Oh hey, it's your sister's new boyfriend who you're quietly judging because of his cracked phone screen and bad shoes. Ali Ward back with another episode of Ologies. If this is your very first episode, Just a few things. We swear a whole bunch in this. We swear a lot of them, most of them. If you wish we didn't, don't freak out. There are bleeped episodes of the podcast available at aliward dot com. I'll put a link in the show notes, moving the dang heck on. Okay, So
freakin toads. What are they? And are they the best? Are they the worst? Are toads the unsung underdogs? Are they wardy friends yet to be made? Or are they bastards? Do they belong in a heap of canceled beasts who don't deserve our admiration? You'll find out. But first business, in which I thank everyone on patreon dot com slash ologies for their questions, for their patronhood, for making the show feasible and possible and just a joy to make.
Also thank you to everyone sporting ologies merch from ologiesmarch dot com and everyone who just gets it and knows that making sure that you're subscribed, and reading the show helps us get seen by pre ologites people who don't know about the show yet. Also thanks to the kind folks who are leaving reviews, because you know that I read them when I'm in a hotel eating gas station food, and they make my day. And so I read you
a new one each week as a thank you. And this week, Justin Dees said, my grandma passed away recently, and the only thing I could do to keep myself from crying was listening to ologies. Ali. You helped me laugh when I felt like crying. That's huge. Keep it up, my friend, Justine. I'm so sorry about your grandma. I'm sending you a hug. Everyone texts your grandma. I does your grandma text? If you have a grandma, text her and say, hey, thanks for pushing out a baby. That
pushed out a baby. I don't know you word it however you want to word it. Okay, boophology, let's go down a total. Let's get the hell into it.
So.
Boofology is a word that I did not make up, although it's seldom cited. To be fair to the eleven Reptile Magazine article titled ode to a toad uses the term boofhology one oh one, so I'm going with it. There's also herpetology, which is reptiles and amphibians. There's about tractcology, which is the subfield that is just amphibians, which I may have pronounced wrong, but I tried to pronounce it so many times. But what if I want to do a frog episode down the line or one on Newts.
So I'm going boofhology because it exists, people use it sometimes. Also, Its root is buffo and the Latin for toad, which may come from a word meaning slimy plant, or it may also come from bouffara, meaning to puff up, and buffoonery is a related word. It's debatable, like toads for some people. So where are you with toads? You know what? It doesn't matter because in an hour and change you'll be padding out to the backyard a little bare feet with your coffee mug every morning, just hoping for a
toad and counter just mark my words. Okay, So this ologist is wonderful. We tried to meet up so many times in the past year or so, but our travel plans kept hitting snags, and then this past week we both happened to be thousands of miles away from our respective homes. We were in Minneapolis on the same night. She was on a road trip toad trip, and I was on this Ology's Midwestern interview Bonanza. So I used your patroon money to get her a nice room in
the same hotel, and with butterflies. I went down to it, kind of like a nervous tender date. She is a gorgeous soul. She's so funny and candid and enthusiastic about toads, and I love her and I hope we are always friends. So if this is your first episode of Ologies, Boy, Howdy, buckle up, get ready to hear scientists passionately describe a
love of toads. She's so humid. I cherish her. So. She was once the program manager for the Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies, where she also served as a national coordinator for her partners in amphibian and reptile conservation. She worked as a biological science technician for the US Geological Survey in the Amphibian Research and Monitoring Initiative, and now works in the nonprofit ecology sector at Conservation Science Partners, but is still in the field a bit out toting
and salamandering and frogging and newting. But today she is in a Minnesota hotel about to get super buffhological with me. So hop on in to a conversation with amphibian enthusiast and buffologist Pria Ninjappa on my way to say, Pria Ato sex ato.
Six.
Here we go me, Pria gonna talk toads, you know six. Oh my goshchry goes.
This is like a blind.
Toads and now you are a lover of toads? Yes, what is it about toads specifically you love? I know that that. Why did I open with a question that's we could do a whole series?
Oh yeah, there's so many things to love. So I was thinking about this because I knew you we're gonna ask me this, And there's so many different ways I could go with this question. But I think just in general, I tend to be somebody who likes the underdog, you know what I mean, like the thing that people don't want to love. You know. That kind of plays into my romantic life as well too. But anyway, that's a
whole nother story. They're just so fucking cute, you know, like you just they're they're fat, and they're like grumpy face, and you just know that they're really not grumpy, or you want them to really not be grumpy, but they just they want to act grumpy. They want to tough, they puff up.
Pre I studied wildlife biology with a minor in environmental studies at Iowa State University, and then she went on to get a master's in conservation biology at Ball University, and her work involved developing the first national database of amphibian distributions and maps. Kind of like a census taker, just going up to tiny toad houses saying, hey, knock, knock, how do hoo? Pardon? How many are you living in that lock? I'd like to observe you eating bugs and
doing the nasty. But what got her into it?
I remember my first toad sighting, which was in my mom's garden in Iowa, and it just would like hop along the tomato plants and eat things, and like eventually we figured out that we could build a little toad hut like out of a pot, you know, and just put that in there and it would just you know, go and hang out. And I was so sad on the days when I didn't see it, like, I'm sure it was all seasonal, but I don't remember, you know,
this specifics of it. And I do remember other people's houses where there'd be one like sitting under the gutter eating the flies and stuff like that. And I liked other critters too, but there was something about the toads that I just kept coming back to that I just kept like, I don't know, I just love them. They're just they just have that face, you know, it's just that face.
I love that you had a toad friend, Like the toad was your friend.
It kind of was my friend.
Her wordy buddy got a toad a boat, and in return it ate all the bugs that wanted to eat their lettuces. It was a mutually beneficial relationship, kind of like when you dog sit and then also while you're there, you eat all their snacks.
And then I think we somehow like figured out or looked it up. You know, there's no no internet back in those tests, but we figured out that there was, that it was going to be a helpful thing, and so yeah, and so that toad lived there, and I want to think that it's was saying the same toad came back like year after year. But I know we definitely saw a toad in the garden at least a couple of years. But yeah, I don't know.
Maybe they're great grandson of the original two.
Oh my god, that will be just so delightful that was true. How long do they live? Oh man, there's a variety of age ranges, just depending on the species. I think probably ten years. You know, five to ten years is on average in the wild, I think, But there are some in captivity. I think that you know, have can live really long.
They look ancient. They do like they're in their eighties. All of them look like Wilford Brimley, and we've like hair listen greed totally do.
