What A Tool!

what's a butcher, a tailor, and a bendy stickmaker? Gotten common? They're all birds? Sorry spoilers, Well discover this and more as we answer the angel question, what's the most humiliating thing to ever happen to an eel? So when you think of animal tool use, you may think of that scene in two thousand one A Space Odyssey where the apes discover how bones can be used to smash each other's faces in the truth is that primate tool use

can be much more sophisticated. Gorillas turn wood and woolen scraps and to make shift slippers so they don't have to walk on the snow, orangatans use leaves as a safety whistle, holding them in front of their lips as they make an alarm call, lowering the frequency of sound and making them sound bigger mandrils. And if you're not sure what a mandrilla is, it's what raffici is from the lime king Uh, they'll make Q tips out of

twigs to clean their ears. So as we'll discover, primates including humans, aren't the only animals out there who use tools, and there are surprisingly sophisticated, cunning, cruel, and well perverted tools used by members of the animal kingdom. So joining me today is comedian, writer, director, lip bomb collector and overall great galcarbon Angelica agreed to have you. Uh I

read about you collecting lip bomb on your Twitter. Are you sort of like, is this kind of like a magpie or raven kind of thing where you just have like a nest full of lip bomb. It's like a magpie if they didn't collect it. Well, Like, it's like I feel like magpies like create a nest, Yeah, and it's full of all and they know exactly where all of their stuff placed it meaningfully. Yeah, where I, on the other hand, accidentally find lip everywhere because I always

lose it and buy more. Right now, I totally understand that I have a few purses where sometimes it's fun to go through my old purses because I'll just find money and al toys and various bombs. Just it's, you know, it's kind of it's fun. It's like I leave myself Easter eggs. Agreed. I I think if you look at it that way, it's it's never there when you need it, but when you happen upon it, it's always there. So

we're talking today about tools of the trade. Do you have, like a favorite tool or is it lip um favorite tool besides lip bomb um? I would U minds a Philips head screwdriver. This is Philip head screw You know what? I like? A measuring tape. Those are good, aren't they? What do you use it for? Um? I like just so that's part time. So I have a little measuring tape that I carry around with me. But then also it's coming handy for many things, like you never know

when you need to measure something said as rope. Yes, you can look it at people, right, you can measure like a door and an item you're carrying, and no, if it's gonna it's instead of getting stuck there. I always used to Yeah, like, I'm carrying like groceries and then you measure their circumference and with like is this going to work? And it makes the job quicker? But also not right? They say, uh, cut your groceries once measure So I'm not sure what my dad told me.

I think that's no, that sounds right, that sounds exactly right, And I'm not going to make any change the circumcisions. Cut wants you forgot to measure circumcisions. Wait did it? Well? So the favorite tool of dolphins is actually a sponge, and not in the way you're thinking, not like, not like a kitchen sponge, although I mean they are so sea sponges are an actual animal ye like SpongeBob. Yeah, I used I used to have one. Really you had,

like did you? It wasn't alive. It was a dad used the corpse of a sea spoon in your devious deeds. I mean you talked about favorite tools, you know. I love to rub dead sea animals all over my body. Um. They they use these sea sponges and they don't look like SpongeBob. They're kind of you know, they're roundish and lump um, and they rip it apart and they cover their little snowts with it like they're wearing a glove on their face. Um. And they do this not just

to be fashionable, although they do look pretty. It's very fetch like the dolphins, which translates to stop trying to make fetch happen. Um. So they use these sponges to probe the sea floor to unearthed fish like sand perch, which is a dolphin delicacy um, so that they can eat them. But the issues the sea floor is you know, sharp and full of pokey. Yeah, pokey will not sticks, sometimes sticks, shells, various assorted corals, maybe a biting fish.

Maybe like maybe some cutco knives that someone's angrily threw into the ocean where they realized how cheaply made they are. I don't I don't mean it. I don't actually know anything about. But you know what people might have angrily throw on the right ocean because that happened right like like they cut themselves in they're like, fie on you knife and throw it in the ocean, and now you've

got knife proliferation among dolphins fish. You know, they cut pennies you gotta be careful with the stuff, right, Like, can you imagine a dolphin like like sort of like tossing a knife from handhand me Like the game has changed. I hope to see that one. Yes. Um. But you know, so they got to protect their snoots, so they wear the sponge and then that um protects them from getting sand up up their nose snoots. Well it's not really a nose because their noses on their their blowhole, but

they're snoop's. Yeah, you don't want to boop the snoot. No, they boop with a sponge sponge. You gotta have a soft boop, not a sharp pokey boop. They spoop sponge boop um. And so, you know, researchers kind of wondered, well, why go to all this trouble when you can just eat fish that aren't on the bottom. Well they think that maybe it's because these fish have more nutrients that they wouldn't get from other fish, like they have really high lipid content. Um. Because because of the physiology of

these bottom dwelling fish. Um. And what's really cool is this is this is very feminism. Ah, this is a very boss bay tactic because like most of the sponge wearing dolphins are females um and they have invented it potentially because of the nutritional pressures of bearing calves, which makes them crave more high fatty nutrients. UM. And then this is a really cool example of cultural learning because they passed the knowledge of sponging onto their daughters. That's brilliant.

I think that makes me like dolphins so much more. The fact that they were like, you know what, I know where to get the good food, and I know it's hard to get it, but I'm gonna problem solve around the right right, like like that that trailblazing dolphin who put the sponge on. It's like, I'm going to teach everybody, ladies. I mean, my mom taught me about the sponge, but it's a different guy. It's a different It was not for booping, well it was. Yes, it's

a form of boop. It's a contracept. It wasn't for food booping. You remember that Seinfeld episode the sponge worthy Elaine like that. I guess that the sponge went off the shelves at one point. But it was Elaine's favorite form of birth control, and so every time she was going to um you know, have sex with a guy she was, would have to determine whether he's sponge you worthy. I love that for her, Yeah, for her. Yeah, that makes sense great because it's a limited quantity of great

