Speaker 1: Welcome to Creature feature production of I Heart Radio. I'm
Speaker 1: your host of Many Parasites, Katie Golden. I studied psychology
Speaker 1: and evolutionary biology, and today on the show, these squirrels
Speaker 1: are nuts, giant flying squirrels, rainbow squirrels, and goth squirrels.
Speaker 1: Squirrel over this and more as we answer the age
Speaker 1: old question, is that dried squirrel p or using as
Speaker 1: an acrodisiac? Or are you just happy to see me?
Speaker 1: Joining me today is writer, director, friend of the show,
Speaker 1: and squirrel man Adam Ganzer. Okay, I'm proud of all
Speaker 1: those titles, every one of those titles. Yeah, Squirrelman, Yeah right,
Speaker 1: My Twitter are teasingal Squirrelman. Yeah yeah. I mean, I
Speaker 1: just thought we should probably have an episode on squirrels,
Speaker 1: and here it is. I could not dis agree harder
Speaker 1: I could. I agree fully with you on this, right right,
Speaker 1: Usually I've tried to tailor the episode to sort of
Speaker 1: my guests likes dislikes. Um, this time, I just kind
Speaker 1: of made the executive decision for it to just be squirrels. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it doesn't matter how you feel about it, squirrel, but
Speaker 1: this one's full nut right at you, right, full nut,
Speaker 1: full frontal squirrel nut. I mean actually literally one of
Speaker 1: the photos in the photo doc. But uh, yeah, No,
Speaker 1: we're talking about squirrels. I think that people have a
Speaker 1: certain concept of the titular squirrel, of little little thing.
Speaker 1: Maybe it's gray, maybe it's sort of a reddish color,
Speaker 1: and it's got that fluffy tail, and it's kind of
Speaker 1: hunched over a nut and it's chewing on an acorn
Speaker 1: with little pause. You know, the little squirrel thingthing. Damn,
Speaker 1: that's how you see him. Yeah, that's how I see him.
Speaker 1: That's the squirrel, you know, the little little squirrel thing
Speaker 1: they do you're sitting there with They're not going iron.
Speaker 1: But there are in fact squirrels out there that'll blow
Speaker 1: your damn mind. I mean yeah, looking at some of them,
Speaker 1: I already shocked by a minimum three are shocking. Yes,
Speaker 1: So we are first going to talk about the squirrels
Speaker 1: of the world that will blow your mind that they exist.
Speaker 1: I certainly some of these in my research. I just
Speaker 1: found it existed, and my ding ding mind is blown.
Speaker 1: One could say my own nut is uh is blown
Speaker 1: because these squirrels are I can't believe it. Uh. And
Speaker 1: then at the end we will come back home to
Speaker 1: the gray squirrels, which I think we're all familiar with,
Speaker 1: but look at them and how amazing they can be
Speaker 1: as well. So you know that is that's the squirrels.
Speaker 1: Squirrel sod in a nutshell, you know. Yeah, I mean
Speaker 1: it's a it's a lovely show. I'm I can't wait
Speaker 1: to experience it. Yeah, well, hey, what are we waiting for.
Speaker 1: Let's talk squirrels. Now, let's do it. So cat sized
Speaker 1: flying squirrels discovered and the Himalayas. Right, that's uh, that's
Speaker 1: not cute, that's terrifying, right, because like squirrels are one
Speaker 1: of the only animals they get close enough to you
Speaker 1: that they're not that cute, you know what I mean?
Speaker 1: Like face, Yeah, it's like they're cute for from a distance,
Speaker 1: but like you get you get real close to them,
Speaker 1: it's close and you start to see those big teeth. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you see, she went on nuts and something else, if
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. Yeah, you wonder if some
Speaker 1: of them have ever thought how does blood taste? You
Speaker 1: know what I mean? I feel like some of them
Speaker 1: thought that. Yeah, certainly I've seen squirrels chewing on like
Speaker 1: a chicken bone, your opportunistic yeah, they will. They will
Speaker 1: eat anything by the way that they keep KFC tomorrow
Speaker 1: your bones. I could see a squirrel having a bumper
Speaker 1: sticker on its squirrel car that yeah. Yeah. Could they
Speaker 1: tree nuts tomorrow your nuts? Yeah yeah. They give you
Speaker 1: a look just like that too, with their black eyes. Yeah,
Speaker 1: like a doll's eyes. Yeah yeah. Yeah, so a big one. Uh.
Speaker 1: Some people like Adam are afraid of the big squirrels,
Speaker 1: but indeed the big squirrels do exist. So we're talking
Speaker 1: about the wooly flying squirrel. And before we talk about
Speaker 1: the recent discovery of these giants flying squirrels, we gotta
Speaker 1: go into the history of the wooly flying squirrel because
Speaker 1: we used to think they were extinct until they were
Speaker 1: rediscovered in the ninety nineties. So the wooly flying squirrel
Speaker 1: is a big honking squirrel. It's five pounds and around
Speaker 1: three ft long. In fact, they can actually reach up
Speaker 1: to four be long from the snoot to the butt.
Speaker 1: They're about twenty four or two ft or sixty centimeters long,
Speaker 1: and their tails add from a foot to almost two
Speaker 1: ft of extra length or forty three to fifty four
Speaker 1: centimeters about that's crazy. That's that's like like the rats
Speaker 1: you hear about in the New York like sewer system
Speaker 1: the New York Post. Like giant rat comes out of
Speaker 1: toilets and bites man's butt off, eats entire pizza, eats
Speaker 1: entire pizza and a butt right, yeah, no, yeah no,
Speaker 1: these these are their massive It's like it's like running
Speaker 1: squirrel operating system on Bear hardware. You know, that's what
Speaker 1: it looks like. Did I stutter when I said it
Speaker 1: is the wooly flying squirrel Because this big old thing
Speaker 1: it flies. It's like I feel like that should have
Speaker 1: been reserved for like monkeys or something. Right, But no, no,
Speaker 1: too bad, there's no flying monkeys, only plans. Yeah, no,
Speaker 1: they fly now, remember that? Remember that. I know, I
Speaker 1: just I just wish they did, you know, like I
Speaker 1: just wish they did. We're gonna pretend like I didn't
Speaker 1: just say they were flying monkeys. Well there's not, there's not,
Speaker 1: but but remember from the Star Wars Star War movie
Speaker 1: what they're like, They're like, they fly now. But these
Speaker 1: squirrels they fly now. Well they have probably for millions
Speaker 1: of years too. But the point is this giant honking
Speaker 1: squirrel does fly or if you're being technical about it.
Speaker 1: It's gliding, not really flying, but whatever, the fact that
Speaker 1: the thing is airborne I think is pretty impressive. Uh.
Speaker 1: If I saw a thing of this size gliding by,
Speaker 1: I don't care if I'm not going to dispute with
Speaker 1: it whether it's flying or gliding. I'll give it whatever
Speaker 1: word it wants to use to describe its movement. Make
Speaker 1: the rules. Giant flying wooly squirrel foot three ft giant
Speaker 1: furry bat. Yeah, absolutely, you make the rules. Now I
Speaker 1: don't make the rules anymore. It is one of the
Speaker 1: world's largest gliding mammals. Unsurprisingly. Actually, I can't think of
Speaker 1: a bigger one unless them. I mean, flying foxes have
Speaker 1: a very impressive wingspan. Those are mega bat but they
Speaker 1: fly so like they genuinely fly. So I feel like
Speaker 1: this might actually be the largest gliding mammal. I can't
Speaker 1: think of one that's bigger. But if I'm wrong, you know,
Speaker 1: yell at me on Twitter. Like other gliders, it's got
Speaker 1: a flap of skin that runs from its wrists to
Speaker 1: its ankles, called pagetum, which it uses to glide gracefully
Speaker 1: through the air. Probably not that gracefully though, honestly, over
Speaker 1: what distance, Like how far are these things traveling? I
Speaker 1: think I read some guy saw it, like, go, I
Speaker 1: think fifty feet? So yeah, okay, that's not that's not
Speaker 1: I'm less scared of a fifty Like it's like fifty feet.
