Speaker 1: Welcome to Creature future production of iHeartRadio. I'm your host
Speaker 1: of Many Parasites, Katie Golden. I studied psychology and evolutionary biology,
Speaker 1: and today on the show Hot Fuzz, we're talking about
Speaker 1: wuffy animals who manage cairdoos without hair per se. That's right.
Speaker 1: These are furries without the fur, critters that look really petible,
Speaker 1: but you probably shouldn't. So how do you get fuzzy
Speaker 1: without being mammalian? Discover this and more as we answer
Speaker 1: the age old question are moth's just tiny flying bunnies
Speaker 1: to Joining me today is Friend of the Show, Friend
Speaker 1: to All Animals, and hosts of Just the Zoo of Us,
Speaker 1: as well as Spellbound and gag Ellen Weatherford.
Speaker 2: Welcome, what's up? Hello, let's go. I probably just clipped
Speaker 2: my mic, but that's okay.
Speaker 1: All right, we're getting mad hyped for fluff on this show.
Speaker 1: We're talking fuzzy guys, and these aren't mammals, so it's
Speaker 1: not technically fur, but boy, they're bringing it. They're bringing
Speaker 1: the fluff. Look in like the sort of Paris Hilton wearing.
Speaker 2: Was it?
Speaker 1: Like? I think it was fake fur? Maybe it's real
Speaker 1: for I'm not really sure, but it's very Paris Hilton.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the like a like a fluffy boa for a moment. Yeah,
Speaker 2: the the like gothic, sort of like widowed, like standing
Speaker 2: in the doorway with a glass of wine, answering the door,
Speaker 2: like very suspiciously. Yeah, going my husband, No idea where
Speaker 2: he was that evening.
Speaker 3: My husband's been missing for a you would you like
Speaker 3: to see my rose garden? It's been nice and in
Speaker 3: the shape of a single funeral plot.
Speaker 2: Always with that cigarette that's like a foot Yeah, the
Speaker 2: one on the cigarette holder that she has, and she
Speaker 2: kind of like makes little shapes.
Speaker 3: In the air with it, Like, of course I didn't
Speaker 3: murder my husband. I'm too busy planting roses in the
Speaker 3: shape of a human body outside.
Speaker 2: I have no idea where who was that evening? For
Speaker 2: the questions, no one.
Speaker 3: Eh, how I hated him and would have benefited financially
Speaker 3: from his death.
Speaker 1: So that's that's what the vibes of these crabs are.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna say. So we're first, we're going crab Ellen.
Speaker 1: You ready for crab?
Speaker 2: I have never been more ready for crabs.
Speaker 1: It's crab times. We've talked about crabs on the show.
Speaker 1: How the Universe the arc of the universe is long,
Speaker 1: but it bends towards crab. These crabs are perhaps my
Speaker 1: favorite crab now that I've learned what they are. These
Speaker 1: are fuffy crabs with sponge chats.
Speaker 2: Now, the image you've provided for me is putting a
Speaker 2: lot of work in. There's a lot of heavy lifting
Speaker 2: being done by this image, and so it's so good
Speaker 2: the word picture. Okay, So the lower crab, the lower
Speaker 2: image is a crab with arms outstretched, sort of like
Speaker 2: if a crab could t pose. It's in sort of
Speaker 2: like a has arms sort of straight out in front
Speaker 2: of it, like it is perhaps like Superman flying through
Speaker 2: the Airman. Yeah. And the arms on this thing, first
Speaker 2: of all absurdly long, yeah, stretch armstrong looking dude, and
Speaker 2: covered in like what what looks to me like an
Speaker 2: eighties fringe, sort of like how you would expect maybe
Speaker 2: like a jacket from the eighties, or I think even
Speaker 2: like Ken in the Barbie movie had a jacket with
Speaker 2: this sort of leg like a fluffy fringe. So that
Speaker 2: fringe is just kind of running all down the arms
Speaker 2: and also a little bit on the legs as well.
Speaker 2: And the upper image has a crab from the front
Speaker 2: where the crab is also decked out in this fluff.
Speaker 2: This fluff looks a little bit more like hair. It
Speaker 2: looks a little bit more like like a hairstyle. But
Speaker 2: it does have a great big lump on top of
Speaker 2: a great big brown sort of mass, just plopped right
Speaker 2: on top of the old mogan.
Speaker 1: A lovely crabby lump. So, yes, these are We're going
Speaker 1: to talk about both of them. Let's first talk about
Speaker 1: the one with the fluff and the lumps. So this
Speaker 1: is Lamark Dromia beagle. It is a spies. Yeah, it's
Speaker 1: Lamark Dromia beagle. It's a say species of crab that
Speaker 1: has two amazing things going for it. It wears a
Speaker 1: completely vegan fur coat and then a not exactly vegan
Speaker 1: hat made from a living sea sponge.
Speaker 2: That's an animal product for sure, Yeah, it's it is.
Speaker 1: I guess it's still technically an animal product if it's alive, right, Like, uh.
Speaker 2: Now, I think there's a suffering component to be considered here,
Speaker 2: Like I think it has to be, like because I
Speaker 2: don't know if the animals not suffering, is that is
Speaker 2: that vegan friendly?
Speaker 1: You know? Like because in this situation, the sponge is fine,
Speaker 1: it's alive, it's getting a free piggyback ride. It is
Speaker 1: technically a hat though, so I don't know if I
Speaker 1: would call it a vegan hat. But it's also not.
Speaker 2: Like being exploited.
Speaker 1: It's being It is in a way being exploited for
Speaker 1: both fashion and also to protect it from potential predators.
Speaker 1: But as far as I understand it, the sponge is
Speaker 1: okay and possibly but it's great. The sponge is doing
Speaker 1: just fine, possibly benefiting from it. I don't know how
Speaker 1: strong the evidence is of the sponge benefiting, but it
Speaker 1: does get a free move around, and it maybe has
Speaker 1: more access to filter feeding options and gets distributed in
Speaker 1: a way. So I would say that this is much
Speaker 1: more likely symbiosis than exploitation.
Speaker 2: It is everything's coming up, sponge, everything great for this.
Speaker 1: It's kind of like if mister Crabs had like a
Speaker 1: super seventies beard and hairstyle and like war SpongeBob as
Speaker 1: a hat. And I'm sure there's already art online of
Speaker 1: that that you don't want to look at, So yeah.
Speaker 2: Don't look up mister Crabs and SpongeBob Fani.
Speaker 1: Yeah, don't, Yeah, just don't. Mister Crab's wearing SpongeBob. Not
Speaker 1: a good idea, don't do it, sad search, bad search,
Speaker 1: and then yeah. But this crab, called the Lamark Dromia
Speaker 1: beagle is not called that because it looks like a
Speaker 1: little fluffy puppy crab, even though that certainly certainly helps.
Speaker 1: It is also named after Darwin's O the Beagle, and
Speaker 1: also the other less celebrated evolutionary biologist Lamarck, who came
Speaker 1: up with some not exactly right theories of evolution that
Speaker 1: were helpful nonetheless in getting as closer to evidence based truth.
Speaker 1: He was not as wacky and like goofy as I
Speaker 1: think we learned sort of in middle school. He actually
Speaker 1: did come up with some pretty good ideas, but you know,
Speaker 1: not always completely right there, but fun but fun but
Speaker 1: fun and also not completely wrong. Now that we know
Speaker 1: about epigenetics, so la mark, the ideas that you could
Speaker 1: get some traits that you pass on through sort of
Speaker 1: your environment, the way in which he conceptualized it not correct.
Speaker 1: You can't like gain muscles or something that you pass
Speaker 1: on to your child necessarily, but there are epigenetics, so
Speaker 1: that that idea that the environment can affect your the
Speaker 1: structure of your DNA when it comes to your gam
Speaker 1: mets potentially correct and it's it's a but yeah, he
Speaker 1: that's not why he thought that, so he was still
Speaker 1: pan wrong.
Speaker 2: Anyways, he was ahead of his time, that's all. We
Speaker 2: were ready for him. We were ready.
Speaker 1: He was a time traveler, and he was like, I
Speaker 1: believe if you have a swool giraffe, it's gonna have
Speaker 1: a baby's pool giraffe. Because he didn't really understand what
Speaker 1: was going on. So, uh, this crab was discovered in
Speaker 1: Western Australia in twenty twenty two. So this is a
Speaker 1: recent discovery.
Speaker 2: Uh, wake up, babe, wake up new crab. Just trup
Speaker 2: you fluffy crab.
Speaker 1: Just dropped in Australia. Are you surprised? It's Australia and
Speaker 1: all the cool stuff they really do. So Uh, it's
Speaker 1: only about nine millimeters wide, so it's it's pretty little.
Speaker 1: That's probably why it hasn't been discovered before. There's just
Speaker 1: so many different crabs.
Speaker 2: Uh.
