Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of I
Speaker 1: Heart Radio. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark,
Speaker 1: and there's Charles W. Chuck Bryant. Couldn't come up with
Speaker 1: a jokey nickname. Jerry's here to everybody. Uh, and this
Speaker 1: is stuff you should know the um that's not a
Speaker 1: Noith edition. So uh. After researching alligators and looking at
Speaker 1: a lot of videos of alligators, you're an expert on alligators,
Speaker 1: I'm an expert. No. Um. I had seen plenty of
Speaker 1: alligator footage and things, and I never really just sat
Speaker 1: and really really watched them for long. And once you
Speaker 1: do that, you cannot help. But just think, what era
Speaker 1: am I living in here to be watching this weird,
Speaker 1: crazy looking dinosaur dragon beast walking along? Okay, Like you
Speaker 1: gotta see him walk, like seeing him swimming around, that's great,
Speaker 1: But when you see them walking around with their bellies
Speaker 1: off the ground, it looks crazy. Yeah, especially if you
Speaker 1: have the theme to the Alfred Hitchcock shows playing alongside
Speaker 1: of it works really well. They look crazy. It looks
Speaker 1: like it doesn't look like something that should be walking
Speaker 1: along on today's Earth. Did you know that the theme
Speaker 1: from the Alfred Hitchcock show is called The March of
Speaker 1: the Marionettes. I didn't know that. It is, all right,
Speaker 1: how does it go? Dude? Do do Do Do Do
Speaker 1: Do Do Do Do Do Do do good evening, do
Speaker 1: do do do do do do do. It's so nice
Speaker 1: you can't sing. Have you seen an alligator in real
Speaker 1: life in the wild? Uh? Yeah, sure. I talked about
Speaker 1: it at one point when I did my Oky Finoki
Speaker 1: swamp paddle and we woke up in the morning on
Speaker 1: our camping pad that they just have stationed periodically along
Speaker 1: the canoe trail. Well, now we know those things must
Speaker 1: be at least five ft above the water, right, Well,
Speaker 1: I tell you, I don't know if it was or not.
Speaker 1: But now that I've read this that they can jump
Speaker 1: out of the water that high, I think it's just
Speaker 1: not something they often do. But you know, we woke
Speaker 1: up surrounded by alligators growling at us or groaning or
Speaker 1: whatever they're doing. It's just sort of a are you
Speaker 1: sure they were alligators and not crocodiles? I'm almost sure,
Speaker 1: and I have a little bit of statistics to back
Speaker 1: that up. Um. Even though the Okay finok is not Florida.
Speaker 1: I think there are about I'm sorry, yeah, it wouldn't
Speaker 1: have been crocodiles. Um about ten if I'm sorry. Five
Speaker 1: million American alligators one point to five million in Florida,
Speaker 1: whereas Florida only has about a hundred crocodiles. I'm sorry,
Speaker 1: a thousand. Cheez, I get this all wrong. One point
Speaker 1: two five million alligators in Florida, one thousand crocodiles. And
Speaker 1: that's the only place on Earth where crocodiles and alligators
Speaker 1: live in the same place. Yeah, down in the Everglades. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there's evergladiers just like whatever, man bring it. And it's
Speaker 1: not nile crocodiles. There's a specific kind of crocodile called
Speaker 1: the American crocodile, just like there's the American alligator. It
Speaker 1: just sounds like the the Is that a crocodile or
Speaker 1: an alligator? I think it's an all like I think
Speaker 1: it's a gaddile. I remember that poster from the eighties.
Speaker 1: It said, like, save an alligator, eat a preppy. That's right,
Speaker 1: what is your tattoo? Say? Oh? Wait, wrong one. It
Speaker 1: clearly has the rounded snout. We'll get to the difference
Speaker 1: between them. This is mainly about alligators though, uh as
Speaker 1: as these like I just called them almost dinosaurs. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you're you're amazed by that. It came through in the
Speaker 1: article you put together. Yeah, it's amazing. Or dragons, Like
Speaker 1: whenever you see the closeup of a dragon, they have
Speaker 1: that same sort of scale male armoring. Chucky realized that
Speaker 1: dragons are made up by humans who have probably seen alligators,
Speaker 1: right exactly. I think we probably talked about that in
Speaker 1: our Dragons episode. Surely we did. So let's let's talk
Speaker 1: about gators. Huh. Yeah, we are talking gators and they
Speaker 1: like I love among them, Like there's one like just
Speaker 1: outside of my condo and the ponds that we have here,
Speaker 1: and figured them a lot around here. You just have
Speaker 1: to like be on your guard, just knowing when you're
Speaker 1: walking a little moment around not alongside bushes you can't
Speaker 1: see through and just stuff like that. Don't walk her
Speaker 1: around a pond. Um, just have to be a little
Speaker 1: extra smart, and they generally tend to leave you alone. Right,
Speaker 1: but stick to inner city parking lots exactly. That's the
Speaker 1: only place she's put her in the car, drive into
Speaker 1: the city, let her out, and put her back him.
Speaker 1: So um, like they're fascinating in and of themselves. It
Speaker 1: never ceases to amaze me to look at an alligator.
Speaker 1: But um, I've had no idea how amazing they actually are.
Speaker 1: And one of the things that you put put down
Speaker 1: there was that they have intensely small brains, like the
Speaker 1: average alligators many feet long ten nine to eleven feet
Speaker 1: long probably on average, um often quite longer, but that
Speaker 1: their brain is only like eight or nine grahams. And
Speaker 1: then this how Stuff Works article, it says that would
Speaker 1: take up one half of a tablespoon, So it's a
Speaker 1: really small brain. And on the one hand, that means
Speaker 1: that like if you had an alligator as a pet,
Speaker 1: which is a terrible idea. It's a terrible, terrible idea,
Speaker 1: like that alligator is never going to come to love you.
Speaker 1: Or two, there's never going to be a point where
Speaker 1: you can let your guard down and relax because this
Speaker 1: alligator is not going to eat The alligator would eat
Speaker 1: you like the first moment it occurred to it to
Speaker 1: eat you. Right, Yeah, But they're so they're killing machines
Speaker 1: in that sense, they're like mindless killing machines. But at
Speaker 1: the same time, there is a lot of anecdotal evidence
Speaker 1: that they are way smarter than they should be for
Speaker 1: having a brain the size of half of a table spoon.
