WEBVTT - How Whale Sharks Work 0:00:00.280 --> 0:00:02.840 Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera. 0:00:03.160 --> 0:00:07.600 It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you should know 0:00:08.200 --> 0:00:14.760 from how stuff works dot Com. The future of our 0:00:14.760 --> 0:00:18.720 planet depends on the forward thinkers among us. Green technology, 0:00:19.120 --> 0:00:22.160 the power of community, and the future of our planet 0:00:22.200 --> 0:00:25.520 are things we can change together. Visit how stuff works 0:00:25.520 --> 0:00:31.760 dot com and search Forward Thinking to join the movement. Hi, 0:00:31.880 --> 0:00:36.120 and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's Chuck Bryant. Chuck, 0:00:36.120 --> 0:00:39.360 are you falling sleep? Buddy? Meditating? It's the morning. This 0:00:39.479 --> 0:00:41.560 is not our usual time to record, so I'm very 0:00:41.560 --> 0:00:44.680 curious to see just how much worse than usual this 0:00:44.720 --> 0:00:47.920 one through. But it is Friday morning, is it? You 0:00:47.960 --> 0:00:50.040 know me? I'm big on the Friday recording. It's Friday 0:00:50.040 --> 0:00:52.680 short stay again. I know Chuck looks like a straight 0:00:52.760 --> 0:00:57.000 up summer babe, ye call them, but his legs look 0:00:57.080 --> 0:01:03.040 like milk bottles. A good thing. Pretty white Okay, Yeah 0:01:03.040 --> 0:01:06.319 I thought you meant the curvature. Okay, the white notes. 0:01:06.480 --> 0:01:08.760 So yeah, no, they look at it. It only slathers 0:01:08.800 --> 0:01:11.520 me with some block because I'm not allowed to beatan anymore. 0:01:11.600 --> 0:01:13.040 Do you have to wear like one of those big 0:01:13.080 --> 0:01:15.560 sun hats when you go out. I do. My dad 0:01:15.640 --> 0:01:17.800 dresses like that. He dresses like he's afraid of stars 0:01:17.880 --> 0:01:19.560 or something. He puts on a big old hat and 0:01:19.880 --> 0:01:23.760 a little surgical mask the lawn and oh yeah, it's awesome. 0:01:23.800 --> 0:01:27.720 He gets very androgynous when he's mowing the lawn. Okay, 0:01:27.760 --> 0:01:31.520 it's weird, Chuck. We got a package recently that I 0:01:31.560 --> 0:01:35.959 would like you to describe, Josh. This is Dare I say, 0:01:36.080 --> 0:01:39.040 one of the cooler promotional items I've ever seen from 0:01:39.040 --> 0:01:43.679 a company. Agreed, Yeah, this is from our parent company, Discovery. 0:01:43.680 --> 0:01:46.400 And what they did was they sent out to promote 0:01:46.440 --> 0:01:50.240 their Shark Week, which, as everyone knows, is huge. It is. 0:01:50.280 --> 0:01:53.120 Have you ever seen the shark gun the building at 0:01:53.000 --> 0:01:57.200 a Discovery HQ and describing, Well, it's a pretty standard 0:01:57.200 --> 0:02:01.200 looking building normally, but around Shark Week time they have 0:02:01.280 --> 0:02:04.000 a giant shark head coming on the building on one 0:02:04.040 --> 0:02:07.200 side and a giant shark tail coming out on the 0:02:07.200 --> 0:02:10.520 other and I suspect a giant shark fin coming out 0:02:10.520 --> 0:02:13.160 of the top and on the sides. It looks awesome. 0:02:13.160 --> 0:02:15.200 It's pretty cool. Actually, you can google that if you're 0:02:15.240 --> 0:02:17.400 interested in looking at that. I think if you like 0:02:17.440 --> 0:02:20.040 to look up Discovery headquarters Shark weeken shore, you can 0:02:20.040 --> 0:02:22.560 find pictures and talking. I know a little bit about sharks. 0:02:22.560 --> 0:02:25.200 We've written tons of articles on him around Shark Week, 0:02:25.760 --> 0:02:29.160 many many, And so what they sent out was it's 0:02:29.200 --> 0:02:33.280 a jar art directed to look like an old beat 0:02:33.360 --> 0:02:35.680 up jar short that may have washed up on shore. 0:02:36.320 --> 0:02:39.560 And inside we were surprised to first find a pair 0:02:39.639 --> 0:02:44.160 of chewed up beat shorts, bloody, blood stained beat shorts. 