Listener Questions (Herman Melville Was A Liar Edition)

So let's get right into it. This is a question from Jim. That's j E. M. Hi. Katie just wanted to say love the show. I listened nearly every night. I've got a nice little question for you. Why do flies have such unique flying patterns? Like why can't they just fly in a straight line? So this is a great question, Jim, and I will answer your question with another question, why is it so hard to swat a fly?

Because it's incredibly difficult to predict their flight path. If they flew in a straight line, you'd have a much easier time swatting them. Or imagine you're a hungry bird or a bat. If they flew in a straight line, would be much easier to just scoop them out of the air and know where they're going to fly next. But by flying in a unique pattern, they evade predators

and annoyed humans alike. But that's actually not the only reason that they don't fly in a straight line, And the answer involves a lot of complicated math and interesting neuroscience. So have you ever noticed how easy it is for a fruit fly to get right on your soda or maybe even your glass of wine or your beer. It's like they're psychic and they can just hone in on

your drink as soon as you open it. So neuroscientists were also interested in this question, and they did a study where they put fruit flies in a dome, trapped them in there, and they hid an attractive odor, and then they used cameras to track the flies movements. So while it may look to us like the flies moving at random, it turns out when you actually map their flight path, they're moving in a pattern known as Levies distribution, which is an algorithm that helps optimize finding the source

of a stimulus. It's kind of like a game of oh, you're getting warmer, you're getting colder. Uh So the fly will move in a straight line until the odor starts to get fainter, and then they turn in about a ninety degree angle, basically turning every time they feel they're getting colder. And so they're flying, not in circles or anything, but these little squares trying to hone in on that odor that they are hoping will be a tasty treat.

So to us, it looks random without knowing what's going on in the fruit flies brain, and it looks very jittery. It looks like they're very whulsive. But it's really calculated way to uh locate a source of a pleasant odor for the fly. And it also has the added advantage of making it much harder to swap them or catch them. So it's a great both as a survival strategy and as a resource location strategy. All right, onto the next question, and this is from Sadie. Hi, Katie, Satie and Katie. Firstly,

i appreciate your show so much. I'm an artist and I'm obsessed with all things nature and fun facts in the podcast makes long days in the studio much more enjoyable. Thank you. So, first question, I've been thinking about sleep and activity routines of the animals in my neck of the woods, and I was curious if which animals change those habits at different life stages. Are there other animals that are categorized as nocturnal at one stage than diurnal

or crepuscular at another. I love that there's always someone out and about snacking and exploring at any time of day or night. So first let me before I move on to city a second question. I will answer that first question. So, yeah, there are animals whose circadian rhythms changes based on life stages. So a major example is the larvae of a variety of diverse sea animals. So fish and marine invertebrates like jellyfish will go through a life stage of being very very extremely teeny tiny. So,

and this is what zooplankton is. Zooplankton is often not just um, a microorganism that has already grown as big as it will ever get. It's also a number of baby baby animals like that. They are called larvae, and this includes fish. It'll look like a big fish as an adult, but when they're fry, they're so tiny. Sometimes

they're even transparent. And it can also be jellyfish and other invertebrates in the ocean, and when they are this teeny and tiny zooplankton is an extremely appetizing source of nutrition for potential predators. They're completely defenseless. Uh. And so while they're this small, they make a mass migration up and down the water column, so they're not easy prey

during daylight. So at night, millions upon millions of teeny tiny microscopic sea babies come from the dark depths of the ocean up to the surface to feed on detritus. So it is the largest daily mass migration of animals in the world. And as adults, when they become bigger, they don't need to do this daily migration because they're big enough to defend themselves that at least they're not easily eaten through a straw. So uh. Now, Sadie had a second question, so this is her second part of

the email. The other thing I was wondering about comes from a couple of recent episodes of Radio Lab called Everyone's Got One and The Unsilencing, both super mind blowing and amazing about placnsus and immune systems. In more. I'm probably going to get some of this wrong, as I'm not a scientist and my listening comprehension is not well,

that makes two of us. But basically they were talking about the way that the X chromosome has more of the instructions for immune related activity, and as a result, many women and other people with two X chromosomes have stronger immune systems, but also are more prone to autoimmune disorders.

