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Speaker 1: Welcome to Creature feature production of iHeartRadio. I'm your host

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Speaker 1: of Many Parasites, Katie Golden. I studied psychology and evolutionary biology,

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Speaker 1: and today on the show Bats Bats, Bats, Bats, Bat Bats,

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Speaker 1: We're getting scary and spooky, but not really with a

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Speaker 1: special bat episode. Bats may not be the horrible Halloween

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Speaker 1: monster that they're made out to be, but they's still

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Speaker 1: one of my favorite orders of animals in the world. Then,

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Speaker 1: just for more fun, we'll talk about a who's list

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Speaker 1: of halloweeny critters and why they're so special. Joining me

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Speaker 1: today to talk about the most incredible unusual bat species,

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Speaker 1: as well as separating bat fact from bat. Libel is

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Speaker 1: science journalist and co author of the new book Atlas

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Speaker 1: Obscure Wildlife Karajaimo.

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Speaker 2: Welcome, Hi Katie. Thanks so much for having me.

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Speaker 1: I have had you on before, and I'm a big fan,

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Speaker 1: especially for someone who writes the podcast and then also

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Speaker 1: likes to read the news for maybe ideas for my podcast,

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Speaker 1: and I have definitely your articles have definitely inspired me

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Speaker 1: before and writing my episode, and so I feel like

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Speaker 1: we have sort of come full circle now you are

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Speaker 1: here talking about this incredible book that you've written that

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Speaker 1: is such a comprehensive journey through all the weirdest and

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Speaker 1: coolest animals in the world.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, totally. This book was so fun to work on.

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Speaker 2: I did really feel like I got to take almost

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Speaker 2: everything I've learned in like ten years of chasing down

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Speaker 2: weird creature facts and put it all in one place.

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Speaker 1: It's so good. I look, I'm not benefiting in any

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Speaker 1: way from promoting this book. I want people to know

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Speaker 1: that I have no financial interest in this, not benefiting

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Speaker 1: at all other than like sucking up to Kara. But like,

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Speaker 1: it is genuinely a beautiful book. Like it's got beautiful,

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Speaker 1: beautiful illustrations and photographs, and the writing is really wonderful.

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Speaker 1: It gives you such a good sort of sense of

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Speaker 1: all of the most incredible facts about these animals. Today

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Speaker 1: we are going to focus on the spooky ones, namely bats.

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Speaker 1: I don't make my love of bats a secret. They

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Speaker 1: are incredible. I find them all cute, even the ones

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Speaker 1: with the weird sort of maze like faces. But yeah,

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Speaker 1: but before we get into sort of specific bats, I

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Speaker 1: think that it's always good to go through kind of

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Speaker 1: the the bat myths and the bat facts because they're

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Speaker 1: one of these animals that like every culture, every mythology

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Speaker 1: has bats in it, and usually they're spooky. Not always,

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Speaker 1: but often they're kind of seen as this kind of

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Speaker 1: spooky thing, especially around Halloween, right, I mean, obviously we

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Speaker 1: also love them around Halloween. I just got this these uh,

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Speaker 1: these cookies that were shaped like adorable little bats. So

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Speaker 1: I think that we are becoming as a society more

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Speaker 1: loving of bats. But there are still some sort of

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Speaker 1: old wives tales about bats, and the biggest one, the

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Speaker 1: number one one, is bats sucking your blood. The whole

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Speaker 1: idea that bats are blood suckers, they're vampires, and they

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Speaker 1: want they would happily suck a human's blood if they

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Speaker 1: landed on you. And so, Kara, is that really true?

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Speaker 1: Like do bats really want to suck up our blood

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Speaker 1: like a bunch of little adorable nose varatus.

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Speaker 2: I mean, you know, I never want to speak for

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Speaker 2: every single bat. That would be a presumpious, but I

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Speaker 2: do think that most bats do not want to suck

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Speaker 2: blood at all. Bats eat a lot of bugs and insects,

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Speaker 2: They eat a lot of fruit, they eat a lot

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Speaker 2: of nectar. I think there are a few species of

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Speaker 2: they're called vampire bats that drink the blood of mostly

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Speaker 2: like other different mammals that aren't people. That's about you're

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Speaker 2: understanding too.

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Speaker 1: Absolutely, you're spot on. There's always three species of vampire

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Speaker 1: bats that are still in existence, and none of them

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Speaker 1: really exclusively drink human blood. Two of the species really

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Speaker 1: rely more on bird blood, and one of the species

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Speaker 1: does rely on mammalian blood, But it's usually live stock, pigs, cows, etc.

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Speaker 1: And the only times they do drink human blood, it's

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Speaker 1: kind of just opportunistic. It's kind of a bit of

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Speaker 1: an accident. It's usually a human who's working in very

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Speaker 1: closet of association with the animals that the vampire bats

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Speaker 1: usually do drink blood from. So maybe a farmer living

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Speaker 1: somewhere really rural, who sleeps near where his chickens are

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Speaker 1: or where the pigs and the cows are, and maybe

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Speaker 1: a vampire bat's gonna slip into his bedroom and get

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Speaker 1: confused and take a little sip of human blood. But

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Speaker 1: they certainly do not exanguinate anything. They ever drink the

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Speaker 1: blood of an animal, so you know, including humans, but

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Speaker 1: they really don't kill by drinking blood. There's the white

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Speaker 1: winged vampire bat, the hairy leged vampire bat. Those are

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Speaker 1: the two that prefer bird blood mostly, and then there's

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Speaker 1: the common vampire bat that's the one that drinks mammalian blood.

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Speaker 1: And they really don't kill their hosts. They're more of

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Speaker 1: a they're not really predators, they're more like a parasite.

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Speaker 1: And when they do kill, it is completely accidental. It

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Speaker 1: is through the transmission of disease. And that is kind

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Speaker 1: of a I mean, that's kind of another thing about bats, right,

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Speaker 1: They do sometimes carry rabies, and they can transmit rabies.

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Speaker 1: It's not I don't think it's as common as people

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Speaker 1: believe based on sort of the idea that if bats

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Speaker 1: around you, you're gonna get rabies from this bat.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. I mean, I'm actually a funny person to talk

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Speaker 2: to about this because I did, when I was young,

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Speaker 2: have a rabbit bat in my house. Oops.

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Speaker 1: I did have to.

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Speaker 2: Murder it with the dad so that we could test,

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Speaker 2: and it did have rabies and I had to get

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Speaker 2: the raby shots and everything. But having gone through that,

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Speaker 2: I feel maybe qualified to say most bats are not

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Speaker 2: going to put you through that experience, I think, right,

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Speaker 2: I was looking into it, and it seems like of

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Speaker 2: all the animals. Bats have rabies more than others. Yeah,

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Speaker 2: but not most of them don't. Like the vast vast

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Speaker 2: majority of them do not have rabies. That's right. Especially

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Speaker 2: if you're encountering them in their own like homes or areas,

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Speaker 2: you don't have to worry about them.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly. I mean the reason that I mean, I'm

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Speaker 1: sorry you had that experience, but one of the reasons

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Speaker 1: that it happens where it's like it seems like so

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Speaker 1: many of them have rabies is the ones that we

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Speaker 1: do encounter, the ones that end up in our homes

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Speaker 1: or that you see on the ground, they're just much

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Speaker 1: more likely to be sick because they don't want to

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Speaker 1: be there. They don't necessarily want to be in your house.

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Speaker 1: They're scared of you, they want to leave. They're not

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Speaker 1: going to be on the ground normally, that's unless they're

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Speaker 1: I mean, it is true that vampire bats do sometimes

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Speaker 1: hop along the ground to latch on to their host,

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Speaker 1: but in general, a bat's not going to be just

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Speaker 1: lying there waiting for a person to scoop them up.

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Speaker 1: They're scared, they're they're wary, and they would fly away

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Speaker 1: or try to escape, and if they don't if they're

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Speaker 1: in your house and they're sick, that just you kind

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Speaker 1: of have a biased sample, right, because these are the

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Speaker 1: bats that are sick, these are the ones that are impacted.

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Speaker 1: They're sick enough to you know, get confused, fly into

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Speaker 1: your house and not try to escape. And so that's why.

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Speaker 1: So like, it is important if you find a bat

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Speaker 1: in your house to uh, you know, try to collect it,

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Speaker 1: turn it into your local animal control so that it

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Speaker 1: can be tested, especially if you think you've been bitten,

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Speaker 1: because yes, it is true they do occasionally carry rabies.

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Speaker 1: It's also important not to handle bats. If you find one,

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Speaker 1: don't pick it up, leave it alone, and the so like,

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Speaker 1: if you do, you know, like, if you do have

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Speaker 1: a bat in your house, the best thing is to

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Speaker 1: call animal control and follow their instructions. But if you're

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Speaker 1: working with bats, right, Like, people who actually work with

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Speaker 1: bats in the wild, they all get inoculated for various diseases,

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Speaker 1: not only to protect themselves but to protect the bats.

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Speaker 1: They use protective equipment. But like a lot of times,

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Speaker 1: like they'll be working with a bat that's nectivorous, you know,

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Speaker 1: bat that drinks nectar, so it's not even going to

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Speaker 1: bite them. Right, It's just like, whoa, what is happening

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Speaker 1: to me? I am being held by someone. All I

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Speaker 1: want is to stick my really long tongue in some

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Speaker 1: delicious plants. So yeah, bats are actually really sweet, and

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Speaker 1: even vampire bats who have this terrible reputation, are really

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Speaker 1: really sweet. They live in close proximity with each other.

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Speaker 1: They live in these really tight and it sort of

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Speaker 1: kinship groups, and they will even share blood meals with

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Speaker 1: each other. By it's a little gross, they'll regurgitate blood

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Speaker 1: into each other's mouths, but they do that with their

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Speaker 1: kin with their families, with their and sometimes even with

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Speaker 1: friends like bats that are unrelated to them, but that

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Speaker 1: with whom they have formed a relationship and mutual trust

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Speaker 1: where it's like, well, you feed me sometimes, so I'm

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Speaker 1: going to feed you sometimes. And it's really important because

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Speaker 1: their metabolism is so so fast that if they miss

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Speaker 1: a few meals that can be fatal for them. So

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Speaker 1: the fact that they kind of have this social safety

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Speaker 1: net of other bats who will give them blood meals

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Speaker 1: as long as they also reciprocate is is really sweet.

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Speaker 1: It's they definitely makes them seem less scary and evil

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Speaker 1: and more just like they're a bunch of little guys

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Speaker 1: just trying to help each other out.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, it's friendship goals. I think if you and your

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Speaker 2: friends can't share a blood meal, then you know.

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Speaker 1: Right right, yeah, I you know, it's like sometimes you

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Speaker 1: got to pick up the tab and sometimes you got

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Speaker 1: to regurgitate a little bit of blood into your friend's mouths.

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Speaker 1: There's another bat myth, the myth that bats want to

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Speaker 1: make nests in your hair, and this is categorically untrue.

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Speaker 1: They do not.

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Speaker 2: All these myths are like, sorry to interrupt you, Yeah,

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Speaker 2: feel like they're very they're very like us centric. You know,

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Speaker 2: we're just thinking like, oh, bats want to drink our blood,

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Speaker 2: bats want to give us rab these bats want to

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Speaker 2: make nests in our hair. It's not about us.

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Speaker 1: We should get over ourselves. Yeah, we're not the main

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Speaker 1: characters in these bats lives. Yeah, they don't. They don't

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Speaker 1: care about our hair. They're not going to make nests

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Speaker 1: in our hair. If they ever wind up in someone's hair,

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Speaker 1: it's an accident, or they do see that you've tried

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Speaker 1: to cut your own bangs and they're like, oh honey, no,

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Speaker 1: So they don't really make nests in general, there is

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Speaker 1: a type of bat that definitely doesn't use hair, but

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Speaker 1: it uses leaves to make homes, which you did talk

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Speaker 1: about in your book. These tint making they are so cute, Kiara, I.

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Speaker 2: Know, I love them. I actually they're the very first

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Speaker 2: animal in the whole book because I love them so much,

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Speaker 2: and I thought they were really good get like an

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Speaker 2: entryway into what the book is all about. But yeah,

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Speaker 2: they's so I mean, there are lots of different kinds

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Speaker 2: of tent making bats, and they're all so cute and

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Speaker 2: when you see pictures of them, it's just like a

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Speaker 2: bunch of little marshmallows in a leaf. Yes, but it's cool, Like, yeah,

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Speaker 2: we don't always think about animals in general as having

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Speaker 2: a ton of agency, which is very very silly, because

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Speaker 2: you know, we all built this world together, all the

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Speaker 2: living inhabitants of it. But these bats, they really they

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Speaker 2: show that clearly. They like engineer these leaves to become

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Speaker 2: shelters for themselves. Yeah, so they'll like nibble on the

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Speaker 2: ribs of a leaf until it kind of like collapses

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Speaker 2: into a certain shape. Different species make different shapes. Some

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Speaker 2: scientists have kind of like taxonomized the different leaf shapes,

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Speaker 2: which I think sounds like a really fun way to

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Speaker 2: spend time a scientists.