Speaker 1: They can do things like climb chain link fences. Do
Speaker 1: you ever see a video of that? Terrifying? They can
Speaker 1: climb trees. Um. They have been shown to be able
Speaker 1: to figure out how to escape enclosures, like not randomly either,
Speaker 1: like looking for ways out, and can actually like manipulate
Speaker 1: manipulate vents and stuff like that. And somebody found that
Speaker 1: they use tools and that they will put sticks on
Speaker 1: their snouts, like they'll gather sticks on their snouts and
Speaker 1: um yeah to uh to attract migratory birds who might
Speaker 1: be nesting, so that they might come to grab a
Speaker 1: stick and then the alligator gets them. It's way smarter
Speaker 1: than you would think for something that has a brain
Speaker 1: the size of a half of a table spoon. Yeah
Speaker 1: the uh. Some of this came from the House stu
Speaker 1: Works article I believe written by House of Works founder
Speaker 1: Marshall Brain. Oh boy, uh ben a while since I've
Speaker 1: read one of those. But he called them instinctual living machines,
Speaker 1: which I think is a great band name. But what
Speaker 1: he basically means is if an alligator is hungry. It's
Speaker 1: gonna eat something, period. Like that's all. It's sort of
Speaker 1: like the description of the great white shark and jaws,
Speaker 1: Like all it does is swim and eat like an
Speaker 1: alligator basically just wants to eat and hang around. Uh.
Speaker 1: They are reptiles members of the Crocodilia order, of which
Speaker 1: there are twenty three different species, including those crocodiles of
Speaker 1: different stripes and sizes and caymans, which we're not really
Speaker 1: going to talk about much in here. The poor cayman
Speaker 1: never gets any of the it's like, but the Crocodilia
Speaker 1: as we know it, and that body for has been
Speaker 1: around for more than a hundred and eighty million years, uh,
Speaker 1: which you know is you got that big head, you
Speaker 1: got that big lizard like body, you got those little
Speaker 1: stubby legs. And when they bring that belly off the
Speaker 1: ground to walk on them, it looks super greepy. And
Speaker 1: they got that big long tail that looks like it
Speaker 1: was just made for for whacking things. Yes, and the
Speaker 1: tail um keeps getting bigger and bigger and bigger as
Speaker 1: the gator grows. Um, and it might not usually I
Speaker 1: think tops out at maturity. I think when they reach
Speaker 1: sexual maturities about the time they they stopped growing. They
Speaker 1: used to think that they alligator would just grow indefinitely
Speaker 1: as it aged goldfish. Yeah, but now there's like a
Speaker 1: top size for it. They realize. Um, but the tail
Speaker 1: might not keep getting longer, but it can keep getting
Speaker 1: fatter because that's where the gator stores it's fat. It's
Speaker 1: fat reserves. Any excess energy gets stored in its tail,
Speaker 1: which is one of the things that makes gator tail
Speaker 1: so ridiculously delicious if you're into that kind of thing. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and you mentioned, Uh, they can grow on average about
Speaker 1: eleven feet as if they're male five to seven hundred pounds.
Speaker 1: The ladies are a little shorter. They're about eight feet
Speaker 1: long and way about half as much. But um, there
Speaker 1: was one that I had looked up. I think it's
Speaker 1: still alive. Um, if the Alligator Adventures, Gator Park and
Speaker 1: Myrtle Beaches, they're at least not advertising that utan has
Speaker 1: passed away. Yeah, he looked like he was still there
Speaker 1: based on their website. I think so unless they're just like,
Speaker 1: don't tell anyone Utan died, and you know, we're just
Speaker 1: trying to get people in the door. They just have
Speaker 1: an intern wearing Utan's right. Well, Utan, my friends, was
Speaker 1: born in nineteen sixty four, and it's just over eighteen
Speaker 1: feet long and weighs two thousand pounds. And if you
Speaker 1: want to see something that looks like it, it's c
Speaker 1: g I from a movie. Just go look at Utan
Speaker 1: and how big this thing is. And watch the people
Speaker 1: in the in the cage with Utan feeding at those
Speaker 1: skinned rabbits. Wow, I mean they're in there in Utan.
Speaker 1: I guess is the deal is, as long as you're
Speaker 1: feeding Utan, you can do this show. Uh. And I
Speaker 1: guess we should go ahead and tell people that, I mean,
Speaker 1: now is a good time to say that they don't
Speaker 1: eat that much for as big as they are. It's
Speaker 1: very surprising how little an alligator needs to eat to survive. Um.
Speaker 1: They I think they feed this thing a rabbit. You know,
Speaker 1: it's got to be uh in bite sized chunks. They
Speaker 1: can't you know, it's not like a python that can
Speaker 1: swallow these eat these big things whole. Although it did
Speaker 1: see a video of a python eating an alligator, which
Speaker 1: was remarkable. It was a small alligator, but it was
Speaker 1: a big python. You know what I'm saying. I know you,
Speaker 1: I know I know what you know what I'm laid down? Um,
Speaker 1: what was I saying though you were saying it bites
Speaker 1: they like bite size, so they don't need Yeah, they
Speaker 1: don't need to eat that much compared to their size,
Speaker 1: and then go a long time without eating because of
Speaker 1: those fat stores. Right. Um. And when a long time
Speaker 1: like you're you mean a long time like a week
Speaker 1: usually in between feedings in the wild, right yeah, but
Speaker 1: if if if the s is hitting the fan for
Speaker 1: some reason, alligators can shut it down for a year
Speaker 1: or two. I know that's like using up a lot
Speaker 1: of fat up. But they have some skinny little tails. Yeah,
Speaker 1: probably when they're by the end of a year. But
Speaker 1: but a week in the wild to One thing I
Speaker 1: didn't see though, was exactly how much it takes to
Speaker 1: fill them up, like how much percentage of their body
Speaker 1: way to the eat, Like is a rabbit enough for
Speaker 1: a week or is that like once a day kind
Speaker 1: of thing. It's a daily thing, just because I think
Speaker 1: they probably try and do a little feeding show every day. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So Um. One of the things, um, that a lot
Speaker 1: of people might not realize because they're so often associated
Speaker 1: with coastal areas, is that alec heres are freshwater. Did
Speaker 1: you know that I did? Okay, surely there's somebody out
Speaker 1: there who fits the bill with what I just described
Speaker 1: there like what like, But they are freshwater. And one
Speaker 1: of the things about like Florida's, if there's like a
Speaker 1: something larger than an ephemeral puddle, there's probably an alligator
Speaker 1: in there. Like they Yes, they'll any body of water.
Speaker 1: They will inhabit a pond, a lake, a river, a stream,
Speaker 1: a canal, an irrigation ditch, a drainage ditch, whatever. As
Speaker 1: long as there's fresh water available, they will um hang
Speaker 1: out there. And even when it dries up, they'll they'll
Speaker 1: um dig what are called alligator den's that is basically
Speaker 1: a burrow back down into the water table, and that
Speaker 1: when some of these uh like more ephemeral wetlands kind
Speaker 1: of dry up, the alligator den um might be the
Speaker 1: only place in the area that has water. And then
Speaker 1: when the alligator leaves, they're leaving that water behind, that
Speaker 1: water filled hole behind, and then when that dries up,
Speaker 1: it provides a burrow for other animals that burrow as well.
