Reptile Fight Club - Are Australian Reptiles unique?

Episode Date: December 2, 2022

In this episode, Justin and Chuck tackle the topic of Are Australian Reptiles unique?Who will win? You decide. Reptile Fight Club!Follow Justin Julander @Australian Addiction Reptiles-http://www.australianaddiction.comFollow Chuck Poland  on IG @ChuckNorriswinsFollow MPR Network on:FB: https://www.facebook.com/MoreliaPythonRadioIG: https://www.instagram.com/mpr_network/YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCtrEaKcyN8KvC3pqaiYc0RQMore ways to support the shows.Swag store: https://teespring.com/stores/mprnetworkPatreon: https://www.patreon.com/moreliapythonradio

Welcome to the edition of Reptile Fight Club. I'm Justin Julander. I'm here with Chuck Poland. We are ready to rumble. What is going on? I am your Thanksgiving turkey. Oh, yeah. I'm ready for that, too.

I guess everyone will hear this maybe after Thanksgiving. Well, maybe not closer to Christmas. Yeah, not closer to Christmas, but definitely further away from Thanksgiving than we have recorded it. I was wondering about that. I am your turkey. Liberia celebrates Thanksgiving. Really? I think there was like 17 countries that celebrate Thanksgiving.

Who did the Liberians steal their land from? No, I guess Liberia was founded by freed slaves from the United States that went back to Africa and set up Liberia was founded by freed slaves from the United States that went back to Africa and settled and set up Liberia. And so they took that tradition of Thanksgiving with them. So kind of cool. Interesting. Yeah. That is cool.

That is cool. I thought it was for sure going to be some colonization thing, but I guess slavery is about the worst thing. Well, you know, we have the worst thing that well you know we have we have a contextual history for colonization yeah that's true i mean it's all pretty uh pretty grim so but for sure uh yeah we won't get into that i suppose so what's uh we can all be thankful we can all be thankful for things without uh having to delve into the history of awfulness. Very true. Not to minimize it, but, you know.

Yeah, exactly. I can't change it, so. Yeah. What is new with me? Let's see. Just getting stuff ready. Diamonds are outside, so I've been having kind of fun playing with those go V's and like watching the diamonds and, um, you know, it's starting to get

kind of cold at night and, uh, they're just freaking trucking along, dude. So it's, it's how old are they? Um, uh, they're four years old now, four or five maybe. But they're pretty small. I don't power feed my pythons. But, yeah, they're adult size. But they do just fine um it's good you know i mean my coastals are huge they're my coastals are outside and they're huge just because they're so much older so i was kind of concerned about that at first but yeah no man after just kind of looking at the temp data i've got one of the govi setes set up in the hot spot where it gets direct sun.

And then the rest of them are all in hides. And so I can kind of just like look at what the daytime high, when they warm up, when it starts to warm up and all that stuff. And they're good, man. They're hitting, you know, their hot spots are hitting upper 80s um 90s some at some points so they're fine yeah they're totally cool yeah and uh put a big old big old roof on their enclosure a couple weeks ago so now you know they're protected from the um protected from the rain and stuff so that was um that was um oh my gosh i'm totally blanking but um um oh my gosh i feel that was a good move or what oh it was a good move and um one of our one of our npr friends one of the aussies and i'm like blanking his name and I like, it's on the tip of my tongue. But, uh, he was like, yeah,

there'll be fine getting cold. Just don't let them get wet. And, um, that's a good recommendation. Yeah. Yeah. So, oh, it's going to bother me, man. Oh, hold on. I had to like, um, Hey, I, I, that's never happened to me. This is, this is ridiculous. I can't believe you're doing this. Exactly. Exactly. Take your time, man. You know, dead air is what it's all about.

Darren Boswell. Darren Boswell. Darren Boswell said that. Yeah. He's kept a fair few different pythons. And his son, right? His son keeps as well, right? I think they were both on NPR at the same time, if I'm right i'm probably remembering wrong but yeah shout out to daz i think i think he goes by daz i think darren is daz is the australian version of darren if not i apologize

but yep i don't know you you took it further than i i was like just struggling for the name you were like giving me Aussie nickname history there. I was like, oh, you go, dude. Yeah, I'm Juzzo. I don't know how I feel about that one. But that's the, I guess that's the Aussie version. Yeah, that sounds. Yeah, it's not the best.

I don't prefer that one. But I guess you don't pick your own nicknames. No, you definitely don't get to pick your own nicknames. Let's see. What else is going on? Not much else. Just kind of getting the tracier ready. I've gotten all the older animals into their bigger cages,

and everybody's kind of settling in and doing all that. Yeah, still geckos galore around here. So, yeah, that's about it, man. How about you? Yeah, just pairing things up, thinking about doing that. I'm having a big problem in my rodent room. The stupid rats got out. They chewed a hole through one of the bins,

and now they're chewing water lines and all that crap i haven't had rodents chew on a water line for a very long time so it's really ticking me off but uh just like every time i go out there i'm like oh you stupid rats so i put out poison i put out those bucket traps i put out you know all sorts of stuff but they're just they're still on the loose. And they're knocking all the insulation off the ceiling and, like, just wreaking havoc on the room. Digging holes through, I mean, the bottom, it's like a dirt floor. So it's not the best setup for loose rodents. So I need to just dump a bunch of gravel or something in there this next year and just take care of that.

Get a couple yards of gravel so they can't this next year and just take care of that and get a couple yards of gravel so they can't just easily dig in and out of there and then i need to put up the walls and i've got one wall or two walls up but yeah everywhere else they've just trashed the insulation so that's a couple hundred bucks down the drain for sure so that sucks it sucks when i get out and it just drives me nuts i just feel like just euthanizing them all and then starting starting fresh again i knew yeah i mean i certainly remember that feeling from breeding rodents yeah um there are definitely some downsides so they're so they're so they got out and they're hiding outside of the shed well they're in the shed

they're in like i just somewhere in the walls or in the ceiling, like, on the insulation. And I didn't have anything, like, over the insulation. Like, I went to buy walls for my, like, I put up the insulation. I went to buy walls right when all the panel wood went from, like, $10 a sheet to, like, $50 a sheet. And I'm like, yeah yeah i'm not doing that like the the price of premium plywood was the same as this osb garbage you know i'm just like really yeah just great timing you know so yeah yeah i can't complain but i i'm going to a little bit i would complain yeah that i think that's fair. Complain. That sucks.

That totally sucks. I hate it when that happens with the rodents. Yeah. At least they're leaving the mice alone. The mice are pumping out and doing good. So that's handy. I think the main change I've made that I've been really happy with lately is switching over the water nozzles from, I was using AgSelect stuff, and now I'm using some that I got from, oh, Heidi's bringing me a chair back.