Speaker 1: It is covered in golden fur and it's a sponge crab,
Speaker 1: meaning it wears that sponge on its back. There are
Speaker 1: many species of sponge crabs, most of them are not
Speaker 1: fluffy like this though, so sponge crabs have specifically adapted
Speaker 1: tiny hook like back claws back legs that they use
Speaker 1: to hold sponges onto their backs, which provide them camouflage
Speaker 1: and protect protection from predators, especially when they choose species
Speaker 1: of sponges which have toxic compounds in them that definitely
Speaker 1: yuck a predators yum. Also, the texture the mouth feel
Speaker 1: of sponges aren't very gone.
Speaker 2: I've heard that. I talked to a biologist who worked
Speaker 2: with freshwater sponges, and she mentioned that if you were
Speaker 2: to kind of like you know, I don't know, squeeze
Speaker 2: or like, you know, feel the texture of a sponge,
Speaker 2: it would feel very gritty because they're made of a
Speaker 2: lot of like silica, Yeah, a lot of like glass
Speaker 2: like structures, so it would be very it would be
Speaker 2: like just kind of crunching on fiberglass. I guess.
Speaker 1: Yeah. It's like when you see insulation as a kid
Speaker 1: and you're like, that looks like hot and candy, and
Speaker 1: then you stick all your mouth and then boom, you've
Speaker 1: got mess with thelma.
Speaker 2: Childhood is a series of discoveries about like the differences
Speaker 2: between something looking tasty and being tasty.
Speaker 1: I still contend that those little white crusty things in
Speaker 1: dirt are pretty good. They tasted pretty good. They're like
Speaker 1: some kind of fertilizer. Don't eat them, they're bad.
Speaker 2: Squad rise up.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I like you dirt.
Speaker 2: It's it's it's the little egg pieces from the Wingspan
Speaker 2: game for me. Yeah, just I want to put them
Speaker 2: in my mouth.
Speaker 1: I do appreciate it now when restaurants make sort of
Speaker 1: like a dirt crumble around ice cream, because I'm like, yes.
Speaker 2: That's exactly what I want to think, thank you. So yeah,
Speaker 2: don't eat sponges, don't eat sponges, and don't eat dirt.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna say you can get I do.
Speaker 2: I feel like I've heard a lot of I've heard
Speaker 2: a lot about crabs putting other sessile creatures just right
Speaker 2: on their old noggin. I feel like this is a thing.
Speaker 2: Crabs are really.
Speaker 1: Yes, like pom pom crabs sessile. It means anything that
Speaker 1: basically latches itself onto a rock and they're like, I'm
Speaker 1: good for the rest of their life and they just
Speaker 1: sit there like sn Enemies say like sea squirts do that,
Speaker 1: sponges do that, coral they're all sessile. Uh And yeah,
Speaker 1: there are a lot of crabs that make you say
Speaker 1: of that, like the pom pom crabs that they hold
Speaker 1: little sea an enemies on their little front claus like
Speaker 1: boxing gloves, and it's this like symbiotic relationship. It's actually
Speaker 1: one of the only cases in nature where an animal
Speaker 1: like helps another an like a separate species helps another
Speaker 1: species with reproduction. Obviously flowers and pollinators, that's the symbiosis
Speaker 1: before these crabs they because they pull apart sn enemies.
Speaker 1: That helps them reproduce because basically they split and then
Speaker 1: they butt into two unique individuals. So they take one
Speaker 1: sea an enemy, pull it apart. Now it's two semies,
Speaker 1: and they wear them on their little arms like boxing gloves.
Speaker 2: And then this it's an infinite glitch.
Speaker 1: It really is. And they feed them and it's it's
Speaker 1: like having a sentient pair of gloves. Uh. And these ones,
Speaker 1: well they're maybe sentient is possibly overstated there for sea enemies,
Speaker 1: but yes, so sponge crabs, they wear sponges on their hats.
Speaker 1: I highly recommend uh you look up sponge crabs online.
Speaker 1: I'll have the picture of the fluffy one. But there's
Speaker 1: so many different flavors of these guys and I love
Speaker 1: all of them. They're all like they're like the little
Speaker 1: goblins of the sea or elves of the sea. Like
Speaker 1: they all have like creative little hats made out of sponges.
Speaker 1: It's incredible.
Speaker 2: You can't go wrong.
Speaker 1: They're like great, they like sea cobalds. I love them
Speaker 1: so uh yeah, they also look so grumpy. They you
Speaker 1: mean my head alone, don't you dog me? Don't you
Speaker 1: do me here by head? Ever again?
Speaker 2: I do like how often crabs come upon an animal
Speaker 2: just sitting there minding its own business, and you're coming
Speaker 2: with me. Let's go, let's ride.
Speaker 1: We're rolling a damn jen.
Speaker 2: You're going. I like the crab character my sponge.
Speaker 1: Road little boot lega some sea moon can. I can
Speaker 1: only do this for so long before my throat gives out.
Speaker 2: I love this little guy.
Speaker 1: He's amazing. I love sponge crabs are incredible.
Speaker 2: You didn't tell me you had another guest booked for
Speaker 2: this episode. That's incredible, snake sponge crab.
Speaker 1: So the reason it has fluff, well, it was discovered
Speaker 1: in twenty twenty two. So the basic answer is we
Speaker 1: don't know. Nobody really knows yet, but the guess is
Speaker 1: that it might help them camouflage better. It might make
Speaker 1: their outline more indistinct. So like when a predator comes up,
Speaker 1: it's like, this thing is covered in a sponge and
Speaker 1: it's furry. I don't know what's going on here, and
Speaker 1: the spongecrab is like heye, Kevin. So this is an
Speaker 1: interesting thing. So I would suspect that because it's a
Speaker 1: recent discovery that we will get more information about, Like
Speaker 1: why does it have these these hairs? These are it's
Speaker 1: not fur exactly, these are you know, hair like protrusions.
Speaker 1: These are filaments that they have all over their bodies.
Speaker 1: That I mean, it really does just look like fluff,
Speaker 1: like soft fluff, but it's super super cute. So the
Speaker 1: other example of a fluffy uh crustacean is the Yeti crab,
Speaker 1: which is the other picture you pointed out, that one
Speaker 1: with the really long arms with the fringe like kin
Speaker 1: in the Barbie movie. It's sort of this. It's a
Speaker 1: it's an eggshell white. It's very classy looking, uh crustacean.
Speaker 1: Uh and uh. I keep calling it a crustacean because
Speaker 1: weirdly enough, this is not a crab. Uh. Yeah, it's
Speaker 1: it's yet not yet well, it's in there there.
Speaker 3: Uh.
Speaker 1: Yeah, this is yet another victim of carsonization who has
Speaker 1: gone I shouldn't say victim, another beneficiary of carsonization. Yeah,
Speaker 1: this is the Yeti crab. And it's called a Yeti
Speaker 1: crab because it looks like a crab, but technically it
Speaker 1: is not a real crab. Uh. It's in its own
Speaker 1: family of weird hairy arm decapods. Like it's just its
Speaker 1: own thing.
Speaker 2: Uh it is it is, Yeah, pioneer.
Speaker 1: It's Kineff all right. So it's found in the depths
Speaker 1: of the South Pacific Ocean on the ocean four at
Speaker 1: about two thousand, two hundred meters below, so that's like
Speaker 1: seven thousand, two hundred feet. It's deep down in there,
Speaker 1: and it's about five inches long. Its arms are like
Speaker 1: most of its body length. They are blind, and their
Speaker 1: hair filaments are actually covered in bacteria. And this bacteria
Speaker 1: the idea is that this bacteria may help detoxify water
Speaker 1: that comes from thermal vents, like they have their own
Speaker 1: little like Britta water system on their arms.
Speaker 2: That's so cool.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So it's it's really fascinating. And the reason I
Speaker 1: bring them up is because I suspect we'll find some
Speaker 1: kind of interesting quality about the the Beagle the Beagle
Speaker 1: crabs in terms of what they use that hair for.
Speaker 1: It could be just for camouflage, but I wouldn't be
Speaker 1: surprised if there was. If we found some interesting bacterial
Speaker 1: growth in there, that could be another example of symbiosis
Speaker 1: in addition to the sponge hat. Because these crabs are
Speaker 1: just they're all about making friends and bringing them on
Speaker 1: a road trip.
Speaker 2: Just it's the more the merrier with crab exactly.
Speaker 1: Well, we are going to take a quick break and
Speaker 1: when we get back, Ellen is going to drop some
Speaker 1: dope moth facts on me.
Speaker 2: Mouths. All right, we are back.
Speaker 1: It's moth time.
Speaker 2: It's moth time. It's real moth hours. I hope you're
Speaker 2: listening to this at night, because that would be real
Speaker 2: moth hours. Yeah, there's a isn't there a Star Wars
Speaker 2: person named moth mon Mathma.
Speaker 1: Mon Mathma, Is he a mothman? I would love that ona.
Speaker 2: Unfortunately they're not brave enough to put moth doesn't he.
Speaker 1: Doesn't have just like a moth. He's you know, they really.
Speaker 2: Well, mon Mathma is a woman.
Speaker 1: Okay, it's mon Mathma mom Yathma.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, have fun trying to say that wars on Mathma.
