WEBVTT - Twilight of the Moa 0:00:04.559 --> 0:00:07.360 Hi, everybody. It's Seth, the producer of Stuff to Blow 0:00:07.400 --> 0:00:11.360 Your Mind. I'm here in March to just pop on 0:00:11.400 --> 0:00:14.440 a quick note into this episode saying, hey, it's March, 0:00:15.320 --> 0:00:17.400 and you know what that means. We're all recording from 0:00:17.440 --> 0:00:22.040 our own homes, all separate, and all social distancing, so 0:00:22.160 --> 0:00:23.880 that means the sound quality of this one is a 0:00:23.960 --> 0:00:27.240 little strange. But just to let you know, each time 0:00:27.280 --> 0:00:30.080 we've been doing these home recordings, they've been getting better 0:00:30.120 --> 0:00:32.280 and better and better. So I can guarantee you the 0:00:32.320 --> 0:00:33.960 next one's going to sound a little better than this, 0:00:34.040 --> 0:00:35.559 and the next one and after that's going to sound 0:00:35.560 --> 0:00:38.200 a little bit better than that one, etcetera, etcetera. So 0:00:38.520 --> 0:00:40.760 just so you know, this is all temporary and we'll 0:00:40.760 --> 0:00:43.360 get back to our regular episodes as soon as we can, 0:00:43.560 --> 0:00:46.680 sound quality wise. Thank you very much and enjoy the show. 0:00:49.960 --> 0:00:52.320 Welcome to stot to Blow Your Mind, production of My 0:00:52.440 --> 0:01:01.680 Heart Radio. Hey a, welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind. 0:01:01.840 --> 0:01:04.800 My name is Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick, and 0:01:04.920 --> 0:01:08.080 we're back. We're still social distancing. Now. There must have 0:01:08.120 --> 0:01:11.600 been a weird back and forth here because Thursday of 0:01:11.720 --> 0:01:14.920 last week's episode we were broadcasting from our closet in 0:01:14.959 --> 0:01:18.880 our laundry room, right, But then Tuesday of this week's episode, 0:01:19.240 --> 0:01:21.680 I think that was recorded in the studio before we 0:01:21.720 --> 0:01:24.720 came home for the great retreat, that's right. And also 0:01:24.880 --> 0:01:28.160 we record our vault episode intros about a month out, 0:01:28.280 --> 0:01:33.200 so people might have noticed that as well. But this episode, 0:01:33.280 --> 0:01:36.520 part two of our Look at the Moa Twilight of 0:01:36.560 --> 0:01:39.760 the Moa we're calling it. This episode is recorded from 0:01:39.760 --> 0:01:43.039 our respective closets in our homes. You're actually in a 0:01:43.080 --> 0:01:45.880 closet now, as opposed to your your laundry room. Is 0:01:45.880 --> 0:01:48.760 that correct? That's true. I decided to become a monster 0:01:48.840 --> 0:01:51.560 in the closet. Uh, And I've got so I've got 0:01:51.560 --> 0:01:54.640 the same talisman's that I had last time in order 0:01:54.680 --> 0:01:57.559 to bring me good luck and watch over me while 0:01:57.720 --> 0:01:59.920 making this recording. I've got tom Atkins from Night at 0:01:59.920 --> 0:02:02.320 the Creeps. I've got my thor Christ. But this time 0:02:02.360 --> 0:02:06.040 I also brought in an extremely tasteful novelty mug that 0:02:06.120 --> 0:02:09.359 my wife found an East Tennessee thrift store, which is 0:02:09.360 --> 0:02:11.480 great because I cannot bring this mug to the office. 0:02:11.560 --> 0:02:14.080 I am sure I would get in trouble for that. Yeah, 0:02:14.320 --> 0:02:17.320 the home office brings with it certain advantages, doesn't it? 0:02:17.840 --> 0:02:20.160 For For me, I looked around the house. I would 0:02:20.160 --> 0:02:22.080 have loved to have had a toy of a moa, 0:02:22.280 --> 0:02:26.320 like a little plastic like Schleck moa, But sadly we 0:02:26.360 --> 0:02:28.560 do not have one, and it would be irresponsible for 0:02:28.600 --> 0:02:31.120 me to even try and mail order one at the moment. 0:02:31.440 --> 0:02:33.680 So you have a plastic Shrek, No I have. I 0:02:33.720 --> 0:02:37.600 do have a plastic terror bird. So it's not accurate, 0:02:37.639 --> 0:02:41.160 but it's it is still an extinct flightless bird. Uh 0:02:41.280 --> 0:02:42.800 So I'm gonna set it right here next to my 0:02:42.840 --> 0:02:45.679 microphone and it will it will serve as my mascot. 