Speaker 1: Welcome to Creature future production of iHeartRadio. I'm your host
Speaker 1: of Many Parasites, Katie Golden. I studied psychology and evolutionary biology,
Speaker 1: and today on the show Ox, we're talking about species
Speaker 1: of ox, not ox, but a UKs. You heard me right,
Speaker 1: from puffins to razorbills to crested oklets. These seafaring birds
Speaker 1: may be a little awkward on land, but they can
Speaker 1: cut through the skies in the seas like acrobats. Discover
Speaker 1: this more as we answer the angel question what does
Speaker 1: bird cologne smell like? Joining me today is conservation educator,
Speaker 1: host of the Panglin podcast, and puffin appreciator Jack Baker.
Speaker 2: Welcome, Hello, Thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 3: I'm so excited to be here. I'm like, I can't wait.
Speaker 3: I cannot wait to just fangirl about puffins for the
Speaker 3: next hours with you.
Speaker 2: I can't wait. I can't wait.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, I love puffins. I think that they are
Speaker 1: a inconspicuously fascinating species of bird. You also like puffins?
Speaker 1: What is your history with puffins?
Speaker 3: So I have a complex that's a good as a
Speaker 3: deep first question.
Speaker 1: Because I have a complex question.
Speaker 3: It is, and I don't think people most people have
Speaker 3: such a complex relationship with what seems like quite a passive, lovely,
Speaker 3: dopey little bird. But I have, Yeah, I have a
Speaker 3: little bit of a storied history and so yes, I
Speaker 3: kind of became fascinated with puffins growing up in Scotland.
Speaker 3: So I'm from Fifth in Scotland, which is a little
Speaker 3: kind of area of Scotland just outside of Edinburgh. If
Speaker 3: you're kind of less familiar with Scotland, it's just kind
Speaker 3: of outside of Edinburgh and around the coastline there. We
Speaker 3: have such a diverse and fascinating array of sea birds.
Speaker 3: We have things like cormorants, We have oyster catchers, we
Speaker 3: have razorbills, gannets which I love, which we're not talking
Speaker 3: about today, but I would ganets.
Speaker 2: If you don't know what a ganet is, go and
Speaker 2: look up.
Speaker 3: They're fabulous, fabulous, huge white birds, like amazing, and of
Speaker 3: course puffins. There is a small island off the coast
Speaker 3: of Five called the Isle of May, and on that
Speaker 3: island there are well I thought, oh, there won't be
Speaker 3: that many growing up. I was like, there'll be a
Speaker 3: couple of birds. And the first time I went out
Speaker 3: there and discovered there were in peak seasons. Eighty thousand
Speaker 3: puffins on that island is just like insane and it
Speaker 3: blew me away, Like me and my dad. I remember
Speaker 3: we got the ferry out to go and have a
Speaker 3: look at all these sea birds one day and then
Speaker 3: it's yes, we kind of we are kind of chatting
Speaker 3: away on the boat, being like when we maybe we'll
Speaker 3: see like a puffin, like two puffins and a pair
Speaker 3: of puffins, that would be nice, I don't know. And
Speaker 3: then we got closer and you could see all these
Speaker 3: like little black and white things like dotting about all
Speaker 3: over the place, and I was like, surely they're not
Speaker 3: all puffins, and they weren't. Indeed, they weren't all puffins,
Speaker 3: but a lot of them, like thousands of them, thousands
Speaker 3: of these birds. And then you go onto the island
Speaker 3: and they have this visitor center and it's I think
Speaker 3: the oldest seabird kind of observation kind of terror and
Speaker 3: place in Scotland. And so there's so many of these birds,
Speaker 3: and there are all sorts of gulls and things and
Speaker 3: also and I just was like instantly captured by this magic.
Speaker 1: Were you able to hear sort of the the sound
Speaker 1: of that many puffins, and what does what does it
Speaker 1: sound like to be sort of in the middle of
Speaker 1: thousands of puffins?
Speaker 2: I imagine what it's like.
Speaker 3: It's like you imagine when you and all your friends
Speaker 3: get together for coffee for the first time or something,
Speaker 3: and you haven't seen each other for months, and you've
Speaker 3: brought this group of people, and but that way where
Speaker 3: everyone's so excited to see everyone that they're all talking
Speaker 3: over each other all of the they're all having the
Speaker 3: same thoughts and they just want to kind of all
Speaker 3: talk about everything all at once.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Now imagine that not human.
Speaker 3: Words, but just like chattering of like these beats like clattering. Yeah,
Speaker 3: And it was, and there's so much of it going on.
Speaker 3: It's like there's one hundred thousand conversations all happening at
Speaker 3: once between these birds. And you could obviously, you could
Speaker 3: kind of hear them a little bit from the boat
Speaker 3: on the approach, but it's only really when you get
Speaker 3: onto the island you realize there's so many of them
Speaker 3: that it's impossible to miss. And you have the kind
Speaker 3: of faint calls of the gulls and stuff in the background,
Speaker 3: and you have that kind of you can hear the
Speaker 3: conflicts between the kind of the puffins who are coming
Speaker 3: back into the nests, and then you have the gulls
Speaker 3: swooping in and trying to steal bits of food, and
Speaker 3: so you hear the kind of this like loud cry
Speaker 3: of gull versus the kind of like, yeah, chattering little
Speaker 3: puffin noises, and yeah, you really it's an impressive soundscape
Speaker 3: which I wish, I wish I could capture and play
Speaker 3: to you. But yeah, unfortunately I'm in my office and
Speaker 3: not on the island at the moment.
Speaker 1: But you don't have puffins in there with you in
Speaker 1: your office. I have a view, no, no, But yeah,
Speaker 1: it's interesting because, yeah, like you said, there is a
Speaker 1: conflict between say something like a goal and a puffin.
Speaker 1: A seagull is a klepto parasite. It is a bird
Speaker 1: who will steal food from other birds. Will actually talk
Speaker 1: about some defensive strategies against klepto parasites later in the episode. Puffins, meanwhile,
Speaker 1: are amazing little fishing birds. They are sort of streamlined
Speaker 1: to catch as many fish as they possibly can. They
Speaker 1: have these We've talked about puffins before in the show,
Speaker 1: but just sort of a little review. They have these
Speaker 1: amazing mouths, like these beaks that are beautiful to look at.
Speaker 1: On the outside, they have this sort of like almost
Speaker 1: Venetian mask style coloring with bright orange red, you know,
Speaker 1: stripes of white or yellowy white, and inside their mouths
Speaker 1: like you have this cute little puffin right like little chubby,
Speaker 1: you know, not two huge bird, and it seems very cute,
Speaker 1: and then it opens its mouth into this sort of
Speaker 1: nightmare of spikes called denticles, and each denticle is like
Speaker 1: this little bristly hairlike projection inside their mouths, and fish
Speaker 1: will get caught on these. These are like hundreds of
Speaker 1: little fish hooks, and so you can see a puffin
Speaker 1: come out of the water with a innumerable number of
Speaker 1: fish crammed in its mouth. It's cartoonish, like it doesn't
Speaker 1: seem like they should have that many fish in one bite,
Speaker 1: but it is because all these fish are hooked on
Speaker 1: this like basely mouth bill crow and can't escape. And
Speaker 1: so despite looking like a very cute, innocent little animal,
Speaker 1: they are actually quite a fierce and very competent predator
Speaker 1: of fish, and of course something like a seagull. Now,
Speaker 1: I love goals, I don't dislike them. But they are thebs,
Speaker 1: and so they will steal when they can from something
Speaker 1: like a puffin, which feels unfair because here's this industrious
Speaker 1: little puffin and then here's this large goal that's able
Speaker 1: to just kind of swoop in and bully the puffin
Speaker 1: away and try to catch the fish. That it's caught.
Speaker 3: It's it's it is, and it's such an iconic, iconic
Speaker 3: feature of an animal. And I think it's like it
Speaker 3: was put into perfect like perspective for me. When you
Speaker 3: think of like iconic. If you were to see like
Speaker 3: a tiger's stripes, you would know what it was. If
Speaker 3: you were to see kind of like the spots or
Speaker 3: the pattern of a giraffe, you would know what it was.
