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Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind from how Stuff

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Speaker 1: Works dot com. Hey you welcome to Stuff to Blow

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Speaker 1: your Mind. My name is Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick.

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Speaker 1: And Robert I got a question for you. Give me

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Speaker 1: with it. What wild animal do you most associate with

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Speaker 1: American founding icon Benjamin Franklin's Gonna Be the Turkey had

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Speaker 1: that whole song about it right in seventy six? Oh yeah,

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Speaker 1: were you in seventeen seventy six? Did you play Ben Franklin?

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Speaker 1: I played Thomas Jefferson. Okay, community theater performance of it. Yes,

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Speaker 1: that's that's who I was. But you got to be

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Speaker 1: the boring guy without a sense of humor, Yes, but

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Speaker 1: with with bright red hair. That was the main appeal

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Speaker 1: and U. Ben Franklin was played by a local attorney

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Speaker 1: named Ray Freely. Ray Freely y f He did wonderful job.

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Speaker 1: So I'm glad I had the part I had. I

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Speaker 1: was more suited for just red haired and kind of boring. Uh,

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Speaker 1: you know Timmy Jefferson, Timmy Timmy. Yeah, he is kind

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Speaker 1: of a Timmy and that isn't he? He like he

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Speaker 1: There are scenes where he plays the violin, right did

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Speaker 1: you play the violin? Oh gosh, I don't remember. I

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Speaker 1: remember scenes where I was had pretending to write in

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Speaker 1: Wada paper. Okay, oh, sorry, we got sidetracked here, but

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Speaker 1: there is a song in there where Benjamin Franklin he

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Speaker 1: suggests that the U. S National bird should not be

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Speaker 1: the should not be the eagle, and should not be

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Speaker 1: the dove, but should be the turkey because it is

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Speaker 1: a most majestic bird. And I found no evidence that

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Speaker 1: Franklin actually suggested that the national birds should be the turkey.

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Speaker 1: But Franklin was all about some turkeys, especially was all

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Speaker 1: about killing turkeys, and especially it was all about killing

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Speaker 1: turkeys with his favorite technological toys, the ladon jar. Uh.

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Speaker 1: We we've talked before in our episodes about the early

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Speaker 1: days of electricity about that that barbecue Franklin hosted where

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Speaker 1: he wanted to kill turkeys with with electrical shocks and

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Speaker 1: then roast them with an electrical jack and then uh

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Speaker 1: and and I guess, I don't know, char their skin

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Speaker 1: with electrical fire from a bottle. It was a rousing affair,

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Speaker 1: I'm sure, because Franklin actually ended up electrocuting or not electrocuting,

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Speaker 1: but he shocked himself very badly. See why isn't this

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Speaker 1: our Thanksgiving tradition? Should a big, big turkey electrocution every year? Wait,

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Speaker 1: a lot of people use electric stoves. I guess that's

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Speaker 1: kind of closed, but it's not quite as a shocking, right,

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Speaker 1: you should be getting the jumper cables and going out

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Speaker 1: to the yard with a gobbler. No pardon for you,

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Speaker 1: all right? So if the if the turkey wasn't his

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Speaker 1: favorite animal, uh what pray tell? Was it? Well? Who

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Speaker 1: knows if it was actually his favorite animal. But the

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Speaker 1: animal I now most associate with Ben Franklin is the squirrel,

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Speaker 1: because Robert, did you know that Benjamin Franklin carried a

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Speaker 1: squirrel across the ocean to Europe? No? I did not

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Speaker 1: know about this. He had a pet squirrel named Mungo.

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Speaker 1: And yes, this is all true. Benjamin Franklin had a

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Speaker 1: pet squirrel named Mungo that he kept in a cage.

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Speaker 1: They got killed by a dog named Ranger. And he

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Speaker 1: wrote a letter to Georgiana Shipley in seventeen seventy two

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Speaker 1: where where he said, I lament with you most sincerely

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Speaker 1: the unfortunate end of poor Mungo. Few squirrels were better accomplished,

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Speaker 1: for he had had a good education, had traveled far

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Speaker 1: and seen much of the world. In other words, I

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Speaker 1: I put it, put him in a cage, and carried

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Speaker 1: him on a I don't know, an oceanic journey. There's

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Speaker 1: some ironies in this story that we can tease out

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Speaker 1: in the second. In fact, Benjamin Franklin wrote a poem

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Speaker 1: of lament. It is like an elegy for poor Mungo.

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Speaker 1: I wonder if we should do a reading of this

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Speaker 1: poem for Mango. What do you think, Well, I don't

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Speaker 1: really have a good Benjamin Franklin voice. Neither do I,

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Speaker 1: but I can give it a shot. Alas poor Mungo,

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Speaker 1: happy wort, thou hatst thou known thy own felicity, remote

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Speaker 1: from the fierce, bald eagle tyrant of thy native woods,

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Speaker 1: thou hatst not to fear from his piercing talents, nor

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Speaker 1: from the murdering gun of the thoughtless sportsman, Safe in

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Speaker 1: his why aired castle, Grimalkin never could annoy thee Grimalkin,

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Speaker 1: of course, is the which is familiar the cat from Macbeth.

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Speaker 1: I think is also just a word for a cat.

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Speaker 1: But yeah, so continues daily Worth thou fed with choicest

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Speaker 1: viands by the fair hand of an indulgent mistress, but

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Speaker 1: discontented thou wouldst have more freedom too soon, alas didst

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Speaker 1: thou obtain it, and wandering fell by the merciless fangs

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Speaker 1: of wanton cruel ranger learned hints ye who blindly wish

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Speaker 1: for more liberty, whether subjects, sons, squirrels, or daughters, That

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Speaker 1: apparent restraint maybe real protection, yielding peace plenty and security.

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Speaker 1: You see how much more decent and proper this broken style,

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Speaker 1: interrupted as it were, with size, is for the occasion

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Speaker 1: than if one were to say, by way of epitaph,

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Speaker 1: here scug lie snug as a bug in a rug.

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Speaker 1: Scug is an antiquated word for squirrel. But you didn't

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Speaker 1: know that one either. I didn't, But you know, I

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Speaker 1: feel like a lot of people by by the time

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Speaker 1: we're done with the special two part exploration of the squirrel,

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Speaker 1: I think some people are going to adopt skug as

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Speaker 1: an appropriate a bit of terminology for these strange furry

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Speaker 1: creatures that, for many obvious fill our backyards in our lives. Robert,

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Speaker 1: I am so excited to talk about squirrels for two

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Speaker 1: whole episodes because I would never have imagined there were

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Speaker 1: two episodes worth of startling squirrel knowledge and oh boy

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Speaker 1: is there Yeah, there is. But before anybody and it

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Speaker 1: thinks I'll skip the squirrels, No no no, no, no, stick

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Speaker 1: with the squirrels because some of this information is shocking.

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Speaker 1: It will change the way you see the squirrel. The

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Speaker 1: squirrels are not what they seem. You're right about that,

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Speaker 1: they are not. Yeah, this is not just gonna be

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Speaker 1: like two episodes of squirrel minutia. This is gonna be

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Speaker 1: episodes that redefine what these animals are and what they

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Speaker 1: are up to in your immediate environment. They may shake

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Speaker 1: your faith in the goodness of the world around you, right,

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Speaker 1: you know. Well, one thing that that I've I've noticed

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Speaker 1: about the squirrel is it, of course, for many of us,

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Speaker 1: the squirrels everywhere, like like, how often do you see squirrels, Joe? Yeah,

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Speaker 1: you see them more than any non human animal who

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Speaker 1: is not your pet, probably, I mean, depending on where

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Speaker 1: you live. But at least we we do. Yeah, Like

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Speaker 1: with us, they're constantly scaring around our yard and on

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Speaker 1: our fence. We have a number of bird feeders that

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Speaker 1: we that my family. We like to when we're having

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Speaker 1: breakfast or dinner together, we like to watch the birds

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Speaker 1: out there, and of course the squirrels come. You can't

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Speaker 1: keep squirrels away from a bird feeder in the same

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Speaker 1: way you can't keep squirrels out of out of a garden.

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Speaker 1: You can try, but they are tenacious. They have an

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Speaker 1: insatiable mammalian quality, a mammalian vitality that the birds just

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Speaker 1: do not have. Even though we we love birds and

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Speaker 1: we've explored you know, when when you put a bird

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Speaker 1: feeder out, you wonder why the squirrels always seem to

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Speaker 1: take it over, And it does seem to have something

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Speaker 1: to do with their mammalian craftiness. And that's despite the

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Speaker 1: fact that birds are often craftier than we expect. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I mean I it is I I root for the

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Speaker 1: birds though when the birds drive the squirrels away, But

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Speaker 1: then the squirrels are just going to get in there

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Speaker 1: and also have their their meal as well. Um. Another

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Speaker 1: thing that I always noticed about the squirrels is that, yeah,

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Speaker 1: for for many of us, we we barely notice them,

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Speaker 1: notice them anymore, and we're certainly not really we don't

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Speaker 1: get hung up over their cuteness though they do have

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Speaker 1: like large kind of cute eyes, yes, and they have

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Speaker 1: big fluffy tails, they're not a chipmunk. Chipmunk is I think,

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Speaker 1: objectively cute, whereas the squirrel is a little larger and

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Speaker 1: a little more grotesque and a little more like a

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Speaker 1: tree rat. There's a reason the rescue rangers are not squirrels,

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Speaker 1: and they just be less cute that way. But but

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Speaker 1: one thing I noticed is that when you have people

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Speaker 1: who are not accustomed to squirrel suddenly encountering them, tourists

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Speaker 1: from Afar, they'll they're just totally one over body scurring

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Speaker 1: creatures and their pointing at them, and then of course

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Speaker 1: they they may give in to the temptation to feed them.

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Speaker 1: Which means if you go to a place like the

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Speaker 1: Grand Canyon, where you know you have you have tours

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Speaker 1: from around the world coming to to see this natural

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Speaker 1: um landscape that's just truly inspiring, uh scene to behold,

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Speaker 1: people are also gonna encounter the squirrels. They're gonna end

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Speaker 1: up beating the squirrels, even though everyone tells them not to.

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Speaker 1: And then you have situations like the one my wife

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Speaker 1: and I encountered on a hike into the Grand canyon

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Speaker 1: where we set down for a second, we're gonna share

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Speaker 1: some some snack mix, and then the squirrel comes and

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Speaker 1: the squirrel starts climbing on us on our bodies to

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Speaker 1: get to the snack mix because it's become so accustomed

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Speaker 1: to eating food given to it by humans. Uh. It

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Speaker 1: was just absolutely terrifying, especially when you watch like the

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Speaker 1: fleet jump off of its nose. It's only a matter

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Speaker 1: of time until they can pull a switchblade on you. Exactly.

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Speaker 1: They're like they are. They are tenacious, and you should

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Speaker 1: and you feed them at your peril, especially if they're there.

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Speaker 1: There are lots of drop offs that you could plummet from.

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Speaker 1: And that's not even getting into disease issues. I apologize

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Speaker 1: it was ranting a little bit. I no, no, no,

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Speaker 1: please rant on. I've been ranting about them a bit

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Speaker 1: as my family watches the bird feeder as well, to

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Speaker 1: the point that my my son told me recently. He's

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Speaker 1: he's six years old, and he he said, actually, Dad, uh,

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Speaker 1: the squirrel is the king of the rats, which um, well,

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Speaker 1: I disagree with. I think the rats are truly the

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Speaker 1: king of the rats. They've earned that that reputation, and

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Speaker 1: they've earned that crown. Yet at the same time, yes,

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Speaker 1: squirrels are incredibly good rats in many respects. Well, there

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Speaker 1: are many respects throughout, especially mythology, but in human history,

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Speaker 1: where there is some correlation between level of authority and

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Speaker 1: physical altitude. And so if the squirrels are in the

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Speaker 1: trees above the rats, that would seem to signal that

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Speaker 1: they are the lords of the rat world, and the

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Speaker 1: rats on the ground below must do their bidding. That's right,

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Speaker 1: they have the height advantage. The squirrels are the wizards

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Speaker 1: up in their ivory towers, and the rats are the peasants,

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Speaker 1: the you know, thank you lord kind of guys who

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Speaker 1: go out and do what they're told. But yet there

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Speaker 1: is an honesty in the rat. We look at the rat,

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Speaker 1: and sometimes we judge the rat too harshly, it's true,

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Speaker 1: but when you look at a rat and you know

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Speaker 1: what the rat does. The squirrel, however, as we will

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Speaker 1: explore in these episodes, the squirrel is not what it seems.

