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Speaker 1: Welcome to stuff you should know, a production of I

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Speaker 1: Heart Radio. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh,

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Speaker 1: and there's Chuck and Jerry is here. And this is

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Speaker 1: one of the greatest episodes will ever do. As far

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Speaker 1: as I'm concerned. Squirrels. I really wanted squirrels. I've been

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Speaker 1: seeing that all day. It's wonderful. That is so wonderful.

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Speaker 1: It is that song isn't But you know, uh yeah yeah.

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Speaker 1: If you go back and listen to BC Boys, you're like, wow,

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Speaker 1: they give them a long way though, and we're announcing

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Speaker 1: that stuff. Yeah for sure. Um, so we're talking not

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Speaker 1: about the BC Boys. Surprisingly, we're talking about squirrels in

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Speaker 1: the morning. It's squirrels. Every evening. It's squirrels. Squirrels to syllables, right,

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Speaker 1: I don't care however you want to say it the

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Speaker 1: little squirrel sure or Boston I guess probably they say

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Speaker 1: it similarly as well. But if you want to get fancy,

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Speaker 1: you can bust out their Latin name. They're members of

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Speaker 1: the Road in Order, but for their family, their scure

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Speaker 1: a day, Secura day. Nope, security day. I look this

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Speaker 1: one up, all right, Sierra die like my more. Okay,

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Speaker 1: did you just toot on my renovation? Yeah, even though

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Speaker 1: it was correct? Did you give me a bronx cheer? How?

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Speaker 1: How is it? Siura die? Well? Let me do the

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Speaker 1: person online? Sierra die okay? Is that Emma who said that?

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Speaker 1: Or Sierra Day was another? But I think we've heard

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Speaker 1: from people that d A E. S die okay? And

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Speaker 1: that's fine. Um, if that's what it's called, I'm just

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Speaker 1: gonna call them squirrels from now on. But there's actually

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Speaker 1: exactly three hundred species of squirrels, and it's it's kind

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Speaker 1: of hard to wrap your head around because usually if

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Speaker 1: you live in a place with squirrels, meaning you live

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Speaker 1: on a continent outside of Antarctica, yeah, like everywhere, Basically,

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Speaker 1: they're probably a lot of squirrels living around you, and

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Speaker 1: they probably all look basically exactly alike, because it seems

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Speaker 1: like when they fill an ecological niche, brother, they fill

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Speaker 1: it and there's not much room for competing species, it

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Speaker 1: seems like from my experience. Yeah, I mean there are

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Speaker 1: And who helped us with this was this? This is

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Speaker 1: a grabster. Yeah, so grabs your points out that you know,

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Speaker 1: you can find mountain squirrels and city squirrels and forest

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Speaker 1: squirrels and jungle squirrels and desert squirrels. You can find

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Speaker 1: squirrels in Alaska that hibernate with the lowest body temperature

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Speaker 1: of any mammal, that have body temperatures below freezing at times.

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Speaker 1: You can go to Africa and find one of the

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Speaker 1: cutest squirrels, the African pigmies squirrel, which is as small

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Speaker 1: as the tiny little mouse. Where you can go to

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Speaker 1: Bhutan and find the giant flying squirrel of Bhutan that

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Speaker 1: with their head and body and is over two ft long.

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Speaker 1: With that tail, they're huge, no two ft long. Without

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Speaker 1: the tail stressing they're distressingly large. Yeah, because the squirrel

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Speaker 1: tail will get into this, but that's one of their

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Speaker 1: signature features generally, although depending on the species, because there

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Speaker 1: are three hundred species, like you said, more than are

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Speaker 1: almost three, some of those tails are a little diminished.

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Speaker 1: But usually when you think squirrel, you think of that

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Speaker 1: big bushy tail. Yeah, and not only when you think

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Speaker 1: of squirrel you think of the tail. But the Greeks themselves,

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Speaker 1: somebody decided that a Greek term would make sense, but

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Speaker 1: scurrios or scurios, which roughly means something like shadow tail

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Speaker 1: ed says shady Butt, also saw shadow tail, which is

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Speaker 1: a reference to how squirrels sometimes high in the shadow

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Speaker 1: cast by their own tail. It's pretty pretty clever, but

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Speaker 1: the squirrel is usually kind of the bushy tail of

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Speaker 1: the squirrel is what makes a squirrel of squirrel. One

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Speaker 1: of the other things that really differentiates it from other

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Speaker 1: rodents is the way that its jaw and muscle are

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Speaker 1: attached to its skull. There's actually a name for it,

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Speaker 1: sirio morphous zygo massoteric system. They look at you hooked

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Speaker 1: on phonics works for me. You even recorded the new pronunciation.

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Speaker 1: You worked it right in there with a syria die

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Speaker 1: I adapted, Yeah, because you should have heard it before

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Speaker 1: when I was work shopping it. That was the first take. Everybody,

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Speaker 1: we're not lying, so um so uh. Those are two

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Speaker 1: things that really kind of differentiates squirrels. But as we've

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Speaker 1: really um gotten better and better at at taxonomy with

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Speaker 1: the introduction of UM genome mapping, we can see like, oh,

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Speaker 1: this animal that doesn't look anything like this animal is

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Speaker 1: actually really closely related and with as with just about

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Speaker 1: every other animal we've studied using modern genetic m taxonomy,

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Speaker 1: UM squirrels are. Our understanding of squirrels has really kind

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Speaker 1: of changed shape of who's related to whom, who's descended

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Speaker 1: from who. But there's there. We're kind of going to

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Speaker 1: go the old school way, which is differentiating them based

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Speaker 1: on their habitat and their behavior. So there's three groups

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Speaker 1: of squirrels that we're going to cover, even though there's

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Speaker 1: technically five subfamilies now ground squirrels, tree squirrels, and flying squirrels.

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Speaker 1: And before we go any further, I officially dedicate this

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Speaker 1: episode to Momo, one of the great lovers of squirrels

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Speaker 1: of all time, who changed changed me in my heart

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Speaker 1: towards squirrels. I used to be a squirrel hatter, chuck squirrels.

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Speaker 1: You remember the bird feeder Momo pointed out to me, said, Dad,

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Speaker 1: squirrels are great. I'm going to teach you to love them.

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Speaker 1: And she did. Yeah, dogs and squirrels. It's what was

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Speaker 1: the Disney It was either Pixar Disney had animated movie

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Speaker 1: where the dog would just stop and go squirrel anytime

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Speaker 1: there's a squirrel. I can't remember which one it was.

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Speaker 1: I don't remember. It wasn't that long ago. But before

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Speaker 1: we move on, to ground squirrels. Uh. It is kind

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Speaker 1: of fun to learn that because of that DNA analysis

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Speaker 1: that we now have at our fingertips and fossil evidence,

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Speaker 1: we know that squirrels uh went to western North America

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Speaker 1: forty million years ago because squirrels like to get around.

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Speaker 1: As we will see, they crossed a land bridge to

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Speaker 1: Eurasia about ten million years after that, and then as

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Speaker 1: soon as they could, as soon as Eurasia met up

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Speaker 1: with Africa about twenty million years ago, they went all right,

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Speaker 1: we're in Africa now too. Because squirrels like to get around.

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Speaker 1: They as you will see. Um, well we'll just tease

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Speaker 1: that and say, squirrels like to get around. Yeah, I mean,

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Speaker 1: you put one tree next to another, squirrel is going

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Speaker 1: to go from tree a treat, but another tree is

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Speaker 1: gonna go the next tree. And if you put trees

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Speaker 1: all the way across one continent to another, they're going

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Speaker 1: to micrate. That's just what they do, and that's what

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Speaker 1: they did. But if I thought I loved squirrels before,

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Speaker 1: now that I know that they're actually native from thirty

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Speaker 1: five million years back to North America, I just think

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Speaker 1: that's that's just the tops. Yeah, And we talked about

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Speaker 1: it before when you were having your bird feeder issue.

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Speaker 1: But you know, Atlanta is a city in the forest,

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Speaker 1: and we have tons and tons and tons of squirrels.

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Speaker 1: Kind of everywhere along the East Coast does, but Atlanta

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Speaker 1: just has a lot of squirrels. And as I was reading,

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Speaker 1: you know, from my upstairs office, there's a window not

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Speaker 1: right in front of my face but sort of above me,

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Speaker 1: and are huge, big, beautiful oak in our front yard.

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Speaker 1: Um doing this on squirrels. I just look up for

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Speaker 1: a second and I see four squirrels running around that

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Speaker 1: tree together, playing like circling it like a barber pole.

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Speaker 1: I take my daughter to school this morning and count

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Speaker 1: the squirrels that I see on the way. I counted

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Speaker 1: twenty two squirrels that I just saw on a you know,

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Speaker 1: twelve minute car ride. You hit one of them there,

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Speaker 1: I have before. It's the worst thing ever. But they're

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Speaker 1: everywhere in Atlanta. And it hit me a while ago

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Speaker 1: about how easy it is living here, just or anywhere

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Speaker 1: where there's a lot of squirrels, just to sort of

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Speaker 1: be like, yeah, the squirrels. But it kind of hit

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Speaker 1: me like how crazy it is that there are these

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Speaker 1: little mammals. They're not hiding in holes generally like mice

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Speaker 1: and stuff like that. Like, they're just out all over

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Speaker 1: the place at all times. Were surrounded by these little mammals. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: out and proud. And if you come close too close

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Speaker 1: to one of their trees when you're walking by and

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Speaker 1: the squirrel doesn't like it, he's gonna sit there or

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Speaker 1: she uh and chatter at you and basically tell you

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Speaker 1: to beat it, you punk, get away from my tree.

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Speaker 1: That's how. That's one of the great lovable things about squirrels.

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Speaker 1: They have such huge personalities, just so great. Chuck. Remember

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Speaker 1: my famous squirrel attack not too long ago, and that

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Speaker 1: when I went outside on I got it on my

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Speaker 1: doorbell camera and that squirrel leaped through the air and

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Speaker 1: hit me in the leg. It was a complete accident.