0:02:45.919 --> 0:02:49.080 Well mayor pocket sized titles watch over us. So, so 0:02:49.120 --> 0:02:51.160 where do we leave off last time? All right? So 0:02:51.200 --> 0:02:53.720 in our last episode, and if you didn't listen to it, 0:02:53.840 --> 0:02:56.200 do go back and listen to that episode before this one. 0:02:56.480 --> 0:02:59.640 In it, we discussed the evolution of flightless birds and 0:02:59.680 --> 0:03:04.200 the eyes of the moa, nine species of large flightless 0:03:04.240 --> 0:03:07.959 birds that evolved as the dominant vertebrates on the isolated 0:03:08.000 --> 0:03:11.080 islands of what He's currently known as New Zealand. But 0:03:11.400 --> 0:03:14.000 the rule of the moa did not last forever because 0:03:14.240 --> 0:03:18.200 Homo sapiens arrived, and this episode will deal with the 0:03:18.240 --> 0:03:21.520 subsequent extinction of the moa because you know what they say, 0:03:21.960 --> 0:03:27.960 more humans moa problems. I wondered how you were going 0:03:28.000 --> 0:03:29.880 to work that in, saying, you know, I had to 0:03:29.880 --> 0:03:33.840 get to it eventually. Yeah, yeah, that's true for i'd 0:03:33.840 --> 0:03:37.640 say every organism except us, right, except maybe like hathogens 0:03:37.680 --> 0:03:41.040 that that prey upon us. Right. Yeah, it's certainly when 0:03:41.040 --> 0:03:45.680 we're dealing with with megafauna um creatures of that nature. 0:03:46.640 --> 0:03:50.000 There's this is a tale of doom whenever humans enter 0:03:50.040 --> 0:03:52.720 the equation, and we'll we'll point out some other examples 0:03:52.720 --> 0:03:54.960 of that as we'd move along. No, wait a minute, 0:03:54.960 --> 0:03:57.320 I'm thinking of some more exceptions. We got rats too, 0:03:57.360 --> 0:04:01.600 I mean rats were great for them. Rat will come up. Yeah, 0:04:01.600 --> 0:04:04.119 so so, yeah, a few exceptions there. But you don't 0:04:04.120 --> 0:04:06.560 want to be a moa when humans show up, right, 0:04:07.200 --> 0:04:10.440 So the rule of the moa was lengthy. They evolved 0:04:10.440 --> 0:04:13.920 into the into these dominant positions in New Zealand, but 0:04:14.000 --> 0:04:17.400 as we discussed on the show before, it can be 0:04:17.680 --> 0:04:21.560 precarious at the top, certainly for apex predators, but also 0:04:21.640 --> 0:04:26.599 from massive dominant herbivores, especially when something changes. Oh yeah, 0:04:26.680 --> 0:04:29.200 we also talked about this in our episode. I believe 0:04:29.240 --> 0:04:33.240 it was on the Leviattan or the Leviathan genus of 0:04:33.279 --> 0:04:36.560 like the the ancient predatory sperm whale. That's right, yes, 0:04:36.880 --> 0:04:38.880 where it's easy to look at a creature like that 0:04:39.120 --> 0:04:41.880 or a creature like hosts eagle, which we discussed in 0:04:41.880 --> 0:04:44.280 the last episode, to look at these creatures and think, 0:04:44.279 --> 0:04:47.400 well that there's no taking that down. That's that's that's 0:04:47.440 --> 0:04:50.479 a dominant organism. But it is, uh, you know, it 0:04:50.600 --> 0:04:53.719 is the ruler, but it is it is it's thrown 0:04:53.839 --> 0:04:57.800 rest upon a precarious pyramid of bones. Yeah, heavy lies 0:04:57.839 --> 0:05:01.680 the crown exactly. So yeah, when something changes, it can 0:05:01.760 --> 0:05:06.279 topple everything over. And in the thirteenth century c. I've 0:05:06.320 --> 0:05:09.120 seen twelve a d c. As a potential date, a 0:05:09.200 --> 0:05:11.880 major change arrived on the shores of New Zealand. And 0:05:11.880 --> 0:05:14.799 that change came in the form of Homo sapiens. Uh. 0:05:14.880 --> 0:05:20.200 The long world changing wave of human migration had finally 0:05:20.320 --> 0:05:22.880 made its way to you know, near the bottom of 0:05:22.920 --> 0:05:25.640 the world, to this nation of the birds. And this 0:05:25.680 --> 0:05:28.240 would have been what would come to be known as 0:05:28.440 --> 0:05:32.040 the Mallory. Uh. These were uh, these settlers were a 0:05:32.360 --> 0:05:36.599 Polynesian people who arrived in several waves uh in what 0:05:36.760 --> 0:05:39.320 is now New Zealand. This is one of the later 0:05:39.520 --> 0:05:44.040 regions of planet Earth to be settled by humans. Absolutely 0:05:44.400 --> 