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Speaker 1: But they love, they love care.

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Speaker 2: But yeah, the leaves they like give the bat shelter.

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Speaker 2: They sort of like rustle if a predator is nearby,

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Speaker 2: which is really useful. They can like collect water for

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Speaker 2: them or protect them from rain. And yeah, mostly just

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Speaker 2: the pictures like go Google tent.

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Speaker 1: Making bats so cute, so cute. There's the I think

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Speaker 1: one is called the Honduran leaf nosed bat, and it

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Speaker 1: is so adorable. It like when you said marshmallow. They

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Speaker 1: do literally look like little marshmallows because they have this

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Speaker 1: white fur and they're like these little puffballs. You look

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Speaker 1: in and they're all kind of all get nestled together

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Speaker 1: like a bunch of hamsters inside these leaves, and it

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Speaker 1: is adorable. So onto the third bat, big bat. Myth

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Speaker 1: it is that bats are blind. They are not blind.

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Speaker 1: They do have functional vision. Some rely on their vision

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Speaker 1: and hearing, and some also rely on echolocation, which is

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Speaker 1: a form of sonar. Essentially, like they send out in

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Speaker 1: a pulse a very high pitch squeak, and then when

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Speaker 1: it comes back to them, it bounces off various obstacles,

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Speaker 1: prey hits those huge ears and then they use those

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Speaker 1: returning sounds to be able to navigate. But generally speaking,

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Speaker 1: their eyes also function, so they're not blind. They might

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Speaker 1: not use their site too much, perhaps at night, but

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Speaker 1: they can use that echolocation. In species that have the

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Speaker 1: echolocation to navigate really really well. And one reason I

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Speaker 1: think people think that they're blind is that they can

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Speaker 1: fly sort of erratically, But that's not because they don't

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Speaker 1: know where they're going. They're in this delicate dance where

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Speaker 1: they are locating the precise position of their prey. So

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Speaker 1: you have say a moth or a mosquito, it's flying around,

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Speaker 1: going every which way, and this bat is sort of

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Speaker 1: narrowing in on it. It's more like a panther kind

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Speaker 1: of like stalking its prey, but it's doing so in

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Speaker 1: like three dimensions, right, So that's why it looks really erratic.

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Speaker 1: It's kind of like flying. It looks kind of disorganized,

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Speaker 1: but really it is trying to hone in on this prey.

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Speaker 1: And they eat in these the species of bats that

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Speaker 1: are insectivores, they're incredible. They eat so many mosquitoes, so

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Speaker 1: many insects that are actually quite dangerous to US humans.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I learned something really cool the other day reading

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Speaker 2: up on the recent bat literature. There was a study

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Speaker 2: that came out, I think actually by an economist that

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Speaker 2: figured out that in regions of the US where white

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Speaker 2: nose syndrome, which we haven't talked about yet, but it's

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Speaker 2: this very bad bat disease that makes bats really sick, yes,

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Speaker 2: often kills them. In regions of the US where bats

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Speaker 2: have white no disease, and where there is white nos

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Speaker 2: disease and therefore fewer bats, infant mortality is higher, potentially

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Speaker 2: because farmers have to use more pesticides to kill insecting

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Speaker 2: because the bats are not eating the insects, and the

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Speaker 2: pesticides are bad for people, especially babies. So it's just

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Speaker 2: this really amazing attempt to quantify all the things that

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Speaker 2: bats actually do positively for us, even though, like you said,

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Speaker 2: sometimes people can get a little sidetracked by these ideas

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Speaker 2: of the negative aspects of bats that may or may

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Speaker 2: not even be true, but they're actually so helpful to

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Speaker 2: human society.

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Speaker 1: This is great news, and it's wonderful to see. Well,

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Speaker 1: it's not good news that bats are dying of white nose,

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Speaker 1: and then that hurts babies. That's not what I'm talking about.

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Speaker 1: It's great news that this is a study written by

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Speaker 1: an economist. Because my husband is an economist, and for

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Speaker 1: the longest time I have been trying to convince him

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Speaker 1: that bats are cute. And now that we have an

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Speaker 1: actual economic study that's shows how beneficial bats are, maybe

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Speaker 1: I can finally convince them, Like, look, even economists agree

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Speaker 1: that bats are great and adorable and wonderful.

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Speaker 2: Ten out of ten economists agree, yes that we need bats.

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Speaker 2: I'm going to send you the study. Yeah, I was

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Speaker 2: super psych you. It was the coolest study I've read

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Speaker 2: in a long time.

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Speaker 1: Thank you. Definitely. I'm definitely like just scooting that over

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Speaker 1: during during dinner, going like, well, here you go. This

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Speaker 1: is this is my proof that that bats are great

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Speaker 1: and you should love them. Yeah, I mean that is

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Speaker 1: really incredible. I think that it is to use sort

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Speaker 1: of like another I guess sort of economics terms, there

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Speaker 1: are trade offs, right, Like, bats do potentially present an

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Speaker 1: issue when it comes to disease, but they also prevent

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Speaker 1: a ton of disease, prevent a ton of uh sort

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Speaker 1: of transmission of say, like you know, mosquito born disease,

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Speaker 1: and help help us with things like pollination, with insect control.

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Speaker 1: Uh So it is you know when when we kind

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Speaker 1: of look at something in just one dimension of like, oh,

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Speaker 1: well some of them have rabies, it's like, yes, that's true,

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Speaker 1: and you should be careful. But that doesn't mean that

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Speaker 1: the species itself is a negative for humans or for

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Speaker 1: the environment. In fact, they're very much a net positive.

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Speaker 2: Yes, I totally agree.

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Speaker 1: And I mean I think, you know, obviously, I think

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Speaker 1: people's awareness of zoonotic diseases has increased for some reason.

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Speaker 1: But it is true that bats can be vectors for

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Speaker 1: novel zoonotic diseases. It is not because bats are uniquely dirty, aggressive,

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Speaker 1: or anything like that. It is due to some characteristics

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Speaker 1: of bats that are actually pretty cool and make them

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Speaker 1: quite amazing and sympathetic. One is that they have incredible

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Speaker 1: immune systems to fight off pathogens. There's a lot of

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Speaker 1: theories about why they seem to be able to live

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Speaker 1: with sort of relatively high viral loads and not seem

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Speaker 1: to get sick. One of them is that because flight

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Speaker 1: requires so much energy, so such a high metabolism, that

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Speaker 1: somehow they have evolved this trade off where their their

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Speaker 1: passive immune system is really strong. And then they're also

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Speaker 1: able to just kind of be in this kind of

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Speaker 1: truce almost with pathogens where the pathogen lives in their

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Speaker 1: bodies but doesn't make them sick. But this means that

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Speaker 1: they can carry diseases without dying, which could also mean

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Speaker 1: that a pathogen could mutate inside them and that could

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Speaker 1: be the origin point for a new zoonotic disease. Another

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Speaker 1: theory for why they may be more likely to generate

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Speaker 1: these zoonotic diseases is that they hibernate for incredible periods

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Speaker 1: of time. They sort of go into this stasis where

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Speaker 1: their body system slow way down, they can survive the cold,

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Speaker 1: and this may allow certain pathogens to stay inside their

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Speaker 1: bodies for long periods of times during cold weather. So

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Speaker 1: essentially the bats are kind of like little storage centers

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Speaker 1: for the pathogens because the bats are able to last

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Speaker 1: such a long time during winter and that their bodies,

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Speaker 1: their metabolism, and their body systems have slowed down, so

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Speaker 1: everything's kind of in stasis. And then the other reason

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Speaker 1: that they can spread diseases that they're really social. They

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Speaker 1: love to a lot of species live in these huge

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Speaker 1: communities where they're all kind of living in these tight

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Speaker 1: spaces like a little city, a bat city. And you know,

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Speaker 1: like I mentioned earlier, they're very socially. They share the vampire.

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Speaker 1: Bat species share blood meals, you have a lot of socialization.

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Speaker 1: They're quite usually they're pretty friendly with each other. There's

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Speaker 1: not a lot of infighting that happens with bat species.

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Speaker 1: But if we hate bats for that, we should also

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Speaker 1: hate ourselves because that's a very human trait, right. We

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Speaker 1: also live in densely packed cities and are really social

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Speaker 1: with each other and give each other hugs and all

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Speaker 1: these things. And so it's like, well, yeah, it's true,

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Speaker 1: but if we sea bats is gross and dirty for that,

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Speaker 1: than humans are the same way, and personally, I don't

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Speaker 1: think that is grosser dirty. I think that's just what

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Speaker 1: a social species is going to do.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, totally. I mean the more we talk about it,

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Speaker 2: the more I'm thinking about how bats actually are a

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Speaker 2: lot like people. Yes, especially in this social aspect. They

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Speaker 2: do seem to really just love spending time together, taking

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Speaker 2: care of each other, hanging out literally literally, Yeah, have

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Speaker 2: you seen.

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Speaker 1: That video of It's the bats? Who are I think

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Speaker 1: they're in some sort of They might be in a

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Speaker 1: rehabilitation center. But they're like hanging from a cage, but

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Speaker 1: it's a bunch of them. And then someone flipped the

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Speaker 1: video so it looks like they're standing up and then

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Speaker 1: set it to music and it looks like they're all

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Speaker 1: doing sort of like, you know, like sort of a

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Speaker 1: goth like rave where everyone's kind of dancing, but in

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Speaker 1: a sort of like yeah, like a sulky like I'm

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Speaker 1: not really dancing kind of dances. Perfect. It's an amazing video. Well,

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Speaker 1: we are going to take a quick break, but when

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Speaker 1: we get back, we are going to talk about some

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Speaker 1: incredible bat species, some of Kara's favorite bats. I'm nominating

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Speaker 1: you too to do this, but these are from these

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Speaker 1: are from your new books, so let's talk about it

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Speaker 1: after the break. All right, So, Kara, you have written

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Speaker 1: about a lot of bat species and you I really

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Speaker 1: love this sort of curated list of your your picks

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Speaker 1: of bats. I'm not going to say necessarily they're your

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Speaker 1: favorite bats, because maybe that's too I don't know all

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Speaker 1: bats are great, but yeah, let's let's talk about it.

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Speaker 1: The one that is really really interesting to me, this

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Speaker 1: is something I did not know. It's the library bats

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Speaker 1: in Portugal. Could you talk a little bit about those?

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Speaker 2: Oh? Yeah, absolutely. First, I just want to say, you know,

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Speaker 2: if I could have made the book all bats, I

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Speaker 2: might have done it, although maybe I.

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Speaker 1: Could still oop soul bats.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly. I also want to say I didn't think

386
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Speaker 2: about this until we started talking, but this book has

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00:22:06,320 --> 00:22:11,200
Speaker 2: so many amazing pieces in it from contributing writers who pitched,

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Speaker 2: you know, their favorite animals and plants and other species

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Speaker 2: and wrote about them. But I realized I kept all

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Speaker 2: the bats for myself. All the bats in this book,

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Speaker 2: I wrote about them.

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Speaker 1: It's smart.

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Speaker 2: I love them that much. These library that's are really cool.

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Speaker 2: So there are a couple of different libraries in Portugal.

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Speaker 2: I don't necessarily trust myself to pronounce them correctly.

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Speaker 1: That's okay, I pronounced not. I pronounced nothing correctly on

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Speaker 1: this show.

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Speaker 2: You go on, Okay, the Joanine Library at the University

399
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Speaker 2: of Coymbra in Coumbra, Portugal. I'm so sorry to anyone

400
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Speaker 2: who knows about Portugal who's listening to this, But basically,

401
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Speaker 2: there are really really old books in there, and old

402
00:22:54,320 --> 00:22:59,280
Speaker 2: books are often made with things like glue and leather

403
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Speaker 2: and stuff that bugs really like to eat. Like you know,

404
00:23:02,800 --> 00:23:05,200
Speaker 2: everybody's sort of bookworms. There are a lot of different

405
00:23:05,240 --> 00:23:07,359
Speaker 2: kinds of bugs that will sort of destroy old books

406
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Speaker 2: by just nibbling on the binding glue or whatever. In

407
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Speaker 2: this library, there are a bunch of bats that live

408
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Speaker 2: there that eat the bugs at night. And this has

409
00:23:17,760 --> 00:23:20,119
Speaker 2: worked so well for so long that it's kind of

410
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Speaker 2: just like it's almost like they work there, Like the

411
00:23:22,560 --> 00:23:25,359
Speaker 2: librarians are used to them. Yeah, they sort of like

412
00:23:25,440 --> 00:23:31,080
Speaker 2: welcome them. They have these really old like leather what

413
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Speaker 2: would you call them, sort of just like roll up

414
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Speaker 2: sheets that they unroll on the tables at night, and

415
00:23:36,880 --> 00:23:39,040
Speaker 2: the furniture, like the fancy furniture, so that when the

416
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Speaker 2: bats poop, it's like nice sale, they can just roll

417
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Speaker 2: them up again.

