83: Two Truths and a Lie (Animal Facts Edition)

Speaker 0 00:03 Welcome to brain junk. I'm Amy Barton and I'm Tracy <inaudible>. And today we're gonna play things a little differently on brain junk. We're going to have a bit of a quiz, two truths and a lie, but it's everything you never knew you wanted to know about animal facts. So excited to do this. We have been talking about this for a while. Yes, I love a good opportunity to lie. So I know you do. You're like fine. Blarney, bring it on. Uh, so the way this is gonna work is we're gonna split the show up into two halves. One of us will tell three animal facts with some background information, that sort of thing. And then it's going to be up to the other one of us to decide which one is the lie and which ones are the two truths. Alright, drum roll please. Who's going to go first here? Speaker 0 00:55 We can do the, you know, bring it on. Okay. Ready? One, two, three. We both did rock. Okay, we're gonna try it one more time. One, two, three. I threw scissors. Okay. Amy just smashed my scissors with her rock. So she goes first. So I get to life. Remember one of these is going to be a lie, so we'll tell you at the end. Okay. But just so you know, don't start trying to do a report for your, uh, you know, biology off of this until you know which one is an actually true. Yeah. Cause your professors and teachers also have the internet. Yeah. My first fact is about the Suriname toad. The scientific name is Pippa. Pippa, which I really love. Tracy is taking notes here. No, I'm just writing down what it is so that at the end that I can, I call her memorize again at the end. Speaker 0 01:42 Cool. So the, it's a toad. It looks like a toad. It's green. It does have, it's called the star fingered towed also. So it's got longer. Skinny fingers. Yeah. Oh, I'll give Wolverine where a toad. It's good. It's a good camouflage. And it lives in this, all of mine are South American animals today. Oh. And it lives in the rail. It's like the bottom of mucky water and it looks like a blob of glop when you at a glance. So it's a good camouflage or it can be about four to eight inches and it's a toothless ambush Hunter. So it's got to be stealth. Here's the weird thing about it. Okay. Bring it on. When they make little Suriname toad babies, the male pushes the fertilized eggs into the back of the female. They stick to her and during the next few days her skin grows up over the eggs where they just date and they like honeycomb looking and it eventually closes over them completely. Speaker 0 02:42 They hatch and they hang out there until they grow into toadlets. And so you see towed with little weird movie stuff on its back. I know it's horrifying, but so good. And then they pushed their way out and swim away and then mom sheds their skin and moves on with life. That's so good. And so she's got like 50 little frog babies creeping out of her back. Yeah. Ah, I imagine dr pimple popper would absolutely love that toad. I can never bring myself to click through those articles when I'm on the news. Wow. Okay. So Suriname towed. All right. So that's one hit me with another one. How about the horn screamer? Oh my gosh. Okay. Also, South America lives in the wetlands. It kind of looks like if a pheasant and a Turkey, the pheasants are the ones with the long pretty, yes, yes. Speaker 0 03:34 Yeah. Like a pheasant and a Turkey had a baby, so it's kind of Turkey sized. It's 37 and a half inches long. It's about half as tall as a fridge. Oh, it's got a chicken like beak, black feathers with sort of a speculative with good color. Okay. Partially webbed feats. He lives in the tropics. There's also the Southern screamer and the Northern screamer. Uh, they're related to ducks and geese. And Swan. Here's the awesome thing. They are like chicken unicorns or Turkey unicorns. They have a spiny spike projecting from there, the crown of their head and it's skinny. Um, think like you sucked down a candy cane, really small. The whole thing is really narrow though, and it looks significant in length. It's not from feather. It's a cornified structure that is loosely attached to the school so it can get bumped off and, but it's also continuously growing. Speaker 0 04:29 What? Yeah, the horn. So would that be a chick, a corn or a unit? Are you going to chicken unit Yunahon or a, you didn't have a screamer, right? Yeah, you in a screamer. Wow. I didn't even think to look up is why they call it a screamer. I'm kind of curious now. You