Did you take that downstairs? Sorry, we're recording. I'm serious. But, yeah, we, hi, Heidi. Chuck says hello. Hi, Chuck. Thank you. Oh, thank you.

What were you sitting on, a bucket or something? What were you doing before? I just had a folding chair. She was working from home for the last week or so with the COVID isolation. So I, uh, brought her up my rolling chair cause her back was giving her issues from the diner set, you know, up in the living room or the dining room. So, um, but yeah, I, I, uh, I don't know. I get really frustrated with those rodents sometimes, but I think the benefits definitely outweigh the downsides. So I'm not, I'm not going to stop anytime soon i'm just gonna no dude and you know what if i if i didn't have to breed him in my

garage um if i had like a detached like barn or something that was away from the house and i could put a you know like a fart fan or something on or with even even if even if i had like uh what do they call those things uh like a like a a carbon filter to to run that that exhaust through and and it would be that would be totally fine and i would probably go back to breeding rodents because you're right dude it is so so clutch especially like right after you hatch out babies and you always have you know the right the right size of of you know live rodents and it's like so clutch and then you know if you need to freeze off your extra you always have frozen rodents so it's like yeah it's so huge so yeah i agree and and it's i mean i've had a yeah the neighbors found a

a rat a dead rat in their yard and they're like oh we found this giant rat i wonder you i'm like oh that's weird like yeah i know exactly where it came from but i'm not gonna say yeah because i don't want them to freak out no Shut your mouth. Shut your mouth. I think the neighbors are very understanding. And, I mean, really, these rats don't do great in the outdoors. I mean, they'd be easy prey for anything, you know. So I need to get some kind of cat or something out there, get some barn alley cat, you know, out there. But one goes through our yard every once in a while but i i don't know how to let it in and out i you know out of the rodent uh barn um i guess if it was the summer i could leave a spot

you know space for it to get in and out not during the winter that's a pain to heat cold that room especially cold it's snowy a little bit of snow but nothing on the ground right now it's warmed up a bit but yeah frost and it's below you know freezing most nights here so cold ass morning yep getting into that fun little winter time when it's dark when you go to work and dark when you get home and cold and miserable but i don't. We've got a good heater. I just got the heater pumping in this room. So that's nice. I can record comfortably and enjoy the heat, but yeah, there's something about, you know, indoor heating and plumbing. That's just a wonderful thing. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I agree with that. I mean, the little things that are, I mean,

maybe they're not so little, maybe I'm looking at that as a spoiled American, but, um, like a I agree with that. So, you know, having an Airbnb with a dryer was like, holy crap, this is awesome. You know, most of them didn't have that. And so it was kind of nice to have a place that had a washer and dryer so we could kind of get our feet under us again, get things dried out and going again. Sometimes, man, that rain can be pretty miserable if you're wet. I mean, for the most part, though, it's warm enough where it's not too uncomfortable out in the rain, just muddy and messy that way. But, you know, if it's almost like a respite from the heat, you know, when it rains, it kind of cools you off a little bit rather than makes you too miserable. But definitely brings out the amphibians. Saw lots of frogs.

I like my comforts, man. I feel like the older I get, the more I like my comforts. I can't even get out of a state that's got a moderate climate. So, you know, you know where I sit on cold weather. No, I sometimes would join you, butidi likes the cold so this is a good compromise does she yeah she does i would probably live down in saint george or southern california or arizona or something yeah yeah but uh yeah this is kind of a nice compromise spot for for some reason i could see arizona as being your oh i'd love to live in Arizona. Yeah. That would be fantastic.

Except I'd be out herping way too much. Yeah, you would never... I'm sure. I'd never get anything done. Have to retire early or something. Papa would be a herpetology rolling stone. Yeah, exactly. Come on, kids. No, Dad, we don't want to go. Yeah.

Good times. But yeah, I'm excited for the season. Hopefully we get some good production from our different projects. Some key projects I'd really like to produce this year. Some fingers crossed projects. Yeah. Yep. Fingers and toes.

So we'll see. Are you extra attentive this year to your... I feel like... I don't know. I find when I'm extra attentive, year to your – I feel like – I don't know. I find when I'm extra attentive, that usually screws it up. So I probably just need to set them and kind of forget them or something. But I don't know. Sometimes we feel –

See, I feel like the opposite. Yeah. Well, I agree with that. You can overdo it. You can overdo it. Well, for lizards maybe. I'm so frustrated. I went out to the reptile room and I was cleaning out the, um, depressing, uh, cage. Right. And so I open it up and I take out all the furniture and I see the baby and then I see the female and I'm like, there's no male in here. The male is loose i have no clue when he got out how he got out when where he might be i scoured the

reptile room i can't find any trace or i i'm so frustrated like where the crap did the mail go i mean like you really went through the cage not oh yeah yeah no i took everything out of the cage there was nothing in there so i mean unless he just really was climbing up the fake rocks and hid really well from me. But I've checked it a couple times now, and I don't see that guy. I don't know what happened there. Oh, man. But I'm really freaking out. Like, where did the male go?

Like, they don't just disappear, you know? Yeah. And I've had, like, the hosmer I got out, and they were both out and cruising around the reptile room. I realized, wait, I haven't seen the female in here for a while. Like, where is she? And then I realized she was out, and I searched and found her in the reptile room. So, I don't know. I need to put out some, like, food or something and put a little bucket trap or something for this lizard i don't i don't sometimes i wonder how i how i

survive as a reptile breeder but it's i feel the same way how did he that's all right i got i got a mexican black king snake that's loose in my house somewhere i don't know a dude yeah yeah like they're fucking those things are escape artists. Like I've never, I've never seen. Reptiles in general do really good at getting out of their enclosures and stuff. I, it got through like, so it was in one of the, I have them in one of those like ecos and you know how the ecos have like those slider vents that just have like the little, I mean the vents are tiny, the holes are tiny. Yeah.

It slid through those it pushed it pushed the slider over and then it was like i'm out boom and they know what they're doing you know it's kind of crazy yeah for sure i wondered if the same thing happened with this guy and i'm like looking around see if there's any holes he could have squozing out but they're little chunk monkeys yeah right yeah i mean it's not like small holes yeah yeah the baby's still in there so i it must have been like i left the door open to grab some feed and he slipped out and i didn't notice it i don't know like and then i i seem to recall when i go in the room i'd hear a skittering noise i just thought it was the animals in their enclosures

move you know taking cover or something they tend to kind of duck and cover whenever i come in the room so i just thought it was them but maybe it was the loose male scurrying somewhere to hide out from me oh man yeah well and now it's getting colder so it's like yeah so now that i find him or he's just to hang out and relax wherever he's landed, you know? So yeah, it's frustrating. I need like a walkway behind all the enclosures and stuff like that. No, dude, I feel the same. Yeah.