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Speaker 1: The squirrel has managed to to pull one over on us.

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Speaker 1: So by now you may be going, Okay, what is

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Speaker 1: the secret squirrel knowledge? I've been I want the squirrel nosis.

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Speaker 1: Let me into this religion. So I guess we should

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Speaker 1: pave the way to divulge that knowledge. So let's enter

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Speaker 1: the kingdom of the skugs. So what are what is

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Speaker 1: a good skug? What? What is a skug? At its

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Speaker 1: most basic nature? Squirrels are a family of rodents. Specifically,

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Speaker 1: they comprise the taxonomic family Scura day and that includes

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Speaker 1: ground squirrels, tree squirrels, marmots, chipmunks, flying squirrels, and a

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Speaker 1: few other varieties. This also includes the so called oriental

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Speaker 1: giant squirrels, the black giant squirrel, the Indian giant squirrel,

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Speaker 1: the grizzled giant squirrel that's real grizzled, and the likely

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Speaker 1: extinct cream colored giant squirrel. Many additional varieties roamed in

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Speaker 1: prehistoric times. Uh and plus this family also includes groundhogs

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Speaker 1: and prairie dogs. But when most people refer to squirrels,

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Speaker 1: they're probably gonna be talking about common varieties, most often

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Speaker 1: of the tree squirrel and the ground squirrel. And so

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Speaker 1: these are the varieties we're gonna be talking about most

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Speaker 1: in this episode. And so squirrels are found all over

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Speaker 1: the world. Their native to every continent except Antarctica in Australia,

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Speaker 1: but of course, humans tend to take their rodents with

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Speaker 1: them where they go. So humans introduced squirrels to Australia,

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Speaker 1: and now they're everywhere on Earth except Antarctica. So I

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Speaker 1: think maybe we've been burying the lead. We should not

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Speaker 1: bury the lead. Part one of this two part exploration.

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Speaker 1: One of the main things you're gonna learn is that

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Speaker 1: you have probably been too trusting of squirrels if you

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Speaker 1: were like I was. I used to look out at

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Speaker 1: the squirrels of my yard and think about them like

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Speaker 1: Benjamin Franklin's Poor Mungo. This this victim, this poor little

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Speaker 1: victim creature that could be eaten by a dog, and

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Speaker 1: was a harmless, sweet little herbivore gathering nuts and hiding

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Speaker 1: them and just going about a peaceful life without ever

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Speaker 1: bothering anybody else. But the fact that blew my mind

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Speaker 1: is that squirrels are not, in fact strictly herbivores. Some

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Speaker 1: not very strictly at all. That's right, and uh and

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Speaker 1: I and I have to say, right before we we

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Speaker 1: actually researched this episode, I had this revelate revelation as

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Speaker 1: well through the bird feeders that we put out, because

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Speaker 1: one of the things we put out in addition to

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Speaker 1: you know, a few different types of bird seed aimed

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Speaker 1: as particular birds, we also put out meal worms, and

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Speaker 1: these dried, dried out worms like you would feed chickens,

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Speaker 1: and birds generally love them as well. But then we

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Speaker 1: started noticing that the squirrels would just eat the ever

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Speaker 1: loving hell out of those meal worms. We feel up

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Speaker 1: this little cup, and you know, squirrel would come and

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Speaker 1: you know, surreptitiously eat one and you know, grab one,

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Speaker 1: get to a place where it could be on the

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Speaker 1: lookout for hawks or whatnot, and then go down and

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Speaker 1: get another one, and then eventually give up on any

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Speaker 1: pretense of looking out for hawks and just just go

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Speaker 1: face down into a this cup of meal worms and

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Speaker 1: just eat absolutely all of them. And we were a

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Speaker 1: little stounded because we were, like, I had we had

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Speaker 1: no idea that that that squirrels eat me, but clearly

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Speaker 1: these squirrels really love meal worms. Well, you know, I

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Speaker 1: might not have predicted that, but at least meal worms.

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Speaker 1: I look at that, Okay, I'm like, it's a worm.

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Speaker 1: I guess maybe a lot of things might eat a worm,

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Speaker 1: right right, I I don't know, it's it's like that's

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Speaker 1: like the cracked corn of the animal kingdom. Right, Yeah,

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Speaker 1: it's there, you eat it. It makes sense, all right.

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Speaker 1: So maybe they're not strictly herbivores, you know, they're they're

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Speaker 1: they're omnivores that will that will eat a worm here

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Speaker 1: and there. But subsequent reading has has revealed that that

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Speaker 1: it goes far beyond meal worms. Uh, they'll eat insects, reptiles, birds,

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Speaker 1: and mammalian flesh if they get a chance. Gray squirrels

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Speaker 1: and eastern chipmunks are noted nest raiders. Gray squirrels will

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Speaker 1: even eat each other. It seems. Squirrels are also capable

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Speaker 1: of killing adult birds. Uh, even the cute chipmunk. Again,

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Speaker 1: the objectively cute chipmunk is a natural born killer, as

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Speaker 1: studies have found meat and upwards of chipmunk survey meat

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Speaker 1: in them, not just in their bodies like they are.

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Speaker 1: Now that sounds so crazy. That makes me think, wait

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Speaker 1: a minute, are we just dealing with like, uh like

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Speaker 1: urban legend kind of observations here, Like I've read stories

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Speaker 1: that I don't believe about squirrel attacks, like the idea

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Speaker 1: that squirrels will will take down deer and kill them.

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Speaker 1: That's right, according to a two thousand fourteen Popular Science article,

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Speaker 1: the tufted ground squirrel of Borneo is said to wait

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Speaker 1: on a low branch for passing deer and then jump

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Speaker 1: out onto them and bite the jugular vein. And once

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Speaker 1: the deer is bled to death from this bite, the

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Speaker 1: s world disembowels the deer and eats the contents of

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Speaker 1: the stomach as well as the heart and the liver.

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Speaker 1: And I do want to just drive home. This is

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Speaker 1: not This is far from any kind of a verified observation.

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Speaker 1: This is very much seems to be in the realm

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Speaker 1: of love of urban legends. This account was told by

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Speaker 1: local hunters who find the remains of the squirrel slaughtered

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Speaker 1: deer and then supposed squirrels supposed alleged squirrel slaughtered deer.

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Speaker 1: And then they also attest to the hearts and livers

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Speaker 1: having been eaten from domestic chickens. Again, uh, fingers pointed

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Speaker 1: at the squirrels. This almost reminds me of like the

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Speaker 1: Coppa legend, right reaching up through your anus to pull

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Speaker 1: your liver out. Yeah, there there seems to be a

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Speaker 1: lot of making sense. Are trying to make sense of

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Speaker 1: stranger remains, but by making several leaps uh in uh

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Speaker 1: in your logic here, as opposed to saying, well, it

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Speaker 1: was probably some sort of scavenger that came and did that. No,

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Speaker 1: it was probably a ferocious and strategically ishous squirrel. Now,

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Speaker 1: on the other hand, supposedly these squirrels could I mean,

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Speaker 1: if you happen to put your finger in their mouths, say,

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Speaker 1: they could do some damage. Yeah. In fact, the author

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Speaker 1: of that article, Douglas Main, points out that those those

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Speaker 1: squirrels do pack quite a fierce bite, and that the

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Speaker 1: giant squirrel ratufa a finnis is known to stalk and

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Speaker 1: prey on birds. Okay, but the idea of a squirrel

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Speaker 1: attacking and taking down an adult dear, I don't know.

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Speaker 1: I highly skeptical. I don't buy it. It sounds like

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Speaker 1: one of those kind of hunter legends. Yeah, it reminds

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Speaker 1: me a lot of of cattle mutilation stories. You know,

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Speaker 1: someone finds again, someone looks at the remains of an animal.

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Speaker 1: There's something kind of weird look going on, and so

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Speaker 1: you jump to uh, totally implausible explanations, such as an

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Speaker 1: alien being performed an autopsy in the middle of a

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Speaker 1: cow field, or squirrels or hunting impacts. But how much

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Speaker 1: could you really learn in the middle of a cow field.

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Speaker 1: I don't know. It's it's like guided research. I would

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Speaker 1: think they would want to remove to some kind of

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Speaker 1: sterile environment where they could control all of the autopsy element.

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Speaker 1: I don't know. But but but I don't want to

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Speaker 1: lose the track of the The important revelation here, Uh,

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Speaker 1: that will get back to, and that is that squirrels

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Speaker 1: do seem to hunt some of the time. Well, we

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Speaker 1: will definitely look at more evidence of that in a minute,

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Speaker 1: but before we do that, we should look at one

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Speaker 1: other apparent I don't know, rumor legend, the kind of thing. Uh,

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Speaker 1: this idea that sometimes squirrels will attack and take down dogs. Yes,

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Speaker 1: I was reading a two thousand five BBC article that

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Speaker 1: reported that that a local Russian media report had indicated

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Speaker 1: that a pack of squirrels bit a stray dog to

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Speaker 1: death in the city of Lazo. So again, local Russian media.

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Speaker 1: But here's here's a gym from the story quote. A

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Speaker 1: pine code shortage may have led the squirrels to seek

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Speaker 1: other food sources, although scientists are skeptical. So in in fact,

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Speaker 1: a scientist in the region one Michael to Yanov said

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Speaker 1: that while attacking a bird's nest for protein was reasonable behavior,

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Speaker 1: for to expect of a squirrel chewing a dog to

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Speaker 1: death was quote absurd. Uh. In a quote that reads

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Speaker 1: like something from a horror movie poster, he said, quote,

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Speaker 1: if it really happened, things must be pretty bad in

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Speaker 1: our forest. I can hear that in the Don la

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Speaker 1: Fontaine voice. Yes, things must be pretty bad in our forest. Wait,

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Speaker 1: that's not Don la Fontaine. Who's that one? I don't know.

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Speaker 1: I don't really know them by name. I'm sorry, I'm

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Speaker 1: sorry to say. In a world where squirrels chew dogs

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Speaker 1: to death, Russian media is the only one brave enough

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Speaker 1: to report. But the thing about these stories is is that, yes,

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Speaker 1: I'm I'm not convinced that squirrels are killing dear. I'm

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Speaker 1: not convinced that they are taking down stray dogs. I

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Speaker 1: I also am skeptical of that. I'd wonder though, I mean,

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Speaker 1: maybe if the dog is, like, I don't know, sick

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Speaker 1: and all ready almost dead, that might be a different

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Speaker 1: kind of thing. I find it hard to believe that

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Speaker 1: like a pack of squirrels would actually attack a dog

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Speaker 1: that could move exactly. Yeah, but if you but the

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Speaker 1: thing is you start looking around at different papers, particularly

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Speaker 1: Journal of Mammalogy papers, mostly from the twentieth century, you'll

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Speaker 1: find a number of different papers that look at carnivorous

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Speaker 1: ground squirrels and carnivorous activity among squirrels uh with titles

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Speaker 1: such as Carnivorous behavior in the Mexican ground squirrel or

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Speaker 1: Carnivorous ground squirrels on St. Lawrence Island, Alaska, or food

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Speaker 1: habits of the Antelope ground squirrel in Southern Nevada. Also

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Speaker 1: the Franklin ground squirrel and its relationship to nesting ducks.