can't look it up right now. Ah, okay. I hate everything. I know. Would you like to talk about my third one? All right, bring it on. How about the collared peccary? These are also called have Molina's must cogs in Trinidad. It's colloquially known as the quaint, quaint Q. U. U. E. N. K. I'm not even sure I can say that. E. N. K. would that be a quake maybe. Is that what it says? It's like, Oh, he probably doesn't make that sound. So if you can't remember what I have, Alina is the think fuzzy pig or like a wild boar is cause it looks like a jungle jungle pig up to 24 inches long. Speaker 0 05:27 35 to 60 pounds. So a compact but chubby. It's the Kia of the pig world. Yes, the Kia Rio of the world, they sleep in boroughs and often under the roots of trees and they can be found in caves or under logs. They're mostly diurnal, but not always. They like to get out at night sometimes too, but mostly have a, what we would consider normal sleep wake schedule. Okay. Um, here's the fun thing about these guys. When, uh, the collared peccary is startled. It temporarily ceases when it feels panic, like the sheep and the goats. And so it's if it startled by sudden movements or loud noises, eh, sometimes they'll attempt to escape, but that panic will take over and they just go like, you've all seen the video yet? Collared peccaries too. So they'll remain frozen in that position that it was in print. So if they're moving and they have that panic and it just, it's called, it's a hereditary genetic disorder called my atonia congenital. Speaker 0 06:29 And so it's actually a, when they're moving, their body will just stop in that motion and they'll tip over like the sheep. That never, that has never struck me as a very practical way of dealing with panic. Right. You know, like if you're going to get eaten, especially by you, you should leave. Right. You know, not just hang out. Yeah. I feel that way about the sheep do or the goats, whichever. I think it's goats. But that just get, and then over they go because yeah, that can't be good because if I were a predator I'd be like, Oh good. It's tough movie free meal. Right. It was fresh just a minute ago. It's probably still fresh. It's fine. So I don't eat that. It's all stiff. Okay. So now I have to figure out, so two truths and a lie. Two of these are true of the Suriname towed the horned screamer or, and what was the last one? Speaker 0 07:19 The collared peccary collared peccary Oh, you have done well. Hmm. Hmm. I'm feeling like, okay. I know the Suriname toad is real cause I actually researched that for this episode too. Yeah. So and thank you to Landy caraway. That was horrifying. Oh yeah. Those videos are gross because the skin ripples and then they're kind of like just popping out and off they go. Um, another interesting fun fact about the Suriname toads is after the male mates, he sheds his skin and then he eats it. Gross. Yeah. I don't know what the deal is with that. He's like, whew, that was exhausting. I think I'll snack on myself. I don't know. Uh, okay. Horn screamer or collared peccary. Mm. I really want the chicken unicorn to be real and I feel like panicking in the middle of the forest would be impractical. I'm going to say that the pig, the peccary is the lie. It is. Yes. Speaker 0 08:18 So no. Is there an actual collared peccary and it just doesn't go and seize up? Everything else is, it's true. Ah, they're just really a cute little jungle pig. Okay. So I need to know now that I can actually look the unicorn. I need to know if the screamer makes a screaming noise. So it's called a horned H. O. R. N. E. D. screamer. Yeah. It has a scientific name, which I couldn't pronounce, so I didn't try horned scream. Oh, there's a video. Oh, good. I don't know why I didn't think of that. I was still all wound up. Okay. So it looks like almost like a pigeon with really long legs and like somebody just antenna to its head and when it flicks it around, they bounce. Yeah, they do a little like a, it's a, it's, it's almost like if we took a kid and you put a piece of gum on their forehead and then stuck a straw to it. Speaker 0 09:07 And then the old school paper straws and I, I almost wouldn't call that a scream. Um, uh, it was kind of a Yodel. I was like, look up. What kind of sound? Huh? Yup. Weird. I love nature. There's a surprising number of things that were, um, I'm like, Ooh, I'm gonna do things that can change color. Like, Oh, fish. I'm sure that you'd like, I'm going to tell her that there's