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Speaker 1: Of course, I don't think the squirrel was trying to

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Speaker 1: kill me, but you don't know. They're just they're all

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Speaker 1: over the place. We're gonna get to all the fun

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Speaker 1: stuff about the black squirrels of New York and why

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Speaker 1: squirrels stop in the middle of the road when they

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Speaker 1: go to across the street. Like there we found reasons

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Speaker 1: for all this stuff, which I love. It's not that

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Speaker 1: squirrels are dumb, and we're going to reveal all that

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Speaker 1: in this episode. Okay, I'm a little excited. I'm a

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Speaker 1: little worked up. I know it's a ted early, but

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Speaker 1: we're so squirrel positive that, I mean, it's a great

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Speaker 1: way to put it. Chuck, all right, so are we

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Speaker 1: taking a break? I say, all right, I need to

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Speaker 1: calm down too, And I guarantee you I'm gonna go

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Speaker 1: like blow my nose in the other room. I'm gonna

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Speaker 1: see a squirrel. I'll be right back, all right, Chuck. So,

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Speaker 1: as promised, we're gonna break squirrels down into three groups crown, tree, uh,

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Speaker 1: flying or aerial um. And I proposed that we start

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Speaker 1: with the ground squirrel, many species of which you probably

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Speaker 1: not you, but I mean you, dear listener, and me

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Speaker 1: I'll include too. Didn't realize we're actual squirrels like groundhog,

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Speaker 1: Chuck did not know that was a squirrel, chipmunk. I

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Speaker 1: had a feeling that might be a squirrel. Gosh, they're

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Speaker 1: so great too. What about a groundhog? You already said groundhog?

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Speaker 1: Did I? Okay? In a list of four things, I'm swirling,

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Speaker 1: I'm swirling still if my love is Yeah, well that's

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Speaker 1: what was coming out of my mouth. Next, Yeah, prairie

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Speaker 1: dog didn't know what about that mere cat? I didn't

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Speaker 1: know that. Well, that's because they're not but prairie dogs, chipmunks,

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Speaker 1: and um, what was the other one? Mormons? Yeah, Marmattan

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Speaker 1: brought them in and groundhogs. Those are all ground squirrels.

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Speaker 1: They're squirrels friends, um, and that makes them pretty awesome.

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Speaker 1: But one of the reasons why they you wouldn't think

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Speaker 1: they're squirrels is because and a lot of those species

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Speaker 1: they lack that characteristic bushy tail. But then also they

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Speaker 1: live almost a totally different life from their tree dwelling

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Speaker 1: more famous cousins. Yeah. I mean they might climb a tree,

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Speaker 1: but generally you're not going to see a groundhogger prairie

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Speaker 1: dog up in the tree if they knew, if they

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Speaker 1: need to, you know, for a brief time, if they're

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Speaker 1: trying to find food or something or uh like on

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Speaker 1: the run from something trying to kill it, they might

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Speaker 1: go up in a tree, but they generally hang out

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Speaker 1: on the ground, hence the name. They love their rocky terrain. Uh. Chipmunks,

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Speaker 1: for speaking for them, are pretty solitary unless they're trying

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Speaker 1: to reproduce. But uh, I know that you've found some stuff.

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Speaker 1: Was it on the prairie dogs that that have their

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Speaker 1: big families and colonies. Yeah, I mean that's one of

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Speaker 1: the main characteristics of of ground squirrels in general, aside

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Speaker 1: from a couple, but that they're much more communal than

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Speaker 1: tree squirrels, and in particular, the largest town a prairie

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Speaker 1: dog town is what they're called the largest prairie dog

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Speaker 1: town on record is in Texas, because of course everything

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Speaker 1: is bigger there, but there was a colony of black

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Speaker 1: tailed prairie dogs and this town, Chuck, stretched a hundred

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Speaker 1: miles wide by two hundred and fifty miles long and

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Speaker 1: contained four hundred million prairie dogs. Again, crownd squirrels all

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Speaker 1: living in this kind of large community. I mean that's

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Speaker 1: like it's like a Chinese mega city or something like that.

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Speaker 1: Time's tend yea. So are these the ones that tend

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Speaker 1: to stay uh grouped with their own sex? Uh No,

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Speaker 1: those tend to be either tree squirrels or flying squirrels.

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Speaker 1: These are more the um because they live in in

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Speaker 1: communal groups and kinship is a big deal. Ground squirrels,

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Speaker 1: like prairie dogs, tend to have a really good ability

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Speaker 1: to send to smell the scent of other ground squirrels,

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Speaker 1: so they can tell, like who's a blood relation who's not.

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Speaker 1: And they've done studies to see, you know, if a

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Speaker 1: like if a ground squirrel, they have a lot of

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Speaker 1: really sophisticated calls too, because they're alerting others to the

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Speaker 1: presence of a rattlesneak or a hawk or something. So

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Speaker 1: they're really talkative and they have a lot of sophisticated

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Speaker 1: different communication um and they found that, uh, like a

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Speaker 1: prairie dog that will stand up and and take the

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Speaker 1: time to risk its own life to alert others, it's

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Speaker 1: actually alerting the others that it's alerting are actually related

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Speaker 1: by blood, and the groundhog or the prairie dog knows

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Speaker 1: this because it can smell it's blood relations among all

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Speaker 1: these other you know, extended family members in the town.

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Speaker 1: There's not much cuter than a squirrel sitting up on

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Speaker 1: its rear haunches, whether it's I mean, obviously those prairie dogs,

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Speaker 1: you know, they do it for a living, but even

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Speaker 1: our eastern gray squirrels sit upon those back legs. If

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Speaker 1: they want to work a nut with their little front

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Speaker 1: pop ads. Yeah, or a chipmunk on its back legs.

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Speaker 1: It's doesn't get much cuter as little busy hands. Goodness me. Yeah, alright,

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Speaker 1: so we can move on to our tree squirrel. This

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Speaker 1: is they're known as our boreal squirrels, obviously because they

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Speaker 1: are tree squirrels. And this is when you're talking your

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Speaker 1: eastern gray squirrel. This is not a groundhog. This is

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Speaker 1: not a prairie dog. This is your died in the wool,

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Speaker 1: cute little fluffy tailed sort of you know, they're called gray,

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Speaker 1: but they're sort of a light brownish color gener only,

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Speaker 1: although the colors do range, as we'll see. Uh. And

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Speaker 1: these are the ones that you're gonna find all over Atlanta,

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Speaker 1: jumping around, climbing around, leaping it podcasters in their front lawn. Uh.

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Speaker 1: They spend most of the time. Uh. I mean you

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Speaker 1: see him on the ground plenty. But they live in trees.

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Speaker 1: They nest in trees called Drey's or uh Drey's or

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Speaker 1: Drey's spelled within a year in a right. Um. And

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Speaker 1: you probably if you've ever looked up and seen a

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Speaker 1: massive like sticks and twigs in a leafless tree in

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Speaker 1: the middle of winter. You're looking at a squirrel's nest

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Speaker 1: called it dre um, and this is where you were

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Speaker 1: you were asking about them um staying in like same

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Speaker 1: sex groups apparently in the winter. Um. Even though the

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Speaker 1: tree squirrel does not live in a communal society like

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Speaker 1: a ground squirrel does, it's they're still social. They still

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Speaker 1: interact with one another. They play, they chase, they chase

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Speaker 1: one another off. They like mate. Um. But when gets

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Speaker 1: really cold, tree squirrels will um kind of group their

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Speaker 1: heat together by staying in a drey communally up to

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Speaker 1: like thirty members. Um. Yeah, it is very adorable. I

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Speaker 1: want to do a little exercise here real quick, Chuck.

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Speaker 1: I want you to use your imagination. Imagine a very

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Speaker 1: cold winter day, the winds blowing, snows being carried on

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Speaker 1: the wind, and it's passing by just outside a woodpecker hole,

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Speaker 1: and we're inside that woodpecker hole, and it's dark. The

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Speaker 1: light is very very faint because it's it's a kind

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Speaker 1: of an overcast sunny day to begin with. But we're

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Speaker 1: also inside a tree, in an old woodpecker hole, and

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Speaker 1: it's lined with a bunch of different leaves, and there's

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Speaker 1: half a dozen or so squirrels all kind of snuggled together, sleeping,

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Speaker 1: sharing their warmth as the winter day passes by outside

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Speaker 1: and they snooze an afternoon away fat on acorns that

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Speaker 1: they all just ate. Boy, isn't that amazing? Almost fell

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Speaker 1: asleep here, real Abert Frost, my friend, Thank you, thank you.

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Speaker 1: I like to think Robert Redford crossed with Robert cross

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Speaker 1: but well, you know Robert Redford if you look in

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Speaker 1: the mirror, but Robert Frost. When you pick a bin

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Speaker 1: up with the touch of Robert Gooley, if you sang it, surely,

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Speaker 1: uh oh man, that really did almost put me to sleep. Um,

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Speaker 1: that's quite nice. I love that scene. So here's a

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Speaker 1: little fun adaptation that squirrels have. If you see a

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Speaker 1: tree squirrel running down a tree face first with uh,

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Speaker 1: with little uh resistance, just like it was made to

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Speaker 1: do it, it's because it is. And they have those

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Speaker 1: little claws of course that really helps. But if you

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Speaker 1: look closely, or if you look up a picture rather

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Speaker 1: and you see like a still image, you will notice

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Speaker 1: that they have the ability to and Ed says, they

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Speaker 1: can turn their feet around. They really kind of just

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Speaker 1: turn their whole back legs around backwards to where those

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Speaker 1: claws are gripping on the way down, and that's why

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Speaker 1: they're you know, it's like the perfect adaptation to be

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Speaker 1: able to run up and down a tree. So, um,

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Speaker 1: have you ever watched one do that up close? Sure?

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Speaker 1: So any time I've seen that there, if you look

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Speaker 1: their legs, because they're turned around, it kicks kind of

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Speaker 1: their elbows out a little bit and though they climb down,

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Speaker 1: it looks a little different. And I've noticed that it

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Speaker 1: triggers the part of my lizard brain that's like a

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Speaker 1: spider alert. It's like that comes that it's it's triggered

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Speaker 1: by that. So it's like a giant, furry spider is

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Speaker 1: coming down to some little part of my brain that

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Speaker 1: sends off an alarm and it's really off putting sometimes

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Speaker 1: until I you know, the larger part, the executive functioning

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Speaker 1: part of my brain is like it's a squirrel, don't worry,

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Speaker 1: But there's that one just zap of. Like this is

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Speaker 1: weird and scary for a second, but it happens to

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Speaker 1: me from time to time when they come down the

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Speaker 1: tree like that. Well, it can be a little startling,

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Speaker 1: you know, if you're going to take out the trash

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Speaker 1: or something. And your trash can is next to a

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Speaker 1: big live oak like ours. And there are two or

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Speaker 1: more squirrels that are They seem like, I don't know

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Speaker 1: what they're doing. They seems like I have a beef

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Speaker 1: with one another. But maybe they're just playing chase. But

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Speaker 1: when they're really boogieing up and down and around a

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Speaker 1: tree right as you walk upon it is it can

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Speaker 1: be a little bit like, Oh, okay, I read that

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Speaker 1: when one was chasing the other. Um, it's a part

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Speaker 1: of the mating ritual. Okay, So that's that's embarrassing for them, right,

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Speaker 1: I don't I don't know if that's across the board,

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Speaker 1: but I saw that in at least one place, all right,

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Speaker 1: not like knowing that. Um. Here's another cool thing about squirrels.

