Current E-fin-ts

We answer to the angel question, can you get sued by a bee for copyright infringement? Joining me today to go over the animal muse is co host of the podcast Ethnically Ambiguous Shrine Lenny Units. Welcome, Thanks Katie, thanks for thanks for having me. Also, I love that you called her Angela. Angel Jolie and Angie, that's not as pretty as Angelina. I'm not gonna lie Angela Angela. Look. I do like the name Angela, but it's definitely got more of like an office casual vibe. Yeah, but Angela

is a beautiful name. No no, no shade towards Angela's but yeah, Angela Jolie definitely does get different. Yeah, it does. Yeah, well sharene I thought that today I would just like catch everyone up with all the animal news in the world. I can't wait. Yeah, what's your opinion about whales? I think they are magnificent creatures. But I know if I was ever in an ocean and one was there, I would break my pants, you know what I mean, Like

they're just like they're they're big enough to wear. They are terrifying, you know, But I think they're amazing really, Like there there are some creatures that are almost like they remind you of the world before humans, Like they're almost dinosaur age like. And that's why I feel like about whales, it's like, oh, animals in the Earth, they were here way before us, you know, Like I also

give it about us. They're so huge and different from us, like in every way, the way they communicate their bodies, and it's like they're still mammals but they're the size of a building and they live underwater and their hands are fins. It's bizarre. It's like, yeah, no, evolution doesn't have like a preference for the human format. Noah, We're gonna make a building a floating building underwater. It's objectively cute to me that they have those blow blow holes

like and it's just like spurred out, that's adorable. You cannot argue that that's like an adorable feature in a creature. I wouldn't even a yeah, I can't even design that. You can't design that. It's just like yeah, yeah, it's this magnificent giant creature of the scene. It comes up from the water and it's like, well, to make them even more adorable. For I think the first time ever there has been footage captured of whales hugging each other.

Like literally, I'm not saying like, oh, this is the version, this is like the whale version of a hug or something. I'm literally a hug. A camera drone recorded to North Atlantic right, whales swimming fin and fin like one fin over the other whales back. Have you ever just thrown an arm around your friend's shoulder and they throw an arm around your shoulder and go swimming on like a big migration on the Atlantic Ocean. I just I just

looked at the video just now. I'm not playing it with sound, but this is the new version of those otters holding hands, you know, like I love that video. I legitimately watched it at least once a month because it's so cute and it gives you life. Yeah, it makes me happy and just like bhinds me my mom. But um, this is the new version of that, just reminding us the animals are so much better than us.

That's how I I mean, I do love those otters holding hands, but this like literally would blow them out of the water because there it's the size of two thousand otters, that's true. Going fin and fin. The whales were migrating from the Atlantic Ocean near the Caribbean to the Atlantic Ocean near the northeastern United States and Canada, where the whales go to give birth to their young and to eat a huge amount of zooplankton because the

waters are very rich there with zooplankton. Researchers don't necessarily know why they're hugging like this, but I do like to think that their buddies, and they're just on their way and their migration. It's like it's is friendly little gesture.

And we know that whales are highly social and generally speaking, quite friendly with one another, and that they communicate over long distances, So I think it's completely reasonable to see this as a friendly gesture, nuzzling up against one another and and kind of having fun being baxt to each other and getting comfort. Yeah, it's just it's so cute cut. It's also just like their belly to belly it's adorable. And and I think this from reading this, right, these whales.

Whales are endangered, So I just think it's like, why would you ever coach or kill these animals are like contribute to their endanger, you know, they are definitely endangered. There's only about four hundred estimated to be left. Four hundred only it's a bad situation, yeah, just from from from hunting, from the fishing industry, and just the the our general alv mint in making the water like uninhabitable basically. Yeah. Yeah, but yeah, they are baling whales. So they are completely

gentle and harmless. They have that rigid row of bristles, you know, like they whales. They just look like they got a bunch of brooms in their mouths and they just filter out krill and zooplankton from the water so they can eat it. Uh. And so they're very gentle giants. And there they are giant there about forty fifty ft long, which is thirteen to sixteen meters and they way up to seventy seven tons, so that means that they're bigger

than most school buses. So if you take a school bus, give it fins and in an extra like five ft of length, like, then maybe you'll get get the get a North Atlantic right whale. Do you think they're attempting to mate here or what's the Do you think this one article I just pulled up says that are a spokesperson that is perhaps showing affection and attempts at mating. I'm not sure if the habit can tell that. Yeah,

I don't know. I think that it's hard to tell because they're made, like the whales so often are deep under the ocean. That like, knowledge about their mating habits and all of these things is rather limited, so it's not like well known that, Yeah, this is the mating hug where you're like, hey, buddy, come over here, give me a side hug, and now now we mate, which

