WEBVTT - Extreme Mammals Part I 0:00:03.120 --> 0:00:06.000 Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind from how Stuff 0:00:06.000 --> 0:00:14.000 Works dot com. Hey, welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. 0:00:14.000 --> 0:00:17.120 My name is Robert Lamb and I'm Julie Douglas, and 0:00:17.200 --> 0:00:19.360 we're doing two episodes here where we're going to talk 0:00:19.400 --> 0:00:23.239 about extreme prehistoric mammals. I think everyone here and it 0:00:23.400 --> 0:00:26.640 already knows vaguely what I'm talking about, talking about the 0:00:26.720 --> 0:00:30.000 creatures that came post dinosaur, that we're that we're just 0:00:30.080 --> 0:00:33.000 as weird and crazy and varied as dinosaurs, except they were, 0:00:33.040 --> 0:00:36.040 of course mammals. They were the prehistoric mammals, the forerunners 0:00:36.440 --> 0:00:39.839 in many cases of what we have today, just earlier models, 0:00:39.840 --> 0:00:45.120 more outrageous models, gigantic models, tiny models, models with features 0:00:45.159 --> 0:00:47.559 that we either don't see today at all or we 0:00:47.640 --> 0:00:50.640 see just a shadow of them. And when I was 0:00:50.640 --> 0:00:53.840 a kid, I remember spending a lot of time in 0:00:54.000 --> 0:00:56.040 dinosaur books, of course, because I you know, I love 0:00:56.080 --> 0:01:00.680 dinosaurs like most kids, and jumped into them. And some 0:01:00.720 --> 0:01:04.000 of the books that I had, including the excellent McMillian 0:01:04.080 --> 0:01:08.160 Illustrated Encyclopedia of Dinosaurs and Prehistoric Animals by Dixon, Cox, 0:01:08.200 --> 0:01:11.919 Savage and Gardener. Uh, this was one of my favorite books, 0:01:11.959 --> 0:01:13.880 and half of it is dinosaurs. Like the first half 0:01:13.920 --> 0:01:18.280 is dinosaurs with all the beautiful illustrations of them and 0:01:18.560 --> 0:01:19.960 how we think they might have looked. And in the 0:01:20.000 --> 0:01:24.640 second half is all mammals and the with the dinosaurs. 0:01:25.600 --> 0:01:28.440 You know, dinosaurs were great, Dinosaurs were awesome, but there 0:01:28.480 --> 0:01:30.560 was more of this division. Like when you took in 0:01:30.600 --> 0:01:33.280 the story of the dinosaur, you knew that something something 0:01:33.360 --> 0:01:36.039 horrible happens, something catacause MC happened, and the age of 0:01:36.040 --> 0:01:39.759 the dinosaurs vanished completely, and that now there's really nothing 0:01:39.920 --> 0:01:42.640 like these creatures roaming the earth. I mean, yes, there are. 0:01:43.240 --> 0:01:46.840 We still have crocodiles now we see to sendence of them, 0:01:46.840 --> 0:01:49.160 and we see some some things that are that that 0:01:49.280 --> 0:01:51.520 remind us more of the world of dinosaurs than others. 0:01:51.760 --> 0:01:55.200 But but when you look at the the extreme prehistoric mammals, 0:01:55.200 --> 0:01:58.000 when you look at things like the giant sloth, uh 0:01:58.320 --> 0:02:00.960 like the creatures we're going to discuss these two episodes, 0:02:01.320 --> 0:02:04.000 it's weirder because they're closer to what we have now, 0:02:04.080 --> 0:02:07.880 but just as alien. Well because they are extreme mammals. 0:02:07.880 --> 0:02:09.560 And we'll talk a little bit more about what is 0:02:09.639 --> 0:02:12.240 extreme and what's normal, but they really do sort of 0:02:12.240 --> 0:02:16.079 boggle the mind. Right, it's a wonderland of creatures that 0:02:16.120 --> 0:02:20.880 you just don't normally um see out there in literature 0:02:20.880 --> 0:02:23.440 in the media, right because Dinosourci always taking top billing. 