Tooth & Claw: True Stories of Animal Attacks - Manatees & Mermaids

Episode Date: June 23, 2025

Mike explores just how manatees ended up in Florida and then tells the strange tale of P. T. Barnum's Feejee Mermaid. Watch here: https://youtu.be/rtBKJoU9FZU Download the Rocket Money app and enter our shows name Tooth & Claw: True Stories of Animal Attacks in the survey so they know we sent you! Get a free 8-count Sample Pack with any purchase athttp://drinklmnt.com/tooth Upgrade your sleep with Miracle Made! Go to https://trymiracle.com/TOOTH and use the code TOOTH to claim your FREE 3 PIECE TOWEL SET and SAVE over 40%OFF! Take the online quiz and introduce Ollie to your pet. Visit https://ollie.com/TOOTH today for 60% off your first box of meals! ~~ To advertise on the show, contact us! ~~ Tooth & Claw is brought to you by QCODE. Support the show and get access to an extensive library of exclusive episodes like this by supporting the show on Patreon or joining the Grizzly Club on Apple Podcasts. For the latest updates on the show and all things wildlife, follow us at toothandclawpod.com and social:  Instagram: @ToothandClawPodcast Twitter: @ToothandClawPod Wes: @GrizKid Jeff: @jefe_larson Mike: @mikey3ds Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

If the world were like a sleep number mattress, everything would adapt for your comfort. Because as your life changes and your body changes, sleep number mattresses adapt and shift to give you personalized comfort night after night. And now everything's on sale during our Memorial Day event. Save up to $1,200 on mattresses for a limited time. To experience a whole new world of comfort, visit a sleep number store or go to sleepnumber.com. Sleep number to a good life sleep. Hey everyone, it's Wes. Really quickly, just wanted to let you guys know, we did a bit of a switcharoo this week. We had recorded this episode as a subscription episode, but we all thought, you know, it's been a minute since Mike has done a main feed episode.

Let's make this a main feed one. We all really like the episode. And then the one that I recorded for a main feed, it's about a shark attack in 2019, a girl who's 17 and lost her leg. And her dad actually is quite the hero in that story. We decided to push to our subscription channel. So they're both really fun episodes. We recommend both of them. You're going to hear Jeff introduce this as a subscription episode, just so you know. But yeah, if you haven't subscribed yet, might be a good time to check us out. On Patreon, we post especially a lot of extra content. I recently shared a playlist on there of songs I've been listening to lately. Usually our Patreon listeners are the first access to our trips.

There's a few other benefits to Patreon subscription. You get to interact with other listeners. And then if you really just like getting your subscription episodes, In your Apple feed, we have our Apple Grizz Club too. Both are great options. And both, if you decide you don't want it, you subscribe, and you don't like it, you can always cancel. We won't hold it against you. All right, I think that's it.

With no further ado, here's the episode. Hello, subscribers, and welcome back to another episode of Tooth and Claw podcast. Jeff Wes and Mike, we're all here. And, hey-o. Do we have anything to say, or should we just get into it? I got nothing to say. I'm not saying a single thing. Uh-oh.

We got fire truck on my street. Uh-oh. Is your house on fire, Jeff? I don't know. Did one of those birds get stuck in a tree? What? You know, firemen are always rescuing things out of trees. Maybe birds got stuck in a tree.

Sometimes. That's the way birds belong. Yeah. Well, maybe one got stuck. Jeff, I'm a biologist. Woodpecker's beak just stuck in the bark. I think of cats. Yeah, I guess.

Mike, you want to get into your? episode, are we doing the second part of your last subscription episode? Yes, I would like to get into the episode, but no, we're not. I'm weird, this is, you're saving that? I teased it, I know. I really did plan on finishing off that duology today with the lowest altitude attacks, however you want us, the deepest, I guess. But for some reason, it's stuck in my brain last episode, we brought up manatees,

and I couldn't stop thinking about them. I don't know why. It was just in my brain. I was like, I think it's time to do a Manatee episode. So that's what I prepared today. Nice. I like it. It could be a joint thing because they're pretty low altitude.

It could be if Manatee has ever attacked anybody. They're so nice. And I had a real journey preparing this episode because I was looking for any kind of, not even a attack story, but any kind of encounter that could be classified as even interesting between humans and manatees, and they're so peaceful and kind and innocent. There's just nothing. So I was like, I kept kind of branching off down different paths. And at the end of the day, I was like, no, we need to make this about manatees.

And so I did. So that's why you're telling people to fall asleep right now? Yeah. Close your eyes. I'm sure you're going to get into this, but I feel like some of the historical interactions with manatees were pretty interesting. Oh, yeah. We're not going to get too graphic.

But I'll leave it to your imagination exactly what's going down. We got Christopher Columbus. He gets involved, your guy Wes, like Chris Columbus. That piece of shit, yeah. Anyway, I wanted to start this off by, and I promise this is going somewhere. But I wanted to just gauge your excitement level for Christopher Nolan's next movie, The Odyssey. Where are you excited yet? Are you getting there?

I'm very excited. Okay. Because the last one I saw was the like made for TV one with, I forget, he's like an Italian actor and then there's really bad CG, but it was really fun. Like I remember when it came out, just really loving it. Yeah. And I've never read The Odyssey, but I have a goal to read it before the Nolan movie comes out. Okay. Jeff?

Yeah, I'm excited. 10 out of 10. He sounds like it. Last year, I did reread the Odyssey. And a lot of new things really stuck out to me. And the one scene that really kind of got lodged in my brain, you know, the genesis of the mythos of sirens, right? Like the call of the siren. If you hear it and heat its call, it'll lead you to your demise kind of thing.

Yeah. Odysseus, he's on his boat with all of his men. And he had been warned, I think it was Searcy that warned him and like kind of given him some directions as to how to resist the temptation of these sirens. and what his plan was was to lodge some wax in his ears and then have his men tie him to the mast of the boat, which is like really couldn't control himself otherwise, I guess. You're pretty horny if that's what you have to do. We've all been there, though. Oh, I mean, come on.

Wait, why did he have to do that? The sirens call is like so, it's such a huge lure for these men that they like can't resist. Yeah. But I don't know what the sirens call is. Do you, have you seen, do you know, oh, brother, where art thou? Okay. You remember that part where there's the three women in the river that are like washing their clothes? Oh yeah.

And like they can't resist themselves, the men. Yeah. Those are the sirens. Okay. There's a common misconception. It's just horny. That's the misconception I wanted to get into. Somewhere along the line, sirens became conflated with mermaids, but they're actually more like birds.

They were half human, half bird figures. And they weren't actually violent. All they would do is they would lure the U.N. with their sweet singing, tell you prophecies and all of these things that were like so pleasing to the ear that you never wanted to leave their presence. So you just like sit on the ground and literally starve to death and die just because you liked listening to them sing so much. But why do I bring this up? I know it was a bit of a roundabout way to get to the order sirenia or, you know, we take that word from the Greek mythology of the siren.

I don't know any of this, but yeah, sure. And the order sirenians. is what the manatee belongs to. Manatees and dugongs are of the order Sirene. So that's kind of the genesis of where we began thinking of manatees, at least historically, as being mermaids. It was a real weird... People who used to be at sea for like half their lives with just any living organism they saw is like,

let's turn this into like half woman and think about having sex with it. There's a reason they get it with manatees up. Yeah. Manatees, it goes a little further than that. But Mike's going to explain it. Oh, it does. So, manatees. We're going to get just right up front, Mike's big old manatee fact right out there just to set the stage.

So manatees belong to the Order of Sirenia, like I said. And the order of Sireneia took their name from those sirens of Greek mythology. And so the beginnings of why people confusing manatees from Mermaids starts to take shape. And one notable instance of this, I alluded to it earlier. So in 1493, Wes, your guy, Christopher Columbus. He's not my guy. I do not.

He's an Italian-American hero. Tony Soprana. So he was sailing down by the Dominican Republic and saw what he thought were three, quote, mermaids. And he later documented in his captain's log what became the first written record of manatees, at least by like European, white European explorer folk. I'm sure there was probably some documentation by indigenous people, First Nations people. I think written record kind of covers your bases there a little bit. Yeah, I just want to make sure, though. But he was quoted as writing in his log that they were, quote, not half as beautiful as they are painted.

Again, he was thinking these manatees were mermaids. And he's like, huh, well, that's a little underwhelming. They're a lot less hot than I remember. Yeah. It just makes me think, like, if manatees were twice as attractive, would he be like, oh, now we're talking? He just writes his turtle. It's funny he even, because his paintings of, like, mermaids that he was comparing him to. Yeah, right.