Speaker 1: So there for and that reason, they're considered a keystone
Speaker 1: species in their ecosystem. It's just about to ask are
Speaker 1: the keystone. They're so keystone, dude, it's like keystone species. Um,
Speaker 1: all right, let's take a little break. I'm all worked
Speaker 1: up and I'm all over the place, So I'll refocus
Speaker 1: and we'll be back right after this. I want to
Speaker 1: learn about a terrosorticel, how to take a proprit with
Speaker 1: all about fractal kiscon. That's a little hun the Lizzie
Speaker 1: Border murders and they kind of all runs on the
Speaker 1: plane every day that we should know. Word up, Jerry Stuck,
Speaker 1: Stuck Stuck. I don't know that you know it. Stuck
Speaker 1: in this stucks. It's a great name, that's the name
Speaker 1: of it. It's a great name. Alright, Stuck st with
Speaker 1: with an X. Okay, so I did mention. By the way,
Speaker 1: I should just point out since I mentioned Utan's age
Speaker 1: of fifty seven years old, born in sixty four. That's
Speaker 1: in captivity. I think they can live a long time,
Speaker 1: but more like forty years in the wild. Um, so
Speaker 1: fifty seven is you know, that's really on the highside.
Speaker 1: Utan is doing quite well in captivity. But I imagine
Speaker 1: Utanan's towards the in the twilight years. Yeah, I've seen though, Um,
Speaker 1: like a couple of I saw a couple of articles
Speaker 1: that said, you know, some alligator was captured based on
Speaker 1: that and that was estimated to be about a hundred
Speaker 1: years old. Um, so I don't think it is necessarily
Speaker 1: like just ridiculously unheard of. But I saw in Smithsonian
Speaker 1: Zoo I believe they're pretty legit. They said fifty is
Speaker 1: usually around the average. I think for a wild alligator,
Speaker 1: probably a lot of that is humans cutting that average down.
Speaker 1: I would guess, Yeah, we'll talk about poaching in a minute.
Speaker 1: That's definitely an issue. Um, should we talk about the
Speaker 1: armor plating? Yes? I think we should. This stuff is
Speaker 1: cool And what made me kind of think of this
Speaker 1: to begin with was watching that dumb show I talked
Speaker 1: about before a Loan Beast where they drop you off
Speaker 1: and give you a dead animal and no tools. And
Speaker 1: in the Buyou they gave people alligators and people had
Speaker 1: to figure out how to cut into this alligator without knives.
Speaker 1: And you know, they do the same for these for
Speaker 1: mammals on other episodes, but the alligator was a particular
Speaker 1: challenge because of this armor plating that they have, which
Speaker 1: is just really super tough to get into. Yeah. Um,
Speaker 1: that's called osteoderms or scoots. I prefer osteoderms, don't you.
Speaker 1: I'm a scooter, okay, Um, But that is that's one
Speaker 1: reason why it's really hard to kill an alligator especially um,
Speaker 1: like as far as hunting alligators goes, um, the state
Speaker 1: of Florida in particular really ties your hands with what
Speaker 1: you can use um, and it really gives the alligators
Speaker 1: like a fighting chance and they literally tie your hands.
Speaker 1: They do. They push you into the water, bunch of
Speaker 1: gators and say you shouldn't be hunting. Um. So they
Speaker 1: literally do have that kind of like the bony plates
Speaker 1: underneath their skin, which does make them pretty tough. Um.
Speaker 1: But despite being weighed down by what amounts to like
Speaker 1: plate mail armor, they're surprisingly fast. And we did this, um,
Speaker 1: we did an episode years and years ago. Do you
Speaker 1: remember whether whether yeah, in a zigzag pattern And the
Speaker 1: answer to that is absolutely not. Don't do that because
Speaker 1: the allegory will probably catch you because it's going to
Speaker 1: run straight, because it's going to be smarter than you
Speaker 1: and that uh in that moment. But um, they can
Speaker 1: top out at about like eleven miles an hour on land. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and that's you know, if you're just a regular human,
Speaker 1: you may be able to run that fast at top
Speaker 1: speed for a little while at your sprint. And you know,
Speaker 1: alligators are mainly that's there. You know, they don't have
Speaker 1: a ton of stamina, but they can't get after you
Speaker 1: really fast. And if you've ever seen a video of
Speaker 1: them coming out of the water to get something unsuspecting
Speaker 1: creature on the shore, uh, you know how fast they
Speaker 1: can be. It did crack me up in this article
Speaker 1: how they were talking about you know that they don't
Speaker 1: have much staminaus because the way their respiration works, and like,
Speaker 1: if you need to just all you have to do
Speaker 1: is just outrun an alligator for like thirty minutes and
Speaker 1: they'll tire out, right, And that's three minutes. Yeah, that
Speaker 1: seems like a lot of that's a lot I would
Speaker 1: tire out. I know, the alligator just laugh and laugh
Speaker 1: as it swam away, like sucker. Five more minutes I
Speaker 1: would have been tired out. But you only made it
Speaker 1: to twenty five minutes, that's right. So one of the
Speaker 1: other things is, uh, we said that they're freshwater, right
Speaker 1: and not salty. It's because they lack of salt gland,
Speaker 1: which is something things like sharks and shorebirds have their
Speaker 1: glands that actually excrete excess salt from the body. Um
Speaker 1: alligators don't have that. That's why they prefer fresh water.
Speaker 1: But they can hang out in water as long as
Speaker 1: it's freshwater. And they have a lot of cool add
Speaker 1: up to atians. Remember their reptiles, they're not amphibians. Their
Speaker 1: lizards basically that can hang out in the water, which
Speaker 1: makes them pretty interesting in and of themselves. One of
Speaker 1: the things that they have are um nictitating membranes over
Speaker 1: their eyelids, which are just these clear second islands. They
Speaker 1: have regular eyelids like we do, but underneath those they
Speaker 1: have ones that come over as like a clear film
Speaker 1: that cover their eyes so that they can see underwater. Yeah.
Speaker 1: It's almost like a contact lens goggle hybrid. Yeah and
Speaker 1: yeah and it and it functions exactly as that they
Speaker 1: can see really well underwater. And I think they go
Speaker 1: back to front instead of just the regular top to
Speaker 1: bottom eyelids that they have. That's pretty neat. And the
Speaker 1: other cool thing is when they do get underwater, they
Speaker 1: can they close up all their holes, all their orifices. Uh,
Speaker 1: they have flaps on the ears. Are you laughing at that?
Speaker 1: They have flaps that close on their ears and their nostrils. Uh,
Speaker 1: they have those inner eyelids already closing, and then they
Speaker 1: have a flap called the palateo valve or palatal valve
Speaker 1: probably that's what I had in my head, that closes
Speaker 1: at the back of the throat, and that's going to
Speaker 1: keep water out of the stomachs and the lung the stomach,
Speaker 1: like there's more than one, the stomach and the lungs,
Speaker 1: and so when they dive, there's no water getting in anywhere,
Speaker 1: and they can stay down there for ten or twenty
Speaker 1: minutes on a regular dive, or if there is some
Speaker 1: weird reason, some threat that they have to stay under
Speaker 1: for a couple of hours and just really rest and
Speaker 1: chill out, they can do that too. Yeah. And that
Speaker 1: palatal valve too means that, um, they can open their
Speaker 1: mouths without water getting into their lungs, which means they
Speaker 1: can carry their prey underwater. They can bite still and
Speaker 1: manipulate things using their mouth underwater without drowning, which is
Speaker 1: a big advantage, as we'll see because we're talking now,
Speaker 1: Chuck about the alligator diet and here's where it gets gnarly. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's the creepiest style of feeding. I think they are lurkers. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they're not hunters, they're not gathers there lurkers. Yeah. There's
Speaker 1: sort of like ticks. They wait for something to keep
Speaker 1: come close enough for them to get it. Basically, they
Speaker 1: stay very still. They just got those little eyeballs over
Speaker 1: the water. Maybe they're nostrils if they want to breathe.