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Speaker 1: The chairs hard become your toilets, and we welcome you.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly, And like it's this amazing ornate library and

420
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Speaker 2: it's kind of the it's the kind of thing where

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Speaker 2: like if you were watching like a cartoon about an

422
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Speaker 2: old library, like maybe a couple of bats would flutter by,

423
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Speaker 2: maybe the impression like, oh this is oldy, this is drafty, spooky,

424
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Speaker 2: but it's actually like no, it's like a collaboration. Yeah,

425
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Speaker 2: the bats like they go out at night. Oh sorry,

426
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Speaker 2: they at night they fly around the library and they

427
00:24:13,200 --> 00:24:14,920
Speaker 2: will eat the bugs and then they'll like fly out

428
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Speaker 2: the windows and drink from the river, and then they

429
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Speaker 2: come back all day and roost and nobody really like

430
00:24:20,080 --> 00:24:23,440
Speaker 2: sees them when they're roosting. And if you want to

431
00:24:23,480 --> 00:24:25,040
Speaker 2: see them as a visitor, you have to go to

432
00:24:25,040 --> 00:24:26,960
Speaker 2: one of the sort of like cool night concerts that

433
00:24:27,000 --> 00:24:28,240
Speaker 2: they have and then you might see them.

434
00:24:28,280 --> 00:24:30,280
Speaker 1: Kind of wow, they have nights.

435
00:24:30,000 --> 00:24:32,280
Speaker 2: But everybody knows they're there and every Yeah, they have

436
00:24:32,320 --> 00:24:33,360
Speaker 2: like library concerts.

437
00:24:33,359 --> 00:24:36,040
Speaker 1: Oh that's fantastic, Which is cool.

438
00:24:36,200 --> 00:24:37,680
Speaker 2: Do all the bats have like there?

439
00:24:37,800 --> 00:24:40,080
Speaker 1: Do the bats all have like little earplugs they put

440
00:24:40,119 --> 00:24:43,200
Speaker 1: in when when there's trying to sleep?

441
00:24:44,520 --> 00:24:46,800
Speaker 2: I know, I mean it's kind of cool to think about. Yeah,

442
00:24:46,840 --> 00:24:51,480
Speaker 2: I wonder how they're like sonar like interacts with music.

443
00:24:51,520 --> 00:24:53,600
Speaker 2: I've never thought about that. Yeah, you know, that's interesting.

444
00:24:54,000 --> 00:24:57,280
Speaker 1: There's definitely like noise pollution in the ocean definitely impacts

445
00:24:57,480 --> 00:25:02,199
Speaker 1: the echo location of cetacean like whales and dolphins, So

446
00:25:02,240 --> 00:25:04,680
Speaker 1: I'd imagine that that can be similar with bats, where

447
00:25:04,840 --> 00:25:08,800
Speaker 1: where noise pollution can impact their echo location. In this case,

448
00:25:09,000 --> 00:25:12,159
Speaker 1: the library sounds like chill enough that they've accommodated the

449
00:25:12,160 --> 00:25:14,439
Speaker 1: bats enough that I think it's okay for there to

450
00:25:14,480 --> 00:25:16,200
Speaker 1: be the occasional concert.

451
00:25:15,760 --> 00:25:16,280
Speaker 2: And the bats.

452
00:25:16,440 --> 00:25:18,360
Speaker 1: Yeah right, just like yeah, all right, all right, there's

453
00:25:18,400 --> 00:25:19,880
Speaker 1: plenty of bugs at least.

454
00:25:20,440 --> 00:25:23,359
Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly, they like, yeah, they really like them. The

455
00:25:23,440 --> 00:25:27,520
Speaker 2: guy I interviewed called them quote unquote honorary librarians, and

456
00:25:28,560 --> 00:25:32,120
Speaker 2: they like replaced the big library doors in twenty fifteen,

457
00:25:32,160 --> 00:25:34,199
Speaker 2: and they less little gaps that the bats used to

458
00:25:34,200 --> 00:25:36,639
Speaker 2: get in and out like they wanted, they wanted them

459
00:25:36,680 --> 00:25:39,000
Speaker 2: to come back. So that's so I love that.

460
00:25:39,000 --> 00:25:43,119
Speaker 1: That's so incredible. I love that so much. I like humanity.

461
00:25:43,200 --> 00:25:45,760
Speaker 1: I don't I think that it's nice that we have

462
00:25:46,320 --> 00:25:48,880
Speaker 1: civilization because I live in it and I like it.

463
00:25:49,720 --> 00:25:53,199
Speaker 1: So I do really love examples where we have figured

464
00:25:53,240 --> 00:25:57,480
Speaker 1: out a way to coexist with animals that like, yes,

465
00:25:57,920 --> 00:26:01,920
Speaker 1: there is a bit of inherent tension, I guess, right,

466
00:26:01,960 --> 00:26:05,080
Speaker 1: because like you could imagine that, say, if these bats

467
00:26:05,080 --> 00:26:07,560
Speaker 1: were in this library, if someone didn't really know what

468
00:26:07,600 --> 00:26:09,160
Speaker 1: they were doing, they'd be like, well this, we got

469
00:26:09,200 --> 00:26:11,200
Speaker 1: to seal up the library, we got to keep them out, right,

470
00:26:12,720 --> 00:26:15,040
Speaker 1: But when we can figure out that Hey, actually this

471
00:26:15,119 --> 00:26:16,879
Speaker 1: is really good for the books, and like, what's a

472
00:26:16,920 --> 00:26:20,439
Speaker 1: little bat guano if it means keeping our books safe

473
00:26:20,520 --> 00:26:25,240
Speaker 1: from insects and having this cool kind of symbiotic relationship

474
00:26:25,240 --> 00:26:27,280
Speaker 1: between the library and the bats, and yeah, that's that's

475
00:26:27,320 --> 00:26:29,960
Speaker 1: really wonderful. I love that there's another sort of a

476
00:26:30,160 --> 00:26:33,920
Speaker 1: there's another ability that bats have very important, perhaps even

477
00:26:33,960 --> 00:26:37,960
Speaker 1: more important than books, and that's tequila making sure we

478
00:26:38,000 --> 00:26:39,679
Speaker 1: get to feel it. If you want to talk about

479
00:26:39,720 --> 00:26:43,640
Speaker 1: the sort of bat relationship to the production of tequila.

480
00:26:43,720 --> 00:26:47,119
Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely, So. This is a bat called the lesser

481
00:26:47,160 --> 00:26:50,240
Speaker 2: long nose bat, like you were talking about. They're also

482
00:26:50,280 --> 00:26:53,320
Speaker 2: a communal bat. They mostly like to hang out altogether.

483
00:26:54,200 --> 00:26:57,480
Speaker 2: But every year, I think it might have to do

484
00:26:57,520 --> 00:26:59,680
Speaker 2: with their age, like a certain proportion of the female

485
00:26:59,680 --> 00:27:04,160
Speaker 2: bats go on this really cool migration from Mexico up

486
00:27:04,160 --> 00:27:09,520
Speaker 2: into California and the southwest US, and then they all

487
00:27:09,560 --> 00:27:12,440
Speaker 2: have their pups together in the.

488
00:27:12,440 --> 00:27:13,560
Speaker 1: Best group, you know.

489
00:27:13,960 --> 00:27:16,040
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a mom's group. It's a traveling mom's group.

490
00:27:16,600 --> 00:27:19,359
Speaker 2: And then the pups you know, get a little bit

491
00:27:19,400 --> 00:27:22,080
Speaker 2: bigger and older and more self sufficient, and then they

492
00:27:22,119 --> 00:27:24,840
Speaker 2: all fly together back to Mexico, but along the way

493
00:27:24,840 --> 00:27:27,760
Speaker 2: they do all this incredible important pollination. So you were

494
00:27:27,760 --> 00:27:30,320
Speaker 2: mentioning before that a lot of bats, all they really

495
00:27:30,320 --> 00:27:32,880
Speaker 2: want to do is like unscroll their long tongue into

496
00:27:32,880 --> 00:27:35,480
Speaker 2: a flower. Yeah, so that's like this kind of bat.

497
00:27:35,520 --> 00:27:37,480
Speaker 2: Is that kind of bat? They're going from often like

498
00:27:37,560 --> 00:27:41,040
Speaker 2: cactus or agave flowers to a gave flowers and they're

499
00:27:41,400 --> 00:27:45,200
Speaker 2: they're drinking the nectar and they're pollinating along the way.

500
00:27:45,880 --> 00:27:48,719
Speaker 2: So just like we know this about bees, especially, like

501
00:27:49,440 --> 00:27:52,679
Speaker 2: plants really need pollinators in order to reproduce and to

502
00:27:52,760 --> 00:27:55,800
Speaker 2: produce fruits and the other like structures of the plant

503
00:27:55,800 --> 00:28:00,840
Speaker 2: that we like the most, and the agave plant only

504
00:28:00,960 --> 00:28:03,520
Speaker 2: I think gets pollinated by these bats. So yes, we

505
00:28:03,600 --> 00:28:05,080
Speaker 2: really need them to do this so that we can

506
00:28:05,080 --> 00:28:08,280
Speaker 2: get agave products that we enjoy, like tequila, as you said.

507
00:28:09,080 --> 00:28:13,080
Speaker 2: So that's another very important relationship between human culture and bats.

508
00:28:13,280 --> 00:28:17,080
Speaker 1: Critical one might say, Uh, did you talk to have

509
00:28:17,480 --> 00:28:22,080
Speaker 1: any chance you talked to doctor Rodrigo Medeian about.

510
00:28:21,760 --> 00:28:23,879
Speaker 2: These I did, Yeah, I talked to him. He's a

511
00:28:23,880 --> 00:28:27,359
Speaker 2: great little piece. Yeah, he was really cool, and a

512
00:28:27,400 --> 00:28:29,480
Speaker 2: lot of people were working really hard to tie the

513
00:28:29,640 --> 00:28:33,520
Speaker 2: story of these bats to you know, the story of tequila.

514
00:28:33,560 --> 00:28:37,240
Speaker 2: And help people understand that they are intertwined. I think

515
00:28:37,280 --> 00:28:38,160
Speaker 2: he's doing a lot of that.

516
00:28:38,360 --> 00:28:42,160
Speaker 1: Yeah, absolutely, it's really important. The next bat that I

517
00:28:42,200 --> 00:28:48,360
Speaker 1: wanted you to talk about was the uh, the kind

518
00:28:48,360 --> 00:28:51,680
Speaker 1: of classic thing, right, like the idea of you go

519
00:28:51,760 --> 00:28:54,240
Speaker 1: under a spooky bridge and then there's a bunch of

520
00:28:54,280 --> 00:28:58,600
Speaker 1: bats there and people are you know, used to be

521
00:28:59,200 --> 00:29:01,760
Speaker 1: afraid of this kind of phenomenon. But can you talk

522
00:29:01,760 --> 00:29:03,520
Speaker 1: a little bit about these bridge bats?

523
00:29:03,840 --> 00:29:09,520
Speaker 2: Yes, another incredible bat positivity tale. So these are the

524
00:29:09,880 --> 00:29:14,160
Speaker 2: Congress Avenue bridge bats in Austin, Texas. I love these bats.

525
00:29:14,160 --> 00:29:16,600
Speaker 2: I actually wrote my master's thesis about these bats because

526
00:29:16,640 --> 00:29:20,520
Speaker 2: I was so taken by them. But basically, yeah, so

527
00:29:20,680 --> 00:29:24,200
Speaker 2: Mexican retail bats. They live in really big colonies, like

528
00:29:24,360 --> 00:29:26,360
Speaker 2: a lot of bats living colonies like we've been discussing,

529
00:29:26,360 --> 00:29:28,600
Speaker 2: but their colonies are huge. And basically what happened was

530
00:29:29,200 --> 00:29:31,000
Speaker 2: there's a big group of them that was living in

531
00:29:31,040 --> 00:29:35,320
Speaker 2: a cave in the woods near Austin. But then you know,

532
00:29:35,480 --> 00:29:39,360
Speaker 2: somebody developed the woods and got rid of the cave

533
00:29:40,040 --> 00:29:42,600
Speaker 2: and they had nowhere to go, so they went into

534
00:29:42,640 --> 00:29:45,400
Speaker 2: the city and I think first they were roosting in

535
00:29:45,480 --> 00:29:48,120
Speaker 2: like a high school or something, and people were like, Okay,

536
00:29:48,160 --> 00:29:49,840
Speaker 2: that's not good. They drove them out of the high school.

