubble.
Speaker 2: Is he's got the do lap on the top of
Speaker 2: his head. Now it's clear and he can breathe it.
Speaker 1: I think I forgot to include an image of the
Speaker 1: do lap, but it's very pretty.
Speaker 2: It's like this brilliant yellow wo awesome.
Speaker 1: The ladies love a do lap.
Speaker 2: The ladies love a doude.
Speaker 1: But because these little lizards are such tasty little snacks,
Speaker 1: not just for the females of their species, but you know,
Speaker 1: for predators, and they're not like the fastest lizards in
Speaker 1: the land. They will take to the water to escape predators.
Speaker 1: They'll literally leap off of a rock and belly flop
Speaker 1: into the water. And so once underwater they are safe
Speaker 1: from a lot of terrestrial or airborne predators. But they
Speaker 1: need to breathe because you know, they can't. They I
Speaker 1: can't breathe water. These are reptiles, they are They do
Speaker 1: not although you know, there are some reptiles like turtles
Speaker 1: who do do gas exchange near an area near their cloaca,
Speaker 1: aka their butthole, but these lizards cannot. We have no
Speaker 1: evidence to suggest that these lizards can breed through their
Speaker 1: buttholes like turtles. I know, darn it. God, I hate
Speaker 1: it when I'm like swimming and I'm like, wait, let
Speaker 1: me try it, let me try it for a second.
Speaker 1: I can't do it. I can't breathe through my butt.
Speaker 1: So they have a problem because they either stand or
Speaker 1: water and drown, or they go above the water and
Speaker 1: get eaten by a predator. So there is recent observations
Speaker 1: of these lizards that seem to suggest that they can
Speaker 1: create a wetsuit made out of air and form a
Speaker 1: bubble around their head that they can breed through.
Speaker 2: This is I you know, truly again, your research is
Speaker 2: so good. You've videos. I could not even imagine what
Speaker 2: this would look like, but now I have a video
Speaker 2: to look at, and it is extraordinary. I'm like blown
Speaker 2: away that they're able to, like what is holding the
Speaker 2: water to their face this way?
Speaker 1: That's a really good question. And while I haven't been
Speaker 1: able to find studies that are really exact about it,
Speaker 1: I would say that it is very similar to other
Speaker 1: times that we see water adhering to animals underwater. So
Speaker 1: with their diving bell spiders that can actually go underwater
Speaker 1: and water, they will also form these kind of underwater
Speaker 1: For the spiders, it's like this diving bell that this
Speaker 1: little bubble that surrounds them that they can do gas
Speaker 1: exchange through. And for them, the air sticks to these
Speaker 1: teeny tiny little hairs all over their bodies. So the
Speaker 1: air literally sticks to these really small fine hairs. For
Speaker 1: these lizards, I don't think they rely on hairs rather,
Speaker 1: I think it's the skin texture. So I think they
Speaker 1: have these probably these really tiny stroke ructures on their skin,
Speaker 1: like these little tiny, probably microscopic indentations and texture on
Speaker 1: their skin that actually traps air on their skin and
Speaker 1: holds onto it through sort of a manner of surface tension.
Speaker 1: I mean, even like when you dive underwater, sometimes little
Speaker 1: bubbles can stick to your skin and you can see
Speaker 1: little air bubbles still sticking to you. But like for
Speaker 1: these lizards, their skin is such that I think it's
Speaker 1: probably you have really small structures on their skin that
Speaker 1: is able to really cling onto this water such that
Speaker 1: you look at these lizards and underwater, it looks like
Speaker 1: they have this whole silvery sheen all over it, like
Speaker 1: their skin is made out of a mirror like material
Speaker 1: and that's all that trapped air all over their body,
Speaker 1: reflecting light underwater like a mirror.
Speaker 2: That's so cool.
Speaker 1: Yeah, they're like it's beautiful. It's one of those things
Speaker 1: where are like, wow, why do they look this cool?
Speaker 1: And then they come out of water and you're like, eh, okay.