Speaker 1: Oh, she's just a lady. That's disappointing. She should have
Speaker 1: had big moth eyes at least, and like.
Speaker 2: Cre more moth elements, I feel it, really they.
Speaker 1: Really drop the ball on that, and I really want
Speaker 1: mothman to be cast in movies more.
Speaker 2: You know, we need more roles for cryptid actors.
Speaker 1: We do need more roles for cryptid Cryptid representation, I
Speaker 1: think is a good idea. So so let's let's talk
Speaker 1: about moths. Uh, they're basically fluffy butterflies.
Speaker 2: I'm gonna say butterflies exactly. You switched to night mode, right, Yeah,
Speaker 2: So Lepidopterans or the family of the moths and the butterflies,
Speaker 2: and the butterflies are the ones that are more active
Speaker 2: in the day, so they're bright and colorful, and then
Speaker 2: the moths are usually the ones that are more active
Speaker 2: at night, and so they tend to be fluffy. Now,
Speaker 2: most moths are to some degree fluffy, Like the body,
Speaker 2: the sort of abdomen and thorax area will be fluffy
Speaker 2: to some degree, and some moths really lean into the
Speaker 2: fluff where they'll have fluff all over their legs and
Speaker 2: even on their wings a little bit. But so before
Speaker 2: I get into some examples of of my favorite fluffy moths,
Speaker 2: I wanted to look at what makes moths fluffy? Like
Speaker 2: why are they?
Speaker 1: I mean, it's fluff, Ellen, It's just fluff.
Speaker 2: It's so often during like while doing like research for this,
Speaker 2: I was like, what does it matter? What the difference?
Speaker 1: Like, it's flocking. You dip you dip him in hot
Speaker 1: mod podge and then you flock them.
Speaker 2: It's like functionally, you know, it works so similarly to
Speaker 2: hair or feathers or things like that. So for for
Speaker 2: moths and for butterflies also, their coating is made up
Speaker 2: of lots and lots of tiny, tiny elongated scales. So
Speaker 2: even what looks like hair on their body, those are
Speaker 2: just long, skinny scales. And I think sort of a
Speaker 2: key difference between like the scales and how like hair
Speaker 2: would be is that they are they're not just growing
Speaker 2: out of like the exoskeleton or the cuticle. They're attached
Speaker 2: by a pedicel, which is like a like a little
Speaker 2: stalk that they're like attached by it, and they're attached
Speaker 2: pretty loosely, so they come off very easily. So if
Speaker 2: you've ever don't do this. But if you've ever touched
Speaker 2: the wings of a moth or a butterfly, either one,
Speaker 2: you may look at your fingers afterwards and find that
Speaker 2: there's like a powder fudge, a little residue. Yeah, there's
Speaker 2: just a little something on your fingers. And those are
Speaker 2: detached scales, right, So the scales come off very very easily.
Speaker 2: They just just like a nudge, we'll detach those scales.
Speaker 2: Which there's a reason for that, which I'll get into
Speaker 2: in just a second. But basically, for months they have
Speaker 2: really leaned into these long, fluffy scales all over their body,
Speaker 2: not just like the ones on the wings that give
Speaker 2: them colors.
Speaker 1: So are they like a dandelion where if you pick
Speaker 1: up one of these guys and blow hard enough, all
Speaker 1: of that fluff is just gonna come off because it's
Speaker 1: so loosely attached.
Speaker 2: I feel like you'd have to blow really hard for that.
Speaker 1: But get out, my heart driver.
Speaker 2: Put one of these dudes in one of those like
Speaker 2: wind tunnels.
Speaker 1: Oh, the poor little babies, don't they're too cute.
Speaker 2: Don't do that, they are cute.
Speaker 1: I don't want tunnel.
Speaker 2: I don't want anything bad to happen to a moth ever, I.
Speaker 1: Know, I know, just sit them in one of those
Speaker 1: like G force training units for sending off astronauts.
Speaker 2: That does seem like something some board scientists with with
Speaker 2: like a spare grant.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a little proboscous, like waggling behind them.
Speaker 2: With the moths they got those fluffy antennas would just
Speaker 2: be like spirally like like a dog with its head
Speaker 2: out the window. So cute, They're so cute and so okay.
Speaker 2: So there's a few different reasons why moths have this fluff,
Speaker 2: which can be all over their body even like they
Speaker 2: can even have like fluffy wings, which is pretty interesting
Speaker 2: to see. Oh. But so moths are typically nocturnal. They're
Speaker 2: out at night and during the nighttime temperatures are cooler.
Speaker 2: It is a lot colder than it is during the daytime.
Speaker 2: So fluff can help insulate them against the colder nighttime temperatures.
Speaker 2: So there's like insulation. That's like a normal thing that
Speaker 2: things have fluff for. Another thing which you touched on
Speaker 2: for the fluffy crabs is having a fuzzy outline because
Speaker 2: moths spend a lot of time at rest, so they'll
Speaker 2: spend a lot of time just laying on the side
Speaker 2: of a tree or you know, on a branch or
Speaker 2: something like that, and having a fuzzy outline breaks up
Speaker 2: their silhouette and it can make it really difficult to
Speaker 2: see them when they're at rest. It's a lot easy.
Speaker 2: It's a lot more difficult to make out that shape
Speaker 2: if it's a blurry shape, and it can make predators
Speaker 2: just like miss them entirely, which is cool. Another reason
Speaker 2: for the fluff is that those scales fall off very
Speaker 2: very easily. Like I mentioned that, you could just yank
Speaker 2: them right off, so it makes them slippery. So if
Speaker 2: they get, for example, like caught in a spider web, right, yeah,
Speaker 2: they can just sort of like scotch tape themselves right
Speaker 2: off that thing and leave all their scales behind and
Speaker 2: lets the rest of them off li free.
Speaker 1: It's the classic move like if say, you know someone's
Speaker 1: got you buy your jacket, you just slip out of
Speaker 1: your jacket.
Speaker 2: I'm not saying a Scooby Doo move.
Speaker 1: It's a Scooby Doo move. I'm saying I'm not encouraging
Speaker 1: people to use this move, you know, to say get
Speaker 1: out of doing righteous crimes. But you know, if you
Speaker 1: were doing a righteous crime and someone grabbed you by
Speaker 1: the jacket. If you slip out of your jacket.
Speaker 2: Jackets are always doing righteous crimes.
Speaker 1: If the jacket don't fit, you must have quit. I'm
Speaker 1: not a tire.
Speaker 2: That's a real Cinderella crime right there. You leave your
Speaker 2: jacket behind, and they have to like gokay, all of
Speaker 2: the princesses checking to see whose jacket is.
Speaker 1: Whose dope bath denim jacket is this?
Speaker 2: They have to try it on everybody to.
Speaker 1: Say, yeah, I've got a panther patch on it.
Speaker 2: They're just checking to see who's cool. Yea jacket I
Speaker 2: just wanted to know. So they can pull the scooby
Speaker 2: Doo move to get out of spider webs. But also
Speaker 2: if something grabs them, like if a predator grabs them,
Speaker 2: they can sometimes just slip right out because of those scales.
Speaker 2: But another reason for the fluff, which I think is
Speaker 2: pretty interesting, is that it dampens sound and it can
Speaker 2: reduce echo, which is very important if you're an insect
Speaker 2: who flies around at night, because who else flies around
Speaker 2: at night and eats insects? Bats? You sound to find you.
Speaker 1: This is so interesting because it's a technique use for
Speaker 1: podcasts recording. I'm just like a like I put, I
Speaker 1: have fluffy right here, I have fluffy things. I have
Speaker 1: a fluffy mic phone. Can you do this? Yeah? Yeah,
Speaker 1: we're just like moths. And it's to help reduce echo
Speaker 1: and stuff in the room so that the podcast sounds
Speaker 1: nicer hopefully, hope you'll like it. Uh And so yeah,
Speaker 1: that's that's you know, I hadn't really thought about that,
Speaker 1: to be honest with you, but yeah, that completely makes sense.
Speaker 1: The ways that moths try to evade that sound detection.
Speaker 1: What better way than scattering sound off your body, because
Speaker 1: that's the way the fluff works in recording studios is
Speaker 1: that it like scatters the sound. It doesn't, it does.
Speaker 2: It's not that it absorbs the.
Speaker 1: Sound, that it scatters it in multiple directions so that
Speaker 1: you never you no longer have this like sharp hard echo.
Speaker 2: Yeah. And and this was actually a pretty recent like development.
Speaker 2: So the paper I was reading about this is called
Speaker 2: Thoracic scales of moths as a stealth coating against.
Speaker 1: Banter title bangers.