537
00:29:50,080 --> 00:29:53,280
Speaker 1: They were given too many people wedgies, too many swirlies,

538
00:29:53,960 --> 00:29:55,600
Speaker 1: shoving all the nerds.

539
00:29:55,680 --> 00:29:59,240
Speaker 2: You know. Yeah, they're definitely jocks. They have so much

540
00:29:59,280 --> 00:30:05,600
Speaker 2: athletic ability. It just it messes with their judgment. Yeah.

541
00:30:03,480 --> 00:30:08,360
Speaker 2: So yeah. They went under this bridge right in the

542
00:30:08,400 --> 00:30:11,160
Speaker 2: middle of the city called the Congress Avenue Bridge, and

543
00:30:11,200 --> 00:30:12,880
Speaker 2: they were like, this is the perfect place for us

544
00:30:12,920 --> 00:30:15,520
Speaker 2: to live. It's right over the water, there's bugs every night,

545
00:30:15,880 --> 00:30:18,160
Speaker 2: we can just swoop around. We're living our like an

546
00:30:18,200 --> 00:30:21,960
Speaker 2: incredible life here together. And the people in the city

547
00:30:22,200 --> 00:30:24,320
Speaker 2: were kind of like, I don't know about this. I mean,

548
00:30:24,320 --> 00:30:27,560
Speaker 2: as we were saying, there's so many bad associations with bats.

549
00:30:28,240 --> 00:30:31,760
Speaker 2: But this group called Bat Conservation International was also getting

550
00:30:31,760 --> 00:30:33,600
Speaker 2: off the ground at that time, and they did a

551
00:30:33,600 --> 00:30:37,040
Speaker 2: lot of education and very quickly people realized like, actually,

552
00:30:37,080 --> 00:30:39,320
Speaker 2: these bats are so cool and you can stand on

553
00:30:39,360 --> 00:30:42,440
Speaker 2: the bridge and watch them do their incredible thing every night,

554
00:30:42,520 --> 00:30:46,160
Speaker 2: and it's so like peaceful and beautiful. Meanwhile, they're eating

555
00:30:46,160 --> 00:30:48,120
Speaker 2: all the bugs that would be eating you if they

556
00:30:48,120 --> 00:30:51,280
Speaker 2: weren't doing it. It's such a win win So what

557
00:30:51,280 --> 00:30:53,320
Speaker 2: has happened is the bats have become like a big

558
00:30:53,960 --> 00:30:58,000
Speaker 2: cultural property of Austin. You know, like people say, keep

559
00:30:58,040 --> 00:31:00,840
Speaker 2: Austin weird. It's got this like quirky repuation as being

560
00:31:00,880 --> 00:31:04,200
Speaker 2: a city for artists and people who want to do things,

561
00:31:04,760 --> 00:31:08,320
Speaker 2: you know, a little differently, and the bats kind of

562
00:31:08,320 --> 00:31:11,960
Speaker 2: represent that. They've become a big symbol for Austin. There's

563
00:31:11,960 --> 00:31:15,080
Speaker 2: a big statue. If you go shopping in town, a

564
00:31:15,120 --> 00:31:18,480
Speaker 2: lot of stores have a lot of bat memorabilia and

565
00:31:18,560 --> 00:31:21,080
Speaker 2: like art and stuff. And I think it's it's a

566
00:31:21,080 --> 00:31:25,120
Speaker 2: great example of people realizing that actually like that. Maybe

567
00:31:25,160 --> 00:31:27,200
Speaker 2: we thought this was scary, but it's it's cool. It's

568
00:31:27,200 --> 00:31:32,680
Speaker 2: helping us and coexistence continuing there, which I love. And yeah,

569
00:31:32,720 --> 00:31:36,040
Speaker 2: if you want to go in the I think like

570
00:31:37,320 --> 00:31:39,320
Speaker 2: summer is the best time to go see them, because

571
00:31:39,320 --> 00:31:40,720
Speaker 2: they they might they hibernate.

572
00:31:41,240 --> 00:31:43,440
Speaker 1: Maybe not the best time to be in Austin, Texas,

573
00:31:43,480 --> 00:31:44,600
Speaker 1: but the best time to see these.

574
00:31:45,560 --> 00:31:49,479
Speaker 2: Yeah, you can go in the late summer too, and

575
00:31:49,520 --> 00:31:52,320
Speaker 2: you can still get a good, good bat view And

576
00:31:52,360 --> 00:31:54,880
Speaker 2: it's always fun like everybody's out. People are like selling

577
00:31:54,880 --> 00:31:56,800
Speaker 2: glow sticks, which I think is really funny. On the

578
00:31:56,840 --> 00:31:59,120
Speaker 2: bridge and hanging out with their friends, and you can

579
00:31:59,160 --> 00:32:02,760
Speaker 2: go kayaking on the river and see them like they're awesome.

580
00:32:02,840 --> 00:32:05,040
Speaker 1: I love those bats, and I'm just thinking of people

581
00:32:05,080 --> 00:32:08,040
Speaker 1: with their glow sticks forming a sort of runway for

582
00:32:08,120 --> 00:32:12,200
Speaker 1: these bats, leading them back like a plane landing. But yeah,

583
00:32:12,240 --> 00:32:15,720
Speaker 1: if you've never seen it. Sometimes, like bats, as we've

584
00:32:15,760 --> 00:32:17,960
Speaker 1: mentioned before, they're very social. So a lot of these

585
00:32:18,000 --> 00:32:23,320
Speaker 1: communal living bats, when they exit their their roost for

586
00:32:23,400 --> 00:32:25,800
Speaker 1: the night, they all do so kind of together in

587
00:32:25,840 --> 00:32:29,440
Speaker 1: this big sort of plume of bats, and it has

588
00:32:29,480 --> 00:32:32,640
Speaker 1: sort of similar properties to say, like birds who have

589
00:32:32,720 --> 00:32:38,080
Speaker 1: these like cool murmurations, and it's really really beautiful, well like.

590
00:32:38,040 --> 00:32:42,040
Speaker 2: The beginning of Batman, but instead of being scary and right,

591
00:32:42,640 --> 00:32:44,240
Speaker 2: it's cool and fun. Right.

592
00:32:44,280 --> 00:32:47,760
Speaker 1: And also they contribute more to the economy than Batman does.

593
00:32:50,520 --> 00:32:52,040
Speaker 2: He's not doing nearly enough.

594
00:32:52,440 --> 00:32:55,840
Speaker 1: He's he's buying a lot of fancy gadgets and not

595
00:32:56,320 --> 00:32:59,760
Speaker 1: you know, paying a lot of his taxes, is all

596
00:32:59,800 --> 00:33:00,400
Speaker 1: I'm saying.

597
00:33:00,520 --> 00:33:01,880
Speaker 2: He's not giving back, right.

598
00:33:02,360 --> 00:33:05,040
Speaker 1: So we're going to take a quick break and when

599
00:33:05,080 --> 00:33:07,080
Speaker 1: we get back, we are going to talk about some

600
00:33:07,240 --> 00:33:12,760
Speaker 1: other halloweeny creatures who are spooky and oogy and creepy

601
00:33:12,800 --> 00:33:17,160
Speaker 1: and wonderful, so we will be right back, all right.

602
00:33:17,360 --> 00:33:21,120
Speaker 1: So I know that this is a very bad centric episode,

603
00:33:21,120 --> 00:33:23,640
Speaker 1: but it is Halloween or right before it or right

604
00:33:23,720 --> 00:33:26,320
Speaker 1: after it. I don't understand the calendar. So I did

605
00:33:26,320 --> 00:33:31,440
Speaker 1: want to talk about some other creepy Crawley Halloween animals

606
00:33:31,480 --> 00:33:34,880
Speaker 1: that you discussed in your book, and these are also

607
00:33:35,040 --> 00:33:39,440
Speaker 1: some of my favorites in general. You know how during Halloween,

608
00:33:39,960 --> 00:33:45,280
Speaker 1: it's crazy how into Halloween Americans are. I'm learning this

609
00:33:45,400 --> 00:33:52,000
Speaker 1: now being in Italy, how incredibly huge Halloween is in

610
00:33:52,040 --> 00:33:54,480
Speaker 1: the States. Like here, it's not as much of a thing.

611
00:33:54,520 --> 00:33:58,640
Speaker 1: It's growing in popularity. But yeah, like the incredible displays

612
00:33:58,680 --> 00:34:02,640
Speaker 1: that people put up at in their homes, I do

613
00:34:02,720 --> 00:34:05,040
Speaker 1: miss a lot. And one of the big sort of

614
00:34:05,120 --> 00:34:08,120
Speaker 1: Halloween decorations is the giant spiders. Like you put a

615
00:34:08,120 --> 00:34:10,920
Speaker 1: big giant maybe it's felt, maybe it's made out of

616
00:34:10,920 --> 00:34:12,919
Speaker 1: pipe cleaners, I don't know, but it's a big old

617
00:34:13,000 --> 00:34:17,400
Speaker 1: fake spider in your doorway to scare the little kids.

618
00:34:17,680 --> 00:34:21,440
Speaker 1: And the cool thing is that there are real spiders

619
00:34:21,880 --> 00:34:26,160
Speaker 1: who do the same thing. So, uh, the like, let's

620
00:34:26,160 --> 00:34:28,600
Speaker 1: talk a little bit about the decoy spider because I

621
00:34:28,640 --> 00:34:32,880
Speaker 1: love these little gals. They are so incredible, totally.

622
00:34:32,920 --> 00:34:36,120
Speaker 2: I'm glad you picked this one. I love this one too.

623
00:34:36,160 --> 00:34:38,400
Speaker 2: This isn't something I really knew about before I started

624
00:34:39,080 --> 00:34:43,360
Speaker 2: doing the research for the book. So, yeah, like Katie said,

625
00:34:43,560 --> 00:34:46,040
Speaker 2: there's a couple of different kinds of spiders at least

626
00:34:46,239 --> 00:34:47,960
Speaker 2: in a couple of very different parts of the world

627
00:34:48,440 --> 00:34:51,800
Speaker 2: that basically they have these webs up in the forest

628
00:34:51,840 --> 00:34:56,759
Speaker 2: and they'll inadvertently or advertently capture little bits of you know,

629
00:34:56,840 --> 00:34:58,880
Speaker 2: the bugs they want to eat, but then also for

630
00:34:59,040 --> 00:35:02,520
Speaker 2: us debris like bits a leaf or stick, and what

631
00:35:02,520 --> 00:35:04,799
Speaker 2: they'll do is they'll like arrange the debris in their

632
00:35:04,840 --> 00:35:08,960
Speaker 2: web to make a big spider. So they're very small,

633
00:35:09,239 --> 00:35:11,400
Speaker 2: but they make the shape of a big spider, and

634
00:35:11,440 --> 00:35:13,800
Speaker 2: you know, they're like the ones that have been found

635
00:35:13,840 --> 00:35:16,759
Speaker 2: are like there's varying degrees of success, right, Like some

636
00:35:16,800 --> 00:35:19,520
Speaker 2: of these big spiders have six legs and some are

637
00:35:19,560 --> 00:35:22,319
Speaker 2: super lumpy, but some of them, like really they do like.

638
00:35:22,280 --> 00:35:26,080
Speaker 1: They nail it. Yeah, the artistic abilities of these spiders

639
00:35:26,200 --> 00:35:27,279
Speaker 1: does vary.

640
00:35:27,880 --> 00:35:30,400
Speaker 2: Yeah, or you know, the intention maybe they're trying to

641
00:35:30,400 --> 00:35:32,640
Speaker 2: go for something that they're like, this is a cubist spider.

642
00:35:32,760 --> 00:35:35,120
Speaker 2: This is a spider, and this is a realistic spider.

643
00:35:35,880 --> 00:35:36,239
Speaker 1: Art is.

644
00:35:38,480 --> 00:35:41,040
Speaker 2: The idea is that, I mean, people, aren't you know why.