Speaker 1: They're not you know, they're not clearing a football field.
Speaker 1: Maybe it was fifty meters. Hang on, Okay, yeah, I
Speaker 1: wanna gotta, I gotta, I gotta, I gotta double check
Speaker 1: check how because that makes a difference. Stuff. It makes
Speaker 1: a huge difference. It's like either this thing has kind
Speaker 1: of a long, floaty jump or it's like we're going
Speaker 1: full breath of the wild and this thing's as a glider,
Speaker 1: you know, like that's a that's scary. Oh it's fifty
Speaker 1: meters not feet. Okay, that's meters two feet Google, it's
Speaker 1: like four that's a hundred and sixty four ft. Yeah,
Speaker 1: classic classic metric to imperial mistake. There, I'm sorry, did
Speaker 1: I say fifty ft? I mean one hundred and sixty
Speaker 1: four ft of gliding capacity these bad boys got, that's yeah. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Like do they when they get in a group, did
Speaker 1: they swarm their murmurations of flying woolen squirrels? No? Yeah,
Speaker 1: they don't go yeah, as far as I know, but
Speaker 1: you know, we know not that much about them. We
Speaker 1: thought they were extinct until they were rediscovered in We
Speaker 1: thought they'd been like extinct for hundreds of years, and
Speaker 1: then someone just went up there. It was like, no,
Speaker 1: they're still here, right? How did it? So? Like they're
Speaker 1: just in that one area the Himalayas, I assume like
Speaker 1: way high up well kind of, but there's a larger
Speaker 1: ore at play there. So the Himalayas are a huge
Speaker 1: mountain range. Uh. These ones are found in northern Pakistan,
Speaker 1: and that's I think where they were originally rediscovered as
Speaker 1: still being alive and not extinct. But there's actually a
Speaker 1: recent discovery that found there is not just one species
Speaker 1: of these wuly flying squirrels, but two species. And they're
Speaker 1: basing this discovery actually on already existing museum specimens where
Speaker 1: they ran some tests on. They looked at their skulls,
Speaker 1: their coat coloration, their genetic differences, and that indicates are
Speaker 1: actually two species of flying squirrels. There are the Tibetan
Speaker 1: woolye flying squirrels and the Union wullly Union wooly flying squirrels,
Speaker 1: both live in the Himalayas, but they live thousands of
Speaker 1: miles apart. So, just as a reminder, the Himalayas are
Speaker 1: an absolutely massive mountain range that spans across Asia and
Speaker 1: many many countries. So you can have these two species
Speaker 1: of wooly squirrel who look almost exactly the same, live
Speaker 1: in very similar environments, but they have basically been separated
Speaker 1: by thousands of miles for possibly millions of years and
Speaker 1: have become two distinct species. Interesting. Interesting. I still can't understand,
Speaker 1: like in an energy conservation way, why a mammal of
Speaker 1: this side needs sized needs to glide. I don't like,
Speaker 1: why why does that need to happen? I mean, in general,
Speaker 1: gliding mammals are filling some kind of evolutionary niche where
Speaker 1: they if if it if resources are scarce, having the
Speaker 1: ability to glide not only gives them an escape from predators,
Speaker 1: and I'm sure they've got some some pretty deft flying
Speaker 1: predators up in the Himalayas, probably some owls, but it
Speaker 1: also probably allows them to find food and travel more easily.
Speaker 1: It may even allow some of these gliding mammals to
Speaker 1: uh find insects and eat insects. Is in addition to
Speaker 1: their other diet. I'm not exactly sure what the diet
Speaker 1: of this thing is. I don't even know. Oh wait, no,
Speaker 1: I do know. I'm sorry, I take that back. I
Speaker 1: know exactly what their diet is because they have analyze
Speaker 1: their poop and they have found that these guys, specifically
Speaker 1: the wooly flying squirrel, has a diet of mainly pine needles.
Speaker 1: So it's got teeth that are super weird. They actually
Speaker 1: don't resemble squirrel teeth. I can't imagine the size of
Speaker 1: the owl that would take to take down the squirrel,
Speaker 1: like we're talking about. Yeah, we're talking about like a
Speaker 1: like some kind of primitive deity sized owl, the mega owl.
Speaker 1: I think, yeah, I think that there is an owl. No, no,
Speaker 1: that's a different owl. They call it the prime owl,
Speaker 1: the prime for owl. So their teeth are unlike those
Speaker 1: of rodent or of squirrels. It's actually their teeth are
Speaker 1: very similar to an ungulate, like a cow or a deer,
Speaker 1: because they chew on this really tough vegetation, pine needles.
Speaker 1: I don't know if you've ever chewed on a pine needle,
Speaker 1: But it's not tender, you know, it's not melt in
Speaker 1: your mouth. So they need really tough grinding teeth to
Speaker 1: be able to chew up these pine needles, and gliding
Speaker 1: probably helps them easily go from from you know, pine
Speaker 1: tree to pine tree and get get that food that
Speaker 1: that highat food and evade predators they probably don't want
Speaker 1: to just kind of like wattle on the ground like
Speaker 1: a tasty little treat. So so yeah, that's that's probably
Speaker 1: why they're also very fluffy. They Yeah, they almost look
Speaker 1: like they have kind of like chinchilla for long, very
Speaker 1: soft looking, kind of a bluish gray, and that helps
Speaker 1: protect them from the cold in the snow because they
Speaker 1: are Yeah, they're in the himmle is uh where it
Speaker 1: gets cold and it gets snowy and all they got
Speaker 1: to eat is pine needles and they're they're big boys
Speaker 1: who got to jump around and glide away from vicious predators.
Speaker 1: What a defiant creature. This creature is like every all
Speaker 1: of its conditions are seeing the unfit for what it is. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's like you say, I can't live here, Screw you.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna eat pine needles. I love these pine needles.
Speaker 1: They're delicious. Crunch, crunch, crunch. This could be your skull
Speaker 1: if I decided, but I'm not gonna you know, you
Speaker 1: know what it looks at your hair? It's like those
Speaker 1: are some soft pine needles. Speaking of scary, Even though
Speaker 1: most of their vocalizations are gentle like little grunt swords,
Speaker 1: sirrups sort of, if they are threatened, they will let
Speaker 1: out a blood curdling scream that some people describe as yetti. Like,
Speaker 1: first of all, what the Yetie's that a thing? Is it? Right?
Speaker 1: What do they mean by that? You know, it's a streame.
Speaker 1: It sounds like a banshee. You know how banshee sound. Now, man, Well, well,
Speaker 1: what would you imagine in yetti to sound like? Now
Speaker 1: that's what it sounds like. Fair enough. ASIA Program for
Speaker 1: the Wildlife Conservation Society Director Peter Zaler describes it thus
Speaker 1: lee quote. The way it was described to me was
Speaker 1: of a chain smoking child falling off a clip. It's
Speaker 1: quite unnerving and an extremely delightful image. Like what a
Speaker 1: delightful image? I like the specificity any of it. Shane
Speaker 1: smoking child falling off a clip. It's a four year
Speaker 1: old in a top hat, you know, like some like
Speaker 1: he's been working over all week. Yeah, rolled up sleeves,
Speaker 1: hard living hard to child like, you wouldn't believe Thomas
Speaker 1: the Tanking Me and Thomas the Tanking jin would talk
Speaker 1: and over over fruit cups, and I was telling Thomas,
Speaker 1: you know those muppets. You know what they get up to,
Speaker 1: don't you. I do, pass me a camel light. I'll
Speaker 1: describe the whole thing for you. Piggy Fitness Piggies out
Speaker 1: of Third Divorce. By the way, children probably don't watch
Speaker 1: any of that anymore, Like like, I have no idea
Speaker 1: what children are watching now. It's none of those things.