birth control. It's got to be the right, got to be the right. And in this case, I guess they're doing it. They're like, we need the good food is spongeworthy. Yeah, the fish are sponge worthy, so they're high lipid content at nice cavs. So another uh sort of animal entrepreneur when it comes to tool use, is called Well, first, I'll just say it's a songbird found across tropical Asia, and it's called a tailor bird because it is a tailor. Basically, this is my kind of saying, this is a bird

after your own heart. Um, yes, because about this it uh, it will so it's self a little like a little cradle for its nest um. So it takes a big old leaf and pierces very very precise holes into the leaf and then stitches them together using their beaks as needles with plant fiber or spider silk. Is the that is awesome, Like these little these little tim gunbirds. I love it, make it work. I love it and they

their noses are the needles. Yeah, so it's a little it's probably a little more difficult than sewing with a with a needle because it's your actual nose and they can't exactly reach or do they reach their claw over. Well, they pass it through with their their face and then they tuck their head out around the other side and pull it through. Sometimes they use sometimes they do like

an actual weaving stitch between this the leaves. Sometimes they use them as kind of like rivets, so they'll you know, stitch them together and kind of like uh no it or fluff it out and so it like forms it kind of rivet a button um and this will support and hide their nest, so it shields it. It gives it extra structural support, and it camouflages it on one Yeah. Yeah,

it's uh. It's very surgical procedure too, so the puncture holes are small enough that it doesn't actually damage the leaves and it doesn't cause them to brown, which ensures that they stay green and keep it camouflaged amongst the rest of the foliage. It's yeah, it's it's amazing. It's uh, it's such a cool use of engineering. Seriously, it actually

kind of reminds me. Um. I think I think this is an Indonesia where there are these bridges made out of tree roots that people have made, uh, and they are they don't actually destroy the trees, they're living roots. Um. So as as you know, after a certain amount of time, the bridges just get stronger and stronger because the roots continue to grow. Um. And it's resistant to like water flow, and it's really incredible kind of natural engineering. We should

do that. We should do that more. I think we should really do that more. I think, yeah, yeah, like you have some living resources in trees, they're going to be stronger. Yeah. Yeah. I like the idea of trying that in l A just like one sickly palm tree wheezing its way to try to support a bunch of cars over the interstate. Yeah yeah, I think we'll need at least two palm trees, and I feel like we'll need a little more. So. Now, I mean, birds, I

think you'll find are very intelligent. I'm not just saying that because I'm a shell for birds, although that is true, I am, um. But New Caledonian crows don't just use tools that they find lying on the ground. They actually make their own specific tools. Um. So New Caledonian crows are crows that are native to New Caledonia. Wow, I would not have seen that coming. I think it's pronounced

Caledonia Caledonia. I'm sorry, I can't verify somewhere in near France France, France, so please please correct me on Twitter. Not really really, I don't mind that kind of correct Yeah, I'd love to clarify. It's a clarification, if any clarification. Um, they not only use tools, but they will modify them to fit their needs and to make them more efficient. Uh. So our researchers first noticed this when they were observing

a captive crow named Betty. Betty, Yeah, Betty, the crow who has observed bending pieces of wire to form hooks so she could snatch meat from a tube. What that's brilliant. Yeah, because they wanted to see her problem solving skills, so they put a little treat down a tube which she can't reach. So she made a hook and then fished it out of the tube. Uh, like a little bird genius, that is, she went fishing. She went fishing. Um. And the researchers at the time thought this was a spontaneous

act of problem solving because she had access to wire. Um. But researchers also found this behavior in wild crow populations. So these new Caledonian crows in the wild will tear off small twigs and craft them into hooks. By first they kind of whittled them with their beaks, so there's a notch at the end. Um. It's like they're actually they're actually carving it um. And then they'll also bend the twigs to be more efficient um, so they can

grab things like grubs and insects and little bits of food. Um. And so the combination of both bending it and like carving it. To me, this is seems very much like a fish hook design because when you look at a fish hook, it's like it has that curve and then a little hook, like a little notch at the end of a barb. So it's like they they've created this little twiggy fish hook. Yeah, do you think they came up? Do you think? I mean? That makes me wonder is

this like a tool that because people do that? People we learn from birds? Yeah? Do we learn from birds? Did they learn from us? Or is it something that is a within our like mindset that we're like, this is the way it's got a I think the world. Yeah, it's an interesting question. Definitely. There are cases of parallel invention in parallel evolution where you have different things coming up just because you stick an intelligent animal in an area long enough and it's going to do stuff. But

it is a good question. I do wonder sometimes because birds are very crafty, and whether we looked at those birds and thought like, huh, you know they made this hook, we should try um, we should try that. Or it could be that it's you know, we we all we we aren't um descendants of birds, but we are cousins, so that that brain being able to develop tool use. We share common ancestors, so we have a bit of bird brain. We do have a bit of bird brain. You know, we are just a bit, just a bit.

I mean it's more of a smart of a reptile brain that we all share. But uh, but it is uh, you know, I think we all have birds inside us. I just ate some chicken salt. What a doc way getting that I had some chicken yum yum um. So they'll also create the hooks in a way that I think is really interesting. So they have different methods of bending the hooks. They'll wedge them into holes, like using

it as a vice to bend it. Um they'll use like rocks is kind of anvil type things where they'll sort of push it or or poke it against the rock until it binds um, and they'll use their feet and just they seem really so it's really interesting because they seem to have some kind of sense of it's not just a pre programmed um subroutine that runs in their heads where they do a certain motion that bends the tool. They seem to be actively trying different things

to bend it more efficiently. I think it's really really smart. Yeah, they're trying to progress there. They're toolmaking kills, which I get, which is a lot smarter than me when I'm faced with some kind of physical challenge, because I'll just keep trying the same thing over and over, like with a with a jar i can't open, or something that's not working, I'll just continue to try to force it until I

yell at the thing, until yell at the thing. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, like if I can't if I'm trying to a symbol, some my keya furniture and something's not fitting I will shove it in and it's like a square thing fitting in a round thing. Like those crazy Swedes. Man, they did this wrong. I'm right. Why would they? Why would they invent a round peg to go in a square hole? Anyways, I gotta hammer it some more. Birds are great, They're really smart. They are smart. I do like birds. Yeah. Yeah.