I do feel like that is for humans. Sometimes you do initiate the side hug like a few steps before attempting mating, but that's like, that's quite There's a lot of stuff that happens between the side hug and actual mating. For humans, we gotta invite you over to watch a movie, you know, and then they put their hand around you being like, you know what's going you know, you know what you're getting into. You're going for a movie time, right, exactly. But the heather hand side hug is it takes a

while to get from there to romance. For for people, it does seem a little romantic because they're kind of like stroking each other. It could I think it could be a precursor to mating. I just don't know that. I mean, regardless, it's just affectionate and lovely and I think that, Yeah, what you said about being a gentle giant is very cool to note because the biggest and

most powerful creatures are very gentle in this world, like elephants. Uh, Gorillas aren't like gentle, but they are vegetarian and you don't and they won't with you unless you people with them, you know, right. Whales are they don't give a thing about anything. They just like seriously swim around, filter food and just keep going. I mean, elephants will a bowl. Elephant will definitely mess you up if you get in its path and it's upset at you, but they are

like it is. It's surprising to me that something like an elephant isn't more like a gro like they There have been things where an elephant will accidentally trample into someone's house and then like look around and see there's people there and gingerly like lift its legs like like not step on anyone. Elephants. I love elephants also. I mean this is a side note, but I always I learned a long time ago about like elephants morning ritually like more like mo you are. They're like tools and

like when when they're they're dead. Yeah, it's so beautiful and heartbreaking, and I just I can't get over how this magnificent creature has been around for so long and has this intelligent way. I mean, they're very intelligent, but I just there's something in about those rituals that like really just like blew my mind. I just think they're amazing. Yeah, because they have they seem to have an awareness of each other and an awareness of of death. And we

actually see that in whales someone as well. Not not necessarily mourning rituals, uh, but we do see like when oh whales baby dies often the mother will carry it for quite some time, and you see that as well with Obviously elephants can't really carry their young when they die because it's just too too difficult, but they will spend a lot of time with them, so it's not it's hard to say whether or not that's an understanding of death, but it certainly means that there is a

deep attachment that they have, and that you see that in a lot of like more intelligent animals like an ape like chimpanzees will sometimes hold onto a relative that has passed away and carry them for for a while because like they they still have that attachment. And there are some behaviors that seem to indicate that they may

recognize that they're not no longer alive. Like it may not just be that they're like right right, It's hard to know exactly, Like it could be in the case of the whales, it could be that they don't quite don't quite understand that they're dead, but it seems like the behavior is so different from what their behavior would be with an actual living calf baby whale that I suspect that there may be some some understanding that something's wrong, but they just are not willing to let go yet,

like yeah, which is so sad. I agree. I think it's just an indication of an awareness of a loss. And I'm just very I have a soft spot for any kind of like mother and or like parent cub

or like child bond. I just like because I have like I love my mom more than anything, like mommy issues, but like, uh, when an animal has that same thing, I'm just like, this is yeah, there's an awareness and an emotional intelligence that you It makes you respect animals so much, and I just I love animals and I just I don't know anyway, that's my tangent about that now. I I feel it instant water works when I'm watching a nature documentary and like someone's like it's a mother's cub.

They get separated somehow, or like the mother the cub dies and there's like you see like instant crying water works, nose running, it's ugly, it's messy, mucus all over my face, like just sobbing. I can't deal with it. I get so sad. It's interesting because like that you you brought up elephants because similar to elephants, in fact, even more than elephants. North Atlantic right, whales live a really long time.

They can live up to seventy years old, but some individual have been estimated to be over a hundred years old, so yeah, they live a long time. And their age if you want to know, like, well, wait, how can you tell how old and whale is? You can't ask them their age. That's rude. But they actually do an archaeological dig into the whales ear wax, so like, uh, they will there's it's really it's kind of gross, but

I think it's really cool. Whales get this thing where their ear wax just builds up over time, and unlike with us, where our ear wax kind of like falls out, it just stays sits in the ear canal, so it forms this like long candle of ear wax and it's like hard. It almost looks like a horn or an antler. It's inside the ear canal, so like, they don't have external ears. They just have an ear hole that goes kind of deep down into where it connects with the

internal ear organs. And if you you can't see it from the outside, but if you pull out that ear wax, which usually like if if you find a whale carcass um that's how you would get one of these ear candles. Uh, It's like they wouldn't do it on a living whale. It's only when they Okay, yeah, you actually wouldn't want to remove it on a living whale because there's some evidence to suggest that it would help with their hearing because unlike a human where when we have too much

ear wax build up, like it blocks our hearing. Because whales are underwater, the density of the ear wax is thought to be similar to the density of the water, so the sound would just seamlessly travel through their ear and then it would also kind of act like swim like ear plugs that prevent like when they if they surface and goes back down, you know. So it's it's potentially helpful that they have these. So yeah, you wouldn't

want to pull it out of a living whale. But what's so interesting is that the ear wax changes color with the sea is in so due to dietary changes because they eat a lot in the summer. They like have a big feast in the summer, and it's more lean times in the winter, so they don't eat as much, so their ear wax forms alternating light dark color that matched the season's Uh, so like it's it's lighter I think in the winter and darker in the summer. I think that's how it goes, unless I got it confused.

