Welcome to Creature Feature production of iHeartRadio. I'm your host of Mini Parasites Katie Golden. I studied psychology and evolutionary biology, and today on the show Weirdest Animal Spit, we are separating fact from fiction when it comes to expectorating animals. Is komodo dragon saliva really deadly? And what could be as cute as a harmless little mal? Discover this and more as we answer the angel question, can we just throw worms on our problems? Joining me today as friend
of the show. Co host of George Center and Lower after Hours, Will Pull aka Christy, I'm a Guccie Mane.
Welcome, thank you for having me back. And you've already referenced moles at the very top of the show, and I feel like, no matter the subject matter they get brought up, every episode I've been on has has moles in it.
They really maybe moles just desire to be your animal.
It's I'm starting to believe that like, if I had a an animal that matches my interests and personality, it would it would have to be the mole. Like they just seem like they are the single most interesting set of creatures of all time.
They are very cool. I love them. There's so many of them. There's like this whole thing of carsonization where nature loves a crab and things keep evolving to be crab shaped. The same can be said of moles. There's a lot of mole like animals or animals called moles, who are not related to true moles, but they look so similar and it's convergent evolution because nature also loves a mole. So eventually we'll I'll either be crabs or moles. So it sounds like you'd be team moles.
That is, that is the We already have the conspiracy theories about mole people right right, Like that's already a thing, so we're already headed there. We're already predicting our own future with that conspiracy theory. So I for when I am excited to eventually take my true final form as a mole person underground. As much time as I spend online, I feel like I'm halfway there.
So I feel like the only reason I would choose crab over mole is that I love scuttling. Scuttling is great.
Okay, so you like walking, like like scuttling sideways especially, Yeah.
No, the sideways scuttle is very efficient and I enjoy it so Other than that, though, mole life sounds great to just be down in dank, moist soil.
Yeah.
Yeah, So we are going to talk about a secret superpower that moles have. But first will have you heard of komodo dragon saliva being especially dangerous? I have?
I heard. I feel like growing up it was one of those science facts that you learn when you're like eight or nine years old that you just run with for the rest of your life, that komodo dragons have poisonous saliva, that they basically have venom or I guess venom would be the correct term there, not poisonous. Poisonous is when you're toxic when something eats you, right, and
venomus is when you deliver toxins to your prey. Yes, So I feel like I grew up hearing that komodo dragons were super venomous, that the bite of a Komodo dragon could take down a wildebeeste or a you know, a ox or something like that.
Yeah. So this is like the way that I heard it is that komodo dragons saliva is so full of bacteria that it can just bite something and then wait for sepsis to kick in. So it's like they have this extremely nasty, noxious septic spit saliva, and then they bite something and then that saliva like gives the animal sepsis. The animal keels over, and the Komodo dragon just casually walks over and eats its prey. So there are a lot of interesting ideas and myths about the Komodo dragons,
but for some of the facts. So, Komodo dragons are indeed very impressive lizards. They are the thickest lizards in the world. They grow over ten feet long and they weigh from about one hundred and fifty to three hundred pounds, so they are the chunkiest lizards on the planet.
That's thickest is an interesting way of describing it. Like I now I'm picturing a komodo dragon with like a nice rear end on it. They do be quite honest.
Thick as a bowl of oatmeal, to be honest.
Okay, all right, all right, They.
Do not skip leg day. They live up to about thirty years, so.
Well more like komodo wagon. Oh my gosh, and that'll be it for me, all right, thank you so much for having me on I appreciate it.
I think that's it. I think we've got an episode there.
We nailed it, and we nailed it.
So they live on islands of Indonesia in dry grasslands and they will dig burrows to shelter themselves and conserve heat. So yeah, about their saliva. You hear that their saliva is full of bacteria such that they can hunt down their prey by just biting them, like once waiting for their prey to run off, and then the prey get
sepsis or an alternative versions of it. They bite their prey, their prey succumbs to the venom, the toxic venom, and then like collapses and then the Momoto dragon just casually walks up. And that sounds really cool, like a very cool assassin move, but it's not actually true. So okay, Komodo dragon saliva is not particularly septic compared to other animals, and they actually have relatively good mouth hygiene, like they don't.
One of the myths is that they have so much rotting flesh in their mouths that it's like that's what makes their mouth septic. But actually, after they eat meat and carry and they spend a lot of time like licking and wiping and cleaning their face, so they're they're clean little guys.
They like not unlike myself. Yeah, having eaten ribs or chicken wings. I'm very Uh I'm empathizing with the komodo dragon, and people would look at me and think that my mouth is full of bacteria. So uh, yeah, I empathize with this creature so far.
Top misconception about will is that he has septic saliva. So they do have venom like proteins in their saliva, so their saliva is partially venomous, but it is unclear to what extent this venom actually leads to death of their prey. If the venom does have an effect, it would probably work by preventing blood clotting and lowering blood pressure,
increasing the chance that the animal goes into shock. But it doesn't just rely on a sneaky little bite and then wait for its prey to succumb to the venom. They very much want to murder as fast and as close and quickly as possible, so the komodo dragon is very patient. It will lay in wait and ambush its prey. Once it grabs its prey, its goal is to kill this thing. As quickly as possible. It will use its razor sharp teeth and claws to tear open the animal's flesh,
causing massive bleeding, shock, and death. And so the one bite and then let it wander off is a myth. The myth may have originated from prey that did escape a komodo dragon attack, only to later succumb to its wounds, or sometimes animals like water buffalo will go into the water and with an open wound, if you go into dirty water, you are very likely to get sepsis, and so like that combined with the blood loss is a
recipe for the animal to die as well. And then the komodo dragon just tracks it down like smells where it goes. And then you know, it's not gonna waste the animal that tried to kill, so if it can, it will kill it on the spot, and then if the escapes, it will try to track it down and resume. Uh dinner.
