Danny Jones Podcast - #319 - Expert Warns: Deadliest Animal in the Ocean is Getting SMARTER | Chris Gillette

Episode Date: August 1, 2025

Watch every episode ad-free & uncensored on Patreon: https://patreon.com/dannyjones Chris Gillette is a wildlife biologist and professional animal handler born and raised in Florida where he has spent a lifetime working with dangerous wildlife. He specializes in working hands on with crocodiles, alligators, sharks and snakes. SPONSORS https://whiterabbitenergy.com/?ref=DJP - Use code DJP for 20% off EPISODE LINKS https://youtube.com/@GatorChris_ https://bellowingacres.org FOLLOW DANNY JONES https://www.instagram.com/dannyjones https://twitter.com/jonesdanny OUTLINE 00:00 - Free diving with a 15-foot crocodile 08:36 - Crocodile vs. alligator aggression 14:46 - How to survive an alligator attack 23:19 - The shark population crisis 33:47 - Orcas are scary intelligent 40:16 - Swimming with bull sharks & tiger sharks 49:23 - Dangers of scuba diving 53:41 - How animals become specialized killers 57:01 - Why tiger sharks are the deadliest shark 01:09:13 - Evolution of alligators & crocodiles 01:20:33 - Becoming a professional gator wrestler 01:31:51 - Hidden evolution map in our DNA 01:40:34 - The fertility rate crisis 01:48:04 - How humans harness natural sunlight Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Pepsi Prebiotic Cola, unbelievably Pepsi. Do you know anyone who's been smoked by a Gator? Dead? No, but like really, really badly, really bad stuff, yeah. Really? Yeah. Doing basically trying to make content and stuff like that? Some of it, yeah. Wow.

Yeah. That's the craziest shit you've seen. Are we rolling you? Yeah, we're rolling. Because I can tell you one, but it happened relatively recently. So I don't want to say it because I want him to be able to say it. You know what I mean? I want him to tell his own story.

Gotcha. You know, so I don't want to steal his thunder or something. But yeah, something pretty major happened. Wow. Real bad. I saw a video just maybe it wasn't the other day, but it was probably a couple months ago where this dude was pissing behind a bar in a lake. Somewhere, somewhere I want.

want to say like near Sarasota and a gator just came up and just took his leg really yeah while he was pissing in a lake i didn't see that one yeah and just like did did the death roll and completely ripped his leg off the dude was like drunk like oh oh shit my leg whoa i didn't see that one i can't believe that i usually anything gator related i'm usually sent about thousand times in a day really you get all the gator news dude everybody's like oh chris is going to love this i'm like that's great so right before we started rolling you were telling the story about this photo right here. Yeah.

What is the story behind this photo of this spooky looking gator? Yeah, so he's a, that one's a crocodile. So that's a crocodile. Yeah, yeah. So you can tell he's a crock, you see both rows of teeth sticking up. So on a gator, from this perspective, you'd only see the top row teeth protruding down. The bottom row of teeth would fit in the sockets in the upper jaw. So, yeah, so when we look, I mean, there's a bunch of different ways to tell.

But, like, just from that angle, you know that's a crocodile, just because of, like, you can see the teeth orientation. And then once you're more versed in them, just looking at his face, that skull, structure, coloration. Yeah. But for a very basic, yeah, just looking, the zigzagging teeth, that's crock. Unless it's a messed up gator. They can also get what's called metabolic bone disease, which will alter the sockets of their

teeth. It happens in a lot of captivity. You get messed up teeth like that. But anyways, yeah, so he's American crocodile. So I sent you a murky version of him if you want to pull that up. Okay. Because that'll show you. Because that's how the story of this guy starts.

All the photos are going to pull up on this one right here. Did you send that to me the first time? To the left. Keep going, keep going, keep going. Right there. Murky. Yeah. Or the one to the right of it.

Might show it a little bit better. Whoa. That's even scary because you can't see it that good. That's the same crock. That's in the same water? So, yes. And the two shots are like two weeks apart. Okay.

So that was after a storm, but that was the first time I saw him. And so it's been like a very big goal of mine to photograph in the wide. a large American crocodile like that, but they're usually murky areas. And obviously, like, crocs and murk don't mix, you know, unless it's, you want to mix your blood in there, too. So, like, I saw him on the surface, and I was like, oh, my God, that is, it's a huge crock for one, you know, so, I mean, that crock's like 15, 16 feet. He's massive. And I saw him, and I'm by myself, and I was just like, like, do I, do I try to do this? Like, I had all my gear with me, all my

underwater gear and everything, but I'm alone, and I look at the water, and, like, Like this is an area, like I was in that spot because it is usually clear. But there was a big storm that rolled through. And so it murked everything up. Right. You know, and so then I saw him and I'm like, like, I got to try that. You know, like, people ask me all the time, like, are you scared? Are you nervous?

And I don't want to be like, no, I'm way too cool for. No, like, I'm usually not, honestly. Like, I'm really not scared. This is one of the few moments I was like, I was legitimately nervous because that is murky water. And like, I don't mess around in murky water with them. Do you bring any kind of like bang stick or knife or anything with you just in case? No. I mean, it's kind of like what's like a good analogy.

Like I would rather be a train fighter against someone in a fight than be someone with no training with a weapon against a train fighter. You get what I'm trying to say? Sure. Like that's a train killer. Yeah. You're not. You know? So like I would rather know what I'm doing.

again, something that is an apex predator killing machine, then to have the false sense of security with a weapon. What would be worst case scenario going down and seeing that thing down there? Oh, he rips you in half. But how would you know? Like, how would you know that thing? Because you'd see your legs over there. Like that, an animal, I'm not even kidding.

An animal that size, if he grabs you and he, I mean, just literally, a 15, 16 footer like that gets your leg or your torso. I mean, you could just, oh, wow, there goes, you know, my, butt floating that way with the legs attached and I'm going this way. Like, I mean, yeah, thankfully, thankfully, he was very calm. He was cool. But like, I didn't know that, you know, and like, they are individual for sure. Like, they're individual animals. And, like, they have individual personalities and some of them are chill, some of them are not chill. Most of them, depending on what species we're talking about, most of them are relatively calm.

So, like, that's an American crocodile. Most American crocodiles are relatively calm. I have worked with some that are not. Rarely, rarely, they are, pretty gnarly. So I didn't know, you know, like going to that and like, I'm underwater and I'm free diving it too. And that's like 20 feet, you know, just, but like, yeah, you do diving stuff. Yeah, yeah. I grew up free diving around here. Yeah. Okay. So, so. So, you know, free diving, low your heart rate, right? And like, I'm pretty, I'm not like a probe. I can hold my breath five minutes. You know, I can go down 100 feet, you know, like when I want to, I could barely hold my breath.

My heart was just like, you know? I was like, dude, that is a huge crock. You don't know what he's going to do. And you're by yourself, you know? So, like, I'd go down and get on the bottom and just start slowly creeping up. But you can't see anything, you know? Like, this is a wide angle lens. That's a 10.

Wow. Yeah. So, like, you can't see crap, man. Like, that thing, I mean, it's like as far away from us as the TV is right now for that shot, you know? And so, like, I'm creeping up. And the first thing you see is the white. white of the teeth.

Just those massive teeth, dude. And I started creeping up on him. And then thankfully, he was chill. So if you go to the photo to the left. So you'll see. So that's the one I actually got of him. So, I mean, that's like right up. That camera is like five inches from his mouth.

Less than five inches from his mouth. So how did you, okay, so you knew he was in there. You saw him on the top first. Yes. And then by the time you got your gear on, got in the water, he had already gone to the bottom. Yes. And then you got to find him. So how long did it take you to swim around and find him?

I don't know, like maybe 15, 20 minutes, something like that? 15, 20 minutes. You know, and you're just creeping around trying to find him. Yeah, it was sketchy. Like, it was very, very sketchy. And what would have been, like, what was the telltale sign that you knew you would be safe versus you knew you wouldn't be safe? Like, what behavior would you have to observe to know that? So the answer is you're not safe.

Ever. Ever, right. For sure. Yeah, like, for sure. And, like, I get that question all the time. people like, well, how do you know you're safe? I'm like, because I know that I'm not safe. Like, you always, always be on alert.

Never think you're safe, you know, like you're dealing with an apex predator. So in his situation, that animal is afraid of me, honestly, you know, because like humans, I mean, we are the thing that kills everything on this planet. So most animals are afraid of humans, you know, and most animals, especially at that size, he's lived a long time, you know, so he's probably had some negative experiences with humans. So he's afraid of me. And so in that instance, he's just hunkering down, holding still, hoping I don't notice him.

And I'm also not going to act like prey either. So I'm going to come. I'm going to approach him. You know, like I approach him like head on. I act confident, you know, and like I'm not acting like prey. Now, if you're like flapping around underwater and like, yeah, he's going to see you his prey, you know. So it's a lot in how you move. But then also understanding his behavior, you want him to see you as another potential predator,

but also not to be afraid of you because then he's going to be defensive. So you don't want to piss him off, but you also don't want to act like prey. Right. Right. So. Have you seen the footage of Manny Pugg? You know Manny Pug?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Where he goes into that canal. There's the famous video of the canal monster. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. He swims down in his speedo and he's literally levitating this like massive alligator out of the water. Yeah. All the way. It must have been, I don't know how deep that was, maybe 10 feet, maybe 12 feet.

But he would like literally grab that thing like, well, that's a crock. This thing was a gator. Yeah. And I think crocs are a lot more aggressive, right? Depends what kind. There's over 20 different species of crocodilians. And so of the crocodiles, like American crocodiles like this, are generally pretty calm. They don't normally see humans as a food source.

You can think about what they're hardwired to eat. Like, they evolved to mainly eat more fish, and that's really their game. You know, they get fish, they get birds. It gets smaller animals. But if we're talking about like Nile crocodiles in Africa, they evolved to take down megafauna. So they're taking down zebras, willed a beast, you are smaller than they. their normal prey. You are prey. You know, so, like, I've been in the water with Nile Crocodiles as well.

Way more freaky. Yeah. Really? Yeah. Yes. I own a Nile crocodile now. And I got four of them. No. Three of them? Yeah. Where the hell did you get a Nile crocodile? So one of them was gifted to me from Gatorland and then the other two were donated to my sanctuary. Okay. Yeah. But, but anyway, just like that the psychology is totally different. It's a totally different animal. Like most people think like, oh, crock is a crock. right. I'm like, no, no, no, no. That's like saying like a dog is a dog. Tawa is the same thing as a pit bull, right? Obviously, Twiowl is more likely to bite you. Yeah, that's something I learned when

Forrest was on here teaching me this stuff. And thank shout to Forrest for introducing me to your stuff. And he was explaining to me how there's all kinds of different orcas too. Yeah. I had no clue. Yeah. And he was explaining how he one day was like chasing these orcas off the coast of, I think it was like South America or somewhere on the West Coast. And it was like this random migrating species of orca that just migrate. They never stay in one spot and they just feed on all kinds of different animals, which is wild. I didn't know that about crocs.

Yeah. So same thing. You know, like Nile Crocs, saltwater crocs, those absolutely see humans as prey. But like American Crocs typically don't. Now, of course, you can do stupid stuff and end up on the menu. You know, I'm not saying they're safe. But like, thankfully, you know. But anyways, we could skip to the clear version of this.

Yeah. Because that was just cool. I just had to show that one to show like, this is what it was like at first. Right. And then... So all these other ones. So, like, this one, where is this one at? So that is at a place called the outpost down in the Everglades.

And that's a crocodile. I worked with for years. Alligator. Yeah. His name is Casper. Yeah. Okay. So a lot of these gators are gators like that you've rescued and rehabilitated or...

Or... So... More domestic? No. So they're wild-caught nuisance alligators. Mm. Yeah. So they're caught out of the wild as an adult animal.

So, you know, Florida has a big nuisance alligator problem. Well, really has a nuisance person problem that then creates nuisance alligators. You know, so that's why I do like my PSA, if I can put that out there, don't feed them. Don't get in the water with them. You see me doing it. Please don't do that. Keep your kids and pets away from the water's edge. You know, those are the three things that cause the most problems with human alligator conflict.

But feeding them is one of the biggest problems we have. And so once they show up where they're not supposed to be, most gators are just killed. The state kills about 8,000 nuisance alligators annually. So each year, 8K. And all somebody has to. to do is just call and say they're afraid of it. Exactly right. They'll come and take the alligator and kill it. Exactly right. That's wild. They don't allow relocation over four feet.

So that's just, they're all going to die, you know. And that's how the trapper actually makes a living is killing the gator and then selling the meat and hide. So he's incentivized to do so, actually. So like at my sanctuary, what we're trying to do is build up enough ponds where can take in some of these nuisance alligators. So the ones that I have are nuisance gators that would have been shot and killed. And so we either some of the trappers are cool enough They'll donate them or we will pay the trap or what he would have made from the skin and be able to save that alligator's life. No way. What is the current like population of gators and like what direction is it headed in Florida?

It's like 1.3 million. Wow. Okay. So it's doing it's doing pretty well. You know, they're stable. They're one of the great success where is the Dangered Species Act. You know, they were one of the first animals listed and they were near extinction just due to hunting for their hides. And then they did captive breeding reintroduction programs and then just general protection of them and the population rebounded really well.

So it's a really good story. What was the lowest it got, you know? So there's actually a little bit of confliction on that because a lot of people think that it wasn't properly sampled because of remote areas holding more than what they would think. So I've heard that kind of go back and forth kind of thing. And then what about crocodiles? So the American crocodiles in Florida, we're the northern extent of the range. So they range from northern South America throughout Central America and then Southern North America,

which is us. Right. So our population of South Florida is listed as threatened under the Nature Species Act. The population as a whole across the range is pretty good. But in Florida, it's very low. Now, it's very low also because we're the northern extent. You know, so, like, it's naturally low because they can't go any farther north. You know, they're climactically limited in where they can be in Florida.