Speaker 2: Hey, you know what, I'll save it, save it for
Speaker 2: the underwater crowd, you know, if they want to be
Speaker 2: less less shiny on top save for the underwater crowd.
Speaker 2: They deserve it more. They're not trying to eat you
Speaker 2: as much.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So they can form this bubble around their head.
Speaker 1: And while this the research on this is by no
Speaker 1: means complete, so this is all conjecture at this point,
Speaker 1: there's this idea that their heads have this kind of
Speaker 1: concave structure just so this air bubble can form, like
Speaker 1: this pocket can form over their nostrils, and when they
Speaker 1: like breathe out, it kind of bubbles up, and they
Speaker 1: breathe in and it kind of bubbles down. So it's
Speaker 1: like this little bubble going up and down as they breathe.
Speaker 2: Makes that's that's so wild. Again, if I didn't have
Speaker 2: this video, I wouldn't be able to put it together.
Speaker 2: I mean, you know, I could understand and imagine, but
Speaker 2: it's just like it's truly a bubble coming off of
Speaker 2: their face and then just sucking back in, right, you know. Wild,
Speaker 2: Like have you ever like.
Speaker 1: Blown a bubble with some bubble gum and instead of
Speaker 1: just like blowing the bubble, you kind of like breathe
Speaker 1: in and out. You're like yeah, and then you do
Speaker 1: like a Darth Vader voice I'm here to chop off
Speaker 1: hands and chew bubble gum, and I'm all out of
Speaker 1: bubble gum?
Speaker 2: Could you imagine I want to see that recut? Wow?
Speaker 1: But yeah, I mean your reaction is kind of similar
Speaker 1: to researchers who discovered this because they just incidentally discovered
Speaker 1: that they that they seem to breathe this way through observations.
Speaker 1: They put underwater cameras down there because they noticed that
Speaker 1: some of these lizards would like dive underwater and then
Speaker 1: they would pop up a few feet away. But some
Speaker 1: of them would dive underwater and then just disappear, and
Speaker 1: they're like, now that can't be right, Like that can't
Speaker 1: be a good survival strategy to just drown yourself whenever
Speaker 1: a predator comes at you. So sure enough, they found
Speaker 1: that these guys can spend up to about fifteen minutes underwater,
Speaker 1: and using these underwater cameras, they found this behavior of
Speaker 1: like them seeming to breathe through these bubbles. Now, it
Speaker 1: hasn't been like scientifically proven that they are actually breathing
Speaker 1: through these bubbles. It's just observation, like you looking at
Speaker 1: this video, but it seems fairly likely that that's the case,
Speaker 1: because that seems to be what's going on.
Speaker 2: Wow.
Speaker 1: And also because they can last so long underwater, it
Speaker 1: seems like this keeps them last longer without having to
Speaker 1: hold their breath the whole time.
Speaker 2: Wow. These are fascinating little beasts right here.
Speaker 1: They really are.
Speaker 2: You've really done it.
Speaker 1: And they're so shiny. I love how just like they
Speaker 1: have like meer skin, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2: Shit, totally the shine, especially like again that it's primarily
Speaker 2: for the underwater crowd. It's like they're just so so
Speaker 2: so shiny, and it almost I almost feel like you
Speaker 2: would mistake it. I mean you shouldn't say mistake it,
Speaker 2: but like you might think that there's like a small
Speaker 2: like pocket knife in the water if you were to
Speaker 2: look right and see just like the body of one
Speaker 2: of these little guys down they're just like whoa that
Speaker 2: is yeah, yeah, my gosh, I do.
Speaker 1: I also I do like the idea that like, above
Speaker 1: water it's like nah, but underwater it's like Miley Cyrus
Speaker 1: turning into Hannah Montana.
Speaker 2: Wow, that's where they shine.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's like Miley Cyrus, eh whatever, just normal girls
Speaker 1: and then she turned to normal.
Speaker 2: Wow.
Speaker 1: Wow, Well I think we I think we've done it.
Speaker 1: I think we've found some of the coolest glam rockers
Speaker 1: in the animal kingdom.
Speaker 2: These are truly glamorous animals you have shared with me today, Katie.