These Uh, I'm looking at pictures of komodo dragons. They have such an odd face to them. It's it's like it's almost dog like. Yeah, they're they're snout like. They they look like they it's it looks like a like a first grader tried to draw a dinosaur and then doesn't quite know how faces work yet, or or like the the muscle structure they're they're almost almost like doofy looking, even though I know, like you you just described them.
You know they're how gnarly these things are. Uh, they're not friendly at all.
They can though I think they're c they are cute. They're not not a good thing to pet, but they are cute, and.
They're they're like you said they are. They are chonky like they're they've got like folds everywhere, like they're they got a little arms. I know all of this is misleading because I also googled a pet komodo dragon because I wanted to see if people actually kept these things as pets. Not that I'm encouraging that, but one of the first suggestions was seven reasons the komodo dragon is an ideal pet. But you are you were dissuading me
of any of that notion. Also, I think this article is actually satire.
So yeah, I would say I would say don't keep a komodo dragon as a pet because it does occasionally, very occasionally attack and kill humans, so they don't typically prey on humans, that's not like their prey of choice, but they attack occasionally. In a thirty eight year period, there were five human deaths caused by komodo dragon attacks and nineteen non fatal attacks. So that's not statistically speaking, your very unlikely to be hurt by a komodo dragon.
But I would say that if you have one as a pet, your chance of becoming a komodo dragon snack has risen, you know, skyrockets. Yeah, your relative risk ratio has gone up quite a bit.
And I imagine, I imagine the like, if you did keep one as a pet, you wouldn't want it to like lick you in the face or anywhere like a dog.
Like.
Even though like you're dispelling this about its saliva, it's still probably not a great thing to get all over each.
It probably still has stink breath from all of the things, and eats I mean, like it will eat carrion. It's not necessarily picky about that. They have also been known to dig up human bodies if graves are shallow enough, and eat them. So people who live in Komodo dragon territory generally try not to bury people in shallow grapes. Nearmoto dragons. But yeah, I mean so they also are.
It's interesting I say they're not picky, but they are actually a little picky because they apparently avoid eating undigested plant matter. When they're eating an herbivore. They'll lead everything else except for like the plant matter that's inside of their bellies because I guess that's difficult for the komodo dragon to digest.
Wow, okay, they are. They are picky. They're so they have the they have the diet of like a kindergartener that doesn't want to eat their vegetables. Oh, actually, that's weird. Kindergarteners don't eat dead bodies for the most part.
That I mean most of them don't.
Most of them don't. Yeah, this is okay, I'm seeing too. This is kind of off subject. But like a two komodo dragons fighting on their hind legs. Yeah, that looks. These creatures are so so cool.
Yeah, they're pugnacious in gnarly h They they'll eat anything too, from like eggs to monkeys, deer, and water buffalo alive or dead. They will sometimes like get a huge chunk of food in their mouth and like ram it down their throat by like slamming into a tree or something,
because like they are trying to get it down. And one true fact about their saliva is that they have a lot of it and it works as a lubricant so that they're more likely to be able to get huge chunks of flesh down their gullet.
Wow, okay, so just more and more like me with everything.
You thought.
You thought moles were the ones you could relate to you the most, but really it's a handle that. Yeah. So they the reason they don't choke when they're doing this is they actually have a tube under their tongue that connects to their air passage. So I don't recommend trying it as a human because we don't have that.
And to make sure that because they eat such large quantities at one time and their stomachs actually can expand to accommodate this, they need to digest it relatively quickly, not too slowly, because otherwise the food will like rot inside their stomach and they'll have sure basically what lactose and tolerant people have to tolerate if they drink milk without a kind of like lactate, but with like a
whole water buffalo. So they will sit bask in the sun after a meal to try to speed up digestion because the sun warms their bodies up, which increases the rate of their metabolism.
It's similar to alligators around here that we have.
Yeah, exactly.
They basically they don't feed in the winter time because that would the food would rotten their stomachs and kill them essentially.
Yeah, exactly exactly. So, yeah, they need that basking time. It's not just to like preen and feel proud after they've eaten a water buffalo. It's so that they don't get sick from the rotting meat if they don't have enough warmth to fuel their metabolism. But yeah, so they are cute to me. Probably not good pets, I'm gonna say.
They will see you more like either an obstacle or a snack, and they are their venom Their saliva is really interesting in that it is slightly venomous and it is a lubricant, but it is not uh, it is not the septic, toxic toilet mouth that rumor has it. So that is just a dirty lie about the Kommodo dragons. They do not have potty mouths.
They do curse a lot, though they did are known. They are known for being very crass, uh, you know, having crass personalities and kind of off color humor.
Yeah. Yeah, they have that edgy South Park humor and it's really immature. Very they grew up.
They grew up like all of us did, like watching Comedy Central in the nineties and developing, you know, mighty personality because of it.
