Secret Stash

how do they do it? From massive dragon hoards of nuts to the treasure of tiny kickboxers we're looking at cash. Is that these animals only hope to clear by eating them? Discover this and more as we answer the angel question can a giant weasel see into the future? Joining me today is friend of the show Garfield, Expert, award winning Indie filmmaker and writer for the show Spirit Rangers, Joey Cleft. Welcome, Katy, Thanks so much for having me. Very excited to be back.

Quick question, Uh, you said you're the host of Many Parasites. Is there like a favorite parasite that you're infested with? Probably demodex? Uh. They live in my eyelashes and they eat my dead skin, and they look like tiny microscopic aliens. Um that that does sound like a really useful parasite, and like, I mean, I feel like all parasites look like aliens in some level. Right, Well, good news you

have them too. Technically, there's no useful parasite. Uh, there's I guess there's some Basically with the demodex, there's some nuance to whether they're actually parasites or if they're in a commensal relationship, meaning that they benefit from us and they don't actually do much for us, because like, while it seems like they might help out by eating the dead skin, they can cause problems and irritation if they're too any of them, and there's not really that much

evidence that they do us much good. So they I think that depending on whether they actually cause any irritation, they're either just sort of in a symbiotic relationship with us where it's a commensal relationship where they don't really hurt us or their parasites when they kind of cause irritation and cause problems. Wow, the sounds like freeloaders to me. Start charging them rents. Yeah, well, just so many tiny little tenants, which makes us all landlords. When you think

about it. Yuck. Yeah. Yeah. Now let's talk about the biggest parasite of all landload. Well, today we are talking about hoarding, uh cashing food. So it's something that animals do to keep a secret stash of food, especially in areas where there are sea and all shifts in food availability or if they really need to have a stable supply of food. So there are two main different types

of hoarding methods. There is the larger method where an animal has a single or maybe a couple specific storage area that it stores food in and guards just kind of like a dragon, you know, it's got it's cave and it's got a bunch of coins and various damsels all in there. Yeah, I gotta say it. Really my favorite are the animals that hoard all their stuff in

this specific space. And whenever there are news stories that come out about like I feel like there's a new story that m floats around every once in a while, Like there was a bird or a squirrel that stored a bunch of nuts in like a satellite dish or something like that, and um, the satellite dish was seeing interference and they were trying to figure out, like you

know why isn't it running out of capacity? So they open it up and just like thousands and thousands of nuts poured out, and I was just like, no, that world stash, it's so hard for it. Better put that back. We're actually going to talk about something exactly like that in just a minute. But yeah, it is. It is sad when like you see these news stories, it's like they work so hard on that stash. Yeah, and these

are little animals. It's like that's like that's like a lifetime worth of just like hoarded wealth that all of a sudden we're just taking from them. It was their nest egg, except instead of egg, it's a lot of nuts. Yeah. There, that was their retirement plan. So another technique is scatter hoarding. So instead of a larder, with scatter hoarding, they will hide their food in many different locations. So this is

something that the eastern gray squirrel does. So they take a nut, they go they bury it somewhere and then go bury something else somewhere else. And so both of these methods can be quite advantageous. The first can be a tage just because you only have to defend and memorize like one or two larder's where you keep things in. But it is a problem because it is more prone to theft if a competitor finds your cash and you have put all your nuts in one hole, so to speak.

Whereas with scatter hoarding, it can be advantageous because you have diversified your nut investment. But the disadvantage is that you have to memorize all these locations. You have to travel to all these places, and sometimes you forget and then we get like if you bury a nut in your squirrel and then you forget where it is that grows into a tree. So which is a squirrel's worst enemy? I don't know. I don't know if you can describe

a tree as a squirrel's worst enemy. I mean, I guess that they like they bite trees, so it's like they feel like I feel like they dig and burrowing trees. That's them. That's combat for trees for them, right, I guess. But I mean maybe it's like it's an adversary or relationship. Maybe I don't think so. I mean, like I don't like, I bite a sandwich, but it's not my enemy. Uh, the sandwich is Miami. Everything that I eat I am in a combat relationship with so question about Okay, so, like,

which type of hoarder are you? I feel like I'm a scatter hoarder because i have a protein bars hidden all around Los Angeles and various locations, and I've got a tiny app that I used to track them, and so far nobody's found them yet. Well, when I was younger, I was a larger hoarder. I had like a closet my first time living on my own, I had a closet where I just put everything in. It was like in the cartoons where you opened the closet and everything

falls out. And I decided enough with that. So then I became a scatter hoarder. So now I leave things and all sorts of crannies and and like I'll reach into desk drawers and there's some candy there, and then it's like where did I put my keys? Uh? You know, in a little I drilled a hole in the wall and I stuck them in there for safekeeping. So yes,