When you think of technological advancements of the Neanderthal, you're probably thinking like sharp rocks, bones, maybe a spirit too. And while it's true that modern human tool development was exponentially more advanced than that of Neanderthals, sometimes our old blumbering cousins can be surprisingly intelligent. A recent finding by archaeologists revealed that Neanderthals used primitive adhesive to glue their

tools together. Researchers found tools in the western coast of Italy that had traces of pine resin that held the tools together like a stone head attached to a wooden handle. These recent discoveries were aged at fifty five thousand years old and were found in an area inhabited only by Neanderthals at the time. The use of adhesive to create

tools paint some more intelligent portrait of Neanderthals. The resin had to be heated and cooled in order to be used as glue, which demonstrates an understanding of how to manipulate fire in different temperatures to change the state of objects.

One of the artifacts showed resin traces on a stone scraper, indicating that the Neanderthals used this tool to help craft another tool with adhesives, demonstrating a multifaceted approach to crafting that has been traditionally seen as a unique characteristic of modern humans. It seems like our assumption has gotten us

into a real sticky situation. Get it sticky. They use glue and also probably sticks, and well, I mean, at least we haven't found evidence that Neanderthals we're still we're using humor because we're still the apex species in company. So when we return, we'll talk about some tools of torture aside from my funds, So stay tuned. So now we're going to talk about tools of torture. When it

comes to torture, sadly, humans seem unparalleled. One of the most creative uses of tools over time has been well to inflect horrible pain on each other. Take for example, the brazen bowl, which sounds like an uncomfortable yoga position, but it's actually a lot scarier than that. And around five sixty b C. In ancient Greece, the wretched tyrant Hilaris ruled the land with an iron fist and our bronze bowl. You see, Phalaris was a bit of a

dillweed and like to torture folks. He was rumored to eat babies and mixed skittles with M and m's, you know, like psychopathic tyrant stuff. According to legend, one of his court sculptors wondered what ticket the monster who has everything, so he gifted him with the Brazen Bull, a metal sculpture of a bowl with a hollow inside, a hatch open to the interior of the bowl through which the

victim would be forced inside. Then a fire would be kindled under the bull's belly, and as the metal heated up, the victim would begin to be broiled alive. The gimmick of this torture device was that the screams of the victim and steam of roasting human flesh would bellow forth from the bull's open jaws, making it seem as if the bull itself was roaring there was some speculation the acoustics were especially designed to amplify the victim screams of

pain and perhaps hypocriphally. The Brazen Bull's first victim was the sculptor himself, whom Flaris used to test his new horrible toy. Whether this is fact or myth, it still remains true that humans seem uniquely and creatively cruel. But as we'll soon discuss, animals can be surprisingly twisted in their use of tools. So, Carmen, you look terrified. You

look horrified. Also, it's so, I mean, like too part of me when you were like and the first person to test out the risin Bull was the sculptor who made it. And I'm like, oh no, such irony, so much irony. Ironic When when you get boil alive in your own ball and your wedding day, you know what, I think, we gotta contact, Yeah, we gotta, we gotta have that lyric to the song yeah saying get it Yeah.

Isn't it ironic? You're dead in your own bowl. You made a torture device, but you thought it wasn't for you, but it was on your wedding name. So, Carmen, what I like to do is welcome my guests onto the USS Imagination Station train. Mixed metaphors. There, that's a ship thing, isn't it. Well, I could see it on a ship to USS Imagination Land going for the bearing straight facts. Yeah, I love it. Um. What do you think you'd do in a Texas chainsaw massacre situation? So, like, imagine there's

a raving lunatic chasing your round with chains on. He wants to hook you up on a meat hook? Like what if he's got all? Right? Because you know, isn't there a scene in the movie where one of the ladies is on a meat hook and she escapes she is on a meat there is that? Ye right? I don't know what would be your say he's got you? If I'm on the meat hood. What would I mean do? Yeah? Like what tools would I make to like fight back?

Or like what I kick real hard? Yeah? Like like for me, I would try to try to make maybe get a good swinging going. Yeah. I get I'd be hanging on a meat hook, so I know it would hurt, But I'd also try to get off. You kind of get a swing going and then either the force of the swing or like then maybe you could grab onto something. Yeah, I thought what she does in the movie, I think, does she like pull herself off that? No, I think they pull her off the meeting. I think they pull

her off. Yeah, but I wouldn't really or you get you like using the mechanical advantage of the meat hook to swing real good. So you are I feel like you're like coming in with like, here's what we do based off of physics and times. I think I'd scream. I just I'm ready. I'm ready to be in a horror movie situation. I would like i'd hold up a bunch of momentum and then when the when the bad dude comes in, like like get get a flying kick in from just swinging on this meat hook. Yeah, yeah,

I love this. I think you'd kill it. You'd kill it. Literally. Well if probably wouldn't be as lucky if I matched up with a butcher bird. Gotta say, oh no, her name is butcher bird. Butcherbird. They are actually pretty cute. They look just like innocent songbirds. Of course they of course they do. Innocent songbird does just I innocent bird tweet tweets. I'm just he had just sing a song. I'm going to sing you a song of murder. I knew the butcher name would come in at some point.

So butcher birds are an Australian magpie sized bird. They're on the larger side for songbirds, but still their songbirds are not that big. They look innocent enough. Um. They're also uh shrikes which are found in your Asian Africa, who also are called butcher birds, who do the same behavior, but they just are a slightly different species. Um. And they're also small, cute, unassuming they got a little bandit

really got like a little zoro mask, you know. I imagine if yeah, if they're doing something a little butchers, Yes, maybe they want that man like an executioner in old times, like how they would wear masks or antemity. Wouldn't it suck if you were an executioner and you were wearing a mask but you had a real distinctive voice, you'd be like, all right, I don't know why that's like, I'm like, that would be great, Like is it? Phil Dennis Dennis my neighbor. You christened my child, No, No,