645
00:35:41,239 --> 00:35:45,120
Speaker 2: We don't know always why these things happen or why

646
00:35:45,120 --> 00:35:47,880
Speaker 2: they evolve. But the idea is that this big spider

647
00:35:47,960 --> 00:35:51,240
Speaker 2: is scarier to a potential predator than the tiny spider

648
00:35:51,239 --> 00:35:53,279
Speaker 2: that is the real spider. So it's like it's like

649
00:35:53,320 --> 00:35:56,480
Speaker 2: a like having a mech suit or something, right, Yeah,

650
00:35:56,600 --> 00:35:59,319
Speaker 2: Like it's like you have a big robot that you're

651
00:35:59,360 --> 00:36:02,759
Speaker 2: inside of. The spider has a big spider that it's

652
00:36:02,800 --> 00:36:05,040
Speaker 2: inside of, and it's kind of There's a whole group

653
00:36:05,080 --> 00:36:08,839
Speaker 2: of spiders called orb weavers that are able to sort

654
00:36:08,840 --> 00:36:13,920
Speaker 2: of create pictures in their webs like this, and it's

655
00:36:13,960 --> 00:36:16,279
Speaker 2: thought that these are orb weavers who have just come

656
00:36:16,360 --> 00:36:21,280
Speaker 2: up with this really cool and bizarre sculpture to build.

657
00:36:21,719 --> 00:36:24,839
Speaker 1: It seems to offer them a bit of an advantage, right,

658
00:36:24,920 --> 00:36:29,880
Speaker 1: Like there could be some camouflage going on where it

659
00:36:30,080 --> 00:36:35,040
Speaker 1: could potentially intimidate predators who would be too small to

660
00:36:35,080 --> 00:36:39,279
Speaker 1: want to take on this large spiders, this large spiders,

661
00:36:39,800 --> 00:36:43,759
Speaker 1: and it could also like redirect the aggression of say

662
00:36:43,800 --> 00:36:47,680
Speaker 1: birds or any other predator towards the sort of fake

663
00:36:47,719 --> 00:36:51,279
Speaker 1: out spider while the real one slips off and just

664
00:36:51,280 --> 00:36:53,359
Speaker 1: scoots away.

665
00:36:54,360 --> 00:36:56,960
Speaker 2: And it's like they can kind of move the web,

666
00:36:57,120 --> 00:36:59,879
Speaker 2: you know, so they can make the big spider.

667
00:36:59,640 --> 00:37:03,200
Speaker 1: Kind of you. Oh, that's so good. You know those

668
00:37:03,239 --> 00:37:06,920
Speaker 1: costumes that they give little dogs that have the spider legs,

669
00:37:07,960 --> 00:37:11,480
Speaker 1: It's like it's like the little tarantula costumes that they

670
00:37:11,480 --> 00:37:13,239
Speaker 1: put on the little dogs, and then the dogs just like

671
00:37:13,320 --> 00:37:15,920
Speaker 1: bounding around, but they've made it such that the legs

672
00:37:16,000 --> 00:37:19,600
Speaker 1: kind of jiggle as the dog trots around, So it

673
00:37:19,640 --> 00:37:23,040
Speaker 1: looks very unsettling when it's on one of these little dogs.

674
00:37:24,239 --> 00:37:26,799
Speaker 1: But yeah, that's kind of essentially it. This is like

675
00:37:26,840 --> 00:37:30,480
Speaker 1: a little tiny Chihuahua spider jiggling around in a big

676
00:37:30,520 --> 00:37:32,879
Speaker 1: fake spider, freaking everyone.

677
00:37:32,600 --> 00:37:35,600
Speaker 2: Out right right. I've been thinking about how I want

678
00:37:35,600 --> 00:37:38,440
Speaker 2: to dress my cats up as bats as Halloween. I

679
00:37:38,480 --> 00:37:40,640
Speaker 2: have two black cats, and I'm sure it would be

680
00:37:40,680 --> 00:37:43,919
Speaker 2: so cute how that I probably wouldn't like it. Oh,

681
00:37:44,080 --> 00:37:48,720
Speaker 2: just just put a little like they wear little harnesses, okay,

682
00:37:48,760 --> 00:37:50,560
Speaker 2: you sometimes they hang out in the backyard.

683
00:37:51,520 --> 00:37:53,560
Speaker 1: Yeah, you could put wings. I see no problem with that.

684
00:37:53,600 --> 00:37:55,239
Speaker 1: You could put little wings on there. I don't think

685
00:37:55,239 --> 00:37:59,520
Speaker 1: they'd noticed, Yeah, I don't. I'm not all my like

686
00:37:59,840 --> 00:38:04,200
Speaker 1: my dog is naked and proud. I the only the

687
00:38:04,239 --> 00:38:07,719
Speaker 1: only Halloween costume I've ever been able to get on

688
00:38:07,760 --> 00:38:11,480
Speaker 1: her was a little bow tie and I just called

689
00:38:11,480 --> 00:38:16,799
Speaker 1: her a political pundit and that was it. I'm babysitting

690
00:38:16,840 --> 00:38:19,799
Speaker 1: three cats and there's no way I would ever get

691
00:38:19,880 --> 00:38:24,600
Speaker 1: anything on them for any amount of time. But one

692
00:38:24,640 --> 00:38:27,479
Speaker 1: of them looks just like Garfield, so I'll say that's

693
00:38:27,480 --> 00:38:31,360
Speaker 1: his costume. He's Garfield, yeah, because he's big. He's big

694
00:38:31,520 --> 00:38:32,440
Speaker 1: and he likes food.

695
00:38:34,719 --> 00:38:37,200
Speaker 2: Speaking of Halloween, I did just remember that last year,

696
00:38:37,680 --> 00:38:39,880
Speaker 2: I got those Reces bats that they make, you know,

697
00:38:39,960 --> 00:38:42,560
Speaker 2: oh yeah, little like peanut buttercup bats, and I printed

698
00:38:42,560 --> 00:38:45,759
Speaker 2: out a bunch of bat facts and I attached them.

699
00:38:45,880 --> 00:38:51,520
Speaker 2: That amazing. That's incredible an educational Halloween.

700
00:38:51,600 --> 00:38:53,520
Speaker 1: You would have been my favorite house. When I was

701
00:38:53,520 --> 00:38:56,040
Speaker 1: a kid, I dressed as a bat. I think more

702
00:38:56,080 --> 00:38:58,279
Speaker 1: than once. Actually, when I was a kid, I think

703
00:38:58,320 --> 00:39:00,400
Speaker 1: there's a couple couple of years I went as a

704
00:39:00,960 --> 00:39:03,880
Speaker 1: I had the wings. I was very particular. I didn't

705
00:39:03,880 --> 00:39:06,800
Speaker 1: want the wings on my back. I wanted them attached

706
00:39:07,280 --> 00:39:09,600
Speaker 1: to my hands because it's like, well, that's what bats

707
00:39:09,600 --> 00:39:14,600
Speaker 1: are like. The wings are essentially extended fingers of the bat,

708
00:39:15,440 --> 00:39:19,080
Speaker 1: which I couldn't necessarily do, but essentially attaching the fabric

709
00:39:19,160 --> 00:39:22,320
Speaker 1: like from sort of my hips to like my pinky

710
00:39:22,560 --> 00:39:24,200
Speaker 1: and then the rest of my arm so that I

711
00:39:24,239 --> 00:39:26,440
Speaker 1: could have wings and like spread my hands out like

712
00:39:26,480 --> 00:39:29,040
Speaker 1: I was a bat. And that was so cool. My

713
00:39:29,080 --> 00:39:31,600
Speaker 1: mom indulged me. I also read the book Stella Luna

714
00:39:31,640 --> 00:39:34,200
Speaker 1: as a kid, so that helped. But I was super

715
00:39:34,239 --> 00:39:38,160
Speaker 1: intended bats as a kid. I loved them. Look at

716
00:39:38,200 --> 00:39:41,280
Speaker 1: you now and look at me now, talking talking talking

717
00:39:41,360 --> 00:39:46,760
Speaker 1: bats on a podcast. So also speaking of our pets,

718
00:39:47,080 --> 00:39:50,120
Speaker 1: there is I think I've actually talked about this on

719
00:39:50,160 --> 00:39:52,120
Speaker 1: the show before, but I can't help bringing it up

720
00:39:52,120 --> 00:39:55,360
Speaker 1: because it's Halloween. But the ghost dogs of the Amazon,

721
00:39:55,719 --> 00:40:00,239
Speaker 1: who are actually not so scary but more just fascinating

722
00:40:00,320 --> 00:40:05,880
Speaker 1: and really cute. I assume I've never seen one, for

723
00:40:06,360 --> 00:40:08,000
Speaker 1: reasons that will become clear.

724
00:40:09,320 --> 00:40:12,680
Speaker 2: Yeah, So just to say, this entry in the book

725
00:40:12,760 --> 00:40:15,200
Speaker 2: was written by a journalist named Claudia Guide, who's really great.

726
00:40:15,320 --> 00:40:18,920
Speaker 2: She spoke to the world's leading ghost dog expert. Were

727
00:40:18,960 --> 00:40:22,200
Speaker 2: not elite Pittman, but basically these dogs live in the

728
00:40:22,239 --> 00:40:26,960
Speaker 2: Amazon and they're just super rare, like nobody ever sees them. Yeah,

729
00:40:27,000 --> 00:40:29,400
Speaker 2: every once in a while, you know, you'll get a

730
00:40:29,400 --> 00:40:31,879
Speaker 2: glimpse of one on a camera trap, or you'll hear

731
00:40:32,000 --> 00:40:37,480
Speaker 2: one making a little hoot, because that's the time they make.

732
00:40:38,360 --> 00:40:40,920
Speaker 2: But like there's really just not that much known about them,

733
00:40:41,600 --> 00:40:44,000
Speaker 2: which kind of brings home one of the lessons that

734
00:40:44,080 --> 00:40:45,959
Speaker 2: I took from this book, which is that like, even

735
00:40:45,960 --> 00:40:48,200
Speaker 2: though we feel like we know everything about the world,

736
00:40:48,239 --> 00:40:50,520
Speaker 2: there's actutes, so so much going on that we don't know,

737
00:40:50,640 --> 00:40:53,840
Speaker 2: especially in places like the Amazon, which we are like destroying.

738
00:40:54,120 --> 00:40:55,960
Speaker 2: We're really destroying all the stuff that we don't even

739
00:40:55,960 --> 00:41:00,239
Speaker 2: know about yet. In any case, this biologist became really

740
00:41:00,239 --> 00:41:02,960
Speaker 2: obsessed with these dogs in around two thousand, she was

741
00:41:03,000 --> 00:41:07,480
Speaker 2: working in Peru. She started to track them with radio collars,

742
00:41:07,640 --> 00:41:12,600
Speaker 2: and she eventually lived with one because somebody had sort

743
00:41:12,600 --> 00:41:16,520
Speaker 2: of like almost like poached a puppy from the reinforest

744
00:41:16,520 --> 00:41:18,239
Speaker 2: and was raising it as like a normal dog.

745
00:41:18,280 --> 00:41:20,959
Speaker 1: It was like, I don't want to be clear, We're clear,

746
00:41:21,040 --> 00:41:24,920
Speaker 1: this is not a These aren't fairal domesticated dogs. These

747
00:41:25,040 --> 00:41:30,120
Speaker 1: are these are canids, a species of canad similar to say,

748
00:41:30,400 --> 00:41:32,560
Speaker 1: I mean not similar, but in the same vein as

749
00:41:32,600 --> 00:41:35,360
Speaker 1: like say, like a dingo is a species of canaan.

750
00:41:36,680 --> 00:41:39,400
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, so it's not. Yeah, it's not the kind

751
00:41:39,400 --> 00:41:41,359
Speaker 2: of puppy that you want to just be hanging out

752
00:41:41,400 --> 00:41:43,360
Speaker 2: with if you're not prepared for that. So she she

753
00:41:43,480 --> 00:41:47,160
Speaker 2: bought this puppy from this person, and she actually sort

754
00:41:47,200 --> 00:41:50,800
Speaker 2: of lived alongside it almost like again not like a pet,

755
00:41:50,840 --> 00:41:54,080
Speaker 2: but just observing and learning a lot about what these

756
00:41:54,120 --> 00:41:57,000
Speaker 2: dogs did and like leading it on the leash or

757
00:41:57,040 --> 00:42:01,200
Speaker 2: being led by it through the leash for a year. Yeah,

758
00:42:01,440 --> 00:42:03,799
Speaker 2: learned like what it eats. They eat fruit, which is cool,

759
00:42:03,880 --> 00:42:07,520
Speaker 2: they eat nuts. They actually like are important seed dispersers

760
00:42:07,560 --> 00:42:11,440
Speaker 2: in the rainforest poops. And after about a year she

761
00:42:11,600 --> 00:42:16,759
Speaker 2: just took the leash off and he ran away. Makes sense.