Speaker 2: Really cool, like every cool word. It's just borassic scales
Speaker 2: and stealth coding against scales. Really cool. Title that was
Speaker 2: by Thomas r. Neil and that was in the Journal
Speaker 2: of the Royal Society Interface and that was in February
Speaker 2: of twenty twenty, so not you know, this is pretty
Speaker 2: pretty recent stuff. And basically, so there's there's kind of
Speaker 2: two different bat evasion methods that that moths can use,
Speaker 2: and this is one of them. One of them is
Speaker 2: just being really really fluffy to kind of bounce that
Speaker 2: sound like away from them, and then the other So
Speaker 2: those are for what's called death moths, but other moths
Speaker 2: can actually hear, like they have a very very simple
Speaker 2: but very very sensitive like ear drum like structure that
Speaker 2: can actually pick up like ultrasonic sounds. So some types
Speaker 2: of moths can just hear the bats and then if
Speaker 2: they hear the calls, they'll just leave. But a lot
Speaker 2: of moths are relying on that fluff to get away
Speaker 2: from bats, which I think is just super cool. So
Speaker 2: there are a few moths that I feel like are
Speaker 2: really doing this very well. I feel like are sort
Speaker 2: of exemplifying the fluff. My favorite is the rosy maple moth.
Speaker 1: I am looking this up because yes, I knew it.
Speaker 1: I knew it so good. I call this the sorbe moth.
Speaker 2: Yes, it does look like just the little like a
Speaker 2: little pink lemonade.
Speaker 1: It's so, it's a delicious looking little little guy, just
Speaker 1: fluffy with right back to right, yeah, right. This is
Speaker 1: how I interface with the world. It's bright pink and
Speaker 1: bright yellow. I remember these guys from yes the Autoba
Speaker 1: on Society Field Guide to North American Insects and Spiders,
Speaker 1: And I remember seeing this like sorbet moth and being like, whoa,
Speaker 1: why am I not? Why isn't this in school? Why
Speaker 1: aren't they teaching this in school? I'm learning about I'm
Speaker 1: learning about like the Civil War, which is important, but
Speaker 1: this is also important. The fact that there's a bright
Speaker 1: yellow and pink moth that looks like, uh like some
Speaker 1: sorbet and is amazing. It looks like it doesn't look real.
Speaker 2: Guys like this is have a lot more entomologists if
Speaker 2: we were more forward with that in I.
Speaker 1: Really think so this was this was a This was
Speaker 1: sort of a pivotal moment in my childhood. Was seeing
Speaker 1: this moth was like, this is actually we live in
Speaker 1: we live in a fantasy world.
Speaker 2: It's real the wait bug.
Speaker 1: Wait, wait a minute, I like bug.
Speaker 2: Wait? I don't like bugs.
Speaker 1: Good bug is good.
Speaker 2: Yeah. So these moths are bright pink and yellow. A
Speaker 2: lot of times people who take pictures of them will
Speaker 2: kind of bump the saturation on it to kind of
Speaker 2: lean into it, like you don't even have to, you know,
Speaker 2: I mean, it's it's cute, but like they just naturally
Speaker 2: are this like very very bright pink and yellow. And
Speaker 2: so since I've never seen one in the wild, so
Speaker 2: I am just going off of pictures, But the every
Speaker 2: time I see a picture of them, I think, why,
Speaker 2: why would like bright pink and yellow doesn't seem to
Speaker 2: me like stealthy, like subtle, you know nature coloring. It
Speaker 2: doesn't seem like a good camouflage color to me, until
Speaker 2: until I saw pictures of the seeds of their host trees,
Speaker 2: maple seeds, like red maple seeds. Do a quick Google
Speaker 2: search for red maple s Yes.
Speaker 1: Wow, yeah, that's it's so you are so right. It
Speaker 1: looks because it's kind of a greenish yellow and it's
Speaker 1: those wing like seeds the kind that like when they
Speaker 1: it's the two kind of wings.
Speaker 2: With the little seeds pod samara.
Speaker 1: And then when you like let it go, that structure
Speaker 1: lets them twirl in the wind. So they disperse better.
Speaker 2: Very whimsical, super whimsical.
Speaker 1: They it looks just like I totally see it. In fact,
Speaker 1: there's like a rosy maple moth image on top of
Speaker 1: these seed pods, and it totally blends in. That is fantastic.
Speaker 2: Yeah, like they they you wouldn't, they wouldn't blend in
Speaker 2: outside of that context. But when they're like in their
Speaker 2: element with like their host seeds, like it's perfect.
Speaker 1: And you can and you can remember it with this
Speaker 1: handy neumonic device, which is uh, pink and yellow kills
Speaker 1: a fellow yellow and pink makes you stink.
Speaker 2: I thought you were gonna say, makes you think hmmm,
Speaker 2: see you.
Speaker 1: Know, there you go. Anyways, I hate useless mnemonic devices
Speaker 1: about color order on snakes, is my point. It's never helpful.
Speaker 1: I'm always confused. Uh so that's incredible, Yeah, no, it completely.
Speaker 1: I mean Also, these maple seed pods are beautiful, man.
Speaker 2: I just want to put those in my mouth too. Yeah,
Speaker 2: a lot of delectable looking stacks.
Speaker 1: I would rather put the seed pods in my mouth
Speaker 1: than the adorable because I do feel like the mouthfeel
Speaker 1: would be worse for the moth. Also, it's cute and alive,
Speaker 1: and I don't wanna. I don't wanna get it hurt.
Speaker 2: Get that call it a dimorphous expression, I get that
Speaker 2: cute aggression.
Speaker 1: That's oh yeah, scralert.
Speaker 2: So rosy maple moth, extremely extremely cute. The next moth
Speaker 2: that I really wanted to highlight is has leaned super
Speaker 2: far into the fluff, but more so as a caterpillar,
Speaker 2: and that is the Southern flannel moth, which their caterpillars
Speaker 2: are also called asp caterpillar.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Sometimes, of course it's Southern flannel because she's wearing
Speaker 1: the ug boot all over her body.
Speaker 2: She's got very Yeah, it's very Stanley Tumblr.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's Stanley Tumblr. Basic girl boots, Yeah, yeah, which
Speaker 1: there's nothing wrong with you know what, I know people
Speaker 1: call it basic. There's nothing wrong with being comfortable.
Speaker 2: I love like basic. Just I love a Stanley tumbler,
Speaker 2: I love an ug boot, I love a pumpkin spice latte. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I love it. It's great. There's a reason there is.
Speaker 2: There's so many people like it.
Speaker 1: Because flannel is comfortable, and fluffy boots are comfortable, and
Speaker 1: pumpkin spice tastes very good. Like personally, I don't wear
Speaker 1: that style but every time I see someone wearing it,
Speaker 1: it's like I would I would be in those clothes
Speaker 1: because they look very comfortable.
Speaker 2: It's nice. It's very the Southern flannel moss. So as
Speaker 2: a caterpillar, the caterpillars are so fluffy that you actually
Speaker 2: can't even see the body under.
Speaker 1: No, it's just pure fluffs, like a it looks like a.
Speaker 2: Wig on the ground. Yeah, tiny, tiny little two pegs
Speaker 2: on the ground.
Speaker 1: It does look like a certain American authoritarian leader did, like, yeah,
Speaker 1: hair fall off and on the ground.
Speaker 2: A very obvious comparison.
Speaker 1: There is a very obvious comparison to a certain American
Speaker 1: authoritarian leader that you know, like I don't want the
Speaker 1: Musk's future groc to like get me into the grock
Speaker 1: Rey education camps. But yes, it does definitely look like that,
Speaker 1: but cuter.
Speaker 2: The caterpillar has a better stock.
Speaker 1: Way better way, fuller. It looks richter.
Speaker 2: The caterpillar looks style.
Speaker 1: It's like what a certain American authoritarian leader wishes his
Speaker 1: hair look like. But in reality it's nothing. It's got
Speaker 1: He's got nothing on these caterpillars.
Speaker 2: The profile picture versus the tag.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, it's like one of those AI images that
Speaker 1: they make with the really buff Donald Trump with the
Speaker 1: cool hair, and it's like in the yeah, kissing Amnion,
Speaker 1: I've seen that, but even the even I mean the
Speaker 1: the caterpillar is for sure super fluffy, but the adult
Speaker 1: has it going on when it comes to like the
Speaker 1: sort of color coordination, Dude, like.
Speaker 2: It's still hitting, it's got sitting.
Speaker 1: Because it's like the caterpillar is more uniform. But then
Speaker 1: the adult has this beautiful sort of it's got a
Speaker 1: bit of that camel color on its back, its wings
Speaker 1: are tipped in white.
Speaker 2: It's got allow it's it.
Speaker 1: It seriously does it's little, it's got the and it's
Speaker 1: got the sort of little black boots fashion going on.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 1: It's like it's like a tope sweater with like black boots.
Speaker 1: You know that look right, Like it's an incredible look.
Speaker 1: It's beautiful. It does look like a toasted marshmallow. But
Speaker 1: you know what, it also kind of looks like to
Speaker 1: me bird poop, which I'm saying not to be insulting, because.
Speaker 2: That what they're going for.
Speaker 1: I think they might in some ways be going for
Speaker 1: a little bit of bird poop because it does have
Speaker 1: like the black when whenever there's sort of like black
Speaker 1: white and sort of brown mixed together, you could get
Speaker 1: a little bit a bird poop vibes from it, which
Speaker 1: I don't. I think it's really cute. I'm gonna say.