0:02:44.320 --> 0:02:46.320 And we've been warned that they were gonna smell. They 0:02:46.320 --> 0:02:49.920 didn't in fact smell right, They did not smell like 0:02:50.000 --> 0:02:52.720 death or gore. We got this cool giant shark tooth 0:02:52.800 --> 0:02:56.760 with a on a little key chain. We got another 0:02:56.840 --> 0:03:00.560 little another little floaty keychain with is an O bit 0:03:00.919 --> 0:03:04.240 in there the obituaries, an obituary type as if it 0:03:04.320 --> 0:03:08.280 was from an old newspaper of Chief Martin Brody from 0:03:08.360 --> 0:03:13.280 Jaws Fame. And one of our marketing people, sam A Dorno, 0:03:14.040 --> 0:03:16.400 found that her O bit turned up in one of 0:03:16.400 --> 0:03:20.200 the marketing packages to scanning her own death notice on 0:03:20.280 --> 0:03:23.640 the date of her funeral. Interesting, yeah, he's lovely in fetching, 0:03:23.720 --> 0:03:26.480 sam A Dorna, and uh so, yeah, they sent out 0:03:26.520 --> 0:03:28.880 all this stuff and basically it's they sent him to 0:03:29.200 --> 0:03:32.200 just different companies and media outlets around the country. They 0:03:32.240 --> 0:03:34.400 did it anonymously, right it was. That's yeah, that's the 0:03:34.440 --> 0:03:36.000 trick is you don't really know what it is. You 0:03:36.080 --> 0:03:38.800 just get this suspicious package that I never would have 0:03:38.840 --> 0:03:40.760 opened had I not known where it was from, to 0:03:40.760 --> 0:03:43.160 be honest, it would have frightened me. It is pretty cool, 0:03:43.200 --> 0:03:45.040 but yeah, it is really cool, good idea, but it 0:03:45.360 --> 0:03:48.240 directs you to go to frenzied waters dot com, right, yeah, 0:03:48.280 --> 0:03:51.240 and the cool stuff on that thanks in part to 0:03:51.480 --> 0:03:54.920 our own Mr Chuck Bryant, who helped come up with 0:03:55.320 --> 0:03:58.520 some aspects of this marketing campaign. Didn't you. I mean, 0:03:58.560 --> 0:04:00.680 what don't you do, Chuck? I do it all due, 0:04:00.760 --> 0:04:02.680 Yeah you do. You wear many hats and each one 0:04:02.800 --> 0:04:05.680 is more fetching than the last. Yeah. I did the 0:04:05.680 --> 0:04:09.040 the fake diary thing from the shark attacks of nineteen sixteen, 0:04:09.080 --> 0:04:11.440 and I'm really excited. It's it's an awesome, cool thing 0:04:11.520 --> 0:04:14.640 to work on. And our our sisters in arms over 0:04:14.800 --> 0:04:17.960 at us Stuffy missed in history class. I think they 0:04:18.040 --> 0:04:22.400 just recorded one, right, um, the shark attacks of nineteen sixteen, 0:04:22.440 --> 0:04:24.040 which really happened. Yeah, it was a great story. I 0:04:24.080 --> 0:04:25.520 was a little jealous I got to do that one. 0:04:25.600 --> 0:04:27.720 But is that why you haven't been talking to either 0:04:27.760 --> 0:04:30.760 of them? I know I've boycotted them. Yeah. Well we 0:04:30.839 --> 0:04:34.760 happen to do something pretty cool recently, So back to us. Yeah, 0:04:35.120 --> 0:04:38.680 it's always about us, um and uh, that is that 0:04:38.720 --> 0:04:43.159 we swam with whale sharks, among many other types of 0:04:43.200 --> 0:04:46.159 fish and sharks and skates and rays. Yeah, that manor 0:04:46.200 --> 0:04:48.240 ray was huge. We we swam with the manaray that 0:04:48.400 --> 0:04:50.960 was at least the size of me yr Chuck. Yeah, 0:04:50.960 --> 0:04:53.520 I mean it looked the wingspan had to be, uh 0:04:53.760 --> 0:04:56.280 six or eight feet across. It was a big, big boy. 0:04:56.560 --> 0:04:59.440 Very cool. The big attraction this is at the Georgia Aquium, 0:04:59.480 --> 0:05:02.320 the bigger track and those definitely the whale sharks, which 0:05:02.560 --> 0:05:08.320 were I think sixteen two I think was the female was. Yeah, 0:05:08.360 --> 0:05:09.880 and you know what that was. It was a noticeable 0:05:09.880 --> 0:05:12.599 difference when that female came by. That's the coolest thing 0:05:12.640 --> 0:05:15.279 I've ever had the opportunity to do. Yeah, so let's 0:05:15.360 --> 0:05:17.680 let's talk about whale sharks. We'll talk about swimming with 0:05:17.720 --> 0:05:20.039 them a little more in a little more detail. But 