0:02:24.080 --> 0:02:26.120 But we're kind of we're taking the bones today of 0:02:26.160 --> 0:02:29.000 all these really incredible creatures, dusting them off, and we're 0:02:29.000 --> 0:02:32.720 gonna look at the oddest parts of them, what makes 0:02:32.760 --> 0:02:36.600 them unique. We're going all prehistoric packing arm today. Now 0:02:36.600 --> 0:02:39.680 you should probably mention of what sparked this. Well, we 0:02:39.760 --> 0:02:43.880 both have seen the exhibit Extreme Mammals. We saw it 0:02:43.880 --> 0:02:46.520 at the firm Bank Museum here in Atlanta, but it 0:02:46.600 --> 0:02:50.600 is organized by the American Museum of Natural History, and 0:02:50.720 --> 0:02:55.320 it has some amazing examples of of these extreme mammals 0:02:55.320 --> 0:02:58.040 that we'll talk about before we get into that. Though, 0:02:58.080 --> 0:02:59.680 I thought it would probably be good for us to 0:02:59.760 --> 0:03:04.320 call over extinction mass extinction, uh, specifically because it's kind 0:03:04.320 --> 0:03:07.520 of plays into this idea of of why these seems 0:03:07.600 --> 0:03:10.600 so exotic and far removed from us. But the fact 0:03:10.600 --> 0:03:12.880 of the matter is that extinction is just not a 0:03:12.960 --> 0:03:17.239 modern phenomenon. In fact, all mammals and other species that 0:03:17.280 --> 0:03:20.960 have ever lived are extinct. Yeah, and which is which 0:03:21.040 --> 0:03:23.720 really drives, and it begins to drive home when you 0:03:23.720 --> 0:03:26.000 start looking through one of these books and you're and 0:03:26.000 --> 0:03:28.440 you realize, oh, well, there were like pages and pages 0:03:28.440 --> 0:03:32.160 of different types of prehistoric horse that that we just 0:03:32.360 --> 0:03:34.680 that are no longer with us, just completely gone. You know, 0:03:34.720 --> 0:03:37.480 I was thinking that, particularly as a kid, if you're 0:03:37.520 --> 0:03:39.280 flipping through that, that's gonna be really hard to get 0:03:39.280 --> 0:03:41.600 a hold on reality, because even when four year old 0:03:42.120 --> 0:03:44.960 will say, Okay, I get dinosaurs, and I get this 0:03:45.000 --> 0:03:48.160 creature once lived, but but what about a mermaid really 0:03:48.200 --> 0:03:50.720 that could live? Right, especially when you say something like 0:03:50.760 --> 0:03:53.480 well the easter bunny, Sure that's that's totally for real. 0:03:53.840 --> 0:03:56.400 But but yeah, I mean you look pat back at 0:03:56.440 --> 0:04:00.960 this past which is just amazing, just riddled with these So, 0:04:01.160 --> 0:04:04.320 starting about one thousand years ago, large mammals and other 0:04:04.360 --> 0:04:08.560 species began to disappear a lot more swiftly than normal 0:04:08.640 --> 0:04:11.560 as humans began to spread from Africa and other continents. 0:04:12.080 --> 0:04:15.800 Then the extension rate sped up beginning about twelve thousand 0:04:15.840 --> 0:04:18.680 years ago, and it continues to accelerate today. There were 0:04:18.720 --> 0:04:22.599 astonishing mammals that roamed North America until about twelve thousand 0:04:22.680 --> 0:04:26.080 years ago. There were beavers the size of grizzly bears, 0:04:26.520 --> 0:04:30.280 giant beaver. Yeah, and short faced bears that stood at 0:04:30.279 --> 0:04:33.800 about eleven feet tall or three point four meters high. 0:04:33.800 --> 0:04:37.280 I mean, this was amazing. So besides over hunting by human, 0:04:37.360 --> 0:04:42.120 scientists have proposed several different theories as to why this happened. 0:04:42.480 --> 0:04:50.160 Climate change, killer plagues, a comment, right impact, or atmospheric explosion. Now, 0:04:50.200 --> 0:04:52.599 truth of the matter is it's probably a bit of 0:04:52.600 --> 0:04:55.440 a combination of all of these factors. So it's not 0:04:55.520 --> 0:04:58.159 just humans. But you know, if you've if you've got 0:04:58.200 --> 0:05:01.160 a comment that is hurling towards the earth, that obviously 0:05:01.240 --> 0:05:04.479 is going to take out a big amount of the population. 0:05:05.080 --> 0:05:09.599 And probably most famously, as you have already mentioned, uh, 0:05:09.640 --> 0:05:14.280 sixty five million years ago, dinosaurs they disappeared in a flash, 0:05:14.360 --> 0:05:16.040 and it's thought to be that there could have been 0:05:16.080 --> 0:05:18.960 a comment and then some atmosphere changes that followed that 0:05:19.480 --> 0:05:23.520 wipe them out. Yeah, And it's these environmental changes some 0:05:23.600 --> 0:05:26.120 of these theories, to me, you're the most interesting because 0:05:26.360 --> 0:05:30.960 you're you're looking as always you're looking at organisms responding 