But anyways, they have these bands of darker exactly exactly and it looks really sick. If you count the bands, you can tell the age, just like a tree. Yeah, that's so fascinating. I mean, okay, I set this off Mike before we started, but this is like the coolest thing to me. Um. I okay, So I have a problem where I like, I pick my skin a lot, and so, uh, to stop that habit. I mean, I still do it, and I don't like that I do it,

but to stuff that habit. Sometimes I will watch and I'm sorry, grosses anyone out, but I know people are out there that relate to it. I just know you're out there. I'll watch like extraction videos with like like cysts or pimples or like ingrown hair. Stuff is really cool to me. But recently my newest thing is earwax extractions. Uh They're they're objectively gross. I'm not going to deny that,

but they're all I could not stop watching them. Uh, They're so satisfying, and there are a lot of YouTube accounts like for whatever reason, mostly in the UK, but these doctors like walk you through what they're doing and like how they're extracting them and I'm like dying to get my ear wax extracted. To be honest, I don't

want to do it so much. Uh I do think can you imagine like if you're a whale, like how I mean, it's probably not good for them, right, but I felt so good to get that whole like that entire candle out of your Yeah, the whole time you were talking about is just like I mean, I would never want to watch it, only because I know that whale is not alive anymore. But it is sad. Yeah,

that's very sad to me. But only if they die of like natural causes obviously, right, But yeah, like using a cute tip for me is hands down maybe the best feeling in the world. Or like, like you gotta

be careful. That's the thing. If I think I used to too much and watching these earwax videos, it's helped me use them less because all these doctors are like this is this impaction is due to overuse of cotton swams and yeah, yeah, because when you use and I first of all, no judgment from me, because I understand that using Q tips does feel really good, but I also want to warn people that you shouldn't do it because it's it's advice. It's it's advice. It's advice, it's advice.

It's it's like it's like doing doing some kind of horrible drug. But it's a keyte tip. But like it actually, first of all, you always risk if like you go too deep, you could actually puncture your ear drum, which is very bad. You don't want to do that. It's

very painful. Little damage you're hearing not good. But even if you don't do that go go too deep, you still like but even though you feel like you're pulling ear wax out, you're actually pressing it in because you're like pushing in and so that will form uh and an impaction. And how our ears work is uh the reason like our ear wax comes out is that like the skin in the ear is constantly growing and renewing, and this sort of like almost a um. It's like

a spiral and outward spiral. So, like Katie, the extractions, the skin ribbons, they call them skin ribbons. Those are the most Nope, it's the most no. Sol I'm so sorry that I'm not gross. The thing is, I don't

find it that gross, but I don't. It's like I don't know, like I I there's something about taking stuff out of the body where it's like I'm like wait, but like when I don't mind getting a shot or something like an injection, but if you take my blood, I'm like wait, but no, I need that like pulling, like pulling something out of the ear. It's like, don't

you need that stuff? Well? Like what I mean like they only obviously take it out when there's like an issue now I know, I know, but it's like it's my visceral reactions. Like you're pulling stuff out of the bath. It's usually the opposite, right. That's an interesting thing that you have. It like you're almost like possessive of your body, right,

or like you're protective of it. You know, don't exactly. Yeah, So so our ears, as the skin cells inside of our ears are constantly renewing, it pushes the ear wax out, so it's like it's almost like a little conveyor belt that starts to push the old ear wax out and it's wet when it starts out like in the ear. It as it hits the air, it drives and flakes out. And so often when you use a Q tip, you're kind of shoving it back in which you can form

like an impaction. So on top of the risk of actually puncturing your ear gym, you don't want to avoid it. I know, Like I'm gonna say that and like people like because because you know, it's like if people just don't listen to that advice, but just just be careful, to be careful. I am trying to look into any wrecks extraction because I do think I know, maybe I'm like, I think there is an issue with me because I get a lot of vertigo. I get a lot of

the ringing in my ears. Right, go to an ear doctor, Yeah, yeah, go to an ear doctor. And if you an ear doctor, will you do have an impaction? They'll they'll get it out. I'm sure that will. And then they'll count the rings and tell your act And I have learned, I have learned a lot. Like it's so fascinating. That's depending on your age or your your health conditions, your your diet, yeah, yeah, and this is true. This is true of whales too.