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Speaker 1: The relationship is not a friendly one. It's complicated. That

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Speaker 1: paper Carnivorous ground Squirrels on St. Lawrence Island, Alaska has

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Speaker 1: some choice descriptions, and it here commentating on some some

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Speaker 1: previous research by other investigators. During his excavations at the

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Speaker 1: old village site of Kakuliak, located a few miles at

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Speaker 1: east to the present village of Savunga, he observed some

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Speaker 1: adult ground squirrels eating the old, partially dried and partially

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Speaker 1: frozen lumps of whale and walrus meat, which we excavated

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Speaker 1: at an approximate depth of eight feet under the surface.

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Speaker 1: What eating whale and walrus meat. So they didn't bring

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Speaker 1: down these whales, they didn't bring down these walruses, but

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Speaker 1: they were more than happy to feast on their like

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Speaker 1: rubbery dried flesh. Also from that paper, there was a

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Speaker 1: part where they were mentioning the work of this previous

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Speaker 1: researcher who reported having seen a ground squirrel quote eat

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Speaker 1: a freshly killed mouse which had been shot by the

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Speaker 1: teacher's son from Savunga. So you go shooting mice in Alaska.

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Speaker 1: Who knows what's going to happen. All right, let's go

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Speaker 1: ahead and take a break here, and when we come back,

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Speaker 1: we're going to get into my favorite carnivorous squirrel paper

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Speaker 1: that I ran across in our research. Thank thank you,

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Speaker 1: thank we're back. So before we get into squirrels as predators,

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Speaker 1: I just wanted to mention another paper I looked at

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Speaker 1: about squirrels eating meat, and this was from the Journal

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Speaker 1: of Parasitology from nineteen fifty six by Raws and other

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Speaker 1: authors called the occurrence of larvae of trick and Ella

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Speaker 1: spiralis in Alaska mammals. So this is a paper looking

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Speaker 1: at the prevalence of this parasite of trick and Ella

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Speaker 1: spiralis in the mammals of Alaska, and trick and Ella

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Speaker 1: spiralis is the nematode worm responsible for trickin nosis, which

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Speaker 1: you may have heard is the you know, the reason

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Speaker 1: that you should not eat pork. Tartar, though not to

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Speaker 1: demonize a lot of pork is much safer these days

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Speaker 1: than it used to be. So some of those fears

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Speaker 1: are based on older, older ways of doing things. But

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Speaker 1: you're not getting trickin noses eating peanuts. That's true even

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Speaker 1: if you're a squirrel. In fact, so when the researchers

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Speaker 1: found one ground squirrel and four red squirrels infected with

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Speaker 1: trick and Ella, which you can only get from eating

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Speaker 1: infected meat, m what's going on here? It's clear what's

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Speaker 1: going on. So the ground squirrel, that with the ground squirrel,

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Speaker 1: they say, although primarily herbivorous S tell Us undulatus, and

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Speaker 1: that's the ground squirrel they were looking at, also consumes

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Speaker 1: mammalian flesh when available. We have observed this behavior in

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Speaker 1: northeastern Alaska and in the Talqitna Mountains, where remains of

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Speaker 1: voles were found in stomachs and cheek pouches of these squirrels.

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Speaker 1: Such animals feeding upon carcasses of dogs or Arctic foxes

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Speaker 1: would of course be exposed to infection because the dogs

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Speaker 1: and the foxes can get the can get the worm,

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Speaker 1: their meat gets infected, and then the squirrels go and

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Speaker 1: eat the dead dogs and foxes. That's pretty messed up.

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Speaker 1: The other one, though, is the red squirrel. How do

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Speaker 1: the red squirrels get them quote we have observed red

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Speaker 1: squirrels feeding upon the flesh of the Snowshoe, hair, carrion,

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Speaker 1: and mammalian bones are often found among the food items

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Speaker 1: stored by these animals for winter use. They no doubt

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Speaker 1: eat any warm blooded animal they are able to capture

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Speaker 1: and kill. I don't know why they keep the bones though.

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Speaker 1: Why do they keep the bones? Are they gonna make soup?

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Speaker 1: What's gonna happen? They're gonna eat those bones, Joe, and

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Speaker 1: I know this because because because it's mentioned in in

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Speaker 1: this excellent paper that I came across from. It was

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Speaker 1: in an addition of the Great Basin Naturalist titled Squirrels

422
00:23:23,400 --> 00:23:28,000
Speaker 1: as Predators by J. R. Callahan. So this is predators now.

423
00:23:28,000 --> 00:23:32,320
Speaker 1: But previously we've been talking definitely about eating carrion. Right,

424
00:23:32,359 --> 00:23:35,399
Speaker 1: they'll find a dead animal, they'll find dead insects, whatever,

425
00:23:35,440 --> 00:23:38,000
Speaker 1: they'll definitely eat that. But he's certainly to eat to say,

426
00:23:38,040 --> 00:23:40,359
Speaker 1: a worm or a snail for a creature the size

427
00:23:40,359 --> 00:23:43,360
Speaker 1: of a squirrel was hardly predation. I mean, if I

428
00:23:43,359 --> 00:23:46,520
Speaker 1: if I ate a snail, I wouldn't call myself a predator, right,

429
00:23:46,680 --> 00:23:49,639
Speaker 1: but this is but here you're talking about seeking live prey,

430
00:23:49,960 --> 00:23:54,280
Speaker 1: killing it, and eating it. That's right. So I'm gonna

431
00:23:54,280 --> 00:23:56,159
Speaker 1: go through some of the major points of this paper,

432
00:23:56,359 --> 00:23:58,480
Speaker 1: but it's out there. It's it's obtainable if anyone else

433
00:23:58,520 --> 00:24:00,600
Speaker 1: wants to to read it in full. Uh. So, he

434
00:24:00,680 --> 00:24:04,960
Speaker 1: pointed out that squirrels are opportunistic predators that are not

435
00:24:05,280 --> 00:24:09,320
Speaker 1: morphologically specialized for the role. You can see that they

436
00:24:09,320 --> 00:24:11,440
Speaker 1: don't have like wolf teeth. Yeah, and I think that's

437
00:24:11,440 --> 00:24:13,359
Speaker 1: one of the reasons it's so shocking. Yeah, they don't

438
00:24:13,400 --> 00:24:16,720
Speaker 1: look like predators. They don't. They don't look like little

439
00:24:16,760 --> 00:24:20,160
Speaker 1: tree dogs or or some sort of a tree cat,

440
00:24:20,320 --> 00:24:23,760
Speaker 1: you know. Uh, it is, so it surprises us to

441
00:24:24,000 --> 00:24:27,200
Speaker 1: think of them chewing on meat. Well, it's interesting how

442
00:24:27,280 --> 00:24:32,439
Speaker 1: much this emphasizes sometimes the flexibility of the animal existence

443
00:24:32,480 --> 00:24:35,040
Speaker 1: as opposed to other types of existence, where an animal

444
00:24:35,320 --> 00:24:38,080
Speaker 1: might not be evolved to specialize as a predator, but

445
00:24:38,480 --> 00:24:43,520
Speaker 1: given pressures on its survival and existence, it can adapt. So.

446
00:24:43,600 --> 00:24:45,840
Speaker 1: At the time of this publication, he says that not

447
00:24:45,880 --> 00:24:49,720
Speaker 1: everyone accepted the idea frequent squirrel predation, though it was

448
00:24:49,760 --> 00:24:54,000
Speaker 1: already universally accepted that they do eat meat. But they were,

449
00:24:54,119 --> 00:24:57,760
Speaker 1: they were just not observed praying all that much. You know,

450
00:24:57,920 --> 00:25:00,520
Speaker 1: a lot of these reports come down to trying to

451
00:25:00,520 --> 00:25:03,400
Speaker 1: figure out, you know, were they just scavenging meat, were

452
00:25:03,400 --> 00:25:05,800
Speaker 1: they just eating something that was already dead, or did

453
00:25:05,880 --> 00:25:08,080
Speaker 1: they or was it an opportunistic attack, or they in

454
00:25:08,240 --> 00:25:10,720
Speaker 1: fact stalking something? How did you get those voles in

455
00:25:10,720 --> 00:25:14,200
Speaker 1: your cheek pouches? Exactly? So, he he lists the different

456
00:25:14,240 --> 00:25:17,800
Speaker 1: prey associated with a whole list of squirrel species, and

457
00:25:17,840 --> 00:25:27,000
Speaker 1: the prey include the following, uh if but not limited to, birds, frogs, rats, lizards, rabbits, gophers, moles, snakes,

458
00:25:27,240 --> 00:25:33,800
Speaker 1: fish bowls, ducks, wild turkeys bringing it all back home. Yeah, turtles, crabs,

459
00:25:33,880 --> 00:25:40,720
Speaker 1: and salaman This is too good. Squirrels getting wild turkeys, rabbits, salamanders,

460
00:25:40,760 --> 00:25:42,879
Speaker 1: this is a whole buffet. Yeah, And He said that

461
00:25:42,920 --> 00:25:45,560
Speaker 1: it wasn't entirely sure if tree squirrels were attacking live

462
00:25:45,640 --> 00:25:48,600
Speaker 1: prey for meat per se, or for calcium and or

463
00:25:48,640 --> 00:25:52,120
Speaker 1: phosphorus from the bones, but there were there There were

464
00:25:52,160 --> 00:25:56,040
Speaker 1: also reports of them eating bone and antler or ignoring

465
00:25:56,160 --> 00:25:59,040
Speaker 1: meat in favor of joints. Joints, so like they're trying

466
00:25:59,080 --> 00:26:02,960
Speaker 1: to get like cardial edge and ligaments and stuff. Interesting. Yeah,

467
00:26:02,960 --> 00:26:05,320
Speaker 1: he's he points out to getting back to the morphology

468
00:26:05,520 --> 00:26:08,480
Speaker 1: versus a behavior, says that one of the behaviors entree

469
00:26:08,520 --> 00:26:12,680
Speaker 1: squirrel seems to be insinuation predation, which is largely utilized

470
00:26:12,680 --> 00:26:16,439
Speaker 1: by invertebrates. Yeah, and so insinuation predation would refer to

471
00:26:16,480 --> 00:26:19,720
Speaker 1: a predator lulling a prey animal into a false sense

472
00:26:19,760 --> 00:26:23,840
Speaker 1: of security by appearing harmless and getting itself into an

473
00:26:23,840 --> 00:26:27,440
Speaker 1: attack position or in close proximity without indicating that it's

474
00:26:27,440 --> 00:26:30,280
Speaker 1: any kind of threat. The squirrels are not what they say.

475
00:26:30,480 --> 00:26:34,440
Speaker 1: It's true. There they are little spies in filtrating your

476
00:26:34,880 --> 00:26:38,359
Speaker 1: safe zones just to get into your nest and steal

477
00:26:38,400 --> 00:26:40,920
Speaker 1: your your wild turkey chicks or something. Now we'll get

478
00:26:40,920 --> 00:26:43,440
Speaker 1: to the specifics of this in a second, but we're

479
00:26:43,480 --> 00:26:47,520
Speaker 1: just talking about them eating bone and antler or ligaments.

480
00:26:47,520 --> 00:26:50,840
Speaker 1: Other times, they have been observed to focus on quote, brains,

481
00:26:51,080 --> 00:26:56,680
Speaker 1: viscera and the flesh of the head. What squirrels eating brains? Yes,

482
00:26:57,280 --> 00:27:01,440
Speaker 1: this can't be real. It is real. It is very real. Brains.