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Speaker 1: They have all kinds of squirrels have scent glands, and

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Speaker 1: it depends on the species where that scent gland is located.

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Speaker 1: It can be uh, near their little bum hole. It

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Speaker 1: can be near their mouth in the corners of their mouth,

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Speaker 1: can be on their back. But in the case of

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Speaker 1: the tree squirrel, um, they have their scent glands on

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Speaker 1: their feet and sweat glands on the bottom of their feet,

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Speaker 1: and they are a squirrel that berries there uh their

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Speaker 1: food over large large areas sometimes like up to acres

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Speaker 1: can be their habitat where they're bearing and hiding food.

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Speaker 1: And they are literally every time they walk to bury something,

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Speaker 1: they're leaving a little scent trail that they can go

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Speaker 1: back and pick up. Ideally, but it's not a perfect system.

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Speaker 1: Sometimes they will lose stuff and not be able to

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Speaker 1: go back. But what they have then done is planted

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Speaker 1: a tree, yeah, which brings up their huge ecological role um,

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Speaker 1: which is like planting new forests, like keeping forests healthy

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Speaker 1: by forgetting about nuts. And the nut is actually a

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Speaker 1: seed and it grows into a new tree that the

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Speaker 1: squirrel helped move away from the tree. It's amazing splaining

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Speaker 1: it's range. They're known as the gardeners of the forest. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: And we taught we did a whole short stuff on

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Speaker 1: squirrels bearing nuts, and I remember one of the things

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Speaker 1: that came up was, um, there was a study that

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Speaker 1: found that if they if they know they're being watched

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Speaker 1: by another squirrel, they'll fake dig a hole and then

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Speaker 1: won't drop the nut in it. And then we'll go

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Speaker 1: somewhere else and mislead a squirrel. It's that they think

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Speaker 1: is watching them. Yeah, they'll look around first and be like,

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Speaker 1: did anyone seen that? Yeah? I think I'm good Todd

359
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Speaker 1: was watching. I better not drop the nut in this hole.

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Speaker 1: He he'll come along. Uh. So that's what the the

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Speaker 1: I'm sorry, not flying, but the tree squirrels. That's how

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Speaker 1: they use their scent. The ground squirrels, we should say,

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Speaker 1: mainly use their scent glands to mark their territory. And

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Speaker 1: you know, because they're all about their clan and their colony,

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Speaker 1: to sort of mark their territory and find out if

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Speaker 1: someone is a part of their clan. Yeah. And then also, um,

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Speaker 1: as far as scents go, I saw some somewhere that

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Speaker 1: some kinds of ground squirrels that are prey to rattlesnakes

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Speaker 1: will actually find shed rattlesnake skin rub it on themselves.

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Speaker 1: I'll chew it up and rub it on themselves to

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Speaker 1: give themselves a rattlesnake scent to throw off rattlesnakes. They

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Speaker 1: camouflaged their scent. That's pretty cool. Yeah, I wonder if

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Speaker 1: they ever wear it and just like fashion a couple

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Speaker 1: of holes and stick their arms through. Yeah, and they

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Speaker 1: bragged that they killed it. Yeah. Have you, man, I

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Speaker 1: shouldn't even mention this. Yeah, I'm gonna mention it, have

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Speaker 1: you because it is it is roadkill. But have you

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Speaker 1: ever seen the pictures of the squirrel road kill with

379
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Speaker 1: a little G I Joe Action figures? No, just look

380
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Speaker 1: it up. I can. They aren't squirrels that someone killed.

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Speaker 1: It's it's someone will take a roadkill picture of a

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Speaker 1: squirrel and they'll take the little G I. Joe figures

383
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Speaker 1: as if they were big game hunters, and they'll have

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Speaker 1: their guns, and they'll have like one leg up on

385
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Speaker 1: the squirrel's head as if it was their trophy. And

386
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Speaker 1: the squirrel looks positively giant next to the Little Action figures.

387
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Speaker 1: And it's kind of funny that one out. I don't

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Speaker 1: want to encourage people. Maybe I shouldn't have even said anything. Well,

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Speaker 1: I don't know if you're encouraging people to like swerve

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Speaker 1: onto a squirrel, you know, or kill a squirrel to

391
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Speaker 1: do that. But maybe just look it up on the

392
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Speaker 1: internet if you want to see that. Don't recreate it.

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Speaker 1: If you kill a squirrel and we find out about it,

394
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Speaker 1: we're coming to your house, I know, with a ghost

395
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Speaker 1: of that squirrel. Yeah, that will introduce to your attic

396
00:23:00,600 --> 00:23:05,080
Speaker 1: you so have we moved on to flying squirrels yet, Yeah,

397
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Speaker 1: let's do it. Those are you know the old story

398
00:23:07,480 --> 00:23:10,280
Speaker 1: when we had one growing up for a little while. Uh,

399
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Speaker 1: you probably don't remember, but my uncle gave us his

400
00:23:12,320 --> 00:23:15,280
Speaker 1: flying squirrel to watch for a while, and he would

401
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Speaker 1: leap from the curtains on the other side of the

402
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Speaker 1: room onto my shoulder. And then when we went out

403
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Speaker 1: of town, apparently they said the squirrel got out. But

404
00:23:23,359 --> 00:23:25,520
Speaker 1: now that I'm adult, I realized that the cat ate

405
00:23:25,560 --> 00:23:30,520
Speaker 1: the squirrel. Oh man, yeah, just to recap that childhood trauma.

406
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Speaker 1: That's wow. But for a little while, we had a

407
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Speaker 1: flying squirrel in our home for a brief shining moment.

408
00:23:38,240 --> 00:23:42,119
Speaker 1: That's the upshot. So a flying squirrel, and I thought this.

409
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Speaker 1: I thought they were fairly rare. Um. Apparently they're as

410
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Speaker 1: common as tree squirrels in some places. The reason that

411
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Speaker 1: you think they're rare is because they're nocturnal, so we're

412
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Speaker 1: usually sleeping when they're out and about. I love thinking

413
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Speaker 1: about those things just flying around all night. Yeah, and

414
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Speaker 1: flying is right, man, I saw Ed says the thing

415
00:24:00,359 --> 00:24:04,200
Speaker 1: glide up to aft. I saw three hundred in some cases.

416
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Speaker 1: And that's what they're doing. They're gliding. They're not flying.

417
00:24:07,640 --> 00:24:10,960
Speaker 1: They have no means of like propulsion. But they have

418
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Speaker 1: a skin flap. They've evolved the skin flap that is, um,

419
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Speaker 1: you know the bat suit that people like you know

420
00:24:17,640 --> 00:24:22,960
Speaker 1: skydive with. That's that is based basically on the flying

421
00:24:23,000 --> 00:24:28,520
Speaker 1: squirrels membranes between its um front legs and hind legs.

422
00:24:29,080 --> 00:24:31,760
Speaker 1: Um that it can you know, spread out when it

423
00:24:31,880 --> 00:24:34,640
Speaker 1: jumps and it just catches the air and they can

424
00:24:34,680 --> 00:24:37,119
Speaker 1: move it this way and that and use their tail

425
00:24:37,160 --> 00:24:39,879
Speaker 1: as a rudder and go a hundred fifty feet in

426
00:24:40,200 --> 00:24:43,119
Speaker 1: a pretty purposeful direction to Did you say what the

427
00:24:43,200 --> 00:24:46,879
Speaker 1: name of the flap was? No? Do you want to now?

428
00:24:46,920 --> 00:24:52,320
Speaker 1: I probably screwed it. I'm gonna go with a potagium.

429
00:24:52,440 --> 00:24:57,119
Speaker 1: That's great, had a gi um. I wonder what they

430
00:24:57,200 --> 00:25:00,199
Speaker 1: call that in the in the flying suit bit is

431
00:25:00,640 --> 00:25:03,760
Speaker 1: extreme flying suit bizz? I don't know, and I think

432
00:25:03,800 --> 00:25:06,640
Speaker 1: they call him bat suits, but that's that's a misnomer.

433
00:25:06,680 --> 00:25:09,000
Speaker 1: If you ask me that, I gotta say, I mean,

434
00:25:09,000 --> 00:25:10,560
Speaker 1: I'm not into any of that stuff. I would never

435
00:25:10,560 --> 00:25:14,720
Speaker 1: do it. But those videos are amazing, and it's is

436
00:25:14,800 --> 00:25:17,320
Speaker 1: it closes humans have come I think to flying it.

437
00:25:17,520 --> 00:25:21,520
Speaker 1: It feels like agreed, Yeah, I would have to have

438
00:25:23,000 --> 00:25:26,200
Speaker 1: probably a lobotomy to um to actually try that. It

439
00:25:26,240 --> 00:25:28,800
Speaker 1: would take that radical of a personality change for me

440
00:25:28,880 --> 00:25:31,159
Speaker 1: to try it well. And I mean sure that kind

441
00:25:31,160 --> 00:25:33,320
Speaker 1: of thing that's the most extreme, like years and years

442
00:25:33,359 --> 00:25:36,560
Speaker 1: of training, Yes, skydiving training and stuff like that, you know,

443
00:25:36,600 --> 00:25:39,879
Speaker 1: like jump into a bat suit. No, no, no, definitely not.

444
00:25:39,920 --> 00:25:41,680
Speaker 1: But even if you do, you know, once you get

445
00:25:41,720 --> 00:25:44,479
Speaker 1: to that point, like I can't imagine how dangerous that is.