In fact, researchers are taking advantage of that fact with whales, and they can tell like the whales diet, like whether they they're eating more or less, like if they're if they are getting adequate nutrition. They can even test for things like hormone levels in the whales, so they can

tell if they're juvenile whales, like going through puberty. When they went through puberty, they can tell if something's wrong, like if they're really stressed out, they'll produce more cortisol and they can actually measure that in the ear candle. But like it's saved for years, so like they can look at the bands and like map out whales life. Yeah, it's like a fossil. It's like a record of the

whales life recorded in ear wax. And apparently like a bunch of museums collected these these whale I think they're called like they just call them ear plugs or something or whale plugs, but I like to call them whale candles. But no, no, it's not. It's me being a weird But like it's like that scene in Shrek, remember when Shrek like pulled out that massive log of ear wax and moving he uses it as a candle. So gross,

but also kind of fun. I mean sustainable, hey, sustainable. Yeah, but yeah, when they when they use uh, apparently like museums kept collecting these things and they didn't know what to do with them. You can only like show the public so many of them before they're like all right, all right, that's enough. But they didn't throw them out yet.

And so when researchers discovered how they can measure things like hormone levels and do these detailed analysis, like, they called up these museums and they're like, yeah, we have palettes and palettes of these like whale chunks of whale ear wax, and we were gonna throw them out at some point, but I guess we'll give them to you now. So good luck to all. And apparently it's a painstaking process of them, like like really going through and doing

these micro scrapings and measuring these things. But much love to all the research technicians just digging through piles and piles of fossilized whale ear wax. I mean I kind of want to do that. We found for Sharie, yeah exactly. Finally I found my colleague. But yeah, it's it's fascinating to learn that there's like a fossilized little record about a whale's life. You know, it's it's just so cool, way an, those are cool. Just yep, yeah, just really so.

Sharane and Jolie covered herself. Wait and I call her Angela again. Angelina covered and well, you know we're real close, so you know, I know, And anyways, that's silly. And she covered herself in bees? What next is that silly girl gonna get up to? Yeah, she was covered in bees for about eighteen minutes. She didn't get stung u

probably because they recognize as her as their queen. She's a queen anyways, So I know, like whenever ange does stuff like everyone's like, I want to be like Angelina Jolie. I want to do the angel No, not Angeline. No, don't cover yourself and bees. It's not a good idea. Don't bother the bees. Bees are really even like, despite their reputation, most native bees, most honey bees really don't want to like deal. They don't want to sting you,

they don't want to mess with you. They don't really do what if they feel threatened yeah, they don't mess with them. They don't mess with you. You know it, right rights, but you know, just don't handle them. Don't put them on you. I know Angelina Jolie is making it look cool, but don't put bees on you unless you're professional. Yeah, did you read that she didn't shower for days because for the shoot? Like something? No, I didn't, Yeah, something about like what was it, Let me try to

look it up, her natural pheromones, yeah or something. Maybe it was like like so, yeah, they told her, Yeah, they're wiping herself with pheromone. I don't know what that is pH And then then and then p h e r oh di meant. And then she said, you have all these different sense shampoos and perfumes and things, and the bee doesn't know what you are. So I think that was part of the reason why she didn't shower or something, or she's just look and you don't need

to make an excuse. We all have times when we just don't want to shower for a while. You don't gotta You don't have to do a photo shoot with bees to justify not showering for a while, is what I'm saying. It's okay sometimes we just save a stink week and that's fine. I mean, I do understand the message behind it is it's because like I don't think a lot of people understand the damage we're doing two bees and how essential they are to our environment and

literally pollinating everything. Um, but I feel like I know that it's like a I don't know a certain kind of way to get people's attention. I just people that go beyond the photo and understand like the reasoning behind it, you know, Like that's that's what I hope. Yeah, I think it was done with the very best intentions. She's advocating for a women's beekeeper program run by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Foundation. Apparently it's also funded

by uh Guerlan Guerraline. I don't know how to connec the French cosmetics company, which makes me slightly suspicious, Like is this some kind of like racket to collect bees wax for like cosmetics? Are they just like you know, what's going on. I think it's okay. I think it's just for the positive press though, that this h cosmetics company is doing it. But yeah, she she's like trying to draw attention to the plight of bees that bees are often endangered or even a threat of extinction due

to pesticides and climate change. And it's not just honey bees, it's also native bees that are indigenous to UM like the United States that actually honey bees were introduced to the US, they're not an indigenous species UM and a lot of our native bees are also in threat of endangerment or extinction UM. And uh So I think like

the message is good. I do think sometimes though when we proposed because like she's she has this like entrepreneurship program for female beekeepers and it's like, well, that's or entrepreneur entrepreneurship for women beekeepers. And I think that's great, But I think that people need to realize that we can't like necessarily entrepreneur our way out of this problem.