So like all my gecko, all my gecko cages, I'll get like a baby or something. They'll get out and it'll get back behind there. And I got to chase it out from behind the cages. And it's a pain in the ass because I have, I have my, uh, my ring. It was like a ranking. What do they call it? Ring? Miss King, Miss King. I got my Miss King all set up. So everything's like, you know, tied together and it's like, it's, it's like kind of a thing to move, to, you know, take it apart, all apart, and get back there.

And a lot of the bigger egos are heaviest crap when you get all of the soil and the drainage layer and all that stuff. And everything's in there. So it's like moving that. I totally feel your pain of like it would be nice to be able to like have a walkway behind all of my cages that would be super huge but yeah we're not dealing with that kind of space i i really hope i can find this guy before it gets too too cold and too yeah me too everything slows down too much but that would be a super big bummer yeah uh yeah i mean it's uh it's that time of year when we're pairing stuff up and slowing things down and turning off heat and things like that give them a cool down and a rest

and i don't know it's probably a it's get a little bit of a rest from the constant cleaning and i mean you still got to clean a bit but making sure all the make sure all the waters are topped off and stuff but i i put out i started going through my list for the inland so that's been been good to start have you gotten a response oh yeah yeah i mean the first couple people on the list were were still interested and, and sold a few of them so far and, um, getting, going through the list. So if you're on the list, you know, watch for a text or an email from me and we'll, we'll get those out soon. I guess if you're hearing this, you probably already seen it by now. If you're on the list, hopefully I got through it.

I've been just you know trying to catch up after the trip and that's always yeah you always need like a week or two before you can get back to normal from a from a big trip especially an international one but slowly getting there i think i'm about there i've been keeping up with the books though so that's been good but i had a few people like hey did my book ever get sent out and i'm like oh yeah i forgot to tell you i sent it out the day you ordered it you know i i get them out pretty quick but i just forget to tell yeah it's on the way so hopefully uh that's uh you know better than the alternative i guess um but yeah sent out like 40 books to cindy uh jackson out in australia so that was she was nice yeah i think i saw a post of all those books which is that's good to get all those

books out there it was an impressive display you know i'll sit now yeah it's a it's a pain to get that many because i've i've got to ship them four at a time and so i had to send out 10 boxes you know she split into the two different orders but like i guess she had the 20 sold within minutes you know putting them up for sale so that was pretty cool i've been pointing people her way in australia but um yeah yeah i'm i think she had sold half the the next 20 by the time i got them sent out to her so yeah she's so uh have you gotten feedback have you gotten feedback from the aussies about the book at all or yeah i mean not yet a little bit like it took a little while for them to get the books because it takes longer to ship out there but yeah we're slowly getting some comments in. So yeah, I appreciate any feedback or constructive criticism or whatever.

Yeah. But Oh, I'm sure. I mean, I'm sure there's going to be people who disagree and you know, feel, feel like you know, feel like there's a different, a different way to slice the pie, so to speak. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I, you know, I think, and that's fine. I mean, that's, that's their prerogative. If they want to, um, do that, that's, you know, that's just fine. I was having a conversation with Steve Crawford, who does the Aussie wildlife podcast, really cool guy. Um, but he was, he was saying he'd heard a bunch of, uh, people, you know, in Australia being like, Oh man, I don't know about this. These guys are,

he's Americans, they're nuts or whatever. And he's like, well, maybe we should give them a chance, like at least read and see what they, why they made those changes. You know, I'm like, good on you, Steve. That's a, that's a, that's a good attitude to take, you know, I'm like, good on you, Steve. That's a good attitude to take. You know, don't just jump to conclusions. At least look at why we divided things like we did. And I mean, in reality, I probably would have done some different things. This was kind of a consensus thing between Nick and I to try to keep the peace somewhat or keep some semblance of what people are used to. Order. Yeah. Yeah. And, you know, at the same time, it's like we probably could have split them even more severely, like made a full species out of some of those, you know, like the McDowell or Metcalfi.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I definitely think you probably could have gone further and it will be interesting to see how the carpet paper that's probably coming

how that will shake out. I'm really interested to see what your findings are versus how they're telling the story and what all of that looks like. Yeah, some of this work has been done for quite a while. And it's like, you know. You're not telling a story that you guys made up.

You know what I mean? Yeah, exactly. you're not telling a story that you guys made up. You know what I mean? You're just going, you're just looking at what other people have done and said, this is what we're seeing. Yeah. This is our interpretation of the data. So, you know,

take it or leave it. But, and I, I mean, if you're going to leave it, let us know why I'm curious. And I don't think you went too far. Yeah.

I don't think you went too far from any conclusions that anybody else made. Like, you know, so I mean, you know, if there was a criticism, maybe you didn't go far enough would probably be, you know. And, you know, to be honest, this whole thing about people who are freaking out about you know well what do i call my my northern coastal now and this and that it's like well call it a northern call it call it a coastal i mean you know i i since when has you know uh taxonomy steered us yeah we still call them chondros exactly yeah exactly i mean there could be a herpetoculture has never shied away from no this is how i learned it and this is how i will yeah stick with it i don't care what anybody says you know like i still stick with soromalice

soromalice obesis i think we should go back to Obesis. Supermalus Obesis. The fur of the Chuckwalla. Obesis just fits with Chuckwalla. I don't know about this adder crap, but anyway, that's another story, I suppose. Well, I guess that kind of leads us loosely into our topic here, so maybe we should get on with the fight but um i was uh reading rick shine's book and he was you know talking about uh the uniqueness of of australian reptiles and how they didn't really fit in the box of the research that had been done on a lot of different wildlife you know through your reptiles throughout the world and how

the observations that were made in countries like the United States or various European countries or whatever for their reptiles didn't really mesh with what he was observing in the Australian wildlife. And so, you know, he kind of concluded that the Australian wildlife is unique and that, uh, you know, a lot of the funding was, was based on that, uh, idea of the uniqueness or, or the need to study Australian wildlife because the, um, observations from other wildlife didn't apply there. So specifically in regards to reptiles. So, I thought, you know, I don't know if I agree fully with that. And so, that could be an interesting topic that we could discuss. You know, are Australian reptiles unique enough that they just kind of stand alone and there's no comparative with other reptile species or groups throughout the world? Or are there a lot of-

Is Australia the get off my continent of reptiles? Yeah, yeah. Okay. Yeah. Old man get off my continent of reptiles. Or are there ties with other reptiles throughout the world? And this is an interesting and and i guess some of this is how you slice it and and where you you know but we'll get into that we'll get into that we have an obligatory coin toss coming up here that's for sure one that you will surely lose but now your fan favorite has not been doing well so um here we go hopefully Hopefully we can. Yep. That's tails. It is.