I didn't christen Todd. When my wife was pregnant, you rubbed her feet. No, I would never you know, her. I mean her feet were aching, but no, I would never off you a kidney. Okay, thank you for that. What's not me? Uh? So, as you may have guessed, uh, they feed on raw, bloody meat of their tortured victims. Actually don't know if you would have guessed that precisely, just that would be something bad their tortured victims, because they do torture them before they eat them. If you

consider impalement to be tortured. Oh, I believe in the textbook definition of torture, that might be one of the phrases. Yes, So they will feed on insects, reptiles, small mammals, or even other birds. Uh. Once they capture their prey, they impale them on spikes, typically thorns, on branches, but they get kind of creative with it. They'll do a sharp plant, sharp sticks, whatever they can find. Um. In fact, they you sometimes use barbed wire. So you already don't look

happy about this. So I'm gonna show you some pictures. Okay. So here's um one of these butcher birds with its prey. You see that spikes just going right through the little mouse's skull. Oh um. And here here's one with its victim and he's sitting on some barbed wire and he's just about to just shunk it right on that wire. Why do they want to impale it's so bad? Well, uh, it gives them a larger of meat, a larger meat larger. Wait, just scrabe what you mean by meat larger? Is it

like like a pantry full of meat? Oh? And it just hangs out. Well, it's like the meat hooks like we were talking about earlier. Um with the what's his name leather say they eat people. That's the I haven't actually seen they eat people. So they got to keep people and like a meat larder, and so do these birds. So does it. But there's not necessarily like the only difference I'm seeing, and maybe you have the answer here is in in in the movie they were in like

a cooling place. Right there. They are these spikes that they these birds find in a cooling plane. No, no, it's not really refrigeration. It's just that you know, you're a smallish bird and you have a big mouse. It's hard to eat. So if you put it on a spike, not only can you eat it more easily, Uh so you can just kind of rip and tear meat off of it without it falling down. Um. But you can also once you're full, you save it for later and or if you want to keep hunting, you can keep hunting.

Put another thing on come back kind of turns into some nice mousey jerky. Uh, you know, just sample different little meats you got having snacks on a road trip, except the snacks are on spikes. Yeah. No, I mean, I guess it's not far off from what we've done. You know. Again, maybe we learned it from the birds. Maybe the birds learned it from us. Yes, we saw, I mean, especially during the crusades and stuff. We saw the birds and are like, this gives me a night idea.

What was it, Theodore? Nothing? Oh nothing, just talking to my bird friends. Thanks guys. The birds tell me to kill So another animal who's kind of into torture in a weird way. God, more than one. Yeah, and it's a it's kind of funny and cute but also kind of twisted. Wild Maccaux will use human hair as dental floss. Maccaques. What is a macca It's a it's a type of monkey. Yeah, and they take a human hair for dental fox. Yes, you look kind of like this than cute than cute

little guys. But they like to rip people's hair out and use it as dental floss. I mean to be fair if it is long hair, and imagine most of our hair is longer than their's. Right, that's true. It's just kind of a very um sadistic form of tool, you for sure. Where So Uh they live in Thailand, um. And there's a group, a specific group of them that lives at an old Buddhist shrine of the praying some yacht I think that's how it's pronounced. Uh. And they're

seen as holy servants of God. Um. And like most people or monkeys, all of this power has gone right to their heads. Um so also to unfortunate bystanders heads like to they'll ride on people's heads and pull out you know, chunction haird um, and then they use these hairs to brush their teeth and floss in between them. Uh. Well, at least they care about dental hygiene in that, you know, yeah,

at the expense of everybody's heads. Yeah, that's true. Just like, uh, that'd be such a weird social behavior if you just just reached over to someone, pulled out their hair and started blossing with it. Yeah, i'd be like, I think there's something in my teeth that is it gone? Is it gone? Yeah? Most of my hair is. Sometimes I use my boyfriend's hand to scratch my arm. That's nice. Yeah, but I don't rip his hand out of its socket. Yeah. I think that's also scratch that you don't do that.

I think it's nice that you don't. It is nice. It's a low bar. But I have jumped, just barely jumped, did it. I've had it and I'm happy. No. Well, I mean, yeah, I guess it is a it's a it's a creative solution. But yike, so where do they get Just people who are walking by, they'll jump on their shoulders. Yeah, so people who visit the shrine and they and they. It's also that you know, these monkeys are regarded as holy, so they're not gonna like, you're

not gonna drop kick a holy monkey. So if a holy monkey gets on you and starts pulling out your hair, it's like it's got God's will, all right, You're welcome. Um, just like how we get allow like other people in positions of authority away with abuses. You know, I guess I guess, but the monkeys they are cuter, though cut they are cuter, and at least it's just at least it's in the name of good dental hygiene. Yeah, and it's well man, oh man, oh man. I'm glad I

haven't visited that shrine. Then. Frankly, my hair would be fantastic. Oh, they would love my hair. It's already like sort of a bird's nest of hair, so I think it's it's just primo, primo monkey plucking kind of hair. Yeah, although it's also kind of um. Each each hair itself is kind of thin where it's like easy to break apart, So I don't know how if it would be good floss, it might be a good toothbrush though. Yeah, that's soft bristles. Yeah yeah, if you like sort of get a big

chunk out. Yeah, you know, personally my hair is mm hmmm. I would say it's actually pretty good for floss, like it would be some primo Yeah. I do remember. This is bringing back this recovered memory of when I was a kid. I did use my own hair at to floss. You did that just is not like because I cared about flossing, but because I wanted to try it. I was curious and it worked. I well, yeah, I mean physically, yeah,

I could do it. I don't know if it actually cleaned my teeth at all, just made him grosser, probably floss like smiling at the school picture. Just a bunch of hair sticking out of my teeth. You get get something that is that human hair, and well you know what they were. I mean, I know that. I think there was a time when I used to I wasn't a kid who ate hair, Thank god. Um, I'm sorry to those listeners who worked children who ate her. But I definitely chewed on my hair. Yeah, me too, Yeah,

I chewed on my hair. Yeah, I wouldn't. Actually, when people eat a lot of hair, it can become a big problem. It's a um have it known as pike where you you eat things you're not um and hair is one of them. And uh, there was a woman who had eaten so much hair it formed an intestinal clog and it weighed like as much as a baby. She got a hairball in her big hairball and they had a surgically removed it and it weighed like ten pounds or something. Disgusted. I feel so bad for her.