Speaker 3: And that's similar kind of thing with the puffin. Was
Speaker 3: like a couple of weeks ago, I was running a
Speaker 3: class for secondary school children age and we were playing
Speaker 3: just as a little warm up exercise. We were doing
Speaker 3: pictionary where they could pick any animal, any kind of
Speaker 3: We were trying to theme it around the ocean, so
Speaker 3: any kind of ocean adjacent animal they could pick to draw,
Speaker 3: and we got some really good drawings, but the puffin.
Speaker 3: All that the kid drew was the beak and the
Speaker 3: like the sand deals that they catch hanging out of
Speaker 3: its mouth and all of that, Like almost all the
Speaker 3: other kids straight away and knew exactly what it was
Speaker 3: they were drawing. So is it's this iconic and use
Speaker 3: the iconic slightly horrifying beak that they have. But it's
Speaker 3: it's amazing, it's amazing.
Speaker 1: They're adorable, I think, is what's interesting. I love a
Speaker 1: predator that is actually extremely cute and innocent looking like
Speaker 1: the blackfooted cat is another one I can think of.
Speaker 1: It's this tiny cat, smaller than a house cat, very cute,
Speaker 1: looks like a sweet little kitten, and it kills small mammals, rodents, invertebrates,
Speaker 1: and it has one of the highest kill rates of
Speaker 1: any predator, any wildcat predator in the world in terms
Speaker 1: of being able to like even better than say, like
Speaker 1: a lion in terms of its kill rate, because it
Speaker 1: is just so and it kills so many little things
Speaker 1: throughout the night because it needs needs all that food.
Speaker 1: But it's adorable, and I feel this. The puffin is
Speaker 1: like the blackfooted cat of the air, if you will,
Speaker 1: a bit of a bit of a stretch maybe to
Speaker 1: make that comparison, but it is adorable. It's about a
Speaker 1: foot long, they're about twelve ounces. They're not very big,
Speaker 1: you know. They have that cute little like they have
Speaker 1: those little webbed feet, that cute stout little body, those
Speaker 1: pinchable little cheeks. They're black and white. They look like
Speaker 1: they're dressed up for a fancy dinner. Males and females
Speaker 1: are pretty similar looking, and so they have this very
Speaker 1: iconic look. They look like little gentlemen, little ginal ladies.
Speaker 1: They're very sweet and cute looking. And then yet they
Speaker 1: are very deadly to the fish that they prey on.
Speaker 1: But I guess I think we don't sympathize so much
Speaker 1: with fish, and so it's a lot easier to not
Speaker 1: feel bad about the puffin's ability to kill things because
Speaker 1: they're like, oh, you're just a little fishing bird.
Speaker 3: I think that is the thing of like I in
Speaker 3: a past life. I think I actually was looking back
Speaker 3: at this reason. I left the job about five years
Speaker 3: ago now, worked in an aquarium, and I think that's
Speaker 3: the thing of like seeing people like we'd come in
Speaker 3: and like look at a fish and they just felt
Speaker 3: no connection to it at all. Really, But if you
Speaker 3: saw when they look at something like a seal, or
Speaker 3: you talk to them about seabirds or something, there is
Speaker 3: this like there's it's an easier way to kind of,
Speaker 3: it's an easier thing for I guess them to relate to, and.
Speaker 2: So they now.
Speaker 3: But when they see a fish that's slimy to them
Speaker 3: and scaly and different and kind of lives in the dark,
Speaker 3: cold ocean, they don't really have that connection to it.
Speaker 3: So when they see something cute hunting it, it's like, oh,
Speaker 3: we love the cute thing. Like it's fair enough. Because
Speaker 3: even though they are like to the sand deal or
Speaker 3: whatever fish they're going after, they are the nightmare that plunges.
Speaker 2: Into the ocean from above.
Speaker 3: Like I think they can go into about sixty meters
Speaker 3: if they have to, and they will go all the
Speaker 3: way down. That's a scary thing if you're a fish.
Speaker 3: But for us watching, we go, look at the puffin.
Speaker 3: That's what a skill. Yeah, yeah, it is.
Speaker 1: It is funny how so much of our empathy towards
Speaker 1: animals is sort of based on the cuteness factor, as
Speaker 1: is how seriously we take them, such as the puffin,
Speaker 1: where they're cute, they're kind of goofy looking. When we
Speaker 1: see them walking like on our turf on land, they
Speaker 1: look a little silly, they kind of wallle around. You've
Speaker 1: seen them swimming, you can see how ruthlessly efficient they
Speaker 1: are in terms of swimming and flying. They're quite good flyers.
Speaker 1: They're quite good swimmers, which is really interesting because typically
Speaker 1: when you have a bird that is a good diving
Speaker 1: or swimming bird, like the penguin right like it's it
Speaker 1: cannot fly, it's completely evolved to be a swimming bird.
Speaker 1: But the puffin as well as other species of ox,
Speaker 1: not only can they dive, but they can swim underwater
Speaker 1: and it looks like they're flying underwater. It's quite beautiful,
Speaker 1: it's quite graceful. So they go from looking a little
Speaker 1: bit goofy to being extremely graceful under the water.
Speaker 3: Mmm, And like, yeah, it's is that It is that
Speaker 3: funny contrast, if I guess we only ever really in
Speaker 3: our exposure to them on like on the island when
Speaker 3: I saw them for the first time, you only ever
Speaker 3: see them in that goofy way. And it's only things
Speaker 3: like documentaries and films that you then watch it later
Speaker 3: that expose you to this kind of like oh, They're
Speaker 3: not just goofy, They're not just silly. They also have
Speaker 3: a bit of like, maybe this is I'm now thinking
Speaker 3: about it, Maybe that's me. I come on to podcasts
Speaker 3: a lot as a guest, and I'm goofy, I'm funny,
Speaker 3: I like a bit silly. And then but actually I
Speaker 3: would like to think I'm a bit more like clever
Speaker 3: than I may appear like. So maybe that's my my
Speaker 3: another connection to the Puffin for me, there like a
Speaker 3: little spiritual connection that I love you very.
Speaker 1: Much sympathize with this puffin in the way that you
Speaker 1: giview it. Well, you had some difficulty having the puffin
Speaker 1: sort of recognized as a serious topic, didn't you.
Speaker 2: I did what that? Yes? I did? I am so yes.
Speaker 3: That's where the complicated part of my relationship with the
Speaker 3: Puffin comes in. So I It was when I was
Speaker 3: doing my masters in conservation and as part of my
Speaker 3: master's program in Conservation Studies, part of that was to
Speaker 3: give each of the class members was assigned a seabird.
Speaker 2: And we had to give a pre on it.
Speaker 3: And I like, as soon as I saw the list,
Speaker 3: I was like, I want the puffin.
Speaker 2: I love puffins. They are incredible.
Speaker 3: They're fantastic, and so I picked them and we had
Speaker 3: to create this presentation. And so yes, we get to
Speaker 3: the day we're giving these presentations.
Speaker 2: It's all online.
Speaker 3: I go on, I give this like presentation about puffins,
Speaker 3: love them, passionate about them.
Speaker 1: Great.
Speaker 3: I like, you know that way where you finish something
Speaker 3: you're like, I'm so happy with that with that one. Yeah,
Speaker 3: And I'm not the type of person who normally like
Speaker 3: holds my hands up and goes like smash that, because
Speaker 3: I like, I'm not. I tend to be the person
Speaker 3: who remembers after an exam all the questions that I
Speaker 3: think I think I got wrong rather than the things
Speaker 3: I think I got right. So I came out of
Speaker 3: this and was like, nailed it, this is great, Absolutely
Speaker 3: smashed it. And I think this is what why environmental
Speaker 3: education is so important and the way we frame environmental
Speaker 3: education is so important. Because I then received feedback from
Speaker 3: one of the markers who, in front of the entire class,
Speaker 3: started off by insulting where I was from, which was
Speaker 3: not a great start with like a connection because he
Speaker 3: knew I was from Fife. There was a little bit
Speaker 3: of an insult towards fife, which we'll not go into
Speaker 3: now because that's beside the point. But he then went
Speaker 3: on to kind of talk about how all my presentation
Speaker 3: style was childish and he didn't like this, this, and this.