It's funny that he even was like, yeah, this is them. That's what this is. Yeah. Yeah. I just like that being the first written record. of manatees was just like these aren't that hot. Like the first thing anybody ever wrote about. So I'm doing a lot of setting the stage here.

But so for today, I'm doing kind of a two-parter thing. We're going to get smart and interesting about manatees first. And then on the back half, we're going to get a little dumber, but still interesting about mermaids, mostly because they're like not real as far as I know. There's a lot of anecdotal people out there or evidence out there from people who seem to have had mermaid encounters. We're going to talk a little bit about that. Very much in the crypto zoology. Yes. Category. Right. So we're doing real science first half, a little bit of pseudoscience

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But first off, I just want to dip our toes in the water, see what the temperature is like. What do you guys think of manatees? Off the top of your head, what are your feelings about them generally? I would agree with Columbus's take. They're not like that hot. Yeah. But I do think they're very cute.

Yeah. Their faces. I think, like, I could stare at a manatee for a long time just because their faces. is like very cute. And I don't know. They're like one of the animals we have in the United States. I'd most like to see that I haven't seen yet.

Yeah. For me, this isn't an animal I've seen a lot in the wild. I've only seen them a couple times and it was like pretty fleeting from the top of a boat. But I kind of feel like they're one of those animals that the first couple times you see them, it's really magical and cool. But then if you've seen them a lot, they would get to. be really boring because it's just kind of they kind of just like sit there in the water and don't do

anything so i feel like people that are around them a lot they really lose their kind of like most animals kind of just stand there when you see them though yeah but for me like i never get tired to seeing grizzly bears because they can be so dynamic or like predators you never know what could happen with them grizzly bears are like the very top yeah no like a mountain lion for me would be higher than a grizzly bear even for like excitement and seeing but a manatee yeah but like a manatee an animal that just literally like sits underwater and like eats underwater vegetation it's like seeing deer or something yeah like there's just not much that's going to happen i kind of get that like when we were in the galapagos that first night when we saw sea lions all over the beach and everywhere it was

really really fun but then by day two or three we were all kind of just walking right by them without even sparing a glance kind of thing. Yeah. Yeah. But that doesn't change the fact. So when I was little, we moved to Georgia. And I remember we drove to a beach about a half hour east of Savannah or Richmond Hill, I guess, where we lived.

And that's where I first learned about manatees. I have this weird concocted memory of seeing them. I probably didn't. But I do know that I learned about them there and was just like dumbfounded that this weird, huge, like, sausage-looking animal was just like there. the water and they're really peaceful and nice. Like, I didn't have to even worry about them. But when I think about manatees, I have this really kind of involuntary spike of empathy

in my heart because, like, they are so innocent and docile. It almost seems like some weird magical creature from a children's book, like tumbled off the page and into the ocean. And now they're just part of like the real world that they're not. They shouldn't have to deal with all of our messed up stuff we're putting them through. And we're going to get into all the danger and all of the injury that they go through because of humankind and some other factors too. But like, I don't know, I just feel really, it's almost like an Eeyore kind of thing. I look at Eeyore and I'm like, man, I just wish you could like, yeah, be happy.

Yeah, right. It doesn't surprise me that you feel a connection to them too because they're called like sea cows. And you love cows. I love them cows. Yeah. So we're going to be specifically talking about the West Indeons. Indian manatees. Those are the ones that have made their home in and around Florida. And this is something that's maybe a little obvious to everybody else. I lag behind when it comes

to just generally pondering the animal kingdom. But I get surprised when I'm preparing these kinds of episodes because I just always forget how fast things can and do change for some of these animals. Like, I always contextualize the animal kingdom as having kind of sorted and figured itself out over thousands and even millions of years with like evolution and where their domain lies and all of that. But this new research that I found about manatees has me thinking outside that little box I always put myself in. So this is a relatively new study that was published in. Thinking outside the box. A little bit outside the box. Wow. You would do great in like an office setting like for a big firm. That's what they're always looking for is someone who will look

outside of their box. Or a Taco Bell commercial. Except for they actually don't want you to. I would do great in a Taco Bell. They just want you to do exactly what they tell you to do. I was always really, I was great in long business meetings because they're like, all right, folks, let's think outside of the box. And I'd like stand up and kind of face the window and put my hands behind my back all

pensively and make it look like I was like, let's figure this out, guys. But I never really contribute anything meaningful to the team. like instead of trying to just like make as much profit as possible let's try to help people and they'll be like you're you're fired no i mean like it was just an idea it's just i don't really want to help people it was just spitballing you know so anyway this is a study that was published in the smithsonian magazine is an article written by sarah kuta in 2004 so just a year ago from when we're recording this and it's titled archaeologists piece together the origin story of Florida's

manatees revealing they were once tourists. Real catchy title. Do you think she's related to Barakudas? Sarah Kuda. Her name is Sarah Kuta? It's S-A-R-A-H

last name Kuta is K-U-T-A. Cutta. That's a great name. That's sick. Yeah. That's great. I do think she's probably a distant relation. Mermaid? Yeah. It's got to be. That's a great mermaid name.

Her head shot, I mean, it was just like the top half of her body. She might have a fin for legs. I don't know. It's hard to save one way or the other. This study suggests manatees. We're not permanent residents of Florida until about the middle of the 1900s, which is, again, very recent. And you're not going to west.

You're not going to believe the reason. Jeff, you might not even believe the reason why. Maybe I'll have you guys rate the believability at the end. It'll be a little believability score you guys can get. So over the years, archaeologists haven't traditionally found very many manatey bones around Florida. And that was one of the first things that had archaeologist Thomas Plucan. You started to scratch his head a little. You know, and you're a little like, what's going on?

You scratch your head starts to itch a little bit for some reason. Yeah. It's because there's an idea back there. Is that what it is? Or something's wrong. Yeah. I don't believe that. You don't think that's why your head starts itching?

I don't think you read that he scratched his head. Well, I'm editorializing a little bit. Saracud is a much better writer than me, it turns out. She doesn't really inject little details. Is that the part you thought we wouldn't believe? Yeah, do you believe that? You nailed it. Do you think geniuses are just never scratching their head

because they always have the answer to everything? Like Ken Jennings. They don't have to wonder about anything. Ken Jennings does scratch. scratching their head. Look at this idiot. We should go back to... Every episode, Ken Jenning was on Jeopardy

and see how many times he scratched his head is probably zero. So they were like, so obviously manatees live here in Florida. Are they not dying here? Like, what's going on? Why are we not finding, like, historical evidence of manatees existing here in Florida? And so Thomas and a team of researchers, they got to researching, and found out that outside of the rare instance in like historical documents, no one is really making any reference to manatees until well into the 1900s,

which by itself maybe isn't the most compelling evidence that they didn't live there. But then there was a newspaper in 1893 that wrote a report about a dead manatee that washed up on a Florida shore saying that, quote, it will no doubt attract thousands of spectators as soon as its presence becomes generally known. So that, like, if they were a normal thing, that wouldn't be such like a big news story. It wouldn't attract such attention, you know? It wasn't until about the 1920s or 30s that newspapers started regularly reporting manatee sightings on the Atlantic and Gulf Coasts. And a decade later in the 1940s, manatee sightings became so common that the word got out and tourists started rolling up to the Everglades National Park just to like check them out.

So that's when their presence started being announced as like Florida, full-time Florida residents, you know. So what's the deal? Where were they before? And why all the sudden are they showing up and then staying full time in Florida? I got a couple of real interesting things here that neither of them had occurred to me and both were, this is, if I were going to give a believability score, it'd be higher. No state tax. No state tax is a big one. Yeah, that was like the third.

That was a footnote. That was the third reason. So smart, man. Why don't we move to Florida? What state, oh, they have no state income? tax? No. I wonder there's so many Florida men living there, you know? Right. There's why basketball players I want to play there too. Right. Texas. Washington. Washington. So the first reason why manatees weren't living in Florida until the 1900s. So this is an interesting thing I'm learning about

like basically as of two days ago when I started preparing this. Did you know about the little ice age? Have you heard about that, Wes? Yeah. So that's not a thing that was ever been inside of my brain at any point, I don't think. The little ice age. Yeah. When you first read it, were you like scratching your head? Dude, I was like both hands. Like all 10 fingers, just like, what?