Speaker 2: It's apothetically bird poop.
Speaker 1: It's aesthetically pleasing. I'm just saying to something that might
Speaker 1: be a predator who's taking a quick glance around, it
Speaker 1: might just be like, that's bird poop and move on.
Speaker 2: Yeah. So the thing about the caterpillars is that they
Speaker 2: are very very fluffy and very very cute and also
Speaker 2: very very very venomous. So those those fluffy hairs are
Speaker 2: hiding in like amidst the fluffy soft hairs are sharp
Speaker 2: venomous spines. It's diabolical, Yeah, And all it takes is
Speaker 2: just kind of brushing up against one. Like you don't
Speaker 2: have to like grab it or harass it or anything.
Speaker 2: You can just kind of like brush up against one.
Speaker 2: And those spines can, you know, really inject a lot
Speaker 2: of venom. Usually it's not the sort of thing that
Speaker 2: kills people, but people regularly have to go to the
Speaker 2: er from these little caterpillars. And I've even heard of
Speaker 2: I think it was an, Texas that one year, I
Speaker 2: think it was one fall they had a particularly bad
Speaker 2: outbreak of these caterpillars and kids being the.
Speaker 1: Way that they are fluffy, it looks it's fluffy.
Speaker 2: It's it's unusual, right, Yeah, it's something if you can't
Speaker 2: see the body, right, so it's hard to see, you
Speaker 2: tell what it is immediately. Kids are curious, kids are tactile,
Speaker 2: kids are sensory seeking. Yeah, so they see these little
Speaker 2: things and they just grab I.
Speaker 1: Had one hundred percent do that as a child, by
Speaker 1: the way, so yeah, I had to be My mom
Speaker 1: had to come get me from school one time because
Speaker 1: they grabbed a cactus off of a teacher's desk, like
Speaker 1: one of those fluffy cactuses.
Speaker 2: I just grabbed it with my whole hand. Of course,
Speaker 2: of course, yeah, my mom had to bring me home.
Speaker 1: I was constantly picking up bugs. I probably shouldn't have,
Speaker 1: but like, yeah, I mean that is a good rule
Speaker 1: of thumb, is that. Yeah, fluffy caterpillars. I know, like
Speaker 1: there are some that are safe to pick up, but
Speaker 1: unless you really know which ones those are, there's a
Speaker 1: really good chance that at the very least those are
Speaker 1: gonna be irdicating hairs. They're gonna be like really irritating. Uh,
Speaker 1: and then on the other end of the spectrum, you
Speaker 1: might have to go to the hospital.
Speaker 2: Like nothing, it can't be good.
Speaker 1: It isn't You're probably not gonna be good.
Speaker 2: Like you you're not gonna pick up a caterpillar and
Speaker 2: suddenly you're like super buff and strong and can jump
Speaker 2: ten feet in the air. Like it's not gonna.
Speaker 1: Help, but you when you say that, like that's specifically now,
Speaker 1: I wonder if maybe you do, and I kind of
Speaker 1: want to try.
Speaker 2: It maybe the like have I not been living up
Speaker 2: to my full potential?
Speaker 1: Like right, I feel like I feel like.
Speaker 2: I haven't tried to pick up anything really heavy.
Speaker 1: I feel like when you specifically make a warning about that,
Speaker 1: I'm like, all right, you're hiding something from me, just
Speaker 1: like the raw milk. You're hiding the raw milk and
Speaker 1: the fluffy caterpillars, And I'm gonna have a bowl of
Speaker 1: raw milk and touch some caterpillars.
Speaker 2: There's only one way to know. No, the the adult
Speaker 2: moth is harmless. The adult moth can't do anything. They
Speaker 2: lose like the venomous spine, everything that the adult moth.
Speaker 2: They're still fluffy, they're not venomous.
Speaker 1: They're to find them and pet them. Then that's it.
Speaker 1: Gotta find for you, you adult moths. I'm gonna pet
Speaker 1: all of you.
Speaker 2: Then, So the venom of the southern flannel moth caterpillar
Speaker 2: and being like really fluffy but also don't touch it.
Speaker 2: Uh makes a lot of people make that same conclusion
Speaker 2: about wooly bears, which are also a tiny, little, very
Speaker 2: very very fluffy caterpillar. If bushy, black and red fluffy
Speaker 2: sort of hairs on them also not hair, technically hairs,
Speaker 2: they're like sea tea. I guess those are not venomous. Now,
Speaker 2: people with like sensitive skin might react to them, but
Speaker 2: that's probably just like either an allergic or like a
Speaker 2: you know, just like some sort of dermal logical reaction. Yeah,
Speaker 2: that is not very common. They're probably fine, but still,
Speaker 2: like you said, you know, air on the side of
Speaker 2: caution and just leave the caterpillars alone.
Speaker 1: Probably, yeah, yeah, unless you're like it, unless you're like
Speaker 1: a professional caterpillar whisperer and you're like, I know this caterpillar,
Speaker 1: we're buds.
Speaker 2: And yeah, me and this caterpillar go way back, right, well,
Speaker 2: probably not that far back. Because I don't live that long.
Speaker 1: Well, you know, it's you know, it's whole life life.
Speaker 2: There was one more fluffy moth that I wanted to
Speaker 2: touch on, and it's you're gonna have to go for
Speaker 2: a ride on this because it's called called I'm putting
Speaker 2: in air quotes the Venezuelan poodle moth.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I you know what I think. I'm I'm
Speaker 1: actually aware of this one because I have seen it,
Speaker 1: like a feltered version of it that people think is real. Yes,
Speaker 1: so like this is the one where where people so
Speaker 1: like people, so people think it's a there's two camps,
Speaker 1: or probably more than two camps. There's a few camps
Speaker 1: of people where it's like some people are like, it's real,
Speaker 1: And here's a photo of it being felt of a
Speaker 1: feltered version of it that looks super adorable and someone's
Speaker 1: holding and it's pretty large, and people think that's the
Speaker 1: photo of it, and it's like, well, that is not real.
Speaker 1: That is a felted version. Then there are those who
Speaker 1: have realized that that's a fake photo and they're like, so,
Speaker 1: then this does not exist. It is not a real insect.
Speaker 1: And then there's those who know the Secrets of the Universe,
Speaker 1: like Ellen Weatherford.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so the it is a real moth, but the
Speaker 2: Venezuela the poodle moth is a very informal name. It's not.
Speaker 2: So what makes us even weirder is that it's an
Speaker 2: unidentified species. Like it was just photographed one time in
Speaker 2: Venezuela by a zoologist named doctor Arthur Anker. He posted
Speaker 2: the photo on flicker, like it's on his Flicker account,
Speaker 2: you can go see it, and he just titled it
Speaker 2: poodle moth. Nobody knows like this, it doesn't seem to
Speaker 2: belong to any like known species of moth. Nobody has
Speaker 2: ever like idd it to a species, and so everyone
Speaker 2: just called it the poodle moth because it's white and
Speaker 2: fluffy and really really cute.
Speaker 1: It's also it's also that it's fluff comes out in
Speaker 1: like little tuffs like a poodle, right, you know how
Speaker 1: like the poodle has the I forgot what that haircut
Speaker 1: is called for the poodle, but it's the one where
Speaker 1: you have the little like butt circles and little like
Speaker 1: pom poms on its legs and then the tiny legs
Speaker 1: stick out. And this photo, the one the sort of
Speaker 1: famous photo of the real one. It's like that it's
Speaker 1: got little tufts on its little legs and then it's
Speaker 1: got little tiny feet sticking out. It is incredibly cute.
Speaker 2: It's very cute. So yeah, just it's just an unidentified
Speaker 2: species of moth that it was. The guy called it
Speaker 2: a poodle moth, and it was photographed in Venezuela, so
Speaker 2: everyone called it the Venezuelan poodle moth. And then that
Speaker 2: kind of gets like thrown around like it's like the
Speaker 2: species name and it's not, I mean, right, because there
Speaker 2: would be a common name anyway. But you know, it's
Speaker 2: just it's just an informal name for an unidentified species.
Speaker 1: And it's not that there aren't other photos of fluffy
Speaker 1: white moths that are found in Venezuela.
Speaker 2: There are.
Speaker 1: The point is that it's not it has not been
Speaker 1: determined which species this belongs to or what exactly this
Speaker 1: one is.
Speaker 2: There's a lot of fluffy white there's a lot of fluffy.
Speaker 1: White moths, and it's not so surprising to me that
Speaker 1: we don't know exactly what it is because like in
Speaker 1: Venezuela and in sort of especially like very like like
Speaker 1: in South American rainforest areas, there's such a huge diversity
Speaker 1: of animals and it's so like densely packed like with
Speaker 1: different species, it's really hard to identify them all.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I believe it. Yeah. So the those are my
Speaker 2: those are my heavy hitters. Those are my my big ones,
Speaker 2: my big three in the family.