Speaker 3: I knew that way where you just feel really belittled
Speaker 3: in front of people that you feel and especially coming
Speaker 3: off as high. And so it became this kind of
Speaker 3: running theme throughout my life that after this happened, I
Speaker 3: obviously found my reinspiration that happened like later on in
Speaker 3: the story, but it kind of really ruined my relationship
Speaker 3: with Puffins going forward, and it became kind of a
Speaker 3: running joke for people, where like for my birthday, obviously
Speaker 3: during a pandemic birthday, the one thing you could get
Speaker 3: somebody was a face mask, and so I received a
Speaker 3: face mask covered in Puffins. I like all of these
Speaker 3: like little Puffin memorabilia things, which is starts showing up
Speaker 3: in my life, and so it became this kind of
Speaker 3: like running joke where like I always felt like kind
Speaker 3: of disinspired, the inspired, uninspired.
Speaker 2: There's the word, there's the word. I was like, that's
Speaker 2: one of these, isn't right?
Speaker 3: Someone pick whichever one you want, and so yes, I
Speaker 3: kind of felt like this kind of uninspired by them,
Speaker 3: and this kind of like every time I saw them
Speaker 3: it was this shame because I had such happy memories
Speaker 3: of this animal, and then this reframing during the pandemic
Speaker 3: where everyone was a bit done with everything anyway then
Speaker 3: kind of like ruin this animal I love and it
Speaker 3: took a few like it is then kind of obviously
Speaker 3: like to this point, I have met some fabulous environmental educators.
Speaker 3: There are fabulous educators at Saint Andrew's. There are fabulous,
Speaker 3: wonderful people who've given me fabulous, wonderful advice I'll never
Speaker 3: ever forget, because in fact, in conservation and environmental science,
Speaker 3: we need to keep that like childlike joy alive, if anything,
Speaker 3: because as we go on we deal with really hard stuff,
Speaker 3: it shouldn't be the passion. We shouldn't shut down the
Speaker 3: things that make us passionate.
Speaker 1: I mean, because obviously, when animal species are threatened and
Speaker 1: our entire planet is threatened, things can get really depressing
Speaker 1: very fast. But I think it is really important as
Speaker 1: a part of conservation outreach to inspire a passion and
Speaker 1: a love for these animals, because I think that when
Speaker 1: we feel overwhelmed by how much work needs to be
Speaker 1: done to save the ecosystems of the planet. We can
Speaker 1: feel paralyzed. But if we inspire this love of animals
Speaker 1: and just like this really embracing sort of the wonder
Speaker 1: and the joy of these animals that we need to protect.
Speaker 1: Can you talk a little bit about like puff and
Speaker 1: conservation in terms of like it. Have there been conservation
Speaker 1: efforts to help preserve the puffin populations?
Speaker 3: So yes, Despite the fact they are charming and lovable
Speaker 3: and everybody seems to know what they are, like a
Speaker 3: lot of very charismatic species like tigers and elephants and
Speaker 3: all of these kind of big popular animals, they are
Speaker 3: kind of under threat from a number of different things.
Speaker 2: Here in the UK.
Speaker 3: They are the RSPB, which is a bird charity that
Speaker 3: is here in the UK. They have a list of
Speaker 3: species which they consider to be under threat, and the
Speaker 3: puffin is considered to be red, categorized red on that list,
Speaker 3: which I feel like I don't need to understand.
Speaker 2: I explain that for anybody, red is never a good thing,
Speaker 2: to be bad color.
Speaker 3: And while they are more certainly a lot more numerous
Speaker 3: than other species which are categorized red in the UK,
Speaker 3: things like the capri keley, for example, which is another brilliant,
Speaker 3: brilliant bird which you should look up if you if
Speaker 3: you don't know what a.
Speaker 2: Capri keley is.
Speaker 3: They are crazy aggressive grouse species that live in Scotland
Speaker 3: and they are just amazing, So go and look them up.
Speaker 3: But yeah, so they are and there's only five hundred
Speaker 3: ish capri keley left and so while the numbers of
Speaker 3: the puff and are not that low, there are obviously
Speaker 3: serious threats to consider there that mean that it is
Speaker 3: classified red as well, and things like it's one of
Speaker 3: those ones that puffing conservation is difficult because they are
Speaker 3: a species which comes into land, they nest and they
Speaker 3: kind of stay on land for a period of time.
Speaker 3: They will kind of look after they're young for a while,
Speaker 3: and then they will go off back to sea and
Speaker 3: they will disappear out in the middle of the ocean,
Speaker 3: and then they'll come back again and then they'll disappear.
Speaker 3: And so there are things called special protected areas in
Speaker 3: Scotland which will protect the breeding a lot of the
Speaker 3: breeding sites of seabirds and kind of prevent certain actions
Speaker 3: from taking place within them to kind of help them.
Speaker 3: But ultimately those birds like a lot of animals that
Speaker 3: can migrate or can fly or can swim will travel
Speaker 3: huge distances, and so they will move out of those
Speaker 3: protected areas into areas where potentially they're threatened, and they
Speaker 3: will kind of fly in all sorts of different directions,
Speaker 3: which make it very, very difficult to then go, oh, well,
Speaker 3: should we protect the bit of ocean that they swim they.
Speaker 2: Fly to for the rest of the year. Well, it's
Speaker 2: kind of like, oh, we can't really do that, yeah.
Speaker 3: And so it becomes a tricky thing, especially because they
Speaker 3: are obviously very dependent on a certain temperature of water,
Speaker 3: So they need a certain temperature of water to eat
Speaker 3: certain types of fish, they can't certain prey. I think
Speaker 3: it was anything up to I won't say I read
Speaker 3: it earlier. If this is wrong, you can cut it out,
Speaker 3: but I think it was around eighteen to twenty degrees
Speaker 3: was like the maximum they could kind of go to. Yes, degrees, Yes,
Speaker 3: they could kind of go to. So if the sea
Speaker 3: temperatures kind of rise, that can have a huge impact
Speaker 3: on their prey as well as that if there are
Speaker 3: in kind of larger storms or kind of unpredictable weather
Speaker 3: patterns for seabirds, that can be exceptionally dangerous. It can
Speaker 3: get very complicated because they are seabirds, they will fly
Speaker 3: around the ocean, and so to think, oh, to stop
Speaker 3: climate change, maybe we should put up wind turbines, or
Speaker 3: we should do kind of water powered kind of electricity
Speaker 3: that can kind of help slow climate change. We'll see
Speaker 3: birds who are flying around those areas often will collide
Speaker 3: with the the either the kind of turbines, that threat
Speaker 3: is low. I believe the science so is that is low.
Speaker 3: But for birds that then dive, if there are kind
Speaker 3: of the ocean wave power turbines that are under the water,
Speaker 3: those become a threat. So it becomes a very complicated
Speaker 3: issue with climate change. And then you add in things
Speaker 3: like overfishing. I'm painting a very grim picture here. It's
Speaker 3: just a very complicated picture. There's all things like overfishing
Speaker 3: of things that they rely upon. There is other issues.
Speaker 3: I'm trying to think if tourism, for example, can be
Speaker 3: considered one. If tourism becomes unmanaged or over kind of
Speaker 3: populating areas. They obviously they nest on land and so
Speaker 3: and they only lay one egg a year, so very
Speaker 3: very important that egg. And so if that becomes damage
Speaker 3: that can cause huge issues. Invasive species that can get
Speaker 3: down the burrows. I think it was in Iceland. I
Speaker 3: think it was in Iceland a while ago there was
Speaker 3: a sort of release of mink escape and they can
Speaker 3: get down the burrows. So there are all of these
Speaker 3: factors that affect the puffins, and so while there are
Speaker 3: still a large number of them, there's life is coming
Speaker 3: at them in every angle. Yeah, and so they're the
Speaker 3: type of species that it's very very complicated picture to
Speaker 3: kind of protect them. But I think, like if I
Speaker 3: was trying to turn it into kind of a hopeful,
Speaker 3: practical thing for you that you can actually do, rather
Speaker 3: than just paint this horrible image, which I don't like.