Speaker 2: I'm touched. These are awesome than I do.
Speaker 1: Before we go, I do want to address a listener question.
Speaker 1: So listener Izzybe writes in and says, hey, creature peeps.
Speaker 1: There's been a meme Twitter thread popping up now and
Speaker 1: again claiming that the Uncanny Valley exists as a deep
Speaker 1: psychological remnant from our early hominid ancestors interspecies competition for resources.
Speaker 1: So frequently these conversations use the idea that animals, even
Speaker 1: our own pets, don't experience the Uncanny Valley as proof,
Speaker 1: but that rings false to me. I am a puppet
Speaker 1: maker and have lots of Sorry. I love this. I
Speaker 1: love this email so much. I love it when you
Speaker 1: guys write into me when I when I was reading
Speaker 1: this and then I got to I am a puppet maker.
Speaker 1: Like I almost screamed in excitement. I anyways, I'm going
Speaker 1: to continue reading.
Speaker 2: This, but like, please please, sorry.
Speaker 1: I am a puppet maker and have lots of experience
Speaker 1: of dogs and cats. Absolutely losing their their quack in
Speaker 1: terror of puppets, usually human based puppets, but sometimes those
Speaker 1: based on other animals. What is this if not the
Speaker 1: uncanny valley, the mental rejection and innate fear of something
Speaker 1: that resembles the familiar but doesn't achieve a fully believable resemblance.
Speaker 1: As someone familiar with animal psychology, I was wondering if
Speaker 1: you had any thoughts on the matter. On a completely
Speaker 1: different note of the arc of the universe bending towards crab,
Speaker 1: one of our latest puppets is a massive crab dragon.
Speaker 1: Although it fails to copy the evolutionary perfect crab body plan,
Speaker 1: it is painted to look like a coconut crab. We
Speaker 1: were even listening to the Carsonization episode while painting her.
Speaker 1: Here are pictures, Izzy be Thank you so much. Izzy. These.
Speaker 1: When you said you were a puppet maker, I was excited.
Speaker 1: I love puppets. It's I mean, like, but I was
Speaker 1: expecting a small puppet.
Speaker 2: Which I was still excited for.
Speaker 1: I was still really excited for. This is a life sized,
Speaker 1: freaking dragon. It's massive, It's three people are operating this thing.
Speaker 1: It's a huge, actual real life dragon puppet the size
Speaker 1: of a freaking real life dragon and.
Speaker 2: It's incredible, and it is incredible.
Speaker 1: It is painted like a coconut crab. It's absolutely beautiful.
Speaker 1: It's amazing, and I, if possible, I'm going to include
Speaker 1: a link to these photos in the show notes. It's
Speaker 1: I'm so blown away by this. This is a beautiful puppet.
Speaker 1: I actually like a note about the Uncanny Valley before
Speaker 1: I get into answering the question. I actually love the
Speaker 1: Uncanny Valley, Like I actively seek out feeling that feeling.
Speaker 1: It's a it's a fun, exciting feeling for me. It's like,
Speaker 1: now I don't like roller coasters, Like I hate roller coasters.
Speaker 1: They scare me. But I imagine the feeling that other
Speaker 1: people get when they go on a roller coaster, of
Speaker 1: like that it's like kind of scary but exciting. That
Speaker 1: thrill that's what I get from like looking at weird
Speaker 1: animatronics or Uncanny Valley things. I love animatronics, I love puppets.
Speaker 1: I just love that feeling of like there's a certain
Speaker 1: sort of offness to this thing. It's like not quite
Speaker 1: a human, but it's almost a human. Like I really
Speaker 1: it's just thrilling for me. So this is a really
Speaker 1: exciting thing for me.
Speaker 2: Nice, this is an incredible puppet These are these are true.
Speaker 2: This is truly I you know, I would totally expect
Speaker 2: to see this at the front of a very well
Speaker 2: produced parade. This is like or you know of a
Speaker 2: like it's a puppet show. Not like a puppet show though,
Speaker 2: but like like a The Muppets.