0:05:21.040 --> 0:05:23.800 Chuck tell me about whales sharks. And this is based 0:05:23.839 --> 0:05:25.919 on an article on how stuff works dot com that 0:05:26.040 --> 0:05:29.400 you wrote. Indeed, you are the whale shark expert. You 0:05:29.440 --> 0:05:32.279 spank me whenever we get into whale shark trivia and 0:05:32.320 --> 0:05:34.600 I stalk off crime, which is all the time. Yeah. 0:05:35.080 --> 0:05:37.520 Uh yeah, let's talk about the whale shark. Everyone knows 0:05:37.560 --> 0:05:40.560 that it is the largest fish in the sea. I 0:05:40.600 --> 0:05:42.880 didn't know that, which also makes it the largest shark 0:05:43.600 --> 0:05:47.320 h in the sea. And some of these can reportedly 0:05:47.400 --> 0:05:50.680 grow to over sixty feet dude, which is like twenty 0:05:50.680 --> 0:05:53.359 ft longer than a full size school bus. Can you 0:05:53.400 --> 0:05:55.640 imagine seeing one the largest one we saw the other day? 0:05:55.640 --> 0:05:58.159 Can you imagine one three times that size? Yeah? I 0:05:58.200 --> 0:06:00.440 can't either. No, I mean it's just mammoth. One of 0:06:00.520 --> 0:06:02.440 the other things that I noticed when we were swimming 0:06:02.440 --> 0:06:04.520 with them that I just found amazing. You remember the 0:06:04.800 --> 0:06:07.720 one right before we got out of the tank. Yes, 0:06:08.600 --> 0:06:10.360 I think it was the female. She was swimming right 0:06:10.400 --> 0:06:13.279 towards me and then dipped right below me and came 0:06:13.320 --> 0:06:16.719 within centimeters touching me, But at no point did she 0:06:16.800 --> 0:06:20.360 touch me, So they apparently have some really great sense 0:06:20.360 --> 0:06:23.320 of kinetics. Yeah, knowing exactly where every part of their 0:06:23.320 --> 0:06:27.200 body is in relation to other things, because I don't 0:06:27.240 --> 0:06:29.720 understand how it didn't brush against me. Yeah, we have 0:06:29.839 --> 0:06:32.080 a couple of times we had him swim kind of 0:06:32.160 --> 0:06:34.960 right under us. We were we didn't do a scuba dive, 0:06:35.000 --> 0:06:37.320 which just so people know we're up up top, but 0:06:37.400 --> 0:06:40.280 with a scuba tank and mask, and they would they 0:06:40.279 --> 0:06:42.000 swam right under us, and I turned around to look 0:06:42.000 --> 0:06:43.640 and I would see that big tail coming at me, 0:06:43.680 --> 0:06:45.800 the big dorsal fin, and I just knew it was 0:06:45.839 --> 0:06:47.680 gonna smack me on the way by, but it just 0:06:47.920 --> 0:06:50.159 it never did went right on. So they're huge, and 0:06:50.200 --> 0:06:54.800 they do appear kind of lumbering, but really they're super graceful. Yeah, 0:06:54.800 --> 0:06:57.080 they're very cool. And they're cool looking too. And there 0:06:57.120 --> 0:06:59.159 were hammer heads in there too, There were I was 0:06:59.200 --> 0:07:01.800 a little nervous hammer heads were kind of eyeing us. Yeah, 0:07:01.839 --> 0:07:03.599 they kind of stayed download that, which is good. But 0:07:03.720 --> 0:07:05.400 it turned out to be the grouper who is the 0:07:05.400 --> 0:07:07.919 big threat, right. Yeah, the grouper was cool looking because 0:07:07.920 --> 0:07:10.840 it was I mean, a grouper just looks like fish. 0:07:10.920 --> 0:07:12.840 If you look up fish, it just looks like a fish. 0:07:12.880 --> 0:07:14.920 Like you had seen a little small tank, but it 0:07:15.000 --> 0:07:17.600 was three hundred pounds. It looked like some land of 0:07:17.640 --> 0:07:21.560 the Lost giant fish, and it was undergoing a sexual 0:07:21.600 --> 0:07:26.120 transformation like Headwig and the angry inch right. Um. Apparently 0:07:26.120 --> 0:07:29.240 when they turned about twenty five or so, they go 0:07:29.360 --> 0:07:33.800 all hermaphrodite and um change sex, and apparently it's not 0:07:33.880 --> 0:07:36.440 a pleasant process. So we had a grumpy grouper in 0:07:36.440 --> 0:07:39.160 there who was in a tank with different kinds of 0:07:39.200 --> 0:07:42.280 sharks rays. It was actually the biggest threat to us 0:07:42.480 --> 