Stuff You Should Know - How Moss Works

Episode Date: June 5, 2012

Think you have moss figured out? You probably don't. Join Josh and Chuck as they explore some of the surprising aspects of these most ancient and important plants on the planet. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Flooring contractors agree. When looking for the best to care for hardwood floors, use Bona Hardwood Floor Cleaner. The residue-free, fast drying solution is specially designed for hardwood floors, delivering the safe and effective clean you trust. Bona Hardwood Floor Cleaner is available at most retailers where floor cleaning products are sold and on Amazon. Also available for your other hard surface floors like Stone, Tile, Laminate, Vinyl, and LVT. For cleaning tips and exclusive offers, visit Bona.com slash Bona Clean. The War on Drugs is the excuse our government uses to get away with absolutely insane stuff. Stuff that'll piss you off. The cops, are they just like looting? Are they just like pillaging? They just have way better names for what they call,

like what we would call a jack move or being robbed. They call civil acid work. Be sure to listen to The War on Drugs on the iHeart radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts. Brought to you by the reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready, are you? Welcome to Stuff You Should Know from HowStuffWorks.com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles W. Chuck Bryant, who now refuses to do the cheeks, everyone. So I can't vouch for how good the episodes will be from this point on. Cheeks are done. I don't care about them anymore. We'll see. Okay. I mean,

if we started nose dive, you're doing the cheeks again. Nope. I will seek to it that you do the cheeks. Can't do it. I will stand on your chest, Ben will grab one cheek, Jerry will grab the other, and the cheeks will be done. For people that don't know what we're talking about, this sounds like really gross. Everybody knows what we're talking about. Chuck does a little cheek pull to start off each episode. It's a little good luck charm, and now he's suddenly decided he's not going to do that anymore. I have a new good luck charm. What is it? It's called not doing cheeks. It's not. It's a bad luck. No. So I've got a joke for you to open this one up. Do you really? And I made it up today. It's a made up joke? I don't want to hear it. What do you call a reproducing

sphagnum? What? Randy Moss. That's pretty good. Not bad. No, no, no. That's into the realm of pretty good. Yeah. I think if I was a tour guide at like a nature like foreign bank science center or something, that would be my go to for the kids to try and identify with them. I don't think the kids would like it as much as maybe the teacher. Yeah, that's true. The teacher would be like, that's pretty funny. And by the way, those brown knee-high socks you're wearing are great. Right. Well, I'm going to give an intro in addition to the joke. Sure. The intro joke. Maybe that should be your new good luck thing. You make a joke. Make up a joke for every... That would be welcome back, Cotter. They have a joke for everyone? Yeah. He introed every show by, or maybe it was

outroed by telling a joke to his wife. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I hadn't picked up on that. I only saw like maybe two episodes of that show. Well, then you heard two jokes. Yeah. Plus all the other jokes. Was his wife one in the same with Bailey from WKRP? Didn't they look alike? Were they the same person? I don't know if they were the same person, but they definitely seemed the same. Gotcha. And they both wore glasses that had the feathered hair. Yeah, sort of long feathered hair, 70s ladies. Yeah. I don't think they were the same though. Yeah. But they were both probably on the love boat. Yes. Within five years as like a way to revitalize their career. That's right. Chuck, I was going to talk about the Ice Age, the beginning of the Ice Age,

or of Ice Ages, glacial periods. Remember, right now we're in the midst of an interglacial period. Right. I want you to think back way back, 470 million years ago. Okay. There was no such thing as a glacial period. And by proxy, there's no such thing as an interglacial period. All we had was one hot, soupy, barren mess of land and ocean. And that was it. That's right. This is what's called the Ordovician period, or Ordovician period, depending on where you come from. Okay. And the beginning of this period is characterized by Ice Ages. And Paleo geologists, I guess you could just call them geologists really, because nobody's studying like present stuff very much. It's mostly Paleo geology, right? Sure. They were like, where did this Ice Age come from?