Yeah. Yeah, really going to town on my scalp. So starting in the 1300s and lasting until about the year 1800s, there's a climate epoch known as the Little Ice Age, during which manatees likely found Florida's waters to be too cold. They really like warm water. Cold water is quickly can kill manatees off. Just within days, if it's like degrees of Celsius too cold,

they really just struggle and have a bad time, often dying. So when the Little Ice Age came to an end, and the Florida water started climbing in temperature, manatees who are coming up from the south of waters around Cuba or other spots in the Caribbean, they're like, hey, the water is actually pretty nice here. Why go back at all? So that was one reason.

But maybe more interesting, this is the second reason, at least to me, this studies authors think that in conjunction with the end of the little ice age, all of the power plants that were getting built along the coastline during like the Industrial Revolution, I don't know if you guys have ever swum in waters near power plants, but like it makes the water really, really, like it can discharge extremely warm water,

like to the point where it's almost uncomfortable. Yeah. It feels weird. I don't know if you've ever done that, but it's cool. I have been cool. But I know like crocodilians often nest are near power plants because of that reason.

Like, they produce warmer water and there's often, like, higher level of biodiversity in the water or two because of that. If it's not too warm, it's too warm, then everything just dies. Right. Yeah. Mike, have you done that? Oh, yeah. So there's actually a cool spot in Hawaii.

I've been to a couple of times where there's, like, this weird big pipe that just pushes out. It's almost like hot tub level warmth of water if you, like, get right up close to it. But that's, so that's actually a thing that manatees are really attracted to, especially during like the colder times of year, the winter, they'll all congregate. Now there's about 10,000 full, I don't know, it's weird to call them full time Florida residents, but 10,000 manatees more or less that are all living and often can be seen congregating around these power plants in the water just to stay warm.

And it's like a really weird conundrum because we're always about let's get to renewable energy, let's shut down these coal power plants and like all the gas and coal stuff. Let's get rid of it and switch to renewable. The manatees are on the other side. They're like, no, let's keep this. Let's keep this rolling. We like this. Yeah, they're like, who cares about polar bears?

Let's get those ocean temperatures rise over. A little chilly today. Man, man, manities are selfish. Oh, man. No wonder Wes hates them. Yeah. I don't hate them. It is weird.

Kind of boring. That, dude, have you seen the video where the manatee like squashes its face up against the aquarium glass? Yeah. You don't like that? That's its best move, though. Like, that's the best thing it can do. Yeah. They're pretty agile swimmers, it turns out.

Mike, have you ever seen a grizzly bear doing anything but just kind of stand in there? Never once. It's either standing there or sitting there. You've seen, like, three grizzly bears. All right. I've never seen one squash its face adorably against the glass in an aquarium. I'll tell you that much. I've seen them do some pretty much.

I'm not getting it. into this argument. All right. Okay. I don't, yeah, it's, yep,

you guys won. All right. Manities are just as dynamic as grizzly bears. I forget why I asked you to rate any of that on the believability scale, but are, do you believe that? Yeah,

I rate it pretty high. Okay. So on like you, you would believe that if you were told. You're like, yeah, yeah, it's very reasonable to believe that that's what's happening.

Yeah. I was just told it and I believe it. Great. So 10 out of 10. me. That's, that was a bad, that was a bad little impromptu category I had. I like it. Okay. This episode is brought to you by Element. Stay hydrated without the sugar, food dye, and other dodgy ingredients found in popular electrolyte and sports drinks. You know who we're talking about. Electrolite deficiency or imbalance can cause headaches, cramps, fatigue, brain fog,

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salty friend and we'll give you your money back. No questions asked. Go to drink element.com slash tooth. That's drinkl mn t.t.com slash tooth. So let's get into some manatey facts. These guys, they're maybe you could classify them. They're kind of like in the rhino camp to me where I think they're like super freaking cool. But like in practice, like you see them in the water. I can see why someone would be like a little underwhelmed, you know? Because rhinos, they're not, they rarely ever charge anything with their horns. Yeah.

Yeah, I would agree with that. Yeah, they're not that dynamic either. But every once in a lot. They're like super dynamic. Every once in a while. Like when Ace Venture came out of one. Yeah. Dynamic.

Let's get to you some facts about manatees. This is one that's. may be commonly known, but I wanted to touch on it. So they're actually distant relatives to elephants. A manatees along with dugongs are descendants of a common ancestor as elephants, woolly mammoths, and mastodons. It's really, yeah, it's really, it's interesting, you know. It seems unlikely, but there's some similarities like nursing mothers, their nipples are

like kind of close to their armpit area. They have like toenails that are reminiscent of that common ancestors. There's some giveaways, if you, are inattentive, if you're a disciple of the manatee, I guess we'll say. They're both hot. That's what you said. Yeah. Disciple.

So, manatee brains are relatively small, but they're smart. They're still pretty smart. They're about the same level of, like, cognitive ability as dolphins. And the Wikipedia article says, they're capable of understanding discriminating tasks. It just doesn't sound very good, right? Discrimination. I don't think that's what they meant by that. I don't know.

They're able to discriminate. That's not. No, like it's clear they're able to like problem, like basic problem solving recognition, long-term memory. And it actually kind of, that's another similarity.

Maybe they have to elephants is their long-term memory is pretty, it's like a pretty robust. Yeah. System of like neural links going on in their tiny little brain. We talked about that in episode how like brain size isn't necessarily indicative of intelligence. It's more like the spindle neurons that they have and the like density of neurons and and a bunch of other things.

So right. That's interesting. Yeah. Yeah. Here's a weird one. So they only have one kind of tooth. They're all molars and they have like four rows of molars like two on each side on like top and bottom.

And they're kind of like conveyor belts where they'll move forward as like the front one gets worn down because they're always chewing on sea grass and stuff under the under the water. So they'll wear down their teeth. And once the one gets to the very front, they'll absorb the roots back up into their body. And then the tooth will kind of just dislodge and fall out. And then the teeth behind it will move forward.

And a new one will kind of drop in at the back. And it's like a really interesting system where it really is just like a slow moving conveyor belt of molars. That's another connection to elephants too, because elephants have this. same. Oh, is that true? Yeah, there you go. That's pretty cool. They average a swim speed of about five miles per hour, moving slow a little slow there. So we can out swim. It's our best. Well, their average, they can, if they put their minds to it, they can really get jetting, but their average speed is about three to five miles per hour when they're just kind of, they don't have any natural

predators. So they don't really have much reason to ever swim very fast. So rarely do they go faster than that, but they can. They live to 60 years old or older and kind of a nice way to identify when manatees are around. If you're kayaking on the surface or like looking from the shore, they leave these, they're referred to as footprints and their oval markings on the top of the water above where they're swimming that are very distinct. So if you see kind of like a ring of ripples, you can tell that's where a manatee is swimming underneath the surface. That's a long time to live just to like float in the water and eat grass. I know.

Like that's a long life for a manatee. 60 years. Yeah. Dude. Yeah. Well, I made this its own little section because I found this part of their anatomy to be the most interesting. So they're breathing.

Unlike other mammals, their lungs stretch pretty much the length of their back. They're like really long, thin lungs. And if you can, we're all scuba divers now. So you can kind of tell why that would be a nice thing to have is just for buoyancy control, able to inflate the lungs all across the length of your body. So you're not tipping forward or backward. It's just you're finding equilibrium a lot easier that way. And when they breathe, the amount of the air exchanged in their lungs is higher than any other mammal.

So when humans breathe, we're actually replacing anywhere from 10 to 15% of the oxygen content in our lungs, unless we take like a really deep breath. Just those shallow breaths that you're taking through your nose or your mouth right now, if you're a mouth breather. that's like 15% maybe yeah every that reminds me of is uh in rogue nation the mission impossible where he oh yeah has the little oxygen meter on his arm somehow it's like telling him exactly how much oxygen is left in his lungs yeah it's a very sophisticated piece of tech it's great when it hit zero all of a sudden he's like how long is he under there for it was like three minutes he was

supposed to be under for three minutes, but he goes, it's longer than that. And I just recently watched it. I'm like, I'm going to try and hold my breath as long as he's under there. Yeah. And I made it like 30 seconds. Yeah. You can, well, you, you're not trained. You're not. No, my oxygen meter just went to do you. Immediately. So, humans were replacing 10 to 15% of the content, oxygen content in their lungs. Manatees, every breath they take, and they only breathe through their nostrils, never through their mouth, they replace 90% of the oxygen content there long. So it's like they bled it all out and then basically fill every last little bit of it in again. And that's just, it's very unusual for mammals, especially one that just kind of like

comes up very briefly, takes a quick breath through its nostrils. But somehow their system is so open and like can ingest so much oxygen so quickly. I don't know exactly what all the mechanisms mechanisms are that allow for that to happen. But I just thought that was like a really cool thing that. That is cool. They're so, such efficient breathers, which makes sense for mammals,

but like even dolphins and other animals like that, they're not doing that as well as many of these are able to. It makes you wonder like what their experience is like underwater too. Like, if it feels like they're holding their breath or if that oxygen is kind of just like dissipating and it doesn't really feel like, you know, like they have the urge to breathe even for a while.