Well, we're going to take a quick break, and when we get back, exciting news, we're talking about moles. All right, So we are back, and now we are onto Will's favorite animal, the male.
Yay.
So moles are adorable little ground dwellers. What kind of threat do you think a male could possibly be? They're so adorable. Well, mole saliva is fitomous.
Ooh really, yes, I had no idea.
So European moles are your sort of classic looking moles. They have gray for a pointy snout. They have large, pink four claws for digging, and a stubby tail.
U the Old Country, the Old Yeah.
And while it's called the European mole, it's also found in Asia, so it's kind of found all over Eurasia. They are very in my opinion, they're very cute. They have the classic like little tiny beady mole eyes. They have a little pointy nose. They're not like the star nosed moles, which are very fascinating. I love them too, but the star nosed moles have those like it almost
looks like a hand in front of their face. And European moles are not the only moles that are have a venomous bite, but we're just focusing on them for this one. So, uh they have rapid metabolisms and eat about half their body weight in food every day, and uh so they need to eat a lot to keep that up. And they have basically a few senses that they use to find and hunt prey. Popular portrayals of moles depict them as being completely blind, which is not
exactly true. It is true that their eyes are very underdeveloped because they spend most of their time underground, so they don't really need a keen eyesight, but they can detect light and dark. They can detect movement, and this is really helpful for them to be able to evade predators that may have invaded their little mole holes. So they're not totally blind, but their eyesight is definitely not great.
These Like I googled mole eyes and they are comically tiny, like they look like like little dots of ink on the mole itself. It's I did not realize they were that small. They're there, it's it doesn't it doesn't look real almost it looks photoshopped just.
To it looks like someone took like a ballpoint pin and just like, oh wait, I forgot the eyes.
Yeah, it looks like if you were drawing a comic of a mole, how you would draw their eyes on it, right.
Just like little dots. It's very I find it super cute. Like you can you can barely see the eyes. It looks like they don't have eyes at all. It's just that their eyes are very very underdeveloped and very very tiny, just basically like little pinpoints.
Yeah, exactly exactly. But these things are so stinking cute.
I know, I know it. Like the the I feel like I love Star No's moles as well. And most of everything I'm saying about the European mole also applies to the Star No's mole. But the Star No's mole, like It's definitely not got the same cuteness because its face looks like a Boshian nightmare.
Yeah, it looks like the uh like on par with pans that pans loud. Yes, creature that holds the eyes.
Yes, absolutely absolutely, And there's a definite reason that it has that disturbing looking nose, which we'll talk about in a little bit. But yeah, I definitely do. Just in terms of cuteness factor. The European mole is quite a bit cuter, so they can hear low frequencies and vibrations. Their hearing is otherwise not like amazing, But the sense they rely on the most is their sense of touch. So the tip of their nose is one of the most sensitive touch organs in any mammal.
Uh.
These are called Emer's organs, and they are able to sense very They're able to sense vibrations through the soil through these organs on their nose, and that's why the star nose mole has those like finger like a pin dies. They have a bunch of these Eimers organs on their nose and they're very, very sensitive to vibration. The European mole also has these on its nose, it just doesn't have as many as the star nose mole.
It's like, you know, similar to like when you drop acid or smoke weed, you're very sensitive to vibrations, like good ones especially. It's kind of their equivalent of doing drugs, you know, right.
And then when they're trying to maintain the little sunglasses that they wear to like keep you from seeing their bloodshot eyes are very comically tiny exactly exactly.
Sometimes they venture into like cultural appropriation where they start growing dreads or wearing like, you know, rosta stuff, and you know, you kind of have to keep the mole in check.
Yeah, you have to do like what rock have you been under? And they're like pretty much all of them. I've been under all the rocks exactly.
We're not We're not doing this anymore.
Yeah, I don't know. I don't know what's what's culturally insensitive or not. I'm literally living underground.
I am a mole person. I am a literal mole person.
So their favorite food is earthworms, though they have been known to snack on other invertebrates as well as on small mammals like shrews and mice. So, you know, you think of moles as being really cute wind in the willows, little guy, you know, being sweet and cute and not eating entire little mice, little baby cute mice. But yeah, they will, they'll do it nice.
Yeah, so they'll they're kind of omnivores in that way. They'll do they eat plant matter of any kind.
I don't think they typically do. They're mostly they're mostly insective wars, but then they are opportunistic carnivores, so they will eat small, small mammals on occasion.
And people people get mad about having moles in their yard. But is it just because they make like the little visible tunnels.
Yeah, on top, it's just because they make the holes. They and if they go through plant roots, like if they tunnel through plant roots, that could damage the plants. But they don't eat the plants. They're eating the earthworms, so you know they're not they're not really plant eaters. It's just they may uh sort of make cause some damage as a byproduct of their tunneling.
And people got to get over that. I think love having moles in my yard. And I think I've had moles in my yard before and I didn't try to get rid of them. You know, like if you're not planting stuff, that can't have like a tiny little adorable mole crawl through it, then you need to plant something hardier. In my opinion, yeah, you know.
They're also much less destructive than like gophers or ground hogs, so.
Yeah, yeah, I like it. I don't think we have gophers, or maybe we have gophers and groundhogs around here. But also our soil is very sandy living this close to the river and the beach, so we don't have like, I feel like, we don't have a ton of those burrowing animals around here. But yeah, I would personally, I would take it as a badge of honor if my soil was healthy enough to sustain earthworms and then moles on top of it.