Like when did this start? And they figured out that what triggered this was the arrival of the very first basic land plants, e.g. mosses. That's right. And they recently figured out that mosses came about about 470 million years ago. And they triggered these Ice Ages by latching onto rocks. So these were a certain type of moss, as you and I know, called granite mosses. And they would actually leach materials from these rocks to use as nutrients and minerals, right? These are like wheaties for moss, early moss. Well, the moss started releasing stuff, releasing, no, sucking in carbon dioxide from the atmosphere enough to reduce the global temperature, mean temperature by 8 degrees centigrade, which led to the beginning of Ice Ages and the Ice Age

periods that we know and love. You can thank moss for that. Yeah, thank you moss. You go outside, you find a little bit of moss, you grab a little piece of it gently, and then shake it's hand. Shake it's little. So thanks for the Ice Ages. Little baby stem. Yeah. Well, we needed Ice Ages. Yeah, that remains to be seen. No, it's all part of the big soup. We've had some. Who am I to doubt it? We've had some chilly, windy weather lately, and it has been getting to me like it's been like just seeing the trees like getting whipped outside makes me feel chilly. And then in turn I feel socially isolated and mad. Wow. Yeah, it's been really windy. Yeah, crazy. So we're talking about moss. This is no joke. April is over by now. We're in it right now. But by the

time this comes out, this is no April Fool's joke. We're talking about moss and how it works. Because it's part of our long parade of explaining absolutely everything in the known universe. That's right. Moss is. Moss is part of that. It's part of that. So let's talk about moss. Well, moss is pretty fun and unique in some ways, if you ask me. Yeah. Because unlike most flowering plants and trees, or let me go ahead and say it, all flowering plants, in trees, they don't have roots like traditional root systems. Moss doesn't. No. Mosses don't. They do not. They don't germinate from seeds. Pretty weird. No. And they don't gush water around through internal systems. Root systems. Yeah. Yeah. And that's weird. It is. Especially if you're familiar

with plants, then you're like, well, when moss is strange. Exactly. For somebody, you know, an average bystander like me, I'm like, oh, okay, well, moss doesn't do that. And plants do. It doesn't seem particularly weird to me. But I do find it intriguing. It makes me want to know more about moss. Well, you got about 15,000 species, if you want to talk about moss. Traditionally, you were probably going to think of moss as the true moss. Well, let's back up a little bit. Okay. They're related to liverwort and hornwort. Yeah. I've seen, I saw other articles on moss and everybody points that out for some reason. I'm not sure if they're like, I got to put 10 things in about moss. I got nine. So let's put that in.

They are in the phylum, Brio Phyta. Yeah. And they're in three groups. You got the granite mosses, the peat mosses, and true mosses. True mosses are probably what we're going to think of when you think of the little green carpeting like padding that you see over here. Like falling tree in a forest or something. Yeah. And there's tons of true moss, like 14,000 species. Yeah. Granite mosses are blackish, small, grow in Arctic regions in the mountains. Yeah. Grow on rocks. They're the most ancient moss, apparently. That's right. And they're only about 100 species of that. And then the final subgroup is the peat moss. Grows in bogs. If you've ever been in a bog, then you've probably seen some peat moss or

sphagnum moss. Right. And that's the money moss, because you can burn it and convert it to electricity and charge money for it. That's why sphagnum is the money moss. And oddly, oh, not oddly, but remarkably, moss, the sphagnum moss that you use is a soil conditioner. We do that in our garden, because some of it can hold 20 times its dry weight in water. It's pretty amazing. That's very amazing. That's some strong moss. You're going to find moss all over the place, including places where you won't find any other living plants, like the bottom of an Arctic or Antarctic lake. That is pretty impressive. Like the only multi-cellular plant growing down there is moss. Right. And it grows really slow. I think as little as one centimeter per year,

this aquatic moss at the bottom of these frozen lakes, and that is the slowest growing and longest living freshwater plant ever recorded. I would guess so. It's kind of like putting somebody on ice. Right. Sure. Slowing down the cellular processes, but they're still active, so you could, in theory, extend their lifespan. Right. That's right. Same thing with moss. Yeah. It's probably even easier with moss. Yeah. And by that same token, the zombie moss, I thought was pretty cool. Yeah. You could dry some mosses out for 19 years without water, and if you add water to it, it'll, you know, resuscitate itself. It'll turn into a big dinosaur. It's pretty cool though. If they can go dormant for that long, yeah, it's amazing.