I'm now realizing that I'm not sure if other animals even have a similar chromosomal situation as we have with the X is and wise, but if so, do females of other species also have a stronger immune system on average. They discussed how there's immunosuppression that happens during pregnancy so the pregnant person's immune system doesn't attack the fetus. So I was also wondering if there was a difference between animals that carry their offspring versus those who lay eggs.

I know that's a lot of stuff, but I've been wondering about it for like a week and couldn't think of anyone else who might be up for exploring it. Uh. And then she attached a picture of her little puppy, Mango and some of her hands, and they are adorable. Actually, her dog, Mango looks a little bit like a new guinea singing dog, very very gorgeous. Uh so uh yeah.

So in answer to the second question about X and Y chromosomes and immune systems, Uh, First, all kind of quickly go over how X and Y works in animals, and it's true not all animals have X and Y chromosomes as their sex determination system. Um, but humans do. We have the X and Y system. So uh, female will have two xes and male will have an X and a Y. And most mammals also have this system, uh, including some other non mammalian species. Bizarrely enough, this includes

fruit flies and turtles. In animals with X Y sex determination, being female is the default. In male uh is one that hy chromosome is introduced, So some mammals, though, aren't X Y. The exceptions in the mammal kingdom include spiny rats, some species of bats, and some shrews who actually have an X O system. Doesn't mean they do cute kisses, although that's BET's do do some version of kissing, I guess, but know what that means uh is Instead of an X Y system, sex is not determined by the presence

of a Y chromosome. In's fact, they don't have a Y chromosome at all. It is determined by the lack of a second X chromosome, so males will have one X and females will have two x is. Dos a kys drink live dangerously? Wait, how did that add? Go? Dos A keys? Oh, stay thirsty, my friends, dos a kiss. But that means you're female if you're of that are

true anyways. Another type of sex determination system is the Z W system, so this is present in birds as well as some species of fish, insects, lizards, and snakes. This is basically the opposite of the X Y system. Females have a Z and a W chromosome, whereas males

have to Z chromosomes. Uh, don't get too caught up on like the then the type of letter used to describe these chromosomes, like, the chromosomes aren't shaped like a Z or W, just like the X and Y chromosomes aren't really shaped like an X and and Y. The only time chromosomes really look like an X are when they're in a stage of mitosis or myosis where they cross over um. The just the different letters are to

distinguish different types of of sex determ nation systems. And that the chromosomes will work differently depending on the types of sex determination system. But yeah, so to recap humans and most other mammals, as well as some other species are xx female and x y male. A few rare mammals as well as a lot of arachnids, and some insects have a system where a single X as male

and two x is are female. Birds, some fish, some reptiles have a z W system where females are ZW and males are z Z. So uh Sadie, your dog mango is going to have a an xx or x Y determination system, whereas your chickens are going to have a z W or zz sex determination system. Uh So. Not all animals have the same type of sex determination chromosomes, but there are animals where immunology does differ based on

their chromosomes or based on their sex. Uh So. As most mammals share the X Y chromosomal system same as humans, it could be that the X chromosome also codes for immunity in many mammals, and there's certainly evidence that females and many mammalian species have stronger immune systems that can be tracked to the level of gene transcription, which seems to imply that yes, it has something to do with the sex chromosome UH, and like in humans, fruit flies

actually have immune systems that are coded by the X chromosomes, and thus gives female fruit flies a benefit. Even in animals who don't have the X y x X sex determination system UH, such as the animals that use the ZW system, there's still examples of immunological differences between the sexes. So in lizards, increased androgens and males can suppress their immune system compared to females, and female birds have as stronger antibody response to pathogens and Sadie, yes, you are

absolutely right about autoimmune disorders. So having a stronger immune system may benefit females in terms of viruses and diseases and um. While having a stronger immune system may benefit females in terms of viruses and diseases, a more pumped up immune response also risks an overreaction to say, a relatively harmless pathogen or even just normal UH biological UH processes in your own body. There are examples of people being allergic to, say, their own hair follicles, so this

can cause an autoimmune disease. So in fact, about seventy eight percent of people with autoimmune diseases are women. Unfortunately, I have checked out this study. It looks like the data available doesn't really break down in terms of say, like CIS women or trans women are people assigned female at birth. So there's some missing data there that would be really important in terms of linking this trend to chromosomes as opposed to say hormones or lifestyle. Um, but

it it is. It is an interesting trend and one that I would think may have something to do with sex chromosomes, so anecdotally, which is not scientific. But I just moved to a new country. I moved to Italy, which has triggered my allergies because of all the new species of plants and pollen. But my husband is just completely fine, which is really frustrating because I'm just sniffling and he had a little bit of sniffles at first.