0:05:31.040 --> 0:05:35.040 to the environment, organisms responding to to where they can 0:05:35.040 --> 0:05:37.920 get resources, how they can can best take take them 0:05:37.920 --> 0:05:42.240 in and these forms evolving over time to exploit them. 0:05:42.480 --> 0:05:45.599 So you with with mammals, you see their maximum diversity 0:05:45.640 --> 0:05:50.680 about fifteen million years ago, during the Miocene epoch twenty 0:05:50.760 --> 0:05:53.880 three point oh three to five point three million years ago. 0:05:53.920 --> 0:05:56.599 It is a time of warmer global climates than those 0:05:56.640 --> 0:06:00.160 in proceeding or following periods. Now, since then, global climates 0:06:00.240 --> 0:06:04.960 have deteriorated and the tropical regions have shrunk, and tropical regions, 0:06:04.960 --> 0:06:07.799 of course, that's where you see the most diversity even today, 0:06:07.880 --> 0:06:09.720 like these are. If you were to use some sort 0:06:09.720 --> 0:06:11.360 of like business model, I guess it would be like 0:06:11.440 --> 0:06:15.760 the capitalist wonderland of the rainforest is where all the 0:06:15.800 --> 0:06:18.640 crazy forms can just run wild and and go nuts. 0:06:18.800 --> 0:06:22.080 But then also the alternating cold and warm periods brought 0:06:22.080 --> 0:06:24.840 on by the ice ages encourage the evolution of particularly 0:06:24.960 --> 0:06:28.640 large mammals such as the wooly mammoth, giant deer, giant 0:06:28.640 --> 0:06:31.640 ground sloths, and as you said, now they're all gone 0:06:31.680 --> 0:06:34.680 over the last twelve thousand years. Yeah, and uh. In 0:06:34.839 --> 0:06:38.479 order to really talk about mammals, we should probably discuss 0:06:38.600 --> 0:06:43.000 what makes them uniquely mammals or mammalian river dolphin mammal, Right, 0:06:43.120 --> 0:06:46.400 spiny ant eater mammal, that mammal, platypus mammal. What do 0:06:46.440 --> 0:06:49.479 they all have in common? Well, they all got the milk. 0:06:49.760 --> 0:06:53.680 They have the milk. They're all vertebrates, they're all warm blooded, 0:06:53.800 --> 0:06:55.800 they all have hair on their bodies, and they all 0:06:55.839 --> 0:06:58.400 produce milk to feed their babies with. Yeah, and these 0:06:58.400 --> 0:07:02.280 are all excellent design feature because the memory glance. This 0:07:02.360 --> 0:07:04.599 allows a mother to leave her offspring in the nest, 0:07:04.640 --> 0:07:06.440 go out and forwards, then come back and pump them 0:07:06.480 --> 0:07:10.480 full of supernutritious milk. The dense fur helps them retain heat, 0:07:11.000 --> 0:07:14.160 which is an important design feature because they're warm blooded, 0:07:14.200 --> 0:07:16.880 and that in warm bloodedness keeps them running at above 0:07:17.920 --> 0:07:21.000 environmental temperatures, so they can remain active for long periods 0:07:21.680 --> 0:07:24.760 regardless of the weather. The trade off, of course, is 0:07:24.840 --> 0:07:26.800 that they have to eat a lot to pay the 0:07:26.800 --> 0:07:29.800 body's high energy bills. Uh. And also you also see 0:07:29.800 --> 0:07:32.239 with mammals they tend to have large complex brains because 0:07:32.240 --> 0:07:35.080 they have to control an advanced nervous system and rapidly 0:07:35.120 --> 0:07:39.160 processed sense data. Yeah and um. Some placental mammals can 0:07:39.240 --> 0:07:41.480 nourish their growing babies in side their bodies for as 0:07:41.480 --> 0:07:43.960 long as two years now. That's really important because that 0:07:44.000 --> 0:07:47.720 means that their offspring are born more fully developed then 0:07:47.800 --> 0:07:51.720 more stupial babies or ones that hatch from an egg. Um. 0:07:51.760 --> 0:07:54.200 This is really cool. Whales and drafts, they're just born 0:07:54.200 --> 0:07:56.840 with their eyes open, ready to go. Yeah, I love 0:07:57.080 --> 0:07:58.560 I don't know if you've ever seen a love birth 0:07:58.680 --> 0:08:01.440 of a draft, but it is amazing to see because 0:08:01.520 --> 0:08:04.640 within like tent poles being born. Yeah, it's like a 0:08:04.720 --> 0:08:07.160 tent being popped up, and they're a little bit wobbly 