I'm Wilford Brimley, and I'd like to talk to you for a few minutes about diabetes PS.
Wilford Brimley was a TV star who was also known for his Quaker Oats commercials and for changing the American pronunciation of diabetes to diabetes diabetes. Also, I just looked up some facts about Wilford Brimley and the one of the most stunning is he's very much alive. He's only eighty four years old, which means that he it was just sixty when he was playing like deep deep Grandpa genre rolls. I respect him for just leaning into that. So toads tiny grumpy grandpas. They are grumpas okay, But
what makes a toad a toad? Straight away? What is the difference between a frog and a toad?
Okay, So generally speaking, most frogs have like smooth skin, they tend to need a closer association with water or aquatic environments. And then the toads that we traditionally know, you know, with the big kind of stout fat bodies and the warts and everything, they typically can be away from water longer and they don't need as much of that sort of direct moisture the way that frogs do. And then they also secrete these toxins from their skin and so yeah, and so like that's the biggest thing.
There are some frogs that do that as well, but pretty much all toads have some sort of gland you know that they and they secrete some sort of buffo toxin. And so.
It's such a good punk band, right, yeah, that would be. Is there skin thicker and what exactly are the worts? Are they air quotes warts.
That's a good question. These warts on toads are associated with these They have mucous glands and granular glands, but the granular glands are the ones that are responsible for the toxic secretions. And it's for an anti predator defense, so that when anything, you know, grabs it, it just tastes bad and they spit it out, you know, or sometimes they'll get sick. Some of the toads produce some pretty strong toxins. So all toads are frogs, but not all frogs are toads. I love those.
It's the old cactus succulent, yes, Like all cactus are succulents, not all succulents are cacti.
Yes, exactly. Like in the amphibian world, there's like like nuts, you know, like all nuts are salamanders, but not all salamanders are nuts, and nuts are too salamanders, like toads are to frogs. Kind of early lineages of toads are they look more frog like, okay, and so like over time that those different features, the more like stout bodies and uh, bigger warts and glands and things like that
appear kind of later in evolutionary history. They came after frogs, so somewhere in that like Cretaceous Cenozoic period they've been around.
Oh geez, they're Wilfrid Brimley's. It's a side note. Wonderfully British vertebrate paleontologist Darren Nish has written extensively on toad evolution and its many gnarled branches. And also he has a pet cane toad named Milo, which looks like it can kick my ass. Anyway, more on cane toads in a minute. But cane toads, like frogs, have teeth sort of, they have like a little peg like nubbuts, but other toads do not have teeth. So to recap, toads are frogs,
and toads have no teeth. Yes, for warts, they've got a poison gland behind their eyes. I called a paratoid gland, thought to have been like an adrenal gland, just gone bonkers. Oh and another souped up special feature not available on this standard frog model.
And then the other really weird thing is that toads have this thing called the bitters organ okay, which sits like kind of between the kidneys and the gonads and I think both males and females have them, but they're thought to be like a primitive ovary or like it's kind of like a spare set of follicles. But the males have it too, and so like in experiments in the lab, they've removed the testes like just castrated them, and all of a sudden, this bitter's organ like is like, oh, okay,
time for me to come into play. And then like it starts forming eggs and like, yeah, initially when I had learned about it, I was thinking that maybe it would go, you know, it would like you know, create sperm or something in the males and over or eggs and the females, but no, it's just like always produces eggs. It has like follicles. And then the same thing with the female, like if one of the ovaries doesn't work,
then it will start to come into play. But the other interesting thing with the males is that like in some situations where there's estrogen, mimic chemicals or like other chemical things that will like chemically castraight, all of a sudden that organ starts taking off too. And like it's named after the dude who discovered it, but it always relates to eggs and oocytes, and that means that, you know, the ability to possess ovaries is probably like the original evolutionary condition, right.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
That's my story, and I was sticking to it.
I love it, publish it. I just peer reviewed it.
Perfect.
That's up, doney. Well okay, And then what about their big, crazy weird ear drum.
Oh so, well, so they I mean, they do have that tympanum, and that's how they can hear each other sing their lovely songs. But those ones in those areas where they don't call, they have like they have lost their ear drums, so they just you know, do the waving thing or whatever, and and they they don't even need them anymore, so they don't have them. So yeah, but it's just that tympanic membrane. It's kind of like
in most frogs like have them. It's that it's just like a little kind of like a drumhead, you know, basically, and they you know, sense vibrations from the calls of others. But they can sense, you know, they can tell the difference between their own species obviously in others. And yeah, what.
About their eyes? Is their eyesight good? Eyesight bad.
I don't think they're supposed to have very good I have never seen them in glasses that they would look so good in glasses though, wouldn't they. Yeah, they would look so good, like just some little hipster like comes to some you know, nice like sort of thick frame glasses or those ones without the rooms. Yeah, so I think they I don't think they're thought to have like
great eyesight, but I don't think it's bad. I think they can discern color though, because like some of the like some toads are sexually dimorphic more than just the size, Like, there is actually color differences, so kind of like in birds and stuff like that. So yeah, so they must be able to have they must have some color vision. But I don't know.
Are the males bigger than the females.
The females are bigger than the males by a lot. Yeah, by a lot, yes, Oh yeah, usually by quite a bit. Like if you see them mating, like it's just like this little tiny male on top of this big old female, and it's just always looks a little funny.
Oh, and both have tympanyms to hear sound, such as for example, the romantic screamy love ballads. Man toads make by inflating an air sack like a big extra chin, kind of like having a subwoofer on your face.
Hey, So, another thing that's really cool about toads is they have all like a lot more bony material in their skull, Like their skulls are like highly ossified, and those crests and the shape of those crests and stuff are what you can use to distinguish species when they are like in the same area and you have a lot of similar looking little brown toads with warts other than the wartz per spot certain species. Yeah, no, it's yeah,
it's it's warts per spot. So like in the like dark brown spot, there'll be like two or three warts if it's an American toad, and then if it's a Fowler's toad or something or woodhouses toad, they'll have more
in each like dark spot. And then there's like the shape of the parotoid glands, which are the things that produce like behind their eyes, that produce that more of the toxic secretion, and then those little crests and and ridges and everything like they yeah, that's how they differentiate themselves. But yeah, so they have these really cool skulls. Frogs don't have that. Yeah, you think of them as like the cavemen. They're actually the ones that came later.
You're gonna get a full toad back tattoo. There are toads on all.
Continents everywhere except Australia, which right now is only being overrun by the invasive cane toad.