Speaker 3: I don't like that at all. I think there's always
Speaker 3: stuff that can be done, and I think it's just
Speaker 3: being honest about the facts and dealing with those things
Speaker 3: and providing people with the information to kind of deal
Speaker 3: with them. And I think the things that you can
Speaker 3: do are very very practical things. By looking after the ocean,
Speaker 3: by kind of if you are you can help to
Speaker 3: protect things like the puffin, which seems like a really simple,
Speaker 3: silly thing, but by taking seriously things like sustainable fishing practices,
Speaker 3: anti littering practices taking place in beach queens, doing kind
Speaker 3: of policy rallying for your local politicians to take climate
Speaker 3: change and ocean issues seriously. All of these things do
Speaker 3: feed into species that we love, like the puffin. So
Speaker 3: while the kind of picture might seem on a very
Speaker 3: surface level quite a scary one, there is so much
Speaker 3: that we can do to go out there and protect
Speaker 3: species like the puffin that we love. And the good
Speaker 3: thing about the ocean is even if you don't love puffins,
Speaker 3: there are thousands of other species that all of those
Speaker 3: things will positively benefit one of.
Speaker 1: Those species too. That depends on the oceans. But yeah,
Speaker 1: I think the really hopeful part of it to me
Speaker 1: is that the puffin population right now is still pretty robust.
Speaker 1: They're not on the precipice yet, but we love them
Speaker 1: and we don't want to see them go. Well, now
Speaker 1: is the time to really care about conservation efforts towards
Speaker 1: the puffin and research into what we can do to
Speaker 1: help protect them. So we're going to take a quick
Speaker 1: break and when we return, we're going to talk about
Speaker 1: a related species of bird, another ak, called the razor bill.
Speaker 1: So we are back and we're now going to talk
Speaker 1: about the razor bill, also known as the lesser ak,
Speaker 1: which is the closest living relative of the extinct great ak.
Speaker 1: The great ak was this amazing bird that was sort
Speaker 1: of penguin like. It had a bit of a longer neck,
Speaker 1: it had a longer, bigger beak, and it was this
Speaker 1: pretty pretty interesting seafaring bird. It was flightless, but unfortunately
Speaker 1: that one did go extinct due to over hunting. But
Speaker 1: the razor bill is perhaps the closest thing we have
Speaker 1: to the extinct grade ac, except that it is not flightless.
Speaker 1: It actually can fly, and it is found in the
Speaker 1: Atlantic Ocean just below the Arctic circle. And you mentioned
Speaker 1: that you have seen some of them near where you
Speaker 1: grew up.
Speaker 3: Yes, yes, so, yeah, the coastline round Fife is home
Speaker 3: to some incredible, incredible species and I'll like the the
Speaker 3: diversity of different things is just fantastic. And yes, so
Speaker 3: you will get things, as I said, like oystercatchers, organets, guillemots, turns, eiders, shags,
Speaker 3: all sorts of amazing birds, but of course also the
Speaker 3: razor bill, which is yes, I'll never forget. It was
Speaker 3: one of my proudest moments was like during university after
Speaker 3: with an exchange with actually the same lecture, who was
Speaker 3: quite to me not to heartback. He did like a
Speaker 3: quiz of like local seabirds, of like you would just
Speaker 3: put pictures up and like see if we could get
Speaker 3: what they were right, every single one.
Speaker 2: Including of course our star of the razor bill.
Speaker 3: And I was like, yes, a little bit of like
Speaker 3: Scottish pride for like our local species.
Speaker 1: I was like, yes, but yes, well it is. It
Speaker 1: is quite I think striking bird. They have black plumage
Speaker 1: with a white chest and a hooked bill with white stripes,
Speaker 1: a pair of the stripes I actually go from their
Speaker 1: bill under their eyes. It looks like some kind of
Speaker 1: beautiful makeup. The insides of their mouths are actually bright yellow,
Speaker 1: so they are quite a sleek and striking looking bird.
Speaker 1: Its wingspan can get up to around twenty seven inches
Speaker 1: or up to seventy centimeters, and from head to foot
Speaker 1: they can get to be around seventeen inches or forty
Speaker 1: three centimeters tall. They live in colonies on island cliffs.
Speaker 1: This is their lifestyle is similar or to the puffin.
Speaker 1: Of course they're quite different looking from the puffin, but yeah,
Speaker 1: they live in colonies on island cliffs, and so they
Speaker 1: are like a lot of species of ox, they are monogamous,
Speaker 1: or these ones have more of a lifetime monogamy. Other
Speaker 1: species of ox may just have seasonal monogamy. So females
Speaker 1: will select a mate and they will typically pair for life,
Speaker 1: although sometimes females will encourage other males to mate with
Speaker 1: her just in case her chosen mate is shooting blanks.
Speaker 1: So there's sometimes a little bit of you know, a
Speaker 1: little bit of strategy there. But yeah, they will both
Speaker 1: incubate the egg, which is precariously placed in a crevice
Speaker 1: or ledge on the cliff side. They don't really build nests.
Speaker 1: Sometimes they just kind of like put random garbage around
Speaker 1: the egg, just like maybe some grass or something. But
Speaker 1: they don't really built construct a nest. It is just
Speaker 1: kind of sitting there on a ledge and they will
Speaker 1: wait for it to hatch. And once it is hatched,
Speaker 1: the hatchling spins sometime being cared for by its parents,
Speaker 1: sheltered under their wings for warmth, and they co parent
Speaker 1: relatively equally in about twenty days. Once it is ready,
Speaker 1: it will follow its father uh and jump right off
Speaker 1: of the cliff of its precarious nesting era into the
Speaker 1: cold waters below, guided by its father. So it gets
Speaker 1: quite a rude awakening once it's old enough, in terms
Speaker 1: of like, well, you're old enough. Now you've got to
Speaker 1: jump off this cliff into this chili water because your
Speaker 1: dad is waiting for you.
Speaker 3: I mean that trial by fire or by water. I
Speaker 3: suppose that that's I can't I'm trying to think twenty
Speaker 3: years old. I was probably twenty No, I'm not twenty old.
Speaker 3: I was probably still just lying there a little bundle
Speaker 3: of nothing. Yeah, this bird is diving into the ocean.
Speaker 2: Good, I mean impressive, impressive. I'm very impressed.
Speaker 1: We can barely lift our heads at twenty days. I
Speaker 1: don't really know too much about child development stages, but yeah,
Speaker 1: like it takes us a while just to be able
Speaker 1: to lift our own huge, heavy heads, whereas this little
Speaker 1: thing in twenty days is jumping off of a cliff
Speaker 1: and swimming. It can't fly yet, but it can swim,
Speaker 1: so it will follow its father out into the ocean,
Speaker 1: and they actually spend their entire winter almost entirely in
Speaker 1: the water, either floating or flying or diving. And just
Speaker 1: as the puffin can dive, underwater, so can the razor bill.
Speaker 1: But the razor bill is a bit bigger, a bit
Speaker 1: more muscular, so it can actually dive up to one
Speaker 1: hundred and twenty meters under the water and it will
Speaker 1: catch fish and they we mentioned earlier seagulls and how
Speaker 1: goals will sometimes kind of of be in competition with
Speaker 1: puffins with other species of birds because they are kleptoparasites.
Speaker 1: They which is a fancy way for naming a thief.
Speaker 1: It will steal fish from other birds. Sometimes it steals
Speaker 1: fish right from the mounds of other birds and so
Speaker 1: the so the razor bill will actually solve this problem
Speaker 1: by eating fish underwater. So it will catch its fish
Speaker 1: while it's diving, and it will consume fish underwater because
Speaker 1: it is less likely to be stolen from which is
Speaker 1: just it's I would love it if I could go
Speaker 1: snorkeling but also be eating a sandwich. But if I
Speaker 1: tried that, I'd get water like in my mouth up
Speaker 1: my nose. Sandwich would get soggy. Can't happen.