0:08:07.240 --> 0:08:11.040 at first, but it is. It's because in an environment, 0:08:11.200 --> 0:08:14.200 especially if you were a prey creature out there in 0:08:14.200 --> 0:08:16.120 the grasslands, you gotta you gotta be ready to go. 0:08:16.320 --> 0:08:19.040 You gotta be ready to just pop up and run 0:08:19.080 --> 0:08:21.280 with the rest of them. There's no just lounging around 0:08:21.280 --> 0:08:23.520 the din all day until you finally reached the point where, 0:08:23.560 --> 0:08:26.000 you you know, go out and get that job right 0:08:26.480 --> 0:08:30.680 where the rubber meets the road. So what makes something 0:08:30.840 --> 0:08:34.800 extreme because it's kind of hard to say, like, oh, 0:08:34.840 --> 0:08:38.880 that's that's an crazy horn because within certain groups, maybe 0:08:39.040 --> 0:08:42.560 all of them have this type of horn on their heads, 0:08:42.600 --> 0:08:45.679 but maybe one is just you know, four times larger 0:08:45.679 --> 0:08:48.760 than the next, well, I mean extreme again we have distress. 0:08:48.800 --> 0:08:52.320 Of course, we're talking about our standpoint, our bow point, 0:08:52.679 --> 0:08:55.880 because today the idea of tiny little horses is is 0:08:56.440 --> 0:08:58.320 kind of silly and ridiculous, but there was a time 0:08:58.320 --> 0:09:01.840 when that was the model so well. And so you 0:09:01.880 --> 0:09:03.840 really do have to look within the group though to 0:09:03.920 --> 0:09:06.760 determine what is extreme, because you know each animal is 0:09:06.800 --> 0:09:08.920 going to have just normal traits, just like we do. 0:09:08.960 --> 0:09:12.480 We're we're an example at both normal and extreme traits. Uh, 0:09:12.559 --> 0:09:14.520 And I'll get to that. But a kangaroo is a 0:09:14.559 --> 0:09:18.360 good example. It's marsupial and uh. While some of the 0:09:18.440 --> 0:09:23.760 smaller shrew like marsupials that do hop um, kangaroos are 0:09:23.800 --> 0:09:27.240 extreme because they're the only large bipedal mammal that have 0:09:27.360 --> 0:09:32.160 that pego stick kind of locomotion, and fossil evidence actually 0:09:32.360 --> 0:09:35.520 dating back to million years ago indicates that their ancestors. 0:09:35.600 --> 0:09:39.440 Kangaroo's ancestors did not hop so most likely when rainforest 0:09:39.600 --> 0:09:43.959 gave way to dry grassy planes, hopping became something that 0:09:44.679 --> 0:09:46.960 was selected for right because you wanted to get across 0:09:47.040 --> 0:09:50.560 as quickly as possible, and that is what makes kangaroos extreme. 0:09:51.040 --> 0:09:53.160 It's interesting because you see the same thing in video games. 0:09:53.160 --> 0:09:57.280 Sometimes they'll give you the ability to make your character jump, which, 0:09:57.400 --> 0:09:59.559 if you were going to play it completely straight, your 0:09:59.640 --> 0:10:03.200 character would walk or run across the level, he would 0:10:03.200 --> 0:10:06.480 not jump like a kangaroo. But the design feature will 0:10:06.480 --> 0:10:09.400 often be such that there's no there's no additional cost 0:10:09.480 --> 0:10:12.760 to jumping, so the player who's just focusing on getting 0:10:12.800 --> 0:10:19.040 through the level might just jump ridiculously. That's probably a 0:10:19.040 --> 0:10:22.920 also a ridiculous tie in to make here, but I 0:10:22.920 --> 0:10:26.160 don't know, it's it's a good visual there. Um. So 0:10:26.200 --> 0:10:29.880 I had mentioned that humans are extreme, um, and that 0:10:30.200 --> 0:10:34.280 comes in the form of our bipedalism and as you mentioned, 0:10:34.440 --> 0:10:38.000 big brains before relative to our body size. You know 0:10:38.040 --> 0:10:42.679 everything else warm blooded, differentiated teeth, five fingers, and toes 0:10:42.720 --> 0:10:44.840 pretty normal, right. You look at at all sorts of 0:10:44.880 --> 0:10:47.559 species across nature and you see the same thing. Right. Well, 0:10:47.559 --> 0:10:51.280 we're also many of us relatively hairless. And of course 0:10:51.320 --> 0:10:53.560 that's a whole side issue that we've discussed before in 0:10:53.559 --> 0:10:55.760 the podcast. Yes, and it doesn't have