There's pictures you want to see. I think you're bringing them up. Yeah, well, it's like it's like when you imagine, like you know, when you you dig in your shower drain that times, it's that hundred times with some probably internal google it's I mean, it actually looked like sort of more like a hairball, just like a big ball of hair. All right, well that's that's okay then. Yeah, I've seen that. I've seen that all the time. I mean they cleaned it off first. I don't know that's true.

They probably didn't want to show would blood. Yeah, they like clean it off to shoot all their fellow surgeons like, hey, look what I found. Look at this jet hair ball. I mean, I guess it's turned around as fair play because we use animal parts in weird ways. I guess so, like if you think about it, because we use we use a boar hair bristles our brushes, We use um horse hair in our instruments, right yeah, violins, Uh, we use hair, we use other animals hair. I got someone

gave me a book called Felting with cat hair. I've seen that. I haven't done. I haven't done it, but I've seen it. Have you felted? With the cat home. No, but I do. I have felted with normal wool. Yeah, I guess wool is like the main the main animal hair we use. Huh, yeah, that is like cat hair. I don't quite understand because I like, oh, you know, some people knit with their dog hair and cat hair. Dog here and cat hair. It ain't ain't it's nasty.

It's also not long or anything, so sometimes like they were doing. Well, there's dogs that are have long hair and cats that have long hair. I don't think it worked with the real short hair ones. Yeah, my dog definitely generates enough long hair to fill with or to knit with if I wove it into yarn. So disgusting. Well, I mean, I guess it's a way to use all of the fluff that's always around the house. I just

like number one. If a friend has an allergy and I'm outside wearing my like cat hair sweater, is that just because you have cat hair on you feels wrong? I mean I already do always have. I mean, we're not anymore. I don't live with cats anymore, but I know my my roommate moved away and took the cats. I'm sorry, it's fine, it's fine. It's fine. They're happy where they are. Face time with the cats. I did.

I did. We faced I FaceTime with my older man and then we I saw the cats in the FaceTime for I like collected their hair, sort of shaped it into the shape of a cat and be like, you are my cat now, you know? I keep I keep texting my old roommate who has moved away, and I keep being like, could you please send me some of their hair? I need to really cat? Is this a bit okay? You're very convincing you. Yeah, I know. She keeps saying no, and I don't know. Why can I

have some of your cat hair for my purpose? I hope this isn't weird. I I'm glad you are all happy where you are now, but I'm going to need you to send me cat hair because I need to make a cat. So have animals themselves ever been used as tools of torture by humans? I mean these are civilized people were talking about, So yes, absolutely, of course they have. Remember that book. You may have heard it name dropped a few thousand times, and remember that scene

where the hero gets torture heard by rats. Well, historically rats have been used for torture, and in an even more gruesome manner, during the Dutch Revolt from the late fifteen hundreds to mid sixteen hundreds, a military leader named Die Derek Snoy found a sickening use for rats. He'd philo ceramic bulup with rats, placed the bull against his

victim's stomachs, then heats the bowl. The rats, who were getting uncomfortably hot from the hot coals, burrowed into the only refuge available to them, the fleshy stomachs and on trails of the human victim. This of course kills the human, though I'm not really sure what happens to the rats. The rats have been used throughout the ages as implements of torture, which I think is really unfair to the

rats here. They are just trying to live their ratty Life's getting cheese every day when you're suddenly forced to be parted to some ghoulish Rube Goldberg machine of torture. Who's the real rats here? The rats are the humans who used the rats to torture of the humans. Right, So when we come back, be shifting gears from tools of torture to tools of love, if you know what I mean. We're gonna talk about animal sex, so stay tuned. So now we're going to talk about tools of well,

you know, as sexual nature. We humans have long sought to separate the act of sex from that of reproduction because sex is fun, while having tons and tons of babies can be gotta less fun. So some historians think that there are ancient tools of reproductive control, such as small rocks, potentially being used as a kind of primitive form of I U. D. There's also a myth that

seems to suggest condoms were used in ancient society. The Legend of Minos, written in one tells the sad story of King Minos, whose semen was cursed to be made out of snakes and scorpions, a huge turn off for the ladies. So to protect his lovers, he used a goat bladder as a female condom. So, YadA, YadA, YadA, history happened, and now we have a bunch of forms of cool birth control and other sexual devices that make sex safer and more fun. But it's putting a bunch

of bells and whistles on sex, a uniquely human habit. Nope, we got some kinky critters who put their creativity to very good use, if you know what I mean. Uh So, I like in the Legend of King Minus, they're like, what if semen was made out of scorpions and snakes? That would be bad, right, but it's I would be

much more concerned. I mean, like sure you wouldn't, but like when that hurt come out, that's gotta those little semen, semen, scorpions are crawling out of your tiny little peny hole, right, that's well put. Yeah, I just I feel like, right, like why would you I like the how the logic is like, oh, you know you gotta you gotta protect you know, have protective sex. That's all good, But would you ever want to have sex again if like every time you had sex scorpions came down of your wei hole?

I mean, listen, how good is the orgasm that is paired with like the payoffs seems to pale in comparison to like, oh, well, you know, I'm gonna like pass an entire snake and a scorpion or like like a couple of seconds of like a couple of sex and sex sex. Yes, I mean, because I've heard passing stones is incredibly painful and those are tiny, right, Passing scorpions. Even I guess that the scorpions small enough. Yeah, I mean, how a little are these little scorpions? I don't know.