I think currently I am a scatter hoarder. I mean it makes sense because like I feel like, you know, as adults were constantly on the move where I mean as a kid, Uh, like larger hoardering makes a ton of sense because you know you're primarily in one location. You're probably hanging around your house a bunch. But as adults, it's like we've got offices we're going to, We've got like different we've got our own homes with different sections of the house, we've got cars. It's like, I totally,

I totally understand. You know your hoarding methods are going to increase and change as you age, Right, Yeah, you're also like increasingly paranoid that you're gonna need just like a quick bite to keep you from, uh taking another nap. So if you hide cheerios around the house, just in little crannies, it's like, oh, a cheerio, then I guess I won't need to rest my ancient thirty year old bones and take a nap. I mean, that's I feel

like that's a real that's like a real thing. Where Um, when I was a kid, I would survive and entirely just on sustaining myself on just like drinking a two liter of orange soda day and I would feel fine. Whereas is an adult, it's like if I go more than like four or five hours without having a snack, I get like a headache, and it's just like getting old sucks. I know, you feel your body sort of like crying out when you aren't eating. It's like like

when you're a kid. It's like, oh, I forgot to eat, no worries, I'll just eat this entire sleeve of oreos and be fine. Now it's like, oh, I forgot to have lunch on time. Okay, I'll eat now because my head hurts. Oh now that I'm eating, I also feel bad. What is going on? Yeah, it's like eight too much. Now I have to take a nap. And then like I feel like I like I drink such a little amount of caffeine that if I have just like a sip of caffeine, I'm just like no, I'm just like

out of it. Like I'll crash for like two days. And it's just one of those things where it's like I used to like live off of soda, like I used to live off of serge. You know. Yeah, I can't like eating too much sugar now in my mouth actually burns from the sugar. It's your mouths right, No, it hurts the roof of my mouth. So it's great, um, but yes, So those are those the main two types

larger larger cashing and scatter cashing. There's a third type of less common hoarding UM where the animal will actually take an inedible food and we'll store it somewhere and let it ripen, which is really fascinating. So we're actually going to talk about all three types of cashing, all three types of hoarding with three different animals. UM. So first we're going to talk about a recent story of a bunch of acorns hidden in the walls of a house. Oh no, I'm so I'm so mad at this that

the cash was found. It was this was this your cash? This might have been my cash, my nuts. Well, apparently in Santa Rosa, California, someone was going about their business in their home and they noticed meal worms coming out of the walls, and so they called the next terminator because when you got worms in your walls, it might

be time to do something. Yeah, I mean, I feel like, I look, it could be a bad sign if you're a family of if you're a family of birds, worms coming out of your walls might be a good sign. So I'm just saying, you know, like perspective, that's like if chocolate starts leaking from your ceiling. I guess if you're a bird, worms, worms is chocolate to birds. Yeah, and I feel like on some level of chocolate started leaking from your ceiling, part of you would be like, oh,

this feels like a problem. They needs to be solved. But another part of you would be like, oh, wow, melted chocolate. Don't mind if I do. It's a problem that can be solved with this boon in my opinion, So in this house, they called the exterminator. So the exterminator started like cut a hole in the wall and a bunch of acorns started to fall out, And so he started to pull out the acorns and more and more and more acorns came out of the hole in

the wall and they just kept coming. Yeah. Looking at the article, uh if it sounds like there are seven pounds of acorns in total they poured out of this wall. Which it's it's such an impressive amount. I think it was made by um. I believe two small woodpeckers over the span of like maybe two or three years or something like that, they made this huge stash of acorns. And uh, I really hope that the woodpeckers were watching through the window as this stash was discovered, and I