I don't know. It's just interesting to think about what that experience must be like. Yeah. So how long do you think they'd be able to hold their breath? Jeff. Jeff. Yeah, I want Jeff to. I want to see what his ability to discriminate is. How long did David Blaine do it? What was it like? 11 minutes or something? Was it 11 minutes? I think that's about what it was, yeah. So I'll say 23 minutes. Wow, yeah. So 20 minutes is kind of the upper limits of how long they can hold their breath.

I wanted to play a little game here. We're calling it Stings Every Breath You Take, Scale. So I want you guys to guess if these animals can hold their breath for a longer time or a shorter amount of time than Manatees. First up is the dolphin. Wes. Do you think manatees can hold 20 minutes for mantis? I'm going to say less for dolphins. Yeah, you're right.

So dolphins are, they're topping off at about 15 minutes. Jeff, sloths. Let's. Yes, so they're about 15 minutes, which that's less than 20, right? Yeah. West, science, scientists, 15's less than 20. So this is a weird little tangent I went down. There's a weird myth out there that sloths are actually able.

15 minutes for a sloth is still like pretty unexpected. Why are sloths even holding their breath that long? I don't know. It's a weird thing. But there's a like kind of a widespread myth out there that they can hold their breath up to 40 minutes. But it's something about their metabolism, their metabolic rate is so low that they just don't need to breathe, I guess, is kind of the science. That makes sense, but I also, this seems like a thing that would be really hard to test in an ethical way, too. There's some bad studies.

I mean, for ocean animals, it's like, yeah, how often do they breathe? Right. But like for sloth, it's... What do you mean? Yeah. Well, that study was conducted back in the 1940s. The Nazis did it. A little, yeah, fast and loose with the rules back then when it came to ethics and animals and stuff.

When they all showed up over here, they're just like, let's hold these animals underwater. Okay, next one. The Kuvi's, Kuviers beaked whale, Wes. Similar to a dolphin. So I'm going to go ahead and say less, but I feel like it might be more. So this is actually the world record holder for mammals holding their breath. I don't know exactly why they're so good at it, but one was recently recorded as having held its breath for 137 minutes. That's impressive.

It's crazy. Yeah. Tom Cruise can't do that. Right? 137 more or less than 20 minutes, Jeff. That's more. Okay, hippo is the next animal. That's what?

The one I was wondering. I'm going to say more. Hippos can hold longer than 20 minutes? Yeah. They're like five minutes. They're not doing great. They're a weird I know they're not like

technically an aquatic animal But they spend so much time there That you'd think maybe they'd be better at it But no I don't know who we're at But Emperor Penguin I think it's my turn I'm gonna say less

Emperor Penguins can hold their breath For up to 27 minutes It's been found It's weird It's pretty comparable It's weird how There is a rhyme and reason I'm not a scientist

I don't take this the wrong way Anyone out there listening But like I just couldn't really pin down a great rhyme or reason why some animals are so good at it and some are not, you know. Yeah. I think like probably a big part of it is energy expenditure underwater, but that's why I thought it'd be less for emperor penguins because they're usually like zipping around. Yeah. The wolf spider, Jeff. More. Yeah. 40 hours, dude. Are you kidding me?

they enter your suspended animation is what it's called, which is like, sounds nice to be able to just do. I'd love to just like for 40 hours be like, I'm just going to suspend animation for a little bit. I don't want to die. I just want to take a break. And that sounds,

it just sounds really nice. So this is one I didn't find enough hard, reliable science for, but apparently we're just talking about scorpions in our last main episode. They can be submerged up to six days under the water. They have some weird, almost akin to gills the way they breathe. They're called book, lungs or something like that. It's like a mix between normal lungs and gills.

It's a weird middle ground. Yeah. Yeah. I think with some of these arachnids too, it's kind of like a bit of a caveat is that they, some of them bring a bubble down with them. Right. They like are just siphoning air off of that air bubble. Yeah.

So it's almost like they're scuba diving, which I think is really cool. Right. Yeah. But it's cheating. It is cheating. I don't know. The Harry Potter kids could do that and gobble it of fire. They just put a bubble on their head.

Some fucking gilly weed or whatever. Yeah. It's like, I don't know. I like, who's the guy that turned his head into like a shark head? That was the best one. That was Cedric, wasn't it? Was it Cedric? Or was it Cronk or whatever's name it?

Yeah. Cronk. Yeah. Of course he did. So let's get in, Jeff, go ahead, sorry. When you would do like breath holding competitions in a hot tub, did you ever think like, I'll just like use the jet for more air? I did.

Oh, that's so funny. It's probably so good for us. Jeez. There's got to be some study done on kids that did that. Some brain cell count or something. something, I don't know. This episode is brought to you by Miracle Maid. The weather's heating up in your nighttime bedroom temperature has a huge impact on your

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kind of the elephant in the room, pun not intended at all, manatee in the room. Yeah, there's some sad stuff to talk about with manatees. Primarily the boat strikes. This is the big publicized danger that manatees face, and there's not been a good solution found to mitigate this, It's been found that only 4% of adult manatees are devoid of boat strike or watercraft-related scars.

That is crazy. Only 4% of adult manatees have not been hit by a boat or a propeller. Yeah. It's crazy to me. And on any given year, 20 to 25% of reported manatee mortalities or fatalities are attributed to getting hit by boats. And it's this weird combination of like they're a little slow, slow moving, not very agile. They're not like quick reflex animals. They're pretty curious, so they're very willing to get close to these watercraft.

And they also have these very dense bones that don't have any marrow in them. That also helps for like water orientation buoyancy control. And that's helpful for that reason. But it also means that their ribs are really brittle. So if they get hit by a boat, they're not very resistant to like bone fracturing. And when a sea creature, like there's not. really a good healthy way to deal with broken ribs, you know, when you're under the water and you're relying on, you know, it sucks. It just really sucks. The part of the water column they hang out in too is just like prime for getting hit by propellers and stuff. It's not like they're stingrays that are, you know, plastered to the bottom of the C4. They're like hanging out within a few feet of the surface usually. Another danger they faced and this is something that was a little new to me as well. Have you heard of red tides? West, yeah.

So we've talked a little bit about this before with sea lions being infected by toxic algae blooms. The same thing is happening over on the East Coast in Florida where they're called brevatoxins. They happen when in algae bloom, there's just an explosion in algae population, small critters like shrimp and shellfish. They eat all of this toxic algae.

Then bigger critters are eating those smaller ones and bigger animals. It's just kind of a chain reaction where large animals are being contaminated with, they're called brevet toxins, which attach to neurons, which causes loss of motor function and control, paralysis, spasms, and even death. And this isn't limited to just animals either who are feeding on this. Like, manatees, they're eating all of this algae and grass and stuff. So, of course, they're being affected and dying.

But these toxins can actually become aerosolized and airborne. And humans, while they're not dying because of this, can still be pretty dressed. affected to the point where they have to go to the ER. So it's it's kind of a wild situation. We're not really sure exactly what causes it. Pretty sure humans are. They think it's warming. Yeah.

And waters like make it much more common than it used to be. Yep. Yeah. So humans definitely not making it better by any of the stuff we're putting the world through. Like I know, I think it was last year Florida had, I mean, there's parts of Florida that were having like 90 plus degree water days, which is just insane when you think about it. That's like a swimming pool that's a little too warm to like swim around in and for too long.

You know, you like start to sweat in that kind of water. Yeah. So it just makes you think like, of course you're going to start to have new types of algae spring up and all sorts of huge effects to coral reefs and all of that. So it's not a huge surprise. Well, I guess on that downer of a note, we're done with manatee. Any final thoughts you want to talk through about manatees before we move on? So West would have that as believable? Yeah.

It's believable to me. Yeah. So far, nothing that you've said has been very unbelievable when it comes to your facts. Yeah. Okay. Well, we'll see if we can rectify that in the second half of this episode. Jeff, are you believing everything? Are you a doubting Thomas?

