Tooth & Claw: True Stories of Animal Attacks - The Dangers of Hunting Cape Buffalo - A Roundup of Recent Animal Encounter Headlines Including a Really Dumb Tonia Haddix Update, the Japanese Bear Safety Drill, and More

Episode Date: August 25, 2025

The guys talk about a bunch of recent animal-related headlines they thought would be educational, entertaining, or otherwise worth discussing. Stay safe out there! Watch here: https://youtu.be/aP8f4m_VQkw ~~ Hims: To get simple, online access to personalized, affordable care for ED, Hair Loss, Weight Loss, and more, visit http://Hims.com/tooth Miracle Made: 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 Ollie Pet Food: Take the online quiz and introduce Ollie to your pet. Visit https://www.ollie.com/tooth for 60% off your first box of meals! #ToKnowThemIsToLoveThem Rocket Money: Cancel your unwanted subscriptions and reach your financial goals faster with Rocket Money. Go to http://RocketMoney.com/claw today. ~~ 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

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Register today at richfield, Utah.com. Hello, listeners, we are Tooth and Claw Podcast. We have our wildlife biologist, Wes Larson. I am his younger brother, Jeff Larson. And then we have Mike, who is once again our editor. So shout out Mike. And he's not happy about it. I can't wait to stop editing again.

Get back here, Bill. You're rehired. Bill, thank you for all your help. Bill, it's become clear to us that if we didn't hire you, the podcast would have been over by now. Yeah, Mike would have, I don't know. I think he would, I think he would just move to another country and not tell anyone. We just wouldn't ever hear from him again.

Back on the menu, boys. It's back on the menu. Well, we love you, Mike. Yeah, hopefully, like, we stay at a point where, like, we're a successful podcast, but not, like, super successful, because then Mike's gone once he gets enough equity. So I'm thinking he has enough money. Yeah. Yeah, that's like, that's like 20 grand for Mike and he's done.

You guys could probably buy me out at a really nice price right now. Like right now? Right now. Yeah, this is the moment. That's kind of funny because I was like really hustling to get ready to record because I realized I had to go turn off some sprinklers and stuff. And right as I was coming in to the shed, I think Jesse could pick up that I was like behind schedule and she could ask me for something in that.

moment and I would say yes because she came up and asked me if I could pay for a new horse trailer and that she would pay me back and normally I stay out of like all horse things and I just was like yeah sure whatever we got to record so that's a big one she literally is going to come like slip a check in under the that I have to sign as we're recording man which is silly yeah smart good move you just let her buy some pigs too right yeah which was my other like when we got our property, I said, hey, the one animal I don't ever want to have is pigs because they smell and I just am not a fan. But then she found some animals you'd rather not have more than pigs too, right?

Yeah, like goats, other things. But it's been... Elephants. We've been here now like three years and she's just gradually been chipping away at me. And finally, she said if I put them in the very far corner, can we have them? And I said, yes, but it's conditional. Like if I ever smell them, they're gone. And they're meat pigs too.

We're going to eat them at the end of the year. So they'll only be here a few months. Yeah. You don't think you'll get too attached a la Nicholas Cage and pig. I could go kill both of those pigs right now and I wouldn't feel a thing. Oh, geez. Actually, I would. I hate the guy who won't kill bugs anymore.

I've been thinking about that a lot, actually, like why that ended up being my resolution. Yeah. And I just think it's like there's been so much death in the world that, I just can't handle anymore. Me and Jeff went fishing recently, and we caught a lot of cutthroat. And at the end of it, I was kind of like, I don't know if I can fish anymore even. Because I just, and not that we were killing them, but just like hurting them even. I kind of am, I'm just, I'm pretty sensitive to that stuff right now.

So anyway, sorry that took a serious turn. No, it sounds like you meat pigs are turning into just pig pigs. Well, I'm not, I'm not doing any of that. Jesse's going to take them to someone that's going to butcher them. Anyway, I prefer store-bought bacon, which is kind of silly, but I do. How often do you have other bacon? Pretty gosh-darn often. Okay.

I don't think I've ever had non-store-bought bacon. I don't think I have either. We buy pigs meat from like farmers, local farmers. But like not at a store. They have like a trench coat in a back alley they're dealing out of. Yeah, you meet them in like parking lots. It's last time we met them in, like, the grocery store parking lot and got pigs, like, pig meat from their cooler. Yeah.

Okay. So it's not at the store. Anywho. Yeah. You can't leave, dude. You're like our best friend, too. If you just left, that would suck. Am I?

Are we just, like, holding on to past emotions? No, I'm serious. We're professional. We've been professional. We're like business partners at this point, you know? Just because you have, Mike, let's go play some volleyball, you know? Never happened. We go to movies.

We're going on a trip. Yeah. You would for sure say no. I know. That's how I know I'm your friend. That's true. I don't ask you those things. You're the best friend I think I may ever have had because you pretty quickly stopped inviting

me to do things with you. Yeah. Exactly. So I'd sneak in into that water park in winter, which was a good one. I was telling Jesse the other day that if I could have anyone moved, to like Missoula it would be the two of you and Brent out of all my friends so yeah make a little like dude perfect compound out there raise pigs by horse trailers killer on live yeah and not even feel bad at all not even feel not even not even not

feel bad but feel nothing is we'll tell people if people don't sign up for patreon we'll kill pigs and broadcast it yeah I don't I take that back I I can't kill without feeling something. So yeah, the pigs would, I'd probably be like in a dark hole for a while. Well, I'm excited to meet them. Yeah. I'm going to try to sit on them like I always do Kevin. That's fine.

You can do whatever you want with these pigs. I'm going to go first. It's our kind of bi-monthly news episode. I don't know. It's about every six weeks we do one of these. There's no rules. No, we don't have rules. It's about every four or five episodes on average.

And I'm excited. We had some good stories this summer. and my first one's actually quite sad depending on your perspective, or for some people, they're getting a lot of joy out of this one, which we're going to talk about a little bit. This is about a trophy hunter that was killed by an African Cape Buffalo. This guy's name was Asher Watkins. He was a real estate magnet from Texas,

a multimillionaire that owned properties in Texas, Colorado, and Arkansas. Magnet? He recently met his end at the horns of an African Cape Buffalo on August 3rd. in Limpopo, South Africa. He died? Yeah, he died. Dang. So there's been a lot of social media attention about this because he was a trophy

hunter. He had photos with himself and a lot of dead critters like mountain lions. There's one with him and tons of dead ducks, a huge deer. And often when someone like this gets killed while hunting, there are going to be a lot of posts congratulating the buffalo or the lion or whatever forgot the guy or the woman. And sometimes, in my opinion, I do think that feels a little gross to me. But I'm going to talk about the story and then we can talk about that reaction and we can all weigh in on it after the story. All right. So first of all, I just want to say, South Africa is

really interesting when it comes to where their wildlife is located and how everything is arranged. And that's the same for these big game hunts. So what this very likely was, was like a private game ranch where it could be very big. I don't know how big it was, but essentially this game ranch will have like, it'll be all fenced in, but really big. They invite people to either come on safari or to hunt. And with hunters, they'll often even like have pictures of the animal they want that they'll send them and the hunter can like say, I want to kill that one. And then when they show up, they'll take them and they will find that specific animal in that game reserve and allow the hunter to kill it. So it's kind of, it's very like boutique and it's almost like you're

picking out your trophy before you even shoot it. I'm not exactly sure that's how this place operates, but I'm pretty confident. That's what it was. So he essentially, this guy Watkins knew he was going to get a big buffalo. Like he knew that he would come home with this trophy. It's likely he even picked the one out. And he knew that finding it was probably going to be somewhat easy. But as we know about Cape Buffalo, they're not always easy to kill. This is a pretty robust animal. They are sometimes considered the most dangerous animals in Africa. And I don't necessarily disagree with that, but we've talked about this before.

I do think we should define the difference between deadly and dangerous. There are definitely animals in Africa that are more deadly. Crocodiles kill more people, snakes kill more people, elephants kill more people. But dangerous, like if you're going to have one of those animals, Cape Buffalo might be the worst one in Africa to like corner and be in a bad situation with. They're incredibly defensive animals. Yeah. Because lions are always trying to jump on their backs and stuff.