See, I jinxed it by saying you weren't going to win. I jinxed myself by losing. So one turkey. It's a lucky giveaway on Thanksgiving. There you go. That's me. This is your turkey pardon. Ah, so I got to decide.

Yeah. Now you got to pick a side huh don't take too long i will say that that i will i will i will say that australian wildlife is unique to australia reptile okay wildlife is unique to australia i'll give you what i think is probably the this is my thanksgiving day gift to you justice i think this is the better i think this is the better side i i think i think you i think you you wait you're giving me the better side i think so i don't need your charity oh come. You've been giving me charity for a while. You've been saying it too. So I'll take the hard side. All right. Thanks, Justin. But I don't care. I'm just like, yeah, take it. Good. I need the bone. a few interesting papers published, some work.

Oh, man, now I'm going to space on the name. Famous reptile biologist. I think Sam Sweet did some research in this, but it's not who I'm thinking of. Don't look at me, Jolander. Man, I'm terrible. I'm sure everybody listening is yelling out the name um anyway he did a lot of research he was a shine no no no no no he was a an american that did a lot of research and kind of the great sandy desert um

oh god why did i even start down this without remembering we're not we're not talking about uh dinardo are we no no no he's he's uh he did his a lot of research in australia um pionka eric pionka there we go okay yeah so good job p Bianca did a lot of studies that showed kind of the correlation between different reptile groups throughout the world, including, you know, some Australian lizards, comparing them with, like, lizards in the Kalahari, as well, it's pretty comparable. I guess you got to compare apples with apples, right? So I think in some ways, Shine was definitely correct. probably mostly done in temperate areas or more you know less boon and bust areas like in the eastern united states or or in europe or things like that where conditions you know vary a little bit but they're not so dramatic as in australia or the american southwest or you know parts of africa where you know desert conditions um where you have times when things just go down, you know, where animals die and there's no – like right now there's, you know, no rain down in southern Africa, in parts of southern Africa.

So you've got famous, you know, these wildebeest herds or zebra herds or giraffes that are just dying because there's no grass because there's no rain. And that happens right in desert areas. You have years where you just don't get any rain. We're in, you know, we're kind of at the end of a, of a five, seven year drought down in, in Utah and Arizona and things. And so now it's starting to kind of turn around and, and we're hopefully going to have some much better herping years ahead of us and see a lot more reptiles out, but, um, it can be pretty, pretty, uh, slow in the desert when it's hot and dry and there's no rain for, you know, no significant rain for a few years, it gets pretty slim pickings and you see the effects on the wildlife. So i definitely think there can be

ties with uh you know australian wildlife and other wildlife that's how i started out yeah yeah and i mean i think you know there You know, I mean, at a simple face value, like things like scrub pythons, Somalia, found in Indonesia, found in – obviously, we can see the path that got are similar um you know like the thorny devil and um and uh a horned lizard kind of to me are kind of like i see i see those two as kind of similar reptiles and they're on completely different continents you know so i think there are like examples of of similar you know reptiles that fill similar niches and have similar adaptations or are just straight up like green pythons found both in Australia and in an adjacent continent or on adjacent islands or whatever. So not completely unique, but we can also see like how they got there. And I, I get what Dr. Shine is trying to say. And I think where he makes his point really well is in things like, um, like the pill bar rock monitor where you can see adaptations. I mean,

there's obviously Veranids on other continents that's not and and you see veranids filling similar niches nippers my bad in on other continents as well right but but you see very specific adaptations to like the pillbara rock monitor that i'm having a hard time in my head thinking like what's another monitor and another continent that has those types of adaptations or looks like that or does that? You know, snake-necked turtles, things like that. It looks like Justin. I was just thinking of the one we saw in Southern California. Those rock lizards.

God, all the names failing me on those, too. The banded rock lizards. Um, I know what you're talking about. I call them the American Pilbara. Yeah. So, and I guess, yeah, yeah, yeah. So I guess, and I guess it's like how you want to like, like, like how you want to slice this pie up.

Right. Because you can definitely say that there's reptiles on other continents that are similar to reptiles in Australia, right? Some of them have different adaptations. You know, like is there – is it like – and, you know, I think about like venomous reptiles. Like the predominance of – I shouldn't say the predominance but a lot of what is you know forefront in in australia is a lapids right yeah a lot of it and and so you can see some other lapids in like africa um and you know other continents have a lapids, but not comprised like that, not in that quantity.

And so I think there's some uniqueness that that's not arguable, you know, where you say like North America, you know, we rattlesnakes like we have a great diversity of rattlesnakes across, you know, almost all of our biomes in North America, which I would say no other continent kind of has. So I think you can make the argument on other continents, just like Shine is making in Australia. But I also think that that translates to say that there are certain aspects of you know reptiles on australia that are unique to australia because australia is you know so how do i say this you have other biomes that are similar deserts grasslands like in generalities right and and those reptiles that will fill those nippers in those different biomes, they're similar. They're maybe not the same. So some of the speciation pressures might be a little different. They might adapt a little bit different. They might have different things going on. But they, oh, by the way, they do adapt a lot of the same type of adaptations do kind of the same, on other continents.

Right. That's kind of a good, unique, mid-sized Python that fills a very general nipper, right? And I think you can find a mid-sized Python that fills that nipper on other continents, but it's not, you know, it's not, it might be a boa and it might not be, you know, a carpet. It definitely isn't a carpet Python or a medium-sized python, or maybe it's divided differently or whatever. You see what I'm saying? Yeah. And I have no idea what I'm arguing anymore. No, I think that's a good point that, you know, there are some unique aspects to Australian reptiles. I mean, one big one that comes to mind, I think maybe Dr. Schein mentioned this in his book, is the fact that there's no large mammalian predators. And so a lot of those nippers are filled by reptiles.