You know, absolutely they are very cute. And then this is kind of where the cuteness ends a little bit. So there's saliva contains a paralytic toxin that can paralyze their prey. Now for a human, it's not very threatening. Their bites can hurt, but they're not going to paralyze a human. But they are very good at paralyzing their prey, so okay, they will, especially earthworms, so these it's hard to feel sorry for it. Earthworms sometimes because they don't
like they don't really got a face. They're basically living spaghetti. But in this case I do feel bad for them, because the mole paralyzes the earthworm with a quick, sharp bite and a distribution of their venomous saliva. The worm is paralyzed but not dead. So the mole will take this paralyzed earthworm back to its burrow, to its larder
and just keep it there for a while. And this poor earthworms still alive and it can't do anything but just helplessly wait for when the mole's feeling hungry and wants to eat it alive.
Wow, so this is a way for the mole to So it's like it's essentially like a refrigerator. Yeah, so your food doesn't go bad, it's it's alive still and you can just you just save it for later.
Yes, exactly. It's like instead of having a fridge, you just have some live chickens in your home and every time you feel hungry, you just kill a chicken. And hey, folks, that's what a farm is.
Yep.
But yeah.
That's wild.
Yeah, except I guess it's a more devious farm because the chickens are paralyzed, like you paralyze the chickens.
Yeah, yeah, it's a little moreistic. Yeah seriously, so could you I know you said it's not harmful to humans, but can you microdose the venom? Like if af a mole bit you, what would happen?
I mean, it would just hurt. I don't think it would make you feel any special kind of way. It would just they have very sharp little teeth. It probably hurt a lot. Maybe your finger might tingle a bit, but I don't think it's gonna I think it's mostly just gonna be very painful.
Okay, Okay, So don't still though your advice, your professional opinion is to not kiss a mole on the line.
I would not kiss a mole on the mouth. I would not kiss all right, I would not kiss any wild animal on the mouth. Particularly.
Did you see, uh, speaking of that, did you see there's an account on Twitter because I refuse to call it whatever he's calling it now, wild TikTok screens and this this woman basically she tried to give CPR to a wild rabbit and then she went to the er with some kind of you know, it's it's not toxoplasmas whatever, but it was like something it was like some kind of wild rabbit induced fever. And now she's like, has all these medical bills because she tried to save a
wild rabbit. Yeah, by putting her mouth on its its face. Yeah, and I'm an animal lover. But y'all don't don't do that. That is not smart at all.
Yeah, don't admit CPR to wild animals. Uh please they So, zoonosis is a thing. Zoonotic diseases, it is. Uh, diseases can jump from other animals to humans. It's rare. But again, it's like komodo dragons. Killing a human is rare. If you try to keep a komodo dragon is a pet and kiss it on the face, it's much more likely to attack you. It's the same thing with zoonotic disease. Notic disease is rare. Giving mouth to mouth french basically french kissing a wild rabbit makes it much more likely
that you're going to catch something from the rabbit. And there I forgot the name of the diseases. But there are things you can catch from wild rabbits that are life threatening, Like you don't want to get those.
No, not at all. So I found it and I was I was confusing it, so this I found. The Lady's tweet says two nights ago, I gave a wild baby rabbit CPR with breaths after I took it from my cat. Dear, Today, I'm being admitted to the hospital with signs of bunny fever. Oh no, tula remia. I'm on eight liters of oxygen, a cocktail of very expensive antibiotics, anti diuretics. Need light and love please, Yeah, like I know this. I know this lady's heart was in the right place.
Her intentions were pure, but her stem was not ready for the rabbit fever. I mean, like I get it right, like you want to. I've had a cat kill a baby bunny and it's very sad. Yeah, what you should do in the case of your cat, if your cat's like injured the baby bunny to the point where it's like it looks like without help it's not gonna make it.
You could either contact a wild rehab center or just merciful kill it, I would say, I mean, like that's kind of a call you'd have to make in the moment, right, Like if it seems like it might be savable again, like call a wild rehab center. They'll tell you what to do under no circumstances. Do you give mouth to mouth to a wild rabbit or to be safe any wild animal.
Yeah, yeah, that's that's just a good general rule of thumb to walk around in life with. As far as I'm concerned. I've seen people.
I've seen people like touching marmots like aka groundhogs or prairie dogs and stuff in the wild, and it's like, y'all they carry the plague.
Like yeah, yeah, it's very it's very rare.
It's very rare. But again, once again, it's like that's how you do get the plague though, Like, so you know your chance even if you touch a wild marmot, sure, your your chance of getting plague is pretty low. But it's gone up from basically zero to like something something.
Yeah, anything less than zero is bad news.
Yeah, to get the plague. So you know, just I would say, don't touch wild animals, even if they are cute and adorable. The I guess the exception would be you can touch earthwormsh just wash your hands afterwards. I wouldn't kiss them.