I think that there are, um we need huge solutions to it, which is like, uh, you know, regulations on pesticides and environmental protections so that we're not destroying their habitat, we're not spraying a bunch of pesticides out there that killed the bees, and also addressing climate change because that's a huge force that is harming bees as temperatures rise. We have like seen a direct decline in bumblebee and

honeybee populations. So I think that it's I think like the message is great, like in the idea of like having people doing like bee keeping and be preservation as sort of this entrepreneurship. That's fine, but it's you're you're helping for sure, but you're the responsibility that lies on each of our individual shoulders is is kind of like it's a small chunk of it, Like we need to like collectively do a big thing in order to preserve

the environment. I mean, I agree, and I also think like there is a responsibility individually because I do believe in voting with your dollar if you're able to uh like or expressing what the public wants. So I am a huge environmentalist. It's a big reason why I stay away from animal products and like all the other other off. But like, I think everyone should just be conscious of what they're of the impact they're having, because I think a lot of people don't really think twice about buying

twelve pounds of whatever. Like I don't think there's like a lot of understanding of like the what happens right before it goes to the grocery store, and so I think the more that we as consumers tell the companies like what we want through what we purchase, that's the only way a company will change. Because a company just wants to make money, they'll do what's profitable for them. So I think the individual stuff matters. But I also agree that like we really have to build on that

and make a bigger, bigger, uh impact somehow. But I will say I looked it up Gerlaine because I wanted to know if they are cruelty free. They are not cruelty free. That's I don't believe that they have good intentions with their ethics behind um standing with this the b thing. And I like that THEYR exactly exactly do what better gives them. At the end of the day, corporations and companies, you don't trust them, They just do what better than them. I knew to be suspicious, yes, exactly,

I don't at this day and age. You don't have to test on animals. You don't need to support companies that test on animals aren't cruelty free. There's just so much out there that's a better option. I just don't know. Absolutely no, I absolutely agree, and I think that it's good to draw attention to bees and like like and and if you want to cover yourself and bees, I'm

not gonna I'm not gonna stop you. But I think it is important, like when there's a feel good story about this, to kind of look a little deeper into the issue of like, you know, yes, it's great that people are doing bee keeping. I think that's fantastic. I love I love, you know, watching beekeepers and people who are especially like when it's not just honey bees and you're like helping facilitate the growth of native bee populations.

Obviously they're very important for for food and pollination and for our agriculture, but like they're important for the environment as well because they're not just pollinating our crops, they're pollinating all so many fruits, you know what I mean, it just goes they're cool as health. I love bees so much, and it's I really want them to survive because bees are rad I think people get overwhelmed with

how much that needs to be done. Honestly, when it comes to the environment, there's like it's too late at this point, it's a lost cause we've gone too far in this lane or whatever. But I think that's not true. I think the end goal is to make someone isn't to make the whole planet plant based or like whatever.

I think the end goal is to just be conscious of the food you're eating and what you're the impact you're having on the environment, and what goes into the food you're eating, like a pest, like pesticides that are contributing to killing so many bee colonies, you know. So I think the end goal is just to make people conscious of, yes, what they're doing and the footprint they're having. Obviously, I mean if that person is able, I know there are um exceptions because of wealth and where you are

at the world. I would never fault someone for doing what they can to like just live. But do you have the privilege to choose and to vote with your dollar? I yeah, no, I I agree. I think that. And also I don't want people to feel paralyzed by the idea that like, oh, we're so doomed, like the bees are all gonna die and there's nothing we can do about it, and solving these big issues is really hard.

It's like, no, nature is extremely resilient, and I think, you know, something like bees will be able to bounce back really spectacularly if we just give them some help. But in more being news, yeah, more bean is this is kind of fun. Sculptor Thomas Libertini is quote collaborating with bees to make sculptures constructed from wire frames and bee hives. Pretty cool. Yeah, collaboration seems a little generous, as if the bees were like, yeah, here, it takes

some of it. Yeah, I don't think the bees like signed signed off on this, signed a contract on this. I feel like the bees could sue this guy because yes, um, but it's it's from what I can tell, it's basically he sets up a wire mesh in a shape like like various sculptures, like he's got vases, he's got the first thing I see here, queen yes, yes, and then just basically sets it up near the main bee hive. Is so they're encouraged to continue constructing their honeycomb around

this wire frame. This whole face bust of Queen Nefertiti constructed in natural honey home, and the bees just go to work. And because the honeycomb is somewhat geometric, just naturally the way that it works, it looks like it's been three D printed. Side note, honeycomb is rad like beautiful, beautiful. There's a skull one where he had them do it over the form of a of a human skull, which

is really metal. They're beautiful, and they can take over two years and over sixty thousand bees working on it to complete. I don't know, I don't really like that you're wasting the bees time, like for some elitist art, like what's the what's gonna happen to the effort that they've put into this. I mean that's true, that's true of any like even like when we have honey or something,

we are taking stuff from the bees. But on the other hand, I kind of I don't feel too bad about it because I think that he is he's basically he's got this high that he just puts this wire frame near so they have a lot of area where the rest of the colony is. I think like on average, the fact that like he seems to be taking good care of these bees, Like, yeah, he is technically removing