446
00:25:44,520 --> 00:25:48,520
Speaker 1: You know, if you smack into something you're going really fast, Yeah, yeah,

447
00:25:48,640 --> 00:25:52,440
Speaker 1: your toast. Yeah, and that happens sadly. But I get

448
00:25:52,440 --> 00:25:55,280
Speaker 1: the impression that it's the rush is worth the risk,

449
00:25:56,640 --> 00:26:01,240
Speaker 1: that's right. Uh. And speaking of risk, there are endangered

450
00:26:01,280 --> 00:26:06,040
Speaker 1: flying squirrels, the Carolina Northern flying squirrel. And we talked

451
00:26:06,080 --> 00:26:08,359
Speaker 1: a little bit about these little land bridges that are

452
00:26:08,400 --> 00:26:12,480
Speaker 1: starting to pop up in the United States over overpasses

453
00:26:12,520 --> 00:26:16,240
Speaker 1: and and freeway crossings. And I just read today there's

454
00:26:16,280 --> 00:26:19,560
Speaker 1: one in in l A that's opening up that's like

455
00:26:19,600 --> 00:26:21,960
Speaker 1: a hundred and sixty ft wide. I can't remember the

456
00:26:22,000 --> 00:26:25,800
Speaker 1: name of it's named after someone, and to allow cougars

457
00:26:25,800 --> 00:26:28,560
Speaker 1: and you know, mountain lions to pass and all kinds

458
00:26:28,560 --> 00:26:33,240
Speaker 1: of animals. And they're using you know, they have done studies,

459
00:26:33,800 --> 00:26:37,119
Speaker 1: uh four squirrels and that they found tagged like radio

460
00:26:37,160 --> 00:26:41,320
Speaker 1: tag squirrels are foraging and building on the other side

461
00:26:41,359 --> 00:26:44,360
Speaker 1: of these massive freeways thanks to these bridges. Like it's

462
00:26:44,359 --> 00:26:47,520
Speaker 1: been proven to work. Yeah, for sure. I think it's

463
00:26:47,520 --> 00:26:53,920
Speaker 1: called the Robert Evans Memorial Animal Land Bridge. Baby. Yeah,

464
00:26:53,960 --> 00:26:59,239
Speaker 1: if only so. Um. That actually kind of leads us

465
00:26:59,280 --> 00:27:02,880
Speaker 1: to a quote I ran across chuck um because if

466
00:27:02,920 --> 00:27:04,920
Speaker 1: you put like I was saying, if you can kind

467
00:27:04,960 --> 00:27:07,480
Speaker 1: of connect the tree to another tree, which really ties

468
00:27:07,520 --> 00:27:10,920
Speaker 1: into that rewilding episode because you're you're using you're connecting

469
00:27:10,960 --> 00:27:14,240
Speaker 1: core to core via corridor basically is what they're doing

470
00:27:14,280 --> 00:27:18,320
Speaker 1: with that. Um that there was an old saying that

471
00:27:18,800 --> 00:27:21,680
Speaker 1: before well not too long ago, I think in into

472
00:27:21,720 --> 00:27:25,320
Speaker 1: the eighteenth century, maybe even early nineteenth century, that there

473
00:27:25,400 --> 00:27:29,440
Speaker 1: was so many chestnut trees in North America that a

474
00:27:29,560 --> 00:27:32,360
Speaker 1: squirrel could make it from Maine to Georgia without ever

475
00:27:32,440 --> 00:27:34,679
Speaker 1: touching the ground. Yeah, what do we cover that in?

476
00:27:35,000 --> 00:27:38,120
Speaker 1: Was it? I don't remember I remember that factoy that's

477
00:27:38,119 --> 00:27:42,000
Speaker 1: a great one. So, um, it really kind of goes

478
00:27:42,080 --> 00:27:43,840
Speaker 1: to show like there there used to be a lot

479
00:27:43,880 --> 00:27:46,960
Speaker 1: more forest in the United States, but there were also

480
00:27:47,040 --> 00:27:50,359
Speaker 1: a lot more squirrels because there's a there's a positive

481
00:27:50,359 --> 00:27:56,760
Speaker 1: correlation between masts producing trees which are um chestnut, beech

482
00:27:57,040 --> 00:28:00,840
Speaker 1: oak um trees that produced nuts, the squirrels and other

483
00:28:01,040 --> 00:28:06,560
Speaker 1: um forest animals eat um, and the number and population

484
00:28:06,600 --> 00:28:08,960
Speaker 1: density of squirrels in an area you have a lot

485
00:28:09,000 --> 00:28:11,480
Speaker 1: of mass producing trees, you're going to have a lot

486
00:28:11,520 --> 00:28:14,840
Speaker 1: of squirrels because again, they fill their ecological niche to

487
00:28:14,920 --> 00:28:18,919
Speaker 1: basically bursting. Yeah, and they you know, bursting with food

488
00:28:19,040 --> 00:28:24,320
Speaker 1: because uh, they are opportunistic eaters is what Ed says.

489
00:28:24,800 --> 00:28:26,639
Speaker 1: And that's a pretty good way to say it. Because

490
00:28:26,680 --> 00:28:29,280
Speaker 1: while they well, obviously if they can get fruit or

491
00:28:29,359 --> 00:28:32,800
Speaker 1: nuts and seeds, that's the stock of their diet. But

492
00:28:33,080 --> 00:28:35,480
Speaker 1: they will eat whatever keeps them alive. They will eat

493
00:28:35,520 --> 00:28:39,960
Speaker 1: insects and fungus and they actually spread fungus, which is great. Uh,

494
00:28:40,000 --> 00:28:43,040
Speaker 1: they eat roots, they have they have found little tiny

495
00:28:43,080 --> 00:28:46,320
Speaker 1: eggs and little tiny birds and little tiny lizards in

496
00:28:46,360 --> 00:28:51,080
Speaker 1: the guts of squirrels. Uh, so they you know, technically

497
00:28:51,640 --> 00:28:56,960
Speaker 1: are omnivores um, which is just to say squirrels are remarkable.

498
00:28:56,960 --> 00:28:58,960
Speaker 1: That's staying alive, and they will eat your garbage. They

499
00:28:58,960 --> 00:29:01,239
Speaker 1: will eat whatever they need too, but that's only if

500
00:29:01,240 --> 00:29:04,320
Speaker 1: they're not finding the nuts and the seeds and stuff

501
00:29:04,320 --> 00:29:06,960
Speaker 1: like that, which there are generally plenty, plenty of in

502
00:29:07,000 --> 00:29:10,280
Speaker 1: the United States. And one reason that they're um they're

503
00:29:10,320 --> 00:29:12,640
Speaker 1: suited for nuts, or that nuts are suited for them

504
00:29:12,920 --> 00:29:16,920
Speaker 1: is because they have two sets of incisors. I believe

505
00:29:17,080 --> 00:29:21,160
Speaker 1: upended down is the technical term. And they grow constantly

506
00:29:21,320 --> 00:29:25,040
Speaker 1: throughout their lifetime. I think they grow something like is

507
00:29:25,080 --> 00:29:29,240
Speaker 1: this even possible that I'm seeing it six inches a year? Well,

508
00:29:29,280 --> 00:29:32,160
Speaker 1: I mean they're constantly grinding them down, so I think

509
00:29:32,200 --> 00:29:34,480
Speaker 1: if a squirrel was in a coma, they could have

510
00:29:34,560 --> 00:29:37,200
Speaker 1: six inch bangs. That's crazy. And then apparently if they

511
00:29:37,240 --> 00:29:40,600
Speaker 1: don't continuously grind them down and they kept growing, they

512
00:29:40,600 --> 00:29:44,080
Speaker 1: would grow through the top and the bottom of their

513
00:29:44,240 --> 00:29:47,360
Speaker 1: face all at Lisa Simpson that time. She needed braces.

514
00:29:48,960 --> 00:29:52,040
Speaker 1: But that's crazy. So they use these very very hard

515
00:29:52,160 --> 00:29:55,800
Speaker 1: nuts like a chestnut or pecan or walnut shell to

516
00:29:56,240 --> 00:29:58,920
Speaker 1: impart as it's a food source, but as they're getting

517
00:29:58,920 --> 00:30:01,360
Speaker 1: to the food source, they're keeping their teeth ground down,

518
00:30:01,360 --> 00:30:04,800
Speaker 1: which apparently they have to do all the time. That's

519
00:30:04,840 --> 00:30:07,600
Speaker 1: pretty amazing. Squirrels also like a little sweet treat every

520
00:30:07,640 --> 00:30:10,400
Speaker 1: now and then. They have found red squirrels in Maine

521
00:30:10,880 --> 00:30:13,600
Speaker 1: that will tap sugar maple trees. They make little bite

522
00:30:13,600 --> 00:30:16,000
Speaker 1: marks in the tree and then they just say, all right,

523
00:30:16,040 --> 00:30:17,520
Speaker 1: do your thing, and they come back a few days

524
00:30:17,600 --> 00:30:22,080
Speaker 1: later and that trap has hardened up and run out

525
00:30:22,120 --> 00:30:24,320
Speaker 1: a little bit. And that is just a little tiny

526
00:30:24,360 --> 00:30:26,959
Speaker 1: sweet treat for a squirrel. That's right, It's pretty awesome.

527
00:30:27,120 --> 00:30:30,160
Speaker 1: They also found that um squirrels can learn by observing

528
00:30:30,360 --> 00:30:34,360
Speaker 1: other squirrels doing something, particularly finding new ways to get food.

529
00:30:35,360 --> 00:30:39,080
Speaker 1: They're adept at that. Okay, so they see Todd doing something,

530
00:30:39,840 --> 00:30:43,000
Speaker 1: they say, not a bad idea, let's give that a shot. Yeah,

531
00:30:43,200 --> 00:30:46,200
Speaker 1: that Todd really came around. Yeah. And if you'll notice,

532
00:30:46,240 --> 00:30:47,600
Speaker 1: I think we kind of skipped over this if we

533
00:30:47,600 --> 00:30:50,960
Speaker 1: didn't mention Australia. Uh, squirrels I think used to be

534
00:30:51,000 --> 00:30:54,520
Speaker 1: in Australia but aren't so much now. And is it

535
00:30:54,560 --> 00:30:57,200
Speaker 1: a mystery or is it just the obvious that the

536
00:30:57,280 --> 00:31:01,120
Speaker 1: Australians were like it? It It was on mate. I don't know,

537
00:31:01,240 --> 00:31:03,040
Speaker 1: I didn't see that anywhere, but I know that they

538
00:31:03,120 --> 00:31:07,280
Speaker 1: introduced the Eastern gray and then in Perth they introduced

539
00:31:07,280 --> 00:31:11,240
Speaker 1: the Indian palm, which is like if you mashed together

540
00:31:11,280 --> 00:31:13,480
Speaker 1: an Eastern gray squirrel in a chipmunk, that would be

541
00:31:13,520 --> 00:31:17,720
Speaker 1: an Indian palm squirrel. But apparently they both died out.