Oh really, yes, Australia got a little bit ripped off on the toad card and then they got pad.
They got yeah kind of yeah, and they didn't used to be on Madagascar either, but now there's a different toad that is found on Madagascar that's also super invasive and yeah, wreaking havoc. So yeah, Unfortunately, the toads that are finding their way to places where they never were, like the ones you just don't want to be there.
Okay, let's loop around back real quick and talk about cane toads, shall we. Okay, great, So these are these huge ass toads. They're also called marine toads even though they're terrestrial. Lineas made like an oopsye daisy in the seventeen hundreds about their habitat, but the largest recorded one measured over nine inches long. They look like holding a big leathery pretzel roll, but with legs, and they are
college Stoner level hungry. They eat everything from like live bats, sometimes plants, to bugs, to dead animals to just straight up garbage, sometimes just literal actual garbage. Most scientists report they seem to give few, if any fucks, enabling them to get both large and in charge. They also have successful and very prolific mating strategies. So insummation cane toads
they're like the Romans. They like to eat, they like to make love, and they're native to the Americas and even South Texas, but they now live all over the damn place because in the nineteen thirties someone was like, hey, I got an idy.
Yeah, is like where they were growing sugar cane. They were they had brought them there to control like the bugs, you know that were eating the sugar cane. And then, of course, you know, anytime you bring a thing to control the thing that you don't want, then that thing goes, you know, crazy. So there are these big beefy marine toads,
and so they can live. They can tolerate like salt water environments, but they also apparently can live all over the place, you know, on land, so they're like in vast swaths of Australia and all over Hawaii, they're in Florida.
Now, how do you control a cane toad population.
It's proving to be really difficult. They have had some luck with I want to say, caffeine, where they're like dropping caffeine or spraying caffeine. That has been effective in some places in knocking down the population. And I think just generally they try to go and like you know, collect collect them up and then just you know, euthanize them. So yeah, that's pretty much.
Yeah, So yes, some parts of the world have a real cane toad problem. Also, the beetles that they were supposed to eat, they like to climb to the top of the sugar cane and the toads are like, it's too high, No, RICI, I'll just eat this bird instead. So now Australia has a bunch of poisonous toads and sometimes people's dogs eat them and trip absolute balls or just die. Okay, but caffeine really as an agent for
toad assassinations. So okay, what happens is concentrated caffeine when sprayed around by a professional eco barista if you will, causes amphibians to have heart attacks, and they well they croak dad word. Really toe the line with that one, kiddos, Please don't stop listening. Okay, So concentrated caffeine it gives
them pretty much like lethal panic attacks. But one can spread coffee grounds in the garden and they might just get real buzzy and uncomfortable enough to just avoid the area, kind of like how I didn't go into a Starbucks for a while after a venti induced anxiety meltdown. But this could also be just wicked mean to slugs and such, because caffeine is a plant's natural defense against getting munched on by a lot of critters. Also, this sent me down a weird hole learning that a plant can poison
itself with its own caffeine. So the leaves drop, the caffeine leaches into the soil, and the plant is like, oh nuts, I brought this on myself now, Okay, if killing animals makes you screamish, you could always just exploit
them for profit and become a drug dealer. So Country Farm Lifestyle website offered up the advice of painting chloroform on the belly of a cane toad until they start oozing milky poison, and then, just like a pimple full of money, you can gently express their paratoid gland right behind their eyes. But watch your eyes. Wear some cool steampunk goggles or something so you don't get splat into on the eyeball and then wind up really crying over
spilt milky white. Also quick aside within this aside a side seption if you will. Does Pria have a favorite toad? Yes, she has a soft spot. She has a soft warty spot for American toads because they were the first she saw in the Midwest. But she did clarify that they
no longer belong to the Buffo genus. North American toads are now classified anaxorus, which sounds like a very cool rebrand if you ask me, Bufo versus Anaxorus reminds me of the time my godfriend Ben wanted us to call him Sebastian with an E on the end, but unlike Anaxorus, it didn't stick. I'm sorry, Sebastian, sebast Jane.
They're a little bit fatter and their eyes are just a little bit more like bulbous, so I really kind of fell in love with them. But there's some really pretty toads too, Like in the southwestern US there are these green toads and then these red spotted toads, and they're just yeah, there can be really pretty, especially in South America. Like I haven't seen like all the buffon and species you know that are done there. I mean
it would take you know, millions of years. There's so many species of toads all over the world, but they are really diverse and interesting.
Ps how many species of toad are out there, hop and around and frowning. It's over six hundred and some look like dead leaves with a face, and some are beautiful rainbow colors. Some we haven't even discovered yet. Right now, just kicking it in a hollow, I think, is that where toads live? Do they live in toad hollows? Do they live in a little like carbons spots and trees and stuff.
Yeah, well, pretty much in burrows of different sorts. Some of them can do a little bit of digging, but a lot of times they'll live in other you know, mammal burrows and things like that.
Okay, So for more on being roommates with a gopher tortoise. See the test Studonology episode with Amanda Hips. Also, I just tried to google toads plus friends plus inner species, and I'll be honest, not much popped up. I guess it's lonely, being horny and toxic. And if you've already heard the thermophysiology episode with doctor Shane Campbell Stayton, you might know a little bit about wood frog anti freeze. But how do toads get houga aka higgy with it
that Scandinavian word for cozy in the winter? Do they knit chunky turtlenecks and sip hot table wine out of a crockpot? Do they all peace out to condos in Florida when it gets chilly? What happens?
They don't freeze like some frog species can totally freeze in the winter, like they produce this anti freeze. But toads don't do that. They just go underground, like below the frost line where it's just warm enough that they can survive through the winter and they hibernate. But they yeah, but they don't freeze, so they just live underground.
And I need you to settle something for me that has been plaguing me for a long time. Okay, and you love toads, you've studied my dudes.
Yes, true or false?
Toads have arms. Yes they do, Okay, thank you. I don't feel like toads have four legs. I feel like they have two legs and two arms.
They do.
Toads have arms.
They do have arms. I mean they're like little popeye arms right, Like couldn't you just see a little tattoo on those little forearms. They're so fat and the males have fatter forearms on purpose, like to clutch yeah on the ladies and they, yeah, they have arms.
Okay, thank you, and tell me you will.
See it like in different places and references about their their.
Arms and like really, so is that official.
I'm gonna say it is.
Because I just cannot accept that those are legs. It's not our legs work.
No, yeah, like they're not even really four legs. They really look like yeah they're they're yeah, they're like little wrestler arms. Yeah, totally, the little hands like they do they do, they really do have.