stuff from the bees. I was kind of imagining again as like you're there in a room and no they're not like imprisoned in the in the sculpture until they completed the rest of the hive. Is intact. He doesn't like destroy the whole hive. And technically these sculptures could last indefinitely as long as they don't melt like bees wax and even honey lasts for thousands and thousands of years. You could eat, you could have some bee honey that's

like thousands of years old. It's just like kind of yes, yes, it has like it has I think, um, like kind of antibiotic like or not antibiotic, but antibacterial. Yes, antibacterial elms to it that preserves the honey and and and bees wax is inert it doesn't. It's like, um, you know it can last basically is as long as it

doesn't get melted, it'll be fine. So yeah, it's really really cool, and it is it's kind of ironic because like if you brought a hair dryer to the museum, destroy these works of art, but if you if you keep them in good condition, they could last for thousands of years. Yeah. Yeah, that's that's pretty sick, pretty sick to this guy. I mean, I also agree, like the use of labor is questionable, but if it's worth the attention that the cause is about, then I think it's worthy. Yeah,

it's all. It's all doing things in moderation and maintaining the balance between what we take from nature and what we're what we're giving back. Yeah, I think I agree, alright, suring new glowing animal alert, blowing animal alert. I like to keep everyone up to date on whenever we find a new glowing animal. And we have and it is called the pumpkin totlet. Cutest name name I've ever heard. Oh my god. Okay, well, didn't look at them, because the name fits the baby. They're so so cute. They're

so vibrant and like they look a pumpkin. Their orange and yes, oh my god, there's so little toady tody candycorns. They just discovered these, are you just like yeah, so they discovered a new species of these. Uh. Albeit, there are thirty six other species of pumpkin totlets, so the existence of the family of pumpkin totlets is well known. But there is a new species of pumpkin totlet and this one glows under are uv light. Toadlets are toads but small. We love that so much. I just love

pumpkin toadlet together. But also to pumpkin totalt dune done, dune done. Pumpkin totallet done done, dune done. So cool. Also, like I would love to know the first impulse to put fluorescent light over Like how how did they're just doing it on tons of animals now because like they found, they just incidentally found that animals we don't expect have a fluorescence biofluorescence. Um, and so now we're just like like, well, let's see if this one glows, and see if that

one glows, and sometimes they do. Yeah, no, it is, It's great. Uh. So the new species is called breaky breaky Cephalus rotten bear gay, which is the long name pumpkin totlet. Better, yes, pumpkin pumpkin totlet. They're bright orange, teeny teeny tiny toads about the size of your thumbnail. Uh. Little babies, little tiny orange babies, and like they are bright orange. Like I encourage everyone that's listening just google

pumpkin totalt. They are yeah, so vibrant, adorable. I'll have a bunch of them in the show notes too, in the in the dock of show notes that you can see some of my favorite photos of pumpkin totlets because they are tiny, very tiny and small and also okay, okay, it gets cuter, it definitely gets cuter. So they are in Brazil's Atlantic Forest. So, like I said earlier, they are thirty six other species of pumpkin totlet. They're all bright orange, about the size of a thumbnail. They're super

bright because this is a pis semitic coloration. So their skin and their organs are highly toxic, full of tetradotoxin, which is the same stuff that is found in like fugu fish organs, So it's bad to eat. You don't want to You don't want to eat these, but you also don't want to eat them because they're so cute.

Their ears are so tiny and underdeveloped that they can't hear their own mating calls, so they don't lie on visual The visuals of the vocal sack inflating, as well as other signals such as mouth gaping, so opening and shutting their mouth and arm waving. So basically little tiny thumbnail size bright orange toadlets flapping and closing their mouths and waving their arms in the air and being like made with me, so like in their mouths. There's no

like gross teeth or like gross anything in there. It's just like this little cartoon mouth like so so cute. And also I just love that they're like waving their hands and yeah, they don't even have ears or they just don't work. It's just they just don't work. They're underdeveloped. Interesting. So yeah, so yeah, they're just waving their arms around, going like come get to this. There's a word you said earlier than I did understand their why are they

colored at this? Wait? That APIs semitism? So that is warning coloration. So have you ever seen like the poison dart frogs and their name is you know, basically do it all? I want to look them up right now. There's many colors of poison dart frogs. There's bright reds, bright bright yellows. I don't understand how this is a real animal, Like these colors are absurd, but yeah, very cool.

They are carnivores typically they yeah, they eat teeny tiny invertebrates, so you know the pumpkin totlet or the pumpkin totlet's eat tiny invertebrates or I guess insectivores is maybe more more of a fair thing. So also they do not have a tadpole stage, so their eggs hatch directly into just inconceivably tiny baby totlets, which I guess would be totalt let's totalt lets. Just teeny teeny tiny. That's so cute.