542
00:31:17,800 --> 00:31:19,240
Speaker 1: I don't know if it's a mystery or not, like

543
00:31:19,280 --> 00:31:23,240
Speaker 1: you're saying, but supposedly there's some feral colonies that escape

544
00:31:23,280 --> 00:31:27,040
Speaker 1: from zoos, at least in Perth. So there are wild

545
00:31:27,120 --> 00:31:30,800
Speaker 1: squirrels in Australia, but they were introduced uh in the

546
00:31:30,880 --> 00:31:33,520
Speaker 1: nineteenth century, which is actually a trend, as we'll see.

547
00:31:33,560 --> 00:31:36,680
Speaker 1: But I say, before we we tackle all that, we

548
00:31:36,760 --> 00:31:38,840
Speaker 1: take a break. How about that? All right, Well we'll

549
00:31:38,920 --> 00:31:41,200
Speaker 1: take the break and we'll talk about squirrel migration right

550
00:31:41,240 --> 00:32:05,520
Speaker 1: after this, okay, Chuck, so As I was saying, like

551
00:32:06,000 --> 00:32:09,240
Speaker 1: back before pre colonial days in particular, but also even

552
00:32:09,280 --> 00:32:12,840
Speaker 1: into the nineteenth century. I think even the nineteen sixties,

553
00:32:13,280 --> 00:32:18,720
Speaker 1: there were reports of massive numbers of squirrels basically stampeding.

554
00:32:20,000 --> 00:32:22,960
Speaker 1: They call them squirrel migrations, and they have been documented

555
00:32:23,320 --> 00:32:25,719
Speaker 1: enough times that that's it's not an anomaly, but they

556
00:32:25,760 --> 00:32:29,440
Speaker 1: are fairly rare. And today they've kind of figured out

557
00:32:29,480 --> 00:32:33,720
Speaker 1: that there aren't dense enough populations of squirrels to ever

558
00:32:33,840 --> 00:32:36,880
Speaker 1: have a genuine like squirrel stampede like they had before.

559
00:32:37,320 --> 00:32:39,520
Speaker 1: But there there used to be so many of them

560
00:32:39,560 --> 00:32:42,080
Speaker 1: that every once in a a while, thousands to tens of thousands,

561
00:32:42,600 --> 00:32:45,240
Speaker 1: two tends to tens of thousands of squirrels would pass

562
00:32:46,080 --> 00:32:49,840
Speaker 1: generally in like a big wave over an area. And

563
00:32:49,840 --> 00:32:52,640
Speaker 1: apparently it was quite a thing to see. I imagine

564
00:32:52,640 --> 00:32:56,600
Speaker 1: it was. And this happened because there would just be

565
00:32:56,680 --> 00:33:02,680
Speaker 1: a really big fruitful year for squirrel food, tons of availability,

566
00:33:02,840 --> 00:33:05,120
Speaker 1: and they would, you know, they would boom in numbers

567
00:33:05,120 --> 00:33:07,560
Speaker 1: because they go to where the food is. And usually

568
00:33:07,600 --> 00:33:11,200
Speaker 1: if that is followed by I guess historically when that

569
00:33:11,240 --> 00:33:14,360
Speaker 1: was followed by a really bad year um like the

570
00:33:14,480 --> 00:33:17,320
Speaker 1: rain you know, didn't work out so great for producing

571
00:33:17,880 --> 00:33:20,600
Speaker 1: nuts and seeds and stuff and fruit, that all of

572
00:33:20,640 --> 00:33:22,920
Speaker 1: a sudden, you've got a ton of squirrels in an

573
00:33:22,960 --> 00:33:27,360
Speaker 1: area that are all looking around going, oh, what's the deal? Uh,

574
00:33:27,360 --> 00:33:29,440
Speaker 1: and their opportunists. So they said, all right, we're getting

575
00:33:29,440 --> 00:33:30,800
Speaker 1: out of here. We're going to where the food is

576
00:33:31,360 --> 00:33:35,480
Speaker 1: let's go everybody. And they would do it all at once, Yeah,

577
00:33:35,560 --> 00:33:38,360
Speaker 1: all at once for some reason. And so there's migrations

578
00:33:38,440 --> 00:33:41,360
Speaker 1: they would be they'd be running through the forest, they'd

579
00:33:41,360 --> 00:33:43,880
Speaker 1: be running across the fields, they'd be swimming across rivers,

580
00:33:43,880 --> 00:33:47,880
Speaker 1: and apparently, in at least one account I saw, um,

581
00:33:48,080 --> 00:33:50,760
Speaker 1: they would be gulped up by bass in the rivers.

582
00:33:50,800 --> 00:33:53,960
Speaker 1: And I can't imagine some worse than a squirrel being

583
00:33:53,960 --> 00:33:57,479
Speaker 1: eaten by a fish. That seems unnatural. Yeah, but there

584
00:33:57,520 --> 00:33:59,280
Speaker 1: were so many of them. This is also at a

585
00:33:59,320 --> 00:34:03,720
Speaker 1: time where worlds were roundly among basically everyone living in

586
00:34:03,760 --> 00:34:10,080
Speaker 1: America viewed as vermin as um uh invaders as things

587
00:34:10,120 --> 00:34:13,080
Speaker 1: that were unwanted, but also a tasty food source too.

588
00:34:13,360 --> 00:34:17,040
Speaker 1: So anytime there was a squirrel stampede uh, the yokels

589
00:34:17,040 --> 00:34:19,319
Speaker 1: would run out with their sticks and bags and beat

590
00:34:19,360 --> 00:34:21,680
Speaker 1: squirrels to death and then cook them and sell their

591
00:34:21,680 --> 00:34:23,960
Speaker 1: pelts and do all sorts of things with them. And

592
00:34:24,000 --> 00:34:25,959
Speaker 1: one of the reasons why they were viewed as vermin

593
00:34:26,040 --> 00:34:29,399
Speaker 1: chuck is because on these squirrel migrations and other times

594
00:34:29,400 --> 00:34:31,480
Speaker 1: where they were just you know, if you were unlucky

595
00:34:31,640 --> 00:34:35,160
Speaker 1: with your planting, um, those squirrels might see as a

596
00:34:35,160 --> 00:34:37,680
Speaker 1: food source the crops you just planted all those seeds

597
00:34:37,680 --> 00:34:40,360
Speaker 1: and would dig them up and ruin your year's crops

598
00:34:40,400 --> 00:34:43,520
Speaker 1: in a day or so. So people didn't like squirrels

599
00:34:43,560 --> 00:34:45,960
Speaker 1: for a very long time. And this idea of squirrels

600
00:34:45,960 --> 00:34:48,680
Speaker 1: being everywhere, these little mammals living among us, like you

601
00:34:48,719 --> 00:34:53,520
Speaker 1: were talking about earlier, that's fairly new, and that's actually

602
00:34:53,640 --> 00:34:58,840
Speaker 1: very deliberate and purposeful, because squirrels were basically gone up

603
00:34:58,920 --> 00:35:02,800
Speaker 1: until about the mid to late nineteenth century in America. Yeah,

604
00:35:02,840 --> 00:35:07,279
Speaker 1: I mean between being hunted because people hated them on

605
00:35:07,320 --> 00:35:10,560
Speaker 1: their farms, like you said, people and people still and

606
00:35:11,200 --> 00:35:15,040
Speaker 1: like generally in certain parts of like Appalachia, still eat

607
00:35:15,080 --> 00:35:17,359
Speaker 1: squirrel on the menu. It is a little gamy from

608
00:35:17,360 --> 00:35:19,560
Speaker 1: what I'm told, I'm never gonna eat a squirrel, but

609
00:35:19,640 --> 00:35:21,600
Speaker 1: they still use pelts. But that kind of you know,

610
00:35:21,960 --> 00:35:24,200
Speaker 1: just like they would eat any larger mammal and use

611
00:35:24,280 --> 00:35:27,719
Speaker 1: their pelts. They would just get crafty with you know,

612
00:35:27,760 --> 00:35:31,400
Speaker 1: as small as a squirrel. And certainly in times of uh,

613
00:35:31,840 --> 00:35:35,160
Speaker 1: you know, real need, uh you know, small rodents would

614
00:35:35,160 --> 00:35:38,400
Speaker 1: come in handy on the menu back then. But uh,

615
00:35:38,600 --> 00:35:42,239
Speaker 1: they were almost gone. We started growing more urban in

616
00:35:42,239 --> 00:35:46,279
Speaker 1: the eighteen hundreds obviously, and they were killing squirrels as

617
00:35:46,320 --> 00:35:50,040
Speaker 1: fast as they could. And in the eighteen forties and fifties,

618
00:35:50,040 --> 00:35:54,600
Speaker 1: there were so few squirrels that they were introduced to

619
00:35:54,640 --> 00:35:57,880
Speaker 1: city parks, but not many. At first. They were just

620
00:35:57,920 --> 00:36:01,279
Speaker 1: like this weird curiosity where you would go out kind

621
00:36:01,280 --> 00:36:03,400
Speaker 1: of like bird watching and you would like try to

622
00:36:03,440 --> 00:36:06,120
Speaker 1: spot a squirrel running around because it was such a

623
00:36:06,200 --> 00:36:09,719
Speaker 1: novel thing. But then by the time Frederick law Olmstead,

624
00:36:09,719 --> 00:36:13,280
Speaker 1: who by the way, deserves his own podcast, came along

625
00:36:13,320 --> 00:36:15,960
Speaker 1: and really introduced the idea these really large city parks

626
00:36:15,960 --> 00:36:19,759
Speaker 1: and urban parks. Uh, they introduced a lot of squirrels

627
00:36:20,200 --> 00:36:23,799
Speaker 1: to these parks and they really really like that. That's

628
00:36:23,840 --> 00:36:25,560
Speaker 1: kind of why we have the squirrels we have today

629
00:36:25,880 --> 00:36:28,640
Speaker 1: was from this movement to reintroduce him in a big

630
00:36:28,640 --> 00:36:31,239
Speaker 1: way to urban parks. Yeah, and um, I mean we

631
00:36:31,320 --> 00:36:33,839
Speaker 1: talked kind of a lot about that whole idea in

632
00:36:33,880 --> 00:36:36,759
Speaker 1: our Central Park episode. This idea that you know, they

633
00:36:36,800 --> 00:36:38,640
Speaker 1: just kept building the city and building the city and

634
00:36:38,680 --> 00:36:41,400
Speaker 1: building city, and people started going crazy because there weren't

635
00:36:41,440 --> 00:36:44,680
Speaker 1: green spaces. So that that brought the parks in. And

636
00:36:44,719 --> 00:36:47,440
Speaker 1: then the idea of adding animals to the park just

637
00:36:47,520 --> 00:36:51,160
Speaker 1: to kind of naturalize it even more. Um that squirrels

638
00:36:51,160 --> 00:36:53,839
Speaker 1: played a huge role in that. UM And not only

639
00:36:54,000 --> 00:36:56,680
Speaker 1: you know, in Central Park, but also it started out

640
00:36:56,719 --> 00:37:00,200
Speaker 1: and I believe Philadelphia and then followed by Boston and um.