Yeah, Okay, that makes me feel better. Okay, so quick aside, I look this up and they are called arms. They are called arms. I went into this thinking this was a battle I had to fight. I was willing to die and leave my corpse on this hill that toads have arms, and instead no one wanted to fight me. It's just a known thing. They have a humorous They have a fused radius and olma bones and four fingers
just like us. The only thing they can't do is give me a knowing appreciative thumbs up, because technically their thumbs aren't opposable anyway. Moving on, so, Priya has done a lot of work with a lot of amphibians, namely salamanders, but her field work helping collect toad data made her love them even more.
Just a little ways into the season, the toads would come in and they would just be everywhere, and they were just so fun to watch, and they just, you know, that have these big like orgies. You know, just the eggs were everywhere, and then the tadpoles would be everywhere, and there's probably at least a couple of sites where they're probably was close to one hundred toads, and you know,
hopping across roads. Whenever we would see them, we would, you know, we'd measure them and determine the sex and just kind of look for overall these sort of health of the animal. And we were doing that in general for the other curtis too, because we were finding some in some cases, like some different malformations with some of the frog species, but we didn't really find that with the toads, which is interesting. We definitely saw a lot of them, you know, just just out and about and
just hopping along. You can really find them when they're breeding, you know, when they come to the ponds to breed. You'll find them like just hopping around in the woods.
But just very randomly like once they once they come in and they do that and then they get out, they just are you don't really know like where they are, what they're doing, and like I just imagine them like underground and they're burrows just having like little you know, socials and you know, like little underground bars and just chilling out, you know, like all winter.
And are they solitary or do they or did they burrow with friends? Do you think? I wonder if they have.
I don't think there are some records of them like in sharing burrows with other toads. And we actually found a multiple species like hybernaculum. But I do think that there are toads that will share the same types of burrows.
And then there are some places like where the soil is really sandy and they can just kind of shimmy down under the sand, especially in the more hotter environments, because in a lot of places in the southern US, both east and west, they're active pretty much year round, or they don't really have much of a hibernation, but you know in the northern areas they do they I don't know, yeah they do, they do sleep. I've never seen a sleeping toe. Yeah, I haven't seen a sleeping.
Tothe Are they nocturnal or are they out in the day?
When they first come out, it's usually during the day, and they will like just be singing their little hearts out like all during the day. Then they kind of shift to just calling at night, and so you don't really hear them during the day, but you'll see them out there sometimes. And we definitely, like when we go out in the field to our sites during the daytime, we would see the toads just everywhere, and they weren't always calling by that point. But then if you came
to the same pond that night. You know, they would just be singing like crazy, and so it's cool.
Oh, listen to these beautiful sounds. That is nature's way of singing. I'm pretty horny. I'm over here. I'm ready to be a dad to thousands of kids I'll never meet once again of ver horny. Well, now that's a fine horny toad, and I want to bet ps where does the word horny come from? I thought maybe i'd wander down a lush forest of buffhological etymology. It turns out horny toads aren't even toads. They're just another name for the horned lizard. They just call these spiky necked
Southwestern lizards toads because they have kind of a stout body. So, good morning, world, we've been lied to for generations. Let's get back to our real friends, the toads and their robust sexuality.
Talk to me.
About toad romance. You mentioned the word orgy. Let's revisit that.
Yes, sure, let's do that.
What is happen when toads, they'll get together to make more toads.
When toads start wanting to get their freak on, they are like so indiscriminate. Sometimes like they will. I've seen a toad andplexing a rock. One time, I was like taking temperature of the water and there were some toads nearby, and this little toad hopped up and like grabbed onto my fingers. They are so funny and and you know, they they get all territorial and they you know, if they think, like in that case, obviously they thought I was like, you know, I gotta get on that thing.
That thing was made that. But but sometimes you know, they're just like you know, defending their territory and they do that thing that like I said, they puff up and as I picked it up, like they do this little release call, like the American toads make this little like like little thing like that, like a.
Version of a car alarm. Let's hear that, shall we? Pria says that release call essentially translates to oops, nope, I'm a boy toad, Please don't mount me, bro, thanks buddy.
Like thet's just a little trill like as I was holding it, and yeah, I fell in love a little bit more of that day. But it they are just like on everything and so and because the males are also really competitive to get the females. There's usually like three or four on the females, and we definitely would find sometimes like half drowned females. And this happens with frogs other frog species too, but like where the there's so many males, they basically are like weighing her down
and then her head is like staying underwater. You know, they breathe air, so they like so she's getting drowned by all these aggressive fuckers.
So these eager dudes.
Number and she's just like, look, yeah, I got I got one, and she's gonna.
Squirt out some eggs and then they're just gonna go by and season them sort of.
Well yeah, and they do have external fertilization. I mean that's you know, part of the strategies. They're just sort of hanging out and then they'll be like ones that'll just be like sitting there like waiting, you know, for the one to hop off so that the next one can hop on.
And Okay, tell me if I'm hallucinating. Is there a type of toad where the baby toads are berthed from holes in the back or was that an American corr story?
No, No, those are those are a different family so they're not bufon ands, they're not true toads, but they are called like the surinam toad. And yeah that, oh man, that's like the craziest like reproductive strategy. They'll lay the eggs and they'll be fertilized, and then they like scoop them up with their legs onto their back, and then their back like the chemistry of the skin changes and it basically like absorbs the eggs into their back and then the skin grows over the back, over the top
of it. It's like some serious sci fi shit. And then and then when they get ready to hatch, they hatch out as like little live it's not even tadpoles. It's like little live baby toads, and they just start cracking out of the mom's back. God's so crazy.
That is such a horror show. I mean, it works for them in good fields.
Right, yeah, but I mean, and it's it's really cool though. Actually, like we use that a lot in like outreach with kids as an example of just amphibian like cool you know adaptations that they have and they're always like ew, let's see it again, you know. So, but yeah, that one's a really freaky one. But yeah, those are not true toads, though those are those are in the Pipidae family. Okay, fanitay, Okay.