762
00:42:17,920 --> 00:42:20,600
Speaker 1: That's really interesting. I didn't know about that that someone

763
00:42:20,640 --> 00:42:24,960
Speaker 1: actually was able to get information that way. Yeah, but yeah,

764
00:42:25,000 --> 00:42:28,480
Speaker 1: that that is I kind of like that, Like essentially

765
00:42:28,600 --> 00:42:31,680
Speaker 1: it's like no, you're not I'm not you're not gonna

766
00:42:31,680 --> 00:42:33,879
Speaker 1: tame me. I'm not gonna be domesticated, and I'm out

767
00:42:33,920 --> 00:42:36,719
Speaker 1: of here, which is very different even from sort of

768
00:42:36,840 --> 00:42:40,520
Speaker 1: dog ancestors. Right, Like, I'm not suggesting anyone tries to

769
00:42:40,560 --> 00:42:45,279
Speaker 1: tame a wolf, but technically speaking, you can, and people

770
00:42:45,280 --> 00:42:49,080
Speaker 1: who tame wolves can actually form a relationship with them,

771
00:42:49,120 --> 00:42:53,040
Speaker 1: and the wolves are actually pretty They can act, you know,

772
00:42:53,640 --> 00:42:56,840
Speaker 1: somewhat doug like, right, like being friendly with their with

773
00:42:56,920 --> 00:43:00,319
Speaker 1: the people who've tamed them. Maybe sometimes you lose some

774
00:43:00,400 --> 00:43:04,080
Speaker 1: fingers or your life, but a lot of the times you,

775
00:43:04,080 --> 00:43:07,640
Speaker 1: you know, these people who you know, tame these wolves

776
00:43:07,719 --> 00:43:12,840
Speaker 1: usually on like wolf rescues do form like kind of

777
00:43:12,840 --> 00:43:15,960
Speaker 1: a relationship with wolves. They're very different from dogs, though

778
00:43:16,120 --> 00:43:18,280
Speaker 1: it's not going to be just like a large husky.

779
00:43:18,440 --> 00:43:22,680
Speaker 1: They are much more fiercely independent than dogs. They seek

780
00:43:22,760 --> 00:43:27,239
Speaker 1: human help, much less, much more likely to kill you,

781
00:43:27,239 --> 00:43:29,880
Speaker 1: you know. They just operate by different rules from dogs

782
00:43:29,880 --> 00:43:32,440
Speaker 1: because dogs have been their dogs are not tamed. They

783
00:43:32,440 --> 00:43:36,560
Speaker 1: are domesticated. They've gone through many, many, many, many generations

784
00:43:36,600 --> 00:43:40,120
Speaker 1: of artificial selection by humans and also potentially some self

785
00:43:40,160 --> 00:43:42,719
Speaker 1: selection in terms of like domesticating themselves so that they

786
00:43:42,760 --> 00:43:47,200
Speaker 1: could get in on our sweet, sweet scraps. But these dogs,

787
00:43:47,200 --> 00:43:52,120
Speaker 1: these ghost dogs, they're not necessarily of the of the

788
00:43:52,200 --> 00:43:55,880
Speaker 1: same sort of lineage, right, They're not. They're related to wolves,

789
00:43:55,880 --> 00:43:58,880
Speaker 1: they're related to domesticated dogs, but they are not necessarily

790
00:43:59,160 --> 00:44:03,320
Speaker 1: pack animals, and so if they have a more solitary lifestyle,

791
00:44:03,440 --> 00:44:06,000
Speaker 1: it makes sense that there's just not You're not going

792
00:44:06,040 --> 00:44:08,719
Speaker 1: to be able to tame one because it doesn't really

793
00:44:08,760 --> 00:44:13,400
Speaker 1: have any interest in you, because in its natural environment,

794
00:44:13,719 --> 00:44:16,560
Speaker 1: is not necessarily social in the same way that wolves

795
00:44:16,880 --> 00:44:20,279
Speaker 1: or dogs or even hyenas or dingos are.

796
00:44:21,360 --> 00:44:24,320
Speaker 2: Yeah, totally. One thing that this bile just learned was

797
00:44:24,360 --> 00:44:27,000
Speaker 2: that one reason that people don't see these ghost dogs

798
00:44:27,040 --> 00:44:30,040
Speaker 2: is they live in burrows, like kind of on their own,

799
00:44:30,160 --> 00:44:31,480
Speaker 2: or they'll hide inside.

800
00:44:31,120 --> 00:44:33,600
Speaker 1: Of hollow trees or yellow that's adorable.

801
00:44:33,640 --> 00:44:36,920
Speaker 2: So they are like they are sneaky, They're just sneaking around.

802
00:44:37,040 --> 00:44:39,360
Speaker 1: Yeah, kind of sounds like my dog. She likes to

803
00:44:39,840 --> 00:44:43,719
Speaker 1: sometimes hide under a chair and I spend like, you know,

804
00:44:43,840 --> 00:44:47,480
Speaker 1: fifteen minutes of panic, like where is she? There's no

805
00:44:47,560 --> 00:44:49,600
Speaker 1: way she could have left the apartment. I'm on the

806
00:44:49,640 --> 00:44:53,040
Speaker 1: top floor. What's going on? And she's just like hanging

807
00:44:53,080 --> 00:44:56,920
Speaker 1: out under a chair, probably deeply amused at me as

808
00:44:56,920 --> 00:44:58,000
Speaker 1: I'm looking around.

809
00:44:58,920 --> 00:44:59,399
Speaker 2: Ghost dog.

810
00:45:00,360 --> 00:45:04,960
Speaker 1: Yes, she did dress herself up for Halloween. She tossed

811
00:45:05,040 --> 00:45:08,120
Speaker 1: a toy weasel in the air and then it landed

812
00:45:08,120 --> 00:45:11,239
Speaker 1: around her neck. Like she's a fancy lady. So that's

813
00:45:11,280 --> 00:45:12,840
Speaker 1: about as close as we're going to get to a

814
00:45:12,840 --> 00:45:17,560
Speaker 1: Halloween costume. My dog the fancy lady wearing a mink

815
00:45:17,760 --> 00:45:21,000
Speaker 1: around her neck, which is actually just a gross old

816
00:45:21,000 --> 00:45:23,360
Speaker 1: toy that she's had since she was a puppy. I

817
00:45:23,480 --> 00:45:27,600
Speaker 1: do want to talk about carnivorous plants, because I think

818
00:45:27,640 --> 00:45:30,319
Speaker 1: that's kind of a that's kind of a Halloweeny thing

819
00:45:31,080 --> 00:45:33,840
Speaker 1: that we don't tell or I don't talk about plants

820
00:45:33,960 --> 00:45:37,799
Speaker 1: that much on the podcast. It's not my strength, but

821
00:45:38,160 --> 00:45:43,040
Speaker 1: I do love carnivorous plants. I love especially pitcher plants,

822
00:45:43,160 --> 00:45:46,840
Speaker 1: because of all of the various symbiotic relationships they have

823
00:45:46,920 --> 00:45:50,799
Speaker 1: with other critters like bats, frogs, crab, spiders. You've basically

824
00:45:50,880 --> 00:45:55,279
Speaker 1: got like your perfect Halloween mix with pitcher plants, all

825
00:45:55,360 --> 00:45:59,239
Speaker 1: the crowd favorites of Halloween, and then your cauldron, which

826
00:45:59,280 --> 00:46:02,040
Speaker 1: is made out of a plant that does even mean.

827
00:46:03,400 --> 00:46:06,800
Speaker 2: Yeah, I love that. I love carniverse plants too. They're

828
00:46:06,840 --> 00:46:10,320
Speaker 2: like they really teach you that there are no rules,

829
00:46:10,480 --> 00:46:12,920
Speaker 2: you know. Yeah, like we think that we understand how

830
00:46:12,960 --> 00:46:15,359
Speaker 2: plants work, but then there's all these ones that are

831
00:46:15,400 --> 00:46:18,080
Speaker 2: like flipping the food chain, and yeah, we're just like, Okay,

832
00:46:18,200 --> 00:46:23,319
Speaker 2: go for it. Picture plants are really cool. Like you said,

833
00:46:23,360 --> 00:46:26,719
Speaker 2: they look like a cauldron. They are just like this

834
00:46:26,760 --> 00:46:29,600
Speaker 2: big cup and then at the bottom of the cup

835
00:46:29,719 --> 00:46:33,359
Speaker 2: there is like a murk of digestive juices, which I

836
00:46:33,400 --> 00:46:35,839
Speaker 2: assume that's what's in a cauldron as well. I guess

837
00:46:35,880 --> 00:46:40,960
Speaker 2: that's something like that confirmed. But yeah, they so all

838
00:46:41,040 --> 00:46:46,680
Speaker 2: carnivorse plants. Basically, instead of getting their nutrients from soil

839
00:46:46,800 --> 00:46:50,160
Speaker 2: the way that we understand plants to do it, they

840
00:46:50,200 --> 00:46:54,120
Speaker 2: get their nutrients from like living things like bugs, like

841
00:46:54,120 --> 00:46:56,399
Speaker 2: a venus fly trap is the classic example. It will

842
00:46:57,000 --> 00:46:59,879
Speaker 2: snap up a little fly and then digest the fly,

843
00:47:00,120 --> 00:47:01,920
Speaker 2: and that's how it gets some of the things it

844
00:47:02,400 --> 00:47:05,680
Speaker 2: needs like nitrogen and phosphorus and stuff like that that

845
00:47:05,800 --> 00:47:07,919
Speaker 2: other plants will drop through their roots from the soil.

846
00:47:09,360 --> 00:47:13,359
Speaker 2: So yeah, very cool. Picture plants. They don't really necessarily

847
00:47:13,400 --> 00:47:16,759
Speaker 2: like actively move like a lot of carnervous plants, like

848
00:47:16,800 --> 00:47:19,440
Speaker 2: the fly trap, which will go like out and grab

849
00:47:19,480 --> 00:47:19,759
Speaker 2: the fly.

850
00:47:19,880 --> 00:47:22,200
Speaker 1: Like a trigger that the fly hits and then that

851
00:47:22,320 --> 00:47:22,920
Speaker 1: triggers this.

852
00:47:25,160 --> 00:47:27,799
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, which is so cool. But the picture plants

853
00:47:27,840 --> 00:47:29,920
Speaker 2: are they're just hanging out and waiting for something to

854
00:47:29,960 --> 00:47:31,480
Speaker 2: fall in. Basically that's.

855
00:47:32,880 --> 00:47:36,280
Speaker 1: My method of eating weight around and wait for something

856
00:47:36,320 --> 00:47:36,840
Speaker 1: to fall in.

857
00:47:38,719 --> 00:47:43,640
Speaker 2: They have these ways of attracting prey, so like they

858
00:47:43,680 --> 00:47:47,640
Speaker 2: will have a little like sweet nectar around like the

859
00:47:47,760 --> 00:47:50,200
Speaker 2: lip of themselves, and then a bug will come and

860
00:47:50,200 --> 00:47:53,200
Speaker 2: eat it and fall in over and sometimes they'll get,

861
00:47:53,320 --> 00:47:55,880
Speaker 2: you know, something bigger than that. But a lot of

862
00:47:55,920 --> 00:47:58,280
Speaker 2: them have evolved over time to be even more interesting.

863
00:47:58,320 --> 00:48:01,279
Speaker 2: One of my favorite ones I learned about writing this

864
00:48:01,320 --> 00:48:04,080
Speaker 2: book was the lowest picture plant, which is also known

865
00:48:04,080 --> 00:48:07,880
Speaker 2: as the shrew poop plant. So basically it's like nectar

866
00:48:07,960 --> 00:48:12,480
Speaker 2: appendage attract shrew shrews, and the shrews will come and

867
00:48:12,560 --> 00:48:15,279
Speaker 2: like leaning over to lick the nectar off the edge

868
00:48:15,280 --> 00:48:17,480
Speaker 2: of the picture plant like puts them in like the

869
00:48:17,520 --> 00:48:21,919
Speaker 2: squatty potty position, you know, And so they're just like, oh, well,

870
00:48:21,920 --> 00:48:24,680
Speaker 2: like how convenient I can eat and also relieve myself

871
00:48:24,719 --> 00:48:25,279
Speaker 2: at the same time.

872
00:48:25,360 --> 00:48:27,120
Speaker 1: Yeah, food plant.