to do with 0:10:55.760 --> 0:10:59.040 a quad gates, although that would be really cool if 0:10:59.040 --> 0:11:01.440 it did. Yes, all right, so we're gonna take a 0:11:01.440 --> 0:11:03.240 break and when we come back, We're going to begin 0:11:03.520 --> 0:11:08.600 a ten part countdown of our favorite extreme mammals. We're gonna, 0:11:08.679 --> 0:11:10.760 you know, start with the smallest and work up to 0:11:10.840 --> 0:11:13.280 the biggest on our list. So we're gonna knock some 0:11:13.280 --> 0:11:15.079 of these out on this episode and the rest will 0:11:15.120 --> 0:11:18.480 knock out on the following episode. And I am going 0:11:18.520 --> 0:11:21.199 to try to have a gallery up as well, so 0:11:21.240 --> 0:11:23.120 that as you go through this, we're going to describe 0:11:23.120 --> 0:11:25.559 these creatures, but you're gonna naturally want to see them 0:11:25.600 --> 0:11:27.880 as well, So I'll try to make sure that we 0:11:27.920 --> 0:11:29.920 have a gallery that you can you can listen to 0:11:29.960 --> 0:11:32.480 the podcast and go through that as well and actually 0:11:32.559 --> 0:11:44.080 look these things in the face. All Right, we're back, 0:11:44.120 --> 0:11:48.480 and we are going to talk about the tiniest, geniest 0:11:49.160 --> 0:11:52.560 mammal to have ever existed. We're talking about one and 0:11:52.600 --> 0:11:56.520 a half inches long. Yes, this thing is amazingly small, 0:11:56.800 --> 0:11:59.839 and uh, his name is bad and annoys, and uh, 0:12:00.240 --> 0:12:04.319 this guy was very small. We're talking zero point zero 0:12:04.480 --> 0:12:08.560 three three two point zero sixty four ounces um with 0:12:08.840 --> 0:12:11.200 more likely we're looking at like one point three grams 0:12:11.520 --> 0:12:14.360 as the general weight of these guys. And they lived 0:12:14.360 --> 0:12:17.920 about fifty million years ago in what is now wyoming. Yeah, 0:12:18.040 --> 0:12:21.200 and uh, the smallest, just so you can have something 0:12:21.280 --> 0:12:24.400 compared against the smallest mammal alive today is the bumblebee back, 0:12:24.480 --> 0:12:28.480 which is only slightly larger. Uh. This, uh, this little 0:12:28.480 --> 0:12:31.160 creature here is thought to be a relative of the shrew. 0:12:32.040 --> 0:12:35.000 And I love it. If you have cats, then you've 0:12:35.000 --> 0:12:38.320 met these or pieces of these things. Yes, I love this. 0:12:38.559 --> 0:12:43.600 Paleontologist Jonathan Block was just looking at some material underneath 0:12:43.600 --> 0:12:48.800 a microscope when he spotted a tiny, tinyy fossil jaw 0:12:49.040 --> 0:12:51.719 and then realized that he was looking at teeth, and 0:12:51.720 --> 0:12:54.199 this is how it was discovered. Yeah, this guy is 0:12:54.320 --> 0:12:57.199 crazy small and just and and and adorable. I mean, 0:12:57.240 --> 0:12:58.839 that is something that's small. You can't help it find 0:12:58.880 --> 0:13:00.679 a little adorable, even if it's kind of shrew like, 0:13:01.000 --> 0:13:04.400 and shrews are kind of ghastly in a way. Yeah, 0:13:04.440 --> 0:13:06.440 But to think that it could sit there and run 0:13:06.520 --> 0:13:08.839 up your the tip of your pencil and hang out, 0:13:09.120 --> 0:13:11.240 that's how small we're talking. Would we could crawl up 0:13:11.240 --> 0:13:13.800 to the tip of your pencil and uh and just 0:13:13.960 --> 0:13:16.280 sat there. It weighed as little as a dollar bill. 0:13:17.200 --> 0:13:19.959 I feel like it would be a great writing companion, right, 0:13:21.040 --> 0:13:24.000 mused if you will. But like a lot of these forms, 0:13:24.040 --> 0:13:26.440 this this, this one one extinct. You won't find these 0:13:26.440 --> 0:13:29.280 guys anymore. Um. And really a way to think about 0:13:29.320 --> 0:13:31.480 a lot of these forms is think of like the 0:13:31.480 --> 0:13:36.080 most specialized business imaginable. Say like during a boom time, 0:13:36.240 --> 0:13:38.880 say during say that the dot com boom, you'll have 0:13:38.920 --> 0:13:42.240 like a very specialized website that comes out. It's it's 0:13:42.280 --> 0:13:44.320 trying to make money off of off of the boom. 