This new species of pumpkin totlet is smaller than it's relative, so I think it's the smallest species of pumpkin totlet scovered. It's got a shorter snout. It's like the pug of the like the rent of the litter. As far as so cute, it's very cute. So so, the toads are sometimes bright colored to like warn other people or like ward other animals of their toxic or yes, yeah, okay interesting. Yeah, so these so all the species of pumpkin totlet are this bright orange and they all have toxic skin and

toxic organs. So that is a warning coloration, and it's it protects the toad because or the frog or whatever animal has that warning coloration because basically a predator will learn like when I eat this thing, I throw up and it's really bad, and so then they won't hassle them anymore. So yeah, because I feel like my impulse is to be like, oh, camouflage makes more sense, you know,

like how it can Julien can like go away. But it's an interesting like flip of that, right, it's like to drawing more attention to them to be like don't eat me exactly exactly because if you like, camouflage is nice because then you don't have to invest in like a toxin in your body, so you don't have to make sort of the evolutionary investment of having to have actually be toxic, so that that's one way to evade predation.

But if you do are able to get into that niche where you can produce a toxin that will make predators sick or even kill them, then you do want that warning coloration. You want to be as noticeable as possible because you're basically saying like, no, I'm not one of the ones you want to eat. Uh. And so what's interesting is you actually have mimics will mimic that

bright coloration who are not toxic. But you can only have a certain amount of mimics because once you get too many mimics, like basically it's this, it's a um. You can't have too much noise in the learning process for predators. So like say you have a bunch of mimics that are mimicking the pumpkin totlet, and you have a predator eat plenty of them and not get sick, then the warning coloration no longer works. So you you see, I'm not actually sure whether the pumpkin totlet has a mimic.

I don't, not that I'm aware of. But you see this especially in butterfly populations where mimics species like, the populations fluctuate somewhat so that the mimic species has always kept in control because if they get too numerous, then predation goes up, and then the both the mimic and the true species population like goes down, and so you get these like interesting patterns of population uh growth in in uh and decreasing if if that, like the mimic

becomes too abundance. It's really it's actually there's like, yeah, there's a lot of like complicated math that I don't remember, uh that that goes into it. But yeah, um so yeah, a little pumpkin toads uh, even though they're adorable and bright orange, they are trying to scream at you do anything. I know, I look tiny and delicious. They look like little candy corns thing we kind of do. Yeah, that's a very good color reference that brightens. But surprisingly they

do actually glow under UV lie. They floor ess. So I think there are only two other species of pumpkin totlet that biofluoress. So this is very exciting. So this new the teeny tiniest of the pumpkin totlets also glow under UV light. They have this like patch of skin. It looks like these little bright blue glowy dots like they're in the freaking Avatar movie or something. It's really really cool. Are those are the things that are lit up? Are those just like organs or like what's there's like

like a pattern on their body. Yeah, that's a good question. I'm not sure exactly what part of them is glowing. I would suspect that they have some some sells, some like pigment cells that that biofluoresce. But yeah, it does look like it could. It's true, like their their skin is They're so tiny that like their skin is somewhat translucent, so I could imagine that some of the cells could be like in or around organs and are glowing. But

it's so cool. Also, their legs their little legs are just like especially the back ones, they're just kind of like pointy things. They don't have like the three uh in my in my brain, like what you what I would imagine a toe foot or a toad foot to look like right, yeah, there's little like pointy things. I

mean there, they do have toes. They're just so small that it's like you can actually see the second toe a little bit behind the frog with their arms or their their front toes, like you can't see it's really hard to see the smaller toes because they're actually trans like translucent, like you can see through theirs because they're so small. They're so cool. Yeah, what cute little guy. They're actually not the smallest frog in the world. So I know these are called toadlets, and they are toads.

Toads are all toads are frogs, not all frogs are toads. So basically toads are a sub group of frogs, and and basically toads have Toads have slightly different body shapes and behaviors and frogs. They tend to crawl, not jump. They tend to have a more like bulldog type body.

They often have rougher skin than frogs. But the smallest frog in the world is actually the pedophrying amanusis or right, no pedophrying ammun ammunists ammunion like pumpkin toadlets or now, I don't I think I can find a cute name, but we could just call them like little little little pipsque pins squeakings. Yeah, that's good, little little little little pee little pee frogs. We'll call them little peepe frogs

of Papua New Guinea forests. They are point to seven inches or seven millimeters long, So they're smaller than like the dude's face on a dime that's f d R right on the dime. Yeah, smaller than the FDR's face on the dime. Uh. And they are so small and delicate, their hands are completely transparent, and they are the world's smallest known vertebrate. Uh. Yeah, So we went from one of the largest vertebrates in the world, the whales, to