0:05:48.320 like these were some of the last in true pioneers 0:05:48.880 --> 0:05:53.520 heading into parts of the world, not not only parts 0:05:53.560 --> 0:05:55.440 of the world that they had not been to before, 0:05:55.480 --> 0:05:59.039 but where no human had gone before. Um. You know, 0:05:59.240 --> 0:06:03.440 the European colonists and explorers would only come in the 0:06:03.440 --> 0:06:07.440 wake of these true pioneers. Now, Polynesian culture itself is 0:06:07.839 --> 0:06:10.440 endlessly fascinating and I'd love to come back and deal 0:06:10.520 --> 0:06:13.680 with some of the related topics on the show, such 0:06:13.720 --> 0:06:19.000 as their amazing navigational abilities or the use of aquaculture 0:06:19.040 --> 0:06:22.320 in the in the Hawaiian Islands. But essentially we're talking 0:06:22.360 --> 0:06:26.520 about a long curving leg of human expansion that extends 0:06:26.800 --> 0:06:32.080 from China through the Philippines, New Guinea, the Solomon Islands, Samoa, Tahiti, 0:06:32.400 --> 0:06:36.120 uh Hawaii, Easter Island, and other islands in this broad 0:06:36.279 --> 0:06:39.840 stretch of the ocean. Again, they were the Polynesians were 0:06:39.880 --> 0:06:44.120 the last true pioneers of human expansion, and Polynesian expansion 0:06:44.160 --> 0:06:46.880 took place over the course of thousands of years as well, 0:06:47.120 --> 0:06:49.680 and the culture evolved along the way it took takes 0:06:49.680 --> 0:06:52.520 on ends up taking on different forms in the locations 0:06:52.520 --> 0:06:56.839 where they land, often due to resulting isolation. Uh, you know, 0:06:56.880 --> 0:07:00.680 because these are in many cases very far flung islands, 0:07:00.720 --> 0:07:03.160 and and and sometimes we're talking about, you know, centuries 0:07:03.200 --> 0:07:08.120 and centuries between people making it to one island versus another. 0:07:08.440 --> 0:07:11.720 So New Zealand was discovered and colonized very late in 0:07:11.800 --> 0:07:17.040 human expansion, and when the archaic Mallory arrived, they encountered 0:07:17.080 --> 0:07:20.800 the moa. Following this encounter, the nine species of moa 0:07:20.880 --> 0:07:24.320 would scarcely last more than another century, and they were 0:07:24.360 --> 0:07:29.320 extinct by fourtet. So let's get into what we're mainly 0:07:29.320 --> 0:07:33.000 going to discuss in this episode, this this collision between 0:07:33.280 --> 0:07:36.000 Homo sapiens and moa. And probably the best place to 0:07:36.040 --> 0:07:38.440 start there is by talking about just the word moa. 0:07:39.040 --> 0:07:42.400 Where does it come from? I was reading in Prodigious Birds, 0:07:42.480 --> 0:07:46.160 MOA's and Moa Hunting in New Zealand by Athol Anderson, 0:07:46.520 --> 0:07:50.480 and the author shares that the earliest recorded use of 0:07:50.520 --> 0:07:55.480 the word moa comes via Cornish missionary William Colenso who 0:07:55.520 --> 0:07:59.440 in eighteen thirty eight heard that some Mallory described the 0:07:59.480 --> 0:08:03.600 moa as a large bird, others as a large bird 0:08:03.640 --> 0:08:06.480 with a face like that of a man who lived 0:08:06.520 --> 0:08:10.720 in a mountain cavern that was guarded by two giant lizards. Wow. 0:08:11.200 --> 0:08:14.760 This in other tales described the residents of Mount uh 0:08:14.880 --> 0:08:20.600 Taranaki or Mount Egmonts described the very strange residents that 0:08:20.680 --> 0:08:24.760 lived there, often taking the form of abnormal birds or lizards, 0:08:24.880 --> 0:08:28.840 sometimes with human qualities. And this really lines up with 0:08:28.920 --> 0:08:31.600 what we've talked about on the show before about sacred 0:08:31.640 --> 0:08:35.960 mountains and holy mountains and the various myths that people 0:08:36.360 --> 0:08:39.559 accumulate regarding the sorts of things you would find there, 0:08:39.559 --> 0:08:42.760 in the sorts of creatures that would populate those uh, 0:08:42.880 --> 0:08:46.240 those mysterious cliffs up there. Yeah, there are a couple 0:08:46.280 --> 0:08:48.120 of ways of looking at that. In our episode on 0:08:48.160 --> 0:08:51.360 the Sacred Mountains, I guess we did two of those episodes. 