Speaker 1: Those are incredible, and I do love them. I kind
Speaker 1: of like, you know, I feel like I want to be, uh,
Speaker 1: sort of just have that be the person that walks
Speaker 1: around the neighborhood with a bunch of moths on my
Speaker 1: shoulders and be known as that, like as the moth.
Speaker 2: All you have to do is just carry a little lantern.
Speaker 1: Right, yeah, exactly, just walk around, you know. I had
Speaker 1: a sphinx moth land on me once and refused to
Speaker 1: let go, and I was chosen and it did it
Speaker 1: did eventually die so like it wouldn't like I tried
Speaker 1: to get it off of my shirt. I was hiking
Speaker 1: and I tried to get it off my shirt, and
Speaker 1: it really like as soon as I would kind of
Speaker 1: pull it off, it would fly back on and like
Speaker 1: it did this like death grip on my shirt. And
Speaker 1: I was worried about crushing it because I couldn't like
Speaker 1: pull it off. So then I like took it home,
Speaker 1: took my shirt off, put it in a box and
Speaker 1: put some flowers in it and put it outside. It
Speaker 1: did die, so it it was I think it was
Speaker 1: just kind of posed to though I think it had.
Speaker 1: This is my theory is that it had already made
Speaker 1: it and it saw me and it was like, dude,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna die on you. Is that cool? Uh? So
Speaker 1: like just like hung on to mean, just wanted somewhere
Speaker 1: like you know, nice and comfortable to settle down for
Speaker 1: its retirement.
Speaker 2: And so attracted to your inner light.
Speaker 1: My my, my inner mothiness, my appreciation for months. Anyways,
Speaker 1: that was a magical experience and I really connected with
Speaker 1: this moth and I feel like, uh we got to
Speaker 1: be really good friends. And it did leave me in
Speaker 1: its will, and it left me like a stick.
Speaker 2: It left you some dust.
Speaker 1: Yeah, some scaled us. We are going to take another
Speaker 1: quick break and when we come back, we're going to
Speaker 1: talk about some more blah blah blah. All right, we
Speaker 1: are back and on exciting news coming out of Australia.
Speaker 1: There news clearly gunning for like some Olympic metal in
Speaker 1: country with the most fluffy arrapods because a new fluffy
Speaker 1: beetle has been discovered in Australia. Actually kind of around
Speaker 1: the time of the fluffy crab was discovered. I think
Speaker 1: it was in twenty twenty one.
Speaker 2: This beetle is big news. I feel like beetles aren't
Speaker 2: usually fluffy.
Speaker 1: Beetles are not typically fluffy. There are some beetles that
Speaker 1: are fluffier than others. They have more bristles called setee
Speaker 1: than your average beetle, and it happens. But this one
Speaker 1: is particularly fluffy and is so. This is called the
Speaker 1: ex Castra albo pilosa. It is a longhorned beetle which
Speaker 1: was discovered in Australia and it is cute with very
Speaker 1: long antinna as most longhorned beetles have. Because the name,
Speaker 1: and it has black and red splotches, and of course
Speaker 1: it is covered in tufts of fluffy white fur that
Speaker 1: makes me want to pet it. Hold me back, keep
Speaker 1: me from petting this beetle. It was found in Queensland, Australia,
Speaker 1: by University of Queensland PhD biodiversity student James Tweed while camping.
Speaker 1: At first he thought it was bird poop, which is
Speaker 1: fair enough. You know, like it see it. I can
Speaker 1: see it too. It's got the white splotchiness, the black
Speaker 1: you know, it's it's kind of it's that classic mix
Speaker 1: of white, brown and red where it's like, if it's
Speaker 1: from a distance and you're just glancing, you could be
Speaker 1: just like, yeah, bird poop, But up close it's very cute,
Speaker 1: kind of like our flannel moth. Actually, in terms of
Speaker 1: like from a distance, I bet that kind of looks
Speaker 1: a little bit like bird Doodoo, and that might be intentional,
Speaker 1: but then up close you're like, you know what you're
Speaker 1: actually you're not bird Dodo. You're a cute little guy.
Speaker 4: Guy.
Speaker 2: It's a little guy. I if I saw this beetle
Speaker 2: that you've provide a photo of, just like out and
Speaker 2: about my first guess if I if it wasn't like
Speaker 2: actively moving, would be that it had been overtaken by
Speaker 2: a fungus. It is really interesting.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it looks.
Speaker 2: Like it's coded in a sort of like because I
Speaker 2: used to work at a pet store and we had like,
Speaker 2: you know, a bunch of fish tanks, and one of
Speaker 2: the things we would have to look for on the
Speaker 2: fish was like white fuzz because white fuzz was commonly
Speaker 2: like a fungal infection. So I when I look at it,
Speaker 2: that's that's what it looks like to me. Is it
Speaker 2: looks like a white fungus.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it looks like a Cordyceps infection. We've talked about
Speaker 1: Cops on the show. It's type of fungus that invades UH,
Speaker 1: infests various arthropods. It's that's the fungus that if it
Speaker 1: sounds familiar and you don't know where to place, it's
Speaker 1: from the video game and TV show The Last of Us.
Speaker 1: Obviously not scientifically accurate, but yes, it is a real
Speaker 1: fungus that infects UH animals ophiol cord aceps UH. But
Speaker 1: the this is actually not fungus. And it's interesting you
Speaker 1: bring that up though, because we don't know yet what
Speaker 1: the fluff is for. And one of the theories is
Speaker 1: that it is meant for it to look like fungus,
Speaker 1: such that predators or ants or anything that might hassle
Speaker 1: this beetle will leave it alone, because you don't want
Speaker 1: to mess with something that is infected with like a
Speaker 1: contagious fungus. Potentially.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so when it gets fluffy, exactly, stuff that's white
Speaker 2: and fluffy.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I definitely throw away my bread when it's fluffy.
Speaker 1: So it is, uh, it is called it's about ten
Speaker 1: millimeters long, so it's like, you know, it's a little guy.
Speaker 1: And uh it is called extra castra albow pillowsa which
Speaker 1: means from the camp covered in white hair, which is
Speaker 1: It's an okay name, but I think he should have
Speaker 1: named it. I think he should have named it. Sorry,
Speaker 1: thought you were bird poop, but you're not. Uh my bad.
Speaker 1: I uh yeah, sorry, I.
Speaker 2: Thought you were bird poop, then thought you were weird fungus.
Speaker 1: Yes, but yeah it is. It's a it's thought that, yeah,
Speaker 1: the the these these bristles that look very soft and fluffy,
Speaker 1: may be uh, some form of camouflage because it doesn't
Speaker 1: seem like they're venomous or irritating or anything. So it's like,
Speaker 1: maybe it's meant to look like fungus. Maybe it's meant
Speaker 1: to look like bird doodoo. Maybe it's a little bit
Speaker 1: of both. Maybe it's meant to look like fungus covered
Speaker 1: bird doodoo. Either way, this beetle is very humble, trying
Speaker 1: to present itself as not cute and edible. But I'm
Speaker 1: gonna say, buddy, you're still cute, no matter how hard
Speaker 1: you try.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you can't fool me. I know you're cute under there.
Speaker 1: You're beautiful because you don't know you're beautiful and you're
Speaker 1: trying to look like fungus covered bird poop. Is the song? Yeah? Yeah?
Speaker 2: That? Wait? Was that direction?
Speaker 1: I don't know. I think the song was girl, You're
Speaker 1: beautiful because you're trying to look like bird poop.
Speaker 2: That that's a quote directly from one direction.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I know it's I know their entire discography.
Speaker 2: I have a lot of songs about bird poop.
Speaker 1: You're just saying, all right, Ellen, how long do you
Speaker 1: think would be the velvet ant?
Speaker 2: So short? I have one paragraph on velvet ants real quick.
Speaker 1: Let's let's let's cap off with this episode with uh
Speaker 1: with something something small and probably not touchable.
Speaker 2: No, no, you don't want to touch these. It doesn't
Speaker 2: stop a lot of people. People do it anyway, because
Speaker 2: I think they just don't know. This is another one
Speaker 2: of those things. It's like you find out about it
Speaker 2: as an adult and you're like, oh my gosh, why
Speaker 2: weren't we all told about this? They're velvet ants and
Speaker 2: they are beautiful, lovely little guys. They are are not
Speaker 2: actually ants. They are wingless wasps, which is like, okay,
Speaker 2: what is an ant but a wingless wasp? I know,
Speaker 2: like ants like evolved from wasps, right, they're like derived.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but you know you fo evolutionary history and they
Speaker 1: have a common ancestor with with winged wasps.
Speaker 2: Yeah. But the velvet ants are like not even in
Speaker 2: like the ant group. They are just wasps. They're not
Speaker 2: social either, They're they're solitary. Now what velvet ants are
Speaker 2: known for. First of all, they're fluffy. There's lots of
Speaker 2: different types of velvet ants. The velvet ants where I
Speaker 2: am from are red velvet ants. So they're red and
Speaker 2: black and very pretty actually like this downy sort of
Speaker 2: like like hair like structures covering their body.
Speaker 1: There. They are our widow who definitely didn't kill her husband,
Speaker 1: uh with the red with the red going, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I would never kill my husband for his substantial inheritance.