They got to be tough. Yeah, they got to be tough. Exactly. And hippos are too smart to be backed into a corner in the first place. Yeah. Hippos are another one. I mean, hippos are ones that are very defensive slash aggressive animals. But I do think when it comes to like, if you're in a cage,

match with one of these animals. Cape Buffalo's probably top of the list of the one you don't want to be facing down. Maybe. What would be the hardest animal to back into a corner, do you think? Like a bird probably? A jellyfish, maybe. Now, that'd be really easy, huh? On land, it'd be tough because you'd have to, like, put them there and you don't want to touch

those guys. A swarm of bees. Maybe the way to put it would be, like, if you round a corner and an animal is, like, right around the corner from you, this is, like, one of the ones you. you'd least want to see. Right. Because there's a lot of them that will just run away, and this one likely charge you.

So, yeah. What if the Cape Buffalo painted itself into the corner? Is it still going to get like all pissed and dangerous? Like that goite video. Huh? Someone I used to know. Got ya? Got ye?

Whatever. Got ye? I don't know how to say it either. I think you're right. Goit. They think it does. So it has a good defense. Like, I was cornered.

What you want me to do? Yeah. But secretly it wanted to. You meant like paint the floor. Especially if the paints red. Yeah. I get what you're saying. That's what painted into a corner man.

I was thinking of like it camouflaging itself with the paint. Oh, that's a good way of too. They'd be extra dangerous because you wouldn't be able to see it very well. Well, I don't think this one did it. But it is hunting them is a dangerous thing to do in cornering them. And apparently that's what happened on August 3rd. Watkins was with a hunter from the company that he had contracted. so they had a professional hunter along with him,

and then a tracker, all three of these guys, were stalking this buffalo on foot when it surprised them and immediately gored and killed Watkins on the spot. The buffalo was shot by this professional hunter, but the damage was done, Waukins was dead. The internet really had a field day with this, and this is what I think we should talk about a little bit.

For me, I don't love trophy hunting. I think when people kill wild animals for food, I think that's kind of the best case scenario if you're going to eat meat because the animal gets to live a good life out in the wild. It gets killed humanely. You get your meat. You have a connection to your food. So for me, hunting for food I see is a good thing. I don't like killing things, so I have a hard time doing it.

But I don't think it's bad. But I do have issue with trophy hunting. I think if you're killing something just to put it on your wall, you should take some time to really think about what that means, you know? For sure. I think it's kind of nice to just recently how much the public perspective of that has changed. Yeah. People didn't really understand a lot about trophy hunting 20 years ago or 30 years ago. So they just see like someone had all these cool, dangerous looking animals and it's like, oh, this guy's like a real man.

Yeah. Now that we understand it better, it's like, okay, you're kind of a tool. Yeah. It's like I would much rather see a beautiful photo that you took of that animal on. your wall than the animal itself. You're the real man. That's not what I'm saying. But the other thing about trophy hunting, and this is like, especially with these large

African animals and the big five, is that a big part of this for these people is this element of danger, you know? Yeah, that's why it's hard for me to feel too bad for him. And it's like he wanted to kill a Cape Buffalo because he knows their reputation. He knows that this is like a badass. animal that he wants on his wall. And if they didn't kill, like, the occasional hunter, then it wouldn't be that, like, element of danger wouldn't be there anymore.

So I do think this is, like, kind of the risk these guys are taking and that's part of the deal. So I don't, personally, I don't really feel bad for this guy. I feel really, really bad for his family, though. Like, they don't have any control over this. They just lost someone that they deeply love and care about. And he has a 16-year-old daughter and losing someone that abruptly. and then having the whole world laugh at it has to be really, really hard, you know. And I hope she's finding some good outlets and the rest of his family is finding some good

outlets for their grief and for their healing. So, yeah, I don't necessarily feel bad for Watkins, but I do feel terrible for his family. I also, I don't mean to play devil's advocate really in any meaningful way for the man himself, but it's not, this is all within the boundaries of legality. Like, this isn't like a black market thing that's happening. And are these hunts... He wasn't doing anything wrong. Are they being employed as a method of keeping populations in check or anything?

Again, that's like gray area. And I don't want to make any excuses for him. But like, this guy wasn't technically doing anything wrong, per se, in like heavy quotations. At some point, we're going to do a whole episode on like on hunters that got smoked by trophy animals and like talk about the kind of ethics of trophy hunting. Because there are really good arguments on both sides for, like, its use. I will say that it's estimated that hunting brings about $169 million to the South African economy each year. But the safari industry brings several billion dollars to their economy each year.

So there's a big argument for, like, these animals all have more value alive. But also with like Cape Buffalo, there's plenty for both. Like, you can have hunters. you can have the safari industry. For me, it's a tricky issue. It just really is. But so, yeah, there's some arguments there. Yeah, I think, like, morally he's fine.

Like, he didn't do anything, like, morally corrupt. He didn't do anything that, like, makes it feel like he deserved to be killed. Yeah. But what I would say is, like, these trophy hunters do love to brag about killing dangerous animals. And, like, they think it's cool. and their community thinks it's cool. So, like, there is a dark humor in that, like, oh, you wanted to go kill a dangerous animal and you got killed.

Yeah. And, like, especially where our weapons are just so advanced and, like, they just pull up in a truck and step out and shoot these with a gun that, like, I don't know. Yeah. That's what confuses me about this story, too, is I know these animals are really fast and really powerful, but there's got to be some kind of dereliction of duty on some. Someone's part if they're close enough or in a compromise. They have guns, like long-ranged weaponry.

It seems like they shouldn't really ever be in danger of getting gourd like that. I think for these, I think for a lot of these people, they don't want to just pull up and take a shot from the back of a Jeep. Like they don't want to get there and 10 minutes later. They see their animal and they shoot it and it's dead. That doesn't have any thrill for them. So I think, again, like part of the appeal of these kind of hunts is like we are going to stalk Cape Buffalo on foot.

This is dangerous. Because that's the story that they can. bring home like I stocked it on foot I shot it at 20 yards it turned in charge like they want a story to tell their family gotcha I'm still I'm still learning about this whole thing then because I did think it was kind of like you're basically shooting a caged animal from your car those but those exist too but I think most of them want to like act like they're you know this big tough hunter the parks to like probably sell it that way like we're going to be like hunting wild right cape buffalo and we're going to be in the bush, you know?

Yeah. I will say as far as, for me, as far as this debate, just a teaser for when we do a whole episode on it, I don't really view trophy hunting as so much as a conservation issue because in most places where it's allowed, it is very well managed. Like you're not taking that many animals from the population. I view as more of an animal rights issue. Like, is it morally ethical to kill something just so you can put it on your wall? You know, and that's what I think people need to ask themselves.

For me, the answer is like a resounding no, that's not ethical. But I think that's up to a lot of people's interpretation. Yeah, I agree with that. This episode is brought to you by Hymns. Hymns can't solve snoring or blanket stealing, but when it comes to performance, they've got you covered. Take control of ED with personalized treatments made with proven ingredients prescribed by licensed providers 100% online.

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All right. Well, that's my first story. Speaking of something that's not very ethical, Tanya from Chimp Crazy, who we covered, Yeah. Haddolls. Tony Haddx. Yeah. So, I mean, most listeners probably listen to at least some of our Chimp Crazy stuff,

but maybe some of you didn't hear any of that. So a real quick recap, but HBO partnered with us. We watched the four-part series called Chimp Crazy, and Tanya Haddix was like the main character in it. But basically, it's just a really well-made documentary that goes into very, eccentric people who own chimps in the United States and how obsessed with chimpanzees they are and that these people just make their lives revolve around chimps and it goes bad more often than they probably I wouldn't say more often than not but more often than like they would

admit you're willing to accept I would say more often than not yeah I think it goes bad I have a lot of chimp owners. Yeah, and I think all of them end up having, like, some problems. Maybe you're at, yeah. Yeah, so she was at, like, this big warehouse that just had, like, I don't know, it was like 30, she was a worker, and there he had, like, 30 chimps, and PETA worked really hard and, like, got a hidden camera in there, and eventually is, like, these chimps don't have a good enough lifestyle in there,

and all the chimps were taken away, or so you thought. But Tanya had taken her favorite chimp, a celebrity chimp named Tonka, and put it in her basement at her house in Missouri. And she, Pita kind of like thought, wait, there's one chip missing. Then she, like, brought in cremated ashes from another dead chimpanzee and, like, was lying and, like, cried in court. And then just, like, right when she's done crying, she's, like, telling the camera crew, like, come look at this. And you go downstairs and just see Tonka in this cage. So yeah, we covered all that. But anyways, Tanya just got found having another chimpanzee in her basement,

which is absolutely insane. She's also on the hook for $225,000 that she owed PETA and legal fees. And she hasn't, like, paid any of that. So then... The crazy thing is, and this is like obviously spoilers for Chim Crazy. but at the end, like, they took Tonka away from her. And Pita was like, if you just say you will never have any exotics again, we won't charge you any of this money.