641
00:37:00,239 --> 00:37:03,719
Speaker 1: So by the mid to late nineteenth century, that's when

642
00:37:03,960 --> 00:37:06,960
Speaker 1: squirrels started to re establish themselves and the way that

643
00:37:07,000 --> 00:37:10,640
Speaker 1: people saw squirrels started to change too, And there was

644
00:37:10,680 --> 00:37:15,399
Speaker 1: this idea that, um, they weren't vermin anymore. Don't shoot them,

645
00:37:15,520 --> 00:37:17,960
Speaker 1: please try not to hit them with the stick. Instead,

646
00:37:18,280 --> 00:37:20,480
Speaker 1: let's go to the park, spend some time outside and

647
00:37:20,560 --> 00:37:23,440
Speaker 1: bring some nuts with you and maybe feed the squirrels.

648
00:37:24,040 --> 00:37:25,560
Speaker 1: And not only you feed the squirrels, but you've got

649
00:37:25,600 --> 00:37:27,600
Speaker 1: a little kid. That little kid wants to hit that

650
00:37:27,640 --> 00:37:30,400
Speaker 1: squirrel with the stick so bad, because kids are are

651
00:37:30,440 --> 00:37:35,200
Speaker 1: awful like that good. You can actually use squirrels feeding

652
00:37:35,239 --> 00:37:38,200
Speaker 1: squirrels as a way to teach kids to have compassion,

653
00:37:38,280 --> 00:37:42,799
Speaker 1: to um, be upstanding morally, to have charity. UM. And

654
00:37:42,840 --> 00:37:46,720
Speaker 1: that was kind of how the whole interaction between humans

655
00:37:46,719 --> 00:37:50,279
Speaker 1: and squirrels was kind of framed around that time, like

656
00:37:50,320 --> 00:37:53,520
Speaker 1: the late nineteenth early twentieth century. Yeah, the boy Scout

657
00:37:53,800 --> 00:37:59,360
Speaker 1: co founder Ernest Thompson's Seaton said that squirrels and introducing

658
00:37:59,360 --> 00:38:02,520
Speaker 1: the two boys in general, would say, would cure them

659
00:38:02,520 --> 00:38:06,160
Speaker 1: of their tendency towards cruelty. But I said, good luck

660
00:38:06,200 --> 00:38:08,000
Speaker 1: a second ago. How do you hit it? I mean,

661
00:38:08,000 --> 00:38:10,239
Speaker 1: I guess if there's a stampede. But you show me

662
00:38:10,280 --> 00:38:12,080
Speaker 1: a kid that can get a squirrel and hit it

663
00:38:12,120 --> 00:38:16,960
Speaker 1: with a stick, and that's a future Olympian. There's no way.

664
00:38:16,960 --> 00:38:20,840
Speaker 1: Those things are so fast. But don't try to do it, kids, definitely, no,

665
00:38:20,920 --> 00:38:23,400
Speaker 1: I don't even practice that. Don't try to qualify for

666
00:38:23,440 --> 00:38:25,360
Speaker 1: the Olympics and that because you'll show up to the

667
00:38:25,400 --> 00:38:27,359
Speaker 1: Olympics will be like, we don't, we don't have that.

668
00:38:28,160 --> 00:38:30,239
Speaker 1: That's not one of our sports. What do you think,

669
00:38:30,239 --> 00:38:35,400
Speaker 1: you say, is Australia right? Uh So these days, you know,

670
00:38:35,480 --> 00:38:39,520
Speaker 1: we've kind of come full circle into just sort of

671
00:38:39,600 --> 00:38:43,000
Speaker 1: letting squirrels be uh there are you know, if you're

672
00:38:43,000 --> 00:38:47,080
Speaker 1: a hunter in the United States, and that may be

673
00:38:47,360 --> 00:38:49,680
Speaker 1: the tradition in your family if you live out in

674
00:38:49,719 --> 00:38:54,319
Speaker 1: the country, to start off your child with hunting squirrels

675
00:38:54,719 --> 00:38:57,560
Speaker 1: with a little twenty two rifle or something two as

676
00:38:57,600 --> 00:39:01,000
Speaker 1: practice to teach young hunters. I'm certainly not into that,

677
00:39:01,040 --> 00:39:02,600
Speaker 1: but I'm not going to judge you if that's your thing.

678
00:39:03,000 --> 00:39:05,520
Speaker 1: And like I said, people still do eat squirrel in

679
00:39:05,560 --> 00:39:10,719
Speaker 1: certain parts of the United States today. Um, I guess

680
00:39:10,760 --> 00:39:12,319
Speaker 1: we can talk. I mean, we found a lot of

681
00:39:12,360 --> 00:39:16,399
Speaker 1: extra fun stuff. Well, well, let's talk about So we

682
00:39:16,400 --> 00:39:19,920
Speaker 1: were talking about how they're viewed in America. They're depending

683
00:39:19,920 --> 00:39:21,560
Speaker 1: on where you are in the world, and depending on

684
00:39:21,600 --> 00:39:24,080
Speaker 1: the squirl you're talking about, they're actually they can be

685
00:39:24,160 --> 00:39:27,840
Speaker 1: viewed quite negatively. I remember in our Rewilding episode we

686
00:39:27,880 --> 00:39:31,360
Speaker 1: talked about how Eastern gray squirrels are considered an invasive

687
00:39:31,400 --> 00:39:37,640
Speaker 1: species in Italy um where they call them Americans killer squirrels. Um.

688
00:39:37,719 --> 00:39:40,400
Speaker 1: And there's also an issue with Eastern gray squirrels in

689
00:39:40,520 --> 00:39:44,000
Speaker 1: Europe where they've killed off most of the Eurasian red

690
00:39:44,040 --> 00:39:47,920
Speaker 1: squirrels over there. Um be they've just out competed them.

691
00:39:47,960 --> 00:39:50,360
Speaker 1: It's not like they've you know, choked them or anything

692
00:39:50,400 --> 00:39:54,240
Speaker 1: like that. They they just they're like almost twice as big,

693
00:39:54,520 --> 00:39:57,480
Speaker 1: they're a lot more ornery, and they've just kind of

694
00:39:57,640 --> 00:40:01,600
Speaker 1: diminished the number of of Eurasian bread squirrels in the

695
00:40:01,680 --> 00:40:04,759
Speaker 1: UK so much so that three quarters of the population

696
00:40:04,960 --> 00:40:08,600
Speaker 1: lives in Scotland, and I would just like to direct

697
00:40:08,640 --> 00:40:14,000
Speaker 1: everybody to the Scottish Squirrels website. Go to Scottish Squirrels

698
00:40:14,200 --> 00:40:17,880
Speaker 1: dot org dot uk and this is very important. Slash

699
00:40:17,960 --> 00:40:22,160
Speaker 1: about and on their about page the header image is

700
00:40:22,280 --> 00:40:25,000
Speaker 1: maybe the cutest squirrel you'll ever see in your entire life?

701
00:40:25,080 --> 00:40:27,359
Speaker 1: Is that the one he sent me? And Jerry, Yes,

702
00:40:28,840 --> 00:40:32,759
Speaker 1: isn't that the cutest squirrel ever? It's pretty cute. You

703
00:40:32,840 --> 00:40:36,000
Speaker 1: also sent something else. If you go to RSPCA dot

704
00:40:36,080 --> 00:40:40,480
Speaker 1: org dot uk, slash Advice and Welfare, slash Wildlife, slash Animals,

705
00:40:40,800 --> 00:40:45,320
Speaker 1: slash gray squirrels, slash feeding, or you could just google

706
00:40:45,320 --> 00:40:47,719
Speaker 1: feeding squirrels and using nest boxes, you're gonna see a

707
00:40:47,760 --> 00:40:51,239
Speaker 1: squirrel with a chicken wing in its mouth. Yeah, that's

708
00:40:51,239 --> 00:40:54,480
Speaker 1: pretty It's better than a bass eating of squirrel, I'll

709
00:40:54,480 --> 00:40:57,239
Speaker 1: tell you that. Yeah, that's a good article you sent

710
00:40:57,280 --> 00:41:00,200
Speaker 1: because it talks about if you like squirrels around, which

711
00:41:00,200 --> 00:41:03,800
Speaker 1: I certainly do, creating a good habitat for them. Trees,

712
00:41:03,960 --> 00:41:06,839
Speaker 1: obviously it's a good thing to have. Not cutting down

713
00:41:06,880 --> 00:41:08,680
Speaker 1: trees is a great thing to do if you can

714
00:41:08,719 --> 00:41:13,239
Speaker 1: avoid it. Uh, And then having squirrel safe bird feeders. Uh.

715
00:41:13,280 --> 00:41:15,640
Speaker 1: And this means not that the squirrels can't get to

716
00:41:15,760 --> 00:41:18,600
Speaker 1: that seed, because they, as you have attested, they will

717
00:41:18,640 --> 00:41:22,080
Speaker 1: find a way. Life finds a way, but it don't

718
00:41:22,080 --> 00:41:25,239
Speaker 1: won't trap the squirrel inside of it. No. Um, that's

719
00:41:25,440 --> 00:41:27,680
Speaker 1: that's a big one too. They also kind of get

720
00:41:27,719 --> 00:41:31,600
Speaker 1: into um, they get all Macbeth or Hamlet, which one

721
00:41:31,719 --> 00:41:35,280
Speaker 1: was to be or not to be? Why you asking

722
00:41:35,320 --> 00:41:38,200
Speaker 1: me this? Because they get all Hamlet or Macbeth on

723
00:41:38,560 --> 00:41:43,680
Speaker 1: whether or not to feed squirrels. You go, Um, So

724
00:41:44,160 --> 00:41:47,520
Speaker 1: they're they're like, you could feed squirrels, but really you shouldn't.