Speaker 1: Yeah, definitely a cirqu of silet production. Yeah.
Speaker 2: No, it's it's a centerpiece right here.
Speaker 1: This is or like The Dark Crystal, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean. Ye Oh, I loved by the way. I
Speaker 1: love The Dark Crystal loved. I also like the the reboot,
Speaker 1: the remake or not remake the was I haven't.
Speaker 2: Checked out the It's good.
Speaker 1: I liked it. Yeah, my skeio, if you liked the
Speaker 1: original one, you'll definitely like the remake. It's or not remake.
Speaker 1: It's just a reboot, but it definitely recaptures sort of
Speaker 1: the it's it's all practical effects. It's really really beautiful.
Speaker 2: I love that.
Speaker 1: In terms of the question about whether animals feel the
Speaker 1: Uncanny Valley, I actually really agree with this listener. I
Speaker 1: think that we don't. While we don't necessarily have evidence
Speaker 1: that says that animals definitely do feel the Uncanny Valley.
Speaker 1: It's like hard to you know, quantify what an animal
Speaker 1: is feeling. I definitely think that animals would have the
Speaker 1: capacity to feel that based on certain animal behavior. So
Speaker 1: some of the things that we know, like, well, first
Speaker 1: of all, this is maybe not super scientific, but I've
Speaker 1: definitely seen a lot of videos of cats on like
Speaker 1: TikTok and stuff reacting to their owners having a like
Speaker 1: a cat filter on their face, you know, like on
Speaker 1: Snapchat or it's like a cat a cat face like
Speaker 1: filter on their face, so it looks like the human
Speaker 1: has a cat face on the phone, and the cats
Speaker 1: like look at the phone, look really startled, look back
Speaker 1: at their human and look at the phone and like
Speaker 1: run away. So, uh, that's that's interesting to me that
Speaker 1: the cats get really freaked out by humans wearing like
Speaker 1: a cat cat makeup or having that like cat filter.
Speaker 1: Of course, that's that's that's totally anecdotal. Uh less anecdotal
Speaker 1: I think, is Well, no, I guess it's still anecdotal. Anyways.
Speaker 1: Another thing that we've seen is like there's this TV
Speaker 1: show called Spies in the Wild where they put like anima, Yeah,
Speaker 1: spy in the wild. It's they it's it's hilarious but
Speaker 1: also a great nature documentary. They create these animatronic versions
Speaker 1: of animals so that they can have cameras like watching
Speaker 1: the animals up close. But it's also kind of funny
Speaker 1: because like most of the camera work in the show
Speaker 1: isn't from the animatronic animals, so it seems like that's
Speaker 1: something of a gimmick, got it, But it's still really interesting.
Speaker 1: I think the most interesting part of the show is
Speaker 1: not like the up close shots that these animatronics get,
Speaker 1: but it's the reactions that the animals have to the animatronics.
Speaker 1: So a lot of animals don't seem to really think
Speaker 1: anything of it, but once you start to get to primates,
Speaker 1: their reactions are very interesting. There are these langers that
Speaker 1: were very tentatively playing with this animatronic linger, and then
Speaker 1: it fell down and like broke and stopped moving, and
Speaker 1: then a bunch of langers all came over that this
Speaker 1: langers are a type of monkey, and they they came
Speaker 1: and surrounded this thing, like like twenty or thirty of them,
Speaker 1: just like looking and like carefully touching it and looking
Speaker 1: it was almost it looked like they were holding a
Speaker 1: funeral almost, but it was like I think they were
Speaker 1: just so freaked out and fascinated by what this was,
Speaker 1: where like it seems kind of like a dead monkey,
Speaker 1: but they weren't sure what it was, but they were
Speaker 1: fascinated and and it seemed kind of freaked out. So
Speaker 1: I think that And you also look at like things
Speaker 1: that we have done research on where dogs seem to
Speaker 1: pay particular attention to human faces on the side of
Speaker 1: the face that's more expressive, Like we're not our expressions
Speaker 1: are not completely symmetrical, Like there's usually one side of
Speaker 1: the face that is a little more expressive, and the
Speaker 1: dogs seem to prefer that side of the face. And
Speaker 1: so I think that that kind of like facial recognition.