0:08:51.400 --> 0:08:53.360 I mean, one thing is we talked about the idea 0:08:53.400 --> 0:08:56.200 that if you get really really high up there, there's 0:08:56.240 --> 0:08:59.679 some evidence that people sometimes start, you know, experiencing psychosis 0:08:59.800 --> 0:09:03.000 or llucinations. Um, so, like that could be a source 0:09:03.040 --> 0:09:06.600 of some supernatural beliefs in some cases. But but I'd 0:09:06.600 --> 0:09:09.880 say probably the more prevalent issue is just that the 0:09:09.920 --> 0:09:13.199 top of the mountain is inaccessible, so it is naturally 0:09:13.240 --> 0:09:16.079 a place to put your mythical creatures at home in 0:09:16.240 --> 0:09:19.400 You know that that is where they hide. Absolutely. Now 0:09:19.400 --> 0:09:21.280 I know what some people are probably wondering here is 0:09:21.840 --> 0:09:25.920 eight That sounds kind of late for the earliest recorded 0:09:26.040 --> 0:09:28.440 use of the word moa. Yeah, so how long would 0:09:28.480 --> 0:09:33.240 the species have been extinct before the word appears in writing? Yeah? Yeah, 0:09:33.280 --> 0:09:36.800 it's uh. It seems a little confusing at first, right, 0:09:37.520 --> 0:09:42.480 because first contact between Europeans and Maori occurred December eighteen, 0:09:42.679 --> 0:09:49.800 sixteen forty two, with Able Tasman's Dutch East India Company expedition. Now, specifically, 0:09:49.880 --> 0:09:54.760 Europeans had been asking the Maori about other giant creatures 0:09:54.760 --> 0:09:58.520 recorded in their traditions since the seventeen seventies. In the 0:09:58.559 --> 0:10:02.559 near two centuries at there was certainly communication and exchange 0:10:02.640 --> 0:10:07.960 between Europeans and Maori, in addition to, of course colonial subjucation. UH. 0:10:08.000 --> 0:10:11.240 Anderson discusses this uh in his book, and it points 0:10:11.240 --> 0:10:15.640 out that earlier references to the moa might either have 0:10:15.720 --> 0:10:20.280 not been recognized or not associated with the term moa. Itself, 0:10:20.360 --> 0:10:22.520 so you know, descriptions of the animal might not have 0:10:22.559 --> 0:10:26.520 been immediately tied with moa. For instance, there were accounts 0:10:26.520 --> 0:10:29.920 of spirits covered in hair in the form of birds, 0:10:30.400 --> 0:10:33.800 and there was talk of how a giant kiwi lived 0:10:33.800 --> 0:10:37.080 in the mountains. Uh. And will again remind everyone that 0:10:37.320 --> 0:10:40.200 the kiwi and the moa are not actually all that related. 0:10:40.600 --> 0:10:44.680 But this, uh, this sort of discovery would have stemmed 0:10:44.720 --> 0:10:49.079 from Earth, from general European interests in the extent kiwi. 0:10:49.280 --> 0:10:51.360 So you know, they might have been asking about the kiwi, 0:10:51.559 --> 0:10:54.760 and they would have been heard about myths of giant 0:10:54.840 --> 0:10:58.240 birds that are in some way like a kiwi. That 0:10:58.400 --> 0:11:01.840 is interesting. Yeah, the idea that that the concept could 0:11:01.880 --> 0:11:05.400 persist over time, especially if you have like something that's 0:11:05.800 --> 0:11:10.520 morphologically very similar but just like much smaller to refer to, right. Yeah, 0:11:10.559 --> 0:11:13.199 And in all of this again we're just we're discussing 0:11:13.240 --> 0:11:17.600 like European knowledge all of the moa, which is ultimately 0:11:17.640 --> 0:11:22.920 tied to European knowledge and understanding of the mallory, which 0:11:22.960 --> 0:11:26.040 of course is is a strained relationship, you know, to 0:11:26.040 --> 0:11:28.760 say the least, because again you're talking about the the 0:11:28.760 --> 0:11:32.240 indigenous people, the Mallory and you're talking about the the 0:11:32.360 --> 0:11:34.960 colonial power that then arrives on their shore in the 0:11:34.960 --> 0:11:38.120 form of the Europeans. Anderson also points out that a 0:11:38.160 --> 0:11:42.720 major factor might be that the Mallory conceptionalize the moa 0:11:42.800 --> 0:11:45.600 as not being true birds but is just being is 0:11:45.640 --> 0:11:49.319 being bird like, which Nights had a little confusing. But 0:11:49.360 --> 0:11:51.480 then I think back to just some of the weird 