fish that can change color, just like the lizards and there. So there are fish that can change. So that's not a lie. Oh yeah. Let's move on. Yeah, I will say that researching this, there were a lot of things where it was hard to find something as fantastic of a lie to go with what's actually true in the world. There's some weird stuff out there. Yeah, there's a lot of words stuff. Let's talk about somewhere and stuff. Speaker 0 09:57 So I'm going to start with my three. First one I'm going to talk about, I've got to give you a little background. I'm going to talk about fingerprints and that's going to lead into an animal fact. Okay, you're ready? Yes. So imagine a crime scene. You know the windows broken stuff is stolen. The guy shows up and he's like, okay, we gotta, we gotta check for fingerprints. And they, you know, they do the little dust thing and then they checked for fingerprints and they take them back and they look and the person's fingerprints are not on record. <inaudible> okay. That's because the person's fingerprints belonged to a koala. All right, so let's go back. We have fingerprints on our hands because they reduce the friction needed to hold onto a flat surface. So like if you were climbing a really skinny tree, you need to be able to grip it, right? Speaker 0 10:44 So not all mammals have fingerprints, chimpanzees, gorillas, koalas, humans. Right? And actually there was a monkey in South America that has fingerprints on its tail because it helps a grip. Right? Okay. But here's the wacky thing. Koala fingerprints are exactly like human fingerprints are so exact and yep, they can fool the police. Huh? And, uh, if you look at microscopic pictures of the worlds and dips on a human fingerprint, a human finger next to a koala finger, uh, you can't tell the difference at all. You can't differentiate. Nope. Not a bit interest. Yeah. So that's my first animal fact. Okay. And also, so if you're going to go Rob someplace, take a quality koala, keep your gloves on, take a koala. So that's my first one. My second one is about bird arsonists. So I'm going to talk to you about Firehawks. They're not actually Firehawks. Speaker 0 11:44 Again, this is like fire NATO. I have this obsession with fire a, these are black kites, whistling kites or Brown Falcons. And these are all birds that you can find in Australia. And this is something the Aboriginal people have known about for centuries. And uh, you know, the colonists were like, this is not, can't be true. So the black kites and these other birds are often found at the front lines of a brush fire. You have a big fire coming through and the rodents and the lizards and the insects are all gonna run out of the fire. So there's easy Pickens right at the front. Well these birds, these black kites and whistling kites and Brown Falcons have figured out that you can pick up a branch in your beak or your claws and carry it up to a half mile away, drop it, and it will start a fire that will create a fire line that will get the animals out. Speaker 0 12:35 So you can, yes. And it was thought for a long time that it was just incidental, like the Hawk was going down and trying to grab a prey animal. Right. And accidentally grabbed a stick. And then as they took off, they were like, Oh no. And then letting go of and it would start another fire sorta like when you hold onto the ski rope too long. But they've, they've watched them, you know, there's been more watching and more studies. That paper came out fairly recently talking about this and they've found that they will work singularly or even in groups, not like two birds carrying up one stick, but yeah. You know, a bunch of them are going, okay, we're going to fly over here and we're going to drop it. Yeah. To start a fire. Wow. Yeah. And seeing a Sao 75% of the Earth's tropical forests burn every, you know, there's some every year with regularity, there's a lot of food waiting to be caught and these birds have just figured out that this is what they can do. Speaker 0 13:25 Birds can be very smart. Very crafty. Yup. So, okay. Firebirds this is my last one. The geography cone snail. Okay. So it's about the size of a teacup, about four to six inches long. There are a lot of cone snail varieties, but this one is a little different. So don't let it slow moving or it's small size fool you because this beautifully patterned Brown and white Shield's nail is a killer. It's a carnivorous snail that has little darts of um, it, they create a mixed