Jeff loves being devil's advocate, so I'm curious to hear this. I think Christopher Columbus thought they were hotter than what he said. He's like, I am not attracted to these at all. Yeah. I promise. Whatever, dude. You know, he was retiring to his captain's bunk. You know what he was doing.

It's just nagging manatees up there. Okay. So, let's get into the mermaid mythos. This is cryptozoology. This goes some interesting places, and I found some... It's kind of dumb. It's... I don't want to call it dumb or anyone that believes.

Like, this is kind of a bigfoot situation. It's not as robust. community of mermaid believers as there seems to be around Bigfoot, but it's pretty similar where there's a lot of fun stories about people feeling strongly compelled to like run and swim in the ocean because they're hearing the call of the siren or they found women's bodies washed up on beaches who claim to their dying day that they were mermaids and they were sent to the shore. You know, it's like it's fun to get into. Some people believe it.

I'm not, I'm not personally there yet. But, you know, there's no river long enough that doesn't contain a bend or two. Maybe someday I'll be convinced. Today is not that day. Whenever I find a dead woman on the shore, I just think, oh, cool, a mermaid. Well, I mean, if she insisted she were a mermaid till, like, for the rest of her life, I would be, I don't know. Maybe a wall or two would be broken down in my brain. She's alive in these scenarios?

Well, there have been accounts of women who claim to be mermaids after they've been, like, I don't know how true any part of that story is for any of these women. That's just what I've read on forums online, which nobody lies on the internet. I choose to believe everything. Yeah. Okay, let's get into this. Solid Community of Mermaid Believers. Some very high-profile hoaxes about mermaids that have really shifted public consciousness one way or the other about mermaid.

Do you remember about 10 years ago there was an animal planet mockumentary called Mermaids, the body found. No. It's like this highly publicized and it was fake. And what Animal Planet did was at the end of the documentary and the credits like very briefly for a couple of seconds. They're like this footage is not real, mockumentary, et cetera, et cetera, don't believe this.

But like so they presented it as if it were fact. Yeah. So I mean, I feel like is that a mockumentary or is that more just like they created something that they wanted people to believe was true? That's probably more accurately put, but... They do that a lot with like the megaladone ones and stuff too. What do you think of mockumentaries? A mockumentary to me means like the audience is like kind of supposed to be in on the joke.

Like you kind of know they're like making fun of something. Yeah. What's that documentary now? Or spinal tap. Yeah, all of the Christopher Guess movies and like documentary now. It's like you know going in that it's not supposed to be actual fact. But to me, those Animal Planet and Discovery Channel ones are more like we're trying to trick the audience into believing these things. Right.

Yeah. It's a real shame that we can't tune into the history channel or Animal Planet and trust things anymore. You know? Yeah. The damage is done. And it's a real shame because, I don't know, we're just being conditioned to, like, not believe things. Yeah. And that's just a dangerous place to lead people down.

There should honestly be like a third party. regulatory thing that like assigns a grade to it beforehand that's like scientific accuracy. Yeah. You don't even believe in the Holocaust happened. Who are you talking to right now? If you're talking to me, you're wrong. Yeah. Well, I mean like, I can't even pretend.

Not going to even pretend. Nope. We all believe in that strongly in this podcast. Okay. I've just been watching a bunch of Norm McDonald clips where he's been saying his co-host is a hogust. It's just incredible bit. Anyway, so mermaid mythos.

Almost worldwide, every culture has their version of a mermaid, which makes it, maybe that's why there's such an intrigue surrounding them globally. Like, people aren't conditioned to believe, per se, that they are real, but we're all growing up hearing stories about them, at least, you know, and it's kind of fun to imagine that there's stuff out there, Bigfoot, the Yeti. Nessy, et cetera. Yeah. When you think about it, like, Bigfoot and Mermaid are the two lowest hanging fruit when it comes

to cryptozoology. Like, they're close to humans, but they've, like, kind of turned into part of the animal that we associate most with, like, that terrain, you know? Bigfoot's kind of like half bear, half human or half ape, half human. And Mermaids are like half fish. I don't know. Vampires, it's just like they have two teeth that are touch longer than ours. Yeah.

Yeah. I don't know. I think, I think, like, It doesn't, to me, it's not crazy that every culture has like a mermaid and a big foot. Like, those are the two that seem the easiest to come up with. I don't think vampires are cryptids. Are they? Werewolves?

I think you can make an argument that they are. Yeah. No, but I think you're on to something. That's another good one, Jeff. It's because I think another big reason is there are so many creatures out there, like manatees or like a bear standing on its hind legs. It's like, you can kind of see where someone saw something and they're like, whoa, what was that?

I don't get it with manatees. Well, okay. Christopher Columbus, he was, he was unimpressed, but he was still like, I guess. I don't think I would ever see a manatee and be like, is that half woman? Yeah, but like, yeah, I think you're, I'm not going to play devil's advocate too hard on that one.

No, but I can see being like, oh, there's probably people out there that are half fish, you know, like their tail, they have tails. And then you would be like, oh, a manatee kind of looks like that. Right. A big one. A really hot one. Right. A really hot one. And some of us are into that.

So the one we're going to focus today on the mythological mermaid story is the Japanese legend of Ningyo, also known as the Fiji mermaid. Maybe you've heard of it. Maybe not. And it's actually documented in one of the oldest books in Japanese history, which is kind of a funny little detail to this story. Like, these things are from the start for Japan. It's like these are things people have been talking about. So it's a genderless human-like monkey fish hybrid that was said to taste delicious and protect their owners from illness, which is a real struggle because it's like, I'd want to be protected from illness. But it tastes so good.

I'm so tempted to eat this thing. So I don't know. I don't know how long I could hold out without eating my ningo or my Fiji mermaid. It's like, I don't know, being sick's not that bad. Sometimes it's kind of nice to take a day off. The juice is worth the squeeze sometimes, you know? Right. So, also, when dead Fiji mermaids washed up on shore,

it was seen as a sign of impending oncoming disaster. So as the legend of the Fiji mermaid grew, fake ones would start being made by Japanese fishermen. And what they would do is they would sew the head of a monkey onto the body of a fish. That was the extent of it. And they would put it on display at Japanese carnivals. And one day, the head of the Dutch trading colony,

his name was Jan Kok Blomhoff. That's just incredible. The meter of that name is so pleasant to me. Jan Kok Blomhoff. He offered to buy one of the Fiji mermaids that he saw. And from that day, enterprising Japanese sailors saw a new global business opportunity. They're just cutting monkey heads.

off everywhere they go. So, someone of these Fiji mermaids ended up in London after a Japanese fisherman sold it to a sailor who in turn sold it to an American captain named Samuel Edie's

who spent 6,000 of that day's dollars on it or nearly $100,000 of today's money which is crazy. Imagine his wife when he comes home and he's like, listen. I promised I wasn't going to buy another Fiji

monkey mermaid. So he had a lot more than his wife to worry about because he didn't have that money. He, like, embezzled it from his ship's account because he was like, I'm going to put this on exhibit in London and earn that money back and put it back into the ship's coffers before anyone notices the balances are out of whack, you know? So he took it back to. Right. He was like leveraging. He was risking it all because he believed in this little feed you're made. Watched a motivational video.

that day where it's like like fortune favors the bold and he's like you know what 100,000

I think I see a future so he put it on display in London at a place called turf coffee house and it was said that hundreds of guests

came to view the mermaid each day but when one of the royal surgeons caught wind of what was happening he was like that sounds interesting

I'll go check it out and just like check the veracity of what's going on and he immediately identified it as a fake and he shut the operation down and the public was like oh I don't know like what do you think gave it away And you think it was just like the crudely sewn on head of a monkey Yeah

So the public they lost interest quickly and he kind of dwindled into obscurity But this mermaid's its story is far from over because when Captain Edies died He actually bestowed this mermaid to his son as his inheritance and he was just like I don't I'm don't don't want. I don't want this. So he got in contact with a guy named Moses Kimball who I think was some kind of curator at the Boston Museum, who

just so happened to have a contact named P.T. Barnum. P.T. Barnum. One of the founding members of the Ringling Bros. P.T. Barnum and Bailey Brothers, et cetera, et cetera. And he was all in on this thing. The moment he saw he's like, I need that. I can

make some moves with this mermaid. So he bought it and he showed it to a naturalist to of time just to like, you know, check out exactly what he's got. And again, it was immediately identified as like, this isn't real on the basis that mermaids are not real. Wait, can you explain what it is a little bit more? It's a fish with the head of a monkey sewn on.