hope that in woodpecker they were screaming my stash. No, They're like looking at the exterminator and be like, uh, it's not mine. I'm holding it for a friend. All those acorns, all right, I just picture they're like sitting on the their sitting on the on the pile of acorns in this in this old chimney, and they're just saying like, we did it, We've prepared for winter, We're gonna be good for ye. And then all of a sudden, the acorns are spilling and they're like, no, no, no, no, no,

no no. My nest for little woodpeckers. So let's talk a little bit about a corn woodpeckers and why they would do such a thing. So a corn and woodpeckers are medium sized birds. Obviously they are a type of woodpecker. They've got a bright red spot on their head. They're quite pretty. They will drill holes in trees and store acorns in them. Basically they turn trees into Swiss cheese. H They fill the tree with a bunch of little holes and basically stuff like one acorn per hole. And

so this is called a granary. It's typically in trees, although some times they will use man made wood structures when it's convenient, like telephone poles. UM. As the acorn sit in these holes, the acorns will actually start to shrink as they dry out, so the woodpecker has to fastidiously keep track of this. They will take the acorn out and stick it into a smaller hole so it

doesn't fall out. UM. And to protect their acorns, they will often form social groups of families, basically a bunch of related sisters and then a bunch of related brothers. But the brothers are not related to the sisters, and so they can all mate together, and so they will all protect their uh protect their acorns from potential bandits. Uh. If the breeding collective is kind of disrupted um, other species of birds like scrub jays will come in try

to steal the nuts. Uh. Sometimes another acorn woodpecker will come in and try to join the collective, insinuate themselves into this breeding collective. And sometimes some acorn woodpeckers just come by to spectate to watch the the show. Scrub jays are always up to no good pretty much. I

gotta say a few things on that. I love that for these woodpeckers, this tree that they're stuffing with acorns basically becomes the family store where it's just like you got a mind of the store boy, Like it's a that they that they're like on watch constantly on this tree filled with acorns. And another thing about it is, um, do you know what trip pophobia is? Yes? I do, Uh, the fear of holes. Yeah, I gotta say, somebody that has tripp pophobia. This photo of this tree filled with

acorns is terrifying. I'm very sorry. I'm very sorry. Yes, it is. It is. I can see how that would be unpleasant even for me. I do not have that phobia, but I feel a little bit of discomfort look at it. Yeah, because it basically it basically looks like somebody just machine gun to this tree full of acorns. It's just covered in holes, and it's like, oh, it's probably not great for the tree. You just see Nick Offerman running by you and saying like, squirrels got guns now? It's like,

what squirrels got guns? Now? It is also like really twisted that these woodpeckers take these acorns and then essentially drill them into the tree. That the acorn came from. It is a little bit evil dead, isn't it. Yeah, it's like, what's your problem? These birds are? These birds are left off. They're twisted and sick. The news story about this woodpecker is unusual because acorn woodpeckers typically stick the acorns in these individual holes that are horrifying to

joey Um, not inside large hollow areas. But according to the exterminator who investigated the home um, he saw the birds dropping acorns into a hole in the chimney, and then they birds would come in a separate hole in the attic to feed on the acorns. So they will actually take advantage of uh naturally forming hollows and trees

on occasion. Generally they do stick to this like acorn in whole structure because if the acorn stashed this pile get some wrought on it, it can sacrifice the whole thing. As what happened to these birds. It's humans came in and messed up the entire horde. So um. But they will sometimes try to use these naturally occurring basically cabinets uh and you mentioned earlier, like them using like um

satellite dishes. They will do that in also in California, acorn woodpeckers filled a concave transmission tower with three hundred pounds of acorns, which stopped the signal from this transmission tower and they had to send someone up there to remove the acorns. Um, yeah, I gotta say, Okay, so I'm sticking by my thought. These uh, these woodpeckers are

real sicks. But but aside from that, I gotta say I really appreciate that they basically with this this house where they filled this chimney with acorns, they essentially threw off the They threw off the chains of the patriarchy and built their own bird feeder. Like they're like, we don't need humans to do this, we can do it ourselves. It's the bird singularity. They've learned to build their own bird feeders and now they're unstoppable. Yeah, now they don't