And she was like, no, absolutely not. I'm not going to be bullied by you guys. And like, which seemed like a very fair deal. And so she could have, like, if Tanya had just never done this again, she would have been fine and probably could have just, like, coasted on this newfound fame from the show. but she just couldn't do it. But even at the end, she's like saying, like, I'm going to start my own petting zoo.

I'm going to get like capuching monkeys and I might even get another chimpanzee. She said in a rangutan too. She wanted to move out onto an island surrounded by chimps. Like, that was her dream at the end of the show. And so anyways, yeah, not, doesn't really think things out very well. No. And part of like PETA winning in the chimp crazy, too, like authorities have. They had authority to go into her house unannounced.

So like getting another chimpanzee was just absolutely insane. And I guess when they got there. It's not an easy thing to hide. What I read, there's not a ton of information out yet. But they got there and the cage was empty, but there was fresh dung in the cage. She's like, oh, that's mine. Don't worry about that. That's fine.

Yeah. So it's just like, okay, like you have to claim that to your poop or it's obvious. There's just empty happy meals everywhere and like Reese's whipped cream cans. And then, yeah, I saw they. That'd be easy to pass off as my own. Pretty easily found the chimpanzee. They think it might be Tonka's like half brother and put it in that same sanctuary that Tonka loves so much.

Good for them. Good for Tonka. Alan coming can go visit them there. But yeah, I mean, I think we should all three just kind of share. Like, it's been a year since, you know, the show came out and we partnered with them. And, like, HBO and the director who did Tiger King as well, like, they did a really great job on it, I think. And I think it's fair to be like, okay, she's an idiot and she wanted attention. I still feel the same way I did.

I think she's really misguided and a criminal and not good to these animals, but I also feel kind of sorry for her. I think she just really doesn't have a place to direct her need to care for people. Yeah, she did. She had a child. She was neglectful and abusive, basically, towards her child. I associate Tanya Haddicks and Chimp Crazy with maybe the least happy I've ever been in my entire life. I think they're redeeming qualities about all humans. Some of us have some good in us.

I believe all of us have some good in it. in us. But she did not bring any of that to bear. And it seems like she's continuing to refuse to do so. And I don't have really any sympathy for her at all because she had plenty of outlets and plenty of chances to change her ways. She got way more than a fair deal from anyone that she encountered along this whole journey, it seems like, especially from PETA, who, whatever your thoughts are about them, like, that's fine. That's a whole separate issue. But yeah, Tanya, I think is genuinely a a bad person. I really feel that way.

I think that's fair. Yeah. The whole thing definitely, like, made me feel better about PETA. Yeah. I remember that. At least their legal team. Yeah. I think it's a lot like Joe's exotic, actually, where it's like, they act like they love

these animals and they probably do to some extent. But then, like, what they really love is attention. Yeah. And the attention they get from owning, like, an exotic animal. And that's just kind of, like, get out. out of here with that. I think when I say I feel bad for her, it's not that I was like, oh, like, she was so, I agree with you, Mike. She had humans to love. She had legal pets that she could have put that into. I think there's something about chimpanzees with some of these people

where it's like so close to a human, but one that they can, they think they can like fully control. And that's not a good quality. I'm not saying that's a good quality, but that's kind of what I see in her. This is a child that. that I can have that isn't ever gonna do anything I don't want it to do. And that's bad, like that is bad. But I do in a way feel sorry for her that that's like how her brain works.

Sure. I mean, but she really viewed it as a child, she probably shouldn't have been like so happy about it cranking off to her. For sure. Like Tanya has some demons to work through. And it's just, it's so sad. It's sad to see something that is

professed to be shown and given love like Tonka. And then you see footage of it just having a mental breakdown, like almost having a seizure in its little cage down in the basement. Or looking at the photos of other chants and stuff. Tanya, if you really, really had genuine love for this animal, you would see that what you're doing is just straight up abusive and neglectful. The crazy one to me was in the show when she like went to the guy that gave her the dead chimpanzee to creamate. and he had like a few chimpanzees and as soon as they walked in there they were all just going insane

like losing their minds shaking everything and it's just like oh my god yeah and they're like oh it's excited and it's like no they are stressed out and angry yeah yeah okay well i'm glad they were excited it's like they shouldn't be that excited yeah like you just walked in the room like that's insane and if that's how they always react. Yeah. Well, I don't know. We had a family dog who would pee all over the place whenever we gave her a hot dog.

And it wasn't even like a good hot dog. It was just like a cold one out of the fridge. This is not like gourmet hot dog. Yeah. That's such a funny trigger. She's dead now. That's on us. Too many cold hot dogs.

She's also like 20 years old. Deidrated. Just couldn't keep water in her body. I'm not mad anymore. I got it out of my system. Thanks, Tanya. Thanks for giving me a little outlet there. So I've got a story that, so just a bit of a peek behind the curtains.

Wes gave me these stories to read. Very kind of you, Wes. I've been busy, okay? And Jeff helped with it too. Jeff looked up a bunch of the news episodes. Yeah. And our intern, and our intern, Bryn sent me those. Oh, my gosh.

Brin. Thank you, Bryn. Yeah, we'll figure out exactly where Jeff sits on this aid, but. This episode is brought to you by Miracle Made. The weather's heating up and your nighttime bedroom temperature has a huge impact on your sleep quality. If you wake up too hot or too cold, I highly recommend you check out Miracle Maid's bedsheets. Miracle Made sheets are inspired by NASA and use silver-infused fabrics that are temperature regulating so you can sleep at the perfect temperature all night long.

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Upgrade your sleep with Miracle Made. Go to try miracle.com slash tooth and use the code tooth to claim your free three-piece towel set and save over 40% off. Again, that's try miracle.com slash tooth to treat yourself. So this story comes out of India and I want to start off with a little, you know I'm a big statistics guy. I'm always keeping track of numbers and stuff. You're like that beautiful mind meme. He's at, I think, a second felony. charge. I think he's up to two now for some kind of real estate fraud or something. I'm not sure.

Do you not like Otani? I know you're a Padres fan. I'm a podjice guy. But you got to kind of like Otani, right? It's a real deep in my heart. I have a lot of love for Otani. But man, he just kills us. Yeah. Anyway, so this comes out of India. And according to a study, this is published in e-life sciences.org. So in India, there's been recorded over a million snake bite deaths in just the past two decades. And you think of that, a million. It's so wild. Over a million.

Not a million exactly. That would have been really insane if that was the case. They average like 50,000 a year. So that, you know, that adds up. Recently, though, there's a little baby who refused to be a part of that statistic. So this is a story about one-year-old Govinda. He was playing at home in a small town of Batia near the Indo-Napal border, kind of where probably we were up in northern India.

And not far from there. Yeah. I'll just say that an unusual little playmate decided to join in on the fun with a little Gavinda. So his grandma later recounted that a Gavinda's grandma, not in the snakes, later accounted that when we saw the snake in the child's hand, everyone rushed toward him. But in the meantime, he already bit the snake, killing it on the spot. So it was just a brief moment of like, holy cow, there's a cobra on our one-year-old's hands. And then immediately realizing he probably had like snakes. snakes in, I don't know, snakes bleed probably.

Yeah. Probably had like some snake blood all over his mouth. Yeah. A real crazy scene. And this wasn't just any old snake. So like I was saying, it was actually an Indian cobra, which are venomous, correct? Extremely venomous. Yeah.

Extremely. Neurotoxic. Yeah. Wow. One of the big four species, in fact, responsible for the most snake bites in India. Yeah. And unfortunately, it had struck first. So, Govinda wasn't just, it wasn't an unprovoked bite.

the snake got him first. It was like a homerabi's code situation here. Eye for an eye scenario. So after biting the cobra to death, Gavinda fainted and was rushed to a primary health care facility for initial treatment. And fortunately, whatever occurred during this bite, not a whole lot of venom was deposited.