Speaker 1: When you when you notice one that you hadn't noticed
Speaker 1: before and they're so still, yeah, well that's why when
Speaker 1: okay pinoki, we heard the growling and I was like,
Speaker 1: wtf is going on? Because it's not like you look
Speaker 1: up and there's a bunch of alligators having coffee on
Speaker 1: top of the water, like you had to look and
Speaker 1: I was like, oh my god, they're everywhere. It's very chilling,
Speaker 1: like your your fingers going to your mouth, like, oh
Speaker 1: my god. Uh. They don't have really sharp teeth though,
Speaker 1: I mean those teeth look super scary. Their teeth actually
Speaker 1: aren't even very sharp. They look really gnarly in their mouth,
Speaker 1: but they're more for crushing, like because they need to
Speaker 1: be able to break bone and like break a big
Speaker 1: sea turtle shell. Yeah, they've got some really strong jaws.
Speaker 1: Their jaws have been shown to be about three to
Speaker 1: exert about three thousand, three thousand p s I, which
Speaker 1: I think makes them the sixth strongest bite on earth,
Speaker 1: and crocodiles have them beat by about eight hundred p
Speaker 1: s I. Yeah, crocodiles are number one. They have the
Speaker 1: strongest bite. And for reference, if you're not down with
Speaker 1: p s I, like you can't, just to me immediately
Speaker 1: imagine what you're talking about when you hear three thousand
Speaker 1: p s I. Lions and tigers. Adult lions and tigers
Speaker 1: typically have bites of around a thousand p s I.
Speaker 1: So gators and crocodiles are are mucco macho when it
Speaker 1: comes to bite strength. I guess is how you put
Speaker 1: it if you were insane. Yeah. At one point in time,
Speaker 1: we did an episode on the Worst Ways to Die?
Speaker 1: Is there a Worst way to die? About a hundred
Speaker 1: years ago, and I don't think this is included, but
Speaker 1: I would have to put it on the list because
Speaker 1: when an alligator gets ahold of you, it's goal is
Speaker 1: to drag you into the water and drown you as
Speaker 1: you're getting essentially, you know have the most pounds of
Speaker 1: pressure per square inch put down on your body as
Speaker 1: your bones and ribs or snack or snacking, they're snapping
Speaker 1: your most snackid almost gonna that that's what they do.
Speaker 1: They drown you and crush you basically and close that,
Speaker 1: you know, close that flap so they're not drowning again.
Speaker 1: And then eventually they'll they'll tear you up into bite
Speaker 1: sized chunks because they can't, like I said, they can't
Speaker 1: um Like I get the feeling when this guy was
Speaker 1: feeding it the rabbit that was sort of a max size. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they want, like you said, bite size for gator, and
Speaker 1: I guess that's about the size of a rabbit. They
Speaker 1: want bite sized chunks because they swallow everything whole and
Speaker 1: they just digest it to They digest everything they eat,
Speaker 1: including bone. Um. But if they happen to catch prey,
Speaker 1: and we should say here, like yes, that would be
Speaker 1: a terrible way to die. And if you look at
Speaker 1: an alligator, you would think they must kill people like
Speaker 1: every day. Apparently it's vanishingly rare that somebody like you're
Speaker 1: about fifty six times more likely to die of a
Speaker 1: hornet wasper beasting um in the United States than you
Speaker 1: are of an alligator attack UM, and I think they
Speaker 1: get about one person a year UM and unfortunately that
Speaker 1: person is usually under age twelve because they basically attack
Speaker 1: based on size, they size up prey. It is, so
Speaker 1: it's very unlikely that that would happen, but yes, it
Speaker 1: would suck terribly. But more likely if you are a
Speaker 1: deer or like a wart hog or some other like
Speaker 1: larger animal in Florida that might wander too close to
Speaker 1: the banks of a um a pond and you're caught
Speaker 1: by a gator. UM. That gator is going to take
Speaker 1: you and stash you under a log as you were saying,
Speaker 1: and is going to just leave you there for a
Speaker 1: few days a week maybe and basically let you um
Speaker 1: ripen so that you're it's easier to tear bite size
Speaker 1: chunks of your rotting flash off from and then they
Speaker 1: have to bring you up to the surface to to
Speaker 1: toss you into the air and eat you um because
Speaker 1: they have to open that palatal valve. Man. There's one
Speaker 1: other thing about gators eating, we should say, is that
Speaker 1: they use what's called twist feeding, or more commonly known
Speaker 1: as the death roll, where they just basically spin on
Speaker 1: the axis. I'm not sure if that would be yaw
Speaker 1: control or what, but they spin around lengthwise um in
Speaker 1: the water and it's weird what they're doing. I thought
Speaker 1: it was just for drowning um, but actually what they're
Speaker 1: doing is there. Actually it's like a type of um
Speaker 1: biomechanical manipulation where they're actually trying to pull you apart
Speaker 1: the way of just pulling you apart. And there's this
Speaker 1: video of a dude at some like see life UM,
Speaker 1: I guess an aquarium or something like that, some demonstration
Speaker 1: or show where he's showing how he can stick his
Speaker 1: hand in this this gator's mouth, maybe a crocodile, And
Speaker 1: of course the alligator crocodile clamps down on his arm
Speaker 1: um and catches him really well and immediately starts doing
Speaker 1: a death roll, and you can see the way that
Speaker 1: guy's arm twists. He had to roll with it. This
Speaker 1: guy suddenly rolled like he was hoist gracy and was
Speaker 1: grappling all of a sudden with this alligator. But when
Speaker 1: he wasn't able to roll as fast, you could see
Speaker 1: the direction that his arm was going that the alligator
Speaker 1: crocodile is about to just twist it clean off just
Speaker 1: from this this um, this twist feeding it was doing.
Speaker 1: So it's pretty ingenious, clever way to break something into
Speaker 1: bite size chunks. But that's why they do that death
Speaker 1: roll is to literally tear you apart so that they
Speaker 1: can eat you more efficiently. You gotta do with Steve Winwood.
Speaker 1: You gotta with a baby that's right or in access
Speaker 1: and be like, never tear us apart. Oh wow, did
Speaker 1: you have that planned? No? How could I possibly plan that?
Speaker 1: I don't know? Oh man r I P Michael Hutchins.