Right. So, like, you know, when we have the cold snaps, they're toast. Right. You know. Yeah, they can't survive cold water. Exactly. So as it's been warm, really warm. for several years. They go all the way up north, Titusville. You know, they end up way up north if we don't

have a cold snap. And then you get a cold snap, boom, those guys are toast. Wow. Yeah. Dude, yeah, I was shocked when I saw a gator, or not a gator, but a crock in the Cayman Islands. Yeah. Once, a long time ago. And I was like, what the hell of this is this thing doing here? I didn't know they were in the Cayman Islands and this like perfectly clear water. Yeah. So, I mean, throughout the, I mean, they have a huge range, you know, so like, like I was saying throughout Central America and the Caribbean. Yeah, they've got a pretty big range out to Jamaica. You know, it's pretty cool.

Yeah, that is wild. Is this the one picture we were looking for earlier? Oh, no, no. It was just... You never found it, Steve? Oh, it's that one. Okay. Yeah, that's what we were talking.

That's the same dude. That's the same guy. Yeah, so that's the same... But that's different time, though. Exactly. So, I was like two weeks later in the same spot, and it was clear. You know, so like I said, it was murky the first time because of the storm, so I came back and he was in the same spot, and it was actually clear, and that's

how I got like that shot. And that's one my favorite shots. I got that one printed up at home. So he just, he stayed there. He never moved. You just came down there, snapped the photo and swam away. He never moved. Yeah. He was just, like I said, in camouflage mode. That's what they do a lot of the time is they're just like, hope nobody can see me, you know? And they just kind of hunker down. But, you know, again, that can change. And I absolutely tell everybody all the time, getting in the water with them is incredibly dangerous. Don't get in the water with them. I usually, you know, when they're on the bottom like that, they are pretty calm. But if they're not, man, like, I mean, you can die so fast.

And even if it didn't rip you in half, let's just say he just bit your leg. Hey, guys, if you're not already subscribed, please hammer the subscribe button below and hit the like button on the video. Back to the show. Right. You know, and he just held on. And then he just sat there. He can hold his breath six hours. What do you got?

Right. Six seconds. So literally, if he wants to, he can just sit there. And then you're just going to drown. Oh my God. You know, so that's why I try to tell people. What do you do if they do clamp down on you? So if you have the presence of mine, okay, that's the thing, right?

I mean, how much presence of mine are you going to retain while you're getting ripped to pieces? You know, so I get people all the time like, what do I do? And a lot of people ask me that because they want to put themselves in stupid situations they're not prepared for. You know what I mean? Right. So like, it's like a self-defense class where you're like, you're going to teach somebody

something just enough to give them the confidence to get themselves hurt. you know what I mean so like I mean I'll tell you but I'm just saying that I want to put that out first like please don't take this as like you know for people watching them like I know what to do now I heard this on a podcast I'm gonna jump in the water right I'm a pro please don't you know so if you were to be grabbed you have the presence of mine um what the animal does depends on why did it bite you and I and I mean that you know like why did it bite you they don't just bite to bite you know so like is he biting you because he's been fed and it's a feeding response is he biting you because he's been fed and it's a feeding response is he biting you because you're getting too close and you're pissing them off. It's defensive. Is he biting you because you're near, if it's a female, it's babies, you know, or does it see you as prey? You know, and then if it does see you as prey, is it apprehensive about you as prey or is it confident?

Because that makes a huge difference too. So a lot of times if somebody's in the water and an alligator sees them as a potential prey, so or a crocodile, well, to back up for a second, what usually happens if you're in the water and they're on the surface, his eye sticking up like an inch above the surface. know they're very low profile. So if he's looking you as a swimmer on the surface, all he sees your head and your arms flapping, you're a funny looking duck, man. You look like small prey. So from his perspective, you are small prey. So that's why even alligators, they don't typically see people as prey. They will come right to rip your head off because he thinks your

head is all you are. And so I've had him do that to me in the wild. And if you're in water, a lot of Florida is very shallow. So I've had them coming right at me. And then you just stand up. And they just even chest high. And they're like, oh, whoa, that is not. Oh, really? Yeah. And they back off immediately. Because they're like, that's not what I thought it was. So a lot of it, a lot of it really is, they think your head is all you are, and then your arms flapping. You know, so a lot of times, that's why I say, like, don't go swimming, you know, in the waters and lakes in Florida. Because if they just see your head, man, they're going, even as small. I've had five foot gators, smaller than I am, come right from my head because they think that's what it is.

It looks like a duck, you know? And then you just stand up and they're like, oh, whoa, that's way bigger than I thought it was. Right, right, right. You know, so a lot of times you can get them to back off just by acknowledging their presence, you know, looking right at him, standing up, going upright. and then they realize, oh, that's, that's not what I thought it was. So a lot of it is like a misperception, you know. Now, let's say it's not. Let's say it's a really big gator.

He doesn't care. You know, he's coming in. Now, usually they are actually, they're smart, you know, and they are apprehensive about novel things. They're nervous. They're like, I don't know what this is. So I'm going to move with some care. And so if you get grabbed, a lot of times, you just turn around and you punch them

right in the face, like in the eye, in the nose, a lot of times they will release because because they're a little nervous. And like, I know it sounds crazy. It really is, though, because they're not sure what you are, and they're like investigating. Investigating. You know? Investigatoring. So they're trying to figure out, are you prey?

And a lot of times if you do hit them, a lot of times they'll back off because they're like, oh, whoa, this thing fights. I don't know what it is. I'm not really sure yet. And so they're afraid. Now, that's not because you're hurting it. It's because you're scaring it. Right. You can't hurt it.

Right. That's the thing. Those things have a very high pain tolerance. That's the point. That's exactly. So that's what I'm escalating towards. is like you are not hurting it, you're scaring it. Because if it is not afraid of you or if it's a defensive bite where it's fighting for its life

and it thinks you're trying to kill it, it's not letting go. I don't care what you do. I know guys have been bit, start stabbing it with a knife, shoot it in the head. If you're not rupturing the brain case, it's not letting go. Like, that's what I'm saying. So, like, it's crazy. I've heard some crazy stories like that, you know? And I'm like, that's why I tell people like, if it really wants you,

there's nothing you can physically do as a human. So best case scenario is it's just curious about you. You know, you hit it in the eyes, you hit it in the nose. And that is sensitive. It does cause pain. They feel pain as long as they don't feel it, but they can choose to ignore it. So if you give it some pain, as you scare it, a lot of times will back off. But if it's defensive or if it's really big and very confident, you've got nothing.

You're not going to be able to inflate. Even if you have a knife, you're not going to do anything. You put it right through his eye. He's not going to let go. Like, if you see them when they fight each other, you know, arm ripped right off. They don't flinch. Yeah. Like arm off.

They twist each other's arms off. Like, no. And they don't flinch. You know, so that's what I mean. It depends on what is motivation. Why is he binding you, you know? So what will work, the one thing that will work all the time. And this is like, it's kind of cool because as far as I know, I kind of came up with

this technique. It's what I call flooding them. So at the back of the mouth, they have the palatal valve. You have palatal valve too. Same reason you can be underwater, open your mouth, you don't immediately drown, right? So but yours is like back here. Theirs is right there at the back. So that's why in their mouth opens.

It just kind of ends right here. Yep. You know what I'm saying? So if you pry that down, it floods. them. The water goes in. They are immediately drowning. It's time to refresh your yard during spring backyard days at the Home Depot. Get low prices guaranteed on propane grills

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by American Express. Yes, it works every time. So that's what's foolproof. But that means you've got to get something in there. So if you're already in there, if they're on your shoulder and your arms in there, you can just hold that thing down and they'll open up. It's immediately going to let go because now he's drowning.

Yeah. So if he's got one arm, you put your other arm in there. Now, the problem is he's got to be in the water, though. Yes. Yeah. So if you're on land, this is going to work. Now, I have done it on land with a hose because I've had them get stuff working in captivity. I've worked at tourism parks, you know,

all through my 20s and everything, and you always get some jerk that, like, throws a water bottle at them, you know, like people are just hate them, you know? So they throw, like, stuff at him, and if he, they think it's food, you know? Like, you throw a water ball at his head, and he's like, oh, what is that?

And they eat it, and they get stuck, it blocks them. It can kill them. It can block their intestinal tract. You know, so I've had him get water bottles and stuff like that on land, and I jump on the alligator's back and have one of my friends bring over a hose,

and we, like, pry it, and, like, get the hose into the gap back here. and as soon as you get the hose past the valve, turn on the water, immediately let's go. No way. So I've done it on land. I've done it in the water like that. So that works every time.

So that's the one thing. But just imagine, like, he's got this arm. So you shove your other arm in there to try it pry it open. But before you get to the valve, you rolls, and both arms are gone. Yeah. So I'm not saying it's like something that you should take as like, I know what to do.

Right. Yeah. It's not a get out of jail free card, by any means. Yeah. But, so when they hunt, do they, like, do they hunt on the, the surface below, all of the above. All the above.

Because I've never heard of somebody, obviously, if they're going to bite a human, 99.9% of the time, I'm sure it's on the surface of the water or by the shore. So it's not underwater. So usually if a human's getting bit, it's because they're feeding it. You know, or somebody else had fed the animal, gets it to associate people with food. They're naturally afraid of us, like I was saying. You know, so like they really want nothing to do with us for the most part, unless somebody's illegally been feeding it, you know, and then it will see you as price.

So usually it is somebody on the shore, either they're feeding it or somebody else had been feeding it, that kind of a thing, you know. But so on the surface they hunt like that, you know, and they will track prey on the surface or perceived prey, like your head, if you're a swimmer, you know, or like ducks and stuff like that. Underwater, what they usually do is they ambush, so they sit totally still with their mouth wide open and that palatal valve closed and they just wait for stuff to bump into them. So they'll sit purposefully at like culvert pipes or any kind of bottleneck where the water

has to come together and they just sit there. They're like this right into the flowing water and wait for fish to come through that are caught up in the current. It's really cool. They're really smart, you know, and they just sit there and chill like that. That's crazy. Now, if you were to step on one like that, obviously that's how you can get bit too. Right, right. What is the law in Florida in regards to hunting gaiters?

Is that a big thing or hunting gaiters or crocs? Well, they definitely don't allow any crock hunting. No crocs. Yeah, no, no, no. So they're, like I said, they were protected under the ESA as a threatened species. Because I was talking to Manny Pugg about this regarding sharks. And what he was explaining to me was that I think it was in like the 80s. There was like way too many sharks.

And then they opened it up for people to fish them. And then the population went down a little bit. Then they stopped it. And like right now, there's the shark population is off the charts in Florida. So is one of my favorite things to talk about. All right. So do you know the concept of shifting baselines? No.

You heard this? Okay. So basically it's shifting your baseline data. So your baseline is whatever your normal is, what you think normal is. Now, the problem is that we're talking about things as normal for right now. Humans have a very short lifespan. Right. So the normal right now is completely unnatural.

So you have to think about, like, how long we've been fishing the oceans in Florida. You know, so if you think about like 200 years ago, the shark population would have been, yeah, I'm just spitballing here. Like, it would have been, you know, whatever, four or five times what it is now. So the way to look at this is what we have now is like, let's say it's 80% lower than what it's supposed to be without people messing everything up. Okay? So if the population is down 80% right now because of what we've been doing for the last, you know,

100, 200, 300 years here of fishing and everything, so the population is really, really, low, but within our short lifespans, we go out and we see like, okay, when I was a kid, there was this many sharks. We don't know it's 80% lower. We just know this is what it is. That's your baseline. For sure. So then we have environmental protections in the 70s, the ESA, you know,

is put through within the 70s. That's an end-dainer species act. So we have all this environmental movement, and so a lot of populations of animals are just now starting to increase because of protections that were done when we were children or some of us not even born. So we're seeing, but keep

mind that generational increase takes a long time. So now we're starting to see some of the effects of these protections. And so the population is slowly starting to increase now. So people that were, you know, around in the 80s, they're looking at like, well, back then there was, you know, this amount, your baseline, 80% lower. Now there's a 10% increase. So let's say now the actual natural population is 70% lower than what it should be without humans. But to me, there's more sharks than there's ever been because my lifespan is so short. And we have so much hubris as humans. So we're like, there's more than ever we have to kill them off, not realizing it's so much lower than what it's supposed to be without us being there. Right.

You get what I'm saying? Yeah, totally. No, that makes sense. But it seems like I think with the rise of more people spearfishing and being in the ocean more, more surfing all around the coast, there's definitely been a huge uptick in shark attacks. And I've talked to spear fishermen. I think actually force was talking about this too. The sharks have been. become off the coast of Florida, they've become addicted to the sound, or not addicted to, but they associate. They've associated the sound of speargun bands popping. Yep.

With food. Yep. So whenever you're going out there and you're popping your spear gun, you're shooting your speargun, sharks are automatically coming because they know there's fish there. Yep. And he was saying that they can go off the coast of like Sebastian Inlet or whatever or Miami and just go out there and start popping their bands. And sharks will just start coming up.

Yeah. Which is completely freaking nuts, man. They're smart. Yeah. So they make that association. You know, so like, if you're the shark and you're trying to hunt fish all day and you're like, bro, these fish are so fast, this sucks. And then here's this monkey jumping around in the water.

He got a, how did he get a fish? These things suck at swimming. And he can't protect that fish at all. I'm going to snatch that thing. Yeah. It's easy. It's so much easier to steal food from the fisherman than it is to have to hunt your own fish. You know, so of course, they're smart.

