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Speaker 1: Hey, and welcome to the Short Stuff. I'm Josh. There's Chuck.

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Speaker 1: There's other Josh over there, and this is short stuff.

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Speaker 1: Getty up down, Mexico Away, Chuck. Yeah, if you're wondering

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Speaker 1: where Jerry is, she's fine. We just she's out for

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Speaker 1: a couple of weeks, and we happen to be recording

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Speaker 1: a lot those couple of weeks. So in podcasts years,

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Speaker 1: it probably feels like Jerry's has been out for months

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Speaker 1: and months. Yeah, not true. It's not the case. Just

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Speaker 1: two months. No, she's doing great. But really, everyone pray

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Speaker 1: for her. Right, that's a pretty good check. That was

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Speaker 1: very nice to think. Jerry's gonna appreciate this if she

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Speaker 1: ever hears it. Not a chance. So when you were

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Speaker 1: a kid, did you were you aware of the idea

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Speaker 1: of something called Mexican jumping beans? Yes, okay, so was.

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Speaker 1: I think probably from like cartoons or something like that.

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Speaker 1: And I'm not sure if I assume that they actually existed.

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Speaker 1: Did did you think they existed? I don't remember when

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Speaker 1: I first saw them. Oh wow, you still never seen them,

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Speaker 1: have you? No? I never had. I've seen them on

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Speaker 1: the YouTube, so that's it. Yeah, I've seen him in

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Speaker 1: person at some point, And I don't know if it

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Speaker 1: was just because you know, you can buy them in

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Speaker 1: a little uh souvenir packs and stuff like that. So

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Speaker 1: I don't know if I saw him when I was

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Speaker 1: a kid or when I was an adult and finally

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Speaker 1: went to Mexico. I don't know, but I've seen him before. Well,

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Speaker 1: there was like a glory day in the in the sixties,

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Speaker 1: I think, where you could walk into like a KB

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Speaker 1: toy store in the United States and find Mexican jumping

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Speaker 1: beans for sale, the golden Age of Mexican jumping beans.

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Speaker 1: That's right, But I guess we just kind of spoiled

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Speaker 1: it if you were, you know, aware of Mexican jumping

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Speaker 1: beans and thought they were just kind of made up

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Speaker 1: like snipe ponting or jackalopes or whatever. No, they're actually

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Speaker 1: for real. Chuck can verify that. But the thing about

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Speaker 1: them is they're not actually beans um their seeds, but

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Speaker 1: they do actually move and kind of jump a little bit,

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Speaker 1: move around at least on their own. And for a

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Speaker 1: while at first, no one really had any idea what

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Speaker 1: the heck was going on. We just knew that it

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Speaker 1: was kind of cool to watch and a little thrilling,

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Speaker 1: especially before the television and even really before radio. This

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Speaker 1: is what people did. They stood around and watch being

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Speaker 1: roll around on their own or like ant farms or

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Speaker 1: police circuses. Yeah, simpler people. So they should have just

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Speaker 1: called them Mexican jumping seeds, because that's just as good

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Speaker 1: to me. I don't know why the bean made it

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Speaker 1: more marketable. Necessarily, maybe because they look like beans. I

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Speaker 1: don't know, I don't know. I mean their seeds. They

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Speaker 1: should just call them that. Hey, asqua Keene Hernandez, the

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Speaker 1: jumping being king, he could tell you. We'll get to him.

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Speaker 1: But they are seed pods. They're from a plant called

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Speaker 1: the Yerba de Fletcher or the Sebastiana pabo Nanna, very nice,

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Speaker 1: it's all right, you said Latin and Spanish in the

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Speaker 1: same breath. That was really great. That means herb of

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Speaker 1: the arrow, which it was taken from the fact that

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Speaker 1: the poison from the shrub sap was used sometimes to

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Speaker 1: tip the poison for their arrow tips from local tribes.

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Speaker 1: I think I looked it up. I think it might

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Speaker 1: be the Yaqui who did that. All right, well, it's

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Speaker 1: a deciduous shrub. It's got leathery leaves that it's dark

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Speaker 1: green but then turn red in the winter. I bet

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Speaker 1: it's beautiful. It is. I think I looked up pictures.

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Speaker 1: It looked nice to me. I've never seen them. I've

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Speaker 1: never been to the to the Rio Mio. I hadn't

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Speaker 1: even heard of it. But it sounds creamy and delicious. Yea, well,

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Speaker 1: that's the region where they're found in Sonora and Chihuahua.