Speaker 1: The children, the zoomers. What are the children called now?
Speaker 1: Are they all zoomers or is there even younger generation?
Speaker 1: Is zoom closed off as the back end of that
Speaker 1: close has has the doors closed on zoomers yet? But yeah,
Speaker 1: they're just like you know, no on tiktokrons. I don't
Speaker 1: know why my child voice is the same as my
Speaker 1: squirrel voice, because they're coming for us. Zs are coming
Speaker 1: for us, for sure. Yeah. Yeah. In the squirrels, the
Speaker 1: zs and the squirrels were unionized, coming for you, union
Speaker 1: for your nuts and your TikTok's and your juice boxes.
Speaker 1: Juice boxes, I'd say, give them to them. Just let
Speaker 1: him happy. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean that can end this. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So you know the wooly flying squirrel, a cat's sized
Speaker 1: squirrel that glides in the mountains of the Himalayas, that
Speaker 1: screams like a chain smoking child and apparently they're dried
Speaker 1: urine and poop is considered an aphrodisiac by some by
Speaker 1: who I I'm not, I'm not gonna say me. Let
Speaker 1: me just put it to you this way, some person
Speaker 1: in or later decided I'm going to take this feces
Speaker 1: and or urine, eat it, and then I'm going to
Speaker 1: have sex with somebody. Somebody like this isn't like a
Speaker 1: person who I imagine is just you know, sick with
Speaker 1: the vapors or something. This is a person who listened
Speaker 1: to Kirk Colbain at some point in their life, like
Speaker 1: I'm gonna eat this and then I'm going to have
Speaker 1: sex with a person. You know. I admire the kind
Speaker 1: of the creativity of you. You find an animal and
Speaker 1: you find find their pea and their pooh, and you're like,
Speaker 1: you know what I'm feeling it? Yeah, this looks like
Speaker 1: this is this is These are good vibes. These are
Speaker 1: vibing with me. This looks like it's gonna take things
Speaker 1: up a nutch. Yeah, sexually, honey. I know you said
Speaker 1: you wanted to spice things up in the bedroom. Well
Speaker 1: eat this. I was in the forest just chowing down
Speaker 1: on squirrel turns and it screamed like a dying child
Speaker 1: falling from a cliff, and I thought, let's eat it
Speaker 1: and then set so you could say I'm pretty horny.
Speaker 1: You can see how I got directly to hear from there,
Speaker 1: you can say, you can see you can see why
Speaker 1: I am in an amorous mood. Yeah, well, what effect
Speaker 1: to know? There's nothing cute about this animal? Well not
Speaker 1: even the picture of it is cute. It's like, yeah,
Speaker 1: and promise cute, I promise squirrel. It's a lot of squirrel.
Speaker 1: I think some people instinctively think that squirrels are cute,
Speaker 1: and I'm like, this, this is not that. It's not that. Yeah. Well,
Speaker 1: you know, all I promised was squirrel content, you know,
Speaker 1: And so I'm not liable for any kind of squirrel
Speaker 1: related like deaths of people trying to eat squirrel poop
Speaker 1: and beeting getting their hair chewed off by one of
Speaker 1: these pine needle eating giant cat sized flying wooly squirrels.
Speaker 1: Is anybody selling their feces a your Probably I'm gonna
Speaker 1: say this is like it's a rule. If there's some
Speaker 1: kind of animal poop out there, I'm gonna go with
Speaker 1: probably someone selling it. You can buy it, Yeah, you
Speaker 1: can buy Yeah, there's like that that that civit cat poop,
Speaker 1: that like that palm civet poop that gets sold as
Speaker 1: expensive coffee. So I'm gonna say, yes, absolutely, probably someone
Speaker 1: selling it on Etsy for killing oh my god, some
Speaker 1: Etsy person. All right, well that's what I'll be googling
Speaker 1: after this. I'm gonna have to look at that. So
Speaker 1: I know I front loaded it with a big squirrel.
Speaker 1: But the thing is, I really keep talking about big
Speaker 1: squirrels because apparently there's actually a good number of large
Speaker 1: squirrels in the world. I mean, this one, it's impossible
Speaker 1: to tell its dimensions from a picture, but it does
Speaker 1: look like an unhappy middle aged man. This is why
Speaker 1: I love it. It has a look on its face
Speaker 1: of extreme grumpiness. Now I should actually say what we're
Speaker 1: looking at. We are looking at the Indian giant flying squirrel.
Speaker 1: Another big one, another one that insists on being airborne.
Speaker 1: But he's not happy about it based on his expression.
Speaker 1: And it's like, you know, we've got two separate pictures
Speaker 1: of two separate individuals, and they both have that look.
Speaker 1: They're both extremely suspicious of your happiness, like they're they're
Speaker 1: not they're not happy for you. Uh So wait, just briefly,
Speaker 1: this Indian giant flying squirrel is not the species opposite
Speaker 1: or or divergence from the previous one, is it? Because
Speaker 1: that was in Pakistan in the Himalayas? Is this? Yeah,
Speaker 1: so this is a different species. I don't know how
Speaker 1: related they are. To be honest with you, I think
Speaker 1: so to be to be clear, they are in this
Speaker 1: family uh called scared day. Yeah. I mean you could
Speaker 1: have said square a day, right, You could have said
Speaker 1: square a day and we would all believed it, right. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna believe any pronunciation you give. Yeah, because I'm like,
Speaker 1: is this is this scurri day? Because like it'd be
Speaker 1: too too much if it was like scur a day,
Speaker 1: Like they're scurring, So we call them scre a day.
Speaker 1: That might actually be how you pronounce it. The second
Speaker 1: picture of the giant squirrel looks like overweight man try
Speaker 1: to be Batman, yeah. Yeah, it's very funny. Yeah yeah,
Speaker 1: and the batman and look at me, fear me. No,
Speaker 1: I don't need it again. But I don't need it.
Speaker 1: I can scare you in you're giving a gun crime
Speaker 1: with those black claws. Look at those dark look at
Speaker 1: those claws. My parents, My parents were killed and they
Speaker 1: left behind me millions of nuts. Actually just probably eat
Speaker 1: eat more like a tree fruit. Um. But yeah, let me,
Speaker 1: let me, let me tell you a little bit about
Speaker 1: this guy. Another large gliding squirrel similar to the uh
Speaker 1: wooly flying squirrel. Um, but you know, they are a
Speaker 1: little a little bit smaller actually. Um. They're fluffy, ash
Speaker 1: brown with a perpetually grumpy little face. They have like
Speaker 1: a little button nose, which should make them cute, but
Speaker 1: they seem extremely unhappy about the fact that they're cute,
Speaker 1: Like they just don't they're not having it. They're about
Speaker 1: seventeen inches or forty three cimeters from snoot to butt,
Speaker 1: and they have a tail of about nineteen inches or
Speaker 1: fifty centimeters, so a little smaller than the wooly flying squirrel. Uh.