Australia is the land of reptiles. A predator is introduced like feral cats or pigs or things. They just don't know how to respond to that, and they're not adapted to coexist with these cats and things. And so that decimates wildlife populations or toads being introduced. They don't know how to avoid toads and poisonous, you know, amphibians. And so we see a huge decline in them until they learn that and adapt and evolve to avoid toads. And, you know, and so I think from that aspect, you know, there are some unique aspects of Australian reptiles that aren't found elsewhere. But, you know, so I think there there is some you know definitely some um credence to what he's what he's saying there um and and i think you know on on the opposite side you know convergent evolution like the thorny devil uh horned lizard example you gave is you know one

of the the best indicators that there there are some uh, uh, analogous, uh, reptile structuring in, in other countries. And just because, you know, a parent is a top predator in Australia and, uh, you know, a bobcat's a top predator in North America. Um, that's not necessarily that different, you know, maybe there's different ways ways of of avoiding those predators or dealing with those predators but for the most part you know a horned lizard um you know sticking his spikes out or or you know avoiding but but it's the same as a but we see yeah but we see apex veranids on other continents that's not that's not necessarily i don't know i mean anywhere else that you have large veranids you also have larger mammalian you know predators you've got uh lions

and and you know and uh hyenas and wild dogs and stuff in africa so even though there's nile monitors that get a pretty good size, they're, they're not gonna out, you know, they're, they're not the apex predator. There's bigger and scarier animals out there that, you know, may or may not prey on, on the things that Nile monitors after, but, um, they, they kind of fill that nipper, uh, a little differently. And I guess, and I guess, I guess that's fair. I guess I don't think of a lot of like especially big cats. I think their prey is more mammalian-based, but I think they would absolutely take the opportunity to eat a veranid lizard if if it presented itself i you know i i guess maybe i i think in very traditional ways of of you know um and so i i your point is taken your point is well taken i i you

know i do you know i it is kind of interesting in and to shine's you know, there aren't a lot of large apex predators, mammalian apex predators in Australia. And admittedly, I guess, you know, I'm trying to like struggle to think of. Yeah, about the scariest thing you get over there is like a call and they're kind of like a cat sized marsupial, you know, that's. Yeah, you know, they're they're probably some, do some predation on different reptiles, but. But you've got dingoes, right? Yeah. Dingoes are definitely a predator, but a lot of the ones. Which would be like our coyotes.

Yeah, exactly. And a lot of the ones that have really messed up the ecosystem or introduced things like foxes and feral cats and, and pigs and things that don't belong thereeral cats and and pigs and yeah things that don't belong there so cane toads and you know and they're not necessarily fit in the america but they're yeah something to be avoided you know yeah and cars cars are the worst predators i think oh yeah for sure they do more damage than probably anything, but yeah. Yeah.

I mean, I look at, uh, and you know, spending time, a lot of time in the desert, um, and then sometime over in the Australian deserts, I, I'm a, I consider myself a desert rat and kind of can, you know, I, I definitely see a lot of similarities in activity patterns and, you know, where, where you're going to find the, you know, the reptiles and where they're going to be active and things like that. I think, um, if you have a, a dry year, um, over here, you're, you know, going to have a similar difficulty finding them as you would in a dry year over there. you know and maybe the maybe the harshness uh or or that unique harshness maybe that's why there are a predominance of reptiles over there but i i don't

think it's it's that unique where you can't make any ties you know as far as well and i you know like and i don't think that's necessarily what he was saying, but that's – Yeah. But I live in San Diego County, and San Diego County just is one of the top five ecological hotspots in the world. They have more specialized plants and therefore have so many specialized bugs and birds. And so it's very – it's a very fragile landscape, but it's highly, highly specialized. Right. And that that specialization has led to very unique diversities and the types of, you know, insects and plants that we have kind of make that up. Right. And so reptiles as well, they specialize because of what the, what their food sources are and what things like the bugs and the plants and the, the, the, and their, so I get, and, and I feel like Australia is a lot that way where, you know, what, the adaptations in North America are not the same as the adaptations that have

driven, you know, even though the landscapes may look different yeah or or the same or a lot of them or the same right so you know there is what am i trying to say even though you can go to a landscape and say ah this is a desert and i recognize these things as you know know, these reptile behaviors are the same in this desert as they are in that desert. Yeah. Because the environmental conditions drive those behaviors because it doesn't work for them any other way. Right. That makes sense. But like maybe Shine's talking about like their dietary thing or maybe he's talking about you know how they uh what what what land resources they use and don't use and and things like that so you know again i don't i don't really know

exactly when he was when he said this you know from a research point of view, what examples of evidence, because I haven't finished the book yet. So I need to read it. So maybe I'm just talking shit and I should shut up and not talk about it. But I mean, I just, I have a hard time buying that there is a certain uniqueness to animal uh across a continent you know what i mean like that it's oh it's it's it's different from anything that you'll ever find like i just you know i i i think that the situations change who's the big dog may change but know, you still see small skinks. You still see, you know, insectivorous lizards.

You still see, you know, large, larger lizards, whether they're the chuckwalla or whether they're a veranid or, you know, you still see those. And their roles, depending upon the the makeup are similar in the right contextual setting right yeah when you're when you're comparing apples to apples now when you're comparing apples to oranges i.e a good example would be the you know the parenti being the apex predator versus you know north america where you have larger, um, uh, you know, mammalian, uh, apex predators. Right. And we don't have a big lizard that runs the show. Yeah. So I, I agree. I mean, I agree that there's, uh, you know, definitely, uh, specific differences and, and, you know, definitely some unique adaptations and radiations and things that occurred in Australia that are not found elsewhere.

But if you look at diamond pythons, there's not another diamond python. Now, you can make the argument, oh, well, there's this snake in North America. But there's no other, you know, such temperate, temper tolerant, medium bodied, large boa python anywhere else that I can think of. Well, yeah, I mean, that fills a similar niche. Maybe rock pythons or Angolan pythons experience pretty cold conditions, potentially, you know. And I would say. Rubber boas put diamonds to shame, you know. They're out basking on snow banks.

So there are some boas that are more adapted to these temperaturies. But rubber boas are more fossorial. Sure, sure. Yeah, they're not necessarily living in the trees. And that's what I'm saying is like when I try to think about it, like I'm kind of like – I can't think of another example that's like, oh, a diamond python is just like this. Like there's – you're right. I can't think of another example that's like, oh, a diamond python is just like this. You're right.

And it depends on what aspect you're looking at it. Yeah, what aspect you're taking into account. Because certainly there's plenty of examples of pythons or boas that are very cold tolerant in North America. So that being just a single factor like yeah you could find that that's not that you know i i would argue that any snake that's black uh is probably pretty cold tolerant it's you know the either that or it's a color mutate a color you know uh camouflage for for predation but you know that black color is there to help them heat up. That's interesting, too, because rubber boas are sometimes light tan colored or kind of that olive green color.