Like the fish's head is chopped off and the monkey's head is sewn on to the body of the fish. So how is it lasting this long? It's some kind of, like formaldehyde. formalde. It's getting gross, though. You should Google it right now, Jeff. Just Google Fiji Mermaid and hit images and you'll see some interesting. This is what protected them from getting sick.

Yeah. And it also tastes delicious. I think sometimes we wish our pets could talk to us, but in a way they actually do. They give us a lot of cues on when they're happy or sad or whatever. And that's how I know that my dog loves Ollie. When I give her Ollie, she gets very excited. She has a tail wag, excited little hot. A big grin.

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Dogs deserve the best, and that means fresh, healthy food. Head to ali.com slash tooth, tell them all about your dog and use code tooth to get 60% off your welcome kit when you subscribe today. Plus, they offer a happiness guarantee on the first box, so if you're not completely satisfied, you'll get your money back. that's O-L-L-I-E dot com slash tooth and enter code tooth to get 60% off your first box. I will say, like looking at these Google images, if I were living in the 1800s or whatever and I saw this in a little traveling freak show, I would think it's pretty convincing for a little mermaid. Like I would be like, wow, that actually is a mermaid. Right. Yeah.

Yeah. You know, if you don't know better. It's like a weird little raisin of a fish monkey thing. I don't think I would pay a hundred grand for it. This one has a mustache. The mustache one. Dude, you can buy them still. There's one on sale on eBay or I think like Etsy or something for $8,000.

I was like, oh. I mean, that's a pretty good deal considering eating spent a hundred K on it. The rest of your life after you buy it too. Right. Yeah. So anyway, Barnum, he bought this off of Moses. He was told it's not real by some. kind of scientist. He was like, but Barney, he didn't care. He was like, he was never one to let the

truth get in the way of making some money or putting on a good show. In fact, he stretched the truth even further by advertising it as having long, beautiful, flowing hair and kind of a sultry, seductive look on the posters that he was like hanging up. Now, remember, like we've said, this thing is just like a weird little wrinkled monkey head on the body of a fish. So you can imagine the public walking into this exhibit expecting to see a beautiful mermaid and then they're just seeing this weird little whatever whatever this thing is the crissbring olumbus effect yeah yeah but despite that and maybe even because of that kind of shock this turned into a sensation people were flocking to see this thing and it was just making him money hand over fist the story

what a world yeah i know it just because they probably are like being energetic reduced to animals that actually exist that they didn't know existed like all the time. So then like they just throw this in the mix and they're like, holy shit, look at this one. It is, it's kind of the NFT of that time period. It's Reddit. It's Reddit. Someone just throwing in a made up story to throw everyone off. Dude, there's some people are getting real creative with the combinations.

I heard one about an orangutan head on the body of a salmon and I was like, okay. This is we're getting too deep into this. Like there's all kinds of combinations you can be playing around with. Anyway, the story supposedly the story ends when the original Fiji mermaid owned by Barnum was said to have been destroyed in a fire that burned down the museum in 1865. Although many institutions still claim to have this original mermaid. No one can prove anything.

It's not a real mermaid to begin with, so whatever. But they're still kind of in the public consciousness in their own niche little way. Fiji mermaids are still like Rob Zombie I think bought one or used one in some films that he made and he has it on display in his house. It's still like a thing for cryptozoologists or like cryptid chasers believers that I just thought that was like a really interesting

historical account of a mermaid. They look like something that would haunt your house if you owned it. Yeah. Breathe in that weird like musty rotten scale skin. $8,000. We could pull our money together We could buy one

You've spent so much money on that A hundred thousand dollars dude And then his son He just gave it to his You can tell I'm sure he was on his deathbed Just like thinking it was such a magnificent gesture To like give this to his kid as he was dying And the kid's just like

I don't Damn it Fri G Mermaid Okay so that's the second half of the episode done. Any closing thoughts before we get into categories? Did we get all our feelings out about mermaids and manatees? I feel like we skip something like pretty big here, which is, I think part of the reason manatees were associated with mermaids is that early sailors, like, thought they could have sex with them. Well, isn't there a fact that like their vagina is the most

similar to like a woman, human woman's vagina? I've read that and I don't know if it's true or not, but maybe we'll do that in episode too that never came up in my i read a lot of accounts and i never heard any vaginal um details being expounded upon that at least was a myth that used to get passed around yeah um and that's like that was supposedly linked to their mermaid like myth too oh i'd never heard that actually but that very much could have just been again like a reddit myth or something that just kind of popped up because they were associated with mermaids people like Yeah. You know, created that.

But I had always heard that, that they were like an object of lust for some of these sailors that had been at sea for too long. For so long that there's just anything that looks even remotely human-like that they can yet. Well, yeah. Well, anyway. Science. I'm glad we didn't dive too. Too deep into that. Science is primarily observation, right?

So maybe we just take a little field trip and start peeping under their skirts. I definitely don't need to do that. All right. It's like Wes always says, you know, if you have enough beers, it three becomes an eight. I don't always say that. You say that. Never said that once in my life.

All right. Yeah, let's go to categories. Let's go to categories then. The first one, Wes is going first, of course. I'm not. Favorite case of something that sounded or looked way more amazing than it actually ended up being. Do you have an answer for that one, Jeff?

Hold on. I'll go first. Yeah. One that I thought of was electric vehicles. Because I feel like for so long, it was like, man, when are we going to have electric vehicles? Like, when are they going to be launched? You know, they're going to change the world. They're going to make everything so much better.

And when they were finally created now that they're, you know, like much more commonplace, there seems to be such a huge tradeoff in the energy requirements to produce the batteries and produce the actual vehicles to the point where they're like not you have to drive them for so long to where you break even on like your your energy consumption on an electric vehicle that they're really not what I always pictured them being as far as like saving us from our energy crisis right and I just wanted to quickly say like the opposite of that something that I think we view as being really bad but it's actually really great is nuclear power where there's this huge public sentiment about how bad it is because of the disasters we had in the past and how hard it used to be to clean up the toxins

from producing nuclear power. And it's so clean now and it's so efficient that it could literally like change the way that we use energy. But because of that negative stigma that we already developed, it isn't used, you know, at scale. And it really should be. So anyway. Every day gets harder for Jeff not to nuke someone. Yeah. It's becoming much more available. That seems to be a common sentiment in the world. Manities, dude, manatees are pissed. Any manatee listening right now, it's like, we want those coal power plants still. We don't like that nuclear stuff.

But they have that tight little window because if it gets too warm, then they get all that red bloom. True. Then they're pissed about that, too. They're just mad. They need to chill out. Jeff, you find something good? Yeah. So, wait, so it's a case of something that sounded and looked way more amazing than it is.

Then it ended up being, yeah. So I thought of like fast food because they always do such a good job advertising and making you want something. My number one all time was when Krispy Cream brought out shakes. Because like at that time, Krispy Cream was like my number one favorite donut. And like it was still like relatively new, especially when it came to Montana. It was like exciting. So then I was like, oh my God, they're making shakes. That has to be like the best thing ever made.

And it's just way too sweet and so gross. And as a backup, I also had, this is just a guess, but I think sex robots. I don't think people actually, like the idea of a sex robot, I can see how some people got sold on that, you know, but I don't think it like adds up to what they wanted. You saw companion, right? That does not end well. Yeah, it didn't. And Jack, he was being, he was a good owner. He was, I saw, I saw, ex-Macki.

Owner is a bad word. Yeah, ex-Machina was another one. Yeah, you know, there hasn't been a real positive sex robot. Trojers? Yeah. We need to change that narrative, I think. I'm going to go with Michael Phelps racing the shark. That was, that was nonsense.

I got excited for that, too. Yeah, was it? And in a similar vein, any Floyd Mayweather fight, but specifically the Manny Pachia one. Like, I hadn't been interested in a boxing match since, like, Lennox Lewis, and that one pulled me in, I was ready to pay money to watch it,

and it was just the worst fight. That's how I am with, like, every Jake Paul. Jake Paul. Although, he hasn't knocked a few people out. Yeah, I want to see him get knocked out, though. That's why they're always so disappointing to me. Like, I thought he's going to get his ass kicked by Tyson. Tyson's, like, 90 years old.

I know. You know, I had a runner-up. too and it's it's one that's going to betray my age a little bit but uh the nintendo glove the power glove like in the movie the wizard when the kid used it it was like this is the sickest thing nintendo's ever done it's so bad and it ended up just being like a total flop and impossible to use but it seems so cool bill put that sound clip in yeah i love the power glove it's so bad it's so bad. Next category, your favorite pop culture, manatee, do gong, or mermaid? I really wanted to find a manatee for this one, but I just, like, couldn't think I won.