Speaker 1: They live in high out to forests in our our
Speaker 1: boreal so they live in trees. They eat fruits in
Speaker 1: in all sorts of business that they can find in
Speaker 1: the trees. I think one of the best things about
Speaker 1: these guys, other than their perpetually frustrated expression, is that
Speaker 1: they have a call that is easily mistaken for an
Speaker 1: owl call uh, specifically the spot bellied eagle owl call uh,
Speaker 1: which honestly, I should probably talk about the spot bellied
Speaker 1: eagle owl on another episode. Because they are also ridonculous looking.
Speaker 1: They have huge head tufts that look like giant bunny ears,
Speaker 1: but they're just feather tufts. Uh. So I get like,
Speaker 1: I don't know. It's every time I do research for it,
Speaker 1: there's always like ten other ridiculous animals are like, and
Speaker 1: I exist too. Look at me like they're all trying
Speaker 1: to impress you like a carnival, right right, gays a
Speaker 1: on my head, dongles. Yeah, let me play you the
Speaker 1: sound of I could not find a recording of the
Speaker 1: call of the giant Indian flying squirrel, but I could
Speaker 1: find a recording of the call of this spot bellied
Speaker 1: eagle owl, whom the squirrel is purported to sound like.
Speaker 1: So you know, here we go. So I just want
Speaker 1: you to imagine, you know, let's go, let's take a
Speaker 1: trip to imagination station. Feel like we haven't been to
Speaker 1: imagination station in a while, but let's let's go back there.
Speaker 1: Imagine you're in the forest at night, in one of
Speaker 1: these forests in India, and and it's nighttime, and you
Speaker 1: hear the haunting cry and you look above you expecting
Speaker 1: to maybe see a bird ward and you just see
Speaker 1: this big fluffy thing, I mean, just a kite made
Speaker 1: out of fur, and and it's scowls at you, uh
Speaker 1: as it's flying overhead, and it's like it looks like
Speaker 1: the Batman, but with fur. I'm pretty sure that's the
Speaker 1: exact plot of Blair Witch. Like they get lost in
Speaker 1: there here in that screen with squirrels the whole time,
Speaker 1: giant squirrels the whole time. We was a witch, but
Speaker 1: we was squirrels the whole time. We was always the witch.
Speaker 1: We told you, we told you we'd get you for
Speaker 1: not sharing your your bagel with us. I kind of
Speaker 1: enjoyed enjoying the idea of like the medieval town version
Speaker 1: of these squirrels, like just getting together and like having
Speaker 1: an irate conversation. I'm enjoying that. Yeah, if you put
Speaker 1: a hat on these squirrels a cabby hat. And I'm
Speaker 1: not belittling them. I'm just saying if you did, they
Speaker 1: would feel right at home Thanksgiving. Just dare you? Dare
Speaker 1: you you put anti squirre technology and your But what's
Speaker 1: going on in the treats? Anybody want to hear what's
Speaker 1: going on in the trees. They're not great in all
Speaker 1: these nuts. It's not easy. Do they eat nuts? What
Speaker 1: are they eating? These ones probably eat more like tree
Speaker 1: fruits and they're they're probably also like nuts and stuff,
Speaker 1: not not acorns. Um, I don't imagine there are acorns
Speaker 1: and these kinds of horse but yeah, like tree, tree fruits,
Speaker 1: tree nuts, that that kind of that kind of business. Um.
Speaker 1: But you know, in case you were worried there weren't
Speaker 1: enough huge flying squirrels to contend with, there's another one.
Speaker 1: They fly out. Uh yeah, if you cross a fox
Speaker 1: with a squirrel with a bird, you get the red
Speaker 1: jo flying squirrel. Found in Southeast Asia and China again
Speaker 1: near the Himalayas. So they like they like this region
Speaker 1: sort of near the Himalayas. Um it's they are like
Speaker 1: bright brick red, almost orange, and quite large. They have
Speaker 1: a long, thin tail. And they're less fluffy than their
Speaker 1: other than like the wooly flying squirrel. Uh, they kind
Speaker 1: of have this like smooth fur which is a little
Speaker 1: bit eerie. And yeah, they just barely look like squirrels,
Speaker 1: but they they are quite quite strange, like when when
Speaker 1: they're flying, they're just basically a rectangle of fur. And
Speaker 1: then this weird little squirrel fox body looking down at
Speaker 1: you with its balls kind of yeah, yeah, it's it's
Speaker 1: definitely flying balls first at you. Yeah, it looks like
Speaker 1: a Yeah. Also, this is one of the rare times
Speaker 1: where I'm like, did we need the menacing eyeshadow? Like
Speaker 1: these things have like these these again batman asque the
Speaker 1: dark paints around their eyes, you know, yeah, yeah, it's
Speaker 1: it's just it's crazy to me that there are so
Speaker 1: many not just giant squirrels, but giant flying squirrels. Like it.
Speaker 1: They seem to be okay with being huge and in
Speaker 1: the air, which I think it's quite something like when
Speaker 1: we think about flying squirrels, they're the little they fit
Speaker 1: in your pocket, you know, they're cute, they're adorable, little
Speaker 1: tiny things, and you're like, yeah, that makes sense. You
Speaker 1: could be airborne because you're so small, but these are
Speaker 1: these are big and coming right at you. In fact,
Speaker 1: there's another one called the red and white giant flying squirrels,
Speaker 1: another species very similar to the red giant flying squirrel,
Speaker 1: but they have like a little white mask that they
Speaker 1: wear on their furs. They don't really wear it. It's,
Speaker 1: you know, biologically a part of them. It's just the
Speaker 1: way they're furze colored. But it's kind of like a
Speaker 1: bit of like a reverse red panda coloration. A little
Speaker 1: bit going on here. But you know, it's a look,
Speaker 1: it's a statement. This is in Africa? Is that what
Speaker 1: these are? Is that what I heard? No, I'm wrong.
Speaker 1: I think they're still in India and Asia. So all
Speaker 1: the cool flying squirrels are in kind of a centralized region.
Speaker 1: It seems like. Yeah, they seem to like to be
Speaker 1: in and around the Himalayas, which I think is interesting.
Speaker 1: But yeah, I know that the red and white giant
Speaker 1: flying squirrel is found in China, um mainland China and
Speaker 1: maybe South Asia. So okay, yeah, okay, but not with
Speaker 1: the flying squirrels. Tired of them, you know, I'm tired
Speaker 1: of They're too big for their bridges. They're like, oh,
Speaker 1: look at me, you know, I'm in the air and
Speaker 1: I'm so big. It's like, you know what, I'm tired
Speaker 1: of that. It's gimmicky. I mean, especially when they're clearly
Speaker 1: trying to tea bag you from the sky. Yeah, what's
Speaker 1: up with that? They're like, you know, these nuts and
Speaker 1: it's like, you know, hello, twenty or jokes, thanks for that,
Speaker 1: But yeah, I want to talk about a big old
Speaker 1: squirrel who doesn't like to put on airs and pretend
Speaker 1: like it's a bird, the Indian giant squirrel. It's a
Speaker 1: huge squirrel, but it doesn't fuss with flying, thank god. Finally,
Speaker 1: just like an honest squirrel. He's like, you know what,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna be a big squirrel, but not you know,
Speaker 1: just go like, oh, well look at me. Maybe I'm
Speaker 1: maybe I'm half bird, maybe I'm batman, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean. I'm just I'm big and I'm colorful. Uh.