Yeah, I wouldn't kiss an earthwork. Although people will eat earthworms, usually for money as a bet. Yeah, yeah, not not really my thing for sure. Now I will so having you know, appearing on on your show. Recently, I saved three baby squirrels that I think we had some bad storms and they came down out of a nest and we did bottle feed some baby squirrels and then got that, you know, as soon as we could get them to
the rehab place. We did. But yeah, we took We took that advice which is always the best to contact your local wildlife rehab. And earlier this year, my puppy found a baby possum hanging onto a branch by itself in the backyard and we rescued that little guy as well took him to the wildlife rehab. So yeah, just keep your distance as much as you can. Although you know, like we wrapped them up to keep them warm and stuff,
and we had to baby them a little bit. But you know, you don't want to imprint upon them or anything. You want to get them to professionals as quickly as possible.
Yeah, in that case, you were not giving them mouth to mouth.
So I did want to kiss them. I didn't want to kiss them all on the forehead and tell them it would be okay, little bedtime story. Yeah, I wanted. I wanted to do that, but because I am a grown man, I am an adult, I fought my urge and did the responsible thing.
Yeah. Yeah, and I think and you still help them and got them to where they are the most likely to receive professional help. And you know, like it's okay if you need to like put a like kind of take care of them while you're waiting to deliver them to the rehab center, that's totally acceptable as long as you're not kissing them giving them mouth to mouth. Personally, I would like, uh, wear gloves, wash your hands. Gardening
gloves are good to like prevent any like bites. Yeah, there are some animals that you definitely don't want to like try to keep to rehab or approach things like bats. Like if you find a bat on the ground, do
not touch it, don't pick it up. Uh, that is that's absolutely not something you want to want to do because like bats who are on the ground are While most bats do not carry rabies, ones that you find on the ground have are is someone that's sick, so that you're the chance that that one has rabies is more than like the general population because they typically don't hang out on the ground. Uh, and so the one anyone that you find on the ground, just don't don't
pick up. Don't pick up a bat unless you're a special bat.
And don't uh don't clean up bat poop either unless you have like like serious ppe. Yes, that's that. That stuff is full of all sorts of toxic.
Stuff mouse poop too, like dried mouse poop, and especially in certain locations. Like that's how you get what's that mouse disease? I forgot what it's called mouse disease, mouse poop disease. I don't think it's called mouse poop disease. It's called something else.
It should just be called mouse poop.
Mouse mouse poop itis, mouse poop disease. It is a hantavirus, that's what it's called. Okay, ok yeah, I just think of that that remember House m D. I think of that meme of House like going like we're gonna use mouse poop as medicine.
Wait, is that a real That's not a real line.
That's not a real line. It's just okay, it's just making fun of the show. Because House it always come up with some kind of like and like very like weird treatment or like his methods were unorthodox, but then they always worked out. And in this case, it's like we have to use mouse Poops's medicine.
Yeah, you can't. It's like Magiver doesn't exactly work for the medical field. Yeahs, as much as these shows would have you believe. Yeah, like maybe every once in a while you can, like you know, Apollo thirteen somebody's medical case where you like use unorthodox methods, but for the most part it does not. The field I don't think works quite like.
No, I've talked to doctors and like they say that Scrubs was the most accurate medical show of all.
Oh that's funny.
Yeah, no, absolutely, it was like the portrayed the medical world like the most accurately, both scientific and in terms of vibes, which I thought, I think is kind of interesting.
Well, that's that's what I've heard about, like Veep when it comes to actual politics and the stupid stuff that goes on behind the scenes, I've heard Veep is like far more accurate than the West Wing or any of these other prestige shows to deal with politics.
Because life is life is ridiculous and silly.
Exactly exactly well, we're.
Going to take a quick break and when we get back, we're going to find out if worms can be our savior. So we are going to talk about wax worms saliva, which is a magical manna from heaven.
So wow, so you've already You've already asked if worms can be our savior, and now you're talking about heaven. I feel like this is about to get like a you know, a very religion heavy segment if involving Jesus worms.
I'm not a Christian, but question for Christians, if Jesus was a worm, would you still love him?
The age old question, you know, if Jesus was a worm. Yeah, if Jesus looked at you and said, hey if I was if I was a worm, would you still love me? What would your answer be? And if it's if it's that you wouldn't accept him into your heart as your savior, then you need to do some soul searching.
There has to be a Bible verse that is essentially that, right, like a Bible verse where he's like if I come to you as a beggar or something like that, but it's like, yeah, if I come to you as a worm, wouldst thou not still love.
Me, oh man, which is why the Internet is our modern gospel. Yeah, you know, because it's asking all the same philosophical questions as any of the old sacred religious texts.
Humanity is on a loop, just with like better technology. That's what I'm convinced.
I'm as a flat circle, absolutely.
So. Waxworms are the larval form of wax moths. They are relatively uninteresting looking. They're kind of gross. They're like your typical grub. They're white, kind of squiggly looking grub. Yep, they are, And wax moths are pretty kind of like drab looking moth. They're kind of tattered and ratty looking. They're neither of these forms. They don't really have a glow up or a glowdown. There's no glow about these things. They're just kind of eugh.
Yeah, you're right, they're they're pretty drab looking.
Yeah. They sadly they they sadly do not have the riz I would say of uh, but despite their appearance, they are actually quite interesting. So the larval forms the waxworms are actually parasites of hive making bees. Like honey bees. They will in bee colonies and eat their pollen, the cocoons, and interestingly, they can even eat bees wax. So that is why they're called waxworms because they can eat bees wax.
Okay, okay, that's cool. So not not because they look like they're made out of wax, but because they can eat stuff that Have you ever tried you've munched on beeswax before?
Yes?