Speaker 1: This new four coat, I didn't buy it with my
Speaker 1: dead husband substantial inheritance.
Speaker 2: Now, don't look too closely at the update to his
Speaker 2: will submitted the day before he disappeared. Yeah, so the
Speaker 2: red velvet ants are really really pretty. They're pretty well known.
Speaker 2: They're called cow killers, although they probably don't actually kill.
Speaker 1: Never, I would never.
Speaker 2: They do have extremely painful stings. Yes, they were given
Speaker 2: a three out of four on the Schmidt pain Index.
Speaker 1: Isn't that that guy who like stung himself?
Speaker 2: When they say the Schmidt pain Index, it's a guy.
Speaker 2: It's a guy Schmidt. He's like, got stung himself. Yep,
Speaker 2: that's smart insects.
Speaker 1: Yeah, no, we're not joking. We aren't joking. This is
Speaker 1: not a bit. It's a it's a guy, a biologist
Speaker 1: named He was like, I'm gonna rank the stings and
Speaker 1: how much they suck. And he's stung himself and he
Speaker 1: was like, that's a Nate.
Speaker 2: He's like, that's pretty bad.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So they they got a pretty high ranking on that one,
Speaker 2: not like the highest, but like about on par with
Speaker 2: most other wasps. So do you have a very painful sting.
Speaker 2: It's said to hurt for about thirty minutes or they're
Speaker 2: somewhat common where I'm from in Florida. I saw them
Speaker 2: in the wild in Florida. Once again. That problem with
Speaker 2: like little kids where they see something like bright and
Speaker 2: colorful and they don't know any better, and they just
Speaker 2: grab it. So you know, that is kind of like
Speaker 2: they can't fly, so they don't I think I remember,
Speaker 2: like the ones that have wings don't have stingers, and
Speaker 2: the ones that have stingers don't have wings, so like
Speaker 2: it's either way, like just just don't don't mess with them, Yeah,
Speaker 2: pull them up. They have a very painful sting. The
Speaker 2: bright red and black coloration is thought to be aposomat.
Speaker 2: That's a warning for predators of their very very painful sting.
Speaker 2: There's also a type of velvet ant called the thistle
Speaker 2: down velvet ant that is once again white and fluffy
Speaker 2: and has these long, this long, bristly sort of white hair.
Speaker 1: I think are those found in southern California, because I
Speaker 1: think I've seen some version of those as Yeah, I
Speaker 1: think I've seen some version of those in southern California.
Speaker 1: I don't know if it's that exact species, but I've
Speaker 1: seen white velvet wasps or sorry, white velvet ants who
Speaker 1: are wasps in southern California.
Speaker 2: And for a long time it was thought to be
Speaker 2: like because they're mimicking a type of like seed pod,
Speaker 2: like a fluffy, white type of like seed that is
Speaker 2: found in that area. But there was a more there
Speaker 2: was more recent research. Unfortunately I didn't write this one down,
Speaker 2: but there was research within the last few years that
Speaker 2: suggested that it's not that they're mimicking the seeds, is
Speaker 2: that they're mimicking other velvet ants. And like they have
Speaker 2: this mimicry ring where there's all these like wasps and
Speaker 2: stinging insects that all kind of look like each other,
Speaker 2: and they're all just kind of mimicking each other because
Speaker 2: this has become a very effective signal of like we
Speaker 2: are something that will hurt you very badly. So it's
Speaker 2: like it's this like Mulerian micry ring.
Speaker 1: So essentially like when you have each other, when you
Speaker 1: have like a knockoff of a show and then like
Speaker 1: or or franchise, and then there's a knockoff of the knockoff,
Speaker 1: and then there's like a big knockoff of the knockoff.
Speaker 2: Yeah, they're all they're all kind of mimicking each other,
Speaker 2: but they do they do look like these little seed pods.
Speaker 2: I just I can't think of why that would deter
Speaker 2: a predator, you know, Like, I don't think there's anything
Speaker 2: particularly wrong with that seed pod. Maybe it just makes
Speaker 2: them not look like an ant.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I found the one. The one that's in southern
Speaker 1: California is white and fluffy and it's called seconds velvet Ant.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, adorable.
Speaker 2: I do like the ones that are called thistle Down.
Speaker 2: I like that because thistle Down sounds a lot like
Speaker 2: the person from Bridgerton.
Speaker 1: It also just sounds fanciful, like a little fairy.
Speaker 2: Very cool name.
Speaker 1: My name is this Down and.
Speaker 2: Grand true wishes Dan you a lot of character there.
Speaker 1: You cry. It's hard not to. They're so fluffy. I
Speaker 1: just want to like when something is fluffy. And I
Speaker 1: do this with my dog, but I just I have
Speaker 1: to give them a stupid little voice. So I'm constantly
Speaker 1: like I'm constantly talking in the voice of my dog
Speaker 1: to my husband. Uh. And I've gotten him to start
Speaker 1: doing it. And it's a it's a it's a shared madness.
Speaker 2: We have always done that, like, you know, narrating the
Speaker 2: internal dialogue of your pets. Yeah, thing, It's like we've
Speaker 2: always done that, and we do it with our cat,
Speaker 2: who's a monster. He's a goblin, he's the worst, and
Speaker 2: we do it so often. We have a four year
Speaker 2: old and the four year old has just started trying
Speaker 2: to do that, like trying to be like his name
Speaker 2: is Aki. The cat's name is Aki. Sorry, the four
Speaker 2: year old name is not Aki. As the four year
Speaker 2: old has started trying to be like Aki's like and
Speaker 2: then like say what he thinks the cat would say
Speaker 2: in that moment, but he didn't really get it at first,
Speaker 2: so he would be like act, He's like.
Speaker 1: Yeah, ya, he is probably much more into what the
Speaker 1: cat's actual thoughts than you guys.
Speaker 2: He probably would say that I.
Speaker 1: Think he's I think he's probably got a better beat
Speaker 1: on this cat than you guys, because like what is
Speaker 1: going through the cat's head probably yam yam, yam yao.
Speaker 2: You nailed it, dude. That is so him. That is
Speaker 2: so classic cat.
Speaker 1: He's gonna be great at impressions as when he gets grows.
Speaker 2: Up, Aki's like.
Speaker 1: Fantastic.
Speaker 2: So I was. I did try. I earnestly tried to
Speaker 2: look around to see if I could get like an
Speaker 2: explanation as to why velvet ants in general tend to
Speaker 2: be fuzzy. Could not find anything. Found absolutely nothing. It
Speaker 2: doesn't seem like it's a question a lot of people
Speaker 2: have asked, so if anyone knows a better answer, I
Speaker 2: would love to hear it. I tried to come up
Speaker 2: with a few guesses of my own. They don't live
Speaker 2: in cold places, so I don't think it's for thermoregulation,
Speaker 2: unless maybe they're like coming out at night, so I
Speaker 2: don't I don't think. I don't know if it's for
Speaker 2: heat retention. They aren't preyed on by bats, they don't
Speaker 2: fly around, so I don't think it's for dampening sound.
Speaker 2: They're relatives. The bees tend to be fluffy, but that's
Speaker 2: more for pollen collection, so I don't think that that's
Speaker 2: like what's going on here. The velvet ants don't collect pollen.
Speaker 2: So my best thought that I could come up with
Speaker 2: is maybe repelling water. Since they crawl around on the
Speaker 2: ground and maybe would be crawling through like puddles or
Speaker 2: you know, accidentally getting water. Maybe they're trying to repel
Speaker 2: water off of their body. That was really the best
Speaker 2: I could think of. I could not find much on
Speaker 2: why velvet ants tend to be fuzzy.
Speaker 1: It could also be a part of their sort of warning, right,
Speaker 1: like I'm pleasant to put in your mouth look at like,
Speaker 1: because you know, even though the thing is something that's
Speaker 1: like really fluff like poofy and fluffy in nature, like
Speaker 1: especially an insect. Insect. Even though to human beings we're
Speaker 1: like I want to pet you, it might be to
Speaker 1: an animal that's thinking about putting it in its mouth,
Speaker 1: like I don't want a mouthful of fluff like that.
Speaker 1: It might also like the texture of it might because
Speaker 1: I know that this is the case for plant hoppers,
Speaker 1: Like they have these big waxy, fluffy tufts that they
Speaker 1: wear and it's meant to be like, look, dude, this
Speaker 1: looks nasty and it's not going to be fine to
Speaker 1: put in your mouth, and then if something does try
Speaker 1: to bite them, it's gonna get a mouthful of fluff
Speaker 1: of the And perhaps this is the same case for
Speaker 1: these velvet ants, Like something tries to bite it, it's
Speaker 1: like the mouthful of fluff. Because even though it could
Speaker 1: use its stinger to ward off predators, it's a valuable resource, right,
Speaker 1: so it's better to like it might it might be
Speaker 1: that it has like two defense mechanisms, right, like that
Speaker 1: that color, the the texture and then also the stinger.