That's not the right word. Injected. Yeah. So he fortunately made it through the ordeal. He's still being surveyed and cared for at this. facility administered to under the supervision of doctors. But a really crazy story about a little one-year-old. And this is just while I was doing a little bit more supplementary research for this story. I actually saw a story. I remembered a story my sister-in-law sent to me about another

little baby who bit a snake in retaliation. Back in 2022, there's a two-year-old girl in Turkey who was bit by a snake. Probably not venomous, is what the articles that I read told me. So, Not as serious as Gavinda's bite, but she did do it first. Still a trailblazer, in my opinion, you know? Yeah. I'm impressed like they can just kill it. Yeah. Yeah, I know.

Like their baby teeth, they probably only have like six teeth and they're just like one bite. Munch in a snake's head. Would you think you start getting their teeth? Probably before a year old, right? I don't know. Did you read the whole article? Is Gavinda actually a mongoose? Because women are nursing their babies once the babies start teething, they're like, oh, my nipple hurt.

That's true. Maybe, yeah, it'd be funny if at the end of the article they were like, oh, edit, Gavinda's actually the name of the family's pet mongoose or dog. Yeah, that's not the case. Well, I'm glad he's okay. Yeah, he or she. He or she? He or she? He?

Okay. So still no comment at all from the snake's grandparents. Let me check roll back Is all they had to say That's a snake that if you were to say Oh we're doing a story about a toddler or a baby that got bit by an Indian cobra Spectacled cobra I would say oh so we're you know we're gonna be talking about a dead baby

And so it's pretty yeah toast a toasted baby But I'm happy that that wasn't the case It sucks the snake had to die but also I'd much rather the snake die than little gavinda. All right, well, I got another one. There's been a couple mountain lion attacks in the news. One was in Washington on July 20th. A mother, a father, and their four-year-old daughter

were hiking an Olympic National Park when a mountain lion jumped from the brush and grabbed the little girl on its jaws. She began screaming, and the father immediately rushed in and pulled his daughter away from the cat, and the cougar ran off and disappeared back into the forest. I couldn't find this family's name. I think they decided to remain anonymous.

which is kind of a cool move because if I save my little four-year-old daughter from a mountain lion, I'm going to be like, hey, you got my name right? My name's Wes Larson. Make sure you put my name down. Spell it right.

L-A-R-S-O-N, O-N. I have a podcast. Another family heard the screams of the girl. They arrived on the scene just after this mountain lion had left. She was taken to the hospital. Her injuries were treated, and the article I read said she was in

satisfactory condition, which I guess is good. It's open to interpretation a little bit. I wouldn't say good. I'd say satisfactory. Yeah. It's like if you are hooking up with someone and you roll over and you're like, how was it? And they're like satisfactory, you'd feel.

I'll take that. You'd think about that for a while. When you're taking an exit survey, satisfactory is like the middle option. Right. Right. Wasn't good enough. It wasn't great. Wasn't terrible.

Yeah. I think for medical care, you would, hope for better than satisfactory. So I hope she's getting better than satisfactory. All right. The cougar was collared. It was so it was easily found by National Park personnel. They did kill it and they issued a statement saying there are no current threats to the

public, which I don't think is a statement they can say in a national park. I think that's one that maybe should have been workshopped a little. Like if you kill one cougar, you can't say, okay, you're all good now. No threats whatsoever. Like, I don't know. I think you can say that one's been taken care of, but sure. They don't have grizzly bears in Olympia, right? No, in Olympic National Park, they don't, but they have, they have black bears, they do have

mountain lions, you can fall, you can get struck by lightning, you can drown, like, there are threats to going into the great outdoors. That's like part of what makes it fun. So, I don't know. I am being a little nitpicky here, but you can't kill a cliff. I do think they still have some threats. Yeah. You can't just take care of a cliff.

blow it up. It's just even more dangerous. It's kind of like Obi-1 when he's struck down, he'll just become more powerful in death. I will say what the dad did is how, this is how you should respond to an aggressive cougar, like rush it, pull away whoever is being attacked, like be as dominant and as intimidating as possible. In this case, it did work and it was enough to discourage this mountain lion. Have either of you ever driven on the PCH in Malibu, Pacific Coast Highway?

Yeah, for sure. How would you describe that drive, Mike? Pretty perfect. Yeah. Nile on just like along the shoreline of California. It's just amazing. Yeah. Like beautiful.

I know a lot of those homes got built or burnt in the, and some of them got burnt in the recent fires. But like pre-fire at least, when I drove that road, those were the kind of homes where I was like, this is the absolute kind of dream, you know, just like a big home overlooking the ocean on a beautiful little stretch of highway. It's gorgeous. It's the kind of place that when you drive through, you think nothing bad could ever happen in a place like this.

But you'd be mistaken because a few days ago, on August 10th, an 11-year-old girl was chased and bitten by a mountain lion outside her home on the Pacific Coast Highway in Malibu. And then the lion also chased her mother and her sibling. Oh, wow. This girl had been doing some chores near their chicken coop when the lion pounced on her and bit her right arm, leg, and lower back. she started screaming and her mom and sibling ran out and the cougars started chasing them one of them actually had a stun gun and the sound of the stun gun was apparently enough to scare the mountain lion away and it just had a stun gun yeah i don't know yeah maybe they heard the scream and they grabbed it what do stun guns sound like like tch tch tch tch tch tisor kind of

yeah it's well taser shoots the hooks into you and then you trigger it a stun gun's the one that you actually like hit against the person, but people often call them tasers. Okay. But it has the two little metal prongs with the little electricity that goes. But that's the difference between those two. Tasers you shoot, stun guns, you push. Gotcha.

Anyway, it ran away. It hid. They called emergency personnel. Because like a gun, you think of shooting. You're right. But unfortunately, that's what it is. The Department of Fish and Wildlife Officers found the line on the property. They did dispatch it.

The girl was treated for minor injuries. injuries and I believe she's still at the hospital. I will say in the same article they brought up some other recent kind of animal encounters in that area and it said that a six-year-old had recently been drug off by a coyote that his mom intervened and saved his life. And it just kind of made me think it's pretty crazy that we've, that there's only been one recorded death from coyotes because I feel like every time we do a news episode and we do coyotes be whiling.

There's like a kid that's being dragged off that a parent intervenes. and saves. And it's just pretty wild that that hasn't happened more, you know? They're getting there, though. Yeah. Then, like, Seattle area, yeah, there's a bunch of photos that went viral of coyotes just like on roofs of houses. So they're figuring stuff out, I think.

Yeah, it's like a social media trend, like plank in. You want, I got one. I got, I'm going to do two different stories because they're both short. Wes, who's John Hayden? John Hayden? Yeah. I don't know. He's a star hockey player on the Seattle Cracking, NHL team.

Yeah, that's right. But he did a promotional video in Alaska, and they go out there and they're fly fishing out in Cap Mine National Park. Mike, do you know what I'm going to talk about here? No, I haven't heard this. Really? No. So they go out there to do like a promotional. video. I think they're trying to get like

Alaskans into the Seattle Crackin because that's kind of like the closest. Yeah, they got a lot of Alaska pole, you know. And like they get their mascot who his name is Bowie and he's like a blue troll. Yeah. It kind of just looks like

a mascot. Fishing waiters with like the hockey player and a couple other people. And like as soon as they get in the river and start fishing, this huge grizzly bear. comes out of the trees and like starts really acting more aggressive than most bears do in that area because that's by like Brook Falls that's like they get a lot of fish in that area and what

has Wes has said they tend to be a little bit less aggressive but this bear starts splashing water at him doing bluff charges and the whole team of people have to like they they turn and start kind of running and there's an amazing video and photos of Bowie the mascot like kind of lagging behind and this grizzly bear just chasing him in a full mascot outfit

and he's just like running away from it and I I will just say really quickly like watching the video this bear's heart wasn't in it like it wasn't trying to get him but it was like running in their direction I don't blame them for being nervous but it never looked to me like it was actually

like charging or serious about making I wonder to like because the guides the guides weren't too worried like I think they fish a lot in that area and like the bears just too like the bears know what people look like they don't really mess with people but I just think like adding someone in a full troll costume adds another variable or you know of unpredictability to like the entire scenario pretty confused and it was maybe a little like Wait, I think I want this thing gone. I think if like aliens land and cat my, there's a good chance bears will be like messing with them a bit at least. Maybe that would be our best bet of like aliens being like, nope, we're not doing anything here. We're out of here. These guys are mean. Mike, do me a favor.