Anything that could I could put in my mouth I have. I'm just gonna put that out there.
Well, that's good to know. Uh yeah, okay, so they's that's interesting. I would never in a million years have figured out that's why they called that the waxworm.
Yeah. Have you ever tried to eat wax lips?
Yes?
Yeah?
Or the the wax like soda bottles.
Yeah yeah, or like the wax covering cheese.
Yes, the outside rind, or like wax from your ears.
Ah yes, well just just kidding.
God, I made myself gag saying that. I'm sorry. Dude.
I had a cat who was obsessed with earwax. He would like, go like go after my ear plugs after using them, and I it wasn't like it wasn't like disgusting because I keep my ears pretty clean because I can't really stand wax. But like, my cat was like obsessed with ear plugs and I think it was like that nasty, stinky ear smell. Apparently there's some kind of like fatty acid in ear wax that attracts some weird cats.
Anyways, after such demonic little goblins grimlins, there's they're the best and the worst at the.
Same Yeah, not even my dog has ever been as gross as that cat was. So the worms themselves, despite eating wax, because they convert the wax into sugars and proteins. The worms themselves are by a variety of animals, including humans. So these are an edible worm.
Okay, ok, yeah, I think I've seen like clips of fear factor with waxworms.
That would make sense. Yeah, I think typically they're cooked, but I believe you can eat them raw as well. You know, I wouldn't pick up any random looking worm and put it in your mouth. But yeah, so these worms are are used as food. So the due to their wax eating habits, their saliva is actually really really interesting and unique. So their saliva is loaded with enzymes that can break down wax, and researchers have found that
these same enzymes can also break down plastics. So waxworm saliva breaks down polyethylene, which is a plastic used for disposable bags for packing materials. So it's a big kind of problem, right because we use a lot of plastic bags, a lot of packing materials and then just throw them out, and it's not something that typically can just decay naturally over short periods of times. It does break down eventually,
but it takes a really long time. So the waxworm saliva can actually break down this plastic at room temperature within two hours, So it starts to break it down within two hours. That doesn't mean they can like neutralize an entire plastic bag in two hours. It's just the saliva starts to go to work and breaks down the polyethylene within two hours, which is actually really interesting and somewhat promising because it may be able to help in the biodegradation of this particular plastic.
So, wow, that's trippy. That's so so would the so if you put like something plastic in a bin full of these things, would they attempt to eat it? Or is it just something that scientists have like isolated, Like have they isolated the saliva and just applied it to plastics? To see what would happen.
So I think it's interesting because I think that they would if it has no other food, it would actually attempt to eat it. And the way they actually discovered this is I think there was a researcher who had some waxworms. I'm trying to remember why she had them, just as a hobby, maybe right, and she was she might have removed them from like her beehive or something, and she was putting them in a plastic bag and she noticed the plastic bag actually started to break down
after she put them inside there. So I think I don't know that they would get much nutrition from the plastic, but if you put no other food in there, I believe they would try to eat the plastic bag. It's probably not great for them.
But yeah, probably not.
But so you know, one would think like, well, we can just throw a bunch of these worms in landfills and problem solved. The problem is that to have enough of these worms to break down all of the plastics that we have represents an incredible amount of worm biomass. So biomass is also something that can produce carbon dioxide, so we kind of need It's not like we can still just like waste as much plastic as we want,
that's not true. But potentially, either through the worms or through isolating their saliva, there is some hope that this might help us with the waste that we already have and future waste in terms of breaking it down and increasing the rate of the biodegradation. So I think it's promising, but it's not the answer to the question. Can we just throw worms on the problem and expect it to go away? Is like not really, but if we work with the worms, we may find a solution.
Yeah, And so I was just thinking, like, also, worms turn into moths, so that like I'm just thinking like if you did try to increase the biomass of worms around like a landfill or something, would that increase? Like, well, I'm just imagining the domino effect of the ecosystem around there, like these these moths moth population exploding. Do the wax moths then, you know, take food supply from other species,
Do what's feeding on the wax moths? Yeah, it would Like definitely, I love the potential that there is here, but it offers a lot of kind of questions that create a conundrum as far as the domino effect goes.
I mean, that is exactly the right question to ask. That is a question that should have been asked by the people who introduce the cane toad to Australia tea.
Yeah, yeah, eat.
Sugar cane bugs. It should have been the question asked by people who introduce mongooses to countless islands to eat snakes. Yeah, so yeah, that is that is absolutely the right question to ask. Like, how would introducing a huge amount of waxworms to say, like a landfill or something affect the local ecology? And you know, like potentially if you have a bunch of these saying like a laboratory setting, you can control that by not just like releasing them out
into the wild. But yeah, it's it's these are the considerations that we have to make when it's like, well, we found this cool property of this animal. Can we just make a whole bunch of these animals and throw them out, let them do what they will. It is very difficult for us to know and predict exactly what impacts that has. And like you said, it's a domino effect. It's like trying to remove one piece of a Djenga tower and you might not realize that that was the
load bearing Jenga piece. Ah, so yeah exactly, but it's you know, they're still pretty cool and hopefully we can figure out how to use them to help us without accidentally creating like a monster that eats all the plastic in the world. Actually, I guess that wouldn't be so bad, you.
Know, yeah, just one one giant monster that ate all the plastic in the world. Like you just have to keep that one creature in check. Yeah, you know, I feel like we could come together as a planet maybe.