toxin in these darts that are kind of like their T, their, they're a the same material that their teeth would be made out of if they had teeth. Okay. And they can shoot these things. It's enough poison to kill a human being. But when you move really slow and you're really small, how do you catch fish? Right? Well, here's where the chemical warfare comes in. Speaker 0 14:17 So you watch these, I was watching these videos and you see the snail and there's fish and they're not really moving the fish. They're not trying to get away. Well, that's because the geography cone snail dumps a ton of insulin into the water around the fish insulin. Okay. And that makes the fishes blood sugar drop and it makes them sleepy. They're confused. So they can see the snail is coming, but they can't do much about it. And it's a snail and that's the snail. But then the snail will expand its proboscis, its nose, and it makes this big fleshy net and it wraps it around. The fish pulls them into its body like a mouth, and then when they're trapped in there, it shoots them with the little harpoons full of the toxins, killing the fish, doing the secondary work after the insulin subdues them. Speaker 0 15:05 Yup. Yeah. And fun extra snail fact snails make different insulin than fish insulin. So the snail is not only making its own insulin, it's making insulin that will subdue the fish. It's not their insulin. Nope. It's, it's a different website. It's weaponized. Yes. These little tiny snails are little chemical warfare masters package. Big. Yup. Pay off. Yep. Wow. Yeah. So to review <inaudible> there's the koala fingerprints that are exactly the same as human fingerprints. There's the black kites, whistling kites and Brown Falcons all falling under the category of bird arsonists and then the geography cone snail, which needs a better name. Yeah. Okay. I'm pretty sure I've vaguely heard of the birds before, but I don't know for sure. I might just be talking cause I want one of them to sound familiar. So I'm gonna got to rule out something. Um, the geography cones, Neil has a really a weird unrelated name and either you're extremely diabolical and clever or no, it's just weird. Speaker 0 16:15 So I'm going to say Wallace or the fake. Oh my. We're both way too smart for it. I wondered if we kind of knew each other well enough. We need to do this with people we don't know. We don't know. Okay. So I have to clarify because just like, you know, your pigs actually exist. Yes. Yes. Koala fingerprints are extremely similar to human fingerprints. Yes. Although I was reading an FBI report where they were talking about ways that people can fool, you know, they're like, we're going to debunk myths on how you can fool people on things. And they were saying that while someone who was not very well trained might look and go, Oh yeah, that looks exactly the same. Someone who's actually an expert would look and know that they were not the same. So yeah. And that wall is, well yeah, call this have two thumbs apparently for gripping. Speaker 0 17:06 And they also don't have the fingerprints on the, you know, like the Palm oil. The Palm would look different. Yes. And I mean how often do you just get a finger? Usually get the hole one. I'm cracking the safe. That's true. So when the cool wall is cracking the safe for your Vicks vapor rub, yeah. You'll know that it's not the same. So wow. Ah, well done us. So okay. Trick each other. But yeah. Well you know, that's all right. But so remember koalas do have fingerprints that are similar but not exactly the same. And those whore, a collared Peck, Peck collared Peck earlier. <inaudible> collared peccary. Yeah. Doesn't actually fall over like the goat. Nope. I'm a little disappointed. It's cute in the jungle. Yeah. I was going to have it be a lizard and then they tip and fall out of the tree and so they're safe. Speaker 0 17:53 And then I thought, nah, that's just not believable. I guess that's good because if one of us had done really well and crushed the other, yeah, that would have been the end of brain junk. That would have been sad. Tell us if we fooled you. Let us know. Oh yeah. On Facebook and Instagram, uh, at brain junk podcast. And if you want to tell us on Twitter, we're at my brain junk and you can also email [email protected] Tracy and I will catch you next time when we share more of everything you never knew you wanted to know were probably likely to lie a little bit less. I don't. I make no promises. You will not be bored.