Just Google a buoy. So B-U-O-Y, bear real quick. I will say, and maybe I'm being a little like pessimistic here. I feel like a cracking What? It's pretty great, right? That's not a cracking is my first thought of us. No, he's a troll.

Yeah, they should have a cracket. I feel like they need to have, like a crackin could be such a good costume. It's a great, yeah, it's a cool mascot. It's pretty funny though. It's cool. Tooth and Claw is brought to you by Ollie. We can be kind of picky about the sponsors that we allow on our show, and one that I'm extra picky about is dog food.

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Tell them all about your dog and use code tooth to get 60% off your welcome kit when you subscribe today. Plus, they offered a happiness guarantee on the first box. So if you're not completely satisfied, you'll get your money back. That's OLLI-E.com slash tooth and enter code tooth to get 60% off your first box. And then I have another one just because I was thought on Backpacker, who just did Bear Month with us. So, yeah, shout out Backpacker. But yes, in Middle Tennessee's Grundy County, there was a hiker. And on August 8th, he, so he was bitten by a timber rattlesnake.

And reportedly he saw the snake and just, like, decided to pick it up. And then it bid him on the hand. Rescuers came. They got, like, he got a call out. Rescuers came. And by the time they got there, he had already died. Wow. And they, like, tried to see CPR.

And he wasn't able to. crazy back from it yeah huh yeah and don't pick them up just kind of yeah that's the other thing too with rattlesnakes we've talked about them a lot and how they typically don't kill people but where most of them have hemotoxic venom and it affects your blood system and stuff if you have maybe an underlying heart disease or blood disease or something that you don't know about and then you introduce like rattlesnake venom into there that can often like trigger something too so you that's I would be curious if that's what happened here because that's pretty crazy that this guy would die so quickly. That's really sad.

Here's a question, Wes. Yeah. You have to wait like three hours for help. Mm-hmm. And you get to choose your hand getting bitten by a grizzly bear or a timber rattlesnake. What would you choose? A grizzly bear. Okay.

Without a doubt. Like it's just going to chomp once and then wander off? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I feel like you have more risk of permanent. damage from a grizzly bear, but more risk of death from a rattlesnake. I think the ligaments and stuff getting torn.

Yeah, I think rattlesnakes, you might lose fingers, you might, yeah, I don't know. Yeah, I'd much rather be a grizzly bear. Oh, is that it? You're done? Sorry, I'm still a little shook from Bowie if I'm being on. I don't, I didn't, wasn't paying attention to that last one. I mean, I have like three rapid fire ones, but I'll just do it. Okay.

The cycles once more. Speaking of people in costumes, we think, we're pretty sure that's what's going on in this story that I've got for us. So, the best anime of the season just dropped, it seems. Some footage out of Japan, I think, from three weeks ago surfaced. And, well, we'll start here. So there's been kind of a spate of bear attacks happening in central Japan. And Japan at large has had its problems with bear encounters historically. But especially asiatic black bears.

Yeah. So there's been three attacks, it seems to me, for my research that really spurred on this. I guess we'll call it like an activity, a drill that took place. So a five-foot bear was wandering around a neighborhood and attacked a 70-something-year-old man's head and neck. And then another bear, not too far off from there, attacked an 81-year-old man's head and neck. So I don't know what they've got against these old heads and necks. If you're a Japanese guy with an old head and neck, then watch out. Yeah, it's like, these guys weren't in World War II if that's what they think.

Like, that's still not old enough either. Like if they're trying to get the World War II survivors still. Dude, that's like Vietnam maybe even. But I don't think they were involved in that one. Good for you, Japan. Staying out of that mess. If you did. Okay.

Anyway, on a mere more serious note, a 52-year-old newspaper delivery man was maud to death. that's really what pushed public consciousness in the direction that something needs to be done here. So in response to these encounters, Japanese police and local hunters in Niko, Tochigi Prefecture, which again is central Japan, like 100 kilometers north of Tokyo, they've been practicing their response to potential bear attacks in a simulated drill. I probably should just show the video, right? Yeah, I think so.

I'll just pull the video. It's pretty important. It's a really good bearer costume. I like how they got the white chest part of it. This is my favorite part. He does like a little stutter step to get away from it. He's like, oh. Oh.

I like when they yell at the bear and it just lays down, face down. Yeah. So there's four cops with riot shields. One's got a megaphone yelling at the bear. Now one's poking it in the butt with some. kind of control prod. And it's not a real bear. It's a guy.

It's kind of like bear pajamas with a plastic bear head. Yeah. And now he's talking to the bear again through the megaphone. I wish I spoke Japanese. I don't. I like I think all three of us are pretty on board with like, we're kind of in the same realm when it comes to like gun control issues and stuff in the US. But it is kind of crazy when you see countries where there's like no guns, how they like

the things they come up with to try and deal with something. like this, which is pretty wild. Yeah. We did, I did a subscriber episode a while ago where some manufacturer created a bunch of robo wolves that their eyes glow red and they make a big like howling sound and stuff. And that's a bear deterrent. So they're coming up with. In Japan as well.

In Japan. Yeah. So it's pretty admirable, honestly, that they're doing whatever they can to make this a non-lethal encounter with these bears before things get bad. Yeah. I think in that video, they kill. that bear in the they have guns I thought it was like a sleep dart or something yeah or like gas or something lays face down they just had shot it and then that what happened it to make sure it's alive

okay maybe you're right I think the cops can have access to guns and like sure yeah anyway I think when I was doing that episode on bear encounters in Japan I was kind of surprised at how often it's an issue for people living especially in the northern like regions, Hokkaido, the Northern Island and stuff, especially has a lot of bear encounters. Grizzlies up there, yeah. Yeah, the brown bears. Are they grizzlies? Is that accurate

to call them grizzlies? Yeah, I mean, grizzlies just our nickname for them. Okay. Yeah. Yeah, it's just, it's weird to think that they're in, even metropolitan areas, bears are getting in, causing all kinds of problems over there. Lots of encounters and lots of more deaths than I would have expected to come out of Japan and

bears in any given year. Forget the exact statistics, but No, they have a big problem with it there. And most of them are from Asiatic Black Bears, but there are some, yeah, some brown bear deaths there too. So it's pretty interesting. That's really, the video's going to really do a lot of the heavy lifting for that one. So please, if you haven't tuned in, you'll find that footage all over the place on the internet.

My cracking episode or story, it's more about the video as well as in the story. Good videos. All right. I have one more quick bear story. It's very quick. There's a pair of e-bikers near Creston Valley Bridge, Columbia, that surprised a pair of grizzly bears. And generally when there's two bears together like this,

they're either going to be mating or it's sub-adults that have recently, their moms recently kicked them off. And sometimes those siblings will hang out for a bit before they disperse. I think this was probably sub-adults. But the husband was attacked by one of these bears. The wife had bear spray. she used it, she got the bears to leave them alone. This wasn't a defense.

It was a defensive attack. They surprised these bears and got mauled. So the bears won't be killed. The man went to the hospital with some serious injuries, though. And it's just like a quick excuse to talk about, again, like there are some higher risk activities in bear country, especially grizzly bear country. And those are generally like fast moving activities. So if you're riding bikes, trail running, something like that, you do put yourself at a

slightly higher risk because you may surprise a bear and like the fact that you're moving so fast it won't have time to really decide that you're not a threat and there's a higher chance that it will actually interact with you so just keep that in mind if you're in grizzly bear country all right i'm done that's it for my stories jeff so in british columbia on august fourth and osprey was like carrying a fish and reportedly maybe got exhausted from the heat It is a really hot day and just dropped the fish on some telephone lines and the fish caused those to spark. And it created a landscape fire that like burned six kilometers. Wow.

So you're giving that to the Osprey or the fish, you think? Yeah, I don't know. You got to give it to fish. I don't know. Yeah. I kind of want to give it to Osprey. Was the fish alive when it hit the power lines or was there probably already dead by then? Probably dead.