Speaker 1: It is a amazing looking squirrel, one of the most
Speaker 1: beautiful squirls I think in the world. I actually mentioned
Speaker 1: this guy briefly on a Listener Question episode, but they
Speaker 1: definitely deserve more attention. They live in tropical forests in
Speaker 1: India and eat a lot of fruits, and tree nuts,
Speaker 1: and they helped the forest with seed disperse so with
Speaker 1: their poop. So they're helpful, beautiful and helpful. God who
Speaker 1: knew squirrel poop with such a valuable commodity. I mean,
Speaker 1: I'm glad I invested in it though. Yeah, that's that's
Speaker 1: the doche coin of nature, right, Like, why is your
Speaker 1: house covered in squirrel poop? And it's like, little do
Speaker 1: you know, I'm sitting on millions squirrel It's gonna explode,
Speaker 1: just like Crypto, right right right to the moon. They're
Speaker 1: a bit smaller than the giant flying squirrels we've been
Speaker 1: talking about. They're only about a foot long from nose
Speaker 1: to butt and a foot long at the tail, so
Speaker 1: about two ft total. But still that is, you know,
Speaker 1: like sixty centimeters of squirrel. That's a lot of squirrels still.
Speaker 1: But what really sets them apart is their truly spectacular coat.
Speaker 1: They have a brownish like almost blue, bluish black purply
Speaker 1: color on their tails and their backs. They have a
Speaker 1: band across their backs also that's like I'm a rune,
Speaker 1: purply color like a mauve. And then they have gold
Speaker 1: fur on their bellies and their faces, and there they
Speaker 1: have a little on top of their heads. They have
Speaker 1: more of that like mav color. Uh, and they're just
Speaker 1: absolutely gorgeous. They also have this like stripe of yellow
Speaker 1: that runs down the underside of their tail. Just the
Speaker 1: most colorful squirrel I've ever seen. Yeah, they look like
Speaker 1: a lot of like uh, recent baseball and football jerseys
Speaker 1: in like Arizona, you know, I mean like those like warm,
Speaker 1: those warm, cool, interesting colors you don't see any other place.
Speaker 1: You're like, all right, yeah, the squirrels where they are, Yeah,
Speaker 1: they're going there definitely. It is like you would find
Speaker 1: a Pinterest board with like these color combos as like
Speaker 1: as an aesthetic. Yeah, you put you put a d
Speaker 1: Bax's hat on this thing, and it's you know, it's
Speaker 1: right at home. H that they're black. By the way,
Speaker 1: I don't think I've ever seen that in nature before. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Like it's a really unusual color, it is. And it's
Speaker 1: interesting because mammals are somewhat limited in terms of our
Speaker 1: color palettes. Really, we don't have that many bright colors.
Speaker 1: Just that's it's based on you know, the structure of
Speaker 1: fur and with things like birds, their their wings structure,
Speaker 1: the structure of their their feathers can actually refract light
Speaker 1: in a certain way and create much more vibrant colors
Speaker 1: than the mammals generally are capable of. So it is
Speaker 1: quite astounding when you get for that's just like you
Speaker 1: know what we're going with, like purply blue and maroon.
Speaker 1: It's I would love an eyeshadow palette and these colors only.
Speaker 1: I think a lot of people could use it. Uh, absolutely,
Speaker 1: a lot of people could use it. You know, if
Speaker 1: it was two thousand five, I wouldn't have minded it.
Speaker 1: You know back when, back when Guyline there was doing
Speaker 1: what was happening? Yeah, you know, we got to bring
Speaker 1: back guyliner. Sure, you know what if squirrel, if this
Speaker 1: squirrel could bring back Guyliner, I think our world would
Speaker 1: be better off for it. I agree, if you could
Speaker 1: just get Franz Ferdinand to release another record and uh
Speaker 1: get Guyliner back in Back in Vogue, two thousand five
Speaker 1: will be here again. We're actually going to take a
Speaker 1: quick break. But speaking of two thousand five, actually probably
Speaker 1: even earlier. When we get back, we're going to talk
Speaker 1: about goth squirrels. So the squirrels are going goth, you know,
Speaker 1: like nineteen five to two thousand and nine called Our
Speaker 1: God's Still Around. That was an arbitrary a little bit
Speaker 1: set up dates a little bit, you know. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: think it's it's more I mean, I haven't been goth,
Speaker 1: but I think it's like contained a certain musical tastes
Speaker 1: or bands. Now know, when was Hot Topic? Oh, founded,
Speaker 1: So I don't know, probably ninety five, I'm guessing I'm
Speaker 1: gonna google it. But night nine, Hey, I was born. Yeah,
Speaker 1: founded in nine nine, So I guess that's when goth started, right,
Speaker 1: I'm going to get people are gonna be so mad.
Speaker 1: I don't think so. I think Hot Topic was actually
Speaker 1: more of a cell stuff to suburban versions of goths. Yeah, yeah, no,
Speaker 1: absolutely and all that. Yeah, but it definitely peaked in
Speaker 1: late nineties. That's when I remember, you know, that's when
Speaker 1: I remember people going to school as goth and it
Speaker 1: being like that's the thing everyone's doing now, right, Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I know. Even when I was in high school, I
Speaker 1: felt like there was still a good contingent of goths,
Speaker 1: you know, going around out with the boots that were
Speaker 1: like big, chunky, like so much so much hell, you
Speaker 1: got to really commit five extra inches, yeah, so many laces. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you can't step lately anywhere if you're a yeah you
Speaker 1: got a clunk around, Yeah, yeah, you're never sneaking in anywhere,
Speaker 1: Like that's not happened. No, you know, I've never heard
Speaker 1: of a sneaky goth. You know that runs contrary to
Speaker 1: the goth kind of manifesto. I believe that I can
Speaker 1: accept that having no idea. Yeah, I'm just gonna say things,
Speaker 1: What are gonna do get me? With their sad powers,
Speaker 1: they might be like, hang on, I'm gonna put on
Speaker 1: these boots and got it. I'm gonna come get you.
Speaker 1: But you know it's going to take a while because
Speaker 1: I've got so many laces scared of you. You've got
Speaker 1: too many laces. We're gonna bring back email. That's what
Speaker 1: we're gonna do, you know, Well, lest the show become
Speaker 1: just go joke our you know. No, the squirrels. The
Speaker 1: squirrels are golf now. They're golf now, So provosts squirrel,
Speaker 1: which again I think is actually already kind of a
Speaker 1: goff name because they like that that kind of stuff,
Speaker 1: like provost or my name is Illiquium and your name
Speaker 1: is Provost. And we are drinking, uh tomato juice but
Speaker 1: maybe it's blood. We don't know. But the prevoce squirrel
Speaker 1: is also known as the Asian tricolored squirrel. And they
Speaker 1: are black, white, and red. Some are just black and
Speaker 1: red and some are black and orange. So they are
Speaker 1: really really dressing Halloween all year long. I mean they
Speaker 1: look incredible. Yeah, they look they look incredible. The orange
Speaker 1: like the blood stained centerpiece here, like the breastplate of
Speaker 1: blood or I guess sort of rust. But you know,
Speaker 1: one could imagine pretty blood red for some of them. Yeah,
Speaker 1: one could imagine Prevost just like drinking out of a
Speaker 1: chalice like he was Gangrell and WF. For sure, you
Speaker 1: can see it. I like these squirrels that my style Prevost.
Speaker 1: My name is Prevost, and these squirrels I like them.
Speaker 1: They're over the top, just like me. Yeah. They're found
Speaker 1: in Sumatra, Borneo and the time Malay Peninsula in forests
Speaker 1: and they yeah, they because their habitats have been kind
Speaker 1: of disrupted by human activity. They like to visit your
Speaker 1: garden if you live in those areas, which you know what,
Speaker 1: I love a goth squirrel garden party, you know it
Speaker 1: for sure. You know they're just like, I mean, the
Speaker 1: one thing you have to give goths and goth squirrels
Speaker 1: is they're mostly pretty chilled out. Yeah, you know, like
Speaker 1: this squirrel doesn't look like it's causing a problem or
Speaker 1: like screaming at you. They're exhausted from getting that cut
Speaker 1: crease on their eyeliner, you know what I mean. Like
Speaker 1: they are two, they have spent five hours on their makeup,
Speaker 1: so they're not going to start a fight. No, just
Speaker 1: pop on the Joy Division record and we'll all chill out, man.