0:11:51.520 --> 0:11:54.240 things about the moa, you know, like that they the 0:11:54.280 --> 0:11:57.200 thing that that the fact that they had no wings, 0:11:57.280 --> 0:12:01.480 not even vestigial wings. They were just two limbed organisms. Um, 0:12:01.520 --> 0:12:05.760 you can see why it might defy easy categorization. Likewise, 0:12:05.760 --> 0:12:09.160 they're just the size of the larger species. Well sure, 0:12:09.160 --> 0:12:11.480 I mean when we use the term bird now, I 0:12:11.480 --> 0:12:13.319 think like you and I are going to be referring 0:12:13.400 --> 0:12:19.720 to an evolutionary clade, uh that is defined by evolutionary relationships. 0:12:19.760 --> 0:12:22.360 But if you're just categorizing animals that you see in 0:12:22.400 --> 0:12:25.720 the world, what are the bases on which you form 0:12:25.800 --> 0:12:29.079 your categories? Like a bird might well be understood as 0:12:29.200 --> 0:12:32.040 something that flies. So if there's something that, look, this 0:12:32.160 --> 0:12:33.640 is kind of like a bird, and that it has 0:12:33.640 --> 0:12:35.560 a beak and all that, but it doesn't fly, it 0:12:35.600 --> 0:12:38.920 doesn't meet your necessary criteria for what makes something a 0:12:38.960 --> 0:12:43.040 bird exactly. Yeah, and so the bones of the moa 0:12:43.120 --> 0:12:46.680 were apparently not described by the Mallory as bird bones, 0:12:46.720 --> 0:12:50.160 but they were described as moa bones. So here's a 0:12:50.240 --> 0:12:53.640 here's a quote from from Anderson and all of this quote. 0:12:53.640 --> 0:12:56.360 It is very difficult to document this point, but the 0:12:56.440 --> 0:13:01.160 separation of dangerous mythological moa from large birds used as 0:13:01.200 --> 0:13:05.000 food and easily hunted to extinction in Pollock's description, and 0:13:05.040 --> 0:13:08.800 the lack of any comparable prosaic tradition about MOA's in 0:13:08.920 --> 0:13:13.200 most of the moa stories collected by missionaries seems suggestive. Certainly, 0:13:13.520 --> 0:13:16.920 it was the very lack of an unequivocal association between 0:13:16.920 --> 0:13:20.400 the term moa and any straightforward account of large birds 0:13:20.480 --> 0:13:23.600 hunted and eaten by maories which formed the main flaw 0:13:23.720 --> 0:13:27.760 exploited throughout the long debate about what, if anything Maloris 0:13:27.800 --> 0:13:32.600 had known about the dinner rithoforms. Oh, and the dinner eiforms. 0:13:32.640 --> 0:13:37.520 That refers to the group to which the moa belong. Right, Yes, so, 0:13:37.800 --> 0:13:41.719 well we'll ponder this dangerous versus easy to drive to 0:13:41.800 --> 0:13:45.120 extinction question as we perceive, because I'm not entirely convinced 0:13:45.160 --> 0:13:48.080 this species can't be both of these things, you know, 0:13:48.160 --> 0:13:51.720 certainly when humans and the humans in question have tools, tactics, 0:13:51.800 --> 0:13:55.079 and invasive species on their side. Oh sure. I mean, 0:13:56.679 --> 0:13:59.839 some of the most dangerous creatures in a one on 0:14:00.040 --> 0:14:03.280 in context are also some of the easiest to drive extinct. 0:14:03.360 --> 0:14:06.000 I mean, if you just wanted to drive an animal extinct, 0:14:06.040 --> 0:14:08.199 what would be like the easiest ones to do, Probably 0:14:08.240 --> 0:14:11.760 like large carnivores, because there's already so few of them. 0:14:11.800 --> 0:14:14.480 Of course, the moa were not carnivores like this, but yeah, 0:14:14.480 --> 0:14:17.920 of course, like large animals generally being fewer in number 0:14:18.000 --> 0:14:21.400 because of their energy requirements within the environment, would seem 0:14:21.440 --> 0:14:23.680 to be easier to drive to extinction than if you 0:14:23.720 --> 0:14:26.120 were trying to exterminate something that's very easy to kill, 0:14:26.240 --> 0:14:30.400 like rats. Yeah, and again I think they the evidence 0:14:30.440 --> 0:14:33.160 seems to indicate they would have been dangerous creatures because 0:14:33.160 --> 0:14:36.320 these were big animals. Even the little bush moa was 0:14:36.640 --> 0:14:39.320 four and a half feet tall. Now that's smaller than 0:14:39.360 --> 0:14:43.560 an adult southern castlewary, which is generally five to six 0:14:43.560 --> 0:14:46.359 ft taller one and a half to one point eight meters. 