Speaker 1: I know. I thought it was from earlier when I
Speaker 1: texted you just get ready for the Steve Winwood joke,
Speaker 1: and then I said, I've got my own l well um.
Speaker 1: And here's the thing with that, the fresh water like
Speaker 1: launching off, the from the water to the shore thing
Speaker 1: is that we've all seen the videos of the animals
Speaker 1: that are just like, oh, I'd like I have to drink.
Speaker 1: It presents a real conundrum for mammals or anything really
Speaker 1: on shore. That's like I've got to get some of
Speaker 1: that water, like I needed to live. Like you look
Speaker 1: around you look around your wart hog uh or or
Speaker 1: have Alina, and you're like, I don't see anything. I
Speaker 1: don't even see those eyeballs. And you you sneak down
Speaker 1: to that shore to two ft in front of them,
Speaker 1: there's an alligator. They're waiting, yep. And then that's it
Speaker 1: for the Havelina unless he can run away quickly, which
Speaker 1: as we've seen, that's possible. Oh, that's Havelna's cold truck.
Speaker 1: And I could see that Havevelina is still continuing to
Speaker 1: run like a mile after that alligator gave up. Can't
Speaker 1: you so chuck? Because they are so um, just vicious
Speaker 1: when they're eating, and that they're eating machines, killing machines
Speaker 1: in a lot of ways. Like it's it's not really
Speaker 1: easy for most humans to sympathize with alligators. They they
Speaker 1: got a bad rap for a very long time, and
Speaker 1: um people used to kill them especially. I don't know
Speaker 1: if we said their range goes from about North Carolina
Speaker 1: down to Texas along the southeastern United States. That's where
Speaker 1: you're going to find the American alligator. Yeah, and then
Speaker 1: in China, not for the American, but they have alligators
Speaker 1: in China. Yes, it's the Chinese alligator. It's much smaller.
Speaker 1: It goes to about five ft and it is critically endangered.
Speaker 1: Now you can only find out on the lower yang Z.
Speaker 1: But now American alligators are doing so well that I
Speaker 1: saw their starting to show up in Tennessee. Yes, they
Speaker 1: now there. They have extended their range to include Tennessee,
Speaker 1: which is nuts because it gets cold in Tennessee. Well,
Speaker 1: we'll talk about later how they adapted to that. But um,
Speaker 1: because they are these killing, vicious machines. Some of the
Speaker 1: early um Europeans who lived in the in the southeastern
Speaker 1: United States first showed up there. Um they would kill alligators,
Speaker 1: mostly as like a matter of course, like you see
Speaker 1: an alligator, you don't want anywhere near your cattle or
Speaker 1: your livestocks, so you kill the alligator. And that was
Speaker 1: about that. It wasn't a huge problem for the alligators
Speaker 1: because there were so many alligators, way more than there
Speaker 1: are now. Um. But then as more and more people
Speaker 1: came along and human civilization encroached further and further onto
Speaker 1: alligators land, there were more and more encounters. There were
Speaker 1: more and more, um, gruesome discoveries when you called in
Speaker 1: the cattle from pasture um, and more and more alligators
Speaker 1: started getting killed. But then it was the French. It
Speaker 1: was late Francais that really brought about the near extinction
Speaker 1: of alligators in America. Strangely enough, that's right because French
Speaker 1: designer said, you know what looks fantastic is a handbag
Speaker 1: made from alligator or maybe some alligator shoes. And then
Speaker 1: all of a sudden, in just a hundred years, uh,
Speaker 1: in Florida they killed an estimated ten million alligators, and
Speaker 1: by the nineteen fifties, I believe the entire United States
Speaker 1: only had about a hundred thousand alligators. Yes, dude, that
Speaker 1: is awfully close to expe Yeah, yeah, especially I mean
Speaker 1: considering there are five million now. Um. So, Florida outlawed
Speaker 1: alligator hunting in nineteen sixty two, then federally five years
Speaker 1: later they did the same thing with its classification as
Speaker 1: an endangered animal. And uh, in just a few years though,
Speaker 1: things they came roaring back, literally, because alligators have a
Speaker 1: sort of a unique breeding such wation and that they
Speaker 1: recover very quickly because they can lay a lot of eggs.
Speaker 1: A female alligator lays about thirty to fifty eggs, buries
Speaker 1: them in rotting vegetation, and they're a little a little
Speaker 1: bigger than a big chicken egg they're not huge, and
Speaker 1: that nest is like sort of like a compost ban
Speaker 1: it provides this heat. And this, to me is one
Speaker 1: of the facts of the episode is the alligator will
Speaker 1: be gendered depending on how hot that pile gets. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and it's real specific to like basically, if it's in
Speaker 1: the low eighty degrees fahrenheight, it's gonna be girls, right, Yes,
Speaker 1: If it's in the higher eighties or low nineties, it's
Speaker 1: going to be boys, little boys. And then if it's
Speaker 1: in between, it's going to be a mix. Like that's
Speaker 1: how that's how close the threshold is. Is Like, if
Speaker 1: it's between eight and ninety, like, that's just the smallest
Speaker 1: ways in temperature is going to turn one into a
Speaker 1: boy and turn one into a girl. Yeah, but if
Speaker 1: you're laying thirty to fifty eggs, I don't know about
Speaker 1: survival rates, but let's say half of those survive. What's
Speaker 1: the number? So it depends are you're talking eggs or juveniles,
Speaker 1: because let me just tell you. Let's start with eggs. Eggs.
Speaker 1: I don't know. Okay, let's take them. Let's start with
Speaker 1: taking them both together. How about that eighty percent of
Speaker 1: alligators do not make it to adulthood. That's still a
Speaker 1: lot of alligators, that's my point. It is still a lot.
Speaker 1: Like if you're talking, I saw some um, some middle
Speaker 1: aged females are able to lay up to ninety eggs
Speaker 1: in a clutch at once. But so like, that's a lot.
Speaker 1: But it makes a lot of sense that something like
Speaker 1: eight percent of eggs and juvenile alligators would be killed
Speaker 1: because alligators are in addition to being a keystone speacies,
Speaker 1: they're also an apex predator, which means that they have
Speaker 1: virtually no predators natural predators themselves, like the occasional anaconda python.
Speaker 1: Apparently maybe once in a while, like a big panther
Speaker 1: will get ahold of one and kill it. But for
Speaker 1: the most part, the um, like an alligator, is not
Speaker 1: going to be killed by anything other than a human
Speaker 1: and adult alligator. So the way that alligator's population is
Speaker 1: naturally controlled is by the faithful raccoon UM who comes
Speaker 1: along and steals alligator eggs much at its own personal
Speaker 1: risk UM, and in doing that and then also eating
Speaker 1: like baby alligators after they've hatched hatchlings, UM, the alligator
Speaker 1: population is controlled like rather than on the other end,
Speaker 1: it's on the it's on the beginning end, which I
Speaker 1: find fascinating. Nature is just gosh darn fascinating. I love it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, if you want your mind blown, just look
Speaker 1: at the video I saw of a leopard swimming through
Speaker 1: a pond two to tackle an alligator on shore from
Speaker 1: behind and drag it into the pond. I was like,
Speaker 1: wait a minute, like my world has turned upside down,
Speaker 1: isn't I thought it was the other way around. I
Speaker 1: didn't know these things. I didn't know any cat really
Speaker 1: enjoyed swimming. And this thing swam through the water and
Speaker 1: stalked on land this alligator from behind and grabbed it
Speaker 1: and took it right back in the pond. I was like,
Speaker 1: what is what world am I living in? As amazing?