They're not that dark, you know. So, yeah, I mean, I guess they're they're dark enough to heat up, but maybe they don't want or need a lot of heat. You know, maybe they're adapted. Well, and if they can get down, if they can get down into, get down into enough substrate, that's very stable temperature. Yeah, because they're not active during the hot days of summer. Yeah. When they're gravid, they might be out basking a little bit.

But yeah, you might find them more often on the surface or in an open area when they're gravid. But usually you find them kind of, they're the first thing you find in the springtime, you know, out on the snow banks, like I said, basking in the snow, you know, that kind of thing. So they're pretty tough as far as, you know, like I said, they could put a diamond Python to shame as far as cold tolerance, you know? So yeah, from, from that aspect there, there are some that are similar. And then you have bread lie that are like the desert version of the Diamond Python. And they're completely different, but they're very similar.

They're very similar. And so I get the unique argument that he's making. And in some aspects of it i totally agree but in you know i i i would be remiss if i wasn't honest and say like in other you know it depends on what level you're looking at it yeah there's definitely parallels and i think you know that's kind of the study of ecology is looking at the similarities between different habitats on different continents or similar habitats on different continents. And diversely radiated or adapted or evolved species that fill similar nippers in those areas. Thank you.

And you can make those comparisons pretty well and i think a lot of uh pionka's work kind of uh revolved around that comparison of of different continents and different uh groups or or families of lizards showing those similarities and how things like the habitat, life history, the metabolic aspects kind of push in one direction or another. And yeah, there are some very unique areas where you can find reptiles that are, it's a little maybe harder to make analogies or to find, you know, convergently evolved animals. I look at the geckos of New Zealand and they're just bizarre, you know, there's not many that

I can think of that are like that, but there probably are. I just don't know enough to make those comparisons, but they seem very unique. And, um, but you know, I look at the geckos of Australia and Africa and, and I see some similarities with geckos in America or, you know, um, Asia or in the deserts or whatever. And like I said, I just feel like it's how you draw the line. Like, yeah, exactly. If you draw the line and it's hard to draw those lines and make you know yeah make claims but more but if you get very very specific which which makes sense because they are specialized i mean australia is a very specialized

habitat uh you know looking from east to west north to south i mean highly different you know, looking from east to west, north to south, I mean, highly different, you know, it's like, it's a little like North America and the fact that, you know, the east coast and the west coast are not the same thing. And then from, you know, Southern California to, to Washington state, vastly different, right. Very different. So, you know, I, it's not like, you know, maybe some of, you know, Europe where it's, it's not so huge and maybe not so different. And I think overall, like Australia is, is definitely a harder place to make a living than, than North America or the United States. Yeah. You know, there's such a pressure, you know. And I think that's why reptiles have kind of taken the throne in Australia and why there's so many different kinds of, you know, reptiles in Australia. And why it's such a great place because of that, you know, is because the landscape is so, you know, difficult to adapt to. And they're absent those mammalian, you know, a lot of that mammalian pressure. Right.

Exactly. So it's kind of like the continent where modern day dinosaurs got to thrive, right? Like, you know, you didn't see, you know, and there's not even a lot of food monkeys there, comparatively speaking. Yeah, that's true. Yeah. And I mean, even their kind of more easier, you know, places to live, like the East Coast of Australia. I mean, that's where Shine was studying some of, you know, some of his studies got messed up because of massive die-offs because the conditions were crap. It was really hard to make a living. So all the animals just kind of died off or hid out or limped along until they could make a living again, so to say.

And that was in the good places where it's easier to make a living, where there's human habitation. That's probably the harder place to study because those things aren't – when things go bad, it's really bad for them. Whereas all the stuff that has evolved in areas where it's always kind of bad, they're tougher. You know what I mean? They're leaned or their their their speciation has leaned them out and maybe it it goes the the other way too is where you know studies and study designs that were developed in the united states or or in europe or or other research you know driven countries um were their methodology couldn't be necessarily utilized in Australia. You know,

a two year study in, in, uh, in a more temperate area or, uh, or an easier place to make a living, um, you might get good results in a, in a couple of years or something. But whereas in Australia, you know, if you pick the wrong two years, it could be catastrophic to your study. And so you need to do like a 10-year study or something. So maybe the uniqueness of the landscape pushes the science to be different. And I think that may be his point, is that it is harder to make a living there than in other places. And so that— I mean, depending upon where you're know, I'm kind of taking...

Depending upon where you're at, I think, you know, that's probably true. Yeah. And that's not to say there's not places around the world that are very difficult to make a living in, you know, where specific and unique adaptations have allowed animals to persist despite these difficult conditions. And, you know, you look at some of the, I mean, you look at the habitat of like a Spencer's monitor in Australia and it's just barren and flat and like nothing going on there. And you're like, how does this thing live? And I mean, in a bad year, you see some pretty emaciated, you know, skin and bone Spencer's

monitors. And I think that's part of the challenge of keeping them i i think about uh matt somerville and his uh i believe it was ring brown pipe uh ring brown pythons pythons ring brown snakes i think it was the one of those uh elapids that was you know kind of one of those uh um desolate uh area survivor type animals. Super lean. Yeah, feeding them a couple times a year. They don't eat a lot.

And then one that died, he opened it up and it had all these fat bodies and stuff. And you're like, how does it have fat reserves on a diet of a couple mice a year kind of thing? It's incredible, these adaptations to persist in some very difficult areas. And so maybe that's why people have a hard time keeping Spencer's monitors in captivity because they just kill them with kindness. You know, it's too much food. They don't need to eat as much as they're being fed or, or the, the meals that they're, the food items they're being given may just be killing them with kindness you know just i mean i think i think that was the problem with you know savannah monitors stuff that we did yeah i mean we're tracy a uh i mean most reptiles right yeah the list can really

really really go on yeah um and that's and once you're kind of like diamond pythons like i mean there was i mean professional like professional herpetologists were like oh they only live three or four years and then they die like what that's not that doesn't sound right like no it's true yeah yeah no it's not you know yeah and it's just well i, when you try to fit a square peg into, you know, square peg in a round hole or, you know, vice versa, whatever, whatever that saying is, you know, you try to fit something to a general scheme and it just doesn't work out like a diamond Python or a Spencer's monitor. Like, I mean, you can, you can't feed other monitors too much, you know, like a, a panoptes

or a, or a parenti or something something or maybe even a parenti doesn't fit that but something like an argus monitor like they will just eat you out of house and home and they will come back for more and they're fine you know that's what they that's what they do in the wild because there's plenty of food or what they're the trash can of the yeah whereas other species maybe like a spencer's monitor is boon and bust where it feeds, you know, a lot for maybe two months and then the rest of the year it doesn't eat at all. It just kind of estivates or hangs out until conditions are better. So, you know, I think reptiles in general are good at not eating. You know, that's why they persist when mammalian mammals die out because they can't they have to eat, you know, their their little furnace needs to be fed. is not something that we readily identify with like the idea of going eight months without a