Speaker 3: No, even if you're a big fan of sushi, I
Speaker 3: don't think that's a good idea. I can't see it
Speaker 3: being a great.
Speaker 1: Plant yeah, so this is interesting and I'm sure you
Speaker 1: will appreciate this. Hundreds of years ago, people who lived
Speaker 1: on Scotland's frigid Saint Kilda Island would scale the treacherous
Speaker 1: cliffs to collect the eggs of the razor bill and
Speaker 1: would bury them in peat ash to preserve them so
Speaker 1: that they could be eaten during the harsh winters. Now,
Speaker 1: in modern times, people don't do this, at least they're
Speaker 1: not supposed to. They are protected by the Migratory Bird Act.
Speaker 1: But yeah, I mean back, you know, back in the day,
Speaker 1: like a lot of times, like you think of an
Speaker 1: island of being a paradise, but islands in these environments
Speaker 1: near Scotland, near Iceland, they are extremely cold. The winters
Speaker 1: are very harsh and so being able to preserve food
Speaker 1: that you can eat throughout the winter can be critical
Speaker 1: for humans to survive in these areas.
Speaker 3: That's why do you think the Scottish people invented steam trains,
Speaker 3: We invented television, we invented telephones. We have nothing to
Speaker 3: do except be cold and creative up here, so we
Speaker 3: have to come up with stuff, and clearly it comes
Speaker 3: into food as well. We can't prioritizing random really difficult
Speaker 3: food to get.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like you know, I mean, if you think, like wow,
Speaker 1: an egg that you've buried in pete ash doesn't sound
Speaker 1: very good. I don't know what to tell you, but
Speaker 1: there are a lot of egg recipes that involves preserving
Speaker 1: them in some way. Of course, my favorite egg is
Speaker 1: the soy marinated eggs you get in ramen. But I
Speaker 1: feel like it is a creative way to be able
Speaker 1: to eat eggs throughout the winter.
Speaker 3: There is an iconic I think it isn't like, well,
Speaker 3: it's a Scotch egg now, ye, which I don't know.
Speaker 3: If you get so listeners, you can think about we've
Speaker 3: gotten a bit more modern. We no longer climb cliffs
Speaker 3: and berry eggs. We cover them in breadcrumbs insteads.
Speaker 1: Yeah, bread crumbs sound a little bit more appetizing than
Speaker 1: pete ash. I will give you that. I'm not gonna
Speaker 1: blame people hundreds of years ago for having to resort
Speaker 1: to pete ash, but yees, bread crumbs sound very nice.
Speaker 1: I don't think i've had a Scotch egg before. It
Speaker 1: is like it's a fry, it's a what so it's
Speaker 1: covered in bread crumbs and fried right.
Speaker 3: So there's a couple of different a couple different variations.
Speaker 3: And this is where the Scottich people who are listening
Speaker 3: will come at me for defining it in the wrong.
Speaker 3: A couple of different ways you can have it. You
Speaker 3: will occasionally get little mini Scotch eggs, which are essentially
Speaker 3: just like a little mini bit of like scrambled egg
Speaker 3: covered in like bread crumb type structure. And then you
Speaker 3: will get like a big Scotch egg, which would be
Speaker 3: like maybe a whole boiled egg. Sometimes if they're feeling
Speaker 3: a little feisty, they'll put something like bacon or something
Speaker 3: in there as well, and then they will yeah, cover
Speaker 3: it in bread crumbs, fry it, do whatever you need
Speaker 3: to do to maintain that as a ball. And it's
Speaker 3: I mean, it sounds it sounds unusual, but it's it's
Speaker 3: pretty good.
Speaker 2: It sounds good.
Speaker 1: It sounds delicious. It sounds like a delicious, heart healthy breakfast. No,
Speaker 1: it does sound very good, but yeah, I mean it is.
Speaker 1: I think it is interesting that these birds, you know,
Speaker 1: have such a I think that with most species of
Speaker 1: animals like you can often find a human connection. I mean,
Speaker 1: it speaks more to our desperation as humans where we
Speaker 1: try to exploit every niche there is. But yeah, we've
Speaker 1: gone from trying to exploit the razorbills to nowadays like
Speaker 1: they are protected, uh and we are just I mean,
Speaker 1: like the the I'm sure that they face a lot
Speaker 1: of the same conservation issues as puffins do. They depend
Speaker 1: on waters, they depend on fish populations, on temperatures not
Speaker 1: rising too much. So if we you know, all of
Speaker 1: these birds depend on us to you know, try to
Speaker 1: try to not exploit the earth too much. And you know,
Speaker 1: I think that is that that's kind of a constant
Speaker 1: theme with these birds.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, and I would imagine, yes, when you go
Speaker 3: out to places like the Isle of May, you see
Speaker 3: all of these various different species and they might be
Speaker 3: there at different times of the year, or they might
Speaker 3: use different parts of islands of different habitats. But like
Speaker 3: by protecting areas like that, you do you have those
Speaker 3: effects of kind of as we were talking about before,
Speaker 3: you have the effects on more than just maybe the
Speaker 3: puffin or more than just the razor build Like all
Speaker 3: of these things are impacted by the tricky stuff, and
Speaker 3: therefore when the good stuff happens, they are also impacted
Speaker 3: by it.
Speaker 1: As well, so, yeah, yeah, absolutely, and I think it is.
Speaker 1: I think it's something that to me means a lot
Speaker 1: because I know about the sad story about the great
Speaker 1: awk that went extinct, which was this amazing animal. It
Speaker 1: was really interesting as well because it showed us sort
Speaker 1: of this evolutionary path from a flighted bird to a
Speaker 1: flightless bird, similar to a penguin that swims rather than flies.
Speaker 1: It would be really amazing if the great auk was still alive,
Speaker 1: and yet it's not, because the it went extinct before.
Speaker 1: You know, I think it went the last ones went
Speaker 1: extinct in the eighteen hundreds. Do you know if that's right?
Speaker 2: I think so, I do know, I'll check it.
Speaker 1: It doesn't matter. I think the last ones went extinct
Speaker 1: in the eighteen hundred. So this is like there were
Speaker 1: some kind of vague conservation efforts that were going on
Speaker 1: at this time, but I think that we just didn't
Speaker 1: take it as seriously as we do now. The more
Speaker 1: species we see endangered or even going extinct, we're realizing
Speaker 1: more and more like, oh, we actually really need to
Speaker 1: do something otherwise, Yeah, we're gonna lose We're going to
Speaker 1: lose a lot more animals than I think we could
Speaker 1: have ever imagined pre industrialization.
Speaker 3: And I always think it's a shame for the ok
Speaker 3: because it is when people think of extinct.
Speaker 2: Birds, they're always always going to think Dodo.
Speaker 3: Like if you say name and extinct birds, but if
Speaker 3: you look like I would say, aside from the Dodo,
Speaker 3: this is probably the most iconic. Like if you were
Speaker 3: to look at pictures of birds that have gone extinct
Speaker 3: throughout time, this is an iconic, iconic The drawings and
Speaker 3: things of the time are like very iconic things. And
Speaker 3: so you even if you don't maybe know what it
Speaker 3: doesn't come straight to your head, when you look up
Speaker 3: the images of this incredible word, you'll know, you'll probably
Speaker 3: know it. And it is it's a shame that that
Speaker 3: we've let things like that historically have kind of slipped away.
Speaker 3: When the conservation perhaps wasn't a concept and wasn't an
Speaker 3: idea that we're going people's head through people's heads. They
Speaker 3: were just in the space of exploring and conquering and
Speaker 3: doing all sorts of very questionable things. And so yeah,
Speaker 3: these animals slipped away. And when we're now in a
Speaker 3: place that we can do stuff about it, and we can,
Speaker 3: we know we should know, and we do know better,
Speaker 3: and we know how we can make a difference. Then
Speaker 3: it would be a shame to let the razor bill
Speaker 3: and the puff end and all these things go the
Speaker 3: same way.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's yeah, yeah, and exactly in the razor bill
Speaker 1: right now is doing all right. So again, I feel
Speaker 1: like it's great to start caring about conservation, what we
Speaker 1: can do to protect species before they start to get
Speaker 1: into just the absolute red zone danger zone, because often
Speaker 1: once their population has dwindled down to that point, it
Speaker 1: can be too late. So yeah, I think that with
Speaker 1: the puffins, with the razor bills, they're still doing okay.