need us. So in that case, I guess it's probably like by by emptying there there's seven hundred pound acorn cachet, we're just we're slowing them down. We've we bought humanity another couple of months, another generously, another couple of months before the up rising. Yeah, so Joey, what do you get when you cross a kangaroo and a rap Um. I'm gonna say my ex wife her just kidding, I don't have an ex wife. I just felt like that

feels like the setup of like a nineteen forties Catskills comedies. Yeah, it's like, you know, she's she's like a kangaroo because she kicks me, but she's like a rat because she loves cheese. Because she keeps biting the walls of our house. That's why we got into force. She ate my house. That feels like a probably women, they're always eating our house, right, fellas. Yeah, and then one guy in the house is like, yeah, yeah, yeah,

but no, the answer is kangaroo rats. Yeah right, yeah, answer, yeah, kangaroo rats. Kangaroo rats. So, kangaroo rats are native to western North America in hot, semi arid sort of desert regions, such as are found in California, Arizona, and in northern Mexico. Um. They are cute. They look like little mice that have kangaroo legs. They have these powerful rear legs that allow them to leap and run. They kind of hop around. Um, and yeah, they look like little tiny mouse sized kangaroos.

They're very very cute. Yeah, yeah, I gotta say that. You have to if you, um, if you're listening to this and you have your phone or you're on a computer something like that, definitely google kangaroo grat It's a very adorable little critter. Um. It's for its very cute. It looks very pettable. UM as a big fan of animals that are cute and cuddly. I'm gonna give this thing five cute muzzles. I like that rating. Yeah, and

there's there's a picture of it in the footnotes. Also in the footnotes is a picture of one of these kangaroo rats delivering a high flying kick to the face of a rattlesnake, because that is what they will do. They are way Wait, do they hunt rattlesnakes. No, they are victims of rattlesnakes. Rattlesnakes hunt them, but they are not a passive victim. They will kick the rattlesnake in the face to evade them. Um do they How often do they win these fights? You know, I don't know,

like a percentage, but it's pretty effective. If they are able to detect that the rattlesnake is there before the rattlesnake strikes them. And they do successfully kick the rattlesnake, they have a very good chance of running away. So if they notice the rattlesnake in time, I'd say their chances are pretty good because they could definitely outrun a rattlesnake. Yeah, and if you look at this photo like it really feels like this kangaro rat has gotta direct hit on

this rattlesnake's face, it's very funny. So another cute thing is that because they live in hot desert climates, they have to preserve their body moisture and regulate their temperature, so they will stay in their burrows during the hot day. They will plug up the holes with some dirt to keep cool um, and while they are sleeping during the day, they curl up into a little ball with their nose in their belly hair, which creates a pocket of moisture

from the condensation around their nose. So very very adorable. Okay, I I'm going to google a picture of that kangaroo rat curled up in a ball and you're going to be able to hear me live react to this. Okay, let's kangaroot called new Ball, Live Live Joey a reaction. Yes they are. They're extremely cute. So the reason I bring up kangaroo rats is that they are scatter cashers or scatter hoarders, and they also store things in their

cheeks in a really weird way. So they have cheek pouches, but it's not kind of like how you would think, like where a hamster. It's cheek pouches and they will stuff something in their mouth and it'll make their cheeks pooch out and it's very cute. The kangaroo rat has external cheek pouches that are not inside their mouths, but are like two pockets on either side of their face. So they have these two pockets on their cheeks that are lined with fur like internally, and it doesn't go

it's like outside of their mouth. They don't put things into their mouth. They put them directly into these like little pockets like you have pockets on your pants. They just have pockets on the sides of their faces that they can stuff seeds into. Yeah, I gotta say the photo that you have that kangaroot cheek pockets um scrolling past it, I was immediately horrified because I thought this

kangaroo had several mouths. Yeah, it's a little spooky. It's also like the photo, I feel so bad for this kangaroo rat because like this is probably it's like secret little seed stash, Whereas this human just like shoved the rat down and it's like pulling its cheek pocket open, and it's like, look at this. This is probably the most embarrassing moment of that kangaroo rats life. Where's his

constitutional rights against unfair search and seizure? Yeah, I mean that that's that said, that kangaroo oute was probably also trafficking kangaroo rat cocaine. Sure, why not? It's not his is his friends? So oh yeah, right, he doesn't. I don't know how it got there. It will deposit these seeds from its weird little face pockets into cases that