Oh. Yeah. We had an Osprey dropped like a 30-inch trout on our lawn the other day, and Polly found it. That's crazy. The West always adds a bunch of inches to his trout, though. No, this thing was huge. Two sailors were rescued in Spain after Killer Whales targeted their yacht in an organized attack. Still got shooters out there.

Yeah. In this them boats category this year. And I guess that the Stradius. of Gibraltar under Spain is now dubbed Orca Alley, which is kind of cool. Yeah, I like that. Yeah. And then one I just want to throw out there and see how you guys react. Gibraltar has enough stuff named after it already.

The rock, the whatever else. A Maryland man. Of Gibraltar. Who knows? Maryland. I'm just going to read this. Maryland man charged after telling his friend he had a woman for him, but it was really him dressed as a woman.

Interesting. Interesting inclusion. That's a dastardly trick. Yeah. So he invited his friend over to probably make love with a woman, but then he was dressed up as a woman and is a trap to maybe assault the person. I wonder how far the got before it was discovered. Was it like just on site?

They're like, come on, John. He's like, where's your friend? I see that bold. He just left, but I'm here. I hope that they just went for it. This was finally the cover they needed to both express. Yeah, it'd be messed up if the guy, like, went through with it just to, like, have the moment and then outed the guy, you know? He's like, wait, that was it.

That wasn't a woman afterwards. Right. All right. Well, we're obviously out of animal stories, so let's get to our categories. The first one is... I think we should change the entire purview of our show after hearing that story. Just whatever. Whatever story you read in the news.

No, just about people cross-dressing, really, is what I'm interested in now. Listen, I throw in a curveball every once in. It's fine. All right. Your favorite pop... And this is in honor of Tanya. Categories. Pop culture character that just couldn't get out of their own way.

You know, they've got some self-destructive behavior. They just can't stop doing. Yeah. I can... I can go first. I'm going to list off a bunch afterwards. Okay. All right.

It was real hard. There was a bunch of ones I really wanted to say here, but I ended up on Jaw Morant being my favorite. Just can't stop shooting things. You got like a small little fine for like flashing a pistol in a TikTok or whatever. And the NBA is like, just don't do that again. Like you're going to be the face of our league. LeBrons are going to retire soon.

We need you. And then, like, what, two or three weeks later, just post another video with like a smaller gun and just like waving it around. And it's like a year suspension. And now there's like all these stories of him like aiming guns at like opposing teams buses, but maybe he's just pointing lasers at it. All of his celebration is just guns. And he's like so far away from being the face of the league. now and it's like dude you just had to not it makes me think of that green goblin that green goblin you know the green goblin's telling spider man to do stuff and he like can't get it out of his head

it just makes me think that's his green goblin like just shooting guns or pointing guns it's so funny uh i picked adam sandler's character from uncut gems Howard ratner just where he just like can't stop gambling and making big bets. I just, I think that's my favorite movie about, like, kind of addiction. And it's just a fun movie, but also super tense. I just really love it. Spoiler, big spoiler here.

But I just saw a video that I really liked about it where he, like, because I thought it was, like, such a frustrating ending. Because it's like, he had finally, like, broke through. Yeah, but he died at his happiest moment of his life. But then it's like, yeah, he's like, yeah, he's, He would have messed that up had he kept living. And he would have, like, gone back to where he was. So, like, that's a perfect outcome for him.

Yeah, his, like, pure moment of happiness. Yeah. By John Morant. That might be my perfect ending if I'd have to keep editing anymore of these episodes. I shouldn't joke about that, even if I do feel like it's true. I'm going to go with bubbles in the wire. That one's a sad one. I like the, I mean, the wire is probably.

my favorite show and he tries so hard and he does so good and it's sometimes like not even his fault and i'm not trying to be like i don't know i'm getting too weird about being an enabler for a fictional character in a show but like sometimes he just wasn't his fault like he was neglected a little bit sometimes yeah no i think he was perfectly acted just an amazing performance it's great i have a couple i want to throw out real quick yeah from one piece uh frankie the cyborg made himself a whole new body just based off of cola, like putting cola and do himself. It's like, you are too obsessed with cola. Like, you could have just used water.

You could use so many easier things. And you know, he's addicted to it because after the time skip, he comes back and he's just like a million times more dependent on cola for like literally every part of his body now. He just keeps tripling down. Zion Williamson with porn stars and soda Yokic his horses

he just can't get him out of his mind I have Connor McGregor Yokic his horse won a race and he like broke down crying in the middle of the track and it's like when you won the NBA championship you didn't show any emotion at all you just wanted to leave and probably go Dude, basketball is pretty cool.

Like, you can be excited about that, too. It was like a local horse race that, like, no one knew or cared about. There was, like, eight people in attendance, and he was just having a breakdown. It's incredible. His ex-teammate, Michael Porter, Jr., just for, like, unprompted just said he's addicted to women, which was kind of funny. Interesting.

McGregor, Connor McGregor, and cocaine. And then last but not least, Voldemort and high schools. Just like, you could have taken over the world, dude. Yeah, we just leave that high school. Like, you tried like eight times. I like that. Maybe there's something deeper there that's being said.

This episode's brought to you by Rocket Money. A lot of people aren't aware just how much they're spending each month. And it's easy to point the finger at subscriptions. And that is a problem for a lot of us, myself included. I actually just discovered that I signed up our business account here at tooth and claw with a subscription that's been going on for a couple of months, so, well, hopefully Wes and Jeff don't find out about that. But it's not just that. We're throwing money in all kinds of crazy directions. And one thing that I've been abusing just a little bit too much

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And it's really bad because there's like flashing imagery. And it wakes me up multiple times every night. But I've tried really hard to sleep in like complete silence. And like, it's kind of funny. When we travel together and we're like sleeping in the same rooms, hotel rooms and stuff, I have to have like my earbuds in and like some kind of something, just stimulus, and it's not good for you. It can't be good to have just like interrupted sleep all night long, but I can't sleep otherwise. I don't know.

It's a real catch 22. I mean, I only have one really good answer for this. What is it? Oxies. Just cranking. That's not that bad for you. Good for your prostate, right? Growing up is just frowned upon in my environment.

was raised in and sure i would stop for a little bit but one wet dream and i'm back to the races you know you still cry afterwards that the answer you want to use yeah okay do you want me to give another one if you want to if you want to leave that if you think that one will stay i'll leave it i'm happy speaker truth all right this is totally on you if you want that to be like i have no problem that's fine with me i'll say another one okay okay okay I think I'm fine with it. A provisional. I can't help but speed.

Like, I just end up speeding when I'm driving. How many tickets do you have? Like three or four. Okay, so you're not like, you're not in danger of having your license taken away or anything. I used to get warnings a lot and now I always get tickets. Oh, uh-oh. Mine is McDonald's. I just like, they're not a good-

You were saying you don't really like it anymore. Yeah, I don't like it as much as I used to. I used to like, McDonald's burger used to be my favorite burger. Like, bar none of any burger. Yeah. I think they're good.

And what? I, like, well, there's been, like, their food's been, like,

scientifically created to be good. No, I genuinely think their hamburgers are legitimately good. Like, if you, if you, like, say they're not good,

sometimes I kind of narrow my eyes. Because they taste good. It's just that they're bad for you. And it's an evil corporation. And, but like, I do have a soft spot. for McDonald's. I just, I don't know. It's something that I've tried to give up, but it's by far

the closest food to my house too. And so it's just like sometimes I'm really lazy and I'm just like, you know what? I'm going to go get the $5 meal and just like enjoy a tasty burger and some nuggets. That way like they clearly had ketchup on their fingers when they put their bun on and stuff. Yeah, it just adds to it for me. I like I want it all smushed and just flat. Yeah. Me too. I like a compact, almost like, welded together with the cheese. Yeah. If I got like a poofy one, like they show in their commercials, I'd be like, this is one I ordered. I ordered like a McDonald's burger.

No, that's a good one because, like, addicts, they're not always just like stoked on heroin. They're not always like, oh, man, that's, it's like so delicious and awesome. They're probably hated at times. Like, I wish I didn't love it so much. And I, like, disgusts them a little bit. But at the same time, like, I need some of those microplastics from that burger. Wes's funny McDonald's thing to me was when he watched the founder, which is like a movie all about how evil McDonald's is,

and he's just like, it made me really want McDonald's. It's so bad. I went, I stopped it like the first McDonald's on the way home from the theater. Yeah. All right. The next one is the most memorable celebrity-owned exotic animal. Another one in honor of Tanya.