Speaker 1: And yeah, I mean it could also like there could
Speaker 1: be something about its environment, like maybe it helps it,
Speaker 1: like as it's crawling through sand or something. Maybe the
Speaker 1: bristles help it move better through the sand or so something,
Speaker 1: or keeps like water from uh you know, getting through too.
Speaker 1: It's cuticle. That's I think those are all all good,
Speaker 1: all good ideas or fashion fashion. You know, it could
Speaker 1: just look nice, just look cool.
Speaker 2: I know that the the Saharan silver ant is a
Speaker 2: type of ant that lives in African deserts, and they
Speaker 2: also have they're coated in hairs. They're not like fluffy.
Speaker 2: I wouldn't call them fluffy because the hairs are more
Speaker 2: like streamlined, but the hair is real selective. Yeah, and
Speaker 2: they help like reflect light from the sun. So that
Speaker 2: is a beautiful regulation in the other opposite direction keeping
Speaker 2: them cool. But I didn't think that was applicable here
Speaker 2: because the velvet ants, like hairs aren't reflective right in
Speaker 2: the same way that the silver ants are, So I
Speaker 2: don't think that's very applicable here. Just yeah, there's some
Speaker 2: some interesting I guess room for room for research, I.
Speaker 1: Think, yeah, yeah, for sure. I feel like given that
Speaker 1: some of them have really either really long bristles or
Speaker 1: short ones, but really brightly colored, I feel like that
Speaker 1: being like a warning of like I'm not palatable. You
Speaker 1: don't want to eat? Ye feels the most right to me,
Speaker 1: but I don't know.
Speaker 2: I did just have a mental like image of putting
Speaker 2: cotton balls in your mouth. If you've ever had to
Speaker 2: do that, like it's.
Speaker 4: A good well I played the godfla. You come to
Speaker 4: the you come to my daughter's wedding right after a.
Speaker 2: I've heard actors say that that's how they do it.
Speaker 2: All Australian accent is believe that they like just pretend
Speaker 2: they have cotton balls in their mouth.
Speaker 1: Well, I'm Australia. I'm not. I'm not hearing it. I
Speaker 1: don't I don't get down. You come to my dollars
Speaker 1: wearing in Australia.
Speaker 2: It's in there, it's in there. You got it.
Speaker 1: All right? Well, before we go, we got to play
Speaker 1: a little game, a game called guess you squawk on
Speaker 1: the Mystery Animal Sound game. The last last year we
Speaker 1: had a Mystery Animal sound the last sound from twenty
Speaker 1: twenty four, and this is the hint for that. Just
Speaker 1: let him grab his winter coat and he's ready to
Speaker 1: start caroling because this was done around when this time.
Speaker 1: And then we had a bunch of interlude episodes and now, hey,
Speaker 1: it's January twenty seventh. Man, I'm back. I'm back in business.
Speaker 1: I guess it's probably later now because it's gonna get released.
Speaker 3: In a few days.
Speaker 1: But hey, we're back. More game, new year, new sounds.
Speaker 1: Let's Oh. I love this. I love this little guy.
Speaker 1: So you got any guesses?
Speaker 2: It's I see it in my mind's eye. I see it.
Speaker 2: It's a little bird? Is it? Is it a ptarmigan?
Speaker 1: It is? Indeed? Good job?
Speaker 2: Oh nice? I like, I just was cracky. I was
Speaker 2: showing my kids videos of them making this stupid little sound,
Speaker 2: and my kids were very delighted by it. So the
Speaker 2: timing could not have been better. I was just like
Speaker 2: a couple weeks ago watching videos.
Speaker 1: Nice little nice.
Speaker 3: Uh.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so absolutely correct. This is a willow ptarmagin uh.
Speaker 1: These are found in the cold parts of northern Europe, Alaska, Scandinavias,
Speaker 1: Iberia in Canada, so they you know, they like the tundra.
Speaker 1: They are very round birds. In the summer, they're brown.
Speaker 1: They just kind of look like brown round birds. And
Speaker 1: they're about fifteen inches or thirty eight centimeters tall, so
Speaker 1: they're you know, they're they're a handful of bird and
Speaker 1: they have this modeled brown and white plumage. Males actually
Speaker 1: have this fantastic red flesh around the tops of their
Speaker 1: eyes because they can work at baby and in the
Speaker 1: winter they trade their brown coats for white plumage so
Speaker 1: that they can blend in with the snowy background more.
Speaker 1: And I mean they really fit for this fluffy episode
Speaker 1: because their feet are super super fluffy. They're covered in
Speaker 1: these protective feathers. They've got all if you look at
Speaker 1: like their little tootsies. They've got all this fluffy, downy
Speaker 1: feathering around their toes and then very thick leathery soles,
Speaker 1: thick leathery soles on the bottoms of their feet to
Speaker 1: stay warm on the tundras. So these are these are
Speaker 1: like real snow birds. They have the same kind of
Speaker 1: adaptations of say, like a snowhair or like a lynx,
Speaker 1: which is I don't know if I find that wild
Speaker 1: that you have, like it's this is these are birds.
Speaker 1: These are dinosaurs and they have the same adaptations as say,
Speaker 1: like an arctic fox or a snowhair.
Speaker 2: Let me copy your homework, just change it up a
Speaker 2: little bit so yeah it doesn't notice.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I mean it's it's yeah, it's it's fantastic.
Speaker 1: Uh they're fluffy. And then the sound and the sound
Speaker 1: they make is so goofy coming out of Would.
Speaker 2: You spell that sound like waddle like.
Speaker 1: Glaggle glaggles? How I would spell it. I feel that.
Speaker 2: We'll just we'll just not be putting them in any
Speaker 2: comics where we have to be uh putting an automn.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 1: I feel like glaggling is a great sounding word, glaggle exactly.
Speaker 1: All right? Onto uh onto the next oops, Nope, ignore that,
Speaker 1: Onto the next mysteral sound. The hint is this, I
Speaker 1: got some wild news for you guys. Fat bay all right, Ellen,
Speaker 1: you got any guesses?
Speaker 2: What gosh? At first it sounded like a like a pig,
Speaker 2: like a pig of copcon. And then it sounded like
Speaker 2: a like a large frog, like.
Speaker 1: A Sorry, I was kind of gassy, I was. I
Speaker 1: just drank a bunch of a bunch of soda.
Speaker 2: It sounds I think it's giving like like a bullfrog,
Speaker 2: like large frog. That's what I'm gonna Say'm gonna say's
Speaker 2: a large frog.
Speaker 1: All right, we got large frog. If you think you
Speaker 1: know who is making that sound, you can write to
Speaker 1: me at Creature Feature Pod at gmail dot com. You
Speaker 1: can also write to me your questions, your comments, your observations,
Speaker 1: or pictures of your adorable pets. Ellen, thank you so
Speaker 1: much for joining me today. Where can people find you?
Speaker 2: Just the Zoo of Us is on the Maximum Fun Network.
Speaker 2: You can listen to that where you get podcasts. Also,
Speaker 2: my other podcast, which is not for kids, by the way,
Speaker 2: is Spellbound and Gagged. Katie's been on talking about parasites.
Speaker 2: You've also been on Just the Zoo of Us, so
Speaker 2: I have.
Speaker 1: I've been in the Extended Ellen Universe.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you're in the Cinematic Universe.
Speaker 1: I'm in there. I've got my own wiki page.
Speaker 2: You're canon, You're in the fan wiki. So yeah, those
Speaker 2: are places where you can listen to my boys. I'm
Speaker 2: also on Blue Sky. I think that's probably the only
Speaker 2: ski media I use regularly these days. Yeah, I'm skeating,
Speaker 2: all skating everywhere, set on the rig.
Speaker 1: Yeah, uh well, you know what, I highly recommend those
Speaker 1: shows and not just the ones I'm on. I do
Speaker 1: recommend those two as well, because if.
Speaker 2: You want to really focus, if you really you.
Speaker 1: Want a full dose of Katie. But the whole shows
Speaker 1: are great, definitely recommend, so do check those out. Guys,
Speaker 1: thank you so much for listening. If you're enjoying the
Speaker 1: show and you leave me a rating or review, you
Speaker 1: that tangibury helps me. I'm gonna say that like I'm
Speaker 1: not Scooby Doo, that tangibly helps me, And thank you
Speaker 1: so much for listening. Thanks to the Space Cossics for
Speaker 1: their super awesome song XO. Lumina Creature Feature is a
Speaker 1: production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts like the one you
Speaker 1: just heard, visit the iHeartRadio app. Apple podcasts are Hey.
Speaker 4: Guess what already listen to your favorite shows.
Speaker 1: I can't judge you. I'm not your mother. I can't
Speaker 1: tell you what to do. But don't pet the velvety.
Speaker 1: They don't want it, they don't need it, and they
Speaker 1: will sting you until you're like, oh my god, that
Speaker 1: Schmidt guy was right. This hurts real. This is twenty schmidtz.
Speaker 2: It hurts bad.
Speaker 1: See your next one. You need to see you next Wednesday.
Speaker 2: M m hm mm hmm