For that Godzilla.
Yeah, yeah, I guess it.
Like a math mathra was right there, but I didn't go for it.
Oh yeah, yep, yep, like giant Mathra. Yeah, giant waxworm mathra. That's so. This is like this always reminds me or kind of like recenters, the notion that everything, no matter how synthetic, originates as organic matter. Yes, and and same thing with with plastics. Like I look at like a plastic hanger beside me, and I think, well, that's completely man made and synthetic. But when you break down the components and you go back far enough, it it all comes out of the ground essentially.
Yeah.
It always, it always does. So no matter, like even though waxworms didn't evolve to eat plastic, their ability to find the organic molecule in the plastics is just is so trippy to think about. And it's similar to like the I remember hearing about bacteria in the ocean that was capable of eating like oil spills, crude oil spills and basically pollution from you know, our terrible treatment of
our waters. And how how just trippy that is that It's like, no, everything eventually is going to break down because it started broken down. We just put it all together with science and it will return eventually eventually.
Yeah, the problem is how long the eventually? Yeah yeah, but yeah, no, Like bacteria are very similar in that they can, you know, help break down things that seem toxic or inable to any living creature. But yeah, I mean you have the same problems as like throwing worms on the problem which is like bacteria of course create byproducts. It could be better than an oil spill, but it could also have unpredictable effects. So it's it's a useful thing.
It's it's something that is promising, but it's also like I don't think we can just be like, well, we can spill oil everywhere, use plastic eyes all the time, and it'll be fine. It's still better, and.
Inevitably that will be the lesson that we take from it. But it shouldn't be. But yes, we we we love coming up with solutions and going well, that solved that. I guess we can. We can keep keep on keeping on, you know. It's it's just we always, without fail take the wrong lessons from whatever advancements we make.
I feel like, yeah, yeah, Unfortunately, I think there's hope for the future though. The kids are all right. Maybe they'll they are they are, Maybe they'll figure finally figure out not to throw more worms on the problem. But we'll see.
It does sound fun, though, Throwing worms on your problems sounds like kind of a blast, you know what. You know what that sounds like. It just sounds like taking up fishing. It sounds like it sounds like, you know, you're, you're, you know what. I'm in a kind of a rut right now. I'm gonna go fishing. Uh And that's like the most like you know, old man boomer humor type of thing. But uh, you know, just hang a sign
up on your door that says gone fishing. Uh, and go sit by a lake and throw worms on your problems.
I feel like I'd take a Dale Gribble approach and just have some pocket worms that I throw on someone that I don't want to talk to you anymore.
Oh that's even better.
They would be distracted.
That I would be uh, rendered speechless, I can honestly admit, and that rarely happens to me.
Honestly, I feel like it's a good technique. Well it is right before we go, Well, do you want to play a little game?
Sure? Love to.
This is called Guess Who's squawk and the Mystery Animal Sound Game. Every week I play a mystery animal sound and you the listener, and.
You the guests, try to guess who is.
Making that sound. So last week's mystery animal sound hint was this. I hope it doesn't have a sore throat.
That be a doozy.
Can you guess who is making that sound? M?
I want to say a giraffe.
You are absolutely correct, as well as listeners Asher P, Emily M, and Joey P. Congratulations, you are right. It
is a giraffe. So, giraffes aren't known for being particularly vocal, but they do make some sounds like they're grunting that you just heard There's sounds are somewhat mysterious to behavioral researchers and haven't been absolutely determined yet, like whether they're a form of communication and if so, what exactly they're communicating, But current research suggests that snorting and hissing may have
something to do with defensiveness. Aside from snorts and grunts, giraffes seem to hum at night, and the exact purpose of this low frequency humming is unknown, but it's thought that it could potentially be a form of communication. Giraffe social life is fission fusion, which means that group composition can change fluidly over time. It's like in high school if you just have groups of friends that change throughout the semester. Giraffes are like that, they're fair weather friends.
Yeah, they I mean, you get like a new hot giraffe that shows up, and everybody wants to be the hot giraffe friend, and you kind of leave your less hot you know, giraffe friends behind, and this is it's messy. It's it's a whole whole messy thing.
Just because Giraffica got her braces off and now she looks super hot every once in a while.
Exactly, friend, exactly.
So annoying it is, it is.
Have you ever have you ever handfed giraffes before?
I have not. I'd love to, though that sounds thrilling.
It It is the trippiest you think you it's it's one of those animals where you picture in your head and you think you know what it looks like, and then you're face to face with one and you're like, oh my god, this is the wildest looking creature I've ever seen in my life. Like it is. It's it's just one of those animals. It's like a zebra or an elephant or a rhino. You you you grow up with these these animals, you know, like toys of them or cartoons and stuff, and then you see one in
person there Their heads are so massive. Yes, I've mentioned it before being on here. We have the Ashburo Zoo here in North Carolina. Incredible, incredible place and you can walk up onto the platform and for like three dollars feed it like heads of lettuce and carrots and stuff, and it is the coolest experience. I highly recommend that to anybody who happens to be traveling through North Carolina stop at the Ashborough Zoo and feed the giraffes.
I think I'd be intimidated. I'm already intimidated by horses. I greatly respect horses because they're so large, and I think that we sure we just we don't get stomped up by them, just through their merciful nature.
Yeah.
So I feel like if I saw a giraffe, I would just like bow in front of them and be like, please spare me, sir.