I mean, I don't know how little they're. Scorpions come in all shapes and sizes. Also, if they're too tiny, then pinching on the outside won't really you won't feel it, right, that's right. So then it's like the bite of um, what do you call those the daddy lung legs? They're the poisoness, but they can't really bite you, I think, And I don't think they're actually that poisonous to humans. I think that's kind of like that might be apocryphal. I'm not sure, Um, but I would know, you know

more about creatures. I wouldn't rub them all over yourself and well, then you're ruining my weekend plans. But I think that, I mean, their their jaws, their teeth are quite tiny. But I'm also not sure if the venom is actually that. Do you want me to have a happy for us July or not? What do you want? There's also difference between harvestman and Daddy long legs, and I don't know what it is. So that's helpful. So have you ever dated a drummer? Have I ever dated

a drummer? Oh my god, I think I have, Yeah, I think once. Yeah, Well, thank you for being on a show. CARF. That's that's just so we came here to ask an answer. Okay, we'll tell me about that. Well, I'm actually I'm actually currently dating a drummer. It's not that's not as main, it's not as Yeah. Yeah, my drummer wasn't his main gig, right, it was just a fun It was a drummy thing. Yeah, it was just a drummy thing. But there are drum people. Yeah, and

there are drum birds. What so cockatoos use drumsticks to get the ladies, I get it. So, um they will accompany their singing with a rock and drum solo. Um. So these are male palm cockatoos. They're found in Australia and they actually look pretty metal. They're black with red cheeks. Oh. I really want there to be a drummer who dresses just like they kind of. I mean it's like it's sort of like, you know, it does look very metal bandish. It's like you know, you got this jet blackbird, and

I mean the red cheeks are adorable. Yeah. Yeah, uh. And so they will use sticks or rocks to rhythmically drum against the branches of trees to attract mates, which is um. I think it's one of the first time we've seen another animal other than humans use percussive instruments that are like a separate tool to use as a percussive instrument, truly using the rhythm of the night. And each bird has his own characteristic drum solo roof. Oh,

that's great. I love that. Yeah, and it's I listened to a thing of it and it's kind of like it kind of sounds like like where wait is that just that was one bird? Though that was another bird might be like yeah, or like one bird might be like, I'm sorry. That bird is my boyfriend. I'm sorry or girlfriend. I don't know what the agenda. They are males, yeah, okay, Oh it is a dude, Okay, so then that's my boyfriend.

They also have red hairstyle because they're cocka teas. Let me just show you a picture of these probably rocker birds. I'll probably put up a photo of these on our Instagram in her Twitter, but they are they look like they look like rock stars. They have a little their little red cheeks. They have a mohawk and red cheeks. That's so funny, it's really, it's really funny. And actually here's one of them holding a twig, probably to use as a drumstick. And you know what, he looks real

rock and roll doing it. He does, well, I mean some of them. And it's like they're they're a little they're little um mohawks can pop up or go down, and so sometimes they look like Emo with their their feathers right, and then of times they like punk rock where they're like ready to rock? Are you ready to squawk? So I don't want to ask you a riddle, Carmen, Okay, when is a tool a tool? Where as a tool it's like a jerk tool, like like that tool is being a real tool. It's a jerk. I mean, that's

a that's a that's a fun one. But no, that's not the answer. But tell me, tell me a penis and I don't. And this's and it's actually a tool like a tool. Truly did not even I wasn't even I should have guessed we are in this actually, like I should have known. You should have known. But that's it's okay because you may not have known that elephants have nearly prehensile penises. What yeah, so they can actually

use their penis for things other than sex. They have used their penises to swat flies, scratch their tummies, or even as a third legged, to balance. I can't get over. I just think that's so I am sorry. I'm imagining like, uh, if humans could do, like if there was a fly nearby, and the guy was just like, they can't, but I thought,

it's just really fun. That's amazing, right, Like, like they've been observed using them to manipulate objects to kind of balance when they're reaching for something like a like a tripod. I mean, so smart and useful. I love that. And they're very big, I imagine because they are elephants, and um, they're very they look like a small trunk, but it is I mean, all right, listen, people be mature about this.

Animals do need to reproduce, and in order to have sexual reproduction, uh, most of the time, you do need a penis. Sometime that penis is going to be the size of a large pool noodle. It's gonna flop around. They're going to use it to swat flies away, and I just want you guys to be mature about this. Okay, if I see a bunch of jokes about like elf and penises, or or a lot of people saying, oh, that's so funny, I will be very disappointed. I am laughing,

but only in straight serious. This is like, absolutely nothing is funny and laughs as she learns. When she learns something, she laughs because that's just the sound of learning. Yeah, it's the joy that comes with learning. I do not find this funny, pure euphoria at learning, truly. I'm just like, I'm so eager to learn. But I agree. I mean, I got it, you know once never um, never be laughing at the fact that have been used to flats wise for you also shouldn't laugh at the fact that

their sperm has to travel over two meters. I love learning. So the reason the uh researchers suspect that the penis is so flexible is that the females vaginal opening is located one and a half meters into her body. Holy mac al, So it has to. And then it's also just kind of hard for elephants to have sex because they're big and bulky. Um, and it's Actually it's it's actually interesting because I read that sometimes um, younger or less experienced females can be intimidated by by bowls. Uh

and um. There it's often consensual, but they're just kind of like whoa, what's going on? And so their their family will like stay around and be like you go girl. Ah, and it's like they're they're a matriarchical society. So it's like older females will be around. It's like you get it, honey, you get some Yes, yes, you're doing great. So that be big elefant t. Did you see him swat fly earlier? It was amazing. You're so lucky girl. Um and uh.

So it's to the male to have a flexible, flexible wiener that can you know, reach the female is quite important. It has to be and it has to be pretty you know agile Yeah, I mean an agile pool noodle of the penis um just reach just doing an old reach around. Oh man, that's so fun. I don't know why the fly swatting is is forever gonna because you've probably imagined it with like a with like a tuba sola going like rod little swat out of here is

kind of making a shoe motion like shoes. It's great. Um, I want to Actually, I had this idea. I don't know if this is gonna work or not, but I wanted to try a predictive text game because it's what the It's what all the folks are doing on on the twitters and stuff, where you you type in some text and let it predict what you're about to say. So I was gonna say, prehensile elephant penis and then just select the predictive text. Prehensile elephant penis is the

best way to make a difference in the world. Oh my god, it's amazing. Way. Should I try? Yeah, you try? All right, let's give it a shot. Uh. And what was the prehensile elephant penis? Prehend So I'm going to text you this too, prehensile elephant penis. All right, then here we go. Was the show that you were hilarious to do? That you were Wow, that's pretty close to reality. I'm gonna send this to you now so that you always have it. Yes, please do all right, here we go.