Speaker 1: I can't watch that stuff anymore, though I don't mind,
Speaker 1: I know what you mean. Like Emily can't and never could.
Speaker 1: And I was always like, you know, it's just the
Speaker 1: life cyclists, the world's order, it's nature, and she's like,
Speaker 1: I know, but I don't care. I don't want to
Speaker 1: watch it. And I was like, fair enough, so you can't.
Speaker 1: Now you can't watch it? Have I soapboxed about this? Recently?
Speaker 1: I don't think so let's hear it. She's like, why,
Speaker 1: what's what's the problem? What changed? And I said, I
Speaker 1: had to think about it, and I figured it out.
Speaker 1: It's not that like what you've just described. I'm generally
Speaker 1: okay with. I've read a lot of David Pierce, who's
Speaker 1: this awesome philosopher who's on the end of the world,
Speaker 1: and he basically says, no, that's suffering still, and we
Speaker 1: should we should figure out how did program the biosphere
Speaker 1: so that there's no suffering any longer, so that there
Speaker 1: isn't that kind of stuff. But if you take all
Speaker 1: that aside and you do just kind of subscribe to
Speaker 1: the natural order of things, then I'm fine with that.
Speaker 1: What I realized I have a problem with is humans
Speaker 1: training their cameras onto it and almost like purient interest
Speaker 1: of death, of blood, of of the the end of life,
Speaker 1: of like viciousness, and that it's like it's that's I
Speaker 1: don't like that impulse, and I certainly don't like celebrating
Speaker 1: and putting out on display and people not you, but
Speaker 1: I mean, like, um, like like the conservationists even who
Speaker 1: who who make documentaries like that saying like it's just
Speaker 1: life it's just the natural cycle of things. Um, it's like, no,
Speaker 1: that's it's it's almost like a form of like like
Speaker 1: snuff pornography, but with animals. That's kind of how I've
Speaker 1: come to feel about it. That's why I can't watch
Speaker 1: it anymore. I don't fault you for I'm just I
Speaker 1: just I'm affected by it now and I wasn't before.
Speaker 1: I don't know what changed. Yeah, I hear you, I think,
Speaker 1: and I'm not defending myself here, but I think like
Speaker 1: I watch it through a very sort of scientific eye
Speaker 1: and like I definitely know that though there are people
Speaker 1: that watch stuff like that where they're like yeah, right, yeah,
Speaker 1: whereas I'm never like that. I'm always like, oh man,
Speaker 1: that's terrible, Like I feel so bad for those animals,
Speaker 1: and like, boy, nature is rough, what I say when
Speaker 1: I turned the channel. Probably see it every time. Boy
Speaker 1: nature is rough. But I'm never like I always feel
Speaker 1: bad and it's always hard to watch. Right. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: know I'm with you now. I understand like I said,
Speaker 1: like I was saying, I wasn't calling you or anybody
Speaker 1: else out. It was more like I had never really
Speaker 1: thought about why before, and it was definitely new so
Speaker 1: I figured it was worth sharing. It is very much,
Speaker 1: and you did talk about that once you can't remember,
Speaker 1: But well, then we're gonna edit all this out because
Speaker 1: I don't know. No, no, no, no, we're too young
Speaker 1: to start having that little of cognitive decline. Do you
Speaker 1: know that I couldn't add seven and six this morning?
Speaker 1: I was like, I think it's thirteen, and I was
Speaker 1: going on with my brain. It was troubling. I guess
Speaker 1: let's put a button on the breeding and then we'll
Speaker 1: take a break. But um, mommy is going to protect
Speaker 1: the nest as best as she can from those raccoons,
Speaker 1: and then about forty days later, those little hatchlings are
Speaker 1: gonna make a little noise and then mama's going to
Speaker 1: dig them out. And then Mama does something unique here,
Speaker 1: uh in terms of modern reptiles, and that she's gonna
Speaker 1: stick around and protect protect those little ladies and dudes.
Speaker 1: Uh if they get into trouble right away for a
Speaker 1: little while. And that doesn't really happen with modern reptiles.
Speaker 1: It's usually like you're on your own, here's the world.
Speaker 1: But Mama alligator is going to protect them for a bit,
Speaker 1: which is something that certain dinosaur species did, which people
Speaker 1: say like, hey, there you go, and that's why, as
Speaker 1: you were saying earlier, like that they had this huge
Speaker 1: comeback because of their reproductive strategies. Yeah, even of fifty
Speaker 1: eggs as a lot of gators. Yeah, because they get
Speaker 1: kind of big. It's like, well, let's take a break
Speaker 1: and we'll come back and talk a little more about
Speaker 1: I don't know, Chuck, how about alligators sounds good. I
Speaker 1: want to learn about a rosortic college, how to take
Speaker 1: a perfect but with all about fractal getting kiscone, that's
Speaker 1: a little hun the Lizzie Border murders that they kind
Speaker 1: of all runs want to play every day that we
Speaker 1: should know. No word up, Jerry Stuck, stuck, stuck. I
Speaker 1: don't know that you know it stuck and stuck. It's
Speaker 1: a great name, that's the name of it. It's a
Speaker 1: great name. Alright, stuck within with an X. So, Chuck,
Speaker 1: I told you that I saw that article about how
Speaker 1: I think it was from the Tennessee Valley Authority basically
Speaker 1: saying like, yeah, there's alligators here now and they're here
Speaker 1: to stay. You can probably thank climate change for that.
Speaker 1: I said that they didn't um I mean it's Tennessee
Speaker 1: Valley Authority. UM. But that just enjoy nature and steer
Speaker 1: clear of them if you see them. That was the message.
Speaker 1: It was like, yes, they're here, now, they're they're not
Speaker 1: going anywhere, which I thought was pretty interesting. Um, because
Speaker 1: Tennessee can get pretty cold. It snows like just about
Speaker 1: every year in Tennessee during the winter. UM. And you
Speaker 1: think you know of gators, usually is something that live
Speaker 1: in very hot tropical climates, right, yeah, exactly, the reptiles.