0:14:46.400 --> 0:14:49.240 But if you see one, you would not mess with it, right, Yeah, 0:14:49.240 --> 0:14:53.080 they're they're fierce creatures. So it seems like the larger 0:14:53.120 --> 0:14:56.440 species of Moa especially would certainly be in a position 0:14:56.720 --> 0:14:58.880 to put the hurt on an aggressor and do so 0:14:58.960 --> 0:15:01.120 in a way that's in keeping with what we see 0:15:01.160 --> 0:15:05.480 in in extant rattite species. But does that mean they 0:15:05.520 --> 0:15:08.280 were a match for the humans that arrived on their shores. No, 0:15:08.520 --> 0:15:11.880 because the archaic now we were a very skilled and 0:15:11.920 --> 0:15:17.160 advanced people. They arrived in waves from Hawaiiki, this is 0:15:17.160 --> 0:15:21.280 a mythical land that is usually identified as Tahiti by historians, 0:15:21.640 --> 0:15:24.480 and they were of course skilled sailors that arrived on 0:15:24.600 --> 0:15:29.200 wooden vessels capable of traversing great distances at sea. For instance, 0:15:29.320 --> 0:15:32.840 the distance between Tahiti and New Zealand is two thousand, 0:15:32.960 --> 0:15:35.920 nine hundred and fifty miles or four thousand, seven hundred 0:15:36.000 --> 0:15:38.680 forty seven kilometers. I mean, that's a long way to go, 0:15:39.360 --> 0:15:42.560 even if you know exactly where you're going. But here 0:15:42.560 --> 0:15:46.040 we're talking about like the settlement of a new, previously 0:15:46.120 --> 0:15:49.360 unknown island, right, So yeah, I just I just really 0:15:49.360 --> 0:15:52.600 want to drive home like the skilled nature of these 0:15:52.760 --> 0:15:56.520 Homo sapiens that arrived um and what's more, they brought 0:15:56.640 --> 0:15:59.840 with them both human cunning and human tool use. They 0:16:00.000 --> 0:16:03.680 are masters of the club and the spear especially. They 0:16:03.680 --> 0:16:06.680 also brought with them other animals, including a breed of 0:16:06.720 --> 0:16:11.240 domesticated Polynesian dog known as the curry, which, as with 0:16:11.280 --> 0:16:15.160 other Polynesian dogs, did not bark, but apparently howl. They 0:16:15.240 --> 0:16:19.280 also brought with them, quite by accident, the kiori, the 0:16:19.720 --> 0:16:23.200 Polynesian rat um. Now the kori is still a pest 0:16:23.240 --> 0:16:26.280 species in New Zealand because, as we know, once rats 0:16:26.520 --> 0:16:30.360 become established anywhere, they're very difficult to get rid of. 0:16:30.760 --> 0:16:32.960 The curry dog, on the other hand, has been extinct 0:16:33.040 --> 0:16:36.120 since the arrival of Europeans, and we'll talk more about 0:16:36.120 --> 0:16:38.640 that species in a minute. And they also brought with 0:16:38.680 --> 0:16:41.480 them um plants as well, such as the sweet potato. 0:16:41.720 --> 0:16:44.040 Well way, is there any thinking that the sweet potato 0:16:44.120 --> 0:16:47.520 could be involved in driving them oa extinct or I 0:16:47.600 --> 0:16:50.040 am not. I have not read anything to suggest that, 0:16:50.360 --> 0:16:52.440 but but I mean that kind of that sort of 0:16:52.480 --> 0:16:56.000 thing is certainly possible. Right generally speaking, when you have 0:16:56.280 --> 0:17:00.200 humans from a distant land show up and introduce into 0:17:00.240 --> 0:17:05.760 the ecosystem not only their destructive selves, but also invasive organisms. Uh, 0:17:05.800 --> 0:17:08.920 there's you know, you're just really upending the croc pie. 0:17:09.000 --> 0:17:11.920 You know, you're really changing the chemistry of the whole 0:17:11.920 --> 0:17:15.080 ecosystem around potentially. Oh yeah, well, actually, now that I 0:17:15.080 --> 0:17:16.840 think about it, I could totally see how I'm not 0:17:16.880 --> 0:17:18.720 saying this is the case here, but I could totally 0:17:18.720 --> 0:17:22.560 see how something like the sweet potato could drive a 0:17:22.720 --> 0:17:25.640 native species extinct. Because humans come, they bring with them 0:17:25.640 --> 0:17:28.840 their crop staples. In order to plant those crops, they 0:17:28.880 --> 0:17:33.359 have to uh to establish agricultural zones that destroy natural ecosystem. 