Let's just list a few, I think. Yeah. Okay. I only thought of one, so I'm just going to do one. Start us off. Mine that really stuck with me was when Paris Hilton had a kinkajoo for some reason, which is like a little tree climbing marsupial from South America. They're really cute, but like no one knew what a kinkajoo was or ever heard of them.

And suddenly everyone was like, oh, she has a kinkajoo. What a cool pet. And it was really bad. It just made me think like, this is a pet that she's going to have for like a couple weeks. and then she's going to pawn off on someone else or like a member of her team is going to like get rid of and Meanwhile there's going to be thousands of people that are now trying to get kinkajus for pets So it just seemed really irresponsible. I think all exotic animal ownership in this context is really irresponsible But that one especially for me was memorable because it felt really gross

Yeah Kinkajou is dangerously close to a couple of slurs somehow in my brain Yeah, I know it's not quite there on any of them. It's a word that's like fun to say and be able to get away with saying. It sounds like a Pokemon to me. That's true. Yeah. They kind of look like a Pokemon.

Pikachu. That's probably it. Pikachu. Yeah. I think you solved that. There you go. Mike Tyson's Tigers, of course. That's the big one.

Yeah, Mike Tyson's Tigers. Michael Jackson had a chimpanzee, right? I know he had a giraffe. He had a bunch of stuff. Yeah, but Bubbles the chimpanzee. Beaver has a little. had a monkey that was kind of got a lot of press. Gilbert Arenas had a whole shark tank.

Do you remember that story from back when he was playing? It was like a whole thing. Wait, he had a, did he have sharks? Yeah, he had like several sharks in the tank. Dwight Howard had a ton of snakes, but I don't know if any of them were problematic. I just, I think while we talk about this, like, I would be remiss if I didn't say, like, don't own exotic animals, especially if you have a public presence and, like, you're going to influence other people to get them because you may have the money and the resources to

take proper care of that animal, but a lot of the people you're influencing don't. So yeah, it's something I've even had to kind of repent of in the past before I knew better. Like I had, I raised some raccoons and re-released them back into the wild and stuff. And now I wouldn't do it because I know that, you know, it creates some problems. You're a formed man. Yeah. All right. Next category is, I want an overrated and an underrated something overrated something underrated I'm surprised us with this one

no I sent it no he sent this one to us what we can start while you think Jeff yeah um I'm gonna go an overrated skill is people that are able to whistle loudly I've never been in a scenario where I appreciate that skill

especially at like sporting events you always get sat right next to the guy who can whistle really loud and he does it the whole game it's like who are what what are you trying to communicate here even you know i hate that too but like when taxis were a thing that'd be like sell useful that would be a little touch i'm not i'm not thinking about taxis i guess and i guess it's soccer international soccer matches whistling is kind of like their version of booing so maybe i'm wrong

on this one but i'm gonna i'm gonna stick to it for now i agree it's always like you're splitting and just is very i hate it and then i hate like don't get me started on this because i really don't enjoy whistling either when people just constantly whistle to themselves it's kind of that for me is very annoying even when people are good at it like they can carry a tune especially when they're good at it i know you know i yeah Andy Griffith do you want me to go Jeff while you think yeah you go ahead okay something i think is really overrated because it kind of feels like i'm in one is our sonnas i'm not a sauna person i know there's been a big kind of jump in like little sauna that you can put in your yard or whatever.

And I'm always, like, I'm always just, like, want to get out as soon as I'm in there. I don't find them relaxing or fun to just, like, sweat and be really hot. I just don't get it. Does that go for, like, everything in, well about steam rooms? I like steam rooms more, but I still don't love them. I don't really even like hot tubs that much, though. I just don't really like forcing myself to be really hot. Unless it's really cold outside, then I enjoy a hot tub.

So that's my overrated. My underrated is seeing movies by yourself. I don't know if we've done that one before. But man, I do that a lot here in Montana. And I like going to movies with other people too. I think there's like something to be said for both. But I really like going to movies by myself. I like not having to like talk about the movie after I come out.

I like just being able to like fully immerse myself without any kind of distraction in a movie. So I really enjoy it. Like you don't want to share your immediate thoughts, but you will want to talk about it later. Because sometimes we talk about movies and it's fun. I enjoy it with you guys. I've heard you say that before. I enjoy it with you guys. If I watch a movie with a group of people, I'm excited to hear what they thought of it.

See, I guess what I don't like is when you go to a movie with like 10 people or something and then you come out and everyone's standing in a circle and just kind of waiting for your turn to talk about the movie. It feels like a forced conference after something. And I kind of just want to marinate a little bit. Like I kind of just want to take a few hours to think about it. With you guys, I'm so close with both of you that I enjoy just to like give my immediate thoughts and hear your immediate thoughts. But sometimes when there's a lot of people, I just don't, I really don't like it. I just like, I like going to movies by myself.

I think it's great. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, I'll go underrated as well if you're still thinking, Jeff. So my underrated is, oh, man. I have two and I couldn't choose. between, I don't know, should we flip a coin? I'm just going to go with both.

Velcro shoes, underrated. Those things are sweet, dude. So easy. They're a little style out of fashion, but like all it's going to take is just one really cool. We just need Timothy to throw on some Velcro shoes and we're back in business, baby. Let's go.

That's probably true. I know you're listening. Timmy C. Our guy. And then my other one is stovetop panseared steaks. It's just a lot easier than getting the whole rigmarole going of the grill outside and the cleanup and all that stuff. Just throw a pan in some olive oil, do a little bit of salt and pepper. You're ready to go.

Yeah, I agree. You don't need to do a barbecue. Okay, I don't know how to phrase this as overrated or underrated, but something that's like really bothering me, so maybe overrated, I guess. Mm-hmm. I think it's like kind of overrated and underrated as dressing rooms. Like, if I'm out a store and I'm like going to buy pants, I feel like I have to try them on, but it frustrates me Because, so like, I bought pants today and I, sometimes it's like 32s will fit me, but sometimes they're too tight. Yeah. So 33's, I like expect to always fit me and maybe I'll just need a belt.

So I found 33's. I'm like, I'll just get these. And then I get home and I tried them on and like can't even get close to, like, they're like 30s. I don't know why they advertise because like I didn't get, like I have like 32s that I can wear right now. Yeah. So it's like, it's their sizing not being consistent.

Like the sizing on pantways are not consistent. And like some companies will even say like ours run a little tight and it'll be like a 32. And it's like, why does it say 32 then? Like, why can't we just figure that out? Mike, what size are you? I wear 33's as well. Okay. Yeah.

Yeah. So, yeah, I'm pretty mad about that right now. Yeah. I actually hate dressing rooms. Like I always, I hate that there's like such a process for it, you know? Like you have to go talk to someone and get an unlocked. And like, I would love dressing rooms if you could just do it on your own. And I know that's like a theft prevention thing.

But like how many of these employees are actually even paying attention? You know, it does like just let us go into the dressing room. I always think about all the people like how many other people have tried these pants on. And that starts to give me a little bit of the ick, you know? Yeah. Yeah. It was what they've got going on down there. That could go either way.

Who knows what I've got going on down there, you know? Yeah. Hopefully you. Let me check. It's looking bad, guys. I apologize to everyone else. Underrated, I'm going to go with gambling. Gambling.

Yeah, people give it a bad time. People say, like, gambling's bad, you know? It's pretty fun. You just, like, play cards. It's, like, playing cards at home is fun, but, like, It's kind of hard to always care how much if you win or not. But gambling, you always care if you win or not because there's something on the line. That's how I feel.