Speaker 1: And it's the whole kind of concept of this idea
Speaker 1: that like only humans would be in some sort of
Speaker 1: like competition with other hominids. That doesn't make any sense,
Speaker 1: Like there are so many species who have very similar
Speaker 1: species that they are in competition with. I mean, like
Speaker 1: you know, canines like like wolves and other canids would
Speaker 1: be in competition, you know, I mean like a dog
Speaker 1: in a coyote Like coyote will often kill dogs, So
Speaker 1: like they have to be very careful around each other
Speaker 1: different kind of feline species, Like you know, a cheetah
Speaker 1: is no friend to like a lion. So it's you know,
Speaker 1: it's they are all sorts of competition amongst species that
Speaker 1: maybe don't look exactly like each other, but are somewhat similar.
Speaker 1: So this idea that the Uncanny Valley evolved in humans
Speaker 1: because we were competing with other species and we had
Speaker 1: to be aware of like ones that were kind off.
Speaker 1: It's like, well, I would say that would apply to
Speaker 1: you know, most most intelligent social animals.
Speaker 2: Great, I support that entirely. I don't. I obviously do
Speaker 2: not have a professional opinion on the matter, but I
Speaker 2: would like to think that, like you know, obviously language
Speaker 2: is something that is created by humans for humans. Yeah,
Speaker 2: but I think for to be for the suggestion to
Speaker 2: be that dogs and and you know certain animals don't
Speaker 2: have the capability to semi recognize something or have to
Speaker 2: wrestle with something as recognizable or not. I think, you know,
Speaker 2: to say, do they experience the uncanny Valley? It's like, well,
Speaker 2: they don't. They don't call it that, but they know
Speaker 2: when something is there and doesn't. It's like this is
Speaker 2: not quite right. This is not I'm confused by this.
Speaker 2: I support you entirely. I think it's I think it's one.
Speaker 1: Yeah. In fact, there there's a study, uh, there's a
Speaker 1: study of mackex that looked at their eye gaze of
Speaker 1: like computer generated images of mckx and like ones that
Speaker 1: were like, uh, sort of realistic, actually kind of cartoonish.
Speaker 1: They sort of looked at a little bit, didn't really
Speaker 1: seem to care. They were real photos they looked at
Speaker 1: for a long time because they were interested. But ones
Speaker 1: that were almost exactly realistic but not quite they were
Speaker 1: like CGI. They didn't like to look at it all.
Speaker 1: They like spent as little time looking at it as possible,
Speaker 1: which you know, it's hard to know exactly how to
Speaker 1: interpret those results, but one way of interpreting them is
Speaker 1: that they did not enjoy looking at that CGI version
Speaker 1: of the the macaque, and so they would avert their
Speaker 1: gaze because they found it unpleasant, which is how humans
Speaker 1: experienced the Uncanny Valley. So I would say this has
Speaker 1: not been researched enough to really say definitively, but I
Speaker 1: think all the research that we have, as well as
Speaker 1: general trends and animal behavior I think would indicate that, yeah,
Speaker 1: this could definitely happen for animals, and I don't see
Speaker 1: any reason to rule.
Speaker 2: It out for animals, right, I agree with you.
Speaker 1: That's why my dog hates polar Express. I thought it
Speaker 1: was just because she hated Tom Hanks, but I think
Speaker 1: it's all those all those weird kids.
Speaker 2: It's all those weird looking kids. That's funny, that's wonderful.
Speaker 1: Oh, Cookie, Also when I make a weird noise, she
Speaker 1: gives me such a look, like she does the little
Speaker 1: head turning thing. But like if I do sort of
Speaker 1: a weird whistling noise, like where I'm kind of sucking
Speaker 1: airin through my teeth or something in a weird way,
Speaker 1: or or if I blow across a bottle and it
Speaker 1: makes that like weird hooty noise, like she just like
Speaker 1: she looks at me like I've been possessed, and she's
Speaker 1: clearly she's like she's interested, but she's concerned. I've been bewitched.