0:07:44.840 in that tank. Hard to believe. They said, it's the 0:07:44.920 --> 0:07:48.640 jaw could break your arm down. Pounds of anything can 0:07:48.680 --> 0:07:51.560 break your arm. So back to the whale shark. Um. 0:07:52.080 --> 0:07:55.640 The whale shark lives in warm ocean waters pretty much 0:07:55.680 --> 0:07:58.680 everywhere where it's warm, except the Mediterranean exactly, which I 0:07:58.720 --> 0:08:00.720 thought was a little It is a little odd. I'd 0:08:00.880 --> 0:08:02.200 want to hang out in the Mediterranean if I was 0:08:02.200 --> 0:08:04.400 a whale shark. And they're starting to migrate in in 0:08:04.760 --> 0:08:08.840 new and surprising places, like they anytime they pop up. 0:08:08.880 --> 0:08:11.560 I was reading an article they popped up um off 0:08:11.560 --> 0:08:15.680 the coast of Mississippi, Louisiana. Actually I'm sorry, UM. And 0:08:15.840 --> 0:08:18.760 some guy who spotted him was a commercial fisherman and 0:08:18.800 --> 0:08:21.960 they were hanging around. Uh and within like several hours 0:08:22.040 --> 0:08:25.160 or a day, his commercial fishing vessel was suddenly a 0:08:25.160 --> 0:08:28.200 research vessel. All these scientists flew down and chartered his 0:08:28.240 --> 0:08:30.000 boat and went out there. He took him out there 0:08:30.040 --> 0:08:33.480 to to study them because we know so little about him, right, Yeah, 0:08:34.200 --> 0:08:36.640 for the most part, they're starting to learn though, since 0:08:36.679 --> 0:08:39.240 we may able to keep them in captivity, they're learning 0:08:39.240 --> 0:08:43.040 a lot more. As Chris Coco are are host and 0:08:43.240 --> 0:08:45.560 shark expert at the aquarium. Yeah, and Chuck and I 0:08:45.600 --> 0:08:52.720 aren't um immune to the arguments about zoology and keeping 0:08:52.760 --> 0:08:56.000 animals in captivity or the whole concept of a zoo. Um. 0:08:56.080 --> 0:08:58.360 You know, I definitely see both sides of the argument. 0:09:00.160 --> 0:09:04.520 But Chris Coco was able to produce um some evidence 0:09:04.559 --> 0:09:07.920 that this exhibit at the Georgia Aquarium. And I think 0:09:07.920 --> 0:09:11.920 they're the only whale sharks in the Western Hemisphere in captivity, right, Yeah, 0:09:11.960 --> 0:09:15.800 you can find them in Japan and then fifteen minutes 0:09:15.840 --> 0:09:18.280 down the road from where we are. Yeah, it's pretty cool. Right. 0:09:18.440 --> 0:09:21.319 So Chris said that they had gotten their whale sharks 0:09:21.320 --> 0:09:25.360 from Taiwan, which is like the whale shark fishing capital 0:09:25.400 --> 0:09:27.960 of the world. I think they consume the most whale 0:09:27.960 --> 0:09:31.360 shark meat of any country in the world as well. UM. 0:09:31.400 --> 0:09:34.400 But since that exhibit opened UH and they formed a 0:09:34.440 --> 0:09:38.280 relationship with Taiwan, Taiwan's kill quota went from I think 0:09:38.640 --> 0:09:43.080 a couple hundred a year for each individual to zero. 0:09:44.120 --> 0:09:46.080 And one of the reasons why is um they were 0:09:46.120 --> 0:09:48.720 able to show that if you if you allow a 0:09:48.720 --> 0:09:50.959 whale shark to live, if you kill a whale shark 0:09:51.520 --> 0:09:54.800 in Taiwan, I read that fishermen would get about ten 0:09:54.920 --> 0:09:58.720 kilograms a pound or ten cents of kilogram. That was 0:09:58.720 --> 0:10:01.839 the non conversion ten cents of kilogram for a whale 0:10:01.840 --> 0:10:04.720 shark me, which is kind of substantial, but really not 0:10:04.840 --> 0:10:07.720 so much. In India they get something like four thousand 0:10:07.760 --> 0:10:11.320 dollars a whale shark. UM A lot of money, it is, 0:10:11.400 --> 0:10:13.760 but that's it. That's all you made off of that 0:10:13.800 --> 0:10:17.559 whale shark, regardless of the size, right, Okay, but at 0:10:17.559 --> 0:10:19.199 the same time you've killed it, you can only make 0:10:19.240 --> 0:10:23.040 money off of it. It's sale once. Thanks to the 0:10:23.080 --> 0:10:28.840 burgeoning UM I guess sector of eco tourism, people are 