873
00:48:27,880 --> 00:48:31,520
Speaker 2: Yeah, it poops into the plant and the plant is like, yes,

874
00:48:31,719 --> 00:48:34,239
Speaker 2: like that's what I wanted, and it's free. I guess

875
00:48:34,320 --> 00:48:37,760
Speaker 2: the nutrients. I know. It's so funny. It's like so crazy,

876
00:48:37,840 --> 00:48:40,759
Speaker 2: how amazing these different strategies are that have evolved over

877
00:48:40,840 --> 00:48:43,600
Speaker 2: time the same thing. There's another picture plant that does

878
00:48:43,640 --> 00:48:46,960
Speaker 2: this with really really tiny pats that are like an

879
00:48:47,040 --> 00:48:51,880
Speaker 2: inch long and it's appendage. Like the bats echo locate

880
00:48:51,920 --> 00:48:54,200
Speaker 2: and they can see like, oh, this is the guy.

881
00:48:54,360 --> 00:48:55,800
Speaker 2: This is the one we like, Like, we want to

882
00:48:55,840 --> 00:48:58,160
Speaker 2: go roost in here. Yeah, And they go and they

883
00:48:58,239 --> 00:49:00,640
Speaker 2: like roost inside the giant picture plan and they poop

884
00:49:00,640 --> 00:49:01,719
Speaker 2: in it, and the plant.

885
00:49:01,480 --> 00:49:06,880
Speaker 1: Is like, yes, right, fertilizer. Because these plants are freaks. Yeah,

886
00:49:07,000 --> 00:49:09,080
Speaker 1: I love that. I also love the ones that have

887
00:49:09,200 --> 00:49:13,320
Speaker 1: the semitic relationship with the crab spiders because the spiders

888
00:49:13,320 --> 00:49:15,840
Speaker 1: will also make a little home out of these plants.

889
00:49:16,000 --> 00:49:20,160
Speaker 1: And it's interesting because these piccher plants will both eat insects,

890
00:49:20,320 --> 00:49:24,200
Speaker 1: but also so it won't necessarily eat the spider while

891
00:49:24,200 --> 00:49:27,760
Speaker 1: it's alive, because the spider is suspended by a thread,

892
00:49:27,800 --> 00:49:31,400
Speaker 1: so it's got kind of a safety tether and but

893
00:49:31,440 --> 00:49:34,239
Speaker 1: the spy but it's not really a it is more

894
00:49:34,280 --> 00:49:37,880
Speaker 1: of a mutualistic relationship because when the spider, the spider

895
00:49:37,960 --> 00:49:41,360
Speaker 1: might catch a fly that it was kind of thinking

896
00:49:41,400 --> 00:49:44,160
Speaker 1: of landing in the plant but kind of decided against it.

897
00:49:44,200 --> 00:49:48,040
Speaker 1: But oops, now there's a spider there. And so it

898
00:49:48,239 --> 00:49:51,960
Speaker 1: will eat the juices out of the spider or eat

899
00:49:52,280 --> 00:49:55,200
Speaker 1: suck the juices out of the fly or whatever insect,

900
00:49:55,200 --> 00:49:57,440
Speaker 1: and then dump the rest of its carcass into the plant,

901
00:49:57,600 --> 00:49:59,959
Speaker 1: and the plant can actually use that. So the plant

902
00:50:00,360 --> 00:50:03,480
Speaker 1: that have these little spiders living in them actually end

903
00:50:03,600 --> 00:50:06,680
Speaker 1: up getting more nutrition than ones that do not have

904
00:50:06,719 --> 00:50:09,200
Speaker 1: the spiders. And of course the spiders also get more

905
00:50:09,320 --> 00:50:12,600
Speaker 1: catches by being in this plant that has this fragrance

906
00:50:12,640 --> 00:50:16,080
Speaker 1: that attracts the flies. So it's a mutually beneficial relationship.

907
00:50:16,400 --> 00:50:21,600
Speaker 1: And then the sort of the best deal for the

908
00:50:21,600 --> 00:50:24,560
Speaker 1: picture plant is that once the spider finally kicks the bucket,

909
00:50:24,800 --> 00:50:26,719
Speaker 1: where does it go? It falls right back into the

910
00:50:26,719 --> 00:50:29,920
Speaker 1: picture plant, and so you know, it's like, well, you

911
00:50:29,960 --> 00:50:33,600
Speaker 1: were my friend, my little buddy, and now you're my meal,

912
00:50:33,760 --> 00:50:36,320
Speaker 1: which I don't know. I don't know that picture plants

913
00:50:36,320 --> 00:50:39,600
Speaker 1: are sentimental, probably because they don't have a brain. But

914
00:50:39,960 --> 00:50:43,680
Speaker 1: still it's a beautiful friendship all the way until the

915
00:50:44,239 --> 00:50:44,919
Speaker 1: soupy end.

916
00:50:46,280 --> 00:50:49,120
Speaker 2: I sort of think it's our job as the storytelling

917
00:50:49,160 --> 00:50:53,600
Speaker 2: species to like add this meaning yeah, onto these relationships

918
00:50:53,640 --> 00:50:56,000
Speaker 2: that we observe. So I think it's totally valid, yeah,

919
00:50:56,080 --> 00:50:58,560
Speaker 2: to sort of be like this is this way. Yeah,

920
00:50:58,600 --> 00:50:59,960
Speaker 2: that's just my personal opinion.

921
00:51:00,120 --> 00:51:03,040
Speaker 1: It's like if a Little Shop of Horrors ended very differently.

922
00:51:06,600 --> 00:51:09,240
Speaker 2: Yeah, Or it's like how people talk about cats would

923
00:51:09,239 --> 00:51:11,600
Speaker 2: like eat you if your dead body was in your house.

924
00:51:12,239 --> 00:51:15,319
Speaker 2: They might, you know, they might, but it's not necessarily

925
00:51:15,520 --> 00:51:18,480
Speaker 2: like a bad thing. It might. No, it's a way

926
00:51:18,520 --> 00:51:22,440
Speaker 2: of incorporating you. Yeah, to themselves.

927
00:51:22,600 --> 00:51:24,960
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean I think that, Like, I think that

928
00:51:26,040 --> 00:51:28,920
Speaker 1: the more complex and animal gets, especially ones that are

929
00:51:29,000 --> 00:51:32,560
Speaker 1: highly social or at least tolerant like cats and dogs,

930
00:51:33,320 --> 00:51:36,720
Speaker 1: the more I do think they really kind of appreciate

931
00:51:37,040 --> 00:51:40,160
Speaker 1: these sort of relationships, right, Like if you have a hamster,

932
00:51:40,719 --> 00:51:44,560
Speaker 1: it may have a dim appreciation for you. A dogg

933
00:51:44,680 --> 00:51:46,960
Speaker 1: or cat is going to have a greater appreciation for you,

934
00:51:47,400 --> 00:51:49,279
Speaker 1: and I think they do. They are going to miss

935
00:51:49,320 --> 00:51:53,520
Speaker 1: you if you keel over and die, and they will

936
00:51:53,560 --> 00:51:57,600
Speaker 1: be sad about it, and they might possibly eat some

937
00:51:57,760 --> 00:52:00,239
Speaker 1: of you. None of those are mutually exclusive of.

938
00:52:00,920 --> 00:52:03,799
Speaker 2: Yeah, totally. They are a little spooky though, so they're

939
00:52:03,840 --> 00:52:04,439
Speaker 2: still on them.

940
00:52:04,600 --> 00:52:08,360
Speaker 1: There you go, Yeah cats and yeah, shout out to

941
00:52:08,560 --> 00:52:11,680
Speaker 1: black cats. I don't think there's any I know that

942
00:52:11,719 --> 00:52:15,000
Speaker 1: people like talk about how Halloween is a really dangerous

943
00:52:15,080 --> 00:52:20,200
Speaker 1: night for black cats. I don't think that's true necessarily,

944
00:52:21,320 --> 00:52:23,000
Speaker 1: like in terms of like people are like, ah, people

945
00:52:23,040 --> 00:52:24,960
Speaker 1: are trying to do rituals with black cats. I don't

946
00:52:24,960 --> 00:52:28,279
Speaker 1: think any of there's any actual evidence of that other

947
00:52:28,360 --> 00:52:33,080
Speaker 1: than like scattered anecdotes. But you know, every night is

948
00:52:33,160 --> 00:52:37,480
Speaker 1: potentially dangerous for cats if they're outdoors, I mean, particularly

949
00:52:37,520 --> 00:52:39,440
Speaker 1: black cats. They're harder to see, so they can be

950
00:52:39,520 --> 00:52:42,399
Speaker 1: victims of getting hit by cars. So you know, keep

951
00:52:42,520 --> 00:52:46,520
Speaker 1: keep your cats in this Halloween and if possible, the

952
00:52:46,560 --> 00:52:50,520
Speaker 1: rest of the year too. But they are they are wonderful,

953
00:52:50,680 --> 00:52:55,120
Speaker 1: wonderful animals. Nothing nothing spooky or different about black cats

954
00:52:55,160 --> 00:52:59,480
Speaker 1: compared to other species or other breeds of cats. They are,

955
00:53:00,200 --> 00:53:02,960
Speaker 1: uh sometimes looked over in shelters and stuff, but they

956
00:53:03,000 --> 00:53:06,640
Speaker 1: really are just the same sweet little fluffballs or sometimes

957
00:53:06,640 --> 00:53:09,600
Speaker 1: not so sweet fluff balls as other cats.

958
00:53:10,880 --> 00:53:14,919
Speaker 2: I love my black cats. I like Halloween because there's

959
00:53:14,960 --> 00:53:16,879
Speaker 2: just a lot of black cat appreciation out there. Yes,

960
00:53:16,960 --> 00:53:18,480
Speaker 2: Like we can go around and you see a lot

961
00:53:18,520 --> 00:53:22,160
Speaker 2: of black cat representation in yards and in windows and

962
00:53:22,200 --> 00:53:24,920
Speaker 2: in the aisles of the drug stores and stuff. And

963
00:53:25,520 --> 00:53:27,280
Speaker 2: I do like that. Yeah for Halloween.

964
00:53:27,719 --> 00:53:29,840
Speaker 1: Yeah, Now there I mean, you know, it's kind of like,

965
00:53:30,080 --> 00:53:32,800
Speaker 1: I do feel that there has been a cultural shift

966
00:53:32,920 --> 00:53:35,960
Speaker 1: in terms of black cats, bats, things like that, where

967
00:53:36,000 --> 00:53:38,920
Speaker 1: people kind of appreciate them more rather than genuinely being

968
00:53:38,960 --> 00:53:43,480
Speaker 1: afraid of them. Black cats are still somewhat overlooked in shelters,

969
00:53:43,480 --> 00:53:46,680
Speaker 1: like they're less taken up than other types of cats,

970
00:53:46,680 --> 00:53:48,399
Speaker 1: which is a shame. But yeah, I mean I think

971
00:53:48,400 --> 00:53:52,520
Speaker 1: that like, if you watch Kiki's Delivery Service and don't

972
00:53:52,560 --> 00:53:55,880
Speaker 1: come away wanting a black cat, there's something wrong with you.

973
00:53:57,760 --> 00:54:00,359
Speaker 1: All right, Well, before we go, let's play a little

974
00:54:00,360 --> 00:54:03,640
Speaker 1: game called Guess Who's squawking? The Mystery Animal Sound Game.

975
00:54:03,880 --> 00:54:07,400
Speaker 1: Every week I play a mystery animal sound and you

976
00:54:07,560 --> 00:54:09,560
Speaker 1: the listener. K you're the guest, try to guess who

977
00:54:09,640 --> 00:54:11,680
Speaker 1: is making this sound. It can be any animal in

978
00:54:11,680 --> 00:54:14,920
Speaker 1: the world, So you know, no pressure, not hard at all.

979
00:54:16,880 --> 00:54:21,040
Speaker 1: Here is the hint for this one. It's a bit

980
00:54:21,080 --> 00:54:22,799
Speaker 1: of a long hint, but here we go. So I've

981
00:54:22,840 --> 00:54:26,319
Speaker 1: actually used this sound before on the show, but I

982
00:54:26,320 --> 00:54:29,040
Speaker 1: can't help pulling it out again because I think it

983
00:54:29,080 --> 00:54:33,719
Speaker 1: could be a sample in a europop song. Our. One

984
00:54:33,719 --> 00:54:41,239
Speaker 1: of our last episodes is about Eurovision, and so one

985
00:54:41,239 --> 00:54:46,959
Speaker 1: of our last episodes was about Eurovision. So anyways, maybe

986
00:54:47,000 --> 00:54:49,919
Speaker 1: I should even say Colombian music because this little guy

987
00:54:50,080 --> 00:54:59,279
Speaker 1: is from the andyes, all right, Cared, do you have

988
00:54:59,320 --> 00:55:00,880
Speaker 1: any guesses of who this could be?

989
00:55:02,840 --> 00:55:03,600
Speaker 2: This a velbird?