So I look this up and as a person who has relaxed to dozens and dozens of videos of blackhead extractions and bought fly maggots under human skin, shout out to lepidopterologist Philteraurus for fostering one in his back recently, and my personal favorite mango worm extraction. I found this surname toad thing revolting. First off, it just looks like a frog who's been flattened by a mallet but came back as a muddy, angry ghost. The surname toad scientifically
known as people pipa. Pipa means kite because it's flat and pointy. It looks like an angular roast chicken breast with webbed feet and like a mesh tank. Top of skin is its back. It's riddled with holes out of which flailing, squirming mini toads emerge in a fury, like a jail break. It's a nightmare you cannot imagine. And if you have that fear of holes whatever that's called, get a restraining order against a species I have met my match. This is disgusting. Also, not even really a toad,
it's an aquatic frog. Get out of here. Let's get back to toads. God, this was gross, I mean beautiful, but very upsetting. Let's talk toad licking. Oh yeah, who's doing it? And why?
Yeah, there's a lot of people that are doing it and they probably shouldn't be doing it. But yeah, so there's only one toad in the US that produces that gular type of it's a boof photox. And you can't just like lick the toad. You will not be very comfortable if you just lick the toad.
Again, do not lick the toad. Why consider this story a PSA against toad basing.
We were driving down this little golf course where another colleague of mine had these rattlesnakes teleimited, you know, tagged, so we could track them. And I saw this thing hopping along and I was like, what is that a bunny? And he was like, those are the Sonoran desert toads. And I was like, what those are those toads the ones that you can lick, And he was like, oh, yeah, those are those ones. And so when we like had
to stop and we went and checked them out. He's like, Okay, now you gotta really wash your hands, like here's some purel and whatever, and like later on, I just like I think I just kind of like rubbed my nose or did something like that, and it was like really burning, like just from that little bit that was probably still on my hands, and thankfully I didn't touch my eyes.
But like that can can be a real problem. I think the indigenous people had learned how to basically harvest it and then and I think you have to dry it and process it a little bit before you can actually use it in those ways for you know, to have the true hallucinogenic experience.
But yeah, so you have to kind of milk them by stressing them out probably a little.
Bit pretty much. Yeah, but I think they just they do have like a fair bit just on them. They're pretty gnarly. But yeah, I don't think it takes much to stress them out. You could see, like certain toads, you can actually see the secretion. It's like this milky stuff coming out.
You just have to sit talk their moms. They're like.
Come flowing out exactly. But yeah, So there are these stories though that people like will do it in such a way that they can still get a high and just keep the toad so that they can like kind of harvest it. And I'm sure, you know, people have studied like all of these different ways of how you can make it happen, But I have not experienced the toad high.
I wonder if people on YouTube are like, listen, oh, yar what you do.
I'm sure you will, and I'm looking forward to learning more about that.
Oh you know, I will. Okay. So the Colorado River toad or the Sonoran Desert toad, same thing. They're native to what's now northern Mexico and the southwestern United States. So these produce a poison that has a form of the psychedelic substance DMT, which is produced in humans naturally, but like during a dream state and maybe when you.
Die god hearing.
Yeah, do not go milking and licking it. That's not going to work. For thousands of years, indigenous cultures have perfected the harvesting and the drying and the smoking of this angry toad juice, and what is said to result is everything from like a powerful love and oneness with nature to feeling like dying and a rebirth to seeing geometric aliens chirping, Well, it comes into another dimension. Did I mention, don't lick a toad? Don't try this on your own. This is not a pinteresque diy hack to
diddle with on the weekend. Respect the culture, Respect the history, Respect the toad. What about toads in popular culture? How do you feel about the children's book series Frog and Toad.
Toad, Toad, the sun is shining, the snow is melting, wake up.
Oh I am not here. Oh my god. One of my favorite books, like for real, like even before I really became like a toad lover, like, it was just one of my favorite books. I just loved the little relationship that they had and how Toad was always so grumpy. But yeah, so I had for Frog and Toad or friends, and then that became the book that I gave all my friends when they started having kids and stuff. There's
a lot of vilifying of toads in pop culture. I feel like, you know, like the whole thing about getting worts from toads, which of course you can't.
You can't.
They can't.
They're not viral. It's just part of their back.
Yeah, they're just they're just trying to protect themselves. They're just trying to make sure that nobody eats them. That's all, you know.
Also, stop licking them if you don't want to get any Yeah, diseasell A lot worse things you can get from licking a toad, like Salmonella's among other things.
Among the other things is a strain of chlamydia and a bunch of bacterial infections I can't pronounce. So don't lick toads. No one wants to get toad chlamydia. You want to tell people you got toad chlamydia. Also, what is the state of the toad these days? How are toads? Do they need us? Do they hate us?
Now?
I know that cane toads are having a heyday, right, Yeah, it's the It is the era of the cane toad. But how in general are toads faring these days?
It depends. So some of the species of toads have been hit pretty hard by the kittrid fungus, the amphibian kytrid fungus, but track a Kittrium dender baddess that's quite a mouthful or BD for short. In Central America especially, there's a couple of the Adylopus genus species that have that are thought to be extinct. Now there's a golden toad that's in the Inscillus genus from Costa Rica, that is, it was like their iconic toad species, and they think
that that's extinct. I think there's they've found like maybe a couple of individuals here and there of all of these different species. But yeah, but they're they've gone extinct. It's because of this fungus, this fungal pathogen. So have you heard of like white nose and bats. So this actually came before and then like the people in the white nose world like learned from that, but it took the b D world, the amphibian world, like a really long time to figure out that it was this fungal pathogen.
It was described as a new species once they figured out that that's what it was. But it's been responsible for well, it's questionable, but there's there's a recent paper that says that there's like five hundred species that have
declined throughout the world on that because of BD. But there's some question about that a little bit, so at least most people say like around like two hundred or so species that have declined orgone extinct specifically because of the impacts of BD and in the US in particular, some of our toad species have been the ones that have been most impacted. So the boreal toads, like I was saying, the western toads, and there's a Wyoming toad that's related as well, and it just has a very
small distribution in Wyoming and it's also been impacted. And so there's all these like recovery programs going on for those two toad species. They were raising them in captivity and you know, having good success with that, but then when they put them back out in the habitat, they would die because this fungal pathogen remains in the habitat. So once it's out there, it's really hard to you know, to figure out like how you can get them back
out there. So they're trying a bunch of different things to maybe see how they how they can help them to persist with it. So disease issues are are something that has impacted our toads. There's multiple strains that are being documented now. There was an out of Asian and out of Africa hypothesis that were kind of competing for a while, and I believe they still have determined that it came out of Asia. But because of trade is
why this thing is moving around. And in fact, with BD they would use those African claude frogs, do you know what I'm talking about. They're fully aquatic with claws like you'll see them like in Asian markets. They're established in Los Angeles, are somewhere down around there like in the wild. Yeah, there's a population down there and in a few other places in the US. But anyway, they were used as pregnancy tests. Wait what so these are not toads, but these frogs were used as pregnancy tests.