0:10:28.840 --> 0:10:31.520 starting to figure out that you can make money over 0:10:31.600 --> 0:10:34.040 and over and over again off of a single whale 0:10:34.040 --> 0:10:38.480 shark through eco tourism, right because you know we what 0:10:38.559 --> 0:10:41.600 we did when we swam at the Georgia Aquarium. Anybody 0:10:41.640 --> 0:10:44.000 can do for like I think two bucks or whatever 0:10:45.400 --> 0:10:50.520 and for full scuba diving um and Georgia Aquarium is 0:10:50.520 --> 0:10:52.360 not the only place to do it. I mean you 0:10:52.360 --> 0:10:55.160 can do it out in the wild and people are 0:10:55.200 --> 0:10:56.959 realizing that you can make a ton of money off 0:10:57.000 --> 0:11:00.439 of it. I think the Australia Conservation Union as demated 0:11:00.480 --> 0:11:04.280 that the value, the annual value of each whale shark 0:11:04.640 --> 0:11:06.760 is somewhere in the neighborhood of hundred and eighty two 0:11:06.800 --> 0:11:10.080 or two two thousand dollars, and we're talking. You know, 0:11:10.160 --> 0:11:13.000 some of the economies where whale sharks hang out are 0:11:13.000 --> 0:11:15.920 not the richest in the world, so you know, they 0:11:15.920 --> 0:11:19.520 can generate serious income if these these local economies can 0:11:19.520 --> 0:11:23.680 figure out how to really most efficiently shift from whale 0:11:23.679 --> 0:11:28.560 shark fishing to eco tourism and finning, which is gross. Yeah, 0:11:28.600 --> 0:11:30.800 shark finning for those who don't know, shark fin soup 0:11:30.920 --> 0:11:33.280 is a delicacy in certain parts of the world, and 0:11:33.280 --> 0:11:35.880 shark finning literally means you pull the shark up on 0:11:35.880 --> 0:11:38.240 your boat. Sometimes not even sometimes they do it from 0:11:38.240 --> 0:11:41.760 the water, dude, and cut the fins off and throw 0:11:41.800 --> 0:11:43.440 it back in the water, or just keep it in 0:11:43.480 --> 0:11:45.840 the water where the shark dies and that's it. That's 0:11:45.840 --> 0:11:47.760 the only part they use is to fin well. They 0:11:47.800 --> 0:11:51.400 bleed to death, yes, awful. And they also without their 0:11:51.440 --> 0:11:55.720 their fin they lose any um way of navigation, so 0:11:55.760 --> 0:11:59.160 they're just kind of drifting about bleeding to death. It's 0:11:59.200 --> 0:12:02.000 not a not a nice death. And we should also 0:12:02.040 --> 0:12:06.680 say to that um. The whale shark doesn't reach reproductive 0:12:06.720 --> 0:12:09.520 age until they think about twenty five or thirty years, 0:12:09.600 --> 0:12:11.760 So the problem is, like a lot of animals who 0:12:11.800 --> 0:12:15.400 have a late reproductive cycle, you kill them before that time, 0:12:15.440 --> 0:12:18.440 and what's gonna happen. They're not gonna have shark pups. 0:12:18.920 --> 0:12:22.439 It has a huge, huge impact done on the species 0:12:22.520 --> 0:12:24.319 big time, because they have up to like two and 0:12:24.360 --> 0:12:27.920 three hundred pups at a time. So you're every shark 0:12:28.000 --> 0:12:30.200 you kill before that age, you're shorting two or three 0:12:30.280 --> 0:12:37.080 hundred potential sharks. And its biggest predator obviously is the human. Yeah, absolutely, 0:12:37.160 --> 0:12:38.920 it's the biggest fishing to see, there's not a lot 0:12:38.960 --> 0:12:41.400 of comers to take on, you know, a whale shark, 0:12:41.600 --> 0:12:44.000 which is funny because they're so peaceful and gentle. They 0:12:44.040 --> 0:12:48.240 really are um and their diet is actually really really light. Yeah, 0:12:48.320 --> 0:12:50.559 let's talk about that. That's cool. Okay. So they are 0:12:51.040 --> 0:12:54.800 filter feeders, right. Uh. They generally just eat plankton, which 0:12:54.840 --> 0:12:59.800 is really tiny, nearly microscopic um plant an animal life 0:13:00.120 --> 0:13:03.160 just kind of is suspended in the ocean. They're also 0:13:03.240 --> 0:13:06.360 surface dwellers, which is where the plankton is, and krill too, 0:13:06.360 --> 0:13:09.520 which are like teeny little shrimps and