Speaker 1: Welcome to brain Stuff production of I Heart Radio. Hey
Speaker 1: brain Stuff Lauren vog bom here with another classic episode.
Speaker 1: I'm not ready to hand the world over to our
Speaker 1: future robot overlords just yet, but I will say that
Speaker 1: robots can help us do some amazing things. In this episode,
Speaker 1: we talk about how they can help law enforcement save
Speaker 1: animals from being killed by poachers. Hey brain Stuff, Lauren
Speaker 1: vogel bomb Here. It's often hard for law enforcement to
Speaker 1: nab a poacher. There are too few of the former
Speaker 1: and too many of the latter on American state lands.
Speaker 1: But officials now have a tool that's helping to catch
Speaker 1: poachers while listening to chance that an animal has to
Speaker 1: die first. An army of taxidermied robotic wildlife has been
Speaker 1: unleashed across the country to help police and game wardens
Speaker 1: stop poachers. The robot animals are made by companies like
Speaker 1: Custom Robotic Wildlife, which use legally acquired animal hides and
Speaker 1: robotic opponents to create realistic critters. With the touch of
Speaker 1: a remote controlled button, the animals move just enough to
Speaker 1: appear alive a tail twitch or a head turn when
Speaker 1: a poacher lines up a shot on them. At the
Speaker 1: other end, of those buttons are officers hiding in the
Speaker 1: bushes or a truck ready to arrest the poachers. Generally,
Speaker 1: the officers have gotten a tip that poachers are in
Speaker 1: the area, so they know where to place the decoys.
Speaker 1: We spoke with Brian Wolfs Legal, owner of Wisconsin's custom
Speaker 1: Robotic Wildlife, who's been creating such decoys for law enforcement
Speaker 1: for twenty years. He gets requests almost every day for
Speaker 1: his animals, which range in price from about two thousand
Speaker 1: dollars for a white tailed deer, his most popular animal,
Speaker 1: to nearly five thousand for a moose. Costs include the
Speaker 1: robotics and the packaging. The prices might seem high, but
Speaker 1: molse Legal notes that the animals can be used for
Speaker 1: many years and take many shots before being retired. So
Speaker 1: how good are these robot animals? We also spoke with
Speaker 1: Jim Reed, the director of stewardship at the Humane Society
Speaker 1: the Wildlife Land Trust. He's the man in charge of
Speaker 1: its robotic decoy program, which donates robot animals to law
Speaker 1: enforcement agencies. He said, where they have been used very little,
Speaker 1: they're incredibly effective. Where they've been used quite a bit,
Speaker 1: the poachers kind of get used to it. Then the
Speaker 1: game wardens have to change things up a little. That's
Speaker 1: when Wolves Legal gets a call for a new animal
Speaker 1: or one that moves in a different way. He said,
Speaker 1: every year we build something different because the officers say,
Speaker 1: I hear the poachers say, if just the heads and
Speaker 1: tails move, don't shoot. So then we make an ear
Speaker 1: move or a leg move. I'm working on a white
Speaker 1: tailed deer right now for a federal law enforcement officer.
Speaker 1: She wants one that picks up its tail and poops.
Speaker 1: How will they manage that, you ask? Wolves Legal is
Speaker 1: trying a few techniques, he said, We got a little
Speaker 1: Auger system going. I have three kids and they just
Speaker 1: love this because I buy M and M's and they
Speaker 1: get to eat every color except the dark chocolate ones.
Speaker 1: An Auger system is a conveyor system to move materials
Speaker 1: on an incline. And as for the brown M and M's,
Speaker 1: you can probably guess what' there for. Poaching is a
Speaker 1: huge problem in the United States, and the decoys are
Speaker 1: great help. Read with The Humane Society says they're very effective.
Speaker 1: They're used to target specific crimes such as hunting from roadways,
Speaker 1: hunting out of season, and shooting from a motor vehicle.
Speaker 1: The Humane Society Wildlife Land Trust has donated more than
Speaker 1: thirty robotic decoys to various enforcement agencies since two thousand four.
Speaker 1: Reid said, in working with game wardens around the country,
Speaker 1: we came to find out these men and women don't
Speaker 1: have the resources they require to do their jobs effectively
Speaker 1: in a lot of cases. The organization plans to continue
Speaker 1: raising funds to donate even more with the goal of
Speaker 1: eventually ending poaching wolves. Legal also builds robotic animals for
Speaker 1: private use. He said, I'm working on a sitting red
Speaker 1: fox for an autistic child with a robotic head and tail.
Speaker 1: He can plug it into the wall and away it goes.
Speaker 1: Today's episode is based on the article Robotic animals are
Speaker 1: helping catch poachers on how Stuff Work dot com, written
Speaker 1: by Karen Kirkpatrick. Breen Stuff is production of by Heart
Speaker 1: Radio in partnership with Householpworks dot com and is produced
Speaker 1: by Tyler Clang. Or more podcasts from my Heart Radio,
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