are distributed all throughout its territory. So it will run to a place, dig a little hole, buried seeds, run to another place, dig a little hole, bury its seeds, and so in this way, it is not unlike the eastern gray squirrel. Research into the behavior of kangaroo rats have found that they don't need landmarks to remember where they have buried their seeds in the short term, but after ten days they use landmarks to be able to

triangulate where they stored their seeds. So they kind of memorized landmarks nearby where they stored things and used that to find caches that they had buried a long time ago. Then ten days later they're just like, wait, where was that. Yeah, it's like yeah, just like, oh, it was by the McDonald's. Yeah, instead of dude wears my car, Dude, where's my seeds? Where's my seeds that I stored in my mouth pouches?

That is really interesting that they that like basically they carry seeds as it's not like a permanent storage thing. They're not constantly carrying like a reloaded seeds for seats, for snacks in their cheeks. It's more like that's just how they more easily carry seeds from location location to put them stat in these cases. Pockets. Yeah, face backpack, that'd be fine. What a very specific mutant superpower face backpacks. I mean, I like it. I've always wanted more pockets.

Maybe not on my face, maybe not on my face, but look, these kangaroo rats make a work for them. Yeah, So now I want to talk about my favorite type of hoarding called ripening hoarding or ripening cachhing. This is where an animal will do something that is in a way very weirdly humans. So so weirdly human at doom, scrolls on Twitter and listens to radiohead. Yes, um, it's a it's a fascinating things stuff like in this economy, stocks and bonds, cell phones and shoes. Yeah, all human stuff.

Uh so. The tyra is a very strange animal found in Central and South America in subtropical forests. It's in the Musteladae family, related to weasels and badgers, and they kind of look like a giant weasel. So they weigh they're they're about the size of like a medium sized dog, small to medium sized dog. They're like about fifteen pounds or seven KOs. They have dark brown body, brown head,

and a lighter patch on their chest um. This throat patch is actually unique and can be used to identify individual tyras um, which is similar to another animal, the giant river otter, who has a neat throat patch that can be used by other giant river otters to recognize their friends. For the tyra's I'm not sure if the con specifics. That is, the members of their own species use the throat patches to identify each other, but humans can use them. So like, hey, that one is break

I remember his throat patch. Yeah, it's a it's a cute accessory. I mean, I gotta feel like, I don't know us humans, we should we should all start getting throat patches. It's just a nice It's a nice way to like break up the fur um. You know. I think you could probably get designer throat patches, something from Gucci. I think that Tyra is just you know, the picture I'm looking at is really working it. Uh, so you

go Tyra. They're very cute. They have these long fluffy tails as well, which I think brings them from Oh this is a sort of like newly animal that wants to bite me too. It's cute. Yeah, it's like it still wants to bite me, but I'm gonna try to pet it while it does. It's gonna bite me, but in this case, it's probably gonna be my fault because

I tried to pet it. Oh for sure. So they are omnivores and they will hunt small mammals and reptiles, but they will also climb trees for fruit, and in fact, they will go to great lengths to get tasty fruit. One resourceful trick they have is picking unripe plantains, And an unripe plantain is not a nice thing to eat, so the tyra hides it somewhere, lets it ripen, and then finds and eats it later. Um. That's so interesting and it really makes me wonder like at what point

did they evolved to learn how to do that? And I feel like I've heard other stories of animals, um, you know, hiding fruit or hiding food until it ferments, and I think that there's actually a few stories of like um animals hiding you know, grapes or something like that somewhere and then waiting for them to ferment, and then them and then getting drunk off of them because it basically it just turns into wine. Yeah. I mean, there are there are multiple cases of animals doing this

sort of like ripening cashing behavior. Um pikas do it. Um. They will take plants that are somewhat toxic and then high kind of put them in their dens and then they over time lose that toxicity. Leaf cutter ants will take sections of leaves and then they will sort of farm this fungus that grows on the leaves and then eat that later. So yeah, this is a technique used

by all sorts of animals and it's really fascinating. Yeah, I feel like I want to say that I do that when I buy bananas from the store and then just don't eat them for a couple of weeks, and then when I find them they're like black, and then I'm like, hey, I could probably stilete one of these before throwing it away. That's definitely uh, me doing this behavior and not me being lazy and careless. My trick with bananas is I don't eat them because they are