Speaker 2: Totally totally different noise, I'm unfamiliar.
Speaker 1: Oh, and she hates it when people ride on bikes
Speaker 1: or skateboards, like, uh, just it's something like about the
Speaker 1: human going faster than they should that like she loses
Speaker 1: her mind over she hates so much. It's like you're
Speaker 1: a human but way too fast. This isn't right.
Speaker 2: Yeah, why is one part of you moving but the
Speaker 2: other parts of you were not? What's up with that?
Speaker 2: What's that?
Speaker 1: It's a bicycle human centaur? Evil?
Speaker 2: I'll bite off its legs?
Speaker 1: What is this?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Amazing?
Speaker 1: Well I think that'll do it for today. Thank you
Speaker 1: so much. Yeah for this email. Love the pictures of
Speaker 1: the puppet. I will share those. And yeah, if you
Speaker 1: haven't have a question and you want me to answer it,
Speaker 1: send an email to Creature Feature Pod at gmail dot
Speaker 1: com and I will either try to answer it over
Speaker 1: the email or even on the show. So yeah, thank
Speaker 1: you so much for that. And Daniel, thank you so
Speaker 1: much for being on here today. Thank you for having me.
Speaker 2: It's always a pleasure. It's such a great show, one
Speaker 2: of my favorite podcasts. Always honored to be included.
Speaker 1: Oh my goodness, thank you so much. He used to
Speaker 1: you used to engineer the dang thing.
Speaker 2: Did used to engineer the dang thing. But then we
Speaker 2: got so you know, we got so big and busy.
Speaker 2: They spread spread us all out there. They're like Danny
Speaker 2: can't do that anymore. You got to go do this
Speaker 2: other thing. I'm like that.
Speaker 1: But the bright side is now we've got Zach yay
Speaker 1: here you guys. He's he's actually he's actually.
Speaker 2: Shrouded by waves.
Speaker 1: He's actually he's actually a dolphins, so he can only
Speaker 1: in squeals and ease yes and confetti emotions. That's insane thing. Yes,
Speaker 1: I engineered.
Speaker 2: Lovely.
Speaker 1: Yeah, thank you so much for joining us. Where can
Speaker 1: people find you?
Speaker 2: You can find me on the on Twitter at dj
Speaker 2: Underscore Daniel and you can find me on Twitch at
Speaker 2: the same twitch dot tv slash dj Underscore d A
Speaker 2: n L. Check it out. We do fun stuff. Yeah yeah,
Speaker 2: and listen to the podcast shoot listen to Creature Feature.
Speaker 2: I mean you already here, so great job. Check on
Speaker 2: the podcast of the network.
Speaker 1: Yeah, check out other podcasts on the network. Uh, thank
Speaker 1: you guys so much for listening. You can find us
Speaker 1: on the internet at Creature Feature Pod on Instagram at
Speaker 1: Creature Feet Pod on Twitter. That's f e a T
Speaker 1: not f e et hood is something very different. And
Speaker 1: as always, I'm Katie Golden. You can find me on
Speaker 1: Twitter just for my Katie thoughts and uh yeah, thank
Speaker 1: you so much the Space Classics for their super awesome
Speaker 1: song ex Alumina.
Speaker 2: That song is great.
Speaker 1: I know it's so good. I love it.
Speaker 2: Can I get it? A Can I get it? A
Speaker 2: corny joke before we leave? Do it? Do it?
Speaker 1: Do it?
Speaker 2: Since? Did you said creature feet? Yeah, you were like, no,
Speaker 2: it's creature feet f e eight not f e e t.
Speaker 2: That's a different website. That website is only Finn's.
Speaker 1: Thank you, No, don't never apologize. Thank you so much
Speaker 1: for that. Oh my god, thank you so much. Creature
Speaker 1: Feature is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts like
Speaker 1: the one you just heard, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcast,
Speaker 1: or Hey guess what where have you listened to your
Speaker 1: favorite shows? See you next Wednesday, Only Finn