Even if you don't hand feed them, you have to just walk up on the platform and just because there, their heads are just like level with you, so you can't really like get in where you're standing or anything. But their tongues are so long and so massive. It is the trippiest looking thing you've ever seen.
They can strangle you with their tongues, yes.
Just about, just about seriously.
Because they're merciful that they don't.
It's true. It's true.
It's strong tongues too, because they use them to like rip off leaves off of trees.
So yeah, yep, they rip whole branches down.
I feel like we've got we are so lucky that they're herbivores so lucky.
Seriously.
Also, speaking of giraffes and zoos, a baby giraffe with no spots was born at a Tennessee zoo. So it's like entirely brown. It's very cute. It's like kind of awesome looking because we just tape for granted that girafts are spotty, and this one has a unique mutation where it does not have spots, so it.
Is that's so cool.
It's just very cool looking. I mean, it's like usually we wouldn't think of it as being like something that's just a solid color as being cool, but like when you see it and you're expecting something else from a giraffe, it's just it's very cool.
Yeah, it has. Are there cases of like zebras being born without their stripes?
Yes?
Yeah, absolutely?
Oh well that's trippy about yeah, huh, I have to I have to look this up now. Oh my god.
Oh, that is the.
Cutest thing I've ever seen. Like, giraffes are already adorable. That is so cute. Okay, Katie, Yes, do giraffes have poisonous saliva or venomous saliva?
Not that I'm aware of, So.
I can't have this one as a pet. I can't have a giraffe as a pet, is what you're saying, You're like publicly endorsed.
That's absolutely what I'm publicly endorsing pets for. Sweet sure, don't do it.
This is the cutest thing in the worldld oh Man, so trippy looking. I can't. It's like it's like when you grow up in your town and you're bored by everything and you hate it, and then you like go out into the world and then you come back to your town and you realize, like, oh, as an adult, this is like such a cool place to live.
You know.
It's like you like grow in appreciations, like growing up at the beach, you know, Yeah, and you take the ocean for granted, and then you move away from it and then you miss it all the time, and then you come back and you kind of rediscover things. That's kind of how it is with these large animals that I'm talking about, like the rhino or the elephant or zebra and you know, tiger, lions all that stuff, Like when you just like examine one with like a fresh perspective. Yeah,
it's like, how do these things actually exist? This is the trippiest thing I think.
It's because like, without the spots, it messes with our pattern recognition and our brain right where expecting a giraffe to have spots and so and we've seen so many giraffes just through you know, picture books whatever that we are. We aren't wowed by a giraffe. Maybe in person we are, but just seeing it in a book, it's like, Okay, that's a giraffe, just seeing a picture of it, but like when it doesn't have the spots, it's like, oh,
it's neck is super long. Like I really hope this one is healthy and makes it to adulthood because I think seeing an all tan fully grown giraffe will really just kind of because it's because it's not falling into your brain's archetype of what a giraffe is. It's just gonna be very startling to see, like, well, this animal is actually really huge, Like this is actually a gigantic animal. So that's very exciting. All right, onto this week's mystery animal.
Sound the hint, you'd better not step over the line with this grounded animal. All right, do you have any guesses for what this animal is?
Huh?
I'm gonna go with a bird of some sort but I am so bad at bird calls. My wife has gotten so good listening to the birds in our backyard. She knows them, she knows all of their songs.
By now, Oh, you want to call your wife in here, I will.
Not use a lifeline. I wouldn't even know. I'm gonna go with my favorite bird, the tufted tit mouse.
Oh cute. Well, we'll find out next time whether you are correct on the next episode of Creature Feature Well, thank you so much for coming on. Where can people find you?
Thank you so much for having me again, Katie anytime. You can find me on Twitter still at the Wopple House. Had to which accounts since last time, dude to some very stupid reasons. I won't get into but at the Wopple House. And you can find me on George Center. That's at George Center Pod. Yeah, I'm on Blue Sky now as well at Wopple House, and George Center's on there as well, and get it wherever you get podcasts.
Thank you guys so much for listening. If you think you know who's squawking on this episode, or you've got any questions, you can write to me at Creature Feature Pod at gmail dot com. I've also finally given in and I have a TikTok. It is Katie Golden. That's k A t I E g O L d I N one word, and I'm posting animal content on that and it's a brand new account. I'm just a little baby. I'm a little baby on TikTok. I don't know what I'm doing. Be nice to me. I guess.
So are you, Katie? Not to interrupt you, are you going to be doing TikTok dances of animals from the Animal Kingdom?
Oh, now that you've said it, I have to do it.
I hate that.
I hate that I have to do.
That, Like rituals of like birds and stuff, you have to.
I guess I got it. I guess I gotta do that now.
Thanks, I'm sorry. Thanks a lot your whole experience.
Now I have to do that. But yeah, I'm giving out animal facts and also playing the Mystery Animal sound game on on the TikTok. So we've got we've got even more opportunities for you to guess animal sounds. So check that out again. It's k A t I E G O L D I N on TikTok, And thank you guys, so much for listening, and thanks to the Space Cossics for their super awesome song XO. Lumina Creature
features a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts like the one you just heard, visit the iHeartRadio app Apple Podcasts, or Hey guess what where you listen to your favorite shows? I don't care, do what you want? Your mother? See you next Wednesday
Mhm.