483
00:27:02,320 --> 00:27:05,760
Speaker 1: So we seem to see far more squirrel meat eating

484
00:27:05,800 --> 00:27:09,199
Speaker 1: and predation in colder climates. And it's and it's far

485
00:27:09,280 --> 00:27:13,439
Speaker 1: more rare among tropical species. And uh. Callahan lists some

486
00:27:13,520 --> 00:27:17,240
Speaker 1: possible reasons for this. So calcium and other nutrients can

487
00:27:17,280 --> 00:27:21,440
Speaker 1: be obtained from certain tropical tree barks. And then uh,

488
00:27:21,640 --> 00:27:24,600
Speaker 1: and in these cases too, we see these same squirrels

489
00:27:24,600 --> 00:27:27,359
Speaker 1: turning to predation when their cage, when they no longer

490
00:27:27,400 --> 00:27:30,600
Speaker 1: have access to those tree barks. Oh, I see carnivores

491
00:27:30,640 --> 00:27:35,240
Speaker 1: and the tropics may also suffer more from stomach nematodes

492
00:27:35,520 --> 00:27:39,920
Speaker 1: while colder climates demand more fat. And then there's also this,

493
00:27:39,920 --> 00:27:44,720
Speaker 1: this sort of opportunistic predation might be a learned behavior

494
00:27:45,000 --> 00:27:48,640
Speaker 1: that spreads through local populations of squirrels. Oh no, that's

495
00:27:48,720 --> 00:27:52,720
Speaker 1: interesting now. For example, in our recent episodes about urban evolution,

496
00:27:53,280 --> 00:27:58,520
Speaker 1: we talked about how apparently learned behaviors can spread throughout

497
00:27:58,600 --> 00:28:02,160
Speaker 1: populations of bird words that live in an urban environment. Say,

498
00:28:02,240 --> 00:28:05,720
Speaker 1: like the example of um, the birds that learned how

499
00:28:05,800 --> 00:28:08,919
Speaker 1: to open milk bottle tops that were being left on

500
00:28:09,080 --> 00:28:13,359
Speaker 1: people's doorsteps, right, Um, and then the spread throughout the populations.

501
00:28:13,400 --> 00:28:15,920
Speaker 1: And so you have to assume if birds can learn

502
00:28:16,000 --> 00:28:20,359
Speaker 1: in that kind of way, squirrels probably can too, except

503
00:28:20,359 --> 00:28:22,800
Speaker 1: in this case instead of opening milk bottle tops would

504
00:28:22,840 --> 00:28:26,000
Speaker 1: be what opening a vole skull to get the brains. Indeed,

505
00:28:26,720 --> 00:28:29,560
Speaker 1: now there are key reasons though to eat live meat,

506
00:28:29,600 --> 00:28:33,520
Speaker 1: because ultimately that's what we're talking about, praying to obtain

507
00:28:33,640 --> 00:28:37,080
Speaker 1: live meat rather than depending on just scavenged and uh,

508
00:28:37,119 --> 00:28:39,680
Speaker 1: you know, meat in the flesh of the dead. So,

509
00:28:39,840 --> 00:28:43,080
Speaker 1: for one thing, reproductive females may need the protein and

510
00:28:43,240 --> 00:28:46,280
Speaker 1: or certain minerals more than the rest, and there are

511
00:28:46,320 --> 00:28:51,000
Speaker 1: reports of lactating female specifically engaging in this sort of

512
00:28:51,040 --> 00:28:54,000
Speaker 1: predation behavior. They might not be able to get the

513
00:28:54,040 --> 00:28:59,720
Speaker 1: necessary calcium, phosphorus, sodium, and nitrogen from seeds alone. Another hypothesis,

514
00:28:59,720 --> 00:29:03,120
Speaker 1: which is weirdly reflected in that story of the Russian

515
00:29:03,240 --> 00:29:06,480
Speaker 1: dog eating squirrels, is that they may turn to meet

516
00:29:06,680 --> 00:29:09,640
Speaker 1: to make up for seasonal depletion, such as during summer

517
00:29:09,920 --> 00:29:13,080
Speaker 1: or indeed some other reason for a lack of seeds. Okay,

518
00:29:13,080 --> 00:29:15,000
Speaker 1: well that would sort of fit the story, but we're

519
00:29:15,000 --> 00:29:17,280
Speaker 1: not saying that makes it likely that they actually did

520
00:29:17,320 --> 00:29:19,040
Speaker 1: take down an adult. I don't know. Yeah, but that

521
00:29:19,120 --> 00:29:23,200
Speaker 1: is a that's a grain of truth. Um. But going

522
00:29:23,240 --> 00:29:26,360
Speaker 1: back to that Russian um naturalist, he said, yeah, things

523
00:29:26,360 --> 00:29:28,400
Speaker 1: would have to be pretty bad in the forest for

524
00:29:28,440 --> 00:29:33,440
Speaker 1: this to happen in a world. So, so we've been

525
00:29:33,480 --> 00:29:36,400
Speaker 1: talking about how squirrels definitely will eat things that are

526
00:29:36,440 --> 00:29:41,000
Speaker 1: dead anyway, sometimes they'll eat carrion. Why why go to predation?

527
00:29:41,160 --> 00:29:44,120
Speaker 1: Why must you go beyond just eating the dead that

528
00:29:44,200 --> 00:29:46,680
Speaker 1: you find. Why do you have to do all these

529
00:29:46,800 --> 00:29:49,320
Speaker 1: risks and spend all this energy trying to kill something

530
00:29:49,360 --> 00:29:51,920
Speaker 1: that's alive. That It's a great question one I had

531
00:29:51,920 --> 00:29:55,240
Speaker 1: in One and one Callahan addressed because he points out that, yes,

532
00:29:55,320 --> 00:29:59,440
Speaker 1: carrion certainly packs the nutrients. Uh, and it's it's also

533
00:29:59,560 --> 00:30:02,360
Speaker 1: not equable of fight or flight. You don't have to

534
00:30:02,360 --> 00:30:06,320
Speaker 1: worry about it fighting back but cheaper date, right, But

535
00:30:06,400 --> 00:30:10,719
Speaker 1: it also suffers from nutrient content depletion. On top of that,

536
00:30:11,040 --> 00:30:15,280
Speaker 1: other better predators and seasoned scavengers may beat you to

537
00:30:15,360 --> 00:30:18,400
Speaker 1: the best parts of the you know, say that the

538
00:30:18,720 --> 00:30:23,080
Speaker 1: dead uh, you know rat plus those specialized scavengers, Well

539
00:30:23,120 --> 00:30:26,960
Speaker 1: they're probably better at dealing with the added bacteria and uh.

540
00:30:27,000 --> 00:30:29,480
Speaker 1: And you know what else sucks about carry on? It

541
00:30:29,600 --> 00:30:33,120
Speaker 1: might not be there when you need it. So in

542
00:30:33,160 --> 00:30:36,360
Speaker 1: our you know, sort of our you know, our urban

543
00:30:36,400 --> 00:30:40,840
Speaker 1: forest environments, uh, you know, or even our rural environments, Uh,

544
00:30:41,000 --> 00:30:44,960
Speaker 1: squirrels can sometimes be seen feasting on roadkill, which Callahan

545
00:30:45,040 --> 00:30:48,560
Speaker 1: points out is an artificial situation. It is very much

546
00:30:48,600 --> 00:30:51,800
Speaker 1: a product of human technology. Do we have these dangerous

547
00:30:51,920 --> 00:30:56,240
Speaker 1: roads uh for animals? Animals get squished on them, and

548
00:30:56,280 --> 00:30:59,120
Speaker 1: then squirrels are able to find meat there. And of

549
00:30:59,160 --> 00:31:00,960
Speaker 1: course a lot of the meat is squirrel meat because

550
00:31:00,960 --> 00:31:02,800
Speaker 1: they run out in front of our vehicles all the time.

551
00:31:03,000 --> 00:31:06,920
Speaker 1: So do they do they cannibalize carrying squirrel carryon? Yes?

552
00:31:07,360 --> 00:31:09,640
Speaker 1: But okay, I'm just thinking about the body of a squirrel.

553
00:31:09,680 --> 00:31:11,840
Speaker 1: I mean, as we were talking about earlier, as a

554
00:31:11,880 --> 00:31:15,880
Speaker 1: squirrel is not has not been shaped by evolution as

555
00:31:15,920 --> 00:31:19,360
Speaker 1: an effective predator, right that its body just is not

556
00:31:19,680 --> 00:31:23,960
Speaker 1: a powerful killing machine. So how how does it get

557
00:31:24,000 --> 00:31:26,760
Speaker 1: this done? Well, you know, some of these these prey

558
00:31:26,800 --> 00:31:30,160
Speaker 1: animals that it goes after essentially quasi prey, like frogs,

559
00:31:30,240 --> 00:31:32,280
Speaker 1: for example, those are and those are easy to explain,

560
00:31:32,360 --> 00:31:34,800
Speaker 1: like there's a frog, it's not getting away from this

561
00:31:34,880 --> 00:31:37,720
Speaker 1: larger squirrel. The squirrel can eat it. But then they're

562
00:31:37,720 --> 00:31:39,200
Speaker 1: the animals that are going to put up a fight

563
00:31:39,560 --> 00:31:41,800
Speaker 1: or run from the squirrel potentially, and that's where we

564
00:31:41,800 --> 00:31:45,240
Speaker 1: see the birds, the rodents, and the rabbits particular, like

565
00:31:45,280 --> 00:31:47,719
Speaker 1: these are all going to be more challenging prey. So

566
00:31:47,760 --> 00:31:50,880
Speaker 1: many researchers believe that true predation by squirrels must be

567
00:31:50,960 --> 00:31:53,680
Speaker 1: just a rare occurrence, only done in the case of emergency,

568
00:31:54,240 --> 00:31:57,760
Speaker 1: but growing evidence, Scallahan said, supported the idea that predation

569
00:31:57,880 --> 00:32:00,400
Speaker 1: is a normal part of their behavior. So they are

570
00:32:00,400 --> 00:32:05,120
Speaker 1: still opportunistic, not fundamental predators. Okay, so he's going, so

571
00:32:05,560 --> 00:32:07,680
Speaker 1: you've got the idea that it's very rare, like it

572
00:32:07,720 --> 00:32:11,160
Speaker 1: only happens on these bizarre, freak occasions, and then you've

573
00:32:11,160 --> 00:32:14,480
Speaker 1: got the idea that they're evolved as fundamental predators and

574
00:32:14,520 --> 00:32:17,000
Speaker 1: that's just part of their normal life. And he's going

575
00:32:17,040 --> 00:32:20,560
Speaker 1: somewhere in between, right, Yeah, he said, like, yeah, I

576
00:32:20,560 --> 00:32:22,600
Speaker 1: mean he's saying that for instance, you know, rating a

577
00:32:22,720 --> 00:32:24,520
Speaker 1: nest when you can get a chance. That's one thing.

578
00:32:24,960 --> 00:32:27,440
Speaker 1: If you kill a competitor and then you're like, well

579
00:32:27,440 --> 00:32:29,040
Speaker 1: I might as well eat part of them, get a

580
00:32:29,040 --> 00:32:32,040
Speaker 1: little energy boost, that's that's another thing. But but here

581
00:32:32,080 --> 00:32:34,680
Speaker 1: we're talking about something far more sinister. And I do

582
00:32:34,720 --> 00:32:37,520
Speaker 1: have to warn everybody out there. If you want to

583
00:32:37,600 --> 00:32:42,160
Speaker 1: retain your previous a false sense of security around squirrels, uh,

584
00:32:42,160 --> 00:32:45,000
Speaker 1: and there's sort of cartoon innocence, then you should probably

585
00:32:45,040 --> 00:32:50,240
Speaker 1: stop listening right now because you cannot unhearu the hypothesis

586
00:32:50,320 --> 00:32:53,400
Speaker 1: that I am about to share with you, lad Onmi Robert,

587
00:32:53,640 --> 00:32:55,520
Speaker 1: all right, so he points Callahan points out that it's

588
00:32:55,520 --> 00:32:57,520
Speaker 1: a waste of energy to avoid a creature that doesn't

589
00:32:57,560 --> 00:33:00,840
Speaker 1: threaten you. It's not surprising to see birds behave defensively

590
00:33:00,880 --> 00:33:05,800
Speaker 1: towards squirrels. Their hunger is likely seasonal. They're known retinest rators.