And all mosses can go dormant. It's like one of their defense mechanisms. They'll just turn brown and dry out. Yeah. And they're in a dormant state. Unfortunately, you can't really tell like what the difference is between dead and dormant until you add water and see if it comes back. Right. That's the only way to determine the length of a moss's dormancy. Oh, so if you add water and it just stays dead, then it's dead. Oh, that's sad. So you said there's like 15,000 species and they kind of range in size and shape and texture, right? Color. Some of the, I think the peat mosses grow different colors like rose. Yeah. Very pretty. Yeah. Some grow black like the granite moss, you said. Yeah. Some are silver, which is amazing. Yeah. And then there's the

smallest moss is the ephemerum, which is a half a millimeter tall. That's crazy. That's adult size. Yeah. And then there's the Dalsonia, which is up to almost 30 inches, 70 centimeters in height, which that's a pretty wide variety. Yeah. The war on drugs impacts everyone, whether or not you take drugs. America's public enemy number one is drug abuse. This podcast is going to show you the truth behind the war on drugs. They told me that I would be charged for conspiracy to distribute 2200 pounds of marijuana. Yeah, and they can do that without any drugs on the table. Without any drugs, of course, yes, they can do that. And I'm the prime example of that. The war on drugs is the excuse our government uses to get away with absolutely insane stuff.

Stuff that'll piss you off. The property is guilty. Exactly. And it starts as guilty. It starts as guilty. The cops, are they just like looting? Are they just like pillaging? They just have way better names for what they call like what we would call a jack move or being robbed. They call civil answer for that. Be sure to listen to the war on drugs on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcast or wherever you get your podcast. My name is Adelita Paz or as some like to call me the modern day Selena. Somoro in my culture, I present Adelita changing the key. A podcast series about the crossover dream of a Tejano superstar starring Diane Guerrero

and Anna Ortiz. And there comes a time when you must decide whose dreams you will fulfill. What would you do for the world of pop music to know your name? Would you just risk it all or play it safe? Do you have any idea how many artists have attempted to do just that? Adelita changing the key is the story of Adelita Paz and the compromises she must make to get to where she wants. Listen to Adelita changing the key as part of the MyCultura podcast network available on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcast or wherever you get your podcasts. Okay. So moss is fairly interesting so far. Let's talk about the individual plants because when you look at moss and you think about moss, you're thinking of a carpet of plants.

Right? Those are actually like a bunch of little plants put together, correct? Yeah. Okay. Yeah, sure. That's one way to think of it. So when you're talking about moss, when you're talking about the individual parts or the individual plants, they're pretty simple. Yeah. They're pretty basic. You have something called the gametophyte, which is the stem and the leaves, right? That's right. The leaves are generally arranged in a spiral pattern and the leaves are usually a lance shaped with like a point, right? Yeah. That's where you're going to find your reproductive parts. Right. At the bottom, there's rhizoids instead of roots. Remember, yeah, these are not roots and so they don't anchor themselves to

anything necessarily. They will anchor themselves to like maybe organic materials or something, but it's not into the dirt. Right. And they also don't, they don't suck up water in the same way that roots do, but they do use rhizoids. A lot of it's kind of academic. The difference is really between rhizoids and roots. Oh. Yeah. In my opinion. Sure. I'm going to get some mail about that, but I think that they're very similar. Well, yeah, but I mean the fact that it can grow on a rock, kind of instead of soil, kind of says it all. Excellent. Okay. So in the gametophyte, you're going to have, like I said, your reproductive parts, both male and female. And then we'll mention this because it comes around later on when we talk about the reproduction. Emerging from the

top of the female gametophyte is the sporophyte and a thin stalk called aceta and a little brown ball on top of that known as the capsule. Right. And then on top of that is the operculum and it's like a little hat that the capsule wears. Right. And that, that comes into play. Well, let's talk about how it gets nutrients. Then we'll talk about the dirty stuff. The Randy Moss. Yeah, exactly. That was a pretty funny joke. No, it was silly. Okay. So a moss needs a few things to live in. One of those is water. Of course. Possibly one of the most important ingredients because it aids in not just the, not just photosynthesis, but also in reproduction, which we'll see. Yeah. I don't want to get ahead of ourselves. Boy, he's really built up this sexy moss.