So I don't get the thing with mermaids. I know they're really popular. I think 100% woman's a lot hotter than 50% woman, 50% fish. So I don't really get the hype. So I just went with the movie Nice Guys, like Ryan Gossens at the party all drunk and at the bar they have like the fake mermaid and he keeps like talking about it and he like goes in the tank with them and stuff. Right.

Oh man. There's one that I came up with for Manatees that I liked, uh, which was South Park and I actually my feelings for South Park have really decreased like I used to really like it but it's become like way too of a kind of like a acerbic just like I think they

it's one of those shows where it's like they make fun of everyone so it feels like they don't believe in anything and I think it's had kind of a negative effect on people but they had an episode I think it was like a multi-part episode where it was like very anti-family guy and they learned that the way that family guy creates their jokes was manatees just randomly selecting like a noun and a verb and a situation and combining them and that was like how family guy produced their humor and like you know no no like hate to people that Love Family Guy, I never got into that show or any of the Seth McFarland stuff, really. Because the humor was always just like too like random and meaningless for me.

And so it really, that one like really scratched a spot for me where I was like, yes, this is exactly how I feel about this show. So that was my pick. I had a runner up too, but I'm going to let you go first, Mike, in case you took it. Probably not. So there was, my sister used to be really into veggie tales. So every once in a while my mom would play like the Veggie Tales CD in the car

And there's a song called Barbara Manatee And I mean it's just like a kid's song, you know But for some reason it made my mom laugh so hard And she wasn't someone that ever really laughed with any real mirth But this cracked her up And I was watching it this morning before we started recording And it's like it's pretty it's kind of a funny Ludicrous kind of set up

It's about like a weird special agent I have to like go off and do something and he's leaving his manatee girlfriend behind because she can't speak French but then she learns to speak French but she won't go with him unless he comes to the ball with her but he can't dance so it's so stupid but it really is just like a silly little thing that made my mom laugh so hard your mom's stupid he Spichytale's the one that has like the kind of like Christian slant to it I think it was yeah I didn't learn that till like much later, but I think it was like a, yeah, they tried to backdoor in a lot of Christian and maybe even front door a lot of times. I don't know. I never watched it, but

silly songs with Larry. I think he was like a pickle or a cucumber or something. He was saying. You think he, do you think he could backdoor his manatee girlfriend? I think he, they've got the anatomy. Is that just front door? I think it's very similar their backdoor to humans. Interesting. Right. Those back doors are pretty similar. Okay. So this is one I just... Wait, my runner up...

Oh, yeah, runner up. It was the mermaid from Cabin in the Woods, which, like, I thought that payoff was great. It's one that you kind of wait the whole movie for, and then there's a great... Murman, right? Murman from Zoolander. Zoolander's a good one. Yeah. We didn't do any dugong stuff, and maybe that's for another episode, but I did think of the Kung Fu Dugongs from One Piece,

where Luffy's, like, teaching them all how to fight. Yeah. Those guys are so good. For people who doggong stuff. don't know what a dugong is it's essentially like the Australian version of a manatee they're a little bit different but they yeah they have a fluked tail whereas manatees have like the paddle tail that's like the big differentiator but they are different yeah okay what musical instrument do you think this animal uh would play if they were in an orchestra or a band or what i want to hear your

answers that you came up with this question so i i envision them on the turn table you know with their flippers on like the two records. And they don't really have a neck. And I always envision like mix Master Mike with the Beastie Boys with the headphones. Yeah, doing his little turns. So yeah, I think they're on the turntable. I think every band could use one. I'm going to try to say this as sensitively as possible.

I think there's an instrument out there that is often played by people by like more rotund people. And it's the tuba. Like I can't picture a tuba player and not picture them being like. Like on the heavier side. So I very much think that a manatee would play the tuba. Plus that lung capacity. They got to be on a woodwind. That's a good point.

Yeah. Or like a bassoon or something. Yeah. That's a good point. I went with the... Tubas aren't woodwinds. The recorder. That's actually great.

That's almost perfect. That's better than mine. That is good. It's back when I thought they were kind of dumb, though. They still kind of look. a little dumb. So like with a recorder, it just, the image works perfectly. Okay. Um, great. We should, we should make a manatee band. Turntable or a recorder in a tuba. Hermonica would be a good answer to me. I thought of harmonica because they kind of have like the big mustache look in the lungs.

Yeah. Okay. Last category. This one I just kind of left open to you. Who do you think someone that's got the sauce right now? I'm not even going to explain what that means to me. I just want you to tell me who you think's got some sauce on them right now who's got the sauce Jeff you on me I got a I got a few okay Jeff's got his finger on the pulse too let's go yeah yeah first I'll go with that company Paneteer the like C-Ail-Leteer no yeah palatteer because I fucking hate palenture because like if they met me like if I was like going to a bathroom and that guy like comes up to me he would know he would probably have like glasses tell him everything about me He would like know I had a disorderly conduct in college.

He'd know I've had two ass surgeries. He'd know I'd watch like 7,000 hours of One Piece, so we'd be like instant friends. Because they're surveilling all of my information already. Yeah. So that's sweet. He's got some real. He's got some sauce. Caitlin Clark.

Is this like Satan that's saying he has some sauce? Caitlin Clark, Jeff. Growing up, you know, bad taste. but all the sports stuff I'd watch, WMBA was always like the butt of everyone's joke, right? The W1 NBA is more entertaining than the NBA right now. And like I give Caitlin Clark, they all deserve credit for it. But Caitlin Clark is like, to me, like watching Steph Curry, who's my favorite athlete I've ever watched.

It's just like you have to tune in to every game because you don't know what's going to happen. And it's so much fun. So I think she's got a lot of juice right now. She got in a fight. Did you see that? She gets in fights. It's great. Because like all the other, well, not all the other, but like a lot of the other players

are kind of mad that she's getting so much attention. So then I think they like go extra hard at her. And then she doesn't stand. It's, it's been entertaining. I also feel like it's so rare that a college athlete that has that much hype like lives up to it when they go up to pros. And she like has. Yeah.

For sure. And then I also want to go with the RISL He's got some sauce. Ristler's got a lot of juice. I think he's at peak juice. I don't think he can like age into it very well. I think he's got milk it. You know,

Big Justice and AJ, the boom guys. Yeah. I think they're falling, they're going down and Rizzler's still going up. Rizzler's finding out like, you know what? I don't need to hang out with this 55 year old dad.

I'm not related to. Like I'm famous enough as it is, but he was like getting invited to Nick's games. He's like, just all he has to do is like rub his chin. Yeah. So I've done a pretty good job of avoiding any kind of. I didn't know who this kid was. I didn't know what he looked like, how old he was.

I like this YouTube channel. It's like the sneaker shopping on complex where rappers like go and buy shoes or athletes or whoever. It's a fun series to me. And recently I watched the one where the Rizzler showed up. he was sneaker shopping with complex. He's eight years old. He's like an eight year old kid. He wears size three.

I was like, what is this kid doing? Yeah. How is this happening? Where are his parents? It's so crazy. He's got it. He is electric.

He's got the sauce. I picked, I picked Timmy Salomey. Every movie he's done recently, he is just nailed. His performances are great. His interviews are like so good. And he seems like a normal person

that hasn't just like completely detached from reality. It's not just like movies. Like the music that he's produced for these movies, everything I see from him, it's like, this is just one of those people who is good at everything he does. And that it's kind of annoying in a way. But also, I feel like the way that he was kind of launched to us over time, like doing lots of art house movies and now bigger budget, it's easy to kind of embrace him and be like, yeah, this is our guy.

He's got the sauce. We love him. The Knicks games really, like, showed how famous he is, I think, because it's just like, everyone was just like Timothy Shalameh's court side. And, like, he was literally sitting next to Miles Teller one game. They, like, would cut him out of the frame when they were, like, showing, like, Timothy's reaction and everything. But there was a, there was a game, too, where they won. He really is the Moab, Moabib. What is it in Doom?

Yeah. Dib. Yeah. There was one of those games where he went out afterward and was like celebrating with everyone, like let them pull him out of his car. And to me, I just, I can appreciate that. Like that's someone that still understands human connection and they're not just, they don't feel like they're above it.