591
00:33:05,800 --> 00:33:09,360
Speaker 1: But in other contexts, birds and other potential prey just

592
00:33:09,520 --> 00:33:12,719
Speaker 1: ignore squirrels. And we see this all the time, you know,

593
00:33:13,120 --> 00:33:16,360
Speaker 1: especially if you watch your bird feeder. But Callahan presents

594
00:33:16,360 --> 00:33:19,680
Speaker 1: an interesting view on this and on the stalking behavior

595
00:33:19,720 --> 00:33:24,640
Speaker 1: occasionally observed in tree squirrels. This is not uh, nest

596
00:33:24,720 --> 00:33:28,720
Speaker 1: robbing behavior, but is linked to infrequent attempts at larger

597
00:33:28,760 --> 00:33:33,800
Speaker 1: prey attempts, mind you, and often aborted attempts mere caricatures

598
00:33:33,840 --> 00:33:37,800
Speaker 1: of stalking the Callahan finds rather conspicuous. He argues that

599
00:33:37,880 --> 00:33:42,160
Speaker 1: it's possible that the effect of obvious, repeated stalking is

600
00:33:42,200 --> 00:33:46,600
Speaker 1: to habituate potential prey. In other words, it is conditioning

601
00:33:46,720 --> 00:33:51,040
Speaker 1: prey animals to disregard their attacks. So this would not

602
00:33:51,040 --> 00:33:53,760
Speaker 1: be something we're saying that the squirrels are doing consciously,

603
00:33:53,880 --> 00:33:58,880
Speaker 1: But they've somehow instinctually learned to like to to sort

604
00:33:58,920 --> 00:34:01,800
Speaker 1: of feign at acts all the time to get it

605
00:34:01,840 --> 00:34:04,760
Speaker 1: to our potential prey animals. Larger prey animals are like,

606
00:34:04,760 --> 00:34:07,040
Speaker 1: oh whatever, it's just squirrels being squirrels. Oh yeah, I

607
00:34:07,080 --> 00:34:09,399
Speaker 1: mean they're not. They're not doing in a conscious sense

608
00:34:09,480 --> 00:34:12,000
Speaker 1: the same way that we would do our humans would

609
00:34:12,000 --> 00:34:14,160
Speaker 1: stalk something, but they but they are doing it in

610
00:34:14,200 --> 00:34:20,000
Speaker 1: the via their evolved behavior anyway. Callahan writes, if most

611
00:34:20,000 --> 00:34:24,000
Speaker 1: squirrels acting like predators do not follow through, then prey

612
00:34:24,120 --> 00:34:28,000
Speaker 1: should learn not to respond. This behavior is analogous to

613
00:34:28,040 --> 00:34:31,200
Speaker 1: the hoarding of nuts, in that the squirrel is hoarding

614
00:34:31,320 --> 00:34:35,360
Speaker 1: prey confidence. Later, when normal food items are in short supply,

615
00:34:35,840 --> 00:34:40,000
Speaker 1: the squirrel can exploit this conditioning. In the longer term,

616
00:34:40,200 --> 00:34:44,400
Speaker 1: selection for such behavior potentially represents an entry point to

617
00:34:44,480 --> 00:34:49,080
Speaker 1: a new feeding niche, particularly in marginal habitats, where tree

618
00:34:49,120 --> 00:34:53,080
Speaker 1: squirrels may be more likely to resort to predation. In

619
00:34:53,120 --> 00:34:56,880
Speaker 1: other words, beware the squirrels. I am never going to

620
00:34:56,960 --> 00:34:59,440
Speaker 1: be able to see squirrels the same after this episode.

621
00:34:59,640 --> 00:35:01,759
Speaker 1: Now the other hand, we don't like to demonize any

622
00:35:01,800 --> 00:35:03,839
Speaker 1: type of animal here, and of course predation is part

623
00:35:03,840 --> 00:35:06,239
Speaker 1: of nature. We don't want to demonize predation. But this

624
00:35:06,360 --> 00:35:11,320
Speaker 1: is shocking. I was not prepared for this. Squirrels, squirrels

625
00:35:11,680 --> 00:35:15,160
Speaker 1: eating dead things, killing things and eating them that I

626
00:35:15,200 --> 00:35:19,440
Speaker 1: don't know. My mind was not ready. Yeah, I have

627
00:35:19,560 --> 00:35:21,600
Speaker 1: to to say much the same. Again, we do we

628
00:35:21,640 --> 00:35:24,600
Speaker 1: do say, we do warn everyone, do not mistreat squirrels,

629
00:35:24,760 --> 00:35:27,279
Speaker 1: do not do not hurt the squirrels. Let the squirrels be.

630
00:35:27,960 --> 00:35:30,320
Speaker 1: They will let you be. Squirrels are not going to

631
00:35:30,360 --> 00:35:35,399
Speaker 1: actually hunt you. Um, they're not going to attack your dogs. Yeah,

632
00:35:35,600 --> 00:35:37,480
Speaker 1: it's it's gonna be fine. Yeah, you're not really in

633
00:35:37,560 --> 00:35:39,680
Speaker 1: danger from the squirrels. But I do have to say.

634
00:35:40,000 --> 00:35:42,120
Speaker 1: It's made me rethink the meal worm thing, like I

635
00:35:42,160 --> 00:35:45,080
Speaker 1: feel I feel extra good about those squirrels eating the

636
00:35:45,120 --> 00:35:49,160
Speaker 1: meal worms because I'm thinking I'm probably saving some bird eggs.

637
00:35:49,400 --> 00:35:52,680
Speaker 1: Maybe I'm not. Maybe that's just just I'm just convincing

638
00:35:52,719 --> 00:35:55,040
Speaker 1: myself this because I hate the idea of squirrels eating

639
00:35:55,160 --> 00:35:58,239
Speaker 1: eating bird eggs. But if they need meat, then let

640
00:35:58,239 --> 00:36:00,000
Speaker 1: me give them meat in the form of meal work.

641
00:36:00,239 --> 00:36:02,200
Speaker 1: That's all I'm saying. Well, you could I don't want

642
00:36:02,200 --> 00:36:04,480
Speaker 1: to make you feel bad. You could also be artificially

643
00:36:04,480 --> 00:36:08,360
Speaker 1: inflating local squirrel populations such that if you ever stop

644
00:36:08,480 --> 00:36:10,720
Speaker 1: feeding them, there will be a massacre in the oaks.

645
00:36:10,920 --> 00:36:15,040
Speaker 1: That's right, the trees will rain blood from above. Well,

646
00:36:15,120 --> 00:36:17,600
Speaker 1: let's hope it doesn't come to that. Speaking of that, though,

647
00:36:17,680 --> 00:36:19,879
Speaker 1: has there ever been a squirrel horror movie? I've never

648
00:36:19,960 --> 00:36:21,959
Speaker 1: I've never heard of one. Well, you know, I looked

649
00:36:21,960 --> 00:36:25,240
Speaker 1: around on this question, and there is a two thousand

650
00:36:25,280 --> 00:36:28,839
Speaker 1: fourteen horror movie called Squirrels. But it sounds it looks

651
00:36:28,880 --> 00:36:30,680
Speaker 1: like it might be a little bit in the shark

652
00:36:30,760 --> 00:36:33,560
Speaker 1: Nado territory, where it's a little bit too self aware

653
00:36:33,880 --> 00:36:36,880
Speaker 1: to be my kind of horror film. But the The

654
00:36:36,920 --> 00:36:40,879
Speaker 1: better horror movie mascot for this episode would probably be uh,

655
00:36:41,239 --> 00:36:45,480
Speaker 1: tromy the radioactive squirrel from Class of Newcomb High to

656
00:36:46,160 --> 00:36:49,520
Speaker 1: Subhumanoid Meltdown. Uh he's also in the third film. You know,

657
00:36:49,560 --> 00:36:52,560
Speaker 1: I never made it to the Class of Newcomb High sequels.

658
00:36:53,239 --> 00:36:55,200
Speaker 1: How do they hold up? I have not seen the

659
00:36:55,200 --> 00:36:57,880
Speaker 1: sequels either, but I I had to look up a

660
00:36:57,920 --> 00:37:02,239
Speaker 1: clip of this, uh, this radio active giant squirrel rampaging

661
00:37:02,239 --> 00:37:05,959
Speaker 1: and knocking over cooling towers. It it is worth checking out.

662
00:37:06,200 --> 00:37:08,239
Speaker 1: But you'll definitely want to see Class of Newcomb High

663
00:37:08,280 --> 00:37:11,600
Speaker 1: one first, you know, for you know, it's compurity and

664
00:37:11,880 --> 00:37:15,120
Speaker 1: continuity of the saga. Alright, on that note, we're gonna

665
00:37:15,160 --> 00:37:17,200
Speaker 1: take one more break and then we'll be right back.

666
00:37:18,200 --> 00:37:23,760
Speaker 1: Thank alright, we're back. So we've been talking about opportunistic

667
00:37:24,360 --> 00:37:27,680
Speaker 1: carry and eating and predation in squirrels, but I wanted

668
00:37:27,680 --> 00:37:31,200
Speaker 1: to mention another less dramatical, less violent way, but still

669
00:37:31,280 --> 00:37:35,640
Speaker 1: kind of weird and shocking way that squirrels are opportunistic feeders.

670
00:37:36,280 --> 00:37:38,640
Speaker 1: So let's let's turn our eye to the red squirrel.

671
00:37:38,680 --> 00:37:41,440
Speaker 1: We mentioned red squirrels earlier. In some cases where red

672
00:37:41,440 --> 00:37:44,279
Speaker 1: squirrels might be eating some dead animals might be eating

673
00:37:44,320 --> 00:37:46,879
Speaker 1: dead dogs or dead foxes or something like that. But

674
00:37:47,600 --> 00:37:52,080
Speaker 1: the red squirrels Tammy Ascurus hudsonicus, like other squirrels, they

675
00:37:52,080 --> 00:37:55,680
Speaker 1: often tried to survive through winter by building up stores

676
00:37:55,719 --> 00:37:58,880
Speaker 1: of food items that are called mast, and mast is

677
00:37:58,920 --> 00:38:01,640
Speaker 1: just all the edible fruits of the trees of the forest.

678
00:38:01,760 --> 00:38:05,400
Speaker 1: It's acorns, pine cones, nuts, and so forth. And in

679
00:38:05,440 --> 00:38:08,719
Speaker 1: the summer and fall, squirrels collect mast and store it

680
00:38:08,760 --> 00:38:12,600
Speaker 1: in these caches to eat throughout the winter. And trying

681
00:38:12,640 --> 00:38:15,120
Speaker 1: to survive by storing food for the winter is sometimes

682
00:38:15,120 --> 00:38:18,720
Speaker 1: a dangerous strategy. You can have an unexpectedly warm winter

683
00:38:18,840 --> 00:38:22,200
Speaker 1: that can cause your food stores to spoil, or caches

684
00:38:22,200 --> 00:38:25,520
Speaker 1: can sometimes be discovered by other animals. They're vulnerable to

685
00:38:25,640 --> 00:38:29,960
Speaker 1: theft and opportunistic scavenging, and maybe most importantly, not every

686
00:38:30,000 --> 00:38:33,040
Speaker 1: warm season offers the same kind of harvest. Trees in

687
00:38:33,080 --> 00:38:36,520
Speaker 1: the forest actually tend to produce greater and lesser quantities

688
00:38:36,560 --> 00:38:40,160
Speaker 1: of massed on multi year cycles. So if you're a

689
00:38:40,239 --> 00:38:43,480
Speaker 1: red squirrel and it's an off year where the harvests

690
00:38:43,520 --> 00:38:46,640
Speaker 1: provided by the forest were very low or something else happened,

691
00:38:47,080 --> 00:38:50,560
Speaker 1: what can you do? What happens if your supplies run

692
00:38:50,680 --> 00:38:53,759
Speaker 1: low while it's still winter and you need some calories.