0:13:44.360 --> 0:13:47.360 And then when they stuff dot com No, no, we 0:13:47.360 --> 0:13:50.679 we've we've survived. I'm kidding were I mean, we are 0:13:50.679 --> 0:13:53.840 specialized in the information realm. Yeah, but we don't think 0:13:53.840 --> 0:13:57.000 of any kind of like specialized, uh you know particular, 0:13:57.080 --> 0:13:59.440 say like a bakery, a bakery that only specialized in 0:13:59.480 --> 0:14:02.640 meat flavor donuts. Well, great, you're gonna clean up as 0:14:02.679 --> 0:14:05.719 long as bacon flavored donuts are the thing. While those 0:14:05.760 --> 0:14:07.640 are in style, you're just it's gonna be hand over 0:14:07.679 --> 0:14:10.840 a fist. But when that goes out of style, well 0:14:11.080 --> 0:14:13.440 then you're gonna you're gonna either have to evolve into 0:14:13.440 --> 0:14:15.840 a different form or you're going to perish. And so 0:14:15.880 --> 0:14:17.319 you see that with a lot of the creatures we're 0:14:17.360 --> 0:14:18.880 going to talk about in this for a for a 0:14:18.920 --> 0:14:21.880 period of time, that was an excellent design. But when 0:14:21.920 --> 0:14:25.120 the environment changed, when the resources changed, when the get, 0:14:25.120 --> 0:14:29.280 when the basic game changed, then uh, then that form 0:14:29.280 --> 0:14:32.640 had to vanish. If this was alive today, do you 0:14:32.640 --> 0:14:35.880 think that it would have, um, you know, pretty high 0:14:35.960 --> 0:14:40.200 internet status if it could sneeze? Yeah, yeah, it could sneeze. 0:14:40.200 --> 0:14:44.840 Anything always always helps. Yeah. Um. The next item on 0:14:44.880 --> 0:14:47.920 our list is the horn to go for. And I 0:14:47.960 --> 0:14:53.560 couldn't help but think about Calibus from Clash of the Titans. 0:14:53.640 --> 0:14:57.600 You know, you know, the horned beast man with the whip. 0:14:58.360 --> 0:15:01.040 Of course, fabulously I brought to life Ray Harry Howson, 0:15:01.040 --> 0:15:05.320 who's sadly passed away this week. But but but yeah, yeah, 0:15:05.400 --> 0:15:06.760 I can see this is this is kind of the 0:15:07.280 --> 0:15:11.240 rodent version of that character. Uh. The rodent we're talking 0:15:11.240 --> 0:15:14.960 about the hornet gopher is epic Gallus. Uh. He was 0:15:15.160 --> 0:15:18.960 one ft long thirty centimeters lived in North America. Probably 0:15:18.960 --> 0:15:23.560 resembled a modern marmot, except he has long, powerful claws 0:15:23.680 --> 0:15:27.240 on the front feet and horns a pair of almost 0:15:27.360 --> 0:15:30.160 rhino like horns that are sort of rising up from 0:15:30.160 --> 0:15:32.760 the top of its snout. And and and I mean 0:15:32.800 --> 0:15:35.480 you see these in the skulls that they have, that 0:15:35.600 --> 0:15:38.760 they've detected these things. I mean, it's it's it's very 0:15:38.800 --> 0:15:42.520 obviously a pair of horns. Yeah, and it's a bit 0:15:42.640 --> 0:15:44.840 of a mystery as to what they were used for, 0:15:44.960 --> 0:15:48.320 probably digging. Some people have said maybe it's a mating display, 0:15:48.400 --> 0:15:50.680 but the fact that both genders have the horn would 0:15:50.680 --> 0:15:53.440 seem really unlikely because it doesn't indicate like, I'm a 0:15:53.480 --> 0:15:58.200 male with high reproductive fitness come over here, so you know. 0:15:58.240 --> 0:16:00.920 Another clue is that they have really small eyes, which 0:16:01.000 --> 0:16:05.160 would indicate the possibility of poor eyesight. So most likely 0:16:05.200 --> 0:16:09.720 they're just we're, you know, hanging out, burrowing, digging a lot. Yeah, 0:16:09.880 --> 0:16:11.200 of course, with any of these things, you're going to 0:16:11.280 --> 0:16:13.960 find the various people have have the varying theories again 0:16:14.000 --> 0:16:17.520 that it's intra species combat, it's the sexual display, that 0:16:17.600 --> 0:16:20.240 it's defense, but yeah, they're the burrowing things. Seems to 0:16:20.280 --> 0:16:22.320 make the most sense sance this, This would have been 0:16:22.360 --> 0:16:25.600 a burrowing animal. It would be amazing to come upon, 0:16:25.640 --> 0:16:28.480 I mean because it really those