meal and being just fucking fine is kind of like what yeah that's crazy you know anybody who's done reptiles long enough is like no that's not crazy at all like i've seen that happen before um but you know most most the average person would be like i can't my brain just broke i need a weekly feeding schedule to yeah exactly why why is my why is my snake not eating well how i've been feeding it a large rat every three days like well that's probably why he doesn't want to eat anymore yeah and that i mean that's something to take into consideration when you're keeping an australian reptile is some of them you know are used to or adapted to persisting when times are tough and i mean that was a big eye-opener when reading about green

tree pythons is they're they're not very successful in their hunting strategies. They don't eat very often. And so that's why every time you go into the room, they're begging for food because they take advantage of any opportunity they get. But in captivity, when there's an unlimited resource in front of them, they don't know how to say no. So they eat themselves to death, basically. They're just eating too much. And so we need to be the ones who realize and say, wait a second, from where they come from, there's not a lot of prey or they're not very successful that often. They only get to about 300 grams in the wild or 400 grams. You know, they don't get above 1,000 grams.

And so we need to take that into consideration. And if you want to feed them more regularly, feed them more regularly, but feed them like fuzzy mice, you know, feed them like really, really small prey items. If you're going to feed them more regularly, otherwise, you know, a small mouse every three weeks, four weeks is fine for them. They, they, they literally don't do anything. They are the arboreal rock like i think i seen i saw a meme where somebody made like a like a ball python uh green tree hybrid and yeah and they were kind of making fun of it and i'm just like to me and oh gosh here's gonna the hate mail

is gonna come but you know the ball python is just the terrestrial rock, whereas the green python is just the arboreal rock. They're the same freaking thing. One's just super crazy when the lights go out because it doesn't ever get fed. Yeah. Well, and I mean, the again, I mean, they're all kind of rocks. That's what pythons are made to do. That's fair. And that's survive a long time without food you know they're they're very high efficiency high you know i i i make the most out of any of my my scrub pythons are not rocks yeah well and and they're honestly neither ball pythons or green tree pythons if you're not feeding them every week you know right they're gonna move

around they're gonna be searching for food in the wild green tree pythons, if you're not feeding them every week, they're going to move around. They're going to be searching for food. In the wild, green tree pythons go up and down a giant tree every night and set up shop to hunt. But if you set them up in a cage and you just bring the food to them, what are they going to do? They're going to sit there and wait for the food. Exactly.

They become couch potatoes, tree potatoes, tree rocks. And then you've got some asshole on a podcast calling them arbor rocks. Well, no. I mean, I think that's where a lot of this comes from is that misunderstanding or disconnect between the natural history. People aren't interested in natural history. They would just want to be given a care sheet and say, this is how you do it. And we have to be aware. There's not a one size fits all. I mean, yeah, you can kind of loosely do that with like a, you know, a Python or a monitor say, this is generally how you keep a Python or generally how you keep a monitor. It's different because you're not going to have a green tree. You're

not going to put a, a, a tree in your house house so your green tree python can go up and down the tree. Like that's not reasonable for most people. Here's an interesting – we did a study to see – we were looking at transplacental infection of mice with West Nile virus, right? And the offspring to females infected during pregnancy seemed very hyperactive. And so we thought, oh, maybe they move longer distances or we can measure this. And so we put wheels in their cages that would monitor how far they went. And how far do you think a mouse runs on a wheel in a night just just ballpark you know what do you how far do you two miles it was five miles like the controls on average would run five miles a night the oh my god that's like a marine

that's like a marine mouse like yeah it's like Semper Fidelis mice. Let's go run five miles, guys! And the pups born to infected dams actually ran less. I don't know if they were like, oh, I'm going to jump on the wheel. Now I'm going to jump off the wheel. So they didn't run straight line distance on the wheel. They were more like, what's that? Squirrel, that kind of thing. They're all on the wheel. They were more like, you know, what's that? Oh, squirrel, that kind of thing, you know, they're all over the place, but I, you know, I wonder, um, and, and I think it was Ryan Young that made this point where, um, you know, if you have, uh,

a four foot wide cage and, you know, by four foot by two foot or something by two foot, there, there's a lot of, you know, and they're doing loops around the cage they can still move quite a distance if you know yeah yeah you can't fit a 30 foot tree in your hat in your you know you can't do a 30 foot tree in your reptile room but but you can give them space where they can move and and and so if you just have one stick in the cage then that might preclude much activity but if you've got a lot of different connecting sticks and whatever and and and you let them get hungry they're gonna move around the cage you know so yeah um can you hear ruby in the background no i i can't hear you can't no oh that's awesome i didn't say she is outside oh she's oh she's pissed yeah she's she she probably hears me recording in here and she's like, how dare that motherfucker leave me outside while he's recording the show?

Yeah. It's terrible. She's pissed. We're heartless. Yeah. Well, Chewy and Ruby got into it with each other. They do. They do that from time to time.

But unfortunately, Maya, my daughter, was kind of in the middle of it. And yeah, Ruby accidentally bit her. time to time but unfortunately maya my daughter was kind of in the middle of it and uh yeah ruby ruby accidentally bit her so she hit she got she had a puncture in her leg and had took her to yeah so it was like so so ruby's in so ruby's in some shit right now so yeah yeah yeah so yeah um and you know now now maya's like sketched out about ruby and it's like oh man our little kind of mix did that bit heidi the other week and yeah he's probably lucky he didn't get taken to the well and you know it's it's like when those two get into it or when you know when and this is i think any dog when they get overly stimulated and they're too excited, they're not the same animal.

So it's very, you know, it's like, you know. That's one hiding guy bet was she was trying to get in. She was kind of in between them and two dogs were going at it or whatever. And I feel bad because it wasn't Maya's fault. She was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. Animals, man. Crazy. Aminals.

But I think we've kind of come to the conclusion that there's a lot of unique characteristics of Australian wildlife. And there's no denying that. But there's also a lot of ways where we can draw parallels with reptiles from other countries. And the green tree python, emerald tree boa comparison. That's always a good one. Oh, that's a good one. I can't believe we didn't bring that one up. Yeah.