Not as interesting as we're making it. Yeah, there's no like writing crops involved or anything like that. Well, but there are parts. Yeah. All right. Okay. So yeah, and I was surprised by the number of parts. I didn't realize they were that involved. I thought it was like, here's a spore. Yeah. Go forth and reproduce. Sure. Anyway, with that water that moss needs, because mosses need like pretty much across the board. One of their great characteristics is a moist environment. Right? Yeah. And they need this water or they get this water since they lack roots in a number of different ways. Some have very absorbent leaf surfaces where you can pour a drop of water on a leaf and it goes, it's just gone. It's a pretty amazing thing to watch. Yeah. Spongy. Sure. And

then another way is the rhizoids, which although they aren't roots, still manage to suck up water and they do this, their capillary action in the same way that like a paper towel, if you, if you put a drop of paper, drop of water on your kitchen counter, ask your mom first before doing this, because some moms will freak out on you if you do something like this. Right. Put a drop of water on your kitchen counter and take a single thing of paper towel, set it next to it, just barely touching and the paper towel go suck it up. It's amazing. That's capillary action. And it's the result of the adhesion in this case, let's say with rhizomes, the adhesion of water molecule to the rhizome. Rhizoid. Yeah. Rhizoid is greater than the

cohesion between that water molecule and all the other water molecules as part of. Yeah. It's a quicker picker upper. Nice. So once you've got a little water in there, the water is going to be moved between cells or transported through cells, depending on the moss. Yeah. And then you're going to get your photosynthesis, which is, you know, part of being a plant. Did you like this analogy? I didn't find it apt necessarily. I just ignored it. Okay. So at the end of photosynthesis, you're going to have sugar and oxygen as a byproduct, releases the oxygen like a good little plant and eats the sugar basically. Yeah. And it says give me more. Yes. So it converts the sugar into energy to break down minerals, say that it's leached from rocks

or a tree stump or whatever it's attached to to grow and to reproduce. That's right. I think we're at the sexy moss point. Reproduction occurs, can occur in a couple of ways. And the first way is for the reproduction to begin, we're going to have to get a vase shaped arcagonia. It's getting all like a Georgia O'Keefe painting in here. It is. And that's going to produce the eggs. It develops at the tip of the gametophyte, which we talked about. And then on the male side, you've got the antheridia and that produces the sperm. And the sperm swims through basically fertilizes the eggs, which is why they need to be moist. Like you said, the sperm swims through nearby water to get to the egg. It's pretty remarkable. Yeah. It's almost like a fish.

Yeah, but it's a sperm. That's right. So it's more like a tadpole. Yeah. That's what you mean. And then the egg is fertilized. You're going to get a sporophyte. We already talked about the sporophyte. That's the tall, thin stalk with a little up a perculum at the top. A perculum is going to open up at a certain point. That's the hat. Yeah. Release the tip of the hat happens. Releases the spores, which are basically like seeds. And there you have it. Well, yes. And then the spore goes and germinates like a seed. This is what I'm saying. Rhizoid, root, spore, seed. I mean, I know that there's some differences here, but they're not that great. Anyway, the spore goes, lodges itself into a...

It's different than every other plant. Every other millions of plants. Okay. I understand. I get it. I know that there are differences. I'm just saying like the difference between the two is not like a wow kind of thing for me. I got you. I wish it was. I understand. I'm not fighting it. So the spore germinates into another plant and the whole thing happens again. Hopefully not with any plant that it's related to though. That's gross. So the other way it can reproduce is asexually, which is pretty cool. Yeah. And basically if you've got enough moisture and a piece of moss breaks off and floats downstream or gets caught up in the wind and it roots down in a nice moist

place, it'll reproduce. It'll just start growing again. Yeah. It's pretty amazing. But it doesn't root. Rhizoids. Rhizomes. Rhizoids. Why does the... I think I'm confusing riboflavin with something else to get rhizomes. Okay. So we have healthy sexually active moss everywhere all over the place. Yep. We understand them. I mean it. We understand them now. Like that's moss right there. Oh, we left out one interesting fact. I thought there's their leaves, the tiny little leaves are so small. They're very rarely one cell thick. Yeah. That's tiny. Yeah. It's neat. It is neat. Okay. So now that we understand moss, if you have said, I like moss a lot.