You know, they're going to learn that. And then they're like, I'm just going to wait for that guy to come back. And then this happens all the time. And they pick up on it. They're like, so if I just hang out over here, I get free food instead of having to actually hunt these fish. Yeah. So they will follow. They'll make that association.

They're smart, you know. Yeah. And with like regular fishing, I know like that just from people I talk to that fish for a living, there's just saying like sharks are like they're becoming a major problem just with like taking people's fish all the time. And, you know, not to say that that's necessary to like a bad thing for. the environment. Maybe it's not a bad thing for the environment, but it's just, it's crazy to see the boom in the shark population lately. So a way to look at that is like, well, first of all,

the sharks are taking the people's fish. Right, right. No, no, they're not actually. Right. Exactly. It's their fish. It's their fish. It's not your fish. It is. Yeah. So just from the start, that's their world. That's not your world. Right. Okay. You're a guest over there. Yeah. You know, but the other way to think about it, too, is the amount of fishing that we do. You know, we already know, like global fisheries around the world are crashing. Everything is going down. We're taking way too much fish. I mean, when you look like, I don't know if you travel a lot, but like when you look out there and you see like Chinese fishing vessels everywhere, everywhere. So like in Costa Rica, they don't have military, right? So Chinese fishing vessels just cruise right in there. Take what they want. What are you going to

do? Do they really? In Costa Rica? Yes. So I was working in Cocos National Park for National Geographic actually. We're filming a show there. And you could just see them right on the edge of the Marine Protected Zone. And they're only on the edge because you're there looking at them. And then as soon as you leave, they just move into the Marine Protected Zone and kill everything. And they just take whatever they want. They don't respect international boundaries at all. They do not care.

Really? They'll just move right in, take whatever they want and leave. So like, if you're not stopping them with a military force, they don't care. So I don't know if you saw, this is just recently. I cannot remember what country it was. But yeah, some country, I know it was in Southeast Asia somewhere over there. they started blowing up these fishing vessels because the Chinese fishing vessels are taking so much of the fish. The local people have nothing to eat.

And so they're fighting back with weapons and blowing up the ships because they're like, are people going to starve? And they're just, they're not respecting international boundaries at all and just taking whatever they want. You got to find this, Steve. I'm sure it's online. You can find it somewhere blowing up Chinese fishing vessels. I didn't know China had a crazy international fishing industry like that. Yeah, it's nuts. I knew Japan was crazy.

Like with the whaling and all that stuff and the. dolphin yeah it's i mean that's not good either but i mean i'm not an expert in this so i don't want to like go too into the rabble hole because i'm going where like i don't know that much on it but like i have seen that myself you know of like the the chinese ones there you go blowing up chinese indonesia oh indonesia has blown up chinese fishing vessels as part of its effort to combat illegal fishing in may of 2016 indonesian destroyed 23 foreign fishing boats including chinese vessels to send a message about illegal fishing activities. Yeah, there's also a big dolphin industry in Indonesia. I had Richard O'Berry on here a few months back. He did the movie The Cove.

Oh, yeah. And he basically, he did this crazy covert operation to hide cameras in this fishing cove in Japan, where they were basically, they take boats out offshore and they... Like, corral all the dolphins in. They corral all the dolphin with like these sonar thing, sonar stuff and like they net it off and they take these sticks and they just stab them to death and then it turns into this just massive red blood bath and uh they documented it and they made this documentary and it won like a ton of crazy awards yeah and he and um he was explaining to me how the the fishing industry in japan is just like it's off the chain and it's so and it's like it's so tied into their government too that you can't get anything done yeah it's it's

really, really, really bad stuff, man. And so where I was, I mean, that's a whole thing. But, like, where I was going with a lot of this is, like, back to Florida is the sharks move. They migrate. You know? So if you're a migrating shark and you're in one of these areas that's just getting raped and pillaged and, like, there's nothing to eat over there where you're going to hang out where it's protected here, where we protect our waters, where we have resources, you know, so you can get an accumulation

of animals there are like, this is, this place is amazing. This is where there is food. You know what I mean? And so like comparatively, like, what would you do if you were the shark, you know? Especially if you're on a migration route like that. Yeah, I'd be hanging out where all the spear fishermen are. You know? And like, we forget that like these animals move through.

And so when you're out there and you see like, there's a ton of them, you're like, it's overpopulated here. And you're like, bro, those are sharks that have come from thousands of miles away. You know, especially when it's the right time of year on their migration, they're breeding. They're using the Gulf Stream. They're moving through. You know, so like you can have these rises. and falls, you know, based on migration. And so it gives you the perception that there's more than ever because they don't live here, man.

That's like going to a club in Miami and being like, oh, my God, there's so many people to live. None of those people live here. Right, right, right, right. Especially during breeding migration. So we have, you know, in the summers, I do a lot of shark diving off of Jupiter, you know. And like, there's tons of them out there in the summer. There's so many. I'm like, again, you're going to the club.

And this is their club, man. And you're like, there's so many that live here. None of them live here. You know, they're migraine. I mean, obviously there's some that live here, you know, like depending on what species we're talking about. Is Florida the only state that protects sharks that heavily? Or do other states like North Carolina, South Carolina, all those coastal East Coast states, do they protect sharks too? Do you know?

So I know some. I think there's a, I know Hawaii does a lot of protection too, as far as I know. Hawaii is crazy. People getting eaten by tiger sharks over there lately. Yeah. Well, you got. So another one. to look at it. Most of like the reoccurring theme here is perception, right? We have more people

than ever. And we have more people than ever in the water. You know, like this stuff's going to happen. You know what I mean? But like, again, it's perception. Like we don't care how many people died today in car accidents. Right. You know, so it gets ripped up by a shark. We want to kill sharks. You know, but I mean, like that perception of like, we want to get vengeance, you know, where it's just like, there's no vengeance against cars. Right. You know, there's no vengeance against kids drowning in their own bathtub at home. Right. That happens all the time. Yeah. We want to get these things because they're predatory animals and we're like, we can go kill them.

You know, we can get them back. And it's like, do you think they understand that? They don't know. Right. The Venge's thing is one that like really catches me up a lot too. I get so mad. Like, well, they kill one of ours. We're going to go kill ten of theirs.

And I'm like, do you think they tell their friends? Do you think they're, oh, better not mess with them. They kill them. No, there's your buddies just dying. They don't know why. Right. You know, they don't make that connection. You know, I think the orcs do make the connection.

Oh, well, that's a different story. Yeah. That's a different story. That's a super intelligent animal. Yes. Yes. And the orcas and the dolphin. I know Force was telling the story about how those orcas were ramming that boat.

Yeah. That's some cool. Out in the middle of the Atlantic. Cool. I think it's cool. Crazy, dude. Yeah. And I was watching a video on Instagram there today too where this lady was, she was swimming.

I think it was somewhere off the coast of California. And there was like this mother orca and it's two calves just like following it around. following this lady around as she was swimming just swimming all around her, like putting their nose up to her feet and not hurting her at all. And she just kept swimming with these orcas surrounding her and this drone was filming the whole thing. So what I

love about that is like, okay, I'm obviously an environmentalist. You know, I love animals. But like there's like it's like everything, there's a spectrum. And there's definitely the spectrum of like full on crazy person. Yeah. And so like the crazy person sees that video and they're like, it's so

beautiful. Look at them. And I'm watching. And I'm watching that like, oh, my God, they're trying to see if she's food. You know what I mean? Yeah. Like, I swam with orcas. And, like, you look at them. Wild ones? Yeah.

I did in Norway. Holy shit. Yeah, and you're just like, oh, that thing is so smart. Like, the only reason they're not eating people is because I don't want to yet. Right. Okay. Like, you don't want to mess. You don't want to, like, I literally said when I went there, I was like, I'm going to go before

something bad happens and then you can't go anymore. Like, that's the way I kind of looked at it because I was like, we need to be a lot smarter about how we interact with like giant predatory super intelligent animals that like thankfully don't see us as prey you know

and like right now they don't let's not give them a reason to there's too many stupid people doing things like you know like pushing the limit with that kind of animal and you're like it takes one person

to do something really really dumb and then that orca's like hmm that was really easy and it tasted really good what made you want to swim to Norway to swim with orcas I do it's just an incredible animal

Yeah, I mean, I just like, I mean, a lot of, so like different facets of why I do what I do kind of thing. You know, obviously, education, conservation, I want to go. I want to tell that thing story, you know, I want to use like my social media platform to bring more awareness to that animal. But then there's the other side of it's just, it's just me and my heart, my soul. I'm like, I want to be around these animals that just give me this sense of awe and like just the raw power they have. And it's just incredible, you know? So like, deep down, I do it for me. I do it because I love it.

You know, but then also I'm obviously going to try to use that for education, conservation, and whatnot, too. So how did that go? Like, what did you guys do? Jets have to go hunt them down, find them where they were, and then, like, jump to just, like, find them and jump in front of them or what? I wish mine was a better story. It was a mess. We actually got, like, really bad weather. We got snowed in. Oh, God. It was that cold. It was horrific, yeah. And so, like, we got snowed in almost the whole time. You know, I paid out of pocket all the way over there, fly over there, rent everything, rent

in the boat. And, like, I did it on my own, you know, like, I've got to do a lot of cool stuff because I get funded by, you know, different TV shows and networks. So I get to do a lot of cool stuff for free. I did this one out of pocket, and we just got screwed on the weather. So, like, literally, it was like the last possible day, and the captain's like, well, guys, snow hasn't stopped. It's too bad.

We can't go. And I'm like, I paid a lot of money. They're like kind of get in the guy's face. I'm like, we're going. Like, and I run tourist operations too. And like, I could tell like he just didn't want to go. It sucked. I was like, I could tell this is doable.

Yeah. Like I wouldn't do something that's not safe. You know, like I wouldn't push somebody to go if it's not safe. But I also tell this guy like, he just didn't want to deal with it. Right. It wasn't unsafe. It was uncomfortable. Exactly.

You know, and I'm like, no, bro, we're going. And we go out there. And like, we finally, we saw, you know, saw this big male orca going by. And I just dipped right off the back of the bone. And like, I got in with him, man, and I got to see him. It was super cool. Oh, this is the video I was telling you about. Look at the shit, dude.

Yeah. I mean, she's really close to the beach, too. Look, you can see the whitewash right there where the waves are crashing. Yeah. This is Hawaii? Ha'hi? No, New Zealand. Oh, no, New Zealand. Oh, duh.

Can't believe I didn't see that. So, like, when you see that, you're like, oh, my God, it's beautiful. And they're curious. They're super intelligent. And thankfully, again, they don't see us as food. But then I would also... That water's like six feet deep. That's crazy.

I would be not swimming, splashing. I would not be doing anything that could be doing. I would be doing a left turn. So like, I mean, I just think about myself. If I was the person in that situation, I would put my eyes right towards them the whole time, maintain eye contact the entire time, let the animal know I'm acknowledging it.

That's a predatory animal. You get to treat it like such, you know? And again, like, I'm not... We run into this problem all the time. Like, for me as an animal advocate, where like I have to deal with the crazy. people on both sides. People thinking extremes. It says all the time. Everybody thinks in extremes.

It's either a bloodthirsty killing machine or is a tame puppy that won't hurt anyone. I'll never hurt a soul. I'm like, reality's in the middle, man. You know, and I try to tell people that all the time, like, treat that thing with respect. Like, again, I wouldn't be splashing. I wouldn't do anything that could possibly be interpreted as prey to that animal in any way whatsoever, you know? And like, but obviously, if it wanted her, it could take her immediately. And it's just checking her out. They're super intelligent, but like, yeah, don't be in the camp of either crazy side. you know, try to stick in reality in the middle and be like, no, it's not a, it's not a

killing machine. It's a super intelligent animal's checking you out. It's also not a puppy. Also, I don't know if there's been any cases of orcas attacking humans in the wild. Yeah, as far as I know, there's not. Can you find that, Steve? See if there's any documented cases of an orca attacking a human. I'd be interested to see that. Obviously in captivity, it's happened, but that's way different. But you're giving it a reason. Exactly. So the same thing here. Like, let's say that, let's say she's swimming and the baby comes up and the baby's like really curious and then take the baby in the face the orca's pissed exactly that's where's going with wild wild workers have rarely attacked humans in the wild uh there's only one reliable

report of a wild orca seriously injuring a human which occurred in 1972 when a surfer was bitten by an orca off the coast of california despite the intelligence and strength of the orcas there's no verified cases of wild orcas attacking humans for reasons other than a mistaken identity or curiosity right yeah i mean that's that's the thing that's like i always say like I'm way more afraid of bull sharks than I'm of great whites. Like I'd rather be in a pool with a great white than a bull shark. You guys see me petting a bull shark? I sent him a picture of that.

A wild bull shark? Yeah. Oh, I can't find this. I said it to you. Yeah, yeah, I got it. Like bull sharks and tiger sharks are like, I'm more terrified than of those things than anything. That's a tiger. Well, that's a big tiger.

Yeah. But the bull shark. Is this off the coast of Jupiter? Yeah. That's a bull shark. Yeah. So that's petting a bull. How did you guys get those bull sharks?

Well, you chump, you know? You just chummed them out. You were chumling up for sharks, yeah. Jesus. And, yeah, shout out my buddy, Michael Dornilis. He sadly passed away. But he took that photo. He was an amazing, free diver, amazing with sharks.

Really? Yeah. But, um, but yes. He didn't die like swimming with sharks, right? Oh, no, no, no. Okay, good. No, I don't know, because I'm sad. No, no, it was drug-related, sadly.