Speaker 1: You know, they are definitely something that we can preserve
Speaker 1: that it is not at all a reach, I think
Speaker 1: to protect them and prevent them from ever becoming endangered
Speaker 1: or god forbid, extinct.
Speaker 3: It's absolutely it's yeah. When you have that's the thing,
Speaker 3: when you have things like this that they are still plentiful,
Speaker 3: Let's do it, Let's do the work now. And I
Speaker 3: think it's it's one of those things that I guess
Speaker 3: the people who listen to this show, the people I talk.
Speaker 2: To regularly, like we're all aware.
Speaker 3: Of animals, we have an interest in animals, And I
Speaker 3: think what we can do is go out and tell
Speaker 3: people and like when they see a razor bill, which
Speaker 3: they might not like everybody maybe knows what seagull is
Speaker 3: or whatever, when they see a razor bill, whatever it is,
Speaker 3: tell people about them, Tell people about the issues they face,
Speaker 3: Tell people about the kind of great ak and the
Speaker 3: dodo or the puffin or whatever it is, and like,
Speaker 3: make people aware of all these things, because it's it's yeah,
Speaker 3: it's our duty is animal lovers who listen to these
Speaker 3: podcasts and who like go out and we see animals,
Speaker 3: and we watch animals and we love them. To go
Speaker 3: out and spread this to as many people as possible,
Speaker 3: and hopefully by making more people aware, we won't. Yeah,
Speaker 3: we can make a real, real difference to them.
Speaker 1: Absolutely, you heard the man. You've just been recruited for
Speaker 1: the puff and Army. Get out there and spread the
Speaker 1: word of Puffins. Well, we are going to take a
Speaker 1: quick break and when we get back, we're going to
Speaker 1: talk about one of my favorite of the ox because
Speaker 1: it is so goofy and so silly and so wonderful,
Speaker 1: the crested Oklet. But we will talk about that when
Speaker 1: we get back. So now we're going to talk about
Speaker 1: the crested auklet. It is a fantastic bird. I feel
Speaker 1: like it is not a super famous bird, and yet
Speaker 1: it is just so silly and goofy. I don't know
Speaker 1: why it doesn't get more attention. So the crested auklet
Speaker 1: is the fancy, ostentatious cousin of the puffin. They are
Speaker 1: found in the Northern Pacific and Bearing Sea. They are
Speaker 1: a little bit smaller than a puffin, about seven to
Speaker 1: eleven ounces and up to ten inches or twenty seven
Speaker 1: centimeters tall. They spend a lot of time in the
Speaker 1: water diving for krill and other small marine crustaceans. And
Speaker 1: just like puffins, and just like razor bills, they seem
Speaker 1: to be able to fly underwater, so they can swim
Speaker 1: with their wings, and they look quite elegant when they
Speaker 1: do so. It has a sleek black body with a
Speaker 1: gray chest, a short orange bill that curves up, and
Speaker 1: what seems like a smile. It is. It's got a
Speaker 1: very goofy looking bill that is fixed in this permanent,
Speaker 1: very silly smile. They also have these bright teal eyes,
Speaker 1: white eyeliner, and most notably, this very fancy little plume
Speaker 1: that sprouts up from the top of their bill and
Speaker 1: curves over. It makes them look like little flappers, little
Speaker 1: little party birds. Both males and females have these crests.
Speaker 1: Males have slightly larger crests that tend to be a
Speaker 1: little more showy, but females have them as well, which
Speaker 1: is very interesting.
Speaker 3: So I actually don't know, I know, I actually don't
Speaker 3: know a lot about this. I'm quite excited to hear
Speaker 3: what you have to say, because I am aware of them,
Speaker 3: and I'm aware of how charmingly goofy they are. They
Speaker 3: have that, as you say, that little face, like it's
Speaker 3: the face that I make whenever I make a bad joke. Well,
Speaker 3: I think that's really funny. Yeah, they have that little
Speaker 3: charm and so I'm excited. Yeah, I'm excited to hear
Speaker 3: what you have to say, Like, I can't wait to
Speaker 3: learn more.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So what's interesting about them, I think is that
Speaker 1: they seem to exemplify this trait. And we see this
Speaker 1: in a lot of species of ox, which is the
Speaker 1: male and female are actually quite similar looking, so they
Speaker 1: both have these ornamental crests. In a lot of bird species,
Speaker 1: the female can be somewhat plain looking, and it's the
Speaker 1: male who has all the ornamentation, all of the bright colors.
Speaker 1: But in this case, the males and females are pretty similar,
Speaker 1: just like you see in puffins, just like you see
Speaker 1: in razor bills. But because this one is so highly
Speaker 1: ornamented with that little crest there, it raises a lot
Speaker 1: of questions in terms of like, how does their mating
Speaker 1: dynamics work? So they also have sorry, so they use
Speaker 1: this crust to attract mates. But that is not the
Speaker 1: only thing that they have. They also produce their own
Speaker 1: perfume or cologne or whatever you want to call it
Speaker 1: that smells like tangerines apparently, which is just such an
Speaker 1: lovely little detail about these birds. They have a sink
Speaker 1: land located between their shoulder blades, and they produce this
Speaker 1: like tangerine scent that is used as an attractive perfume
Speaker 1: for mates.
Speaker 3: I mean, because I've heard of like things like the
Speaker 3: binterrong for example, that smells like popcorn. Yeah, very infamously
Speaker 3: smells like salted popcorn. Yeah, I have that. I feel
Speaker 3: like a tangerine maybe is a slightly nicer, a nicer
Speaker 3: scent to have around you.
Speaker 2: All the time.
Speaker 3: I can at least I can imagine someone going out
Speaker 3: and being like, I want to smell like tangerines, rather
Speaker 3: than going in and wanting to smell like pop points.
Speaker 3: So that's a it's a charming way to kind of, yeah,
Speaker 3: attract each other, who yeah, hook each other in.
Speaker 1: I do not encourage you to harass these birds, but
Speaker 1: part of me does want to like catch one just
Speaker 1: to kind of huff it, just smell it, get a
Speaker 1: little whiffin some some bird watching in aromatherapy all at once.
Speaker 1: But yeah. So what's interesting is that both males and
Speaker 1: females select based on physical appearance of course that lovely
Speaker 1: tangerine smell and the general vibes that they're getting from
Speaker 1: the other bird. So mating occurs at sea, and males,
Speaker 1: like many other bird species, do not have a penis,
Speaker 1: so the act of copulation has to be highly cooperative,
Speaker 1: highly synchronized. It is this acrobatic teamwork that needs to happen.
Speaker 1: And so as the male hovers over the female like
Speaker 1: while they are on the water, they will engage. They
Speaker 1: will engage in a chloacal kiss, which is how birds
Speaker 1: without penis is made. And what is achloacal kiss, well
Speaker 1: chloeka is that I like to call it the hole
Speaker 1: that does it all. It's found in birds and reptiles
Speaker 1: and so that like with achloacal kiss, it's just like
Speaker 1: what you would imagine, like basically, you know, two holes
Speaker 1: just like touching and then exchange of semen and that
Speaker 1: is how they mate. And so this because this requires
Speaker 1: such cooperation. The female really has to be into the male.
Speaker 1: The male has to be into the female, which I love.
Speaker 1: It's it's they both really have to want this to
Speaker 1: happen and be really into the mating and so that
Speaker 1: they can coordinate this highly acrobatic mating ritual.
Speaker 3: I'm just really sad for the listeners that they didn't
Speaker 3: get to see the hand actions which kiss is. It
Speaker 3: really pains a very accurate picture of what it is like.