725
00:41:47,520 --> 00:41:50,480
Speaker 1: In the RSPCA takes I think a pretty sensible tact,

726
00:41:50,480 --> 00:41:53,920
Speaker 1: which is build a habitat for the squirrels and that

727
00:41:53,960 --> 00:41:56,239
Speaker 1: you're planting the right kind of trees that provide a

728
00:41:56,280 --> 00:41:58,040
Speaker 1: place for them to nest in a place for them

729
00:41:58,040 --> 00:42:00,239
Speaker 1: to get food, and then just step back. I can

730
00:42:00,320 --> 00:42:03,960
Speaker 1: enjoy them. If you're like you know, me and Mo,

731
00:42:04,160 --> 00:42:05,879
Speaker 1: and you go on walks or whatever and you want

732
00:42:05,920 --> 00:42:08,120
Speaker 1: to feed the squirrels. There are some things that are

733
00:42:08,200 --> 00:42:11,279
Speaker 1: better for squirrels than others, and it's basically you want

734
00:42:11,280 --> 00:42:14,359
Speaker 1: to give them what they would naturally eat. Um, which

735
00:42:14,400 --> 00:42:20,120
Speaker 1: is masked unshelled nuts like walnuts, chest nuts, acorns, hazel nuts,

736
00:42:20,160 --> 00:42:24,799
Speaker 1: that kind of thing. Yes, but not black safflower seeds.

737
00:42:24,840 --> 00:42:26,319
Speaker 1: I saw that if you are one of those people

738
00:42:26,320 --> 00:42:30,680
Speaker 1: who can't stand squirrels rating your um bird feeder, black

739
00:42:30,719 --> 00:42:33,880
Speaker 1: safflower seeds are they'll eat them, but they're not crazy

740
00:42:33,920 --> 00:42:38,160
Speaker 1: about them, and most birds like them instead. So that's

741
00:42:38,200 --> 00:42:39,919
Speaker 1: one way to do it. But you can also feed

742
00:42:39,960 --> 00:42:43,200
Speaker 1: them vegetables too, and chuck. They included this little tip

743
00:42:43,280 --> 00:42:46,360
Speaker 1: that I didn't realize. But if you if you're feeding squirrels,

744
00:42:46,400 --> 00:42:48,120
Speaker 1: you're leaving food out for squirrels in your yard, and

745
00:42:48,120 --> 00:42:50,359
Speaker 1: you have a garden that you care about, you don't

746
00:42:50,360 --> 00:42:52,480
Speaker 1: really want the squirrel taking the food and then burying

747
00:42:52,520 --> 00:42:54,719
Speaker 1: it elsewhere. So they said, if you're gonna feed them

748
00:42:55,239 --> 00:42:59,279
Speaker 1: fruits and vegetables shredded, because the squirrels is gonna eat

749
00:42:59,280 --> 00:43:00,960
Speaker 1: it there, it's not gonna try to bury it. I

750
00:43:00,960 --> 00:43:03,280
Speaker 1: thought that was smart. Yeah, And if you have the nuts,

751
00:43:03,320 --> 00:43:08,960
Speaker 1: don't give them like honey roasted almonds, like unsweetened, unsalted stuff.

752
00:43:09,880 --> 00:43:11,400
Speaker 1: I have set up you know, I have a camp

753
00:43:11,440 --> 00:43:15,280
Speaker 1: cam at the family camp trail cam and it's uh

754
00:43:15,320 --> 00:43:17,680
Speaker 1: it's keyed in on my deer feeder that I got,

755
00:43:18,320 --> 00:43:22,560
Speaker 1: which is corn, and I've seen one deer. But almost

756
00:43:22,560 --> 00:43:27,120
Speaker 1: every night I have scores of raccoons and almost every day,

757
00:43:27,320 --> 00:43:32,000
Speaker 1: well every day, I have squirrels, crows, and now daily

758
00:43:32,480 --> 00:43:37,560
Speaker 1: turkeys visiting. Lots and lots of turkeys. So I don't

759
00:43:37,560 --> 00:43:39,759
Speaker 1: care that the deer aren't visiting. It's all kinds of

760
00:43:39,760 --> 00:43:41,640
Speaker 1: animals are coming around. It's always fun to watch on

761
00:43:41,680 --> 00:43:44,400
Speaker 1: the camp cam. That is very cool. Um. One thing

762
00:43:44,440 --> 00:43:47,239
Speaker 1: you want to be careful with with peanuts too, is

763
00:43:47,320 --> 00:43:52,240
Speaker 1: giving them raw peanuts because peanuts can carry um an affletoxin,

764
00:43:52,719 --> 00:43:56,400
Speaker 1: which is very It's not good. It's not good for squirrels.

765
00:43:56,400 --> 00:43:59,480
Speaker 1: It's not good for humans either. It's a type of fungus.

766
00:43:59,520 --> 00:44:03,239
Speaker 1: I think that actually is not only carcinogen carcinogists that

767
00:44:03,280 --> 00:44:07,799
Speaker 1: can actually like just kill you on the spot neurologically speaking. Um,

768
00:44:07,840 --> 00:44:12,239
Speaker 1: So you actually want roasted peanuts, but not salted or

769
00:44:12,280 --> 00:44:17,680
Speaker 1: anything like that. So like plain roasted peanuts, or what's

770
00:44:17,680 --> 00:44:20,400
Speaker 1: even better because it helps with their teeth, are mass

771
00:44:20,480 --> 00:44:23,400
Speaker 1: nuts again like pecans, walnuts, that kind of stuff. But

772
00:44:23,560 --> 00:44:25,680
Speaker 1: a lot of people say don't feed squirrels because you're

773
00:44:25,719 --> 00:44:29,120
Speaker 1: actually what you're doing is, as we've seen, if squirrels

774
00:44:29,120 --> 00:44:30,640
Speaker 1: know that there's a lot of food, they're going to

775
00:44:30,719 --> 00:44:32,840
Speaker 1: mate mate mate mate mate, and there's going to be

776
00:44:32,840 --> 00:44:35,440
Speaker 1: a lot of squirrels and they're going to become dependent

777
00:44:35,560 --> 00:44:39,520
Speaker 1: on that additional food supply. Um, and they might start

778
00:44:39,560 --> 00:44:41,800
Speaker 1: showing up at your neighbor's house, they might start burrowing

779
00:44:41,840 --> 00:44:45,279
Speaker 1: into your attic. There's just a lot of there's a

780
00:44:45,320 --> 00:44:49,560
Speaker 1: lot of things that to to take into consideration. I guess, yeah,

781
00:44:49,600 --> 00:44:51,880
Speaker 1: well the family camp, there's nothing but would so I

782
00:44:51,920 --> 00:44:55,279
Speaker 1: hope we get overrun. So I agree with you. So

783
00:44:55,360 --> 00:44:58,359
Speaker 1: you found a couple of cool things, um, including why

784
00:44:58,480 --> 00:45:01,600
Speaker 1: squirrels like seem to ash in front of your car

785
00:45:01,680 --> 00:45:06,040
Speaker 1: when you're driving right. Yeah, so, and and again I

786
00:45:06,080 --> 00:45:08,160
Speaker 1: love that we've just finally found answers for this stuff

787
00:45:08,160 --> 00:45:11,399
Speaker 1: because this is kind of a fun, non obnoxious fact

788
00:45:11,440 --> 00:45:14,440
Speaker 1: to jump on to drop on someone. If you're driving

789
00:45:14,480 --> 00:45:18,000
Speaker 1: around a neighborhood and the squirrel does that thing and

790
00:45:18,040 --> 00:45:20,839
Speaker 1: people go, why the squirrels do that? We can say, well,

791
00:45:20,880 --> 00:45:25,000
Speaker 1: it's actually an evolutionary instinct to get away from a predator.

792
00:45:25,200 --> 00:45:29,279
Speaker 1: So if you run out and you initially freeze when

793
00:45:29,320 --> 00:45:32,400
Speaker 1: there's a predator. The predator, it's sort of like a

794
00:45:32,400 --> 00:45:35,840
Speaker 1: football player waiting for the defensive player to make their move,

795
00:45:36,680 --> 00:45:39,239
Speaker 1: and then you go the opposite way with a little juke.

796
00:45:39,680 --> 00:45:41,359
Speaker 1: And that's what the squirrel is doing. They go out,

797
00:45:41,560 --> 00:45:44,520
Speaker 1: they freeze when they see that car, and if it

798
00:45:44,560 --> 00:45:46,360
Speaker 1: was a predator, they would wait on the predator to

799
00:45:46,360 --> 00:45:48,360
Speaker 1: sort of make a move and then they can quickly

800
00:45:48,400 --> 00:45:52,040
Speaker 1: go in a direction that is really comes in handy

801
00:45:52,040 --> 00:45:54,000
Speaker 1: when it's a predator, when it's a car that's going,

802
00:45:54,360 --> 00:45:57,560
Speaker 1: you know, generally in a big, hulking straight line. Uh,

803
00:45:57,560 --> 00:45:59,440
Speaker 1: it's not the same thing. But a squirrel has a

804
00:45:59,480 --> 00:46:02,160
Speaker 1: squirrel brain and it doesn't realize that. So that's why

805
00:46:02,200 --> 00:46:05,480
Speaker 1: a squirrel will jump out in the street, see a

806
00:46:05,480 --> 00:46:08,440
Speaker 1: car and just stop. They're not dumb. They're waiting on

807
00:46:08,520 --> 00:46:12,439
Speaker 1: you to make some hawk like move, which doesn't happen

808
00:46:12,480 --> 00:46:15,400
Speaker 1: in the car. So what you do is you just

809
00:46:15,440 --> 00:46:18,239
Speaker 1: slow down and check your review mirror. Don't say I'm

810
00:46:18,239 --> 00:46:21,240
Speaker 1: on the brakes or anything, but you know, they're everywhere,

811
00:46:21,239 --> 00:46:24,239
Speaker 1: and I've hit I think maybe two squirrels in my

812
00:46:24,239 --> 00:46:27,759
Speaker 1: adult life, so it's not like the most common thing

813
00:46:27,840 --> 00:46:31,000
Speaker 1: to run over a squirrel. Yeah, I ran over one once,

814
00:46:31,000 --> 00:46:33,520
Speaker 1: and my brother in law said that he was on

815
00:46:33,560 --> 00:46:36,080
Speaker 1: his way to buy a birthday present for his young

816
00:46:36,200 --> 00:46:38,759
Speaker 1: kid who was waiting forever for their dad to come

817
00:46:38,800 --> 00:46:42,640
Speaker 1: back for his birthday present for his party. It was

818
00:46:42,680 --> 00:46:47,080
Speaker 1: not helpful. Uh, and what about these black squirrels. Uh,

819
00:46:47,239 --> 00:46:49,960
Speaker 1: Emily and I we're taking a walk through Brooklyn one

820
00:46:50,000 --> 00:46:54,279
Speaker 1: day and saw a black, black, black squirrel, not just

821
00:46:54,360 --> 00:46:56,360
Speaker 1: a hint of black, and it was the coolest thing

822
00:46:56,400 --> 00:46:58,320
Speaker 1: I've ever seen. And I've since seen a few more

823
00:46:58,680 --> 00:47:00,560
Speaker 1: here and there in New York. And we had the

824
00:47:00,560 --> 00:47:06,080
Speaker 1: answer there too, right, Yes, Uh, they seem to be

825
00:47:06,320 --> 00:47:09,920
Speaker 1: so they used to think that they were freaks of nature.