693
00:38:54,160 --> 00:38:55,799
Speaker 1: I guess you can hope the tourists come by and

694
00:38:55,840 --> 00:38:58,719
Speaker 1: feed you snack bars. But that's probably not a good uh,

695
00:38:59,080 --> 00:39:01,319
Speaker 1: not something you can bank con right. You can't bank

696
00:39:01,360 --> 00:39:03,680
Speaker 1: on tourists. You can't bank on vole brains. You might

697
00:39:03,680 --> 00:39:05,800
Speaker 1: not be able to come come across any of those.

698
00:39:06,360 --> 00:39:08,759
Speaker 1: So what the red squirrel does, it's it's so. The

699
00:39:08,800 --> 00:39:11,240
Speaker 1: red squirrel is common throughout the United States and Canada,

700
00:39:11,480 --> 00:39:14,239
Speaker 1: and it has this cool survival technique. In a book

701
00:39:14,280 --> 00:39:18,400
Speaker 1: called winter World, The Ingenuity of Animal Survival UH, the

702
00:39:18,480 --> 00:39:22,719
Speaker 1: University of Vermont biologist and nature writer Burned Heinrich has

703
00:39:22,760 --> 00:39:25,839
Speaker 1: written about this strategy and what they do is they

704
00:39:25,880 --> 00:39:29,880
Speaker 1: make tree candy. The red squirrel will find a sugar

705
00:39:29,920 --> 00:39:33,320
Speaker 1: maple tree and it will make incisions in the bark

706
00:39:33,360 --> 00:39:35,800
Speaker 1: of the tree with its front teeth, and this allows

707
00:39:35,880 --> 00:39:38,400
Speaker 1: sap to drain out from the inside of the tree.

708
00:39:38,800 --> 00:39:41,360
Speaker 1: And then after the sap runs out, its water content

709
00:39:41,400 --> 00:39:44,600
Speaker 1: evaporates and it dries in the sun. And this leaves

710
00:39:44,600 --> 00:39:47,840
Speaker 1: a sweet sugary residue on the outside of the tree

711
00:39:47,920 --> 00:39:51,320
Speaker 1: that the squirrel can return and lick. Like a maple

712
00:39:51,400 --> 00:39:54,799
Speaker 1: syrup lollipop to get some sugar in its system. There

713
00:39:54,800 --> 00:39:56,880
Speaker 1: are lots of videos of this happening. Some of the

714
00:39:56,960 --> 00:39:59,880
Speaker 1: videos seem to show squirrels looking trees other than maple's.

715
00:40:00,000 --> 00:40:02,880
Speaker 1: I'm not sure, but uh that. Yeah, they're licking trees

716
00:40:03,400 --> 00:40:06,200
Speaker 1: and it's pretty sick. It looks weird. Well, I don't know.

717
00:40:06,320 --> 00:40:10,000
Speaker 1: This sounds like a refreshing dose of just cute behavior

718
00:40:10,560 --> 00:40:14,040
Speaker 1: after the the brain eating and then the stalking that

719
00:40:14,120 --> 00:40:17,600
Speaker 1: we just got through. So I'm all for them eating

720
00:40:18,080 --> 00:40:21,000
Speaker 1: maple candy of their own construction. I wish I could

721
00:40:21,040 --> 00:40:23,440
Speaker 1: have seen this without having read about it first, so

722
00:40:23,480 --> 00:40:26,120
Speaker 1: I could just wonder what's going on? Did you see

723
00:40:26,120 --> 00:40:28,799
Speaker 1: them biting holes in trees and then coming back and

724
00:40:28,880 --> 00:40:31,600
Speaker 1: just licking tree trunks to death? But I guess maybe

725
00:40:31,600 --> 00:40:34,600
Speaker 1: we should get back into more violent territories. Okay, So

726
00:40:34,680 --> 00:40:38,640
Speaker 1: you mentioned earlier you gave this list of animals from

727
00:40:38,640 --> 00:40:42,000
Speaker 1: that paper that squirrels will sometimes prey on or get

728
00:40:42,040 --> 00:40:44,400
Speaker 1: into battle with, And one of the animals you mentioned

729
00:40:44,480 --> 00:40:47,359
Speaker 1: was the snake the serpent. So I want to talk

730
00:40:47,400 --> 00:40:52,120
Speaker 1: about one particular squirrel snake relationship that is not so

731
00:40:52,239 --> 00:40:55,040
Speaker 1: rare or infrequent or alleged, but instead is a well

732
00:40:55,120 --> 00:40:59,720
Speaker 1: known evolutionary war spanning millions of years that has given

733
00:40:59,719 --> 00:41:03,879
Speaker 1: birth to some amazing squirrel martial arts and battle tactics.

734
00:41:05,200 --> 00:41:08,840
Speaker 1: So the squirreling question is the common California ground squirrel

735
00:41:08,920 --> 00:41:12,160
Speaker 1: Odo sperma Phyllis b ch a. And it's found throughout

736
00:41:12,200 --> 00:41:16,080
Speaker 1: the western region of North America, including California, Oregon, Washington,

737
00:41:16,160 --> 00:41:20,600
Speaker 1: and the Baja Peninsula of Mexico. And this utterly mundane

738
00:41:20,680 --> 00:41:24,560
Speaker 1: squirrel faces a plenty of natural predators, including rattlesnakes like

739
00:41:24,600 --> 00:41:30,520
Speaker 1: the northern Pacific rattlesnakes Croatalys viridus oreganus. By some accounts,

740
00:41:30,680 --> 00:41:33,680
Speaker 1: the squirrels make up about seventy percent of the western

741
00:41:33,760 --> 00:41:37,360
Speaker 1: rattlesnakes diets. And for years now, scientists, especially at the

742
00:41:37,440 --> 00:41:40,960
Speaker 1: University of California Davis, have been discovering more and more

743
00:41:41,000 --> 00:41:45,759
Speaker 1: of these ingenious, highly adapted anti predation techniques that the

744
00:41:45,840 --> 00:41:48,560
Speaker 1: squirrels used to their advantage in the Great War against

745
00:41:48,640 --> 00:41:51,279
Speaker 1: the serpents of the West. All right, well, what are

746
00:41:51,280 --> 00:41:54,400
Speaker 1: these techniques? Well, some are pretty straightforward. For example, research

747
00:41:54,440 --> 00:41:58,080
Speaker 1: has found that adult ground squirrels inhabiting areas with greater

748
00:41:58,160 --> 00:42:01,960
Speaker 1: rattlesnake populations have of all, a greater natural resistance to

749
00:42:02,040 --> 00:42:05,200
Speaker 1: rattlesnake venom. And you can see this is an evolved

750
00:42:05,200 --> 00:42:08,160
Speaker 1: trade because meanwhile, squirrels in areas with few or no

751
00:42:08,320 --> 00:42:12,400
Speaker 1: rattlesnakes have lost this resistance tends to go away. But

752
00:42:12,560 --> 00:42:17,759
Speaker 1: sometimes California ground squirrels tend to go on offense against rattlesnakes,

753
00:42:17,760 --> 00:42:21,920
Speaker 1: displaying aggressive behavior and harassing the snakes to keep them

754
00:42:21,960 --> 00:42:24,840
Speaker 1: away from their young. Sometimes they'll go by petal and

755
00:42:24,880 --> 00:42:27,200
Speaker 1: they whip their tails back and forth in the air

756
00:42:27,239 --> 00:42:30,480
Speaker 1: and this display that's known as flagging, and they'll kick

757
00:42:30,560 --> 00:42:33,360
Speaker 1: sand at the snake and so forth. And sometimes this

758
00:42:33,440 --> 00:42:37,280
Speaker 1: aggressive display can discourage or scare off a predatory rattler.

759
00:42:37,600 --> 00:42:40,520
Speaker 1: And sometimes the squirrels even attack the snake and bite it.

760
00:42:40,560 --> 00:42:42,480
Speaker 1: There are videos of this you can look up as well.

761
00:42:42,600 --> 00:42:45,480
Speaker 1: Or it's just like a standoff between a squirrel and

762
00:42:45,840 --> 00:42:49,120
Speaker 1: a snake and the squirrel is the attacker keeps biting

763
00:42:49,160 --> 00:42:51,560
Speaker 1: the snake on the spine. Wow, So not even not

764
00:42:51,640 --> 00:42:55,560
Speaker 1: just going after you know, another omnivore, herbivore, but going

765
00:42:55,640 --> 00:43:00,200
Speaker 1: after a predatory reptile here. Yeah, and you might think,

766
00:43:00,200 --> 00:43:02,520
Speaker 1: wait a minute, how could a squirrel win in a

767
00:43:02,600 --> 00:43:06,160
Speaker 1: standoff with a snake? Wouldn't that be suicide? It depends

768
00:43:06,160 --> 00:43:10,040
Speaker 1: on the circumstances of the confrontation. Sometimes yes, But remember

769
00:43:10,080 --> 00:43:12,720
Speaker 1: that the adult ground squirrels in the snake heavy regions

770
00:43:12,760 --> 00:43:16,120
Speaker 1: tend to have this resistance to snake venom. And also

771
00:43:16,239 --> 00:43:19,600
Speaker 1: the adult squirrels are generally not prime prey for the snakes.

772
00:43:19,719 --> 00:43:23,040
Speaker 1: Juvenile squirrels are are the much more vulnerable ones. They're

773
00:43:23,080 --> 00:43:25,880
Speaker 1: the ones the snakes want, and snakes are less likely

774
00:43:25,960 --> 00:43:28,120
Speaker 1: to try to prey on adults because they can put

775
00:43:28,160 --> 00:43:30,640
Speaker 1: up more of a fight. More than that, some snakes

776
00:43:30,640 --> 00:43:33,960
Speaker 1: are simply much more dangerous than others. For example, in

777
00:43:34,040 --> 00:43:38,240
Speaker 1: a paper by Sways, good Row and Owings called anti

778
00:43:38,239 --> 00:43:41,759
Speaker 1: Predator Responses of California ground Squirrels to Rattle Snakes and

779
00:43:41,840 --> 00:43:45,840
Speaker 1: rattling sounds the roles of sex, reproductive parody, and offspring

780
00:43:45,880 --> 00:43:48,840
Speaker 1: age and Assessment and decision Making Rules from two thousand

781
00:43:48,880 --> 00:43:53,600
Speaker 1: three UH Specifically, they found that quote larger, warmer snakes

782
00:43:53,719 --> 00:43:58,000
Speaker 1: are more dangerous than smaller, colder snakes. H So that

783
00:43:58,120 --> 00:43:59,880
Speaker 1: might be kind of useful, But then again, how do

784
00:43:59,880 --> 00:44:01,920
Speaker 1: you know what kind of snake you're dealing with. You

785
00:44:01,960 --> 00:44:04,160
Speaker 1: can't look at a snake and say, well, that snake

786
00:44:04,280 --> 00:44:08,239
Speaker 1: is warmer than the other one. Apparently, what the squirrels

787
00:44:08,280 --> 00:44:11,799
Speaker 1: do is they listen to the rattle. So if you

788
00:44:11,880 --> 00:44:14,560
Speaker 1: rear up on two legs and you dance around aggressively

789
00:44:14,640 --> 00:44:17,439
Speaker 1: and flag your tail and generally harass a rattle snake,

790
00:44:17,520 --> 00:44:20,360
Speaker 1: it'll probably be rattling at you. Right, And if you

791
00:44:20,480 --> 00:44:23,239
Speaker 1: listen to the sonic characteristics of the rattle, you can

792
00:44:23,280 --> 00:44:27,440
Speaker 1: actually tell the difference between the rattle sound produced by big, warm,