990
00:55:04,520 --> 00:55:08,200
Speaker 1: Oh man, you are so close, you are so so close.

991
00:55:09,760 --> 00:55:13,000
Speaker 1: It is it's in the same sort of region. It's

992
00:55:12,760 --> 00:55:16,759
Speaker 1: a it is a bird. This is the club winged Mannikin.

993
00:55:17,600 --> 00:55:21,640
Speaker 1: So this you are incredibly close it Actually they sound

994
00:55:21,920 --> 00:55:25,040
Speaker 1: very similar, but they have a very different way of

995
00:55:25,200 --> 00:55:28,919
Speaker 1: producing sound. So the club wing Mannequin is a cute

996
00:55:28,920 --> 00:55:31,560
Speaker 1: little bird with a red cap, a brown vest, and

997
00:55:31,760 --> 00:55:35,200
Speaker 1: black and white wings that are surprisingly short and stubby.

998
00:55:35,800 --> 00:55:40,200
Speaker 1: They are bad flyers, not very graceful, but the wings

999
00:55:40,239 --> 00:55:45,080
Speaker 1: have this superpower, which is sunnation. They vibrate their wings

1000
00:55:45,440 --> 00:55:49,919
Speaker 1: incredibly fast, and they have a mechanism similar to how

1001
00:55:50,120 --> 00:55:53,960
Speaker 1: insects produce sound through stridulation, like crickets that rub their wings,

1002
00:55:54,520 --> 00:55:58,080
Speaker 1: but the feathers have been specifically modified to kind of

1003
00:55:58,120 --> 00:56:02,040
Speaker 1: have this like ridge structure, sure, like a spoon and

1004
00:56:02,160 --> 00:56:07,520
Speaker 1: washboard kind of structure that allows them to stridulate, and

1005
00:56:07,800 --> 00:56:10,720
Speaker 1: so it shakes its wings like a hundred times a second,

1006
00:56:10,800 --> 00:56:15,880
Speaker 1: producing this loud incredible sound, which a bird like the bellbird,

1007
00:56:15,880 --> 00:56:21,200
Speaker 1: which produces a very similar sound, produces instead with its syrinx,

1008
00:56:21,239 --> 00:56:23,640
Speaker 1: which is sort of the bird version of a larynx,

1009
00:56:24,200 --> 00:56:26,680
Speaker 1: and it just has this large resonance chamber that can

1010
00:56:26,760 --> 00:56:30,000
Speaker 1: produce this loud sound. But this little bird uses its

1011
00:56:30,040 --> 00:56:33,960
Speaker 1: wings and it is one of my favorites. And it's

1012
00:56:34,000 --> 00:56:37,799
Speaker 1: also just really funny how little and stubby, and if

1013
00:56:37,800 --> 00:56:42,240
Speaker 1: you've ever seen them fly, they are not elegant.

1014
00:56:44,640 --> 00:56:46,840
Speaker 2: That's so cool. Thanks for teaching me about that. I

1015
00:56:46,920 --> 00:56:48,160
Speaker 2: learned so much today overall.

1016
00:56:48,680 --> 00:56:51,920
Speaker 1: Well, I learned so much from reading your book, so

1017
00:56:52,840 --> 00:56:55,960
Speaker 1: it seems we have made a fair exchange of knowledge here.

1018
00:56:57,320 --> 00:57:00,200
Speaker 1: And you also help out this podcast. When I read

1019
00:57:00,239 --> 00:57:02,160
Speaker 1: your articles, I'm like, I have to talk about that.

1020
00:57:02,840 --> 00:57:05,440
Speaker 1: Uh So, I'm so glad that I could return the

1021
00:57:05,480 --> 00:57:10,040
Speaker 1: favor at least once. Onto this week's mystery animal sound.

1022
00:57:11,680 --> 00:57:16,920
Speaker 1: The hint is this happy hollow ween from this loud

1023
00:57:17,160 --> 00:57:30,720
Speaker 1: little aquatic gentleman. All right, Karen, you got any guesses.

1024
00:57:30,800 --> 00:57:35,280
Speaker 2: An aquatic gentleman? An aquatic like a little tadpole with

1025
00:57:35,320 --> 00:57:39,640
Speaker 2: a top hat, but probably a fish of some kind.

1026
00:57:41,040 --> 00:57:43,560
Speaker 2: Is it like a like a sea robin or something

1027
00:57:43,600 --> 00:57:43,920
Speaker 2: like that.

1028
00:57:44,000 --> 00:57:46,360
Speaker 1: Oh interesting, I don't as sea robin.

1029
00:57:46,400 --> 00:57:48,960
Speaker 2: You said, yeah, that's a kind of fish that I

1030
00:57:49,000 --> 00:57:49,840
Speaker 2: know can make sound.

1031
00:57:49,920 --> 00:57:52,440
Speaker 1: But you know, I don't even know about that fish,

1032
00:57:52,560 --> 00:57:55,680
Speaker 1: so you are incorrect yet. Now I want to learn

1033
00:57:55,680 --> 00:57:58,480
Speaker 1: about the sea robin fish, so you're on the hook

1034
00:57:58,520 --> 00:58:02,400
Speaker 1: for teaching me that. So another hint. It's not the

1035
00:58:02,400 --> 00:58:05,080
Speaker 1: sea robin fish. But tell me about the sea robin fish.

1036
00:58:06,080 --> 00:58:08,760
Speaker 2: Oh, I mean, it's just like, it looks really funny.

1037
00:58:08,960 --> 00:58:11,400
Speaker 2: It lives in shallow water, and it's called the sea

1038
00:58:11,440 --> 00:58:14,000
Speaker 2: robin because it has fins that look sort of like wings.

1039
00:58:14,040 --> 00:58:16,960
Speaker 2: And then it also comes like I love this guy

1040
00:58:17,280 --> 00:58:20,000
Speaker 2: gurgle above the water. It can make suense.

1041
00:58:20,040 --> 00:58:22,600
Speaker 1: Oh my god. Well now I know what I'm going

1042
00:58:22,680 --> 00:58:24,760
Speaker 1: to use for a future one of these. I'll have

1043
00:58:24,800 --> 00:58:26,919
Speaker 1: to wait a little while so people don't see it coming.

1044
00:58:26,960 --> 00:58:30,400
Speaker 1: But this guy looks incredible. I love his little wings.

1045
00:58:30,480 --> 00:58:34,200
Speaker 1: That's amazing. In a way, you still win because you

1046
00:58:34,360 --> 00:58:36,360
Speaker 1: taught me about an animal that I have not heard

1047
00:58:36,400 --> 00:58:40,400
Speaker 1: of before. But but no, you did not get it.

1048
00:58:41,600 --> 00:58:45,520
Speaker 1: But we will reveal the answer to this one next

1049
00:58:45,600 --> 00:58:49,960
Speaker 1: time on Creature Feature. Kara, thank you so much for

1050
00:58:50,000 --> 00:58:52,560
Speaker 1: coming on the show. I'm so pleased to have you on.

1051
00:58:53,560 --> 00:58:56,880
Speaker 1: I had a great time reading your book, and I

1052
00:58:56,920 --> 00:59:02,320
Speaker 1: highly recommend it. It's Atlas Obscuro, not a ciro, sorry,

1053
00:59:02,360 --> 00:59:07,640
Speaker 1: at List Obscure Wildlife and co authored by Kara Gaimo.

1054
00:59:08,400 --> 00:59:10,439
Speaker 1: Where can people find your book and where can people

1055
00:59:10,480 --> 00:59:12,200
Speaker 1: find more of your incredible writing?

1056
00:59:13,480 --> 00:59:17,240
Speaker 2: Oh? Yeah, so my book is available basically everywhere. You

1057
00:59:17,280 --> 00:59:19,320
Speaker 2: can buy it online, you can probably buy it at

1058
00:59:19,320 --> 00:59:23,240
Speaker 2: your local bookstore. I agree with Katie, if you like

1059
00:59:23,320 --> 00:59:26,520
Speaker 2: this podcast, you'll probably like the book. I I feel

1060
00:59:26,520 --> 00:59:29,360
Speaker 2: like more confident saying that than I have on any

1061
00:59:29,360 --> 00:59:30,520
Speaker 2: other podcast I've done.

1062
00:59:31,400 --> 00:59:34,720
Speaker 1: It's one hundred percent true. Like, if you like this,

1063
00:59:34,720 --> 00:59:38,200
Speaker 1: this is like kind of like this podcast in book form,

1064
00:59:38,440 --> 00:59:43,760
Speaker 1: but with very much care of flavored. So wonderful.

1065
00:59:45,480 --> 00:59:47,240
Speaker 2: And as for me, I don't know, I'm I'm all

1066
00:59:47,240 --> 00:59:49,000
Speaker 2: over the place. I'm actually I'm on a book tour

1067
00:59:49,080 --> 00:59:50,920
Speaker 2: right now. If if you're I don't know when this

1068
00:59:50,960 --> 00:59:51,600
Speaker 2: episode is going to.

1069
00:59:51,600 --> 00:59:55,640
Speaker 1: Come out, but halloweenish, okay.

1070
00:59:56,920 --> 01:00:00,120
Speaker 2: If you're in Portland, Oregon, you can see me at

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01:00:00,160 --> 01:00:05,920
Speaker 2: Portland Book Festival on November two. That's my birthday. Oh

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01:00:05,960 --> 01:00:06,520
Speaker 2: that's cool.

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01:00:07,640 --> 01:00:12,040
Speaker 1: Celebrate celebrate my birthday by going to Portland.

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01:00:14,760 --> 01:00:17,600
Speaker 2: And I'll yeah, I am freelance, so you can I

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01:00:17,720 --> 01:00:19,400
Speaker 2: crop up all over the place. You can look for

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01:00:19,480 --> 01:00:27,280
Speaker 2: my byline anywhere. You enjoy fine journalism about creatures, And yeah,

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01:00:27,320 --> 01:00:29,120
Speaker 2: I think that's all I can really plug right now.

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01:00:29,440 --> 01:00:31,560
Speaker 1: I have gotten to the point where I will be

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01:00:31,600 --> 01:00:33,760
Speaker 1: reading something and I forget to look at the author

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01:00:33,800 --> 01:00:35,920
Speaker 1: and I'm like, wait, this is para, isn't it. And

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01:00:35,960 --> 01:00:37,600
Speaker 1: I checked and I'm so right.

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01:00:38,240 --> 01:00:42,680
Speaker 2: Oh, that's fun, that's cool, that's awesome.

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01:00:42,760 --> 01:00:45,000
Speaker 1: All right, guys, well, thank you so much for listening.

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01:00:45,160 --> 01:00:49,600
Speaker 1: Have a real, real, good, spooky and fun Halloween. Enjoy

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01:00:49,640 --> 01:00:52,280
Speaker 1: all the candy. I'm not a dentist, so I'm gonna say,

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01:00:52,360 --> 01:00:55,000
Speaker 1: eat all the candy you want. Don't even refresh your teeth.

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01:00:55,080 --> 01:00:59,760
Speaker 1: I don't care. Yeah, happy Halloween. If you're enjoying this show,

1088
01:01:00,200 --> 01:01:03,000
Speaker 1: you rate and review that tangibly helps me and I

1089
01:01:03,040 --> 01:01:05,840
Speaker 1: read all of them and appreciate it all. And thanks

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01:01:05,840 --> 01:01:09,440
Speaker 1: to the Space Classics for their super awesome song Exo Alumina.

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01:01:09,720 --> 01:01:12,360
Speaker 1: I almost forgot to tell you that if you think

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01:01:12,440 --> 01:01:14,840
Speaker 1: you know who the mister animal sound is, if you

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01:01:14,920 --> 01:01:19,320
Speaker 1: have any questions ooh oh, if you have animal costumes,

1094
01:01:19,360 --> 01:01:22,480
Speaker 1: that you put your at least partially willing pets in,

1095
01:01:22,720 --> 01:01:27,920
Speaker 1: send them to me at Creature Featurepod at gmail dot com.

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01:01:28,280 --> 01:01:32,480
Speaker 1: And this has been a production of iHeartRadio. For more

1097
01:01:32,800 --> 01:01:36,160
Speaker 1: podcasts like the one you just heard, visit the iHeartRadio

1098
01:01:36,200 --> 01:01:38,880
Speaker 1: app Apple Podcasts or Hi Gus, what where have you

1099
01:01:38,920 --> 01:01:42,000
Speaker 1: listened to your favorite show. I'm not your mother, and

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01:01:42,040 --> 01:01:45,960
Speaker 1: I'm certainly not watching you from behind you right now,

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01:01:46,360 --> 01:01:49,800
Speaker 1: so it's none of my business. DNX Wednesday,