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Speaker 1: I can't even get a good laugh out of you

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Speaker 1: with my dad jokes anymore. They're that bad. Uh. That

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Speaker 1: one was okay, all right. I wasn't sure if you

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Speaker 1: were serious or not. So they grow on these rocky slopes,

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Speaker 1: and back in the nineteen twenties is when they first

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Speaker 1: started to kind of hit the States. That's when they

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Speaker 1: came state side in San Francisco. San Francisco, and there

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Speaker 1: was an article in the chronicle about the little freakish

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Speaker 1: brown seeds that just basically delighted people of all ages. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: Mental Flaws had a pretty good article on this. Um.

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Speaker 1: He said that these beans cavorted about to the edification

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Speaker 1: and delight of children and grown ups. Yeah, well, actually

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Speaker 1: they said seeds, Yeah they did. They call it seeds correctly, right,

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Speaker 1: because this was pre Joaquin Hernandez, right, so I guess he.

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Speaker 1: I wonder if he really was the one who changed

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Speaker 1: it over to beans. Who knows that he's a smart kid.

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Speaker 1: Maybe take a break. I think we're at the halfway point. Sure,

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Speaker 1: all right, okay, chuck, enough enough dilly dallying. Let's get

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Speaker 1: to Joaquin Hernandez. Please. Who is he? He is a

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Speaker 1: I who in the forties was twelve years old and

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Speaker 1: was aware of Mexican jumping beans, although they weren't called

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Speaker 1: that at the time, he knew they were kind of interesting,

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Speaker 1: but he thought, maybe if you marketed these things just right,

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Speaker 1: you could really have like a novelty on your hands.

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Speaker 1: Joke shops will go bonkers for these things. And he

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Speaker 1: was absolutely right. He's like, kids are dumb, Yeah, kids

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Speaker 1: like me. Yeah. I mean, it's amazing. This guy was

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Speaker 1: twelve years old and he became the literal jumping bean

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Speaker 1: king right over the following decades. I think Alamos and Sonora,

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Speaker 1: where he lived, is now the capital, the jumping mean

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Speaker 1: capital of the world. It will probably never give up

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Speaker 1: that title. Why would it so? Um? Early on, like

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Speaker 1: people did not know what was going on with these things.

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Speaker 1: They were just delighted by them. Some people were kind

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Speaker 1: of curious, some people had an idea. But there were

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Speaker 1: early theories before it was widely understood, things like, um,

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Speaker 1: that there was a static charge or something like that

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Speaker 1: maybe making bounce, or there was gas trapped inside that

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Speaker 1: was somehow exploding. Who knows. It turns out that botanists

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Speaker 1: and biologists are anomologists, I should say, figured it out.

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Speaker 1: Maybe the all three Linda hand, yeah, they all. It

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Speaker 1: was a joint effort, but they the entomologist that's who

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Speaker 1: I'm going with, said, you know what, you know what's

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Speaker 1: in there. There's a live, living moth larvae in there,

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Speaker 1: and that is what's making these seeds bounce. That's right.

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Speaker 1: The jumping bean moth lay this little eggs and the

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Speaker 1: flower of that plant, and then of course the eggs

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Speaker 1: are then in the seeds. Starts to rain in the springtime,

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Speaker 1: and that seed develops and matures and it splits into

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Speaker 1: three little guys. Uh, they fall on the ground and

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Speaker 1: then those they don't always but usually those little smaller

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Speaker 1: parts have the martha larvae inside larvae larvae, and that's

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Speaker 1: you know, they're in there. Screaming help. Well, they're doing

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Speaker 1: all sorts of things. For one that they they um

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Speaker 1: burrow or they make their um there cocoon, I guess

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Speaker 1: in the in the um these seeds, because they eat

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Speaker 1: the seed from the inside out as they're kind of

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Speaker 1: going through this metamorphosis into a moth. And if you

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Speaker 1: have Mexican jumping beans you can get them. Still. If

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Speaker 1: you have them and you take care of them, you

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Speaker 1: could actually witness the moth emerging from the seed eventually.

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Speaker 1: But in the meantime it's eating the seed from the

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Speaker 1: inside out, which causes movement um. And then also they

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Speaker 1: weave their cocoon. They spend their cocoon inside and they

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Speaker 1: suspend it from the interior walls of the seed. And

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Speaker 1: so when they move about, their movements are telegraphed through

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Speaker 1: the cocoon and the silk that's like attached to the seed,

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Speaker 1: which is it creates enough energy or enough force to

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Speaker 1: actually move the seed pod. Yeah, and I think, uh,

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Speaker 1: where did you get this? Was some of this from

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Speaker 1: the mental flaws article? I know there was a um

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Speaker 1: There was another thing that I will mention in a second,

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Speaker 1: if you will keep talking, Okay, I'm not stalling him.