Oh, really? Oh, that sucks. Super, super sad. It was amazingly. talented guy. Really? But he actually taught me a lot that I know about sharks. You know, I mean, he was a really, really cool guy. But yeah, with the bulls, so a good story of like how bulls work or like how a lot of predatory animals work in general. So we would do these drift dives with the bulls out there off of Jupiter. And like at most, I think the most we've had in the day is like

50 of them at once, like 50 bulls at once. And sometimes just me and him out there. It's just us. And, you know, we're down there, free diving up and down, you know. So you're just holding your breath down there, 50, 60 feet deep. How deep is it there? Oh, that's at the ledge. That's like 110. Okay. You know, and so we're just up and down hanging out with the bulls. And when we were in clear water, it's fine. You know, maintain eye contact with them. Don't act like prey. Don't flop around. Don't splash. Be calm. Be cool. Watch them. You know, that confidence. Like I was just saying, you know, like they pick up on that. And they're like, okay, this is like another predatory animal in our environment, too. You know, and like when you have bait in the water like that,

if you don't have struggling bait, they first come in, they'll come in hot because they like smell the blood and they're like kill. And then they come in and their attitude will totally change. They're like, okay, this is like a scavenger situation. You know, because then they realize nothing's struggling. You're not struggling. There's nothing else is struggling. And their mindset will go from like kill mode to like scavenge mode. You know? Because I mean, obviously sharks been scavenging off of whale carcasses and stuff like that for millions of years. So like they know that game. And then they know like, okay, be chill. Like we're just scavenging. We're picking up food. They see you. You're chill.

They're like, oh, this is another thing scavenging the same thing. And so then you're just kind of chilling with them and they're not seeing you as pray anymore, you know? And then like they really become really calm. And it's really, it's amazing to see like the attitude shift of like one individual shark. Because you see them coming hot and then they understand. And then they're like, okay, this is not that bad, you know?

And then like, boom, I'm sitting there petting one. Yeah, it's a wild bull shark. Never seen them before. You know? But then we're doing a drift dive. That's in clear water. Drifted into murky water. We get out of the water within like five minutes.

Right. They started getting bold immediately because they're very aware. They're so much smarter than people think. Like, they are aware of your awareness. The visibility doesn't affect them. Oh, no, it does. Oh, it does. So they're more sensory.

But then they also know you can't see them. No, I'm saying the poor visibility doesn't affect them negatively. No. Like it does for us. So what it means is they're going to rely more in touch, and they're going to rely more in electrosensory. Which means they have to be closer. So instead of using their eyesight and the clear water,

now they're like, I've got to bump into this thing, you know, see what it is. And then they get more sketch. Right. You know, and then you also, if one bumps, you can't help, but flinch. Right. And then when you flinch, they're like, are you struggling? You know? And it just, it changes so fast.

And like, literally the same group of sharks that were so chill five minutes ago, drift into the murk, they're not so chill anymore. You know, so a lot of like what happens in a human predator interaction depends so much on the environment. What is the human doing? What environment are you in? You know, in murky water, stuff like that. Same with alligators and crocodiles.

Like that's what I was saying. Being in murky water with them is so bad. Because they're not looking at you. They're feeling. You know, and then they're going to feel. They're going to check it out with their teeth. Instead of looking and being like,

what is this thing? No, they're just trying to see, you know, trying to feel. I did this shark dive once in the Bahamas. I think it was off NASA. It was the only place that did these shark dives. We were filming for this project we were working on. And there was this tour that basically put you out in the reef,

and they lure in hundreds of reef sharks. And then you get in the main. middle of them and you're in a reef shark tornado. Yeah. And it is like, they say it's safe, but that is not fucking safe, dude. There's these, you're getting bombarded by sharks running, ramming you from every fucking angle.

And if one of those decided to bite you, I think they would all do the same. I think they would all just rip you apart. So, we were just talking, I was talking to Steve before you got here. We were just literally talking about like the, um, when somebody with confidence says something is safe, everybody like, oh, okay, cool,

it's safe. It's funny. Nothing to worry. It's so weird, bro. Like, I've worked in this industry forever. And so, like, I run my own tours, you know. I don't at the moment. So nobody email me because, like, I'm trying to build my sanctuary. So we don't have any tours at the moment. That's, like, my life thing right now.

It's developing everything. But when I would run all these tours are done for, like, 20 years, you know, I would see so many people are like, oh, with Chris, it's safe, you know? And I'm like, hmm, you got a lot of confidence in me for somebody you just met five minutes ago. But, you know? But then when I go and I travel and I'm somewhere else and then I'm like, I'm not the guy now and someone else is the guy, you know, and they're like, and then they're talking, they don't know who I am.

And I'm like, this guy's full of crap. Like, you know, I'm just listening to this dude talk, and I'm like, he doesn't know what he's talking about. Like, and then all the other people who are there, just regular tourists are like, okay, okay, all right, awesome. This guy really sounds like he knows it. And I'm like, oh my God, we're all going to die. This guy should need somebody through battle.

He could convince people to fight a war. It's nuts. Human psychology, dude. Yeah. You can say, it doesn't matter how full of shit you are, as long as you say it with confidence, people will follow you. People will follow you, man, you know. And so, like, I was telling Steve, I'll tell you this, like, little quick thing because it was, like, really interesting. So I was,

I was filming, I won't say the location just because I don't want to start any drama or, like, throw any shit at them. I was somewhere and these other guys were in charge of everything, and they don't know who I am, you know, and we were filming some sharks on the bottom, some reef sharks at night. And we had been at that dive site during the day, and there were tigers cruising around on the edges, you know, like, and they were hunting, like, predatory hunting tigers. Is this Florida? No. Okay. But again, like, I don't want to, like, through too much shit

at them. Okay. But, uh, because they did some really stupid stuff and some people got really messed up for it. Okay. Um, but, uh, so, like, during the day, we saw tigers, you know, and I kind of was like, eh, you guys don't, uh, really seem to pay much attention to the tigers, you know, like, ah, no, it's not a big deal. So you guys are down deep? Uh, yeah, the dive site's like 60 feet. And, and there's tigers above you? Um, well, I'm getting there.

Okay. So, so during the day, um, and these tigers are like, so, normally, normally almost all the interactions you would have with a shark, you know, as like a regular person, is either like, you know, you're surfing or something like that, or if you, which usually I don't see me, the water's not that clear, usually. It's usually because it's baited dive. You know, so like as a tourist person, it's a baited dive. The sharks are there for the bait. They're not there for you. You know, and they're not actively, they're not really hunting. They're there because they want to pick up on that bait, right? These sharks are actively hunting. There's no bait here. We're in a very, how do you want to say? There's a lot of life going on. There's a birdroquery. There's like really pristine reefs. So like, they're not hunting people, you know, but they're hunting. Like there's activity all over the place. Everywhere. You're in a real wild ecosystem, you know? So I like told the guy

I'm like, you know, you guys don't really seem to pay that much attention. Oh, don't worry about it. Whatever. It's not a big deal. You know, and he's like, and I'm like, no, I think it's something you should worry about. You know, and the guy like kind of like made fun of me for it. You know, I'm like, okay, whatever. And then we go out at night and everybody's looking down at the reef with the lights. And I'm like, you know, I'm looking up. And then

after the dive, you know, I'm like, you guys weren't looking up at all for tigers. We were just here during the day. There's, there's tigers everywhere. There's no tigers there at night. And I'm like, what do you mean they're not there at night? Like, for one, how do you know? Because you're looking down. For one, you don't know. For two, there are. Like, I know there are. You know, and for three, how could you be so confident to say that they're not? Like, we're in the ocean, bro. There could be anything, you know? And like, I kind of got into it with this guy and we argued, you know, and like, it got a little heated, you know, because, like, I wasn't going to back down. Like, I know what I know. And I know this guy's full of crap. And kind of got into it.

little bit and then we went back out there and he's like they're not there and i'm like okay watch and we went out the next night again they're all looking down i looked up tiger right over our heads no it was right it was like a 12 13 foot tiger shark just right over our heads if it wanted somebody had him you know it just easy now thankfully again like we're not on their menu for the most part you know like they really don't see us as prey for the most part so like you're it depends how hungry it is right for the most part right don't act like prey you know so like we're not their normal pray so thankfully they don't see us as prey, you know, and I got back into the, you know, on the boat with the guy and I, like, like, really got to fight with the guy, you know, like arguing with him about it. And like,

it didn't, you know, I kind of told him off, you know, whatever, fast forward. A month later, like literally a month later, later gets her leg ripped off right there. No. She dies. Oh, my God. It was a tiger. At night? It was actually during the day.

During the day. So she had an uncontrolled ascent. And so she was panicking and freaking out. And it's a, so do you scuba dive? I, not lately, but, yeah. Yeah, I'm certified. I've scuba dived for a long, for like probably 20 years I was scuba dive. So, like, when I was running tours, I was doing like scuba dive tours. I stopped doing them because there's too many people that got certified 30 years ago.

And they haven't been diving since. And they have the certs. So they get on the boat and everything. You don't know, that dude has not been in the water for like 20, you know. That happens all the time. So I just, I just, I move my tours, like over tours more like just snorkel, you know. Because you get, it's just too many people don't know what they're doing on scuba because they don't dive often. I enjoy free diving.

more than scuba diving. Me too scuba diving. There's too much equipment, too much stuff to remember. It's just, it's so much easier to remember how much air you have in your lungs. You know what I mean? And like, you know your limits, right? Yeah. There's too much that they can go wrong with scuba diving. I remember one of the last times I was scuba diving was in the

Cayman Islands. We were shooting for that same project I was telling you about with the sharks and NASA. We went to the Caymans. And we were filming off this deep wall, this deep ledge. It went from like 150 feet down to like over a thousand feet. And we were like on the edge of the ledge.

going through these caves like up the side of it and we were completely surrounded by reef and rock like in this dark cave and I'm filming I have a huge underwater camera in my hand and I'm like shooting

and I'm not paying attention to any of my gauges and all of a sudden I suck my fucking tank dry I was like that's the worst feeling in the world isn't it? And we're 150 feet down oh no I have no air

I wasn't paying attention because I was You have multiple safety stops like oh yeah and I And I'm just like, because I'm only focusing on the camera. I'm so like focused on getting shots. I'm not paying attention to anything else. Luckily, I got a guy in front of me and a guy behind me.

So I didn't even think of that, though. I literally dropped my camera and I shot. I tried to shoot to the surface. I tried to go right through a hole. I got up maybe like 20 feet. My buddy grabbed me by my ankle, pulled me down because I was like, I wasn't thinking. Yeah. And I was able to breathe off his octopus until I had to do a safety stop, obviously, at like 80 feet.

Have you ever felt the expansion? Did you feel it? I don't remember. It's a horrible feeling. I don't think I got up high enough. I don't think I, luckily, he grabbed my foot before I got too far. But if I would have, I'm sure I would have felt it. It's the weirdest.

Like, you just, you can't exhale enough. You're like, and you could feel your lungs starting to tear. It's the worst feeling. Oh, my God. It's such a weird feeling, too. Really? Have you ever been bent? No.

Well, I mean, that might have qualified. I've never been bent back. that. If that would qualify. I don't, that probably wouldn't. But yeah, no, that's not. That's just, what is that called? I can't remember. But, um, but yeah, just trying to exhale as hard as you can and you can't get it out fast enough and you just feel it like, it is such a weird feeling, man. Yeah, I can't imagine, man. Mani was telling me he's been bent like five or six times. Oh, yeah. Now, thankfully I never have. That put the fear in me. Yeah. You know, and I was like, I pay attention to my gauges. Exactly. That's the thing. That's why I don't like,

that's what I'm not a fan of scuba diving. It's just, it's just, it's just, it's, It's, it's, don't get me wrong, it's fun as hell. Like, when you're really on top of your shit and you know what you're doing, like, it's, it's super fun. But like, for me, it's like paying attention, all that stuff, being up to date on everything. Also, you got to keep track of your gear. Like, if you scuba dive once a year, you got to check all your gear, make sure all your gear is still good, kosher, working fine. Yeah. And there's so much shit that can go wrong.

And I've heard so many horror stories of scuba divers. It's just like, I just, you know, I feel more comfortable, free diving. I know my own limits. I know what I can do. You know, people shallow water blackout. a lot but you got to do with friends make sure you have people around you watching you and yeah and all that kind of stuff so um i got to take a leak real quick oh we'll jump right back in yep have you seen that video of the guy in egypt who got eaten by the shark yes that is the

i think that's the worst video that's ever been ever been documented of a shark attacking somebody yeah that was that was nasty that was fucking that i had nightmares about that for weeks yeah but like one of the things about that place though i think is that was, uh, I heard that they were like disposing of goat carcasses or something. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So that's what I heard something like that too. And like, again, like, you know, these are so they're intelligent and all animals are intelligent, you know, just right off the bat with like most like general public people think animals are just stupid. It's an eating machine, you know, and like I try to explain to people like animals are smart. They're so

much smart and you think they are and they get good at doing something. And like, like with Alice, Alligators. Like, we've had some 10-foot alligators that we catch, and, like, we get them in their captivity for, like, a month or two, whatever, and then they, like, puke up a bunch of snail apirculums. Like, you know, the, the thing that covers the snail's door, you know? So, because they can't digest that thing, the keratin in it. Interesting. But basically, it just means that that's all that dude's been eating. Like, he's just been eating the crap out of snails, because he learned snails are easy. Oh, that's an animal that could take down a huge other animal, you know, like, it's a big predatory animal. But when they learn that they're

good at something, they stick with it. Like, they're smart. And so a lot of animals, even within their own species, become specialist of something because they learn that they're good at it. Like, you'll see the dolphins in the bay where they have one side of the teeth all ground down because they move the fish up against the shore and they get the fish like this. I've never seen that. Oh, it's really cool. Yeah, yeah, you could look that up or the ones that do the bubble rings and trap the fish inside the bubble ring and then get them in there. So, like, yeah, it's really cool. I'd not seen that either. Yeah, well, I mean, dolphins, there's lots of examples because they're just so smart. I heard a Dolphins getting high on puffer fish.