the devil's fruit. Wait there the devil's fruit. Why are there the devil's fruit? Because they're stinky and bad and I hate them. Oh, anything anything I don't like personally is immoral. So um so I guess that, like you were saying that, when you're eating a sandwich, you're not having combat with the sandwich, but if you're eating a banana, you're in combat with the banana exactly exactly. Yeah, yeah, I'm you're not eating it for necessenance, you're eating it

to destroy it despite the banana exactly. So with these tiras, they will hide their bananas in these very creative spots, like sometimes in like the bowl of a bromeliad. So a bromeliad is this plant. It's like this sort of spiky plant that attaches itself to trees and it will form kind of like a bowl or like a shelf

against the tree. And so these tires just like put the banana and the bromelia to hide it like they're hiding an Easter egg, and they'll come back a few days later to come get it when it's nice and ripe um. That's awesome And I'm just so crafty they are. Yeah, And there's like some discussion about like, well, does this mean that tiras are able to plan for the future.

Can they conceive of the future because they are waiting for bananas to ripen um And I don't know if the fact that they ripen bananas is evidence that they have a concept of the future, but they at least understand that the food can't be eaten like right then, so they have to like put it somewhere, wait a while,

and go get it, which I think is it's pretty intelligent. Yeah, when you have to think about like going back to the the acornwoodpecker, like presumably when they're up storing a munch of acorns in a chimney or something like that, there is this attitude that like there's you know, they're saving up for winter. They're like saving up for like

more more lean times. So like I feel like in these animals that we're talking about, there's definitely at least some idea of planning that's going into the decisions that they're making. I mean, one can look at it two ways. I mean it could be planning or it could just be this instinct right like this, like with squirrels, like this instinct like I got a nut, I gotta bury it, and you know I would I would say that with things like squirrels and woodpeckers. Not not to say they're

not intelligent. I'm just not sure that they. I think a lot of it has got to be instinctive, Like they just have this desire to get as much stuff as they can and shove it into things. Because it's such it's such repeated behavior. So it's so it's like my instinct to hide chocolate at my desk got it wake up in the morning, and I don't know why

I'm doing it. I'm just doing it. Yeah, I mean, like, I think that even in humans, we still kind of have like you may have that like feeling of security if you accumulate a lot of food, like if if you've stored a lot of food, like when you're packing a backpack full of food or putting food in your pantry. I think there is a satisfaction in that. And I think with animals they are sort of some of these

animals there and instinctively driven to do these things. When you're like preparing food, like you have food that you can't eat at the moment, but you put it in a position that you will be able to eat later. It could be instinctively driven, it could be learned behavior. It could like something like the tyra may not have a concept of the future, but may just through trial and air, know this to be a thing, or learn

it from other tiras. You know. It's so it's it's it's unclear how much this reveals about how this animal can sort of think about the future, but it it's so like an example that I've read about that seems to indicate something where like, uh, there's like a story of captive chimpanzee like hoarding rocks, keeping rocks of very specific shape and then using those rocks to like toss at zookeepers or something. To me, I don't think that's like an instinct. I think that this Uh. I think

that that chimpanzee is a jerk. It's premeditated, yeah, which I love, love love chimpanzee crimes. Um. But yeah, I think it's it's it's starts. It gets confusing because I think it's like, well, what is instinct? What is just this little squirrel going like I gotta not I want to bury it? And what is some like at what point do they does it become something where it's like, huh, have this thing? This is a surprise tool for later, Like you know, it's hard, it's hard to know what

point at which that happens in animals. But I do think generally, like a chimpanzee, I am much more willing to believe I can think about the future and make a plan, whereas like an Eastern gray squirrel, I don't think it has a concept of the future. I think it is more driven just by these like instinctive urges. Yeah, I guess that that's That's something that's so interesting me about like, um, you know, animal intelligence, and you know, I'm a big cat guy. I think about cats all

the time. I remember a cat that I had growing up, like my childhood cat, um. Whenever we would give it a bath, immediately after we gave it a bath, it would like snug. It would like, you know, while it's still wet, as we're dragging off with the towel, it would like snuggle up to us and want to sit on our laps. And at first we thought it was cute because it was so like violently opposed to get