Speaker 1: But yeah, no, these are like I feel like, actually,
Speaker 1: this one's sort of like the SF Giants coloration, like orange,
Speaker 1: white and black. Um, this one's just this one straight
Speaker 1: up just like blood red and black, like blood red
Speaker 1: on its tummy and black on its back. That's that's hardcore. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's like the Black Widow of squirrels. Yeah, yeah, no,
Speaker 1: it's absolutely. Yeah, it's pretty that's pretty melodramatic for a squirrel, yes, right, Like,
Speaker 1: and I'm not I'm not saying that that's wrong. I'm
Speaker 1: just saying like, hey man, why you know, like what's wrong,
Speaker 1: like what's up? You need to talk or anything that's
Speaker 1: not kind of like middle school golfs where they're basically
Speaker 1: little babies. They've drawn like black eyeliner that like runs
Speaker 1: down their face and it's like, oh, but you're like
Speaker 1: ten years old, Like you're not even old enough to
Speaker 1: like disintegration or something. You know. Uh, you just like
Speaker 1: the makeup, yeah, which, hey, it is great, Which is great. No,
Speaker 1: I'm not No, you can get like the squirrel too.
Speaker 1: It's like, you know, what if you want to be
Speaker 1: a cute little squirrel. And this is like, to be clear,
Speaker 1: these are like just standard squirrel shaped, like they look
Speaker 1: like little squirrels. It's just it's like you took a
Speaker 1: squirrel and you know, just put on some golf makeup
Speaker 1: on just a normal squirrel. I mean, I do enjoy
Speaker 1: this bit. It kind of looks like it was painted almost,
Speaker 1: Like that's what's so crazy, is it. It's like that's
Speaker 1: another weird color of black, not not not quite as
Speaker 1: as unusual as the other one, but like a pretty
Speaker 1: dark color of black. And then the red is like
Speaker 1: night and day different, like it's so saturated bright. Uh,
Speaker 1: it's pretty. It's pretty wild. Yeah, yeah, they don't. They
Speaker 1: look like they've they've got some kind of filter on
Speaker 1: these squirrels. But I don't think so and this is
Speaker 1: just the straight up squirrel truth. Yeah, and these kinds
Speaker 1: of colors are very rarely seen in mammals, that bright
Speaker 1: blood red, especially contrasted with the black. Yeah, I mean
Speaker 1: you you hit the nail on the head with like
Speaker 1: they are black widow coloration, which is crazy. Probably owl
Speaker 1: poison and I'll eats one of those, and it's just
Speaker 1: you know what I mean, like it dies gurgling as
Speaker 1: soon as it eats one of these. I thought you
Speaker 1: were kind of like saying, like a band of owls
Speaker 1: that like Poison the band, but made up of owls, Like, yeah,
Speaker 1: but that would be a parliament of owls, wouldn't it.
Speaker 1: Right right now? That's true, But I mean because I
Speaker 1: was gonna say, like I think Poison is glam metal,
Speaker 1: it's not really gone. No, Poison is not goth. That
Speaker 1: is accurate. It's the wrong, wrong aesthetic and vibe. I mean,
Speaker 1: when I think of God, it's basically the Cure and
Speaker 1: joint Division, Like those are the bands that are like, like,
Speaker 1: you can't go wrong with either of those. Yeah, but yeah,
Speaker 1: other squirrels are deciding to go goth as well. I'm
Speaker 1: sure you are familiar with the Eastern gray squirrel. Even
Speaker 1: if you don't live in the east of the US,
Speaker 1: they are still in the west of the US because
Speaker 1: they are good at spread and around. But yeah, the
Speaker 1: if you live in basically anywhere in the US, and
Speaker 1: even in I think Canada and all over North America,
Speaker 1: the eastern gray squirrel is finds its way around. Um,
Speaker 1: especially around college campuses. I'm sure you've seen them. And
Speaker 1: they have this thing that happens in mutation of their coat,
Speaker 1: which creates melanistic squirrels. So melanistic squirrels are black instead
Speaker 1: of gray. And you know how like there's albino versions
Speaker 1: of animals, that's where they kind of lack all pigment.
Speaker 1: Melanistic versions of animals are the opposite. They have extreme pigment.
Speaker 1: So this occurs in other animals as well. In fact,
Speaker 1: black panthers are there is no distinct species of like
Speaker 1: black panthers. Those are melanistic versions of leopards and jaguars.
Speaker 1: I didn't know that. Yeah, okay, I'm looking right now
Speaker 1: at a eastern gray squirrel that's melanistic and uh this
Speaker 1: is this is a great looking creature. I think like like, wow,
Speaker 1: if you saw one of these in the wild. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they're beautiful. They're also like very striking and be like, WHOA,
Speaker 1: but but they're really beautiful. I I hope to run
Speaker 1: into one the next time I'm at a university campus
Speaker 1: where squirrels rule all squirrels everything there. Well, if you
Speaker 1: want to see some of these melanistic squirrels, you can
Speaker 1: go up to the Stanford College campus in northern California,
Speaker 1: where there are bountiful numbers of these melanistic squirrels. In fact,
Speaker 1: there are so many around the Stanford College campus that
Speaker 1: there was a rumor that they were an escaped scientific
Speaker 1: experiment that some scientists, Stanford scientists are just like, yeah,
Speaker 1: we're gonna make make some uh make some god squirrels
Speaker 1: and release them. I mean, they do look like you know,
Speaker 1: in the genetic Mentel's p plant arrangement of it all,
Speaker 1: they do look like they were made you know what
Speaker 1: I mean. Uh, yeah, you wouldn't think it's what you're
Speaker 1: saying is like a strange mutation. You'd think they were bred.
Speaker 1: So I understand that rumor, Yeah, it's but yeah, no,
Speaker 1: it is incredible because they do occur naturally, completely naturally.
Speaker 1: In fact, like I think we've seen so many other
Speaker 1: squirrels that have ridiculous coke colorations that at this point
Speaker 1: it's like, oh, yeah, of course, of course these black
Speaker 1: versions of the gray squirrels are gonna occur naturally. As
Speaker 1: to why this coat coloration happens, I mean similar to albinism,
Speaker 1: Like there is just a genetic mutation that can mess
Speaker 1: with the body's production of melanin and pigment. But we
Speaker 1: don't see that many albino animals because they are such
Speaker 1: easy pickens for predators unfortunately, so as beautiful as they
Speaker 1: can be, they are you know, often picked off by
Speaker 1: predators pretty quickly because it's easy to spot them, whereas
Speaker 1: luckily with the melanistic squirrels and other animals, Uh, that's
Speaker 1: not as much of a factor. So, like, they don't
Speaker 1: stick out as much as an albino animals, so they
Speaker 1: often survive more than their albino counterparts. So in terms
Speaker 1: of natural settings where the melanistic coat variation maybe beneficial.