Yeah. So apparently that's off of like one instance, though. Oh, yeah. So it's like kind of blown in proportion. Damn it. But even in things like sharks and alligators, which are obviously not as intelligent as a dolphin, but they're still pretty smart. You're a lot smarter than you think. So like gators, like they will become good at something. And then they stick to that thing.

It's like a gator, there you go. Oh, wow. Yeah. So they'll like do that and encircle the fish. Isn't that cool? Wow. And then just tighten it up. So like, again, dolphins are.

really smart you know but they're fascinating even within gators and sharks like they become good at something like a lot of gators get really good at either catching uh you know they're catching him in their mouth that's wild there you go isn't that so cool yeah that's so cool um but anyways uh so what's just trying to say though is there a lot of them are not just like a generalist that kills everything they see they get good at something and then that's like their thing and like they'll grab other stuff too, you know, but like in that instance, like that shark came across carcasses over and over and over. And he's like, bro, this is my thing. Yeah.

Like, this is awesome. I'm going to do this all the time. I'm going to get good at this. And so he's probably searching that area all the time. And like, that looks like another carcass. You know, you know what I mean? Mm-hmm. So like thankfully, again, they don't usually see people as prey.

We're not, you know, like when we're in the water, we're so unlike everything else. There's nothing comparable, you know, unless we're talking like Nile Crocs in Africa, then you are comparable. that's a species that is really good at hitting things that are big mammalian on the bank. So when you're the dude on the bank, you're fitting the bill. Right. You know what I mean? So. Also that shark that killed that kid was pregnant, I think, because they immediately found it and killed it and cut its belly up.

It was, they had hundreds of little baby sharks in it. Yeah. Which you find a hungry, pregnant female tiger shark, and I don't think that's a good situation no matter what's going on. Well, so like, I... I was talking to Steve before, just about tigers in general. Like, tigers are like, I mean, that is a real apex predator. You know, like any shark, you know, talking about lemon sharks. Like, you know, like, a lemon's no joke.

Don't get me wrong. But, like, a tiger's an apex, man. Right. You know, like, it's a different level, you know. And like, they, like, I've watched a tiger go right past a diver. Like, during the baited dives, they're there for the bait. Like I was saying, you know, they're there for the bait. But the tiger's like, I mean, he's top of the food chain.

So he's really opportunistic. You know, everybody's, they're all opportunistic. mistake, but like, he's really, I watched a tiger go right past a dude, and the dude just kept on looking forward. He's like, oh, yeah, because there's a couple of them. He goes right past the guy. He didn't turn and watch it. And that tiger's like, you're not looking to me. Grabbed him right by the tank and just lifted the dude up off the bottom. I watched it happen, you know? And then like, the guy fighting, the tiger's like, okay. And then he's like, no big deal, because he's not afraid of you. Like, you know, it's a different kind of level.

And I think he just like swam off? I don't know. He just circled back for the bait again. You know? It's like the tiger, like, he doesn't necessarily respect. you at the same level that like 11, you know what I mean? Or even the bulls, you know? Like, bulls are, bulls are more shy than what people would think. Like, they're more afraid. Like, they're a lot more afraid than what people would think. Really? They're pretty quick to take off. You know, like, you can, I don't know for a better word, I say this all time. Like, you can offend them pretty easily, you know? And they just, they zip off really fast, you know? But like, and I mean, depending on the situation, again, they're intelligent. So, like,

that tiger in that instance, these are on divers all day. It's at one of the feeding spots where they do the tourism stuff. He's so used to people. Right. When we get, like, we can tell when we do a shark dive, we'll get a tiger, like, that's a wild tiger that, like, does not interact with people. You can tell by the way it acts. It comes in very zippy. It's, it's more nervous, you know? Like, you can really tell, like, this is a shark that's habituated towards people and has done this game before, and this is one that's, like, actually wild. What, um, have you seen the girl in Hawaii that makes the videos with the tiger sharks?

Yeah, Ocean. Her name's, her name's, yeah, she came to my Gator tour. Oh, really? Mm-hmm. those videos are absolutely insane. Swimming with those giant tiger sharks. Or the great whites. You've seen her with the white sharks. Oh, yeah.

She's like, she swims down to them. It's not the same though. Like the tie. She gets really intimate with those tigers, I feel like. Well, the tigers once, you know, because again, they're an apex predator, once they kind of learn the game and they're like,

we're getting fed and you're not really my prey, they're pretty comfortable in show. And those are some well-fed tiger sharks. You can tell when you love. at them. Yeah. Those things are fat. They're big, man. But it's kind of like the dichotomy of like, well, they're big and they're chill, but then also just keeping in mind the whole time that like it is a big predatory animal that can change is mine. Kayak gets my flight, hotel, and rental car right. So I can tune out travel advice that's just plain wrong. Bro, Skycoin, way better than

points. Never fly during a Scorpio full moon. Just tell the manager you'll sue. Instant room upgrade. Stop taking bad travel advice. Start comparing hundreds of sites with kayak and get your trip right. Kayak, got that right. You know, and that can recognize like, I can take advantage of the situation. Yeah. So, like, one time I was diving with wild tigers that are not habituated towards being fed by people. And I was just kind of like messing around. So I wanted it. I was like, you know, it's scared of me. I could tell. We have no bait. It's scared of me. And I'm like, I wonder if I can get it to see me as prey. So I started trying to purposefully act like prey just to see what he's going to do. Because like,

I've handled tigers a lot in these baited situations. I've had him get frisky with me and grab him by the nose, flip them. I've done all that stuff. So like I know how to handle them, you know. And so I'm like, I'm going to push the envelope a little bit and see what he's going to do. So again, there's no bait here and like, yeah. Yep. So like I've done, I could send you a photo. I've done stuff like that. You know, like I know how to interact with them and grab my the nose and flipping and all that kind of stuff. So like, Like with this one, but it was wild, there's no bait. So I started, and I was on free dive, so I started shooting down and then just rocketing up, and it was about 60 feet, and I just go as fast as I could, like, just because that makes

it look like you're running. You know, so you're running away. Never run away from a predator, you know, so I'm doing everything you shouldn't do because I want to investigate the behavior. Is that safe to do that? So swim up that super fast going to, 60 feet down? Yeah, free dive, yeah. Really?

Yeah, because you have your air, yeah. Yeah, because you're taking the air from the surface down with you. So if you were on compressed air, God, no, you're going to get an air embolism. kill yourself if you're on scuba. Wow. I didn't know even if you were free diving. I thought, because even when I free dive, I try not to come up faster than my own bubbles.

Oh, no, you can rock it. Yeah. Really? Yeah, because you're taking the same air. You're taking the air from the top, bringing it down, it's pressurized, and then you're going back up with it. Instead of breathing, pressurized air down there.

Right. So that's where the expansion causes a problem. Oh, okay. No, now I'm thinking of something. So one time, me and my buddy, we freed dove down into this sunken ship, and there was a submarine decompression chamber on the bow of the ship, which was like 70 feet down, and we swam into it. And there was

air in it. Oh. And we were hanging out and they're breathing the air. And that's your problem. And he's like, he's like, don't swim up faster than your bubbles. Yeah. We were swimming up. Yeah. That's probably why, because that was different air. Yeah. Exactly right. Yeah. Okay. But so I want to get this tiger to like see me as prey on purpose. Yeah. And again, like, never do this. You know, like, I'm trying to like say, don't ever do this. You know, but like I, again, I've done this a lot. I know these animals. I know how they think and how to handle them. So I started rocking it up and you saw this tiger like, starts to like, you know, starting to like kind of eyeball me a little bit. And and then it followed me a little bit up to the surface. And I'm like, oh, he's, he's hooked. He's

like he's investigating. So then I got up on the surface and I just started swimming as hard as I could with just one arm, like doing the wounded sea turtle in a circle. And it just, you could just see the gears churn in this dude's head and just clicked in and just right up me. You know, and I mean, it's big. It's probably like a 12-foot tiger. So what the fuck? Why would you do that? Well, I get that's what I was saying. Like, this is kind of the stuff that I do is like investigating the behavior because like I want to understand how he thinks. Like how is this animal think? How does it work?

What exactly is going to trigger it to start to see me as prey? Because I'm not its prey. Right. And at first, it had no interest in me. I mean, a little bit. It's looking at you. You know, they're always a little bit interested. They're a little curious.

But I want to see what is it, what actions are going to make it actually see me as prey? Because I know how to work this situation in these animals. I can do this investigation, and then I'm able to teach people, don't do this. How are you still alive? Well, again, because it came right up my fins and it came right with bite me, and so I just flipped around underwater and pushed him by the nose. You know, he's going to try to bite. Was he charging?

Oh, yeah, yeah. It's flying at full predatory. What? Yeah, that's pretty cool. Is this on video? No. Holy crap, dude. I got, I was shooting photos.

So I had, like, not a great camera. I got photos of it, like zipping up behind me. I got my bubble trail and everything. I got them right up at my fins, you know. And where was this? That was in Costa Rica. Costa Rica. There's tiger sharks in Costa Rica.

Holy crap, dude. I didn't know there was tiger sharks in Costa Rica. That's nuts. I mean, they're Atlantic, Pacific. Yeah. I mean. I thought that, yeah. They're pretty much everywhere.

Yeah. I guess you don't really hear about too many sharks in Costa Rica for some reason. I don't know. Maybe that's just me. No, there's a lot of them. there. Huh. What is that? Is that a great way? Yeah. Is that her ocean? Yeah. That's great way. Oh, is this in Hawaii? Yeah. Oh, my God. Yeah, see, they're just, they're not that scary to me. They're just like big, slow, fat. Look at the dolphins. Dolphins are just like chilling below them. That thing is. Is that thing pregnant?

I think so. I'm sure it looks like it. Yeah. That's a big fucker. Good Lord. Pretty cool. Yeah, man, that's wild. That girl's nuts. Yeah, that's pretty awesome. I want to get out there. I dove with Great Whites in Mexico. In the cage? So we slept the guy in extra a little bit of money. Yeah?

They let you get out of the cage? Where they did. Now they shut it down totally over there. I'm not sure why. Actually, I have heard supposedly maybe it's because they want to be able to let. They don't want people around because they're getting paid off to let in the Chinese fishing vessels. No. I heard. I don't know. That's total hearsay. But I have heard people say that. In Mexico. That would be really sad if they did. Yeah, Mexico has amazing diving. Yeah, no, I've heard. I've heard stories of Mexican diving being good. But yeah, that's, that's crazy. I had no idea that Chinese fishing companies were like all up and down.

It's a big problem. The West Coast. It's a big problem, man. They're just, they're everywhere. like and if you're not going to stop them militarily then they're not going to respect that law they're not going to respect that boundary at all like they do not care is coast rica the only country over there on the coast that doesn't have a military i'm pretty sure and then they i'm sure they strike deals with the other countries that do to let them in their waters right like you just alluded to in mexico uh well costa rica is generally pretty good about their conservation of their animals you know i mean especially mainland um they definitely have slacked a lot on shark protection yeah you know like but uh For the most part, like, I mean, they're really good at protecting everything going on on the mainland for sure. Yeah. I spent a lot of time there. I mean, put you this way.

I got yelled at by a guy for using flash photography on a snake. Really? Yeah. I was like, bro, it's fine. Wow. Do you mess around with a lot of other different species around Florida? Like, do you mess around with, like, snakes and iguanas? Yeah, I got some pythons, if you want to see that.

I sent him some photos. I used to do the python catching out in the Everglades. That's a black mamba. Yeah, it's crazy how many snakes are in Florida. Yeah, Florida is really, really good for snakes. Yeah, so it was a black mamba, all the hippos. That was cool. Is that in Africa?

Yeah, that was in Botswana. I sent you some huge pythons to the right at the end. Yeah, so many of them. Oh, shit. That's a good shark one. There we go. Wow, dude. That one's a bushmaster in the end.

Amazon. It's the largest viper in the world. Oh, that's in the Amazon? Yeah. Well, since I started the sanctuary, I've been wearing flip-flops in the Amazon. So, funny story. I do not recommend that. What happened is my boots got like messed up, like in the plane somehow. And then they were like bent and it made my tonal fell off. Oh, yeah. My whole toe, my big toe like turned purple. The toenail fell off. So then I ended up doing the sandals. I hiked, I'm not kidding, literally 50 miles in the Amazon and sandals. That is... And I caught that thing. Nuts.

That's like a 10-foot bushmaster. What country is that? That was in Peru. In Peru. No way. Yeah. Dude, I've heard so many crazy stories about the Amazon. I want to go down there so bad. Do it.

It's amazing. How... Okay, what is the difference? Because I've never really understood this. Between the Cayman and the Amazon and, like, the crocodiles here. So, Cayman are in the Alligated Torre family. So they're actually more closer. related to an alligator than a crocodile.

So, like, when you look at a black cayman, you can see it. Like, a black cayman looks more like an alligator. But when you look at, like, spectacle cayman or dwarf camin, they look more crocodile-like, even though they're actually more closely related to an alligator. Right. But, yeah, but down there, so most of South America has Cayman. In northern South America, you get some American crocodiles, too. Are they super aggressive, or no?

The Cayman? Yeah. So most Cayman are smaller, they're on the smaller side. The big one is the Black Cayman. Black Cayman can get, like, 15 feet. they do get big. There are some reports of them grabbing people, but they're generally, again, generally not interested in people.

Very much like an alligator. They're, you know, obviously alligators occasionally get somebody, but we're really not on their menu, you know. And then the other Cayman species are smaller. They're super defensive. So, like, if you're trying to catch one like I do, like handling-wise, like a 10-foot alligator is easier to, like, hand-catch and a six-foot Cayman.