And what they would do is they would take they would have them in a doctor's office, you know, and then a woman who thought she was pregnant, they would take her urine sample and inject it into the frog and if it laid eggs, then she was pregnant. And so no, of course, after they were done with these frogs,
they would just like chuck them outside. Oh dear, Yeah, and so many of these had those obviously came from Africa, but they were carrying this fungal pathogen and apparently can like they're resistant or they you know, they can persist with it, and so they were then spreading it to all the native species.
So this was an awful practice, but at the time it seemed favorable to the older way, which was injecting a live rabbit with prego pee, waiting a couple of days, killing it and then examining its ovaries, or or you could pee on wheat and just see how long it
takes to germinate. So if you're ever in a position to pee on a drug store stick, I guess just be glad you're not waiting for seeds to sprout, or like actively murdering a bunny other than fungus and old timey pregnant ladies and I guess really desperate fish fans. What are the predators of toads?
Oh, there are various birds and snakes that will eat toads. Hog noo snakes are kind of toads specialists. The toxin doesn't seem to bother them, so they're able to manage with them. But crows, which are super smart as you know, will like eviscerate toads and then just eat their guy insides. My gosh, yeah, that's what I.
Do with airport sandwiches, I just eat the middle.
Yeah, right exactly. That's what I do too, because I try not to eat as much bread anymore. So I just eat like the cheese and the Sometimes.
I'm gonna fall asleep if I eat this whole pretzel roll with the inside.
So you eviscerate your sandwiches.
Yeah, So they just on zip them in the belly pretty much.
They just go for the little soft part right there and then they just like you know, pick them open and just the I mean, like and it's sometimes it's like you can see it's like a little shirt that has been removed, you know what I mean. Like I've seen some toads out there where they've pulled off the skin in such a way that it looks like they're just stuck with their shirt like a buff over their head,
you know what I mean. And my god, and raccoons will do that a little bit sometimes, like they'll they'll bite off like the head or the legs and then spit them out and then they'll just like you know, clow out or suck out the insides. And so we'll see these like half eaten toads and stuff in the breeding season, especially because you know, they're like, oh smrgas.
Oh my god, it's like a it's like a shrimp avan, a crucious going for it exactly. Oh my gosh. Okay, now toads in pop culture? Toads? Are there any any toads in movies?
Oh, there's a whole like cane toad movie. Do you not know about this toad? Oh my god, you have to. It's like Attack of the Killer Toads or something. I think if you look it up you'll find it. But it's all about these cane toads, and it's it's hilarious. It's like such a great like classic B movie.
When I'm driving a car, I have no hesitation of running over them whatsoever.
I couldn't do without them. They're friends.
So she's talking. I think about the very cheesy nineteen eighty eight documentary Cane Toads and Unnatural History, which I would very very much like to just kick back and watch these cane toads. Man, who I had no idea.
I think the biggest toad. Cane toads are the biggest toads, and they can like I think the record is like three pounds or something like that.
It's an absolute unit toad.
Yeah, completely.
Would you ever keep one as a pet?
No, you know, everybody asked me that and I never I never have.
So no, no pet toads for prey, as she prefers to see him hopping about and just enjoying the wild having their orgies, one of which was recently captured as ten cane toads. At once we're writing a pithon bear back in Australia. It looked like toads on the subway home from work, but what was really happening was not commuting. The python just didn't have that release call churep if
you know what I'm saying. But let's say you'd like to have more outdoor pals and you're not a python, how can you make your backyard a haven for toads? So you've turned over a pot in the garden and then did you carve out like a little toad door? No?
Like you just I think I actually like you. They have this stuff like at the nature centers, like these little guidance type things. But you can like bury a pot like halfway so that it's like becomes like a little tunnel, you know what I mean. You can find these little like designs that are out there for these little toad homes. And they even make like actual like terra cotta toad homes. Like yeah, So.
Do yourself one favor today and look up the hashtag toad abodes. Oh what a site, What a site for sad hearts. Just all it's a pottery in the shape of mushroom houses, toads, road houses, little ceramic cottages for wardy locals. Several times a day since seeing that, I just stare off. I think of all the toads and all the little houses all over the world. Taking a snooze. All right, let's Pepperperia with some questions. Are you ready for Patreon questions?
I think so.
But before I ask the questions that you submitted patrons, a few quick messages about sponsors of the show who make it possible for us to make a donation each week to the cause of the Ologists Choosing. So this week Pria requested a donation to be made to the Amphibian and Reptile Conservancy to support inclusivity and diversity initiatives in amphibian and reptile conservation. So thank you, Pria. Also, if you like ologies, I think you would dig a
podcast called Gastropod. I don't know if you've heard about it, but it's about the science and history of food, and it's hosted by two lovely women. I just wanted to give them a shout. They go on these deep dives into the most curious topics. They visit the world's most advanced model gut at dinner time, they take you on a quest to figure out where microbes and sourdough come from. They figure out whether science can speed up the very
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Really yes that quickly?
Yest to them. Okay, okay. Jack kelliher asks life cycle of a toad same as similar to a frog? Or do they live longer shorter than a frog? Do you think?
Oh? Well, I think it depends on the species. And you know, some frogs live pretty long. Some some toads live pretty long, but but you know, kind of on average in that sort of five ish seven ish, you know, tennish range of years. But life cycle yeah, very fairly similar to a frog, because you know, they are frogs.
They are frog.
Yeah. So they will like mostly be on land until it's breeding season, you know, or like be hibernating or whatever, and then they'll come to the ponds for that breeding season. They'll call attract their mate. There are some toads that don't call, and they're, oh my god, I can't. There are some toads that will do that leg waving thing. You know. Have you ever seen that? Oh my god, you have to.
Yeah.
So they like in these like stream environments where it's so loud because of all this stream noise, they have evolved this like they just they literally take their back leg and they just like go like this.
By the way, is laying on the hotel room bed doing a move that looks like part synchronized swimming but also part shipwreck victim.
And I think in some of them it's their front leg maybe too, but they anyway or their arms. Yeah, and they they just like they're like, hey, I'm.
Over here, god, like hailing a cab.
Yes, and then some you know, chick tota is walking by and just like, oh, oh okay, I see you.
I never that they did that.