a path. And then it would poop on us, and then we were like, oh, this cat, that was for sure that cat doing that out of spike because it did not want a bath. And then it was like, it's like making eye contact with us while it's pooping in our laps. Well, I do think animals can be spiteful, especially cats, So I don't know, maybe that was out of spite. Could be. Yeah, Well, before we go, we have to play a little game, and that game is

called Guess Who's Squawking? The Mystery Animal Sound game Every week I play a mystery animal sound in you the listener, and you the gifts try to guess who squawking, and that can be any animal in the world, not just birds, not just bees, any animal. Last week's Mystery Animals sound hint was this. This is one unhappy noodle. Do you hear that? Yeah, so I'm going to guess that that is a parakeet. Interesting gifts, Uh incorrect. However, so this

was actually a mink rescued by Ontario Wildlife Rescue. This mink was apparently trapped in an air conditioner. Um. Yeah, no, they got him out. The noise of him. He's not in the air conditioner. He's like in a little transport cage. Okay, good, I think you were like this yeah this uh, this mink is in the process of being tortured with no. No, he's just he's just annoyed because probably a little scared because he's in a transport cage. But you know, they

got him and then they they they released him. Um, but you know, so he's not These are not happy noises, but he's all right. Um this uh, this tiger is in the process of being no oh no. Um. So minks like to live by the water, and they will often fish things like fish for fish or crustaceans um, or they will hunt for things UH pick on somebody

their own size, like rabbits UM. Unfortunately, minks are also prized for their fur, and mink farms UH will often like selectively breathe them for like white coats, and then they will kill them and harvest them for their fur um other than you know. Obviously, the problems with this is that minks are not well suited to a mostly sedentary cage lifestyle, and they will often show signs of

mental deterioration and compulsive behavior in mink farms. UH. And then, aside from this being bad for minks very obviously, it's bad for people to Mink farms are not great in terms of safety when it comes to viruses because these minks are housed closely together in these battery cages and there's a lot of nose to nose contact and ability

for viruses to spread quickly. So we actually saw sort of in the midst of the pandemic like um covid spread UH in these mink farms, and more recently we've seen H five in one the Avian influenza sort of go through a mink farm, which it typically does not transmit well within mammals. So the fact that it was transmitting from mink to mink in these mink farms is not It's not great. It's like not a good thing. So five and there's an H five five and one. Yeah,

they keep coming out with sequels. Yeah, it's like it is. I feel like, um, you know, especially in times of COVID, it's like it was very big news whenever there was a new COVID strain, and now it's like I feel like things are covered like just slightly less, to the point that like you don't watch the news for three days and then you're just like there's a new virus.

I should like monkey talks, what's that? You know? Yeah, I mean you can drive yourself kind of nuts, like trying and keep up with all the stralians of viruses that come out because there's a lot. So I I don't want to scare people. I still think that, like especially with H five in one. Yeah, it's like epidemiologist, virologists, they're concerned about it. But these kinds of scares happened

pretty frequently. It's just people aren't usually tuned into them. Um, like we don't really they don't really make it to the news as much, or even if they do, they're not as big of a deal. I think everyone's really plugged into it now because of COVID, because we've been

through a pandemic. Uh So I think it's I think it's good, like more awareness is good to a certain extent, but I I think that like there it can go too far where people are just like it's scared that every new mutation of every virus is going to be like an apocalyptic event, which is very unlikely. But yeah, so it's it's like, yeah, you know, this is this

is concerning. But you know, I do think that things like mink farms are not necessary, uh at least not necessary to have them be such sort of cruel bio hazards. I would say, oh yeah, I mean it's one of those things where it's like there's a there's a lot of reasons why mink farms are maybe not the best thing in the world, and this is definitely one of several reasons. Yeah. Also, like you know, just chill out.