Prehensile elephant penis was the show that you were hilarious to do? That you were that's true, that's so true. I feel like the more I do this, the more the predictive text is just going to curtail itself to like my needs, and eventually the show will right itself. So I know what you're asking, Carmen. Elephants don't have hands, So how do they masturbay? That's so true? The answer

with whatever they can find? Oh no, so they've masturbated, just like rubbing against the ocean floor with decapitated fish, hey god, and most bestly, live eels. Oh no. There was an observation of a particularly crafty dolphin wrapping a live eel around his wiener and just like riding it out. Wait, so that it was like wrapped around like a like a like a piece of thread around a stick. Let's say, yeah yeah, And that eel was just like, let's hold

on for this one. Wouldn't that's so humiliating for the eel? Like, wouldn't it suck if you were reincarnated? Uh? You know, like in Mowanna, she gets reincarnated as like a manta rage big gorgeous sting ray and like, uh, you're like reincarnated as a cool sea animal like an eel. You're like, wow, I'm in the ocean and like you know, and then a horny dolphin just like I'm gonna use it. Oh god, I love that now, like horny that's what horny dolphins

sounds like. It's just like, oh my god, that's at more than for your like sounds like, oh god, what's the who the actor? The uh you sound like Matthew McConaughey. Oh yeah, yeah, that's the heels keep getting older. My wait, I've already made a gross but yeah, dolphins and eels. I didn't wonder if it was an electric heel and if that would be bad or good. I like, it

depends on the dolphins. The dolphin into like some of this S and M stuff with like electric eels, I mean, is it sort of That's another way people do that, right where they like attached car batteries to their judget People get zapped. I mean like like I'm not I'm talking about the consensual No no, I mean people get zapped right right. As someone who's never electrocuting myself in the name of fun, yeah, I wish I could. I wish I could weigh in as somebody who has the

experience knows, But I don't write. I mean is it just because, like I wonder if it's just that it's painful, or there's something like more interesting about it. I mean, there's it's like the whole dichotomy of pain and pleasure, I imagine, I guess so. And I wonder if, like if like electrocuting yourself like makes more blood flow out in the areas. I mean, that's that's good. I don't know it's interesting, but yeah, that would That sucks for thee sucks to me. That does the eel just not?

I mean if the eel doesn't atally doesn't understand, doesn't know, it's just like, why am I? All right? I guess where I'm gonna chill for a half second. This is truly the less This is a bumpy ride, right, I guess I'll get somewhere. So dolphins aren't the only ones who have found a sort of masturbatory aid. Peter Bruckmann of the Natural History Museum at the University of Austin claims that orangutans make dildos out of wooden bark. Well, all right, get a girl, yeah, get it, girl, empower

yourself with that wooden dildo. I love like the general vibe of this when we are in the sex section for women is just like we just imagine all of the animal girls being like, get it, girl. I mean sometimes, like with elephants, they're very supportive. I love yeah, and I love like these orangutans just like um. And I don't think it's just exclusively females, if you know what I mean. I think, man, sometimes we'll use them, use the dildos. I mean, hey, it's all about the sexual pleasure,

you know. I don't know if they're as sexually liberated as Bonobo's who are very much so. They just hump everything each other all the time, and it's all fun. It's a greeting. It's like it's just like you want to borrow cup of sugar. You just you hump your neighbors sometimes, you know, um, but orangutans, you know, it's it's it's surprisingly progressive. Tree bark dildos. That's nice. I mean tree bark to those personally, it doesn't sound terribly

comfortable for me. I don't know how they get it smooth. I would imagine they would sort of pick them out, you know, based on smoothness, like uh like kind of a smoother you know, like like select I wonder, I don't know if there's any evidence that they like actually shape it, but they are. They are some of the apes that one would they do use tools so so

that I imagine they get crazy. Who's to say that they don't, because they they'll, like we said talked about earlier, they use leaves as sort of like safety whistles, and they'll use leaves to protect themselves from rain, So they have some concept of tool use and so like, it wouldn't surprise me that much if they sort of, like you know, had their favorite piece of bark that they kind of I mean, don't we all, you know, don't

we all have our favorite I don't know. Uh, but it's not just a sort of intelligent primates or intelligent um sea mammals like dolphins, but also female porcupines have been observed to maybe use sticks as dildos. Well, porcupines.

I don't blame do you blame them though? No, I don't blame them because it's gotta be rough to Oh yeah, it's actually it's actually not so it's I don't think it's actually so bad for porcupines because I think they're um hiny areas are softer, like the there's not really that many quills around. I would hope their heiny areas um. And you know, their their quills are sort of like if you just stroke them one way, they aren't painful, like it's only if you write. They can be surprisingly

soft if you stroke them one way. It's just like when they make all their quills erect and it's like, yeah, this is protection right right. Um. Although hedgehogs have more problems. I think they can't hedge and like I read something about hedgehogs having sex, like how do hedgehogs have sex? And like a biologist was like, very carefully, very as we all should, you know, we should be careful but have fun. You know, yes, yes, I agree with that. Uh. And just to get back on the topic of tool tools,

you know what I mean. I'm talking about dragonfly penises are like ice cream scoops that remove other dragonfly sperm from their partners during mating. Think that through Wait, just take a moment. They take out with a sky scream scoop, which is their so they take it out like it's a condom. So they're like, I don't want to reproduce right now scoop it out, put it out well almost, but with competitors sements. So they super want to reproduce their like but just with me, but just with me

and my and my seed. Oh my god, that's pretty gross, but it's um so. I read this in the book called Dragonflies by Cynthia Burger. Uh quote. He uses his own shaped penis to either scoop out or tamp down the old sperm before he has his own tampdown, like like an old timey you know, one of those plant in your seeds muskets. Gotta tamp it down, tramp it down most of the and she also writes that most of the time the two dragonflies are together in copulation wheel,

they are not actually mating. Instead, the mail is occupied with the victing or compressing the sperm deposited by a previous mail. Oh so they're trying to they're getting that old sperm all away, but they're also tamping it down. I think that's also like that's to make room for their own spur like scoop throw but any leftover like tamp tap tamp right right right, that's crazy. Yeah, it's like trying to get pixie sticks sugar back in the tube.