Like a spectacle-comin, they're, lightning fast. Really? Yeah, they're scary, man. They're so fast and strong. They're like, yeah. And the difference between, so the way I heard you explaining this on that other podcast I was listening to you, I can't remember the name of that podcast.

I wish I did so I could shout them out. But you guys were explaining how alligators and crocodiles don't necessarily, and I might be messing this up, but they don't necessarily come from the same ancestor. No, they do. They share a common ancestor. They do share a common ancestor. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. So really weird. So really weird is that an alligator or crocodile is more closer related to a bird than a lizard.

Wrap your head around that for a minute. What? Yeah. So because their common ancestor would be archosaurs. So archosaurs diverged into like, oh my God, I'm going to start butchering names here because it all gets like very hard to pronounce names. Anyways, archosaurs branched off to what we have crocodilians. Arcosaurs. Archosaurs, yeah.

And then dinosaurs. And then, you know, as we know, all dinosaurs went extinct or evolved into birds. And then, so later on, what we have are actual, like, reptiles as we know them, come so much later in time. So, because there's so much later in time, like, the common ancestor of crocodilians and birds is the archaosaur. So really, they are literally closer to each other than they're. are to like a lizard. It's really weird stuff. Yeah.

So alligators and crocodiles aren't, they weren't around when the dinosaurs were around? No, they were. But they had, so, okay, this is going to get way complicated. We need a graph on this. Okay.

See, you might be able to find something. Yeah, no, you definitely could. So you would have like, let's say there's archaosaurs are down here and then it like splits off. And then we have the crocodilians that are going through time. And then dinosaurs, as we know them,

evolve up here. And so they're taking place in the same time space. But they have the common ancestor down here. And then as we keep on going, the crocodilians keep on going to present day, dinosaurs, asteroid hits. They either go extinct or evolve into birds as we have them today. Right. Oh, that's a good graph. There you go. Telecrator, birdline arcosaurs. Okay, so the bottom of it is the arcasaur ruling reptiles. Then you have on one, on the right hand side of it is the bird line of them, Then goes to dinomorphs, dinosaur morphs, then dinosaurs, then birds. And on the left side, we have crocodilians. Yeah, really cool, weird stuff.

God, dude, evolution is so bananas. Okay, here's those bananas. You know, crocodilians, like what you would call a crocodile has evolved independently multiple times. Like, look up a phytosaur, P-H-Y-T-O-S-A-U-R-U-S. That's not a crocodile. that evolved independently of the Crocodillion line. Whoa.

Isn't that nuts? Yeah, how does something like that? So the nostrils are up there by the eyes instead of at the end of the snow. What? Yeah. All right, now you really want to, so this is cool because this is what we're talking about, crocodilian-wise, but if you really want to throw your brain for a loop, look up how many times crabs have evolved, this is going to really mess you up.

How many times crabs have evolved? So like all those things Crab like creatures have evolved Oh sorry Crab like creatures have evolved at least five times According to Scientific American The process is called Carcinization

Yeah so all roads lead to crab Oh yeah The body Yeah Right the body of a crab has evolved independently Yeah independently So those things are not related to each other Even though they like all look the same

Really? Yeah So like That's why they say peak evolution on earth is crab. All roads lead to crab. So eventually we're going to look like crabs. That's dude. It's so weird.

Yeah, so you have these cases of convergent evolution. Like, we know they're not related, and they end up going to the same body type. It's so weird. That is really crazy. But how the hell would we end up looking like crabs? Well, I don't think we will. I mean, it's environmental pressures, and we have been able to supersede our environmental pressures with technology. Right, right.

We are likely not going to. But you never know, man. Yeah, you never know. Isn't that so weird, though? That is super strange. You know, there are, like, so many, there's so many different types of crabs. That's interesting.

And crabs can, they also can regenerate their, their claws, which is crazy. That is bizarre. Yeah, there's some weird stuff, man. Yeah, and another interesting thing about the crocodiles and the alligators is that you guys were explaining on the, the name of that podcast was Juggernaut, by the way.

Oh, okay. So they were, the girl was explaining how, or maybe it was you, that the alligators only have these specific scales on their heads that can sense movement and pressure and all kinds of things. And that the crocodiles have them all over their body. That's right. So it's called an integumentary sensory organ.

So it's a little tiny dome pressure sensor. And so gators will have them just along the face and the jaw line. And so they can detect movement in the water, you know, much like a lateral line in a fish. So in really murky water, they feel that movement. movement, they know where to snap. Meanwhile, crocodiles have them across the entirety of the body.

And then like other so you can see the little black dots. Hey, that's my video. Bottom right? Oh yeah. Who stole that? TikTok. So blurry.

Go to that. Yeah, because they stole it. Go to that photo. Dude, my stuff gets stolen constantly. Go to find a closer by the skin, Steve. It was like above there.

There you go. No. Yeah, on the left. Bottom left. So like that, can you see them there? Yeah, hold on. There we go. There you go.

Look at that. Yeah, so the little black dots. So they have, so Gator, or Crocs have those all over their skin. And those are like super sensors. Yep. So they have been shown to be 10 times as sensitive as a human fingertip. That's crazy, dude. Isn't that nuts?

It's all like really, really, really cool. And what is the lifespan of a crocodile? That's a good question. So you really want to. Do we know? that's a good question so generally speaking you would normally say oh yeah they can get up to 80 years or 100 years or something like that but in order to know how old something is you either need a diagnostic on the animal be able to tell the age which they don't have they continue to grow and so like you can't check their teeth they shed their teeth and replace them throughout their life so a lot of animals you check their teeth right you can't do that with them right uh you can't apparently you can't check their bones that doesn't work either you can do that with some some things um so we don't have a way to tell how old an alligator is just by looking at it or even by cutting open dissecting. So there's no way to know.

So the only way you would know how old it is, you would have to have a record of when it hatch out of the egg. And then you would have to have that record keeping methodology going for longer than their lifespan is. And we know they can get over 100 years and we don't have any record-taking methodologies that have been going on for over 100 years. Oh, shit. Really?

So isn't that wild? That is crazy. So like the oldest supposed one is this big crocodile named Henry who's supposedly like 120 years old. And they tracked his hatch. Yeah. So he's supposedly 120. But that also, like when you look at it, you can look him up.

If you look him up, you couldn't tell me that crock's not 50. You couldn't tell me that crox not 200. Right. You can't tell. That's what I'm saying. So it's just wild. Henry is a Nile crocodile who's believed to be the oldest living crocodile in captivity. Born in the night, born in 1900 in Botswana.

Yeah. Jesus Christ, dude. So then you have, you have records. Dude, those Nile Crocs are so crazy. looking. Yeah. So then you have indigenous people who have records of animals that are supposedly, you know, like over 200 years old. And people just write it off because it's like, oh, what do you know? You can't even read.

You know, it's like, yeah, but those people have a generational knowledge you don't know about. And when you're dealing with an animal that lives beyond what a human's lifespan is, you have to have that knowledge of multiple generations, you know? So there are claims, oh, that's dingo. Right there, that guy, that's dingoed Nekleman. He just passed away very sadly. Oh, no. Yeah. So he, He's a really awesome reptile guy. Obviously, he works with crocs.

He was really famous for working with snakes. And, yeah, he got bit and sadly passed away. By a crocodile? Oh, no, no, by a mamba. Oh, no. Yeah, and he's actually allergic to the, oh, man. The venom? I think that he was allergic to the anti-venom, I think.

Oh, the anti-venom. Or maybe even the venom, too. I'm messing it up, man. Honestly, like, I know him personally or knew him. And so, like, when he passed, like, I, kind of purposefully didn't read into it that much because it made me really sad. Right. So I don't want to like misquote it, but I'm also like, it just really

upset me obviously. So like, I know he was allergic and I didn't really look it up a lot because it just makes it upset, you know. God, that sucks. But he was an awesome dude. Super, super, super, super nice. We see, like, in a lot in the animal world of, like, animal people, like, everybody's kind of a jerk.

There's so many egos, you know? Like, most people, like, because they're like, yeah, man, I'm the crocodile hunter. Like so many of these guys have like such an ego And like he had no ego man He was so kind He was so nice Like he'd just meet people like Like I'm not gonna name names

And throw some shave Like a lot of these guys won't give you the time of day You know like they think they are like You know crocodile Jesus You know They just like They won't even talk to people You know they think they're so cool

Dingo would talk to everybody You know he was like so enthusiastic So excited He was such a cool guy man Yeah He was really really cool dude That's amazing Have you heard

I'm sure you've heard of that that story that happened in, I think it was during World War II, those crocodiles that massacred that island. Yeah. It was called like the Matador, Operation Matador or something like that. Yeah.

And then Forrest was saying that they went there to film and there was just skulls everywhere. Yeah. From the alligators, just ate like hundreds of people. Yeah, Crocs. Yeah. Crocs, that's what I meant.

Saltwater Crocs over there. Yeah. And it was in Myanmar. Myanmar. Yeah, that's what it was. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. It was a crazy thing. Like the military force pushed them into the swamp and just held them at bay. Like wouldn't let them get out. And you just hear like through the night they were camped out. They said that you would just hear random just scream, gunshots, splash, silence. Oh my God, dude. Yeah.

Not a good way to go. That's so crazy, man. With your, with your new, with the bellow, what's it called bellowing acres? Bellowing acres. Bellowing acres. So you are basically taking. these crocodiles or these gators that people are calling in on that are going to get killed and you're taking them and you're giving them like a safe haven to live and you're like raising them there. Yeah. So I've only had the property for we're coming up on two years now. And so basically I spent my whole 20s literally as a professional alligator wrestler and I made my money and saved everything and I just put my whole life savings into creating this.

Wow. And so yeah, I'm putting, I'm all in man. It's do or die here. You you you grew up wrestling them? Yeah. Yeah. Like literally like. How the hell of, what gave, when did you first do that? What gave you the idea? Like, I want to wrestle alligators. Um, so, well, you start small, you know, so like, as a kid, like, I wasn't, like,

jumping on 10 foot all the other than I was a kid. But I was, you know, catching smaller ones and whatnot, you know, and I catch lizards and all that kind of stuff, you know, and like, baby gaiters. And then as I got bigger, I could catch bigger ones. Yeah. And, like, so, you know, kind of moved up the food chain, so to speak. And then literally spent, like, all my 20s as a literal professional alligator wrestler. And, like, when I first-

How do you become a professional alligator, Alligator wrestler. So I will say why. Yeah, so I'll say why. Well, for one, I say, you could say professional because that was my main source of income. Okay. You know, and I did it for so long. But then also because like when I first started doing it, it was literally like, it was like some

Coliseum stuff, dude. It was like literal like gladiator man first beast. Like WWE type stuff? No, no, no. I meant like your life is on the line. He's trying to kill you. Oh, right. For sure.

Like, well, I say that because eventually I learned to train them and I learned they're intelligent. But I didn't know that at first, you know. And so, like, when I first started at it, it was man-vers-beast. You know, like, you're diving on its back. It's spinning around trying to rip your head off. And you're literally fighting for your life in front of an audience of, like, you know, 200 people. And when you got a good crowd, it was pretty awesome.

I'm not going to lie. Like, you were, like, a legitimate gladiator. And then you had to do the same show with the same alligator for, like, two foreign guys from Europe that don't tip and don't speak English. And you're like, I'm going to die. And they don't even know what I'm saying. Like, it was rough. Okay. But you're making this face like, I'm crazy right now.

This is crazy. Yeah, no, I'm not. So people are paying you to wrestle and just watch you wrestle a massive alligator. Yeah, yeah. And like, here's the kicker. A lot of the, I've worked at a lot of different places. A lot of them don't pay you because of insurance. So the only money you make is tips.

So, yeah. Huh. Yeah, tell me, that's not a scam and a half. So, like, I would literally be doing a show. And, like, if you're good, and I was good. And, like, so if you're good, you can make decent money on tips. You've got a good crowd. I think I did the same show for the next crowd

and like you get a bunch of dudes from Norway that don't speak English and tipping is not in their culture and you're like you just screwed man literally I would do a whole show for free and you're just like I was this like on your own or were you part of some big like park or something no part of these parks I've worked at quite a few different parks

oh okay I see and but so like when I started it was like these gladiator shows it was nuts but then like I realize like and the thing too is like there's no like Gator you like there's no one teaching you know how to do this stuff. So like I'm self-taught. Like I figured out on my own, you know. Yeah. And then I realized like, you know, these animals are a lot more intelligent that we think. and they started working on, like, training them and, like, habituating them.

And then eventually my show evolved from, like, a man-verse beast to a man-with-beast, like working with the animal. And I got the gators, like, because, again, they're wild-caught alligators. Like, I didn't raise any of them, you know, like, sometimes you get them in, like, that day, you know, that kind of thing. But then once I learned I could work with them, I can train them. I get them to understand I'm not going to hurt them, you know? And I can teach them their names.

They come when they're called. And I got these gators so calm where, like, I can literally go in, pick up this, like, alligator, like a nine-foot alligator, carry it out of the... And he's letting me. Right. Yeah, you see some of the photos, you know. That's nuts, dude. So that's trained behavior.

So these guys are used to you, though. Yeah. But that's teaching them that you're not a threat. You're not going to hurt them. It's because they're intelligent. Right. And then I would carry the alligator out. And then I would talk about it and do an educational show.

And then I realized I made more money making it into a comedy show than making it like a, you know, you're going to die show. Right. You know, so like my whole, my whole persona basically evolved on like how I approach this whole thing. It's really cool, you know. And again, once you understand they're intelligent, like, you work with them, not against them, you know? And it's better for you. It's better for the animal. Because that animal's trying to kill you, not because it's aggressive, but because it's afraid of you.