Speaker 1: It's theorized that in certain forests that go through more
Speaker 1: periodic burnings that black coat coloration would help them fit
Speaker 1: in with sort of a black forest. Yeah, there's also
Speaker 1: a theory that the black firm may help them stay
Speaker 1: warm in the winter due to thermoregulation, where you know
Speaker 1: they're absorbing more heat from the sun, but I would
Speaker 1: imagine that would also put them at a disadvantage because
Speaker 1: black fur on white snow would make it really easy
Speaker 1: for a predator to spot. Uh. But really, you will
Speaker 1: see most of them in an urban environment, especially around
Speaker 1: college campuses. And the most compelling reason for them being
Speaker 1: so plentiful around college campuses and in urban areas is
Speaker 1: that their natural predators are pushed out of the urban environments,
Speaker 1: so there are fewer hunting pressures on them, so they
Speaker 1: can just thrive in their beautiful black coats. So if
Speaker 1: you've been on a college campus, sometimes you know like
Speaker 1: there will be like an albino squirrel that gets really
Speaker 1: fame miss amongst the campus. And the reason that you'll
Speaker 1: spot these albino squirrels and they may live to adulthood
Speaker 1: is that they are somewhat sheltered by being on a
Speaker 1: college campus because there are going to be fewer of
Speaker 1: their natural predators around so many people, whereas the squirrels
Speaker 1: are totally fine with the presence of of human beings. Um.
Speaker 1: So uh, you know, college campuses are kind of ideal
Speaker 1: for these squirrels because the high foot traffic, lots of
Speaker 1: people willing to part with food, lots of trees, lots
Speaker 1: of noise pollution, uh and light pollution that probably drives
Speaker 1: off animals like owls or red tailed hawks who would
Speaker 1: normally be their predators. So, you know, squirrels like to
Speaker 1: go to college and party. Two. Let's be honest, though,
Speaker 1: if a redtail hawk swooped down while you're in class,
Speaker 1: right and it was like, you know, ask you with
Speaker 1: its eyes, can I have some of your sandwich, you'd
Speaker 1: give it some. It's really that the hawks aren't trying
Speaker 1: as hard as they could be trying. They're not try hard. Not.
Speaker 1: This is what I keep saying. Squirrels are try hards
Speaker 1: and hawks, aren't you. Yeah, squirrels have no shame, and
Speaker 1: I'm not judging. I'm not judging them. I'm saying like
Speaker 1: they have evolved to the world we live in now,
Speaker 1: where it's like, look, we're gonna ask for food and
Speaker 1: you're gonna give it to us, and that's how it is. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's a good lesson that things like pride and shame.
Speaker 1: You know, look how successful squirrels are adapting to an
Speaker 1: urban environment. Now compare that to the less less success
Speaker 1: with red tailed hawks. Really, shame is just holding you
Speaker 1: back your your manners. Your talent manners are going to
Speaker 1: be the end of your species. So where did that get?
Speaker 1: I see you holding up your teacup with one talent
Speaker 1: daintally lifted monocle. I see you, right, and then the
Speaker 1: squirrels just down there like give us a nuts, right? Yeah,
Speaker 1: Like the squirrels basically like the drunk frat boy of
Speaker 1: the university animal them like it'll it'll wander right up
Speaker 1: to you. It's mostly harmless. It'll look at you until
Speaker 1: you address it. You know, if you give it some food,
Speaker 1: that's it. That's the end exactly. Well, before we go,
Speaker 1: I've talked a lot about squirrels outer appearances, but I
Speaker 1: want you to get to know the insides of the
Speaker 1: squirrels as well, the depth of the squirrel uh, their
Speaker 1: guts in their heart and now I'm kidding, like you
Speaker 1: know their behavior. So I'm going to talk about gray squirrels,
Speaker 1: who we actually this is what we've been talking about,
Speaker 1: the melanistic version of gray squirrels. Um and you know,
Speaker 1: we think of squirrels is just being kind of dumb
Speaker 1: and just banging nuts around and not really thinking about stuff,
Speaker 1: but that they're actually surprisingly intelligence. So gray squirrels have
Speaker 1: a pretty incredible memory for where they bury their nuts
Speaker 1: because they like to have cashes where they just like
Speaker 1: bury it in sporadic areas and so of having like
Speaker 1: one big cash, some squirrels do that, where other species
Speaker 1: where they just have like a bunch of nuts in
Speaker 1: one area, like a nut pile in like a hollow
Speaker 1: log or something, but gray squirrels like to bury it around.
Speaker 1: They diversify their portfolio. They're not portfolio. It's very smart
Speaker 1: and they are able to remember where they put these
Speaker 1: nuts and retrieve up to ninety of their cash. Obviously
Speaker 1: this can vary, so sometimes they only recover like of
Speaker 1: their cash. But there's this idea that like squirrels forget
Speaker 1: most of their nuts, and that's just not true. It's
Speaker 1: just very variable. Sometimes they're really good at retrieving like
Speaker 1: most of them. Sometimes it's harder for them to retrieve
Speaker 1: their nuts and find them. But they definitely do have
Speaker 1: good spatial memory. There have been a lot of studies
Speaker 1: on that, and they actually use kind of landmarks to
Speaker 1: help triangulate where where their nuts are. That's incredible. Yes, wow, uh,
Speaker 1: I would think that they would, like do they know
Speaker 1: when their site has been disturbed? You know what I mean,
Speaker 1: like if they bury them? Like do they know if
Speaker 1: like an owl set a little trap form or something?
Speaker 1: You know what I mean? Well, actually, sometimes they will
Speaker 1: be observed by thieves, so other squirrels will stalk them.
Speaker 1: These are all gray squirrels, so like some of them
Speaker 1: are just kind of sneakily watching another squirrel that they
Speaker 1: see has got a nut, and they like stalk them.
Speaker 1: And so squirrels have developed this strategy, this counter strategy.
Speaker 1: So the thief will stalk the squirrel and then wait
Speaker 1: until the other squirrel is gone and then go and
Speaker 1: dig up the squirrel stash and take it for themselves.
Speaker 1: So a strategy that they've done to thwart the thieves
Speaker 1: is they will bury like fake nuts, so they pretend antomime, Yeah,
Speaker 1: they pantomime burying a nut, and they actually put nothing
Speaker 1: in the ground. So like, uh, they dig a little hole,
Speaker 1: thrust their little paws inside as if they're burying something,
Speaker 1: but there's nothing there, and then cover it up with
Speaker 1: leaves and go away, so that the thieves will go
Speaker 1: over there and like try to dig up nothing, like congratulations,
Speaker 1: you found nothing, while the other squirrel is off like
Speaker 1: baring its Actually, that's incredible. It would have been a
Speaker 1: little better if there had been like one of those
Speaker 1: boxing gloves on a spring when it digs it up,
Speaker 1: you know, right right right to the thief. Yeah, or
Speaker 1: like a little note I owe you one nut. Yeah
Speaker 1: yeah x x so yeah exactly. Yeah. How far are
Speaker 1: we from squirrels and venting banks? Are we? Right? That's
Speaker 1: once that happens totally different. It's ten years. I think
Speaker 1: that's right. Yeah, yeah, we're close. I mean yeah. They
Speaker 1: are pretty smart with their nuts. They get a nut
Speaker 1: that it detects houses a larvae like a moth larvae.
Speaker 1: The squirrel will eat the nut immediately instead of storing
Speaker 1: it because it knows that the larva will eventually eat
Speaker 1: all the meat of the nut before the squirrel gets
Speaker 1: a chance to retrieve it from its cash. So like
Speaker 1: it has a nut and it's got like a little
Speaker 1: hole in it, and it goes like, well, if I
Speaker 1: bury this nut, like in a few weeks, when I
Speaker 1: come back to get the nut, the larva is probably
Speaker 1: it's worthless. The larva is going to have eaten it,
Speaker 1: so it just eats the whole nut, larva and all
Speaker 1: extra protein. It's good. Actually helped out in when I
Speaker 1: was a undergrad. I was did this. It was one
Speaker 1: of the mini student ras on like a study where
Speaker 1: we were looking at squirrel behavior with these nuts and
Speaker 1: we would give them nuts to that had holes in
Speaker 1: them and have to watch them and write our observations
Speaker 1: down on the clipboard, which was really good for my
Speaker 1: like kind of social reputation, just like sitting down giving
Speaker 1: us nut to a squirrel and then writing stuff down
Speaker 1: very normal behavior. Did you name them? And stuff like
Speaker 1: did you did you go that far? Squirrels? No? I
Speaker 1: wanted to remain impartial. Named Lucy. You're rooting for it,
Speaker 1: right right exactly. I don't want you know, it's got
Speaker 1: to be double blind. I can't know who you are squirrels.