Yeah, so there are so anyways. I kind of digress there. But yeah, so generally speaking, they attract their mate. The mate, you know, the female comes over and they you know, do the deed, and they have mostly external fertilization. There's a couple of exceptions. And then you know, they lay their eggs, and mostly most of the species like lay a lot of eggs and maybe you'll have a pretty decent amount of the eggs that will hatchet to tadpoles. But then like the tadpoles are food for all sorts
of stuff. Oh delicious, Oh my god. Have you ever seen like all little toadlet's popping on?
Are they really called toadlets?
Yes, oh good toadlets, and they are. They are so tiny, but they're just like they're the cutest frickin' things.
Frederick Roy wants to know are there any studies on the possible medical applications of toad toxins.
Yes, I don't know the details of them, but I know there's some study on how it affects heart rates, and there's kind of like a steroidal element to it, and I think like in the cocktail there's also like epinephrine and you know, components and things like that, and so in animals and other things that have like experienced the toxin coming into contact with the toads, like they have these like extended periods of fast heart rate or sometimes they have like a really slowed heart rate, And
so I think they're studying like maybe there's a way to kind of like hone that in there's some cool stuff going on.
With that ps I gave a quick Google just to make sure, and yep, sure thing. Plenty of research being done on toad toxins as anti inflammatory agents, cardiac activity regulators, and anti cancer agents. So the future is toads. I'd love to see a prescription pad that just had just said to toad two licks a day, Good morning. Heather Albricks says, what are toad communities?
Like?
I always see toads on the ground blazing their own trails, but then there's always another little guy not too far away. Do they reconvene at the end of the day in communal housing? If they survived by lawnmower or do they battle it out for prime resources? Do they have friends?
Do you think they all come together for the breeding season, but they're not really like friendly, you know, they're like all competing during that time. And it is true that you do tend to see them together, and I think that is probably because they must like hang out together wherever they're you know, overwintering or hanging out during the hot months or something.
Maybe they're in the same hypernaculum, which is my new favorite word. Ever. I'm like, literally, I'm gonna get a sign from the bedroom just called the hyperdetcula.
Yes, it's the perfect it's the perfect name for the bedroom house.
Janamee Parrington wants to know why does everyone think toads are so much grosser than frogs.
I don't know, that is such a good question. I think it's because of the words. You know, people just think, oh, gross, it's all wordy and they don't want to touch it. But you know, they're just so like if you just actually look at a toad face, no, I mean, they're just so cute, so expressive, so expressive, and like you you just you kind of know where they stand. And I just I love that.
They're just toads do not suffer fools.
They do not suffer fools.
Yeah, Irag Gray wants to know why do toads pee on me when I pick them up?
Oh yeah, you're like, yeah.
That happens.
That happens all the time. I've got so much toad p on me. It's just a defense mechanism, you know, they just don't They were like, hey, maybe if I p on you, you let me go.
I mean, who hasn't tried that in a meeting you wanted to leave?
But you know, they just from sitting in a in a little puddle of water or something like, they can absorb up enough water. So it's unless it's been really dry, like you're not really it's it's you don't have to worry too much about it. But if you're finding a toad like out in the middle of the woods and you pick it up and then it peace on you, then you might have kind of made its life a little bit harder for a little while. Gave a little
careful of water. Just yeah, just put a little just pour a little bit of your water into a little bowl and just just like PLoP it in there. Let it just reabsorb some more.
I love that they do that. Yeah, Sarah Terry wants to know what what do you think is the most poisonous one ever?
Or rather, that's a good question because like there's you know, the different toxin cocktails in these these buffo toxins. I think the cane toad is pretty toxic. Yeah, I don't know if it's the most toxic though, that's it's a good question. But I know that that genus, that Rhinella genus, I think a lot of those have like pretty strong toxins. I think the inscillus maybe does too. And that's the genus of the Sonoran desert toad, the one that is the ucinogenic one.
Shoot, I don't think I've said this yet, but don't lick toads. Sarah Peck would like to know if you know any toad related magic spells. I'm sure you know. So.
In Macbeth that same like double Double Toil and Trouble poem, at the beginning of it, it talks about a toad and like put that in the pot first.
Toad under Coldstone Fordays and nights thirty.
Well, they're basically trying to get the toad toxin into their oo, which is brue. But I'm sure there are other toad poems. I don't know.
Oh yeah, I'm going to look up some toad witch spells. I'm sure there's a ton. So I just did a little tippy tapping and according to some very helpful occult website, during medieval times, toads were seen as satanic creatures, and folks thought that witches could like magically cause play as toads and then go poison people and just cause general
toad related mayhem. Although, now that I'm thinking about it, that Disney Frog Prince fairy tale of a woman kissing a frog and then turning it into some well groomed and presumably fiscally stable man was maybe just a parable about a hallucination. Who knows. Moving on, I'll pecka paka wants to know. Is there a humane way to get rid of cane toads or not?
I know, yeah, probably the most humane way is if you could like just collect them all up and like, I don't know, freeze them or something. I know, like they like slowly slowly turn the temperature down. Yeah, totally freeze.
I don't know, Just go to sleep, sleep sleep.
Yeah, well there are you know they actually, you know, I don't know. There's this thing that we used to use when we were either getting ready to preserve critters, liked for pickle jars, and it's this stuff called MS Touto too, which I think is like regulated differently now,
but it's it's kind of like a cocaine relative. You just like you would sprinkle a little bit into like a jar of water, and you'd put the toad or a frog or whatever in and like, after a little while, I'm just like, and so if you put in more, then it'll feel that way just before it dies, and so then it's kind of a peaceful death. So yeah, if but there, you probably couldn't do that very easily with especially the cane toads as big as they are.
You'd have to get like big vats of that. Just have to literally get like a piles and piles of kilos of me.
You need a tooler. Mark Kenney wants to know do toads travel far from their burrow or wherever whatever a toad home is called to forage or find a mate? How is their commute? What's a toad commute?
Like? You know, I think generally speaking, their thought to be not that they don't move that far, but there was recently one of my colleagues in Utah was tracking these western toads and found that they moved like five or six miles, which you know, a toad that hops, like that's a long ass way, like between where their breeding site was and where they I think were hanging out like in the winter, because they'll go back to
the same ponds where they emerged to go breed. And so when those habitats got fewer and far farther between, like if they went back in their pond that they know was not there, they'll usually just go a little bit further until they find the next thing. And so probably like over time, these animals have developed the ability to go that far, and especially the ones in these montane habitats, you know, like there are a lot fewer areas, you know, and a lot more ground to traverse between ponds.
That was one that I remember was like pretty striking, Like I just learned that a couple of years ago that those particular ones were able to do that. And I'm pretty sure that there's nothing in the literature that suggests that they go that far do they.