the smallest little babiest. Yeah. I mean really imagine that, Like, get out a dime right now and just imagine how tiny this little creature is. That's so interesting. Yeah, it's gonna be like it's gonna fit on your pinky nail. Wow, and I want like now I want like little frogs,

frog designs on my nails. Yeah, painting on each of my names and their colors just look really fascinating, Like it's almost like a splatter painting, you know what I mean, Like, yeah, Jackson Pollock who apparently they're so tiny researchers can't and because they're not bright orange like the pumpkin toadlets, they're very very hard to spot, so researchers can't just like

go looking for them. They have to pick up a bunch of leaf litter and toss it in a bag and then like kind of like look around the bag to see if they've got one, because otherwise there's no way to know where they are. They're too small, so cute, They're very cute, very very cute. And do you think small It is usually cute because like and actually big.

I mean I used to be kind of low key afraid of toads because I saw this like back in middle school, I saw this video of how Australia has this very specific Yes, oh my god, they are so terrifying looking or like just like I would I wouldn't want to be around the stampede of toads, like there are so many in Australia. So I was always like weird up by toads, and then I got older and I got rid of that aversion and these little guys

I can never be like they're just so cute hopefully. Yes, yes, no, yeah, Cane toads are freaky though, so I don't blame you for being afraid of them. They're they're big, they're big. They they're an invasive species in Australia. I shouldn't have done that. No, no no, no, I still I still don't like them. I think that that documentary or like whatever video I saw the amount of them that I saw it in the street and every yeah, just like copping

along a marching army trying to take over Australia. We actually talked about them on the invasive Species episode we did a while back, and yeah, they are. They look bad and they are, at least in the context of Australia, really bad because they are they like kill some of the native animals there, and they are because they actually have toxic glands that makes it hard for predators seat them because like if a predator tries to eat them, and like then they get sick and they can die,

and so it's just like, yeah, they're they're nightmares. So you're right to be You're right to be concerned. I feel I feel good that Katie Golden is telling you this, so I feel validated. I feel good. I mean, maybe in their not in their natural habitat, I would say, like, you know, we've got a respect, we gotta respect to chaintoad, but when they're in Australia trying to take over the country. Yeah, exactly. Well, thank you so much for being on the show today, Shrine.

I'm really glad you enjoyed the whale ear Wax conversation. We've learned a lot about you, maybe maybe too much. Maybe too much. I haven't said that one podcast ever, or even like to most people I know, I've said it to one person. So this is I'm sure you're getting like some people are going to be grossed up, but you're going to get a bunch of people who are going to write in and be like, you know what, me too. And I'm so glad she said that. There's

just something. I mean, I know people are out there that know it's that also find it satisfying it just like, I don't know. There's dozens of you, there's dozens of you, there are dozens of me out there. Come find me. I'm just here. I'm here, I'm waiting. Yeah, I'm not. I'm not into it, but I respect it. I mean, honestly, it feels perfect that I was here for the real wax. Your babe brought you here exactly. But go ahead, and sorry, I don't know just I was gonna, well, thank you.

I interrupted you as you were thanking me. It's okay. It's hard over zoom to like, yeah, no, let me thank you, let me thank you. Shut up, shut up, I'm gonna thank you, thank you so much. But for real, thank you for having me. I had a lot of um. I just love animals and I love to talk about animals. To think, oh you are an absolute delight. Uh and tell people where they can find you so they can experience more of the Sharine experience. Cool. Uh yeah, I'm

on Twitter at Shiro hero six six six. That's like, uh, can I spell h E E R O H E R O six six six? That was we're talking to myself all right, right right? That was okay, feel like, no, go ahead, to spell on this podcast, there's no rule against it. Yeah, and that Instagram is just Shiro Hero so Shiro Hero on Instagram, hero Hero six six six

on Twitter. Oh along on this crazy journey of me watching your wax videos at two a MN and definitely check out Ethnically Ambiguous with three and also Anna, who we just had on the podcast not too long ago. So yeah, it's it's a great podcast. And and you guys talk about some really important issues. So and you can find uh the Pipe podcast on the internet at Creature Feature Pod on Instagram at Creature feet Pod on Twitter. That's f e a T note eat has something very different.

And you can email me your questions, your concerns if you secretly like to watch ear wax extraction videos and you want Sharen to know she's not alone at Creature Feature Pod at gmail dot com. And thank you so much everybody for listening. If you enjoyed the show, please leave a rating or review. I read all of them, I enjoy them. They make my day and they do actually help the podcast and the algorithms and so on, So thank you so much for everyone who does that.

And thanks to the Space Costics for their super awesome song. Ex Alimina Creature features a production of I Heart Radio for more podcast like the one you just heard is the I Heart Radio app Apple podcast? Or Hey, guess what? Why have you listened to your favorite shows? I don't judge. Even if it's in between you watching ear wax videos, that's totally fine. See you next Wednesday.