0:17:33.440 --> 0:17:35.399 So yeah, I could see it. Again, not saying we 0:17:35.440 --> 0:17:38.400 know that that happened here. All right, On that note, 0:17:38.480 --> 0:17:40.440 let's take a quick break, and when we come back, 0:17:40.640 --> 0:17:44.640 we will continue to discuss the collision between Homo sapiens 0:17:44.680 --> 0:17:50.280 and the MOA. Than alright, we're back. So what do 0:17:50.359 --> 0:17:55.240 you need as fresh colonists in a world like New Zealand. Well, 0:17:55.320 --> 0:17:58.480 let's see classic hierarchy of needs. I'd say, first you 0:17:58.520 --> 0:18:01.840 need you need fresh water, food, and shelter, probably right, 0:18:02.200 --> 0:18:06.000 Oh yeah, absolutely, Am I on the right track here? Yes? Yes, 0:18:06.240 --> 0:18:08.840 But another need that I I didn't instantly think of, 0:18:08.920 --> 0:18:11.040 And part of this is probably because I've never been 0:18:11.080 --> 0:18:13.639 to New Zealand myself, so I don't have like the 0:18:13.920 --> 0:18:17.119 bodily experience of this. But New Zealand can be quite cold, 0:18:17.840 --> 0:18:20.360 so you know you're you're arriving in a new land, 0:18:20.400 --> 0:18:22.520 but also a land where the temperatures dipped down a 0:18:22.520 --> 0:18:27.040 bit more. Uh So the the Archaic Mallory, uh they 0:18:27.080 --> 0:18:30.040 were fortunate and that they did bring within the coury dogs, 0:18:30.320 --> 0:18:33.240 which helps solve some of these issues because the creatures 0:18:33.280 --> 0:18:37.600 had many utalitarian uses. They could be eaten, their pelt 0:18:37.640 --> 0:18:40.280 could be made into clothing, and other parts of its 0:18:40.280 --> 0:18:42.840 body could be used for bits of clothing and tool 0:18:42.960 --> 0:18:45.920 use and so forth. But beyond that, you know, when 0:18:45.920 --> 0:18:49.160 they started exploring this new world, they very quickly would 0:18:49.160 --> 0:18:52.240 have discovered the Moa, and the Moa would be just 0:18:52.359 --> 0:18:55.680 a gift of resources to these people. Now here's a 0:18:55.760 --> 0:18:58.680 question that researchers and historians have have pondered over the years. 0:18:58.720 --> 0:19:03.040 So what sore of Moa population did the Archaic Mallory encounter. 0:19:03.440 --> 0:19:06.119 It's long been widely accepted that, you know, the newly 0:19:06.160 --> 0:19:08.680 arrived humans at least played a role in the extinction 0:19:08.680 --> 0:19:11.440 of the Moa. But there there there's been some disagreement 0:19:11.480 --> 0:19:14.199 in the past over to what extent. For example, did 0:19:14.240 --> 0:19:19.080 the archaic Mallory encounter thriving populations of moa across much 0:19:19.119 --> 0:19:22.280 of the islands, or did they encounter dwindling populations of 0:19:22.280 --> 0:19:25.240 moa that were restricted to certain areas, or did they 0:19:25.240 --> 0:19:29.960 find moa populations that were already in severe decline. And 0:19:30.000 --> 0:19:32.560 of course, depending on the answer, it paints a different 0:19:32.560 --> 0:19:37.080 picture of the extent of Maori moa hunting and the 0:19:37.119 --> 0:19:40.600 impact of their arrival. You know, some could argue that well, 0:19:40.600 --> 0:19:44.520 in perhaps climate change, volcanic eruptions and or disease had 0:19:44.600 --> 0:19:49.399 already impacted moa populations and humans were just the final straw. 0:19:50.440 --> 0:19:53.280 So the moa certainly went extinct over the next century 0:19:53.359 --> 0:19:55.960 or so. You know, there's no moa hiding in the 0:19:56.000 --> 0:19:58.760 wilds of New Zealand, sadly, no matter what anybody might 0:19:58.760 --> 0:20:01.240 try and tell you. And it wasn't until the nineteenth 0:20:01.240 --> 0:20:04.400 century that Europeans discovered evidence of the great birds, consisting 0:20:04.440 --> 0:20:08.159 of charred skeletons, gizzard stones and egg shells. They certainly 0:20:08.200 --> 0:20:12.040 told the tale of their demise. DNA evidence, however, does 0:20:12.080 --> 0:20:15.639 shine light on the question of pre Maori moa populations 0:20:16.040 --> 0:20:19.680 as Rachel Newer wrote in The New York Times back 0:20:19.680 --> 0:20:24.159 in quote Morton Eric Allentoft, a researcher of the University 0:20:24.200 --> 0:20:27.600 of Copenhagen, and colleagues analyzed DNA from two hundred and 0:20:27.640 --> 0:20:31.760 eighty one moas collected from museums and new excavations and 0:20:31.920 --> 0:20:35.159 estimated the age of these specimens using radio carbon dating. 