Speaker 1: You just make it oh with one hand and oh
Speaker 1: with the other and just kind of, you know, make
Speaker 1: them kiss. This is the one time a kiss can
Speaker 1: get you pregnant. So they are monogamous, but only for
Speaker 1: one breeding season and then they may or may not
Speaker 1: go back on the market. Around forty five percent of
Speaker 1: crusted auklets remain with their partner for the next breeding
Speaker 1: season and then the rest of them go back out
Speaker 1: on the open market. So both the mother and father
Speaker 1: will incubate and care for the egg and hatchlink just
Speaker 1: like we see in razor bills. There is a theory
Speaker 1: that it is not a coincidence that birds speak. She's
Speaker 1: like crested auklets or even puffins and razor bills both
Speaker 1: have this equitable parental care where both the male and
Speaker 1: the female take care of their young, and this absence
Speaker 1: of sexual dimorphism, or at least less observable sexual dimorphism.
Speaker 1: So sexual dimorphism is when you have one sex looks
Speaker 1: quite different from another sex. Think of a peacock. You
Speaker 1: have the peacock. He's brilliant blue, brilliant green, has this
Speaker 1: amazing fan tail. And then the female, the pea hen,
Speaker 1: is brown. She's lovely, she's a lovely bird, but she's brown.
Speaker 1: She doesn't have that amazing tail. Because she is the
Speaker 1: one selecting the mate. It's from her perspective, from her
Speaker 1: judging eye, discerning eye, that she will determine who to
Speaker 1: mate with. Whereas with puffins, with razorbills, and with this
Speaker 1: crested auklet, both the females and males are judging each other,
Speaker 1: and so there is this theory that because the male
Speaker 1: is actually investing so much in parental care, it is
Speaker 1: in his best interest to also select for a highly
Speaker 1: fit female as it is for the female. So like
Speaker 1: for a lot of bird species, the male will mate
Speaker 1: with the female and then it's off and it's done,
Speaker 1: and it has no involvement in the care of the offspring,
Speaker 1: and a lot of species there is actually this parental care,
Speaker 1: so the male will actually care for the offspring help
Speaker 1: the female. This happens in everything from two cans to penguins.
Speaker 1: You know, you have this co parenting and so the
Speaker 1: idea is that you are more likely in these co
Speaker 1: parenting situations to have less sexual dimorphism, less difference between
Speaker 1: males and females, and more ornamentation in both males and
Speaker 1: females because they are both trying to impress each other.
Speaker 2: Mm hmmm. I love that. I think that's yeah, it's
Speaker 2: it's impressive. It's actually so.
Speaker 3: I I work part time at Edin Brazoo and we
Speaker 3: have gentoo penguins, king penguins and northern rock copper penguins.
Speaker 3: They are and it's just when when this is being recorded,
Speaker 3: it's just the season where they're starting to lay eggs
Speaker 3: and kind of have this like scenario, and it's it's funny.
Speaker 3: It's it's funny to watch when you have these kind
Speaker 3: of two parents who are equally trying to like equally rambunctious,
Speaker 3: equally kind of wanting to show off to each other,
Speaker 3: but also equally protective and kind of like back off
Speaker 3: from our egg because type scenario. It's really it's it's
Speaker 3: fun to see like these co parenting like scenarios and
Speaker 3: how they work in the animal kingdom, because yeah, it's
Speaker 3: it's fun when it's it's interesting and it's not the
Speaker 3: kind of stereotypical, Oh there is a male lion who
Speaker 3: is surrounded by all of these females. Like, it's interesting
Speaker 3: when you have this kind of partnership going on in
Speaker 3: the relationships that form, and I think that.
Speaker 2: It forms quite charming stories and like you.
Speaker 3: Kind of get connected to these these love stories and
Speaker 3: these bonds because you get you put, as we often do,
Speaker 3: you put your own emotions into it.
Speaker 2: You go on, yeah, that's just the sweetest thing.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, absolutely, I mean I think that for a
Speaker 1: lot of people who are in equitable, say relationships, it is.
Speaker 1: It is much more relatable when you see a bird
Speaker 1: like this, like ah, the both the male and female
Speaker 1: are taking care, they're young, they both want to make
Speaker 1: a good impression on each other. It's not so lopsided.
Speaker 1: I think it does appeal very much to sort of
Speaker 1: modern you know, my feminist sensibilities. Of course, I can't
Speaker 1: project those onto a bird. And you know, I don't
Speaker 1: like I'm not like oh, lions tho, it's misogyn those sexists.
Speaker 1: And of course things like with lions and other animals
Speaker 1: that have sort of this more like harem structure where
Speaker 1: you have multiple females to one male. Often it's put
Speaker 1: through this framework of like, well, you know, these females
Speaker 1: are submissive to this male. But you can also look
Speaker 1: at it as like these are matriarchal societies because the
Speaker 1: male is interchangeable. The males can come and go, a
Speaker 1: new male can come and take over. But the female
Speaker 1: lions are somewhat consistent, and they actually form the main
Speaker 1: social group of the pride, and they can collectively chase
Speaker 1: away a male that they don't like. So they're all
Speaker 1: sorts of really interesting dynamics and animals that are maybe
Speaker 1: less relatable to us as humans, but definitely for these
Speaker 1: birds it is somewhat I think in a way it's
Speaker 1: very charming because it's relatable to me as someone who
Speaker 1: likes to be an equal in relationships, and so it's like, yes, crestedoclet,
Speaker 1: that's great. You guys treat each other good.
Speaker 2: Mm hmmm hmmm, it's yeah.
Speaker 3: It's reminding me of like the pride I felt in
Speaker 3: that we have currently. So as as happens the penguins
Speaker 3: don't well and birds and things that will pair up occasionally,
Speaker 3: there will be a couple of men who decide we're
Speaker 3: gonna we're gonna pair up have a kind of companion
Speaker 3: relationship for a year, and it's this whole conversation is
Speaker 3: reminded me. This year at Edinburgh, there's two males. Snowflake
Speaker 3: who is the sweetest, one of the most iconic because
Speaker 3: he has a condition where his feathers are all all
Speaker 3: kind of white and wow, so he's one of the
Speaker 3: and he's paired up this year with another one of
Speaker 3: the males, and just to really hit home, I'm like, yes,
Speaker 3: i'd love you too for each other. We did they
Speaker 3: did an exercise with a group who they got to
Speaker 3: paint little pebbles, so the penguins will will all kind
Speaker 3: of fight over these pebbles to build their nests. And
Speaker 3: even when it's men, like two males, they will still
Speaker 3: build this nest and they will still kind of form
Speaker 3: this thing. And one of the children painted a rainbow
Speaker 3: one of the pebbles, and these two penguins, who have
Speaker 3: decided to have this like relationship together for a year,
Speaker 3: picked the rainbow penguin the rainbow pebble, and I was like, yes,
Speaker 3: I love it.
Speaker 1: So much, so cute, I love I love this. I
Speaker 1: want to see a Pixar movie of Snowflake. That is
Speaker 1: that's fantastic. It must be such a pretty bird as well.
Speaker 1: I love the both the melanistic and the albino or
Speaker 1: the animals that have these like interesting coat patterns. I
Speaker 1: didn't realize that that this could happen. Well, I guess, yeah,
Speaker 1: of course it could happen with penguins. It just never
Speaker 1: occurred to me. But that's fascinating. I have to I
Speaker 1: have to check out a picture of Snowflake. I'm sure
Speaker 1: very cute.
Speaker 3: I'll try and find one and same one across because
Speaker 3: thank you a star, a star.
Speaker 1: Oh, congratulations Snowflake. That is I'm happy for him. He's thriving,
Speaker 1: he's in his lane with his rocks and his wonderful partner. Fantastic. Well,
Speaker 1: before we go, I want to play a little game
Speaker 1: called Guess he's squawking? The Mystery animal sound game. Every
Speaker 1: week I play a mystery animal sound and you the listener,
Speaker 1: and you're the guest. Try to guess who is making
Speaker 1: that sound. It can be any animal in the world
Speaker 1: on the planet Earth. If there's any animals outside of
Speaker 1: planet Earth, I would also include them. So far, no luck,
Speaker 1: but yes, So the hint for last week's mystery animal
Speaker 1: sound was this, don't call this great animal a peasant,
Speaker 1: all right, Jack, You have any guesses as to what
Speaker 1: this could be? So the.