Now my nose is just like a faucet. Uh. And yeah, I'm I guess just trying to get used to the local pollen. I'm going to have to talk with some bees see how they do it. Uh. Yeah, But thank you so much Sadie for writing in for and for your wonderful at pictures. I hope you continue to enjoy the show. We are going to take a real quick break, but when we get back, we have even more listener questions. All right, and we are back, and we have even more sex shenanigans to talk about. So this question is

from Jake uh So, Katie. First off, I love your show and I went all the way back to the beginning and listen to every single episode. Oh thank you, Jake. It is very educational and I love learning while I'm working anyway. I work in a military maintenance shop and for some reason the subject of dog fertility came about. Is it possible for a dog to have puppies from multiple different sires? Like could my buddies husky have puppies

from a lab and a Rottwiler and others? If you could help us out on this conundrum, that would be awesome. Keep doing what you're doing, and we love the show, thank you. So yes, dogs can apps aolutely have puppies from multiple sires. This is called super fecundation. This is the fertilization of multiple eggs from multiple sperm from different sexual encounters. So this actually happens in many different animals

and very rarely also humans. As long as there are multiple eggs released into the uterus and multiple sperm introduced into the sexual reproductive tract, more than one egg can be fertilized and just stayed around the same time. One thing this can mean is that these same father can have sexual intercourse on different occasions and with the mother create twins that would be conceived on different days. This can also mean multiple fathers could be responsible for twins

or siblings born on the same day. And unlike humans, dog have litters of multiple puppies at once. Well, okay, humans can have twins, but the norm for humans is to have one offspring at a time. But yes, twins, even quintuplets, sex tuplets, octuplets, I don't know how else how further up to count in tuplets, no tuplets, nine tops, I don't know anyways. So yes, humans can have more than one offspring out once, but typically it's just one offspring.

But dogs typically do have multiple offspring at once, which makes it more likely for dogs versus humans for a super fecundation to happen. So as long as the male dogs each mate with the female while she is fertile. You could get a litter of puppies that have different dog fathers and are even different breed mixes. So you could have one dog that's like half lab and and a half you know, Schnauzer. I don't know if a Schnauzer in a lab anyways, So yes, it can happen.

It's the point which is really really interesting. So onto the next question. Uh, this is from Laura and it is about some birds Shenanigans. Hello, all summer, I have been wondering about our crazy backyard birds. We live in a small village in Michigan, and every evening we have a huge flock of how sparrows gather in our two maple trees in our backyard. They are very loud and we can see feathers and poop raining down on our backyard. I love bird o'clock and come outside every day to

listen to their party. But I am curious about what they are doing. It happens all summer, so I don't think they are mating. They sometimes seem to be fighting with each other, although over what I have no idea. Sometimes after dark, if I come outside, I hear them stir so maybe they're roosting in our trees. They seem like a pretty social bird from what I watch at our bird feeders, so maybe they're just interacting with each other.

Just curious if you have any insight. Regardless of what they are doing, I love them and am honored they choose our trees for their birdie raves. Thank you so much for the podcast. It has kept me company during many chores. Thank you, Laura. Yes, so, how sparrows are some of the most noisy little party ers I've ever heard? Uh. They are indeed extremely social and gregarious, and it's definitely

not limited to mating seasons. In fact, when it is mating season, they are less social in terms of big groups, so they like to roost communally and just hang out together in general. So part of this is safety numbers. Sparrows are cute little snacks, but a large part of it just seems to be they really desire each other's company. They also enjoy bird o'clock. So the reason this happens