0:20:35.480 --> 0:20:38.800 They found that in the millenniums before humans arrived in 0:20:38.840 --> 0:20:42.400 New Zealand, the MOA displayed none of the genetic bottlenecking 0:20:42.680 --> 0:20:47.360 indicative of a declining population. So there's no genetic evidence 0:20:47.400 --> 0:20:50.359 of a of a decline in the MOA during the 0:20:50.480 --> 0:20:55.359 five thousand years prior to their rapid extinction. Uh, you know, 0:20:55.480 --> 0:20:58.479 via the human arrival. Okay, So what does that tell us? 0:20:58.880 --> 0:21:01.320 What that leaves us with this version of the story, 0:21:01.520 --> 0:21:04.120 The archaic Mallory arrived on the shores of a new 0:21:04.200 --> 0:21:08.480 land where strange, often gigantic birds were roaming around, and 0:21:08.480 --> 0:21:11.800 through the use of spears and snares and hunting dogs 0:21:11.880 --> 0:21:14.280 and the human cunning, they were able to bring the 0:21:14.320 --> 0:21:17.520 birds down and process their kills with the same sort 0:21:17.520 --> 0:21:20.840 of efficiency we see, you know, with the coury dogs. 0:21:20.880 --> 0:21:24.119 It's also possible that the moa had no natural fear 0:21:24.160 --> 0:21:26.639 of humans as well, which would have just made them 0:21:26.680 --> 0:21:29.520 even more susceptible to this kind of harvesting. Well, yeah, 0:21:29.520 --> 0:21:34.080 i'd imagine that's possible, especially without um, without large mammalian 0:21:34.160 --> 0:21:38.040 predators on the island of New Zealand, Like they're only 0:21:38.160 --> 0:21:41.760 real predator would have been the hostile eagle, right, which 0:21:42.440 --> 0:21:44.960 they're adapted to a landscape in which the only thing 0:21:45.000 --> 0:21:48.240 to worry about comes down at you from above. Uh. 0:21:48.800 --> 0:21:51.000 Who knows what they would have done if, like, you know, 0:21:51.440 --> 0:21:55.359 a bipedal hominid walks up to them in a group. Yeah, exactly. 0:21:55.840 --> 0:21:59.960 And and plus their extinction didn't just come via the hunting. 0:22:00.000 --> 0:22:04.600 Have grown adult MOA's because they're they're large, eggs were 0:22:04.600 --> 0:22:07.760 certainly sought after foods as well. We see that from 0:22:07.760 --> 0:22:10.240 some of the you know, the evidence of you know, 0:22:10.280 --> 0:22:13.080 the finding egg shells and evidence of the eggs having 0:22:13.119 --> 0:22:16.040 been consumed. And since the moa produced just one or 0:22:16.040 --> 0:22:18.720 two eggs, the harvesting of their eggs would have further 0:22:18.840 --> 0:22:22.760 spelled doom for the nine species of moa. For example, 0:22:23.040 --> 0:22:26.119 the I believe this is a k Cora egg, the 0:22:26.200 --> 0:22:30.560 largest moa egg ever uncovered would have weighed nine pounds 0:22:30.600 --> 0:22:34.760 when fresh. Wow. To put that in perspective, an ostrich 0:22:34.800 --> 0:22:38.880 egg typically weighs one point four kilograms or three point 0:22:38.920 --> 0:22:41.760 one pounds, which is more than twenty times the weight 0:22:41.840 --> 0:22:44.879 of a chicken egg. So we're talking about you know, 0:22:44.920 --> 0:22:48.840 two two people, uh that have arrived on these islands, 0:22:48.880 --> 0:22:52.080 you know, struggling for existence like that. That's huge bounty 0:22:52.080 --> 0:22:55.240 of resources in that egg. Do you ever see anybody 0:22:55.320 --> 0:22:58.520 eat an ostrich egg? I feel like I have before 0:22:59.240 --> 0:23:02.560 in the past, but I haven't. It's not the kind 0:23:02.560 --> 0:23:04.480 of thing I've seen on the menu recently. It did 0:23:04.480 --> 0:23:09.399 not come highly recommended to me. Apparently, in addition to 0:23:09.440 --> 0:23:11.640 being very large, it's got a it's got a tough shell. 0:23:11.720 --> 0:23:13.480 I guess, as you might imagine. You know, it can't 0:23:13.520 --> 0:23:15.800