I've seen moss before. I want to bring more moss into my life. I happen to have a yard, so I'm going to introduce moss to it. We now can say, yes, here's how you do it because we understand moss and here is how you do it. Yeah. And I like the look of moss. Like to go between plants or like in Japanese gardens, moss is like big. Yeah. Crazy big. Yeah. So if you want to grow some moss, one thing you can do sometimes is just transplant it, like gently scrape it off that rock in a, you know, sort of like a big chunk of like a carpet square as you can get and just throw it on the ground and water it. Water it. And sometimes that'll be very important. It is. Yeah. Not always. If you, if you put it in the right kind of place,

mosses require low sunlight. Sure. Basically shade. In fact, if you have low sunlight and you have trouble growing grass, moss is a great alternative. It is very much so. So they want low sunlight or shade and they also prefer low acidity, lower acidity than turf grass prefers. Yeah. So yeah, if you have a patchy piece of, piece of yard, moss might grow there very well. So in just transplanting it like that could work, especially if you keep it watered. Yeah. You can also try propagating it using a pretty ingenious little method of taking a clump, a whole bunch of moss, throw it in a blender with some buttermilk and then taking that mixture with the paintbrush and painting it wherever you want. Yeah. Very cool. Yeah. Buttermilk,

it just must be the wonder thing for the moss. Yeah. It's like it's packed with nutrients. You also want to take care of your moss. Sure. As, as low maintenance as it seems, like there is some things you have to do like leaves, twigs, that kind of stuff. Since it's in a shady area, it's usually subject to those things falling on top of it and that actually will burn it like acid. There won't be a lot of growth in that area of your moss. Sure. Because the leaf is preventing it from doing its thing. Yeah. So you want to clean it off like you would your carpet? Yes. Maybe with a very light broom, very light. Yeah. A leafblower on a low setting. Which you hate. Yeah. I just don't like the noise. Yeah. But in this case,

it makes sense. Sure. Unless you have a very light broom or you could just pick these things off individually. That's right. If it's got weeds, you don't want to yank the weeds out. Yeah. Because that can yank up moss. You don't want to do that. So you just want to like snip it with scissors. And it's no wonder this is popular in Japan because they're always more like tender and caring with their gardens. Anyone who has the patience for like bonsai and origami and things like that will snip weeds with scissors. You, me and I were in Kyoto and witnessed a man cutting the grass at a park. Yeah. With scissors. Yeah. My neighbor used to do that in my old house. Man. But his lawn looked awesome. Oh, but yeah. I don't have time for that. And that's why my yard

looks like crap. No one has time for that. So yeah, keep it well fed as in once a year, aside from the water, you're going to want to in mid spring get out your buttermilk again. So basically like right now or like last week. Yeah, true. I get about a quarter bottle of buttermilk, mix it with a couple of gallons of water and spray it. Yeah. Spray it all over. And mist your moss. They love mist. They do. They drink it up. Yeah. Literally. Yeah. Well, they use capillary action to drink it up. That's right. No roots involved. Let's say you want to kill moss. Yeah. I thought that this is very interesting in this article. It's like all pro moss and then all of a sudden it takes a really dark turn with the subject heading how to kill

moss. Well, some people don't want it, you know, like they don't want Ivy taking over their yard. They don't want moss taking over their yard. That's true. Although they point out in the article, it's not going to take over your lawn because it's not going to grow where your lawn would grow. Right. So lighten up. But if you're one of those people who are prone to slipping on things, you may not want that on your sidewalk. You definitely don't want moss on your roof. There's a sign that you have a big problem if you have moss on your roof. Unless you are doing that on purpose. Like a green roof. Sure. Well, then you're not going to have the kind of roof that you have to worry about. Exactly. If you have a traditional shingled roof and you have

moss, you need to do something about it for a couple of reasons. One, it's the presence of moss, trapped moisture. Moss is designed to do that if you're into intelligent design theory. And that means that it's going to foster things like fungus that will decay the wood beneath, meaning you'll have a hole in your roof. Yeah, at some point. The rhizomes, right? Rhizoids. What is wrong with me? I don't know. The rhizoids also like to get in between shingles and loosen them. That's right. And what else? Well, I mean, you don't want it on your roof. And so one thing you can do to kill it is use pesticides and chemicals. Not pesticide. I guess it would be a herbicide. Yeah, they say pesticide in here. That wouldn't be right. No, it's an