every evening is that they are on a schedule. They engage in social singing and communal chirping right before they settle in for the night and also right before they leave the roost in the morning, So this seems to

strengthen the social fabric. It works out little disagreements without violence, and it can help the birds form closer bonds, which can be important for the birds because sometimes they'll like follow each other to food sources and this it just helps them sort of act as a little bird community. But during mating and nesting seasons, the birds are actually less social and they will break off into pairs, and when they're choosing their nesting spots, they can be really

really aggressive. I read one account of a sparrow I guess killed a rival. Now I'm not sure if it was a fellow sparrow or another bird's species, because they can be very very aggressive towards other bird species. But it killed this other bird and then just built its new nest right on top of this other bird, which is kind of a real interesting horror movie from a bird's perspective. I guess, like a house built on the grave of someone you murdered and you raise your kids

in it. Real messed up birds, real weird. You know what's interesting is another species or multiple species of animals that also do communal roosting our bats, and they also chatter with each other there. They tend to actually be a lot more chill than something like a sparrow. They have, they don't get into too many fights. There's a lot of uh communal cooperation, like communal alloparenting, which means that they're raised helping raise each other's young and even sharing

food and resources. So it's really interesting to me. I don't know if you ever read Stella Luna as a child, but this, uh, this idea of this little bat being adopted by these cute little birdies, it's I don't know if that would really happen. I think, uh, I think that bat would be dead meat. And on the other hand, I feel like bats are pretty chill. They get a bad reputation, but birds, generally speaking a little more high

strung than bats. So we're actually gonna take a real quick break, and when we return, we have one more question about whale eyes, and then I will reveal the mystery animals sound from last week. Alright, so this question is from Kevin, Lauren and Natalie. You guys wrote some really nice compliments and I really appreciate that. Um, but right onto the question here. It is I have a question.

I'm reading Moby Dick and came across this part where Melville describes the orientation of the sperm whale's eyes and how they see, And so here is the quote from Moby Dick. Moreover, while in most other animals that I can now think of, the eyes are so planted as imperceptibly to blend their visual power so as to produce

one picture, and not too to the brain. The peculiar position of the whale's eyes effectually divided as they are, by many cubic feet of solid head, which towers between them like a great mountain separating two lakes and valleys. This of course, must wholly separate the impressions which each independent organ imparts. The whale therefore must see one distinct picture on this side and another distinct picture on that side, while all between must be profound darkness and nothingness. To him.

Man in effect be said to look out on the world from a sentry box with two jointed sashes for his windows. But with the whale, these two sashes are separately inserted, making two distinct windows, but sadly impairing the view. This peculiarity of the whale's eyes is a thing always to be borne in mind in the fishery and to be remembered by the reader in some subsequent scenes. So they go on to ask is this how a sperm

whale would actually process what it sees? He describes it as if the whale sees in the brain two distinct images as their eyes are set on opposite sides of their head. I assumed that the animals with eyes set on the sides of their head, like deer and whales, see in a way not that dissimilar to how humans do. Now that I'm writing this email, I don't know if I understand how human brains process the information they received

from the eyes. At some point, our brain combines what we see into one's signal or image, processes that information and that is what we see. Does the sperm whale not do the same thing. They would just have a larger blind spot directly in front of their head and a greater view of what is behind or beside them. Well, this email is longer than I thought I would be. Thanks again for the great pod. So again this is from Kevin, Lauren and Natalie. Thank you so much guys

for your question, so really interesting question. About whales. The thing is Herman Melville didn't really know what he was talking about. But on the other hand, neither do we really currently. So sperm whales are enormous, I'm sure you know. So there's a big problem when it comes to studying their brains, like how do you you know even do you do that? It's so big. There's no sperm whale sized m r I or e e g For something that huge normous. So first, something about whale eyes that

we do know. They are adapted for or water vision, and it makes it such that their vision is less clear and less color based than human eyes. So studies on like the inside of their eyes seems to indicate that they see in gray scale and at lower resolution than humans with vision. So they also have multiple focal points per eye, So their pupils dilate and contract, not in like the neat little circle that humans do. Uh,