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Speaker 1: I not know. The cool thing that they mentioned is

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Speaker 1: that if it was just a little larvae inside, it

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Speaker 1: would in order to move that being like it moves,

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Speaker 1: it would smush itself. If it was just like slam

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Speaker 1: dancing against the walls. That one was all josh, oh,

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Speaker 1: that was all you all right, Well, the fact that

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Speaker 1: it those silk cables from the cocoon are attached is

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Speaker 1: what makes it move because uh, and then the the

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Speaker 1: example of the whip makes a lot of sense. You know,

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Speaker 1: when you use a whip, the whip crack at the

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Speaker 1: end is has way more force than what you're doing

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Speaker 1: with the handle of the whip, right exactly. It's the

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Speaker 1: same principle basically, right. Um. And the this the stuff

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Speaker 1: that I based that on came from Wayne's word. It's

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Speaker 1: an online textbook of natural history. Nice. Yeah, check it out, everybody. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: that's one of the cooler facts of this one. I

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Speaker 1: think the other one that shot that stuck out to

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Speaker 1: me or shot out like a little uh jumping bean moth.

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Speaker 1: Are you saying you like the fact that I made

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Speaker 1: up out of whole cloth the most that's your favorite one.

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Speaker 1: It finally happened, Thank you. Chuck. The other one I

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Speaker 1: thought was really interesting is you expose these things to

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Speaker 1: heat to get them to jump around, and the they

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Speaker 1: think that that might be a an adaptation basically that

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Speaker 1: when these beans are out there baking in the hot sun,

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Speaker 1: they're like trying to scooch over into a shady spot

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Speaker 1: by making those movements. Yeah, and that amazing. That's pretty remarkable.

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Speaker 1: It really is. So if if you have Mexican jumping

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Speaker 1: beans and you want to make them jump for your friends,

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Speaker 1: and they don't actually jump is not quite the right word.

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Speaker 1: They move about. They kind of shimmy, they'll roll, tumble

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Speaker 1: that kind of really catch air exactly. Well, put dude

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Speaker 1: in a very eighties gleaming the cube way that's right. Um.

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Speaker 1: But to make them really move, you just expose them

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Speaker 1: to heat. Put him out in the sun, and so

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Speaker 1: they try to move out of the sun. Well, if

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Speaker 1: you can kind of keep them in the sun, they're

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Speaker 1: really going to start moving. The problem is is this

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Speaker 1: can kill the larvae inside. Yeah, the problem is it's

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Speaker 1: super mean, It really is. So like if this happens

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Speaker 1: out in nature, you know, if the the the larvae

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Speaker 1: can't move the seed pod to a shady spot and

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Speaker 1: actually dehydrates and dies from the heat. That's that circle

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Speaker 1: of life kind of stuff, right. Yeah, But if you

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Speaker 1: believe that every living thing deserves respect and to be

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Speaker 1: treated well, then do not give these to your children, no,

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Speaker 1: because if you do kill them and it's just for

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Speaker 1: humans amusement, that is that's a little mean. Yeah. I mean,

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Speaker 1: just think of the kid where this being, if the

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Speaker 1: adaptation theory is correct, is desperately trying to get to

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Speaker 1: shade and little Timmy keeps just shoving it right back

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Speaker 1: in the sun with a magnifying glass on it. It

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Speaker 1: makes you want to shove little Timmy, that's right, as

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Speaker 1: if he were the kind of kid who would squish

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Speaker 1: a lady ug or something. Good. Point. So, um, there

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Speaker 1: are people who say, hey, you can keep these things

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Speaker 1: as pets if you want everybody. In fact, there's a

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Speaker 1: website called jban dot com okay and jbing dot com

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Speaker 1: says you can keep them cameround in your pocket and

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Speaker 1: the body heat will make them wiggle. If you actually

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Speaker 1: want to let them, um actually come to fruition, you

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Speaker 1: want to keep them in a cool place so that

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Speaker 1: they don't have to wiggle. They can use their energy

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Speaker 1: for eating um. But you want to keep them wet,

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Speaker 1: so you missed them once a week and eventually if

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Speaker 1: you take care of when you can see a moth

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Speaker 1: come out sometimes amazing, It is amazing. Mexican jumping beans

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Speaker 1: are chuck. Amazing. That's right. Well, that's it. You got

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Speaker 1: anything else? Got anything else? I don't either, So this

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Speaker 1: is short stuff Audios. Stuff you Should Know is a

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Speaker 1: production of iHeart Radios How Stuff Works. For more podcasts

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Speaker 1: for my heart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,

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Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. M