You ever spill, you ever spill a pixie sick and you get sugar where you're trying to scoop it back in there. It doesn't get don't you know what? You make a point. You made a beautiful visual point right there. It's just so funny to me that they just like have this like like you know, spoon, like shovel peans and like hi ho, hi ho. I'm otoper high tap tip tampa. Oh man, bugs are growth oh, I mean with like dragonfly, just that they just that they have

a peanut spoon. It is I think, I don't know, I don't know where like evolutionarily, I feel like that's such a strange. I get it, like it's not a choice evolutionarily how you are created. But that's just the spoon element of being like no, scoop it out, scoop it. Well. I think it's actually that's actually pretty common where a strategy for all sorts of creatures to get competitors firm out of the reproductive tract of the female so that when they deposit, because they don't want to waste their

reproductive opportunities. Um. So, there are a lot of animal penises that will actually act as kind of like I don't know, wet wipes or uh, well we'll be able to remove I just the the shovel penis is really funny to be yours, it's burned out, it's very funny. So I want to end the episode with a new section that I like to call news. So this is it's a news item that it doesn't have as much to do with tool use, but it's uh just where

humans and animals collide um current events. And there's a news story out today about a woman who has learned to walk, trot, gallop and jump like a horse. Um wait, hang on, like with on all fours. Yeah, oh right now let me. I'm going to show you a video of this. This is very real, all right, yes, it's very real. Her name is I like Kirstine. I think she's a Norwegian woman, and um, she has figured out how to walk and how to trot and it's really

it's actually quite impressive. Um, oh my god, Oh my god. She's trotting like a horse and it's with galloping like a horse and she can go fast that yeah, dogs are better, I mean, like but look, look she's what she just jumped over a picnic table. It's like, I can't even jump over a picnic table like a human, let alone like a horse. This is the funniest and you know, good for her, it is impressive. I can't

do that. I don't have problems with this. I think that if you want to embrace sort of walking like a running and jumping like a horse, I mean, live your life. You know who's to say? This is amazing.

She's very good at jumping's very good. And what's interesting too, is like her body, Like I can definitely tell she's like studied how horse has moved and then copied them because she's got like the leg kick after she jumps, for like after a horse will jump over the thing, that legs kind of will kick in the air to

just make sure they got that extra oof of clearance. Yeah, it's also it's gotta she's like, I gotta have a lot of arm strength because she's doing this on all fours and she's doing the exact like you said, the motion of the horse. It's wild. It is really cool. It's I do wonder though, how much time she has on her hands and feet, if you know what I mean, all fours, how much time she has on her hives. Truly, though, I will say from a personal perspective, that looks very uncomfortab.

It does look uncomfortable. That's got to put a lot of strains straight on your lumber. Lumber. Yeah, yeah, I feel like back hurts watching it. Yeah, my lower back just like got thrown out by that video. But you know, hey, good for you. That's that's pretty interesting to her. I know, that's a skill I could never do. It's so very impressive and just like, I don't know, that's that's the thing to have in the world. Woman who jumps like

a horse and just try that follow your passion. When you said that, I was like, well, as a kid, didn't we all like pretend to be like animals at one point? And I'm like, no, no, master does it. Well, you may have done it poorly, but she actually does it. Really, it's very accurate. She put a lot of work into it. So Carben, you've got anything to plug other than dragon fly? H man, I hate that I can plated ice cream in my head with that. I know, Well, you can't

help it. Sorry, Scoop, scoop, uh for me. Let's see, I guess I'm I'm now helping to host. I guess I'm helping out with a stand up show. I wouldn't say I'm hosting every now and then. I'm on it, but I'm helping out. You're peripheral, Yeah, I'm peripherally involved. But they'd like, Um, you're gracing the stand up show. Yeah me, Teresa. Oh cool, Jason found of glass. Um, they host and it's at the local or it's at the public house. Cool, that's all. It's an elly if

you want to go to see its stand up. They have very very good stand ups that go up, so you should definitely check it out. Um. And then and that's on sorry, that is on Monday at ten pm Monday, which Monday, Monday, Any Monday, all Mondays, all the Monday. Well yeah, that's so cool. Yeah, just you can come any Monday, Yeah, any Monday. And it's free, and there's some pizza and you can eat pizza and it's free. Is the pizza free? Yeah, the pizza's free. What the heck?

You gotta be fast that you gotta get there. I wasn't going to come to support you as a friend. Then I said for pizza. I know, free pizza, so you should definitely if you like stand up and you should you like stand up and you like free pizza, yeah you should go. And it's all free. The show is free, and the pizza's pizza with Carmera's Young Cheese. That's nine. And then your Twitter handle handle. Where else can people find you? You can find me on Instagram.

I no longer have a Facebook, so don't even bother, don't even bother, don't even a hassle with it, because she ain't there, not there. You can't find you can't find her anywhere. And then yeah, otherwise you can check out my website at www dot Carmen and jelic at dot com. And I have all my work up there point and I do stand up around l A so you can see there, you can see you and all of your sort of lip palms. Oh my god, you listen. I mean, once you've see me a few times, you'll

have seen all. She leaves a trail I do. You can find me that way, and you can find us on Creature feature Pod dot com. Our Twitter is Creature feet Pod f a t our. Instagram is Creature Feature Pod, and uh, you can find me at Katie Golden and of course at pro bird writes where I am a bird on Twitter? Or is the bird me? Or am I the bird who knows you? You decide um. I also want to make a special shout out to fan and Instagram or Mary Danger, who she's been making some

amazing and weird comics for the show. She just made a comment recently about last week's episode and she'll probably have one up on this week's episode too, so check those out on Instagram. Those are really awesome. Uh, thank you so much for listening. I'm super honored to be allowed in your ear holes. If you're enjoying the show, please leave a writing comments, subscribe, or gently blew a kiss to the next Burgee see. Your support really does mean so much to me, and also the conspiracy of

birds I'm part of really though. Thank you so much and I'll see you next Wednesday on Creature Feature. And thanks to the Space Classics for their awesome song Exo Lumina