That was in front of my face. Moloch, horned lizard, and all those different. So there are definitely some similarities. I was even thinking, is it the myli? Myli, one of the little geckos in Australia. And the coleonics kind of remind me of the same. And leopard geckos. I mean, they all kind of have similar desert-y or living undercover kind of remind me of the same. And leopard geckos. I mean, they all kind of have similar desert-y or living undercover

kind of lifestyles. Yeah. Yep. Well, I don't know. Did we do it? We're good. I think, I mean, that's for the listener to decide.

Yeah, if you want to bring up a different point or argue a different aspect of aspect of this that would be that'd be fun um yeah i think uh maybe rick shine wants to uh reply back to rick on the show what a bunch of bollocks we we just threw out there and i i would i would i would i would love to hear a rebuttal from rick shine that'd be the best yeah i would i would uh i would feel fully validated even if he made me look like a complete schlemiel. Something tells me he doesn't listen to our podcast, but. I'm pretty sure not.

Yeah. Yeah. I love that book. But a great guy. Oh yeah. I highly recommend his book to anybody out there. So many snakes, so little time. Really, really great reading. It just kept me interested the whole time and, so little time. Really, really great reading. It just kept me interested the whole time, and I really enjoyed it.

A lot of fun anecdotes of him getting into some pretty hairy situations and stuff. So I really like the book. Hopefully Eric and the crew will do a book review on that one. I think they're talking about it. I want to be invited to that. Eric's read it, right? He's through the book, right? be invited to that hint eric's read it right he's done he's he's through the book i think so yeah i i don't know if because wasn't he reading was it he was reading it a while oh no because yeah he was reading it a while back and then uh it was it

was uh ipers a lapid book that he was going to wait on for in lieu of the carpet book so um i'm i'm interested to read that one too. I don't know a lot about the Lapids. It'd be cool to learn more about those. I inquired about that and he kind of recommended waiting until there was a distributor in the US that had the copies of the book.

So hopefully Bob or somebody over here will get some or it'll be available on Amazon or something. Work that out, Scott. Let's go, man. I want to read this thing. Yeah. I should have had the boys pick me up a copy while they were over there, but I don't even think he had copies for them to pick up.

So they could have brought one home for me. That would have been a big ask. Did you hear Eric talking about or do the recap of their trip where he left his passport in the more complete carpet python in the pouch in front of his seat? So he had to run back to the plane and pick it up. That sounds like something that could have been a bad situation. I mean, could you imagine if you would have lost that book? How terrible? Oh, my God. Yeah, dude. I mean, you can get another passport. I don't know if I'm going to send him another book, you know. No, not after that disrespect either. I mean, I mean, that was that's pretty cool that he would entrust his passport into the book. And it probably saved the book from getting chucked or something. Yep. Well, I think that was a good, fun conversation.

There's quite a few topics that were kind of drummed up in my mind by the book. I need to go back and review some of them. yeah well we'll get some more discussion on by your book or dr shine's book yeah yeah okay yeah yeah yeah i didn't make a very clear uh transition there but that's good well hopefully you all had a had a nice thanksgiving if you celebrate thanksgiving if not hopefully you ate a nice meal and, and, uh, have some good food in your belly,

but we, uh, appreciate you listening. Our, our listener out there. Um, we know we have at least one, so that's good.

well, I think, uh, I, I guess we can throw out, uh, we, we, uh, recognize and appreciate the support of the NPR family and Eric and Owen for their work on the NPR crew.

Check out all their social media stuff, NPR, MoreliaPythonRadio.com, I think, if I'm not mistaken. The social media stuff, they're all over the place. Check them out. Lots of great podcasts. Speaking of which, well, this is Snakes and Stogies, but our old buddy Dustin Grahn was on Snakes and Stogies. It was fun to listen to some of the stories from the Arizona Herb Trips. So even though they're not on the NPR network, Justin Schmitty and Phil do a great job on that show.

And it's fun to listen to them and hear some of our buddies like Dustin. But yeah, check out that. Yeah, good stuff out there. You can find me at, uh, at JG Jewlander on Instagram or Justin Jewlander on Facebook. Um, JG Jewlander on YouTube, you can see some Australian, wild Australian reptile videos, as well as some North American, uh, reptile videos as well. Good times. I just put up pictures of our trips to Arizona. So you can see all the stuff we found there, see some of the crew in action, and check out Chuck on a few of the pictures.

Ooh, yeah, check me out. It's on my website, Australian addiction dot com on the visits tab. You can see some of the trips I've done. So I don't think I got our California trip up there. I think I spaced that one. Got to get that up there, man. I know. Maybe I should use this Thanksgiving time to get that up.

But the the Arizona trip photos are up. I think we found between the two trips we saw a total of 42 different species so or 43 somewhere on there somewhere over 40 so not not bad that's quite a quite a few species for a couple weeks of herping or just a week and a half catch did you catch the latest lizard brain um i did i start listening to that one who was the psalm is on there oh a week and a half. Did you catch the latest Lizard Brain? Did I start listening to that one? Hussam is on there. No, I meant to listen. It's good. You should

check it out. He's a cool guy. I really like Hussam. Yeah. And yeah, I mean, the Lizard Brain Radio is a fantastic podcast. Again, not on the mean, the Lizard Brain Radio is a fantastic podcast. Mm-hmm. Again, not on the VR, but still definitely worth listening to.

Yeah. Yeah. Bill is the shit. Bill is the man. He does it upright. He does. We need to have him back on here. He's a great guest to have.

Fight with old bill. Well, um, anything you want to put out there into the, um, I guess if you wanted to find me, you could look on Iggy under Chuck Norris wins. And I am on Facebook under Chuck Poland.

Um, yeah. Cool. Cool. Cool. Yeah. I'm trying to get all my, uh, my pictures up from Costa Rica on, on Instagram. So if you're curious to see some of the stuff we saw in Costa Rica with my family, you can look at the, uh, my Instagram or Facebook for, for those photos. I think those go to my Justin Julander on Facebook account, but JG Julander at Instagram, you can see all those fun photos. We saw quite a bit of wildlife over there. What a place, but slowly getting through them, trying to do one or two

photos a day and get, get all the wildlife up. I guess it gives me something to post during the cold winter months in Utah. So, yeah, but I'm looking forward to the next trip. It's can't come too soon, but I think I'm going to be waiting a few months to do any herping. So, well,

well, get ready, get ready for spring. Yeah. Spring in California. Yeah. I'm excited for your trip, man.

See how you do it up here we'll see all right we'll find a yeah i gotta start getting on that rosy boa yeah yeah we will yeah all right we're gonna go with the man yeah all right thanks for listening to reptile fight club we'll catch you again next week for another battle. We hope you had a great Thanksgiving. And remember, Mac and Santa is watching you for Christmas. We'll be right back. Outro Music Bye.