herbicide. Yeah. Like roundup. Sure. Which if you're into spraying that kind of junk on your lawn, feel free. I advise not to. But that's just how I play in my yard. So you don't use scissors, but you don't use pesticides, huh? No. You just kick back and you're like, grow, baby. No, I took care of things, but I just don't like spraying chemicals all over the yard. What do you use as herbicides and pesticides? White vinegar. Yeah. Like as a spray? For what does that work for? Anything. Like pesticide and herbicide or? Oh, I don't know about pesticide, but herbicide, like it'll kill weeds. Really? Huh. That's interesting. Yeah. Put it in the huts and sprayer. Gotcha. Or just live with it. Yeah. I guess it depends on the weed for sure.

But if you have animals, you don't want to be spraying your yard with chemicals. Even though they say like once it dries, it's fine. I don't buy that. I don't buy that either. Yeah. But if you do want to get rid of it, they say the best way to get rid of it naturally is to, you know, make it a not moss friendly environment. So like cut back some shade cover, maybe make it sunnier. That'll help get rid of the moss. Yeah. Just make it so it wouldn't want to live there even if it could. Yeah. Or scrape it off if it's like on a sidewalk or something. Yeah. That could leave a spore so it may come back. Don't be surprised. But yeah, just a flat shovel or a hoe will take care of moss usually too. That's right. And it says here zinc. Yeah. I didn't

know about this. Yeah. You put a zinc strip up on your roof and it'll keep mosses away. Up on there. Hate that stuff. That's right. And then the last moss fact of the podcast, if you're ever lost in the woods, you need to get your bearings. That's right. Start looking around and see what side of the trees and well, pretty much an upright growing tree, what side moss is growing on. And you probably have found something like north. Yeah. Because moss is going to grow on the side that gets the least exposure to sunlight, which would be north. So just follow that and you will end up in Canada every time. That's even if you start out in Australia. Yeah. Hey, Australia. The war on drugs impacts everyone, whether or not you take drugs.

America's public enemy number one is drug abuse. This podcast is going to show you the truth behind the war on drugs. They told me that I would be charged for conspiracy to distribute 2200 pounds of marijuana. Yeah, and they can do that without any drugs on the table. Without any drugs, of course, yes, they can do that. And I'm the prime example of that. The war on drugs is the excuse our government uses to get away with absolutely insane stuff. Stuff that will piss you off. The property is guilty. Exactly. And it starts as guilty. It starts as guilty. The cops, are they just like looting? Are they just like pillaging? They just have way better names for what they call like what we would call a jack move or being robbed. They call civil acid.

Be sure to listen to the war on drugs on the iHeart radio app, apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. A podcast series about the crossover dream of a Tejano superstar starring Diane Guerrero and Ana Ortiz. And there comes a time when you must decide whose dreams you will fulfill. What would you do for the world of pop music to know your name? Would you just risk it all or play it safe? Do you have any idea how many artists have attempted to do just that? Adelita changing the key is the story of Adelita pass and the compromises she must make to get to where she wants. Listen to Adelita changing the key as part of the Michael Dura podcast network available on the iHeart radio app, apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts.

All right, well, that's moss, huh? You got anything else? No, I'm going to grow a little moss garden in my front yard. Are you going to? Yeah, well, I was going to zero escape it anyway, so they might as well get some moss gone. I wrote an article on that. Zero escaping? Yeah, but the problem is, this isn't zero escaping because that's dry landscaping. This requires water, but it'd still be pretty low maintenance. Yeah, and my front yard doesn't get very much sun. I failed miserably at trying to grow grass, so I'm just going to mulch and moss and put plants and stuff.

I'd like to see that. Yeah, one day. If you want to know more about moss, including seeing some very pretty pictures of moss, and to get to the bottom of what Chuck and I decided was an in-app analogy between photosynthesis and cookie baking, you can type in moss in the search bar at HowStuffWorks.com and it'll bring this up and you will be very happy. And you should also be happy because I said search bars means it's time for listener mail. Josh, we're going to call this the nicest Irishman on earth. Wow. This guy was super nice. Okay. Josh, Chuck and Jerry. My name is John Keating, and I'm writing from Dublin, Ireland.