All the minks guys. They they just want to be They just want to scamp around, be furry little noodles and eat fish. Yeah you look, you don't. You don't have to wear mink coat. Just throw on a Garfield T shirt. It's just as nice and made of cotton. It's great. Yeah, man, I I Garfield sweaters over meat coats all the way. Honestly, to meet Garfield is much higher fashion. Oh yeah, for sure. If I see somebody on a runway with a mink coat, I'm just gonna

be like, what is this nineteen? Whereas if I see somebody with a Garfield coat, I'm gonna be like, are you my new king or queen? You know how? Like animal rights activists like tossed red paint over like for we should toss orange paint and be like you've been garfed orange orange paint and then just like us, and then somebody runs in with like some black paint. Just paints on some black stripes really quick, two big google eyes. Yeah, garfing in the name of animal and human welfare. I

like it, Garfield activist. I mean now the okay, so now might I might go the other direction? The urge to get uh a giant fur coat and to die the fur orange with pleque tots. So it looks like I skinned Garfield is you know, definitely I'm not going to do it, but the urge do it's greater than zero. I got good news for you. You can buy fake for an orange already probably and then wear that like

a skin Garfield. You could probably even get like a big Garfield stuffed animal and skin that one, and then that will really sell the experience of you skinning a Garfield. Okay, yeah, this sounds like this sounds like a good fashion They're actually on Google there there's already a ton of Garfield

fur coats, good healthy fun. I like how we've we've ended this podcast where I try very hard to spread empathy for animals with like this is how you can simulate skinning Garfield and wearing them, whereas I'm just like I gotta skin me a Garfield and then who will Hey Mondays, I think you would hate Mondays even more

if you skinned them on a Monday. Yeah, that's my that's my special instructions to the mink farm because like is like, make sure that you before you die these mink fors Garfield killers, make sure you do it on a Monday. Wow. Yeah, Like yeah, we could be saying like, hey, maybe cool it with the spreading viruses and being mean to minks, or we could be like, actually, the problem is you don't dire for orange and make it look

like Garfields. Honestly, Now I'm just going and I'm just going down the rabbit hole, like seeing what Garfield fur coat turns up. And there's a lot of like really amazing like Marina wool and faux for trimming jacket that's like very much Garfield kilors, but not on purpose, so it feels like it's high fashion. Well, I figured out my new the new me before you drop a bunch of disposable income on Garfield out or where we have to play this week's mystery animal sound. So the hint

is it is something that no Lemur wants to hear. So, Joey, who do you think that is? I mean that sounded terrified, like no Lemur wants to hear this, and none of us do either. Yeah, I also did not want to hear that. Um, so I'm gonna say, look, as a grand expert, I think this might be a grant. You are absolutely correct, which means all the listener will hear is a mysterious quacking noise and uh so they will

have to guess who is making that sound. But yes, congratulations, you're absolutely right if you think you know who is making that sound, and you write to me at Creature Feature Pod at email dot com. If you guess correctly, I might read your name on the podcast. Uh well, Joey, thank you so much for joining me today. Where can people find you? Um? Yeah, thanks so much for remy it's always a blasting on Creature Future and congrats on

secretly incredibly fascinating. Yes, so you can find me on Twitter at Joey kagemant Um as well as TikTok at Joey Cayman, and then you can find me on Instagram at Joey Clift with like five or six eyes. And then, um, if you want to check out stuff I'm working on right now. Um. I was a writer consulting producer on the show Sphere Rangers, which just came out on Netflix, super super cool kids show. I think it really dig. And then my Comedy Central digital series Gone Native just

came out on all of Comedy Central social channels. It's a bunch of fun animated shorts about just like microaggressions that native folks have to deal with. So check all that stuff out and uh and follow and listen to work Creature Feature. It's a great podcast. Thank you like plug yourself, not me, but I appreciate it. Yeah, yeah, yes. The main plug is to keep listening to this show you're listening to. Oh gosh, thank you. I don't think I don't think I've ever gotten reverse plugged before, but

that's appreciate that. It's very thoughtful. Well, thank you guys. And and hey, I'm gonna plug Joey check out Joey stuff for goodness sakes. Thank you and thank you guys so much for listening. If you're enjoying the show and you want to leave radio review, I deeply appreciate it. I read all of them and I appreciate each and every single one. And thank you to these Space Classics for their super awesome song Exo Lumina. Creature Feature is

a production of I Heart Radio. For more podcasts like the one you just heard, visit the I Heart Radio app Apple podcast or Hey guess what where have you listening to your favorite shows? I don't judge you. See you next Wednesday.