It always makes it more fun. Like if I want to care about baseball, I'll just bet on baseball. And then all of a sudden, look at me, I'm a baseball fan. Yeah. I played some disc golf the other day with my neighbor. And it was our first game together, so we didn't bet anything. And I was bored after like four holes. But if there had been a little bit of money on the line,

even just like $5, I would have been like fully locked in. It was nice talking to him. It wasn't enough just to know you're a better disc offer. I wasn't. He beat me. He's great. Maybe if there's some money on the line,

I would have played a little harder. All right. Well, let's do a couple listener questions. First one is from, well, a few people actually, but Miss Gianna asked,

what's the name of the opening, closing song you use? My BF and I are constantly duetting the high and low-pitched vocals, like constantly all day. And we had a few other people ask us about our opening music, and we've talked about this before. But Mike, do you want to kind of say how that happened, like with the genesis of our theme song? Yeah, so right around the time we were starting this podcast up, I was actually involved with another project with a few other friends. Bill actually, our editor now. So I sat down in the basement with his other friend, like our

mutual friend and we put together some music for that project and this track is called Boss Fight Jungle with Middy Voice 3-6 so that's the you can put that name to it if you guys need one it was going to be like kind of a video

game centric project and never really it got off the ground but just barely before crashing and burning in the base of tooth and claw which was a much more immediate success so there you go boss fight jungle with the media voice. And I remember remember when we started it, I had said like, hey, I want something that kind of sounds like

jungle drums, but also like kind of ominous. And you were like, I've got just the thing. Oh, I've got it locked and loaded. It's like 10 minutes later. It was kind of just a placeholder for us where we like always talked about having like a professional, much more professional like group come in and make something for us. But every time we've suggested that our network, Q code, like other people, listeners are like, no, absolutely not. Don't ever replace it. So I don't think it's ever going anywhere. That's here to stay. Yeah. All right, this one's from Nathalie. Nathalie says, assuming I had no bear spray, would running away from a mother bear protecting her cubs make any sense? If I'm running away, I'm not a threat anymore. Or would that just kick

in her predator instincts? You don't want to run away ever from any kind of like potential predator because it could kick in those instincts or just fast movement in general when you're around Cubs can trigger mom and make her feel like something's wrong. So backing away slowly is the move. Don't run. The logic makes sense, though.

It does. It does. And that's why I wanted to do this one because I get what Nathalie is saying. But yeah, you don't want to run. Tell that to buoy. Yeah, tell that to boo. Would it make sense to make yourself smaller

while moving away? Like if you lay down and roll away, would that be smart? You don't want to leave down and roll away. No. But not looking intimidating with Cubs is kind of the move. You don't want to be intimidating. Or maybe they don't really quite understand distance that much, like Rocket and Guardians of Galaxy.

So if you make yourself smaller, it'll all of a sudden think you're like a mile away. Yeah, what about that? I don't, yeah. I think just what I said? earlier backing away slowly um not being intimidating with the female and cubs is is the move but this one's from olivia Olivia says favorite late night snacks or munchies what do you all think it's been tough for me because i try not to eat as unhealthy as normal so i don't have a lot of stuff in my house but then i get those late night urges and i'll just scrape together anything i can you

No. Combing through the carpet like a meth addict. Like if there's a cough medicine that has enough sugar in it, I'm there. Cherry flavored. I'm more of a salty guy at night, it turns out. So like popcorn and lately cheese it's. I've really been craving cheese its a lot when the clock strikes 12. What type?

Just original? Extra toasted is the ones I've been getting over. Extra toasted. They knew what they were doing when they gave it that name. I'm an Oreos and Milk kind of guy. That's what I crave late at night. It's my favorite treat. And I'm always like, I'm just going to have two.

Two will be enough. And then I end up having like six or seven. So, yeah. I think that's the one treat that I always have in my pantry are Oreos. That's just kind of my one that's always there. All right, this one's from doodle. Recently, I've been really into Ben and Jerry's. salted caramel cheese cake cookie ice cream.

Oh, that does sound good. That sounds really good. Yeah. All right. Doodle P says, Hey, guys, my fiance and I started doing this new thing where we give claw ratings to things other than animals.

He's not a listener, but I am, and I gave him a list of my 10 claw animals, and it just started from there. Like, what's a 10 claw fruit or what's a 10 claw meal? What are some things that aren't animals that you would rate 10 claws?

I'm just going to take that first question and use that one. What's a 10 claw fruit? fruit for you guys. Peaches and mangoes are my two most consistent tens. Yeah. They're not always tens, but yeah. Locos always my favorite. So Montana cherries and Utah peaches. Yeah, Montana cherries is a great pick. They're definitely a 10 for me. I would also say for me, like strawberries and pineapple are the two that I just always enjoy and are always good. Like if I go to a hotel and they have fruit out in the morning, those are the two that I'm most likely to take, I think. So. Okay, a couple of quick ones, too.

I just asked for 2000s-themed listener questions on Instagram. Madge Hodgson 7 asks Best 2000 song for a school dance. I'd say Arrique Anglesius, the one that played at like every church dance. Is it Baailamos? Baikalamos. A third time take you over, bylamos. What are we taught? Mamacito, Baailamos.

A club banger? or like a slow dance song because those are two like Kiss by a Rose is going to be the slow dance one for sure right seal or is that a 90s song I forget I think that's 90s overall I'm going little John Eastside Boys get low

that's gonna get everyone going without a doubt without a doubt or Apple Bottom jeans Get low is mine too Top three Disney Channel movies Did you guys get into any of the Disney Channel original movies No I never watched one

No Okay I'll just take this one Brink, Johnny Tsunami, for sure, and then probably that Even Stevens movie they made. Or the girl who dirt bikes was the Super Cross or whatever. That was a good one. Camp stack wants to know, Christina or Brittany? Brittany. Yeah.

Christina's, it's... I'm surprised you guys went that. I know. I really like Christina a lot. I was like the perfect age. when Brittany Spears came out to be, like, having Britney Spears come out. I just remember that Rolling Stone cover and being like, oh, I'm in love, you know? So that, yeah.

Yeah. For me, it was Hillary, Hillary Duff, but I, but Brittany of those two for sure. Okay. Yeah. Oh, are we going like music or who we think is, because I, I'm actually more of a Christina Aguilera as far as like I'm attracted to her a little more than Brittany even. But I do like, I think it's music. I think it's a combo. It's like saying in sync or Backstreet Boys, but it's Brittany or Christina Aguilier.

I like Britney's music a lot more, too. So she takes it for me all around. Yeah. Ashlyn Pierce wants to know favorite 2000s animated movie. I mean, that's like my favorite Pixar era, I think. So maybe Wally. Spirited Away, I think, was 2003, and that's my favorite animated movie ever. So that's a good idea.

Emperor's New Groove was 2000. I really like it. Oh, that's a good pick. Yeah. That's a great movie. I feel like that was the last, like, really good classic Disney movie. All right. Last one.

Kylie Elizabeth asked best pop punk song of 2000. So not your favorite. Like, pop punk. So, yeah. The best pop punk. Opened up a real Pandora's box here. I was very squarely in the pop punk scene in, like, early 2000s. That was like, that was it for me.

This is a hard one for me to pick the best. I mean, mine would have to be cute without the, it's like my favorite song. Yeah, you think that counts? That's a good pick. Yeah, they're like emo, pop punk. Sure. It's close enough that. I think that counts.

I was going to go somewhere emo too, like teenagers or Helena from Mykem, but. If I got to go less emo, I'll take the, what's their name? Oh, I just had it. The, like, lifestyles of the rich and the famous. Good Charlotte. Good Charlotte. Interesting. Yeah.

This is really hard for me, actually. Maybe a Sun 41 sneaks in there. Dude, Sum 41 is really fun. I thought about that for a second, too. Man, I don't know. I'm having a hard time picking. Like, this is different from your favorite. Right, because my favorites were like,

weren't even pop punk necessarily, but it would have to be a Blink song for me. No, Weezer's not Pop Punk. Garage Rock. Yeah. I would say probably, like from the 2000s, I'd have to say like maybe feeling this by blink. It might be my favorite like pop punk song, but I don't know.

That's, I'm, I don't feel good about that answer, but that's just what I'm going to say. You can talk about it more later if you. Yeah. You can have a good trial if you want. I don't want it. Yeah. Yeah. My mind went to MXPX because they were my favorite.

They were the most pop punk band in like 2000. Or Anthem by Zebrahead? I'd say they were the most punk of the pop. punk bands too. So like, I don't know. They, they, like, there were real punk people that really liked. They didn't even, like, swear or anything. I know.

But they still had, like, they did have some credibility in that scene. They really did. All right. Well, thank you guys for sending in questions, both our subscribers and our listeners at large. Again, another benefit to subscription is we have a whole thread on our Patreon channel where people could submit questions. We don't get to all of them.

There's a lot of questions on there. but it is a higher chance of having your question read if you are a subscriber. That's it. That's it for the news stories. This is it. All right. Love you guys. We'll see you later.

See ya. Love you. Polar bears have dark skin. See ya.