I've been a reasonably long time listener. I started listening to the show over a year ago when I started studying for my leaving cert, the Irish university entry exams. On a number of occasions during my exams, I was able to recall a topic you guys covered during the series, especially in English and history. Due to this, I feel I owe you a great deal of thanks as I was accepted to the College of the Holy and Undivided Trinity of Queen Elizabeth, near Dublin, better known as Trinity College. Nice. And it's Go Thunderbolts in case you're curious. Nice. During the year in Trinity, it was announced that a fraternity is to be established within the college in Ireland as well as in the UK. Society and clubs take up the role of frats

that frats have in the US. However, one exception is normally these clubs, societies do not have a particular house associated with them. Okay. Like we do here. Right. This house concept is something I'll have to deal with the near future as I shall be staying in the Beta Theta Pi branch of the University of Toronto while I'm in the city in search of work this summer. On this side of the Atlantic, the frat concept is mainly centered around their depiction in such movies as Animal House or how the Winklevoss twins were portrayed in the social network. Sure. Do you see those guys under any commercial for like pistachios? I did. Oh, God, it's awful. Hey, man, you're going to make that dollar some way, huh? Yeah,

the multi-million dollar payout was enough. Right. Yeah. And they were wealthy already. Yeah, exactly. They seem like nice enough guys. Oh, they seem like great guys. In such, we see them as being an alcohol-fueled rich boys club. Yes, except for the College of Pharmacies fraternity. What do they look? It's a pill-fueled club. I know that both of you weren't associated with the frat when you were in college, so maybe I'm right on the button there. Also, I'm curious as to why the idea hasn't successfully been exported to Ireland and the UK and further afield. And what exactly is the association with the Greek Alphabet and why did they develop in the U.S. in the first place? So he wants us to do a podcast. Oh,

I thought he wanted us to answer now. No, man. As this email has already exceeded the limit I felt it would, so I shall end it on this note. I just want to further emphasize my gratitude and respect I have for the SYSK team and all the individuals involved in How Stuff Works. Here's hoping for a successful venture on the TV. Best of luck and slam. Let's be an Irish thing. S-L-A-N. Ever heard of that? Is it like an acronym for something or? No, it just says best of luck and slam. So we'll probably hear about that. And that is from John Keating. Thank you, John. That is very nice of you. That was a very nice email, wasn't it? Do you want to do frats? Yeah, I think we should at some point. Well, I guess we have to explain everything. If we did moss, we have to do

frats, right? Yeah, sure. Um, let's see. What should we call for, Chuck? I don't believe anybody could possibly have a moss story, which makes me want to hear one. Well, that means people go, oh boy, you didn't think you'd get a moss story. Listen to this. Okay, so we might as well ask for it. I once laid so still for a year I had moss growing on my side. That'd be pretty cool. That would be cool. And then there's the tree man, who I think some people call the moss man. I don't think I know him. Oh, you do. There's a video on how stuff works with this man who has like some sort of HPV and like he's growing like bark bark like skin. Yeah, I've seen that. Yeah. Wow. I think he's called the tree man though. It's not the moss man, is it? I don't know. It's sad. So we've

already heard about that guy. Don't send us any links to that video. Seen it. But if you do have an interesting moss story, we want to hear it. Not only that, if it's interesting enough, we'll promote it on the show via listener mail. You can tweet at least the first 140 characters of your moss story to us at syskpodcast. You can post a bunch of it on Facebook at facebook.com slash stuff you should know. And you can send us the whole shebang at stuffpodcast at discovery.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit howstuffworks.com. Brought to you by the reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you? The war on drugs is the excuse our government uses to get away with absolutely insane stuff.

Stuff that'll piss you off the cops. Are they just like looting? Are they just like pillaging? They just have way better names for what they call like what we would call a jack move or being robbed. They call civil acid. Be sure to listen to the war on drugs on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcast or wherever you get your podcasts. The world of chocolate has been turned upside down. A very unusual situation. You saw the stacks of cash in our office. Chocolate comes from the cacao tree and recently varieties of cacao thought to have been lost centuries ago were rediscovered in the Amazon. There is no chocolate on earth like this. Now some chocolate makers are racing deep into the

jungle to find the next game-changing chocolate and I'm coming along. Okay that was a very large crack it out. Listen to obsessions wild chocolate on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.