You're jumping on it, you know? That's crazy, dude. You're letting that thing. You're freaking open its mouth right on your head. Oh, I sent him quite a few photos that are pretty crazy like that. Good Lord. But, but here's the thing. So when you look at that, what's important to understand is that animal is trained.

It is not tamed. It is not domesticated. I did not raise him from a baby. he's not well fed before I interact with them at all. No? No, because it doesn't matter. Really? You don't have like a little bit better of a chance if it's full?

So I've literally watched them, I'll tell you. I've literally watched them. One of the parks used to work at, they would back up a truck full of meat and dump it in there. And you would watch them come up and they'll eat and they'll eat and they'll eat until they puke and then they eat the puke back up. They literally will eat. They are always hungry.

They always want more food, man. So like, will they slow down when? Yes, it slows down. Like, I'm not going to say it like it doesn't make any difference, but they will definitely bite the hand that feeds, rip it off and swallow it in front of your face. Like they don't care about you. But they do get lazy, right? Yes, it's not, yeah. So it is, it is like, it's hard.

Like the famous, like, joke about alligators of Bush Gardens. Like, you just, the truck backs up, someone grabs a pitch forker starts slinging chickens into the, into the pit of alligators. The alligators don't even move. They just go. So, but that's not laziness is intelligence. Sure. That's realizing that's the easy way. Right.

They're not wasting their energy. But at the same time, that same gator, if you were walking by and you tripped and fell next to his face, it's going to grab you. It's not tame, you know, and that's what I really try to drill home. Like, like, you know, that alligator, you know, all the other alligators I work with, like, you know, I can work with them very close. I understand them and I train them again, but like they're not pets. You know, I drill this home. Like I said, it's like I should put it on my t-shirt. They're trained.

They're not tame. They're not pets. And like, if you mess up, they will grab you. And my best example of this and like why I say this all the time, one of the parks that we're worked out there's a male and female that were there together. And they were there way before I was there, so like 20 years or something, male and female. The male is way bigger than the female.

So if you wanted to, he could easily kill her, right? If you wanted to. And you're getting distracted. You're crazy, dude. You're nuts. No, but listen to this. This is important. So, you know, they're husband and wife alligators, right?

They're together. They have sex, you know, all that. I'm making the claim that their bond is greater than my bond with them. Right. Obviously. He cares more about her than he would ever care about me. Right. It doesn't matter from the food.

that's how he gets laid. He likes her more than he likes me. One day I saw it happen, she had a seizure. I was very sad. She had a seizure. She flipped in the water like this. I started twitching. And yeah, and I was like, oh my God, no. And it was like from here to like, you know, the door over there. Okay. Before I could physically get that far, he was eating her. Introducing the new best skin ever ultra slim precision concealer from Sephora Collection. It's full coverage with a matte finish and perfect for. any look, whether you're building it up for a full glam moment or targeting correction for a more natural vibe. At only $12, it's great for affordable touchups on the go. Get this new must-have

concealer at Sephora or at Sephora.com today. What? That's what I'm saying when I tell you they don't love you. They don't bond to you. They do not care about you. Like, that's what I'm saying. So that's why I drill this home to people because everybody's like, oh, it's safe. It knows you. It knows you, it won't hurt you, and I'm like, it will if you mess up because he killed her. God, dude. So it's like the ultimate archetype of a reptilian is just, you know, they're, they're synonymous with just like evil, right? In all stories.

I hate that. In stories. It's true. Well, no, a lack of emotion. Like, it's not yet, right. He's got, you know, explain it. It's not, right. It's not necessarily.

It's what we, as human beings, evolve the story of evil, right? Right. That's how we inject that into stories that we can understand. But yeah, the way you just explained that is like lack of all empathy, emotion. But here's the thing. It's because she had a seizure. He could have killed her any moment. He has all the power.

He's twice her size. If he wanted to kill her, no contest. She has no ability to defend herself against an animal that size. So if he wanted to kill her, he would have killed her. It's only because she was no longer herself. You know, she had a seizure. So now you are no longer. you. Or was it because she was no longer valuable to him alive? Yeah. I mean, that's part of it too,

you know, but like evil, I would say evil is inflecting pain on something else because you enjoy it. You know what I mean? Like, he doesn't enjoy that. It's, are you useful or not? You know, like, what value do you have to me now? Right. You know, you don't have value? Okay, then that's it. You're done. Right. But like to humans, that is the most terrifying idea. That's the most terrifying archetype. That's the most terrifying archetype of something as a psychopath exactly it's exactly what it is but again i i want to make it clear i don't count that as evil because like no no i yeah you're right it's not people torture people that's evil that that is evil people torture animals you're finding joy through something else is suffering these animals have no joy in watching you suffer in fact they don't i would i would even

say like for most predatory animals they don't want you to suffer like they want it over with quickly because the faster you're dead, the faster they can eat you, the faster it's over with, so something else doesn't come and steal the kill, you know? I can't imagine what was going through your mind when you were going trying to save this alligator. It was sad, man. All of a sudden, the other one just starts eating it. Yeah, it was sad.

It's just like, as a human, you find you're horrified, you know. But then, like, you know, you can pull up the stories with people who die and their dog eats them. People say the whole time. What? Pull it up. Stop it. Pull it up, dude.

There are stories of people dying and their pets eating them? Yes. Yeah. Oh, my God. I mean, you know, think about who you're on a plane with in case it goes down. You know that story. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah, we know that story well. You know? Yeah, survival. I mean, when it comes down to survival. But even things that, like, owner dies, pets eat them. While it is a disturbing thought, there are documented cases where dogs have scavenged on their deceased owners, particularly with left alone without food. Right. Oh, it's not a common occurrence.

But we think of the dogs as a man's best friend. They would never do that, right? People say that all the time. Yeah, well, if you, I mean, that's different than like if you die and your dog has nothing to eat for weeks. And it's like, okay, there's this fucking rotting flesh carcass here. I'm going to eat that. But like the second, the thing starts having a seizure. Well, here's the thing. It's just one is realizing you're no longer you faster. Right.

You know what I'm saying? Right. It's messed up. But I mean, that's, you know, it's kind of like, yeah, no, he knows you're not you anymore. You know? Right. Yeah, it's pretty wild. It's pretty sketchy.

But that's why, like, I'm always so clear about. about it when I'm like, no, bro, like, they're still predators. They will still bite you. If you make a mistake, they'll still kill you. Yeah. Like, you know. Didn't, did I hear you right? Do you said there's like a reptilian dolphin?

Yes. Yeah. Isn't that so weird and cool? What's it called? Oh my God, I know it. It's a reptilian dolphin. I mean, he could pull it up. Yeah, there you go.

Ictheosaur. Is it still, it's not around anymore? No, no, no, no, no. No, but it's really cool. Itchyosaur. Oh, wow. So ichthyosaur, literally, ichthy fish, sore lizard,

fish lizard. You know, it's so crazy that, like, there's so many aquatic animals that aren't around anymore that went away with the dinosaurs because, you know, a lot of aquatic animals lived, like sharks and gators and crocodiles.

But, like, it's just, you know, it's interesting to think about, like, why some species died off and why some didn't, like this. So, I mean, obviously we have multiple cataclysmic events on the planet, you know, mass extinction events, asteroid impact, stuff like that. Yeah. I mean, that's usually what it is. But here's a really weird, cool topic.

So, like, you like UFOs, right? It's all the UFOs. I love UFOs. Okay. So, convergent evolution. We have multiple cases of unrelated animals finding the same body type repeatedly throughout history. They have no relation to each other really, you know, and like reptile dolphins, mammalian dolphins. You know, crocodiles, phytosaurs, all this kind of stuff.

Have you heard that, like, there is a body-type plan in our DNA that makes us go towards an end goal of, like, an alien life form? A body-type plan in our DNA. Yeah. So, like, that makes us go towards an alien life form. Like, well, what we would consider to be an alien life form. But, like, so the idea is, like, in your DNA, in your genetics, there is, like, this plan that given enough time, all roads lead to crab, like that kind of idea. You know, so like we will eventually become, no matter what,

you're going to become like a gray, you know? Oh, yeah, I've heard about that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, there's this. Well, that's what gives a credence, because we have multiple examples of this, you know? Like all roads lead to crab, all roads lead to being a gray alien, you know. It's just a fun thought.

Yeah, no, we had Mike Masters on here, who is an anthropologist, and he was explaining that there, he did this study. on chimps and how there's this phenomenon called pedomorphism where basically chimp, uh, adolescent chimps look more like humans, right? So, so like the babies, the babies of hominids look more and more like fully, fully adult hominids extrapolated into the future. So like, um, so a baby chimp, if you look at a baby chimp, it looks more like we do, right?

It's, it sits straight. It's got a, it's got a perfectly round. head. It doesn't have this huge protruding jaw and this slanted forehead. Yeah, right there. Yep. So a baby chimp looks more like human beings, which are way more evolved than when they are. And when they get to adolescence, look how their jaw protrudes, their head slants back, their net kind of goes forward. So like the idea is if you take that and extrapolate, take us, right, with that model, our fully grown adults are going to look like the toddlers of today. And that's how people explain Grayalians looking like kids.

Right. Like short little toddler look at things. All right. So here's what we're going to blow your mind. Okay? So I've thought about this too. And so this comes to domestication associated with neoteny.

So neoteny is the retention of juvenile traits as an adult. And so that's just like this kind of stuff. Yeah. So that is heavily associated with domestication. So when we domesticate an animal, they become cuter. so like yeah and so like the domesticated version of an animal is always cuter even if we're not

selecting for cuteness so like if you select for docility like this fox experiment in Russia they they were trying to see how fast you can domesticate foxes purposefully so like domestication just to give like so people understand domestication's process whereby you selectively breed an animal for treats that you want

across many generations so that's why an alligator I have that was caught out of the wild will never be domesticated because domestication is literally genetic engineering through selective breeding. Okay, so like one animal cannot become domesticated in his lifetime. That's not a proper use of that term. So could we domesticate alligators? Yes, we could if we did it, you know, many generations. Anyways.

So we see through domestication a lot of these traits come out of being like cute, fluffy, bigger eyes, neotenny. You know, so those are juvenile characteristics. even if we're only selecting for docility. So therefore, does that mean we have been selected for docility? Why do we have Neoteni as adult humans compared to our hominid brothers? Yeah, but compared to like, do we have, do we have that? Like, how do we know we have that?

Because you look like a baby chimp. Baby chimp doesn't look like you, bro. You look like a baby chimp. You look at the equation. Right, but isn't that just the part of the evolutionary process? though. That's domestication. See, if you were to domesticate chimps, they would look more like their babies.

So you're saying that we could be by some sort of force that's outside of us being selectively bred to be more domesticated or docile? Yeah. That's what I'm saying. That's some weird stuff. I'm not saying it's a fact, but that's some weird stuff I think about. So look up the, if you bring up the domestication experiment of foxes in Russia, So I think they were just selecting for docility, make them chill. You know, so they want them nice and friendly.

Foxes are just super cute no matter what. No, but they start tail wagging. Oh, really? Yeah, so tail wagging is not normal. So like silver foxes for tameness. So they're only going for tameness, but they exhibit behavior similar to dogs. So ears going down, flopping down, bigger eyes, tail wagging. These are all like cute things, you know?

So like that's what I would argue that we are the cute. cute version of like chimps. We are much more like a baby chimp than an adult. And so that's that neonetany thing, which is associated with domestication. Right. Yeah, that is wild. Isn't this weird? I think, like, but like, what if we could be doing it to ourselves, though?

I think, I think we are. Um, or, or somebody, something. Because like, just like, think about how we, like, we are so far away from the, our ancestors that needed to just survive. Like, just to get through the day, we need it. We don't need to hunt and we don't need to kill other animals to eat and survive anymore. We're living in a world of such luxury and high technology that, like, people are just,

the vast majority of people are just worried about how they look on Instagram, chicks worried about how hot they look and, like, editing their fucking eyes on Instagram. And, like, I wonder how that is going to, when you extrapolate that into the future, like what we're going to look like in 500,000 years. Like, are we going to optimize for that? Well, here's the problem is we're optimizing artificially. So you are selecting your partner on physical characteristics

that are not part of their genome. They are plastic surgery characteristics. Yeah, yeah. So we're screwing our genetics on that. Yeah. So, like, we're no longer picking someone because you're attractive because you have these attributes that are phenotypically expressed based on your genetics.

We're doing it because you look like this because you had a lot of money and it got to fix everything that was wrong with you, wrong with you, you know, perceptive-wise. Yeah, and a big problem is, is like these designer babies people are trying to have. That's some weird stuff. Like the CRISPR stuff.

Yeah. And even, this anthropologist was explaining to me, he was, it's a very kind of like sensitive taboo topic, but in vitro fertilization, people who can't have babies. You get to pick. you get to, they can figure out a way to take your, your eggs out and take somebody's sperm and like make it in a test tube and then put it back in you. Dude. He was saying that that's like, that's going against nature and that's, that could lead to some scary shit. You know Andrew Scholes?

The comedian? Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So on my drive here, I listened to his new special on Netflix. Oh, really? And it's all about him trying to conceive with his wife. Yes, yes. And he literally talks about you get to pick. He's right. We did in vitro. Right, right, right. And he literally said it. He's like, we have nine embryos. Do you want a boy?

Do you want a girl? That's so crazy, dude. And then he picked the one. And then they're like, oh, you have five more left. He's like, I thought you said it was nine. He's like, well, why is it not nine? He's like, oh, we're not really comfortable with the other ones. And he kept on saying and beating her.