they are actually a rounded crescent. So when fully contracted, the pupil actually narrows down to like two dots connected by a thin line of pupils. So they actually have two focal points per eye, which is really hard to imagine how their brain would interpret that. So Melville's idea that the whales have two separate images in their brain that remain separate, like two TV screens with a bunch

of darkness us in between. I mean, we don't really know, but based on our own vision and other animals of vision, it seems like that's unlikely. So, uh, even if the whale's head is really massive, the brain could do a great job of splicing the images together into a single understandable image. So we actually, like you guys pointed out in your question, we have a blind spot and our brain will just overrite that with information we don't know. We don't see like a big black spot in the

middle of our vision. We just fill in the blanks. So it is not a profound darkness. It's just we think, oh, yeah, this is normal. This is uh what what we see in the world. I mean, think about like can you see beyond your eyes limit, Like stare straightforward and think, well, what does it look like from my ear outwards? It's not a black void. It's it's just nothing. So oh, even a whale with a blind spot like that is

probably not going to perceive a black void. It's just gonna not perceive that area which is a hard I know, that's a hard thing to like wrap your mind around. But still, so you know, it's very likely that sperm whales have a similar way of coping with this blind spot. In fact, whales have another source of information, visual information, which comes in the form not through sort of their eyes,

but through their echolocation. So could whales put together the information they get from their biological sonar with their visual system to paint a clearer picture of the world. Again, we don't really have a definitive answer. It's really hard to study, uh, sperm whale in general, litt alone study a sperm whales brain. H. So you know, but I think that there isn't much utility to basically experience the world where you just have this big black void and

then two separate screens. I think that would be too confusing. It wouldn't make much sense, I think for something like a sperm whale to have to deal with that all the time. My my guests would be that the brain does compensate for this void and maybe even includes the echolocation as a sort of aid in their visual processing, so that they maybe have a more coherent visual system. Uh, that isn't so like Jankie and interrupted by like you know,

they're the blind spot that is their massive head. Uh. It's not to say that their vision is anything like ours. I would guess based on what I've read, And of course I don't know. I haven't like avatar into a whale brain, so I can't say what it's like to be a sperm whale. But I bet it isn't gray scale. And it seems like they sort of perceived, perceived this high contrast kind of gray scale image of the world

around them. So the sea might be black or really dark gray, and then images that come out from it, maybe these kind of grainy white, ghostly images. And then maybe with the sonar they also get more detail of like depth perception of further away. So maybe it's just like weird gray and bright brilliant, bright white world of of these like ghostly images coming from this grainy dark sea, uh, that they put together in this like three D stereoscopic view of the world around them. But I don't know.

I don't know. I've not had the opportunity yet to interview a sperm whale on the show. But if you are a sperm whale and you'd like to be on the show, just you know, hit me up. So before we go, I'm going to reveal the mystery animal sound from last week's episode. So as a reminder, here was the hint. They may sound like Ringwraith, but these passionate fellows have something other than Frodo on their minds. Yeah. I actually had a bunch of people right in with

the correct answer. I'm really impressed with each and every one of you. I know I make the game, but I don't think i'd even be as good as you guys are at guessing these sounds. So the first three to write in with the correct answer was Joseph P. Who is Johnny? Which that's their actual handle, it's who is Johnny? I'm not asking who is Johnny? And Maryanne D. Congratulations you guys, and to all the other ELK enthusiasts wrote in, great job guessing. So now onto this week's

mystery sound. A hint. I sneakily mentioned this animal during this very episode of the podcast. Did you catch it all? Right? Well, if you have an idea of the answer, or you want to write in with a question or picture of your pets, you can reach out to me. A creature feature Pod at gmail dot com, Creature Feature Pod on Instagram, and Creature Feet Pod on Twitter. That's f e E ten, not f E t is something very different. Thank you

guys so much for listening. If you're enjoying the show, or you want to give me feedback, rating review, if you write that down in I Tunes or wherever you're listening, that really helps me. I read all the reviews and I really appreciate them, and thank you so much to the Space Classics for their super awesome song Exoluminate. Creature features a production of I Heart Radio or more podcasts like the one you just heard. Visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or hey guess what. Wherever you

listen to your favorite shows. Maybe if you're sperm oil, you listen down in the water with your weirdo eyes. See you next Wednesday.