those horns are just 0:16:28.560 --> 0:16:32.000 so unexpected, and I think that's probably what's so amazing 0:16:32.080 --> 0:16:35.080 to us humans is because we are used to our 0:16:35.120 --> 0:16:38.280 regular run of the Milico first. But it's probably just 0:16:38.320 --> 0:16:41.160 as simple as you know. Here in the United States 0:16:41.160 --> 0:16:44.240 in the Southeast, I could care less about squirrels or 0:16:44.280 --> 0:16:46.960 they're taking over my yard. But maybe another person in 0:16:47.000 --> 0:16:50.680 another world might think that they're quite excited. I've I've heard, 0:16:50.760 --> 0:16:53.600 you know, accounts of people who who visit, say Atlanta, 0:16:53.680 --> 0:16:56.680 and they have they've lived most of their lives in 0:16:56.680 --> 0:16:58.560 a place that does not have squirrels. They come here 0:16:58.600 --> 0:17:00.280 and it's amazing. They're like, oh my good us look 0:17:00.320 --> 0:17:02.200 at these amazing creatures. And we're just like, yeah, those 0:17:02.200 --> 0:17:05.960 are those are tree rats. That's that's what. But epigallis 0:17:06.359 --> 0:17:08.159 a lot of fun because it's kind of like a 0:17:08.200 --> 0:17:11.480 devil rat. Uh. And it also you can't help but 0:17:11.600 --> 0:17:14.280 be reminded a bit of the jackalope, which of course 0:17:14.359 --> 0:17:17.919 is a is a false creature created through taxidermy that 0:17:18.000 --> 0:17:21.840 has like the head of a jack rabbit with antlers um, 0:17:21.880 --> 0:17:24.879 which is a ridiculous, ridiculous thing to see on a 0:17:24.920 --> 0:17:28.359 wall somewhere. But in this example of the epic Galius, 0:17:28.440 --> 0:17:31.960 we see something just as crazy. Now, the next example 0:17:31.960 --> 0:17:34.119 that we have on our list is a tiny horse. 0:17:34.359 --> 0:17:39.360 It's called hieroch ethereum the dawn horse horsey a w N. Yes, 0:17:39.440 --> 0:17:42.840 and it called the dawn horse because this is basically 0:17:42.840 --> 0:17:47.280 the earliest known equit ancestor of all horses. Uh, but 0:17:47.600 --> 0:17:50.520 rather peculiar. Would you would might not instantly recognize it 0:17:50.520 --> 0:17:52.840 as a horse, or if you saw it today, you 0:17:52.960 --> 0:17:55.000 might think that there was something weird going on in 0:17:55.000 --> 0:17:58.679 your brain, like you're having a little acution episode. But 0:17:58.760 --> 0:18:02.879 first and foremost, this tiny horse was eight inches tall 0:18:02.960 --> 0:18:07.120 at the shoulder or twenty cimeters. Extremely tiny. This this 0:18:07.200 --> 0:18:09.919 is just like completely out of scale with what we 0:18:09.920 --> 0:18:12.479 think of as a modern horse. It's true, And I 0:18:12.520 --> 0:18:14.399 think about it as like, oh, this is something that 0:18:14.480 --> 0:18:17.960 I think a Russian billionaire would try to pray resurrect, right, 0:18:17.960 --> 0:18:20.719 like for what are we gonna do with the wooly mammoth? 0:18:20.720 --> 0:18:24.840 But if you could clone eight inch horses, yeah, and 0:18:24.960 --> 0:18:30.399 start selling those, my goodness, Russian billionaire's daughters all over there. 0:18:30.400 --> 0:18:32.080 Who wants a pony when you can have an eight 0:18:32.080 --> 0:18:34.480 inch horse and a stable of them? Yeah, you could 0:18:34.480 --> 0:18:37.480 be in your apartment in New York. You know, you're right, 0:18:37.800 --> 0:18:41.320 this is perfect for the apartment dweller. Um. Now, they 0:18:41.359 --> 0:18:43.959 were a bit different from horses in other regards as well. 0:18:44.000 --> 0:18:46.879 For instance, they had four toes in the front and 0:18:46.960 --> 0:18:49.919 three in the back, so they ended up having large, 0:18:50.440 --> 0:18:54.880 unhorselike feet. It's true. Um so when you think about 0:18:54.920 --> 0:18:57.719 a horse, you think about that powerful toe with a hoof, right, 0:18:57.800 --> 0:19:00.280 it's just not a footpad, and these guys has had 0:19:00.320 --> 0:19:04.240 more le footpads for trying to navigate the terrain. You know. 0:19:04.359 --> 0:19:07.840 They also lived fifty million years ago during the early 0:19:07.840 --> 0:19:10.720 part