793
00:44:27,560 --> 00:44:31,080
Speaker 1: killer snakes and the rattle sound produced by small, cold,

794
00:44:31,239 --> 00:44:34,040
Speaker 1: less threatening snakes. Oh, it's it's It gives you a clue,

795
00:44:34,160 --> 00:44:37,200
Speaker 1: or gives a squirrel a clue as to how how

796
00:44:37,320 --> 00:44:41,280
Speaker 1: fast this snake would be if it starts uh coming

797
00:44:41,280 --> 00:44:44,520
Speaker 1: after them. Yeah, And so they investigated this by they

798
00:44:44,560 --> 00:44:47,040
Speaker 1: had a little study where they would playback rattle sounds

799
00:44:47,080 --> 00:44:50,640
Speaker 1: from different types of snakes, and sure enough, squirrels treated

800
00:44:50,719 --> 00:44:54,240
Speaker 1: rattle sounds from bigger, warmer snakes as a greater threat

801
00:44:54,280 --> 00:44:57,600
Speaker 1: and we're less likely to approach the playback speaker. It

802
00:44:57,600 --> 00:44:59,880
Speaker 1: almost feels like something out of sun Zoo, right, you know,

803
00:45:00,120 --> 00:45:02,640
Speaker 1: kind of like provoke and observe. You get your enemy

804
00:45:02,680 --> 00:45:05,000
Speaker 1: to reveal their strength through the sound of their rattle,

805
00:45:05,360 --> 00:45:08,080
Speaker 1: and you judge how to engage, and they can tell

806
00:45:08,160 --> 00:45:11,480
Speaker 1: from that sound how strong their enemy is. It also,

807
00:45:11,719 --> 00:45:15,840
Speaker 1: this also is is very reminiscent of that stalking behavior

808
00:45:15,880 --> 00:45:19,360
Speaker 1: we previously discussed. You know, just sort of be there,

809
00:45:19,480 --> 00:45:23,080
Speaker 1: be a little obnoxious in your presence, and then use

810
00:45:23,280 --> 00:45:26,000
Speaker 1: that intel to your advantage. Yeah, but some of their

811
00:45:26,000 --> 00:45:29,640
Speaker 1: other tactics the same. Squirrel it just gets brilliant. So

812
00:45:30,200 --> 00:45:32,560
Speaker 1: I want to talk about rattlesnake baths. Oh yeah, I

813
00:45:32,560 --> 00:45:34,680
Speaker 1: think I read about this in Good magazine. This is

814
00:45:34,760 --> 00:45:38,680
Speaker 1: a this is for for for for your skin tone,

815
00:45:38,760 --> 00:45:41,319
Speaker 1: right right, you melt fifty rattlesnakes and get into the

816
00:45:41,320 --> 00:45:44,680
Speaker 1: bathtub with your special pumice stone. No, no, no, no no,

817
00:45:44,920 --> 00:45:48,320
Speaker 1: this this is for squirrels, not for humans. So rattlesnakes

818
00:45:48,400 --> 00:45:51,200
Speaker 1: generally have poor vision, and one of the key senses

819
00:45:51,280 --> 00:45:54,160
Speaker 1: they rely on for hunting is scent. So snakes can

820
00:45:54,200 --> 00:45:56,319
Speaker 1: smell with their nostrils, but they have a much more

821
00:45:56,440 --> 00:45:59,200
Speaker 1: keen sense of smell not through their nostrils, but through

822
00:45:59,239 --> 00:46:01,680
Speaker 1: a region in the roof of their mouth called the

823
00:46:01,800 --> 00:46:05,400
Speaker 1: Jacobson's organ. This is where the flicking tongue then connects

824
00:46:05,440 --> 00:46:07,600
Speaker 1: with the roof of their mouth. Yeah, exactly right. So

825
00:46:07,640 --> 00:46:10,200
Speaker 1: when you see a snake flicking out its forked tongue,

826
00:46:10,560 --> 00:46:13,560
Speaker 1: that snake is sniffing the air. The flicks of the

827
00:46:13,600 --> 00:46:17,480
Speaker 1: tongue collect information, which are volatile scent carrying compounds in

828
00:46:17,480 --> 00:46:20,560
Speaker 1: the air, and they bring those compounds back into the

829
00:46:20,640 --> 00:46:23,600
Speaker 1: mouth to mix with oral fluids and then get taken

830
00:46:23,640 --> 00:46:25,400
Speaker 1: through ducts in the roof of the mouth to the

831
00:46:25,480 --> 00:46:29,279
Speaker 1: Jacobson's organ. Side note, there's apparently some amount of controversy

832
00:46:29,520 --> 00:46:33,040
Speaker 1: about whether humans have a functioning Jacobson's organ, Like it

833
00:46:33,080 --> 00:46:35,760
Speaker 1: looks like we've got some kind of tiny analogous structure,

834
00:46:36,080 --> 00:46:40,960
Speaker 1: probably nonfunctional, that might be worth a deeper look someday. Um.

835
00:46:41,160 --> 00:46:44,399
Speaker 1: But anyway, snakes use this smelling apparatus to locate prey

836
00:46:44,440 --> 00:46:47,320
Speaker 1: by smell. So if you're a squirrel that this snake

837
00:46:47,360 --> 00:46:50,000
Speaker 1: would like to eat, what do you do. You can run,

838
00:46:50,280 --> 00:46:53,960
Speaker 1: you can hide, but you can't stop emitting volatile compounds.

839
00:46:53,960 --> 00:46:56,480
Speaker 1: You're always going to be putting up these molecules that

840
00:46:56,600 --> 00:47:00,160
Speaker 1: this relentless predator can tract through the air. So the

841
00:47:00,200 --> 00:47:04,520
Speaker 1: California ground squirrel has this wonderful adapted behavior. It takes

842
00:47:04,520 --> 00:47:08,400
Speaker 1: a snake bath. Snakes periodically have to shed their skin

843
00:47:08,520 --> 00:47:10,680
Speaker 1: in order to allow their bodies to grow and remove

844
00:47:10,719 --> 00:47:14,320
Speaker 1: external parasites, and when one of these squirrels comes across

845
00:47:14,360 --> 00:47:17,680
Speaker 1: a snake skin discarded in the on the ground, it

846
00:47:17,719 --> 00:47:20,480
Speaker 1: begins to set to work. So first it takes bites

847
00:47:20,480 --> 00:47:23,239
Speaker 1: out of the skin and choose it up into a

848
00:47:23,239 --> 00:47:26,759
Speaker 1: snakeskin mushball in its mouth, and then it spits the

849
00:47:26,840 --> 00:47:31,120
Speaker 1: mushball out on itself and smears the snakeskin poultice around

850
00:47:31,160 --> 00:47:33,720
Speaker 1: in its fur, and then it keeps doing this until

851
00:47:33,760 --> 00:47:36,839
Speaker 1: it smells more of snake than of squirrel. And these

852
00:47:36,840 --> 00:47:39,960
Speaker 1: animals have also been seen smearing snakeskin mush under their

853
00:47:40,000 --> 00:47:42,960
Speaker 1: young to protect them as well. If a snakeskin is

854
00:47:43,000 --> 00:47:45,759
Speaker 1: not available, sometimes they will pick up the snake scent

855
00:47:45,800 --> 00:47:49,319
Speaker 1: by rubbing themselves in the soil from places where rattlesnakes

856
00:47:49,320 --> 00:47:52,720
Speaker 1: have been resting, and apparently the North American rock squirrel

857
00:47:52,760 --> 00:47:56,520
Speaker 1: has been observed doing the same thing. One last crazy

858
00:47:56,560 --> 00:47:59,919
Speaker 1: anti snake adaptation. In addition to their sense of smell,

859
00:48:00,120 --> 00:48:03,520
Speaker 1: rattlesnakes use heat sensing organs right called pit organs in

860
00:48:03,560 --> 00:48:07,359
Speaker 1: their faces to hunt down by detecting body warmth. So

861
00:48:07,520 --> 00:48:09,920
Speaker 1: the snake lives in a world of smell and heat.

862
00:48:10,280 --> 00:48:12,640
Speaker 1: And if the squirrels have a smell based defense, do

863
00:48:12,719 --> 00:48:15,880
Speaker 1: they also have a heat based defense? You bet you

864
00:48:16,000 --> 00:48:19,440
Speaker 1: that this is true. Researchers, including Airin S Rundas, discovered

865
00:48:19,480 --> 00:48:22,799
Speaker 1: in the two thousands that California ground squirrels threatened by

866
00:48:22,880 --> 00:48:26,040
Speaker 1: rattle snakes turn their tails into this weird kind of

867
00:48:26,160 --> 00:48:30,200
Speaker 1: beacon of heat energy. It's a whipping heat element. So

868
00:48:30,320 --> 00:48:33,480
Speaker 1: Rundas claimed at an animal behavior conference in Mexico in

869
00:48:33,520 --> 00:48:36,040
Speaker 1: two thousand four that the squirrels apparently do this by

870
00:48:36,080 --> 00:48:39,000
Speaker 1: getting the fur on their tails to stand straight up,

871
00:48:39,280 --> 00:48:42,280
Speaker 1: which allows more of the underlying skin to be exposed

872
00:48:42,280 --> 00:48:45,680
Speaker 1: to the air and dilates the blood vessels under the skin,

873
00:48:45,800 --> 00:48:48,520
Speaker 1: causing the skin to broadcast more heat in the form

874
00:48:48,560 --> 00:48:53,280
Speaker 1: of infrared radiation. And further research on these initial observations

875
00:48:53,320 --> 00:48:57,040
Speaker 1: involved creating a robot squirrel. Did you ever think science

876
00:48:57,040 --> 00:48:59,680
Speaker 1: would take us here, Robert robot squirrel? No, I have

877
00:48:59,760 --> 00:49:01,839
Speaker 1: to have to say, it seems like they're you would

878
00:49:01,840 --> 00:49:04,839
Speaker 1: expect robot mice. You would expect robot snakes, and I've

879
00:49:04,880 --> 00:49:08,759
Speaker 1: seen both of these, but I've never contemplated the robot squirrel. Well,

880
00:49:08,840 --> 00:49:11,400
Speaker 1: I I like the swimming robots. You know that there

881
00:49:11,400 --> 00:49:13,360
Speaker 1: are a lot of good robot animals out there, but

882
00:49:13,640 --> 00:49:17,320
Speaker 1: I'd never heard of robot squirrel before this. But sometimes

883
00:49:17,360 --> 00:49:20,160
Speaker 1: you gotta tweak different independent variables. Sometimes you need to

884
00:49:20,160 --> 00:49:23,000
Speaker 1: make a robot squirrel. So that's what they did. Uh.

885
00:49:23,040 --> 00:49:25,680
Speaker 1: And I want to mention one study from Proceedings of

886
00:49:25,719 --> 00:49:28,239
Speaker 1: the National Academy of Sciences in two thousand seven. This

887
00:49:28,320 --> 00:49:32,760
Speaker 1: is Rundus owings Yoshi Chin and Giannini called ground squirrels

888
00:49:32,840 --> 00:49:36,319
Speaker 1: use infrared signal to deter rattle snake predation. So in

889
00:49:36,400 --> 00:49:40,000
Speaker 1: animal trials, Rundus and co authors found that quote, California

890
00:49:40,040 --> 00:49:43,680
Speaker 1: ground squirrels add an infrared component to their snake directed

891
00:49:43,719 --> 00:49:48,200
Speaker 1: tail flagging signals when confronting infrared sensitive rattle snakes, but

892
00:49:48,320 --> 00:49:53,160
Speaker 1: tail but tail flag without augmenting infrared emission when confronting

893
00:49:53,200 --> 00:49:57,200
Speaker 1: infrared insensitive gopher snakes. So this means they can tell

894
00:49:57,280 --> 00:50:01,719
Speaker 1: the difference between different kinds of potential predators. Uh, the

895
00:50:01,800 --> 00:50:04,960
Speaker 1: kind that that since heat got a hot tail and

896
00:50:05,000 --> 00:50:07,840
Speaker 1: the kind that do not since heat got a cold tail.