Speaker 3: So the clue made me think it was some kind
Speaker 3: of and the noise really makes me think it's a bird.
Speaker 3: Really makes me think it's maybe some kind of owl.
Speaker 3: But I could be miles off there, and I am
Speaker 3: not the expert on bird song that I should be
Speaker 3: given the topic of this week's episode.
Speaker 2: But yeah, we'll go with some kind of owl.
Speaker 1: I mean, look, I'll put it this way, if I
Speaker 1: had to play my own game, I don't think i'd
Speaker 1: be very good at it. You are right that it
Speaker 1: is a type of bird. Congratulations to Auntie B, Grant
Speaker 1: W and Maran D who all guessed correctly. This is
Speaker 1: not an owl but a great argus pheasant. So oh,
Speaker 1: it's not the most common bird when one thinks of
Speaker 1: a bird. So I was a little bit mean this
Speaker 1: week did a pretty hard one. But these are found
Speaker 1: in the rainforests of Borneo, and they actually look a
Speaker 1: bit like peacocks. In fact, they are in the same
Speaker 1: family as peacocks. It is the largest pheasant in the world,
Speaker 1: with males weighing around six pounds or over two point
Speaker 1: seven kilograms, and with a body length including its tail,
Speaker 1: of up to around eighty inches or two hundred centimeters.
Speaker 1: Females are mostly brown, as we talked about earlier with
Speaker 1: the difference between males and females and peacock species, so
Speaker 1: in this the great argus pheasants, females are mostly brown.
Speaker 1: They're somewhat plain, whereas males have this bright blue head,
Speaker 1: this blue rust and brown feathers. They're not as brightly
Speaker 1: colored as peacocks. They're not as spectacularly colored, but their
Speaker 1: feathers still have these mini eye spots just like the peacock.
Speaker 1: You see all of these eye spots on their feathers.
Speaker 1: The great argus pheasant also has these eye spots that
Speaker 1: are meant to impress females, and they will fan out
Speaker 1: their tail in this amazing display. And so the male
Speaker 1: will clear a staging area and issue a call just
Speaker 1: like the one you heard, and as soon as it
Speaker 1: attracts its audience, hopefully a female who comes to listen,
Speaker 1: the male will fan out its tail like a peacock
Speaker 1: and dance for the female in hopes of enticing her
Speaker 1: to mate.
Speaker 3: Not just a singer, you're also a dancer. Is there
Speaker 3: a triple threat? Is there a third magic skill that
Speaker 3: they have?
Speaker 1: I mean probably the fan of tails with like so
Speaker 1: many eyes that makes them sound like a biblical angel
Speaker 1: where they're like, be not afraid, I just want to
Speaker 1: mate with you.
Speaker 2: So it's a strong image.
Speaker 3: Actually, I feel like we would all be enticed in
Speaker 3: if all of a sudden something appeared out of nowhere
Speaker 3: with a thousand heights, like amazed anyway by what it was.
Speaker 1: Well onto this week's mystery animal sound. The hint is
Speaker 1: this Madagascar native is named after the following alarm call, ge,
Speaker 1: do you have any guesses?
Speaker 3: So I know there is a Madagascar native that is
Speaker 3: a very iconic famous animal that is named after its call,
Speaker 3: but that doesn't sound like what its name is.
Speaker 2: So that's kind of that has thrown me. I have
Speaker 2: like because to me, my guess just based on the
Speaker 2: clue would have been raped. But that's not what I
Speaker 2: would have imagined that to sound like. So I'm like,
Speaker 2: I'm very like thrown off, So I think I'm gonna
Speaker 2: have to go with that and just like, wait and see.
Speaker 1: You are absolutely correct, and therefore I am going to
Speaker 1: bleep out your answer, but everyone will know that you
Speaker 1: are correct. So uh, yes, I guess you get a
Speaker 1: little extra hint there. You might be surprised to find
Speaker 1: out what its name is because it's call maybe doesn't
Speaker 1: sound as similar to its name as you would think,
Speaker 1: but it is meant to be an on amanopoia name.
Speaker 1: So good luck everyone, see if you can get it
Speaker 1: just as Jack has. And if you have a guess,
Speaker 1: and even if you think it's a wild guess, I
Speaker 1: don't care. Write to me at Creature Feature Pod at
Speaker 1: gmail dot com. Jack, thank you so much for joining
Speaker 1: me today to talk about puffin's conservation and some other
Speaker 1: species of ox. Where can people find you?
Speaker 3: So yes, thank you so much for having me. It's
Speaker 3: been an absolute pleasure. It was such a full circle
Speaker 3: moment for me to come and be able to talk
Speaker 3: about puffins.
Speaker 2: So it's been so fantastic.
Speaker 3: If you're interested in learning more about me and what
Speaker 3: I do, I am the host of Panglin the Conservation Podcast,
Speaker 3: which can be found on Spotify or Apple podcast or
Speaker 3: wherever you get your podcasts from. If wherever you're listening
Speaker 3: to this, I suppose you can also search for me.
Speaker 3: And that show is a celebration of all of the
Speaker 3: kind of underappreciated stories. It started off as a celebration
Speaker 3: of the pang and then I realized there are so
Speaker 3: many other animals which fall under this category of weird, underappreciated,
Speaker 3: bizarre creatures that people need to know more about, and
Speaker 3: so we've kept that as the title, and I've moved
Speaker 3: on now to talk about everything from giraffes to amphibians,
Speaker 3: to orchids to all sorts of.
Speaker 2: Bizarre, amazing things.
Speaker 3: And so yes, I'm there I'm at pangling podcast.
Speaker 2: On all of the social media's.
Speaker 3: If you're interested on me, on me personally rather than
Speaker 3: the content. If you're satisfied with your animal podcast content
Speaker 3: by listening.
Speaker 1: To this one impossible. No one can ever be satisfied.
Speaker 3: No, I don't think so. I don't think so. But
Speaker 3: if you are, you can find me on Twitter. I'm
Speaker 3: at only Jack Baker on Twitter. I'm at the only
Speaker 3: Jack Baker on Instagram all over the place. Find me,
Speaker 3: ask me questions, tell me to talk more about puffins.
Speaker 2: I'll do anything.
Speaker 1: You know. I'm there, Send him puffin paraphernalia. Yeah, this time,
Speaker 1: this time I'm ironic.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Well, my favorite I didn't get to I didn't mention
Speaker 3: it during. My favorite favorite piece of puff and memorabilia
Speaker 3: in the house is not mine, but it's my mom's.
Speaker 3: We went to Iceland one year and they are in
Speaker 3: a gift shop. Was three puffins, like and they had
Speaker 3: their arms out like kind of like hooked like this,
Speaker 3: and there it's a wine bottle carrier. They just carry
Speaker 3: a bottle of wine. And I think it's fantastic.
Speaker 1: It's wonderful. I want that so much. I'm gonna have
Speaker 1: to go there just to get this puff and wine carrier. Well,
Speaker 1: thank you, Thank you guys so much for listening. If
Speaker 1: you're enjoying the show and you leave a rating or review,
Speaker 1: I would deeply appreciate that. I read all the reviews
Speaker 1: and I appreciate every single one of your ratings. Thank
Speaker 1: you so much, and thank you to the Space Classics
Speaker 1: for They're a super awesome song. XO. Lumina. Creature Feature
Speaker 1: is a production of iHeart Radio four more podcasts like
Speaker 1: the one you just heard. Visit the iHeartRadio app Apple podcasts,
Speaker 1: or hey, guess what where we listening to your favorite shows.
Speaker 1: I don't judge you. In fact, you could listen to
Speaker 1: it in any way.
Speaker 2: That's fine.
Speaker 1: See you next Wednesday. Mm hmm