of the Tertiary period, and they were a pretty 0:19:10.720 --> 0:19:15.359 wide spread throughout Europe and Asia exactly, So I mean 0:19:15.400 --> 0:19:17.200 you'd have to go back pretty far to be able 0:19:17.240 --> 0:19:19.399 to check these guys out. And they were probably pretty 0:19:19.400 --> 0:19:22.320 bright because they think they had rather large and complex brains, 0:19:22.720 --> 0:19:25.200 so they were probably very alert, you know, constantly on 0:19:25.240 --> 0:19:27.800 the watch because they're tiny horses. And while we think 0:19:27.840 --> 0:19:32.080 they're adorable, we would think they're adorable, the actual creatures 0:19:32.119 --> 0:19:34.000 they had to share the world with probably thought they 0:19:34.000 --> 0:19:40.280 looked delicious probably and uh, speaking of deliciousness, they were vegetarians, 0:19:40.320 --> 0:19:43.160 so they weren't going after any meat themselves. They're having 0:19:43.200 --> 0:19:45.000 more complai, I would hope so, because it would have 0:19:45.040 --> 0:19:48.199 really put a dark twist on this if we finally 0:19:48.240 --> 0:19:50.240 revealed that they were carnivores, but of course they're not. 0:19:50.280 --> 0:19:52.800 They're they're vegetaries. Well now I'm just imagining and look, 0:19:52.840 --> 0:19:54.960 you know, this eight inch horse like hanging off the 0:19:55.000 --> 0:19:57.320 neck of a giant creature trying to take it down. 0:19:57.880 --> 0:20:00.119 But they had a more complete series of teeth than 0:20:00.160 --> 0:20:03.520 modern horses, which were used to feed on those soft, leavy, 0:20:03.640 --> 0:20:07.440 leafy vegetation spots. All right, so we we've had two 0:20:07.440 --> 0:20:10.320 tiny creatus, well, three tiny creatures so far. We've we've 0:20:10.320 --> 0:20:14.200 talked about the uh, the the tiny pencil crawler. We've 0:20:14.200 --> 0:20:16.639 talked about the horned rat, we talked about the dawn horse, 0:20:17.000 --> 0:20:19.480 and now we're going to talk about the whale who 0:20:19.480 --> 0:20:23.720 could walk. This was amazing to see at the Extreme 0:20:23.840 --> 0:20:27.240 Mammals Exhibit because it it is a whale with with 0:20:27.280 --> 0:20:31.080 four feet essentially, and it is terrifying to look at 0:20:31.400 --> 0:20:33.720 because you know, normally think of whales as being the 0:20:33.880 --> 0:20:38.040 sort of benevolent creatures lolling around in the waters but 0:20:38.160 --> 0:20:40.480 not able to actually scramble up on a river bank 0:20:40.600 --> 0:20:43.480 or you know, the sand and eat your foot. Yeah, 0:20:43.480 --> 0:20:46.080 it basically kind of looks like a ten foot long 0:20:46.480 --> 0:20:51.040 mammalian crocodile, like a flesh of dial Yeah. And one 0:20:51.080 --> 0:20:52.919 of the cool things about this one is so a 0:20:52.920 --> 0:20:56.520 lot of our our stories of sea monsters come from 0:20:56.560 --> 0:20:58.760 the fact that if you if you have a whale 0:20:58.800 --> 0:21:00.400 that is washed up on the beach and of its 0:21:00.480 --> 0:21:03.200 flesh is gone, the and not not only the whale, 0:21:03.200 --> 0:21:06.800 but other other sea mammals um with the flesh disappears, 0:21:06.800 --> 0:21:08.639 and you're just looking at the skeleton. It looks like 0:21:08.640 --> 0:21:11.000 a drastically different creature and you think, oh, look at 0:21:11.000 --> 0:21:13.159 this thing. It has this slender head and it's was 0:21:13.200 --> 0:21:15.119 living in the water. It must have been something fierce. 0:21:15.560 --> 0:21:18.439 Well this is basically what this is, basically what this 0:21:18.480 --> 0:21:21.159 creature looks like. Yeah, it just really looks like it 0:21:21.200 --> 0:21:23.439 could take you off guard, I guess you could say, 0:21:23.480 --> 0:21:25.520 which is the whole point of it. Right. It lived 0:21:25.520 --> 0:21:28.240 about forty nine million years ago in the shallow seas 0:21:28.320 --> 0:21:31.600 of what is now modern day Pakistan. Yeah, because Pakistan 0:21:31.880 --> 0:21:33.879 back in these days, uh as an island off the 0:21:33.960 --> 0:21:36.920 coast of of India in the Indian Ocean, yep. And 0:21:37.080 --> 0:21:40.600