Speaker 1: We got to protect the squirrels privacy, you know, because
Speaker 1: what if we find out like, oh, squirrels are good
Speaker 1: at this, but Hector is not, you know what I mean,
Speaker 1: like he's not good at it? Uh, yeah, then he'd learned,
Speaker 1: which we know is death for squirrels, right, No, we can't. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's shame will be the downfall of squirrels. They can't
Speaker 1: ever know shame that will. There can never be an
Speaker 1: Adam and Eve squirrel otherwise they are doomed eating the
Speaker 1: nut of eating still a snake that tempts him though,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean, Like, I feel like a
Speaker 1: snake still works for that story, right right. Fortunately, even
Speaker 1: when squirrels forget their nuts, it still has a happy
Speaker 1: ending because forgotten squirrel nuts can help with forest growth
Speaker 1: because they are essentially just doing gardening. They got tricked
Speaker 1: into doing gardening. Unbelievable. Yeah, yeah, squirrels some like they're
Speaker 1: incredibly positive influences on their environment, despite being three feet
Speaker 1: of winged doom as I as I felt earlier, right right,
Speaker 1: three to four feet of winged furry doom coming from above,
Speaker 1: screaming like a child with him the sema that description
Speaker 1: deserves to me on mat Man's tombstone, just like a
Speaker 1: chain smoking child. What is that, sir? Like? Where did
Speaker 1: did you learn that the coal mines? Where did you
Speaker 1: find that fact? Yeah? You think you know nuts? You
Speaker 1: know no nuts about nuts? You know you want to
Speaker 1: play Jack's uh well, did you enjoy learning about squirrels.
Speaker 1: They're great. What a lot of fun squirrels there are. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I still think they're like inclined towards evil, though, right,
Speaker 1: I'm allowed to still think that. I think they're just
Speaker 1: inclined towards success with no moral compass. They're a moral
Speaker 1: they're morally neutral, and but they crave success. So maybe
Speaker 1: that is what evil is. I don't know. I'm not
Speaker 1: a philosopher. I'm also not not one. I'm not a
Speaker 1: doctor of philosophy. I am simply an appreciator of squirrels.
Speaker 1: That's true. Yeah, I mean, you know you could do
Speaker 1: some positive philosophically, couldn't you. Yeah. I posit that squirrels
Speaker 1: are they are takers, and they are. I posit that
Speaker 1: squirrel not generous, can't trust they're not generous. I posit
Speaker 1: that squirrels should probably be investigated by the I R. Sure, like,
Speaker 1: so these are we're all just talking about the nuts
Speaker 1: we see? What about the nuts? You don't see? It's
Speaker 1: just kind of the tip of the nutbird underneath the forest.
Speaker 1: If you dig down far enough, we suspect there's just
Speaker 1: a gigantic nut down there. An I R. S auditor
Speaker 1: just like opens up a closet and a bunch of
Speaker 1: nuts start like you know, pouring out and then just
Speaker 1: keeps coming. You think it's gonna end, but no, more
Speaker 1: and more nuts were staring with what would be an
Speaker 1: apology in a different animals face, but not these squirrels
Speaker 1: now just smoking a cigarette thing. What do you want
Speaker 1: me to tell? Figuring out the angles? Like, that's what
Speaker 1: he's doing. My texted herd he has been in Bermuda
Speaker 1: since July. I'll lead this to you, and then he
Speaker 1: flies out the window and wings. Well, squirrels now you know,
Speaker 1: now you love them, now you fear them, Adam. Where
Speaker 1: can people find you? Where can the squirrels come to
Speaker 1: your dreams? Well, they can find my podcast on the
Speaker 1: Small Beans network. I have three of them. One of
Speaker 1: them about video games called one Upsmanship. Another one is
Speaker 1: about friendship media called I'll show your Mind to show
Speaker 1: me yours and finally direct your piec it or is
Speaker 1: about basically the filmmaking process in your pop low art movies.
Speaker 1: It's very fun. You can find me very funny on
Speaker 1: Twitter at the Real Games also Twitch. I do a
Speaker 1: lot of video games streaming. Had the Real games and
Speaker 1: some day sum in theaters, Golding Someday, someday, soon you
Speaker 1: should do one on a script the it's the Prehistoric
Speaker 1: Squirrel and the Ice Age trilogy or is it a quadrilogy?
Speaker 1: How many ice Ages are there? More than many, more
Speaker 1: than I've cared about, more than I want to face
Speaker 1: the reality of that. There's so many animated films that
Speaker 1: are like, oh, that makes a lot of money and
Speaker 1: I don't care about it. Yeah, but it's truly about script, right,
Speaker 1: Like the squirrel who's always after that nut and he
Speaker 1: can't get his nut, Like it's script, it's the human condition.
Speaker 1: He's the you know, Sisyphus of squirrel of food gathering. Yeah, right,
Speaker 1: like the rest of the Ice Age movies, I think
Speaker 1: is kind of like just junk that it's a vehicle
Speaker 1: for the script stories, which are truly beautiful. And there's
Speaker 1: a kind of Kaman exploration that's that we're all do
Speaker 1: about script, right, a nihilism. It's a squirrel. The squirrel
Speaker 1: sort of like revealing the naked, naked reality of failure
Speaker 1: to attain a journey, the hollow sorrow of success, like
Speaker 1: you know, maybe the movie right exactly, the movie begins
Speaker 1: right when he eats a nut, and it's like, now,
Speaker 1: what you know, He's always spending his time pursuing the
Speaker 1: nut and never time just experiencing. Yeah. Well, anyways, you
Speaker 1: can find us on the internet at Creature feature Pot
Speaker 1: on Instagram, at Creature feet Pot on Twitter. That's f
Speaker 1: a T not et that is something very different. You
Speaker 1: can write me your questions or comments or squirrel pictures.
Speaker 1: I'm actually playing anning on doing a good chunk of
Speaker 1: listener question shows soon, so please do send me and
Speaker 1: your questions at Creature Feature Pod at gmail dot com
Speaker 1: and I would certainly appreciate those. Thank you so much
Speaker 1: for listening. If you've been enjoying the show, I would
Speaker 1: really appreciate No, I'm not going to put it that way.
Speaker 1: That sounds appreciate. Could you know what I would appreciate
Speaker 1: it if you left a rating and review right now? Now?
Speaker 1: I'm kidding, guys, I I really just you listening is enough.
Speaker 1: I really appreciate it. But you know, if you do
Speaker 1: have the time to live a rating and review, I
Speaker 1: really really really appreciate that because that really does help
Speaker 1: the show. And I read all the reviews and they
Speaker 1: wore my Heart. I got a really sweet review from
Speaker 1: a kid recently, and I see that and it's adorable
Speaker 1: and thank you so much for for your review. It
Speaker 1: made my day. Man thanks to the Space Classics for
Speaker 1: their super awesome song. Ex Aluminate Creature features a production
Speaker 1: of I Heart Radio. For more podcasts like the one
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Speaker 1: favorite shows? See you next Wednesday.