actual little shrimp 0:13:09.600 --> 0:13:13.559 as well. Uh. And in captivity, they also love dog food. 0:13:13.600 --> 0:13:16.640 It looked like remember those little brown cubes of nastiness 0:13:16.640 --> 0:13:19.760 they're feeding it. Yeah, that was a gelatine mixture that 0:13:19.800 --> 0:13:23.240 they made their dequarian. But for their size, you know, 0:13:23.320 --> 0:13:27.480 they actually don't eat a lot right at once, but 0:13:27.559 --> 0:13:30.080 they eat constantly out in the wild, right, It's all 0:13:30.120 --> 0:13:32.720 they do. So they're they're drifting along with their mouth 0:13:32.760 --> 0:13:36.240 open pretty much, and the plankton goes in right like 0:13:36.240 --> 0:13:39.800 a little vacuum. Huh. And then whatever can't get out 0:13:39.800 --> 0:13:42.400 of the gills get stuck there. And what do they 0:13:42.400 --> 0:13:45.520 do chuck. Well, they the gills actually as like a 0:13:45.720 --> 0:13:48.480 like a strainer, so the water goes out and then 0:13:48.520 --> 0:13:51.360 they're the algae and the krill and everything or in 0:13:51.400 --> 0:13:54.320 the mouth. And don't they cough? And they cough it 0:13:54.520 --> 0:13:56.439 like they howk up a bunch of planktons. Oh yeah, 0:13:56.520 --> 0:13:59.240 if they if it's too big, if I think two centimeters, 0:13:59.280 --> 0:14:02.680 anything over two centimeters, they'll hack back up and spit out. 0:14:03.120 --> 0:14:06.680 And I did ask, actually Gus ask Chris at the aquarium, like, 0:14:06.720 --> 0:14:08.880 when you're feeding these guys, do they did one of 0:14:08.880 --> 0:14:11.080 these other fish because the other fish kind of hang 0:14:11.080 --> 0:14:13.599 out to try and get little leftovers. Yeah. Remember, And 0:14:13.640 --> 0:14:15.120 I was like, do you ever see one of the 0:14:15.120 --> 0:14:18.360 bigger fish accidentally get sucked in this huge mouth? He said, yeah, 0:14:18.400 --> 0:14:20.440 that's happened a couple of times, and they pretty much 0:14:20.440 --> 0:14:22.960 cough it peck out really quickly. And he said that 0:14:23.000 --> 0:14:25.400 swims out of the fish is expelled it about twice 0:14:25.400 --> 0:14:28.200 the speed it was originally going in. I really wanted 0:14:28.200 --> 0:14:31.040 to see that. I didn't, Yeah, because you know, fish 0:14:31.040 --> 0:14:34.960 make funny faces when they're scared. So we have figured 0:14:34.960 --> 0:14:38.200 out some stuff about whale sharks um just from the 0:14:38.560 --> 0:14:41.600 few studies that have been able to be conducted. I 0:14:41.960 --> 0:14:44.200 read an estimate Chuck that there was like five hundred 0:14:44.200 --> 0:14:47.640 thousand and estimated five hundred thousand in the wild, which 0:14:47.680 --> 0:14:52.880 is really really low. Yeah, especially considering that millions of 0:14:52.920 --> 0:14:57.760 sharks are killed each year recreationally. Millions, dude, millions. The 0:14:57.840 --> 0:15:00.280 highest estimate I saw was a hundred million. The in 0:15:00.560 --> 0:15:03.240 the media and I think was about thirty million. Sad, 0:15:03.680 --> 0:15:06.120 but yeah, if there's five hundred thousand of you and 0:15:06.240 --> 0:15:09.720 people are indiscriminately killing sharks and you're in trouble, yeah, 0:15:09.720 --> 0:15:13.040 well their listed is vulnerable by the World Conservation Union, 0:15:13.440 --> 0:15:15.680 so that's no good. But what we have figured out 0:15:16.600 --> 0:15:19.240 for a long time, they thought that whale sharks actually 0:15:19.320 --> 0:15:22.480 laid eggs, right, yeah, which is not the case. Now 0:15:22.520 --> 0:15:26.120 they have pups they do um. I think in female 0:15:26.120 --> 0:15:29.080 whale shark was killed and they cut her open and 0:15:29.440 --> 0:15:34.640 found three hundred well shark pups sixteen. I bet that 0:15:34.720 --> 0:15:37.120 is one of the cutest things you've ever seen, dead 0:15:37.120 --> 0:15:43.080 whale shark pups. No, well, it's it's funny. Yeah, I 0:15:43.160 --> 0:15:45.120 forgot the fact that the fact that they were dead, 0:15:45.440 --> 