897
00:50:08,800 --> 00:50:11,320
Speaker 1: And here's where the robot squirrel comes in. They built

898
00:50:11,360 --> 00:50:13,880
Speaker 1: a robot squirrel that could whip its tail with or

899
00:50:13,920 --> 00:50:16,719
Speaker 1: without tail heating at the same time. And what they

900
00:50:16,760 --> 00:50:19,960
Speaker 1: found was quote, when the infrared component was added to

901
00:50:19,960 --> 00:50:24,080
Speaker 1: the tail flagging display of the robotics squirrels, rattlesnakes exhibited

902
00:50:24,120 --> 00:50:28,720
Speaker 1: a greater shift from predatory to defensive behavior than during

903
00:50:28,760 --> 00:50:32,880
Speaker 1: controlled trials in which tail flagging included no infrared component.

904
00:50:33,440 --> 00:50:35,520
Speaker 1: So when you go at a heat sensitive snake with

905
00:50:35,560 --> 00:50:38,360
Speaker 1: a hot tail wagging around in the air, for some reason,

906
00:50:38,600 --> 00:50:41,799
Speaker 1: the snake is more likely to back down. And so

907
00:50:41,840 --> 00:50:44,640
Speaker 1: to answer that question, research with rattlers and with this

908
00:50:44,719 --> 00:50:47,080
Speaker 1: robot which is of course known as the robo squirrel

909
00:50:47,400 --> 00:50:50,560
Speaker 1: that's been ongoing more recently. But there there is video

910
00:50:50,760 --> 00:50:53,200
Speaker 1: of the robot squirrel online. We've referred you to several

911
00:50:53,280 --> 00:50:56,319
Speaker 1: video type searches. You can look up robo squirrel and

912
00:50:56,760 --> 00:50:59,560
Speaker 1: it's worth seeing. It's it's pretty good. It's like on

913
00:50:59,600 --> 00:51:02,680
Speaker 1: a act, so it'll like rack forward towards the snake

914
00:51:03,280 --> 00:51:05,799
Speaker 1: and then its tail will whip back and forth, and

915
00:51:05,840 --> 00:51:07,759
Speaker 1: if they hate it up, the rattler just kind of

916
00:51:07,800 --> 00:51:10,239
Speaker 1: sits there. But if they don't, when the squirrel tries

917
00:51:10,320 --> 00:51:13,880
Speaker 1: to retreat, the snake will lunge at it. Yes, do

918
00:51:14,040 --> 00:51:15,880
Speaker 1: check out that video if you get a chance. I

919
00:51:15,880 --> 00:51:18,319
Speaker 1: gotta say, I am in general quite impressed with the

920
00:51:18,360 --> 00:51:21,879
Speaker 1: California ground squirrel. It's a machine. Yes, it's the non

921
00:51:21,960 --> 00:51:25,880
Speaker 1: robot version is a machine. It is um and generally

922
00:51:26,360 --> 00:51:28,799
Speaker 1: here at the end of this episode, I I am

923
00:51:28,840 --> 00:51:34,080
Speaker 1: just really impressed by the abilities and the viciousness that

924
00:51:34,160 --> 00:51:37,680
Speaker 1: we find in the Kingdom of the scugs. The these

925
00:51:37,719 --> 00:51:41,120
Speaker 1: these the squirrels, these tree rats that we we've just

926
00:51:41,200 --> 00:51:44,080
Speaker 1: so often taken uh for granted. You know, one thing

927
00:51:44,120 --> 00:51:46,640
Speaker 1: I wanted to return to, if you don't mind, is

928
00:51:46,760 --> 00:51:50,000
Speaker 1: I've been shocked by the behavior of squirrels that we

929
00:51:50,120 --> 00:51:52,200
Speaker 1: learned about in this episode. But I'm also shocked by

930
00:51:52,239 --> 00:51:57,400
Speaker 1: Benjamin Franklin because his his elegy for for Mungo the

931
00:51:57,440 --> 00:52:02,200
Speaker 1: scug uh is very ant high freedom and pro security.

932
00:52:02,280 --> 00:52:04,680
Speaker 1: Did you notice that vein in it? I didn't really

933
00:52:04,719 --> 00:52:06,279
Speaker 1: pick up on that. Now, I guess I was just

934
00:52:06,360 --> 00:52:09,959
Speaker 1: more focused on the cage squirrel without really thinking about

935
00:52:10,280 --> 00:52:14,359
Speaker 1: the political implications. Well, he says again, learn hints ye

936
00:52:14,360 --> 00:52:19,520
Speaker 1: who blindly wish more liberty, whether subjects, sons, squirrels, or daughters.

937
00:52:19,520 --> 00:52:24,600
Speaker 1: That apparent restraint maybe real protection, yielding peace plenty and security.

938
00:52:24,680 --> 00:52:27,520
Speaker 1: That seems to really go against that Benjamin Franklin quote

939
00:52:27,520 --> 00:52:29,880
Speaker 1: where he says, those who would give up essential liberty

940
00:52:30,160 --> 00:52:34,160
Speaker 1: to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.

941
00:52:34,200 --> 00:52:35,719
Speaker 1: That's one of the you know, one of those great

942
00:52:36,280 --> 00:52:39,759
Speaker 1: American pro freedom quotes. But I looked that up to

943
00:52:39,840 --> 00:52:42,440
Speaker 1: see what's the deal with did he really mean that?

944
00:52:42,960 --> 00:52:47,000
Speaker 1: Weirdly enough, Unfortunately, that's one of those quotes where the warped,

945
00:52:47,080 --> 00:52:50,560
Speaker 1: out of context misunderstanding of the quote is actually a

946
00:52:50,560 --> 00:52:54,040
Speaker 1: lot more profound and good than the original meaning. The

947
00:52:54,040 --> 00:52:56,680
Speaker 1: original meaning of that quote hinges a lot more on

948
00:52:56,760 --> 00:53:00,279
Speaker 1: the idea of quote a little temporary safety. He was

949
00:53:00,320 --> 00:53:03,440
Speaker 1: like writing against people who were putting in place sort

950
00:53:03,440 --> 00:53:08,080
Speaker 1: of temporary inadequate security measures. Yeah. Interesting, I like the

951
00:53:08,120 --> 00:53:11,120
Speaker 1: misunderstood version better. Yeah, Yeah, I think it is a

952
00:53:11,160 --> 00:53:15,319
Speaker 1: more pleasant thought for sure. All Right, Well, there you

953
00:53:15,400 --> 00:53:19,400
Speaker 1: have it, uh, first part of our two part exploration

954
00:53:19,600 --> 00:53:24,160
Speaker 1: of just general squirrel weirdness and savagery. We hope you've

955
00:53:24,280 --> 00:53:28,440
Speaker 1: enjoyed this introduction reintroduction to the world of the Scugs,

956
00:53:29,120 --> 00:53:31,040
Speaker 1: and I hope that you will tune in next time.

957
00:53:31,040 --> 00:53:33,439
Speaker 1: As we continue, let us leave you with one more

958
00:53:33,480 --> 00:53:35,600
Speaker 1: thought at the end, though, do not take this as

959
00:53:35,719 --> 00:53:39,040
Speaker 1: license to mistreat squirrels just because they may carry in,

960
00:53:39,160 --> 00:53:41,680
Speaker 1: just because they may want to vole brain now and then,

961
00:53:42,040 --> 00:53:44,720
Speaker 1: that doesn't make them the bad guys of the animal kingdom.

962
00:53:44,960 --> 00:53:47,279
Speaker 1: We encourage you instead to look on them with all

963
00:53:47,400 --> 00:53:50,560
Speaker 1: and wonder. Yeah. I think actually the squirrels are more

964
00:53:50,680 --> 00:53:53,440
Speaker 1: entertaining to me now because I know what they're really about.

965
00:53:53,440 --> 00:53:55,920
Speaker 1: I know what they're up to. All right. Well, you

966
00:53:55,920 --> 00:53:58,200
Speaker 1: can check out all the other episodes of Stuff to

967
00:53:58,200 --> 00:54:00,359
Speaker 1: Blow Your Mind at Stuff to Blow Your Mind com

968
00:54:00,440 --> 00:54:02,640
Speaker 1: That is the mothership. That is where you will find

969
00:54:02,840 --> 00:54:05,640
Speaker 1: uh all those episodes. You'll find links out to our

970
00:54:05,719 --> 00:54:07,960
Speaker 1: verious social media accounts at the top of the page.

971
00:54:07,960 --> 00:54:11,359
Speaker 1: You'll also find our store button. Yes, you can go

972
00:54:11,440 --> 00:54:16,760
Speaker 1: to our store. You can buy t shirts, stickers, coffee mugs,

973
00:54:16,800 --> 00:54:21,560
Speaker 1: tote bags, you name it, featuring our brand new, swanky logo,

974
00:54:21,719 --> 00:54:24,600
Speaker 1: a few variations of that logo, some without any text

975
00:54:24,640 --> 00:54:25,799
Speaker 1: at all. You can do what I like to do

976
00:54:25,840 --> 00:54:29,080
Speaker 1: and just have some sort of perplexing glyph. Uh you know,

977
00:54:29,160 --> 00:54:32,000
Speaker 1: on your your sticker or your your shirt, and just

978
00:54:32,120 --> 00:54:34,080
Speaker 1: let other people ask you about it or figure it

979
00:54:34,160 --> 00:54:36,000
Speaker 1: out on their own. And we're gonna be adding more

980
00:54:36,040 --> 00:54:39,000
Speaker 1: designs as as the days go on. We just recently

981
00:54:39,000 --> 00:54:41,960
Speaker 1: added one that was a reference to a movie Robert

982
00:54:42,000 --> 00:54:44,880
Speaker 1: and I talked about wishing existed in our black Holes

983
00:54:44,920 --> 00:54:48,640
Speaker 1: episode The Sphere Catastrophe. Yes, you're sort of what nineteen

984
00:54:48,640 --> 00:54:52,280
Speaker 1: would you say, sixties fifties sixties? Yeah, nineteen sixties horror

985
00:54:52,280 --> 00:54:55,640
Speaker 1: movie about a black hole, French horror movie. Well, now

986
00:54:55,680 --> 00:54:58,120
Speaker 1: you can see what that poster might look like on

987
00:54:58,160 --> 00:55:00,879
Speaker 1: this uh this T shirt or stick or note bag

988
00:55:01,000 --> 00:55:04,000
Speaker 1: or bad a throw pillow, you name it. You can

989
00:55:04,000 --> 00:55:06,680
Speaker 1: get it on anything. There's also a bicameral mind shirt

990
00:55:06,719 --> 00:55:09,680
Speaker 1: on there that some folks are really digging. Merch up, Yeah,

991
00:55:09,800 --> 00:55:11,840
Speaker 1: merch up. And it's a great way to support the show.

992
00:55:12,200 --> 00:55:14,600
Speaker 1: Another way to support the show without spending a dime

993
00:55:15,160 --> 00:55:17,960
Speaker 1: is to simply rate and review us wherever you have

994
00:55:18,080 --> 00:55:21,440
Speaker 1: the ability to do so. So true huge thanks as

995
00:55:21,480 --> 00:55:25,280
Speaker 1: always to our wonderful audio producers Alex Williams and Tarry Harrison.

996
00:55:25,400 --> 00:55:27,359
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997
00:55:27,400 --> 00:55:29,840
Speaker 1: to let us know feedback on this episode or any other,

998
00:55:30,320 --> 00:55:32,920
Speaker 1: or to suggest a topic for the future, or just

999
00:55:32,960 --> 00:55:35,279
Speaker 1: to say hi. You can email us at blow the

1000
00:55:35,360 --> 00:55:47,160
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1001
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