And he made a lot of really funny jokes about it. You know, she watched the special. Right. I actually saw him. He came here like a year ago into his show. He was like, I think when he was still working that special out. He did my Gator tour. Did he really?

Yeah, yeah, he was super funny, man. That's funny. It was before, like, he was, like, big, you know? Oh, really? And, like, I didn't even know who he was at the time. And he came into the tour, and we had a really good time. And then he just blew up. Yeah.

And I'm like, I knew him. That's crazy. Literally, it was right before he blew up. Like, I remember him sending a photo. He took a selfie of me and him in The Alligator and texted it to Joe Rogan. Uh-huh. And I was like, what? You know what I mean?

That's hilarious. It was cool. But yeah, being able to do that, being able to pick. Yeah. We're already altering all that stuff, you know. Yeah, man. I think about that shit all the time. Like, with the technology being able to just like fix any.

Because, you know, I think about like people who can't have kids or like, you know, it's really sad when people can't do that and have this experience. But like at the same time, you've got to think about like, is that? some sort of natural selection right like maybe you weren't meant to have kids maybe maybe your partner wasn't meant to have maybe there's like a reason genetically or some sort of scientific thing in your body that's basically not allowing you to do that right well have you have you have you researched a lot on like microplastics and stuff and effects on fertility yeah yeah i have yeah Thalates. Yeah, we had Dr.

Shauna Swan in here. Oh, you did? Yeah. No way. Yeah. That's so cool. Yeah. I love her.

I mean, her work is fascinating. Dude. Insane. Fertility rates just, yeah. All the thallates, microplastic, all that stuff. Fertility rate and sperm count have been dropping,

I think it was like one to two percent per year since the 50s. Yeah. It's terrifying. Like that's literally, I'm not kidding you. I brought my water bottle in here because I was like, they're probably going to have plastic water bottles and I don't want to plastic.

Yeah. You know what she said? She told me, I asked her like what the best way was to avoid the microplastics and the thallates. And she said it's not the water bottles or the food because it's hard to avoid that shit. She's like the number one way to avoid that stuff is to take your shoes off outside because your shoes bring the most of that shit into your house. Really? Yeah. The shoes themselves or what you step in? With the stuff with the stuff. With the stuff with the stuff. She was like, that's one of the biggest, the biggest ways to contaminate yourself or your house or your kids or whatever with this stuff.

obviously, you know, it's in everything. Every food, every, even like, even like metal cans, they have a plastic liner on the inside. Yeah. There's this brand liquid death. They make water. And it's all about death to plastic. We, they put death in aluminum cans, but I just found out recently that they have a fucking plastic liner on the inside. It's terrifying.

Yeah. I mean, okay, it's like the cup that I have the coffee and you guys made for me. Paper. Well, it's plastic liner in the paper. And then that's hot stuff. That's the other thing she said is avoid anything. it against it. So like that was a big point that she made is like don't heat anything. So like I took a couple of tips of this coffee. It helped me, you know, be a little prepped up for this.

That goes with the alien thing too, man. The aliens are genderless. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But are the genderless because of environmental factors like that or because we realize there's no point in having any gender because we're going to select the best embryos in vitro and why would you have sex with random recombination in DNA? When you can make the perfect thing. Exactly. You can select it. Why would you do that? Yeah, just 3D print the perfect creature. Yeah. The perfect human.

It's crazy. It's crazy. I love this. There's so many different crazy rabbit holes to go down with the whole UFO thing and how it like how it ties into human evolution. And my favorite one is, my favorite one is that they're time travelers because there's so many, there's so many cases of people being abducted, whether that's real or not. A lot of those people say that they had their sperms and their eggs extracted from them when

they went up to them to the spaceship. It's a vast majority of them. Because in the future, they're so... So in the future, if we got bottlenecked into the future by some sort of cataclysmic, comic, cosmic event or something like that or a fucking super volcano, who knows? Yeah. And the species bottlenecked, there would be a lot of inbreeding, right?

So if we had time travel, why would not just go into the past when we were robust and diverse and take the DNA from those folks and bring them back into the future and try to repopulate the planet? Yeah. I mean, it makes sense. So what I think about with that, too, is like, why would they look like us? Right. You know, so if it was alien, like truly alien, then there's no way it would look like a hominid.

Unless there's a code in the genes that all roads lead to crab, you know, that kind of thing. So that's the only way that it would possibly make sense is the whole pan-spermia thing and our planet was seated by the same DNA source as other planets and then all roads lead to the same thing eventually because it's coded in there. otherwise it makes absolutely no sense that something involved in a different planet would look anything like us. Right, right. Plus, like, human beings

are so rare just on this planet. I think there's over two million cataloged species of living animals on this earth, over two million. Out of the two million, there's 20 hominids. Out of the 20 hominids, we are the one that could figure out technology. Yeah.

Right? And the technology that could get us off the planet. So we're like, point. 0.01% of living animals on Earth. On this planet that's perfectly inhabitable for life, right? Teeming with life. So all the other planets that we know of that are in like Goldilocks zones that have water, that have atmospheres. How rare those are.

Now look at like most of them, I think, are water worlds. So there's not any land, if any land on those on those planets. Their gravity is far different. Their atmospheres are different. They're probably like, you know, who knows if they have a planet like Jupiter that can suck in all the asteroids that can stop? Who knows that they are binary star systems or they have two stars? You know, there's so many different variables. Like, if we're 0.001% on this planet, like what are the chances that something is going to evolve to have two arms, two legs, upright walking hominids with the brain that sits directly on top of the eyes?

That seems almost impossible, dude. Yeah, but that's why it makes way more sense. If there are aliens on the planet and they do look like that, they are something of us. dimensional future I don't know you know but like it makes way more sensitive that is actually

what they look like that they are some version of us either again interdimensionally or whatever yeah I just want to know I want to know if sharks and alligators

made it that far into the future I want to ask them well here's this crazy you know sharks are older than trees I saw that what I heard that so how did they find how did they determine that though

sharks you said they can't do it with alligators right well no like their lineage is older than trees. So like... Their lineage. Yeah. So we know like, oh, man, what is it?

Like, there's a shark... I heard the other thing I read that there was a shark that was still alive. Oh, the Greenland shark. Greenland shark. Okay. Yeah. That was older than like the first tree or something like that. No, no, no.

So, yeah, so we're mixing up two things here. So like the shark lineage is older than trees. The Greenland shark itself is older than the United States. Okay. It's not thousands. it's hundreds of years old. It's like, yeah, there, he can pull it up so I don't say the wrong thing anyways.

So they look and they do something. Do Greenland sharks live 400 years? Go up, down, right there. People also ask, do Greenland sharks live longer than 400 years? Yeah, scientists estimate that Greenland shark can live to be over 400 years old, making them the longest living vertebrates. What?

Yeah. So it's something in the eye. Huh. Literally. Oh, that's a per cent. on its eye. Oh, yeah, yeah. Yeah, they get some nasty parasites. But um, dude, I had this guy in here explaining to me, uh, this brain surgeon. He was explaining to me, I mean, he spent a lot of his life studying, um, the effects of light on mitochondria on human beings. And he was explaining to me how like

human beings with the development of technology and being underneath artificial lights all day, inside, not waking up outside in the sunlight. Like we, we don't wake up exposed to the sunrise or I'll, I'll go to bed with the sun going down and how. the circadian rhythm of the sun directly affects our mitochondria and all the cells in our body. And with the development of technology and human being staying inside

more than usual, it's shortening our lifespan, it's creating more diseases, more cancer. He said it's similar to like an orca in the wild versus an orca in a tank of sea world. I believe it. Yeah, I mean, I definitely believe it.

I mean, just think about like how much we mess up animals with our technology, you know, and like just, you know, like it's doing it to us too, you know, and like, I don't know, like, you know, so I have a 40 acre sanctuary, right? So I'm out there, I'm outside all day, every day, and I'm working all day. And if I don't turn on lights and if I don't like, I'll sometimes, I'll do it on purpose. I'll work until the sun is going down and it starts going down. I'm like, I'm not going to turn on any lights. Because to me, I'm like, like, I like, I like to try to like, I don't know, like test my limits, I guess, you know, so I'll, I'll,

like walk around the sanctuary just by the moonlight. Yeah, I do it all the time. And like, I turn off my lights on purpose and I just walk around just with the moonlight, just with the starlight, too. When there's no moon, I can literally walk around by starlight because I'm in the middle of nowhere. So it's so cool. It is. It's really cool. But what I also notice is how tired I get. Yeah. And I'm like, it's only 8 p.m. Why do I want to go to sleep? I don't go to sleep till usually midnight. And I'm like, oh, because the sun went down and my whole body is telling me go to sleep now. Right. But as soon as you turn on the artificial lights, I'm like, yeah, I'm up until 12.

you know every night yep yeah that's that fucks people up so much more than than than most people are aware of but another cool feeling that i noticed doing that is on full moons how energized i feel being outside yeah because like i i don't know like i think that i i don't know but i feel like we evolve to really take advantage of full moons and i'm sure through our history of how like you can hunt Like I can really see on a full moon at night When you're out in the country, there's no light pollution Like I'm like, dude, I could totally hunt right now if I, if I, you know, like And so I feel like we're wired for that, you know, like when you're out there in a full moon,

Like it totally kicks something in my brain that gets me like amped. Yeah. You know, and I'm like, I feel like I could like actually be out and doing stuff right now. I noticed that I started sleeping way better when I started getting up the morning and being outside during the sunrise. Oh, that's a Huberman, you know, He talks about all the time is like, what is it, 30 minutes of sunlight exposure immediately upon waking up. Like, makes a massive difference in like your well-being overall. Well, specifically when the sun's rising, there's more red light.

The light is more on the red spectrum. It's not so much ultraviolet yet. Right. And that makes sense. And something about that red light in the morning during the sunrise, when you're getting that light into your eyes, it creates this. hormone called, I might be messing this up,

but I think it's called melanopsin. And that melanopsin hormone is what's responsible for melatonin production in your body. So our bodies are wired to, okay, now I know in 12 hours you're gonna start getting tired this melatonin's gonna start being released

at the right time. So that's when you know you're getting tired and that's when you should go to bed. Fascinating shit. I know, I love all that stuff, man. And I love trying to figure out why does it work like that? Like, you know, evolutionary.

Like, as you're saying, like, the full moon thing. Like, why are people more crazy on full moons? Yeah. You know, like, there's that spike and, like, crime and, like, all that kind of, people get more crazy, you know? And I'm like, why is that? And I'm like, I would imagine that on full moons, we had more, like, festivals, more, like, hunting events, you know, in our history. Because, I mean, again, when you're out there, like, when you're out in the country in a full moon, it really gives you this, like, feeling, you know? And, like, I feel it.

And I'm like, I don't know. I bet it was, like, more of a time of celebration, festival. kind of thing. You could do hunting, war. You could war against another tribe because you could see them, you know. Yeah, man. That makes perfect sense. Wild shit. Well, Chris, dude, thank you so much for coming and doing this. Yeah, absolutely. This has been fascinating. When do you plan on opening up the new spot? This is 40 acres? Yeah. So, well, we're only really working on the 20s so far. The other half is just wilderness still right now. But yeah, we're hoping this year to hopefully be able to open up for tours. It's just a lot of bureaucracy, paperwork, all that kind of crap, you know.

Yeah. So we've got to figure out all that stuff. And then hopefully this year or next year, we're going to open up for actual tours and whatnot. Oh, that's badass, dude. Yeah. Who is that famous photographer that's always around Florida, taking all those wildlife photos? And he's a huge part of conservation in Florida.

There's quite a few. Which one? Was he? He actually, his parents, like, five minutes from here. Is a young guy, older guy? I want to say he's in his 40s. He's not that old. Is it Mike? No, his name, I don't think it's Mike. God, it's going to drive.

This is going to drive me crazy now. We talked about him with Forest. I think I have his name somewhere. Yeah, I think we reached out to him. He's like in Tampa. Yes, yes, yes. I forget what that is. But anyways, he goes around. He has cameras all over Florida, like in all, like the, like the Everglades, up in all the Florida.

Carlton Ward. Carlton Ward. Oh, look at that moment. Yes. Yeah, dude, the stuff that he gets on those, on those, those cameras is insane those photos are fucking wild yeah he does incredible work

yeah but um okay cool this is your website bellowing acres yeah yeah so that's the name of the sanctuary and um we have over 200 animals at the sanctuary right now

oh wow yeah so um but I mean really what we run into is cost you know I mean that's what's difficult like I built that sanctuary out of my pocket you know and I grew up poor like it's all money it's my blood money literally for me to wrestling

different kind of blood money you know But, yeah, we've got several alligators, crocodiles. But the area is upland, so it's very sandy, which is a good thing, you know, for, like, flooding goes. But it means our ponds have to be, like, concreted. So anybody out there listening, if you have a concrete hookup, let me know. Hell yeah. Or concrete fabric.

That's what I want to try to do. Concrete fabric? Yeah. So that's what I'm looking into now because, like, our ponds we have now, they're, like, six inches of concrete to have a whole form because they're, like, 50-foot ponds. And I'm trying to build, like, a hundred-foot pond. And my concrete quote for that was 76,000. just for the concrete. No way.

I got a guy. Yeah? Yeah. I got a good friend as a concrete company. Yeah. If anybody wants to help out, you know, hook up.

We are also a nonprofit. We're a legitimate 501c3 nonprofit. So if people want to make a tax deductible donation to us, you know, again, we have over 200 animals we've saved so far. We're constantly trying to do more, build more, save more animals. Hell yeah, man. Sweet. We'll link it all below for people to go check it out.

And thanks again, dude. This was super fun. Yeah, thank you. Thanks for having me on. All right. Good night, everyone. Spring is the season everyone refreshes everything except their blinds. People put it off because they think it's complicated.

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