Speaker 1: They're cold blooded, they need to be warm. Well, they
Speaker 1: don't actually hibernate, I don't believe, like not technically. They
Speaker 1: will burrow and hang out, but they're not like in
Speaker 1: a state of hibernation like you know, we did a
Speaker 1: whole episode on that. UM. But when it snows, that
Speaker 1: means that the water can freeze, and if they're in
Speaker 1: the water, chuck. They actually have a UM strategy for
Speaker 1: dealing with these freezing temperatures, because, as everyone knows, if
Speaker 1: a pond freezes, it'sund like the fish all die. Underneath
Speaker 1: is actually a little warmer under towards the bottom than
Speaker 1: it is up top. That's why it doesn't freeze all
Speaker 1: the way through solid um and the fish can hang
Speaker 1: out there as well. A gator can do the exact
Speaker 1: same thing. And I think we should just share with
Speaker 1: the world with their strategy is because it's it's outstanding. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think it could be summed up with two words.
Speaker 1: And this is probably what they yell out when that
Speaker 1: lake starts to freeze to each other. Nostrils out. That's right,
Speaker 1: that's kind of it. Yeah, they just think those little
Speaker 1: snouts up so they can breathe, and then they just
Speaker 1: let the ice form around them and their little snout.
Speaker 1: That's it. Have you seen a photo of that. I
Speaker 1: didn't look that up for some reason. It's pretty amazing. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean it's exactly what you think. It looks like
Speaker 1: it's a gator snout just barely sticking out of the
Speaker 1: ice frozen pond. But they're just sitting there in in
Speaker 1: a you know, they're not sitting there like doing their
Speaker 1: tax is there anything, Like they're in a very like
Speaker 1: slow state of metabolism. But again they're not they're not hibernating,
Speaker 1: and when the pond thaws enough, they'll break free and
Speaker 1: swim away until the next time there's going to be
Speaker 1: a freeze and then they'll say, what nostrils out? That's right. Uh.
Speaker 1: I guess The implication though, is that it's better to
Speaker 1: be in that frozen lake than on the shore. That's
Speaker 1: my that's my understanding. Again. I think maybe the water
Speaker 1: temperature is warmer than the air temperature below the ice.
Speaker 1: I don't know, I guess because my thing would be like,
Speaker 1: it takes a while if it's not like water doesn't
Speaker 1: freeze in an instant, So I would be like, why
Speaker 1: don't they just get out of the water, But they
Speaker 1: must stay in there for a reason. Yeah. This is
Speaker 1: in the day after tomorrow, for Pete's sake, man, that
Speaker 1: poor Scottish helicopter guy. Goodness so um, so yes, they
Speaker 1: can live in Tennessee. Now look out Tennessee. Um. One
Speaker 1: of the other things, Chuck, whether we've kind of talked
Speaker 1: about is, you know, almost interchangeably talked about crocodiles and alligators,
Speaker 1: and they're definitely different. Um. And when you look at them,
Speaker 1: if you know what you're looking for, you can very
Speaker 1: easily differentiate between an alligator and a crocodile, right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean my go to would be to look at
Speaker 1: their teeth and if their mouths are shut. You can
Speaker 1: see for both of them, you can see those upper
Speaker 1: teeth pointing downward, but only for a crocodile can you
Speaker 1: see those bottom teeth pointing up right? They have that
Speaker 1: toothy grint is how it's put and it really is
Speaker 1: an appropriate description it is. They're creepier looking, I think
Speaker 1: because of that. But the the actual shape of this
Speaker 1: nout is different to the alligators have a wider rounded
Speaker 1: U shaped now and the crocodiles there's more long and
Speaker 1: pointed and V shaped, And I think alligators have a
Speaker 1: wider upper jaw, and then the crocodile have the same
Speaker 1: upper and lower jaw. That's why you can see those teeth. Man,
Speaker 1: speaking of crocodile teeth, you know that bird that cleans
Speaker 1: a crocodile's teeth? Yeah, I think I feel like I
Speaker 1: remember that. Apparently that is a science nature myth. Oh,
Speaker 1: that's sad. Supposedly there's no genuine photo documentary evidence of
Speaker 1: this bird cleaning the crocodile's teeth, and that somehow somewhere
Speaker 1: a legend of it grew up because that was like
Speaker 1: an example of symbiosis, right, yes, exactly, but it's fake
Speaker 1: symbiosis apparently, which is such a bummer. Man, man, I
Speaker 1: know we got a bus myths. But yeah, well, well don't.
Speaker 1: I don't want to drag anyone down in the Alligator episode.
Speaker 1: That's okay, you'll just as usual. Give me the the
Speaker 1: blue pill. I always forget which pill it is, Yeah,
Speaker 1: blue pill, the blue Pill. You see that new Matrix
Speaker 1: document or trailer, No, there's a new one. Uh is it?
Speaker 1: Is it like the same everybody? I believe it is
Speaker 1: just Lanta Wakowski, not both the Okowskis as far as
Speaker 1: the filmmaking goes. But yeah, I mean it's Canu. And
Speaker 1: I saw what's her name? Oh what was her name?
Speaker 1: I had the biggest crush on her back then carry Moss,
Speaker 1: Carrie and Moss. She was great Memento and it looked
Speaker 1: like a I don't think it's a d aged Larry Fishburn.
Speaker 1: I think it's just a younger actor that they got.
Speaker 1: It looks a lot like Neo, not Neo. What was
Speaker 1: his name? Jerry? Yeah, Laurence Fisherman's character and the Matrix
Speaker 1: is Jerry, just like our Morpheus. Yeah right, And I
Speaker 1: think even the lady was the in it. The the oracle. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think she's even in it. Oh, yeah, it looks
Speaker 1: pretty good. I don't know. I mean, I'll go see it. Yeah, sure,
Speaker 1: wouldn't though they burned us with the second third ones.
Speaker 1: Oh I don't know about that, did they. I didn't
Speaker 1: definitely wouldn't have seen the third, but I think I
Speaker 1: saw the second one. They weren't well regarded. Some people
Speaker 1: will defend them, but they're generally were not regarded. I see, okay, Uh,
Speaker 1: I guess quickly before we go, we should talk a
Speaker 1: little bit about the fact that they do have a
Speaker 1: hunting program in Florida. Now, after saying you can't kill
Speaker 1: them at all, they have introduced a hunting program where
Speaker 1: they issue a limited number of hunting permits. I believe
Speaker 1: you can only capture a couple of them. Uh, and
Speaker 1: their limits is to size and all that stuff. And
Speaker 1: I guess this is population control, right, I mean that's
Speaker 1: what that's what hunters say usually, and apparently it has
Speaker 1: like helps stabilize the population from basically every account I've seen.
Speaker 1: I know there was a big outcry because the year
Speaker 1: after they took him off of the endangered list is
Speaker 1: when they started the hunting program. Um. But from what
Speaker 1: I saw, it has kept the population stable. So um.
Speaker 1: I mean it's been going on for thirty years. And
Speaker 1: I know, like I said, they tie hunters hands in Florida,
Speaker 1: not literally you said, no firearms. They you can use
Speaker 1: what's called a bang stick UM, which basically delivers one
Speaker 1: um usually a forty four caliber charge bullet to the
Speaker 1: back of the gader's head. It's basically like a like
Speaker 1: a spear with a bullet coming out of the end. Um.