0:15:47.680 that's under pretty insensitive. I would just say, like a 0:15:47.720 --> 0:15:50.040 two ft whale shark pup would be really cute alive, 0:15:50.240 --> 0:15:54.040 I'm sure, because they're pretty cute. Twenty ft they are. Yeah, 0:15:54.080 --> 0:15:57.440 they they have their mouths are at the front of 0:15:57.680 --> 0:16:01.240 their face, not under the unusual flash shark yeah usually, 0:16:01.320 --> 0:16:05.200 and it's just this big, wide, narrow, gaping mall. Yeah, 0:16:05.200 --> 0:16:08.040 a big square head really, and their eyes are real 0:16:08.080 --> 0:16:10.040 tiny and kind of on the side, and they're just 0:16:10.120 --> 0:16:12.520 they're cute, they're big. You just want to cuddle with them. 0:16:12.560 --> 0:16:14.400 I know, I really wanted to touch one and kind 0:16:14.440 --> 0:16:16.640 of give it a hug, but they said, uh, and 0:16:16.680 --> 0:16:19.320 we'll actually talk about this when you're swimming with the 0:16:19.360 --> 0:16:22.240 fish in the wild. It's called a soft encounter. Yeah, 0:16:22.320 --> 0:16:25.240 So basically, you want to be a you want to watch, 0:16:25.320 --> 0:16:28.000 you don't want to be a participant. Well, anytime they 0:16:28.040 --> 0:16:30.440 got nearest, we had to like lay flat and still 0:16:30.760 --> 0:16:32.440 and just let them pass by and let him check 0:16:32.480 --> 0:16:36.040 us out. Pretty cool, yeah, but they're they're whale sharks. 0:16:36.040 --> 0:16:38.040 Aren't the only things that you can have a soft 0:16:38.640 --> 0:16:41.480 encounter with, right, We can have a soft encounter with you, 0:16:41.560 --> 0:16:45.720 big boy. It would be super soft encounter. Even our 0:16:45.760 --> 0:16:49.600 producer Jerry got in on that, Yes, you can also 0:16:49.680 --> 0:16:54.000 swim with humpback whales. It's pretty popular. Um in the 0:16:54.040 --> 0:16:58.160 Dominican Republic and the South Pacific island of Ponga, you 0:16:58.200 --> 0:17:02.480 can swim with humpback whales, another docile creature and chuck. Actually, 0:17:02.480 --> 0:17:05.040 there's a there's a place in the Philippines that has 0:17:05.080 --> 0:17:09.199 become kind of a hot spot for um soft encounters, 0:17:09.720 --> 0:17:14.000 soft in water encounters. Right, soft encounter cracks me up 0:17:14.040 --> 0:17:17.240 so much, it is kind of funny. Um. And that's 0:17:17.240 --> 0:17:20.920 a doncile Philippines right right. They were really the kind 0:17:20.920 --> 0:17:23.240 of the first to get on board with the soft 0:17:23.359 --> 0:17:28.400 encounter eco tourism thing. Um, and they've kind of provided 0:17:28.440 --> 0:17:34.560 a model for everybody else. Absolutely. You know another creature 0:17:34.600 --> 0:17:38.879 that people like swimming with, but it doesn't usually work out. Dolphins. 0:17:40.440 --> 0:17:44.040 People love dolphins. Well, yeah, you said in another article 0:17:44.080 --> 0:17:46.520 that you wrote, um, what was the name of it? 0:17:46.720 --> 0:17:49.000 What sea creatures can you swim with? Yeah? That that 0:17:49.920 --> 0:17:51.920 you would think that, you know, you just hang onto 0:17:51.920 --> 0:17:53.680 the dolphins fin and go for a ride and maybe 0:17:53.680 --> 0:17:55.440 it would let you, But all of a sudden you'd 0:17:55.480 --> 0:17:57.679 find that you were going really fast and if the 0:17:57.720 --> 0:18:00.560 dolphin wanted to dive really deep and you would be 0:18:00.600 --> 0:18:03.320 in some serious trouble. Yeah, dolphins are fun, but there's 0:18:03.359 --> 0:18:05.400 no way you're gonna do the flipper thing and hang 0:18:05.440 --> 0:18:08.880 on and take a little ride. Plus also they're deadly 0:18:09.119 --> 0:18:13.360 deadly creatures. Are they hate humans? Dolphins? Now? I thought 0:18:13.359 --> 0:18:16.359 they like people. You're josh and they're all about the 0:18:16.359 --> 0:18:19.920 soft encounter. Um, there is another side of the coin here. 0:18:19.920 --> 0:18:22.040 You can also swim with sea lions by the way, 0:18:22.080 --> 0:18:26.399 and sting rays, ah and seals here and there, Like 0:18:26.400 --> 0:18:28.920 in the UK you can swim with seals. But there 0:18:29.000 --> 0:18:32.000 is another side to this which a lot of wildlife 0:18:32.000 --> 0:18:35.600 experts kind of decry this whole practice, and they say 0:18:35.800 --> 0:18:37.320 you shouldn't be able to do this at sea world. 