So for me, he's got the sauce. I'll always, no matter what happens, I really like him. But he won my heart when years ago I learned he started a business when he was younger of customizing Nintendo 64 controllers. And I was like, man, if I were cooler, I would have done that. Yeah. I just, I thought that was a really endearing kind of business venture to go on. Yeah, I feel like I would have hated him in high school.

Sure. Yeah. But I like him now. Yeah. You've always been a huge Kendall Jenner fan ever since he, like, stopped the protest, Wes. Like the Pepsi. Touching the Pepsi thing. Not, that, that is, that is one mark against him.

But, you know. Everyone has their Kardashian phase. Yeah. Yeah. It's his turn. I'm just going to do a quick little sauce alert. I'm not saying he's got the sauce all the way yet. But yesterday, clips, they reformed Pusha T rapper. Ooh, yeah.

Might have just started the next big rap beef with Travis Scott. Okay. We're not sure. All I know is that when Pusha gets involved, he's not playing. When he, he released maybe the most scathing distract since Ether. on Story of Adidon, Drake, before Kendrick was even in the picture, really, disson on Drake. Pusha killed him. He just annihilated him.

So now Travis got up next maybe. See if he said Travis, he's like, we got the boys jacking. That's what he responded by saying. The boys are jacking. I don't know what that means. So you're saying Push-a-T has the sauce? I would, yeah. You think they're bigger than MGK and M&M?

I think that was, I think so. I do. Well, mostly I'm just excited clips are back. Ferell's producing again. It's been like 15 years since their last album, and I just love those guys. Malice. I think he's back to Malice.

He's not no malice anymore. He's malicious again, I guess. But for me, real sauce. I think Ryan Coogler's got the sauce, at least for me. I think after Sinners, I don't care. He's going to have to put out like six or seven bad movies in a row before I stop being excited to see whatever he does next.

because he's just been, he's been killing it. So Ryan Coogler's my guy for now. Didn't he do the Creed movies? He did the first one. He did the first one. The one that's worth watching. Not my favorite, but. Well, that's an interesting, that's interesting,

because you don't like Michael B. Jordan. I know, he keeps using that's Coogler's guy. It's like he's going to be in all of his movie. Black Panther. It's like awesome. It's like De Niro and Scorsese. Yeah. I'm just saying, I think he's,

got a vision that is both accessible but also artistic in a way that's not normal and that's enlightening and important in our day and age. And that's just what I've got to say about old Googler and he's dope. Okay. I think that's it for categories. Do we have any listener questions? Yeah, I got it come. Let's do them. Thanks everyone for sending him in. I think you all know, like our mine and Jeff's mom has been helping us organize Patreon inbox. So thanks for being so nice to her. I was thinking now that we can have like little threads on Patreon, we should just do the questions. Like, right? Where we can just have it on Patreon and you guys can read, submit your questions on there.

Yeah. It'll be easier for us to just scan through that. I believe I already set up like a thread for questions, but if not, I'll do that right after we're done recording. Just so, but that's a good thing to let everyone know exists. So Kylie wanted to say, hi there, do you apply the same rules of. anthropomorphizing wildlife to orcas, it's been proven that they have emotional and intellectual intelligence and that they do things like play with food and exact vengeance. Do you think that that means they deserve a different level of understanding and respect

when it comes to anthropomorphizing? No. You don't think intelligence has to do with it? Like, if they can have, because like the more intelligent they are, they probably have more concepts of emotions. Yeah, but like we're still using words like probably and like they may, you know, like I think just because I think I don't think saying because an animal plays means we can anthropomorphize it. Because like most animals play. We know that. But we don't know necessarily like the like dopamine

and every like the feelings they're getting from that play is what we can't ever say. Like that's that's to me where the line has to be drawn is like we can never. say what is happening to that animal emotionally because of its behavior like no matter what devil's advocate you don't you think animals who are closer to human intelligence probably have like more similar emotions to humans than some dumb ant or something yeah i think i think that's totally i think that is totally okay to say like these animals are probably experiencing life in a more similar way to us than an insect, but you can't, that's not anthropomorphizing. Anthropomorphizing is when you say, oh, that orca is super happy right now because it's playing

with that salmon. Yeah, but like, I guess like, wouldn't it be more correct to say like an orca is like really angry at some specific boat as to like a spider is really angry at like a book or something? You know what I mean? Newspaper roll. I think we can take better guesses at mammals that have like a higher level intelligence and stuff at what they're feeling. I think you're right in that those guesses can be made more accurately. But we can never fully say what they are experiencing.

We can never fully ascribe our emotions to other animals because we never know. And like for all we know, bees are experiencing heightened emotions and love and all these different things. But we don't know. Like we just don't know. So that's what I don't like about anthropomorphizing. All right. No, great answer. I was just, you know, I thought it was a good question. It is a good question, for sure.

All right, so Allie Cat asks, I have a question for Jeff. Would you rather never see any sports ever again or never see an animal in the wild again ever again? I do watch a lot of sports. I would probably never watch sports again, though. Sports are getting, losing it a little bit for me. I feel like it's becoming less about like proving you're the best. more about just like gaming the system and then having like a bigger market advertising all over everything and like so many commercial breaks yeah like i'm getting way

more into like continual sports like tennis or like i even like watching hockey but you know unfettered capitalism just slowly ruining everything in our lives yeah yeah i will quickly sorry just to go back on something very quickly just so everyone knows i don't think it's wrong to anthropomorphize if you're just like talking about animals. I think it's wrong for like researchers to do it, but I don't think it's wrong for people to do it. So I don't want people to think that that's like bad. I think too, like, I don't want to speak for you,

but I do think you kind of agree with what they were saying. I just don't think you like the word anthropomorphize because like I think it is better to anthropomorphize smarter animals than like dumber animals. What I agree with. It makes more sense to do it. What I agree with is that if you're on a boat and you're just a person enjoying a bow ride and you see an orca and it jumps through the air and does a flip, you could say like, man, that looked really fun, you know. But like if you're a researcher and you're researching orcas and you say, this orca has a little salmon hat because it thinks it's cute, then like you aren't doing a good job of like creating science, you know?

And so that's, I just think there's a line for how much we can anthropomorphize within science and research. That's true. I'll agree with that. Okay. Yeah. Cheers to that. Yeah. All right.

So Max Jones Gardner wants to know it's a West, Westian. Oh, I like that. Yeah. A Westian. Five years later, we came up like that. And me and West can, or me and Mike can answer, too, if we have an opinion. But he's from Australia and he says. that they have the platypus, which has long been considered one of the, one of Mother Nature's

like most oddball animals. So in North America, what's our most oddball animal? I'd say opossums for like well-known animals. They kind of just are like a weird animal that doesn't seem like they really fit in America to me. It's they seem much more like an Australian animal to me, like a marsupial, naked tail, weird-faced. Just like, I don't know, let me think a little bit more. Do they have like a shell that protects them kind of like a penguin?

No, no. So like another good one would be an armadillo. Armadillo is a really strange. That's a good one. That's a strange oddball animal. Man, there's one that I'm forgetting that it's going to later, like in two hours, I'm going to be like, damn it, why do I say this? Manatees, honestly, not a bad choice.

Manatees are a real weird thing. I don't think moose are, like, they have that dangly thing on their neck, like a, like a, a turkey and then they have like they're just like a little bit weird i will i will say this though i think um monotrems which are like platypus and echidnas mammals that lay eggs i don't think there's anything weirder than them like i think the platypus is maybe the weirdest animal on her yeah we don't have like it's weird so it's a high bar but we have some weird ones yeah i think alligators if you really are just objectively taking a that back, it's like kind of crazy that those exist.

Yeah. Just like big, chomping, scaly, hard dinosaur animals. Yeah. Yeah. I would probably say Armadillo, though. Armadillos are pretty weird. Yeah. I like Armadillos.

The thing about alligators, like, I agree, but like, there's just so many crocodilian that they're wide spread. Yeah. That's true. And they've been around for so long. Good question. True that. Max.

That's all I got. All right. Great. Thanks for the questions. Thanks for listening to me. Talk about stuff. Thanks, Mike. That was a fun one.

Sure. Yeah. Oh, sure, bud. Yeah. Oh, sure there, bud. The Fiji mermaid thing to me is very fascinating. I'm going to spend some more time on that for sure. Spend some money on it.

Yeah. Get you one for your birthday. We should raise some money to buy one. We don't need to raise money for animal conservation. Let's buy mermaids. Right. Yeah, no, this is a fun one to put together. I've been thinking about manatees a lot, so I'm glad to share a little bit of

knowledge about them. Great. Thanks, Frank. We'll see ya. See ya. Love it. Love you guys.