Have a homing device? How are they finding the same ponds?
Yeah, I think they believe it's a little bit both like astrological as well as chemosensory, and they're able to like, you know, smell their home ponds basically and go back. Yeah, that's that's true of a lot of amphibians in general, Like they tend to go back to the same and actually a lot of reptiles as well, like they'll they'll kind of they have sight fidelity.
I didn't know that's what it was called. Megan Janelle Lession asks, in your opinion, what type of toad has the most beautiful mating call?
Oh oh man.
And and says, some of the best sleep I've ever had took place at a little cabin in northern Wisconsin. And I specifically remember the toad songs being extreme.
I do really love the American toad call. It's just that long trill. It's so pretty. Have you heard it?
No.
Priya offered to do a toad trill and I said, yes, please, Oh my.
God, that one is a very soothing one. Like there's another relative, the woodhouses toad or the Fowler's toad. They sound like a woman or a child being murdered. Seriously, Like I have been out in the woods with other herpetologists and we're like, oh my god, there's a woman in trouble. And we're like, oh, no, shit, that's just a fower's toad. Oh my god, just hord toads.
Yeah, oh god.
So those are the not soothing ones.
In all of this praise of toads. Something's gotta suck. They've got to be ad dick to someone what is wrong with a toad? There's got to be something you disc like about toads, or about just in general toading, toad tripping.
I mean, I think the worst quality of a toad is that they just they try to be so tough, like just just admit it, Like you're just a soft, little sweet thing, Like just admit it. You know, this is what this is again like where my romantic life comes. But like, I know you're trying to be all tough and badass, but you're not. You're not all that tough and bad ass. Like just be soft, just be It's okay that you're soft. I see your soft belly. It's all good, all right.
And what about the fact that you got sexually assaulted by it.
Well, see, that's also Yeah, they're pretty they're pretty aggressive.
So forgivable.
Okay, No, that's that's pretty bad. You're right. What else though, I think.
When you're out toad hunting, Yeah, well the tox is. But what about when you're out toad hunting? Are you out there in the middle of the night, are you are you slopping around in boots?
Oh? Yeah, in the in boots at night, headlamp, trying to like take the females heads out of the water so that they don't die. Yeah, you're out.
When you're out frogging and toading at night and you're in hip waiters in boots. Do you bring along like a thermos of hot tea or anything? What are the creature comforts out there?
Well, you know, once it gets to be around toad season, like the nights are relatively warm, or at least they were out in Maryland. So yeah, so it's kind of nice being out at night. You know, it's like those like sort of warmish nights. I mean, there were definitely some days, like one of my friends and I in grad school, we would just like we wouldn't even wear boots.
There's these like monky ponds, and we would just take off the waiters because they would get stuck in the muck, and we would just go barefoot in like in shorts and and just like yeah, just kind of like become one with the and they would be like all around you and other frogs and stuff too. And then you get to see like things swimming in the water, like turtles.
And now, uh do we say favorite thing about a toad? So hard to pick. Do you have a favorite thing the one thing about a toad that you love the most, or about your job as a herper?
Oh?
What is my favorite thing about a toad? I don't know, there's just I just I just love their little bodies. They're little, that classic toad shape and just the little hop and the face, you know, just that little classic toad face. You're gonna get all these comments afterwards, like oh my god, I can't believe shouldn't say about this shitty thing that a toad does, like I know, oh
my god. But speaking of that though, they do, like so they pee, but you have to look up a toad pooping well, like the deal they're they have the biggest shit, like they poop out these logs that are seriously like a third to half of their body length. I'm telling you, it is the craziest thing. I've only seen it once, only once, like in the wild, but like videos, yeah, you have to google that.
Oh of course I looked this up.
I mean I think they just eat a lot in one sitting and then they like hop around and then all of a sudden, like the one that I saw, like it started just doing this weird like crunching thing, you know, kind of like a dog gets ready to poop and like it. And then all of a sudden, was like, oh my god, it's pooping. And then this thing like just kept fucking coming out and it was this huge ass shit like, yeah, you have to see.
Oh boy, oh boy, oh boy. Okay, I guess if you take nothing else away from this episode, it's just that toads make turts. I of course I sought out video proof and was instantly furnished with some YouTube gems, such as one titled toad pooping a giant turd.
Look at the size of it flowed.
Oh my god, dude, it's like he's laboring it out. It's almost like he's given and yet another small film called toad taking a massive shit. How much it's an impossible seeming volume in a human scale, you would easily need a second toilet. Let's move on, And you are my favorite boophologist. You're my favorite toad lover on the planet.
I'm the only one you know, aren't I?
That is true, but you're also in my favor. So ask smart people stupid questions and follow Priya Nujapa on Twitter at totally Pria t O A D A L L Y Pria. And also you're gonna want to follow her on Instagram at Wild Beautiful World because she mentioned she might get a toad tattoo on her toe and that then she would be tattoed. Follow her and love her. Okay. Links to those accounts will be in the show notes, and they will be up at my website at aliward
dot com slash ologies. I'm at ologies on Twitter and Instagram. I'm at ali Ward with one L on both and if you're looking for less adult science content, I'm also on the Netflix show Brainchild, which is a science show. I host the CW science show did I Mention Invention? I'm also on Innovation Nation with Moroca on CBS every Saturday morning. So thank you also to Aaron Talbert and
Hannah Liippo for admining the Ologies podcast Facebook group. Thank you Shannon Feltis and Bonnie Dutch for all of your super hard work making the Ologies Merch site run. You can get merch and tagget Ologies Merch so I can repost you on Instagram on Mondays if you like. Thank you to assistant editor Jared Sleeper of mind Jam Media, who also helped with a bunch of research this week, and of course to Stephen Ray Morris, host of the kiddie podcast The per Cast and the Dino podcast see
Dressing Right for his cane do attitude. The theme song was written by Nick Thorburn of the band Islands, And if you stick around to the end of the episode, you know I tell you a secret, and this one is I still feel bad for shit talking that non toad with the skin that erupts some babies. But I'm just telling you. I can watch mango worms all day long. I could watch hours of mango worms. But that got me. That got me fam okay doloo for now.
Oh.
Also, guess what next week is? Mycology kiddos Mushrooms. Mark your calendars. Okay, bye bye, don't look tootes.
Pacadermatology, hobology or do zoology, lithology, technology, meteorology, pathology, methology, zeriology, elinology.
Everybody loves hypno toes.