Speaker 1: But that's it as far as like firearms go. You
Speaker 1: can't use guns or anything like that. You can use
Speaker 1: fishing fishing rods. Did you see that. Yeah. I also
Speaker 1: saw a video of a guy that was fishing in
Speaker 1: a Florida pond and an alligator came up on shore
Speaker 1: after him and he ran away like filming it. Well,
Speaker 1: this is like people will fish for gators. They make
Speaker 1: gator rods and like you know, you can use certain
Speaker 1: kind of fishing line and hooks to fish for gators. Um.
Speaker 1: You can also use harpoons. You can use crossbows, bows
Speaker 1: and arrows. But again these are things. It's like, these
Speaker 1: gators are tough and it takes a lot to like
Speaker 1: fish for a gator and then fight it for thirty
Speaker 1: minutes before you can bring it in. UM. So, you know,
Speaker 1: I don't advocate hunting in any form, but you know,
Speaker 1: it sounds like Florida's kind of set it up where
Speaker 1: there's a um it's it's it's not just like you know,
Speaker 1: like you can't shoot, uh exactly. Remember Internet hunting maybe
Speaker 1: the most despicable thing of all time. Yet I know,
Speaker 1: hats off to you Mack in the day I was
Speaker 1: assigned that and I was like, I'm not writing this, um,
Speaker 1: but supposedly there are It's not like that by any stretch,
Speaker 1: but supposedly a lot of the hunts, like especially if
Speaker 1: you're an out of stater coming to Florida to hunt
Speaker 1: an alligator, like a guy Ritchie type, um, and you
Speaker 1: show up, you very well, maybe hunting a what amounts
Speaker 1: to a tame alligator from an alligator farm that has
Speaker 1: no fear of humans because it's been fed hand fed
Speaker 1: chickens and rabbits its whole life and wants to come
Speaker 1: toward you. UM, and that you probably you're going to
Speaker 1: be hunting one of those. And it's perfectly legal, although
Speaker 1: it's kind of unethical. UM So if you are going
Speaker 1: to hunt alligators. Again, I don't advocate it. You really
Speaker 1: need to do your your research and your homework and
Speaker 1: make sure you're dealing with a legit outfit. Yes, and
Speaker 1: because poaching in the black market is still a problem
Speaker 1: since you brought it up, you should never feed alligators.
Speaker 1: And as a matter of fact, you as a bystander
Speaker 1: should feel comfortable yelling at somebody who's feeding an alligator. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's not something you do for sport. I've seen it's terrible,
Speaker 1: But I've seen people like drag meet behind their boat
Speaker 1: just for fun to like tow an alligator along. Um,
Speaker 1: keep your distance, like you said, don't don't walk your
Speaker 1: small dogs near ponds or bushes where you can't really
Speaker 1: see what's going on in there. And uh, if if
Speaker 1: you do get run at they do, say like you
Speaker 1: said earlier, to run straight as you can, fast as
Speaker 1: you can. And if it happens to get ahold of you,
Speaker 1: you got to fight him like a shark. You gotta
Speaker 1: hit him, you gotta poke out their eyes, you gotta
Speaker 1: punch it in the head, go for the palatal valve.
Speaker 1: I've heard plenty of times. Yeah, Like, do whatever you
Speaker 1: can because that alligator is going to need to adjust
Speaker 1: at some point. It's sort of like when you're playing uh,
Speaker 1: tug of war with your dog, right, you act like
Speaker 1: you're not paying attention, so the dog readjusts and that's
Speaker 1: when he yank it. Yeah, that's how you get the
Speaker 1: dog every time. That's also how you escape with your
Speaker 1: life from a gator. Dumb dogs. Did you ever see
Speaker 1: the video of the guy who was walking his cute
Speaker 1: little dog too close to a pond and the gator
Speaker 1: got ahold of it. No, no, no, and the guy
Speaker 1: jumped in and just calmly, almost expertly, like open pride,
Speaker 1: open the gator's mouth to free his dog. And he
Speaker 1: was smoking his cigar, had his cigar in his mouth
Speaker 1: the whole time while he's doing this like he does
Speaker 1: it like it's part of his and his dog's morning routine. Okay,
Speaker 1: yeah it was, Okay, it was a little scratched up
Speaker 1: and I think probably deeply traumatized. But if it lived
Speaker 1: and I don't even know if it like had to
Speaker 1: go to the hospital or not, amazing, It is amazing.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of videos you can check out on
Speaker 1: alligators if you're board. Yeah, there it's pretty fun to watch. Um, yeah,
Speaker 1: it is. Uh. If you want to know more about alligators,
Speaker 1: then go learn more about alligators. There's plenty to learn.
Speaker 1: Just don't get too close. Since I said don't get
Speaker 1: too close, it's time for a listener mail. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: call this gentle ribbing from Louise. Hey, guys, I was
Speaker 1: listening to the episode on I'm Bombing this morning while
Speaker 1: I was making my breakfast. When I got to the
Speaker 1: part about the body's blood being drained out and going
Speaker 1: into a regular water treatment. It made me laugh. How
Speaker 1: Josh was so dismayed that they would law blood to
Speaker 1: go through the same process as poop and b It
Speaker 1: was almost as if he had never menstruted. This is
Speaker 1: a very embarrassing email from me. This is at both
Speaker 1: of us because I certainly didn't say, well, what about menstruation?
Speaker 1: It was far from my mind too. That's very nice
Speaker 1: of you to say, but this is really most embarrassing
Speaker 1: for me. How will take the bullet with you? While
Speaker 1: I occasionally have some background knowledge or at a perspective
Speaker 1: on the topic, it is rare that I hear either
Speaker 1: of you exclaim and wonder over something I've known about
Speaker 1: since I was twelve, just some gentle ribbings, since you
Speaker 1: manage to make me feel befriended over the years. Really
Speaker 1: enjoy your podcasts and all that I learned through your
Speaker 1: lighthearted and conversational tone during these strict shutdowns at the
Speaker 1: beginnings of the pandemic. You definitely provided me with a
Speaker 1: sense of companionship as I listened to you talk to
Speaker 1: each other while also teaching me. I appreciate the diversity
Speaker 1: of topics you present in the way you make challenging
Speaker 1: concepts approachable without being condescending. Keep up the good work, Louise. Louise,
Speaker 1: that was the sweetest uh gentle ribbing we've ever gotten,
Speaker 1: so thank you for that. Really pulled it out at
Speaker 1: the end there, Louise very much, so thanks a lot. Ah.
Speaker 1: You got anything else? I got nothing else? Okay, Well,
Speaker 1: if you want to be like Louise and ribb us gently,
Speaker 1: we always appreciate that kind of thing. You can wrap
Speaker 1: it up in an email and send it off to
Speaker 1: do stuff podcasts at iHeart radio dot com. Stuff you
Speaker 1: Should Know is a production of I heart Radio. For
Speaker 1: more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app.
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Speaker 1: H