826
00:47:10,040 --> 00:47:13,080
Speaker 1: I think is one um naturalist put it like years

827
00:47:13,120 --> 00:47:15,520
Speaker 1: and years ago, and somebody said, I don't know that

828
00:47:15,600 --> 00:47:17,640
Speaker 1: that's true. I think these actually might have been the

829
00:47:17,680 --> 00:47:22,160
Speaker 1: dominant version. Uh. They seem to be closely related to

830
00:47:22,480 --> 00:47:25,200
Speaker 1: Eastern grays, if not just a type of Eastern gray,

831
00:47:25,280 --> 00:47:28,279
Speaker 1: like a different breed of that species. Um. But they

832
00:47:28,680 --> 00:47:31,600
Speaker 1: were saying they used to possibly be the dominant version

833
00:47:31,640 --> 00:47:34,759
Speaker 1: and then they got edged out by the Eastern gray,

834
00:47:34,840 --> 00:47:37,799
Speaker 1: and so they're there's they're they're they're just kind of

835
00:47:38,320 --> 00:47:42,319
Speaker 1: uh infrequently, they infrequently appear, but there are parts of

836
00:47:42,520 --> 00:47:46,000
Speaker 1: um North America where they seem to populate more than others,

837
00:47:46,040 --> 00:47:49,040
Speaker 1: like New York. You mean, I um used to see

838
00:47:49,080 --> 00:47:52,800
Speaker 1: them in d C. Toronto. They're all over Toronto, UM

839
00:47:52,840 --> 00:47:55,719
Speaker 1: in Ontario in general, from what I understand. So it

840
00:47:55,800 --> 00:47:58,439
Speaker 1: seems like from what I could tell, that they think

841
00:47:58,440 --> 00:48:01,320
Speaker 1: that there they were, they're already and now we're just

842
00:48:01,400 --> 00:48:03,600
Speaker 1: kind of seeing them in like this kind of moment

843
00:48:03,640 --> 00:48:06,920
Speaker 1: in time where their numbers have diminished tremendously, where if

844
00:48:06,960 --> 00:48:09,279
Speaker 1: we went back in time we might see a lot more.

845
00:48:09,360 --> 00:48:12,000
Speaker 1: Is that Does that seem accurate? Yeah? I mean, it's

846
00:48:12,080 --> 00:48:16,120
Speaker 1: just genetics. It's a recessive gene that causes an abnormal pigmentation,

847
00:48:17,000 --> 00:48:19,880
Speaker 1: and you will, you know, you're you're only going to

848
00:48:19,920 --> 00:48:23,160
Speaker 1: get more of that recessive gene if these squirrels or

849
00:48:23,200 --> 00:48:27,279
Speaker 1: any uh, you know, creature is reproducing in a in

850
00:48:27,320 --> 00:48:30,239
Speaker 1: a smaller area. So if you've got to contain population,

851
00:48:30,400 --> 00:48:34,560
Speaker 1: like let's say an island like New York or apparently

852
00:48:34,800 --> 00:48:37,920
Speaker 1: Roosevelt Island has a lot of them, uh, you're just

853
00:48:37,960 --> 00:48:41,520
Speaker 1: gonna see more of them. So uh, d C is

854
00:48:41,560 --> 00:48:44,560
Speaker 1: a little not inexplicable, but it makes more sense in

855
00:48:44,600 --> 00:48:47,600
Speaker 1: New York because you're just going to get more, you know,

856
00:48:48,480 --> 00:48:52,080
Speaker 1: more of this recessive gene happening in a certain area.

857
00:48:52,640 --> 00:48:55,759
Speaker 1: So not at all my explanation. Then, now what's your explanation?

858
00:48:57,040 --> 00:48:58,960
Speaker 1: Now you nailed it. And this was an article the

859
00:48:59,000 --> 00:49:03,400
Speaker 1: Mysterious Black Squirrels of NYC from what turns out to

860
00:49:03,400 --> 00:49:06,279
Speaker 1: be a really good website called Untapped Cities dot com

861
00:49:06,280 --> 00:49:10,640
Speaker 1: and writer Michelle Young. It's it's really cool read um. Yeah,

862
00:49:11,040 --> 00:49:14,560
Speaker 1: so you got anything else on squirrels? Nothing and hug

863
00:49:14,560 --> 00:49:17,600
Speaker 1: a squirrel, Embrace the squirrel. But but don't do that,

864
00:49:17,880 --> 00:49:20,080
Speaker 1: don't know. If you do feed them, don't don't let

865
00:49:20,160 --> 00:49:22,960
Speaker 1: them meat out of your hand because they'll bite you.

866
00:49:23,400 --> 00:49:27,520
Speaker 1: Even though they're grateful, there's still bitey um. And since

867
00:49:27,560 --> 00:49:33,920
Speaker 1: I said that, everybody, it's time for listener mail. That's right.

868
00:49:34,000 --> 00:49:36,200
Speaker 1: And it's a great listener mail because we get to

869
00:49:36,239 --> 00:49:43,319
Speaker 1: say hello to a kindergarten class, which is always fun. Hello, Hi,

870
00:49:43,520 --> 00:49:47,520
Speaker 1: Mr Chuck and Mr Josh. My name is Katie. It's

871
00:49:47,520 --> 00:49:50,760
Speaker 1: either fink or finky, and I'm emailing with my kindergarten

872
00:49:50,760 --> 00:49:53,000
Speaker 1: class in Baltimore City We sometimes listen to your show,

873
00:49:53,400 --> 00:49:55,200
Speaker 1: and we were so excited when you heard you mentioned

874
00:49:55,200 --> 00:49:59,120
Speaker 1: the three Sisters in the recent watermelon episode. We actually

875
00:49:59,120 --> 00:50:01,000
Speaker 1: spent a whole week and learn about the three sisters

876
00:50:01,040 --> 00:50:04,239
Speaker 1: this fall and wanted to share with you our excitement.

877
00:50:04,800 --> 00:50:06,520
Speaker 1: We hope you do a short stuff on them soon.

878
00:50:06,680 --> 00:50:10,360
Speaker 1: We definitely will if you need some Three Sisters experts

879
00:50:10,680 --> 00:50:13,200
Speaker 1: who wanted to uh tell you these facts that we

880
00:50:13,280 --> 00:50:16,200
Speaker 1: learned this year. Uh, and here's a little short list.

881
00:50:16,320 --> 00:50:19,759
Speaker 1: Native Americans would plant fish first in the ground to

882
00:50:19,840 --> 00:50:21,960
Speaker 1: prepare the soil and make it healthy and rich. Love

883
00:50:22,040 --> 00:50:26,560
Speaker 1: that the corn grows so tall that holds up the beans,

884
00:50:27,400 --> 00:50:30,600
Speaker 1: and the squash keeps the soil moist so the other

885
00:50:30,600 --> 00:50:34,040
Speaker 1: two sisters have enough water to stay hydrated. And finally,

886
00:50:34,160 --> 00:50:36,960
Speaker 1: all three of the sisters are dried so that people

887
00:50:36,960 --> 00:50:38,879
Speaker 1: can save them to eat later in the winter, which

888
00:50:38,960 --> 00:50:42,440
Speaker 1: is a great benefit. So, uh, we really want to

889
00:50:42,440 --> 00:50:44,160
Speaker 1: share our knowledge in case you do a short stuff.

890
00:50:44,400 --> 00:50:48,680
Speaker 1: Thanks for reading. Love Miss fink E's or Miss Fink's

891
00:50:48,800 --> 00:50:52,279
Speaker 1: kindergarten class. And uh, like I said, this is in

892
00:50:52,320 --> 00:50:57,160
Speaker 1: Baltimore City. Man, that's really impressive. Like I remember in kindergarten,

893
00:50:57,200 --> 00:51:06,160
Speaker 1: I was learning Red Red Red. I wasn't learning about

894
00:51:06,160 --> 00:51:09,480
Speaker 1: the three sisters and groundcovers like keeping them moisture in

895
00:51:09,600 --> 00:51:11,600
Speaker 1: place for the other two. I mean, come on, that's

896
00:51:11,600 --> 00:51:17,359
Speaker 1: really impressive this week read. I think it was more

897
00:51:17,440 --> 00:51:21,799
Speaker 1: like that month. February is red month. All right, Oh

898
00:51:21,840 --> 00:51:26,160
Speaker 1: that's great. Well, thank you, miss Fink or Finky's class.

899
00:51:26,160 --> 00:51:29,200
Speaker 1: Hats off to you guys. Keep it up. Uh and yes,

900
00:51:29,280 --> 00:51:31,799
Speaker 1: we will definitely do a three Sisters episode some day

901
00:51:31,880 --> 00:51:35,520
Speaker 1: dedicated to you guys. All right, Chuck for sure. If

902
00:51:35,520 --> 00:51:37,520
Speaker 1: you want to get in touch with us, you can

903
00:51:37,640 --> 00:51:44,360
Speaker 1: to via email at stuff podcast at iHeart radio dot com.

904
00:51:44,440 --> 00:51:46,760
Speaker 1: Stuff you Should Know is a production of i Heeart Radio.

905
00:51:47,239 --> 00:51:50,399
Speaker 1: For more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app,

906
00:51:50,600 --> 00:51:53,520
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.

907
00:52:00,000 --> 00:52:00,080
Speaker 1: T