0:18:37.320 --> 0:18:40.560 You shouldn't do this in the wild because when you 0:18:40.600 --> 0:18:43.840 swim with sharks like um, the small reef sharks and 0:18:43.880 --> 0:18:46.320 things will chum the water. They say that disrupts their 0:18:46.359 --> 0:18:50.520 feeding cycle and just being humans being around them basically 0:18:50.680 --> 0:18:54.840 says disrupts their whole uh underwater system they got going there? 0:18:54.880 --> 0:18:57.000 Oh yeah, definitely. I mean think about we're we're all 0:18:57.040 --> 0:18:59.680 pretty much lousy with swine flu these days. You don't 0:18:59.680 --> 0:19:02.359 need to that into their environment. It's terrible, So there 0:19:02.359 --> 0:19:04.040 are two sides to the coin. I mean, it's good 0:19:04.080 --> 0:19:06.280 for a lot of these places. It's a big part 0:19:06.280 --> 0:19:10.119 of their uh, their income as a country. You know 0:19:10.160 --> 0:19:12.360 a lot of these places are poor. You know, they're 0:19:12.359 --> 0:19:16.320 not like swimming off the coast of Abitha or anything 0:19:16.359 --> 0:19:21.040 like that. No, like Philippines not necessarily the wealthiest country 0:19:21.080 --> 0:19:24.240 in the world. Yeah, so they could use the money. Um, 0:19:24.320 --> 0:19:28.040 where do you fall What do you think of eco 0:19:28.080 --> 0:19:30.720 tourism versus the butchering of sharks? Well, no, no, no no, 0:19:31.080 --> 0:19:33.119 I mean I mean just period, like should they be 0:19:33.160 --> 0:19:36.480 completely left alone or should this stuff be allowed? I'm 0:19:36.520 --> 0:19:38.639 curious because I still don't know what to think. I 0:19:38.680 --> 0:19:41.840 think you can learn a lot, but who knows if 0:19:41.840 --> 0:19:43.960 there's any damage being done. Well. Yeah, Also in the 0:19:44.000 --> 0:19:47.120 other problems you posted about, um, the French tourism board 0:19:47.200 --> 0:19:51.440 asking Parisians to smile at the tourist swine recently, right, 0:19:51.840 --> 0:19:54.240 I mean, there are a lot of yokels out there 0:19:54.480 --> 0:19:57.080 who would love to just maybe get in a slap 0:19:57.119 --> 0:20:00.320 fight with the seal or something like that. Um, so 0:20:00.359 --> 0:20:02.960 there's always that danger. But again, I think if it's 0:20:02.960 --> 0:20:06.359 the if it's the choice between making money, you have 0:20:06.440 --> 0:20:08.920 to make money. Humans have to make money, and if 0:20:08.960 --> 0:20:11.800 you're a coastal economy, you're gonna make money off of 0:20:11.840 --> 0:20:13.600 the sea. So you're gonna make money off of the 0:20:13.640 --> 0:20:17.600 seat through conservation that eco tourism can provide, or you're 0:20:17.600 --> 0:20:20.320 gonna do it by catching and killing whale sharks for 0:20:20.359 --> 0:20:24.320 their fits. Right, That's clearly the choice is obvious, and 0:20:24.359 --> 0:20:26.639 there's but there's also more sustainable ways that you can 0:20:26.680 --> 0:20:29.440 carry out ecotourism as well. And I think that since 0:20:29.440 --> 0:20:33.560 it's such a new embudding economic sector, we don't really 0:20:33.680 --> 0:20:35.679 fully know how to do that yet, but I think 0:20:35.720 --> 0:20:38.399 it's good that that's the direction we're moving it. Yeah, 0:20:38.600 --> 0:20:41.040 that's that's my final judgment. What I want to do 0:20:41.119 --> 0:20:43.160 now is uh, and I now I kept you because 0:20:43.160 --> 0:20:46.639 you're scuba certified. Apologize again, don't worry about it. I 0:20:46.720 --> 0:20:49.200 kept you from scuba diving because I could not scuba 0:20:49.200 --> 0:20:52.400 dive and we both had to stay together. Uh, that's 0:20:52.440 --> 0:20:54.440 my next goal. I want to get down there because 0:20:54.520 --> 0:20:56.560