Wild Times: Wildlife Education - The Wild Times #103 - Face To Face With A Bull African Elephant

Episode Date: October 10, 2022

The Wild Times crew discuss Forrest's latest adventures in Mexico, celebrate World Animal Day with their favorite animal encounters in which Forrest comes face to face with a bull African elephant and if eating bugs are a good or bad idea.     Leave a review on iTunes Apple Podcast: https://thewildtimespodcast.com/itune...   Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wildtimespod/   Official Website: https://wildtimes.club/ Info: https://thewildtimespodcast.com/info   Merch: https://thewildtimespodcast.com/merch   Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/wildtimespod  Enjoy, brosteners!   TWT #103 - The Breakdown   00:00 - Intro  05:25 - Forrest Tagging Whale Sharks in Mexico  14:20 - World Animal Day - Favorite Stories  25:25 - Weird Snacks Around The World  30:00 - Is Eating Bugs Good or Bad?  39:39 - Malawi Terror Beast  45:05 - Short Battle Royale  48:55 - Wrapping Up

And we ate so much raw fish way too early after drinking all night the night before. Oh, God. That me and my traveling partner were like, oh, God, like, I feel like shit. It's like, what's the right thing to do? And then we saw this little guy selling those little mochi balls. And we're like, gosh. It's so fucking good, man. Something about that texture.

Red bean flavored. You got like six flavors. We got like a strawberry. Oh, my God. I've seen the red bean flavored. I've never dabbled. I've seen it at fancy sushi restaurants. red bean flavored mochi and I'm like,

I don't know if I want my ice cream. It is the shit. Like you. Forrest, you order bubble gum ice cream when we get ice cream. That was one time and you're never letting that go ever. It was a huge mistake. It's literally just a five second video in the Galapagos.

After we found Fern, we were about to go out drinking. We stopped at an ice cream place. And I have a video for us saying, two scoops of bubble gum, please. Wild times. Here we go. Wild Times. This is an episode. I don't know what number. And we're here. Three, episode three. Yep. We're getting there.

103. Oh, 103. Okay. Sorry. I thought you said episode three. I was like, yeah, that's kind of a good joke. Yes, man. This is the Wild Times podcast, the greatest show in the world. I am coming to you live, thanks to Elon Musk's Starlink from Baja, Mexico. Right behind me? Are they a sponsor you? No, but they should be. There's my view. Very nice. I don't know if it's just nuclear looking through there. I think I saw a whale shark.

There was one. That's why I left a minute ago. There was one that swam by. We've had two swim by today, which is pretty neat. Yeah, they're right here. They're like 25 feet offshore. I've just had my friends in town for the last three days. They were staying with us.

We got out every day on the boat. I got stories. I got all kinds of things. But seeing as this is a regular and not a bonus, by the way, if you're listening to this, check out the bonuses on Patreon. I'm your host, Forrest Galante,

joining me, as always, the wonderful, the fabulous, the fantastic, the definitely not balding, Mr. Peter Fitzer. How are it, Peter?

I may be balding. I've been balding since I was 28. Well, it's interesting because you accuse Patrick and I have it constantly, and yet neither of us are. I've never accused you of balding except for today,

and it's because your hair is, I mean, I don't know. I don't, look at maybe. You can see. Maybe right there, right there,

right there. And Pat, deaf is balding, has been since he's 12. I'm good. Hold up in my house. I am jealous of where you're at. I am obese. I'm going on a 21-day diet reset. So next time you see me, I'll be... Beans? Are you doing beans? Beans will be involved. It won't be the premise of the diet. Like last time, even though it did work, and I'm pretty certain it was allowed me to get my wife pregnant. That said, having a good day. How are you gentlemen doing? Good. Very well. And to finalize the intro, Mr. Papa P himself, the pen pusher, the broducer, Patrick DeLuca. What's up, Pat?

Hey, man. Well, I'm just excited to be recording with you guys today because it's World Animal Day. Woo! Today is World Animal Day. What does it mean to you, Forrest, World Animal Day? Oh, dude, I don't care about animals. It's stupid. He looks like an animal today. That's for sure. I didn't even know it was World Animal Day. To be 100% honest, World Everything Day doesn't mean anything to me. Like, I remember when it like, no, it doesn't. It doesn't mean anything to me anymore.

I remember when it, like, kind of started. And I was like, I remember what the first one was, like World Sea Turtle Day? And I was, like, awareness for sea turtles. And that was like, you know, 10, 12 years ago when all these World Day days started. Now it's like World Hot Dog Day, World Beach Day, World Animal Day, World Tree Day. It's like, fuck, I don't care anymore. Every day is World Animal Day for me. I don't need this.

Wow. I bet you weren't expecting that answer. Were you bad? I think he's drunk. You must be. I'm not. I'm on my first drink. I'm not.

I'm on my first drink today. I had to work today. That's why I looked so camped. You're great. You got all dressed up for your video meeting. That's right. No, but that's my answer. How do you guys feel about World Animal Day?

Well, I just found out about it. So, you know, yeah, I guess it's, what is it? It's a day that you're supposed to do something nice for animals, donate money. I don't know. What is World Animal Day? Well, listen, I'm a big fan of World Animal Day. I got plans. I invited Pat to go in the next, this upcoming weekend to a place where there'll be pigs and bees.

And I love pigs and bees. Pigs and bees together is rare. So we're going to be celebrating World Animal Day this weekend, and I'm thrilled about it. But you guys come down here That offer is open This place is epic It's a little freaking ride To suck your dick, isn't he?

I mean to hang out for a while, isn't he? And you think I'm the drunk one saying inappropriate things No, I'm just, I just have no filter Kyle is coming down He's coming down in a couple weeks We're going to go film some whale sharks We're going to go out fishing It's going to be great

It's going to be great Nice Well, in honor of, oh sorry, go ahead Well, I was going to say I talked to you the other day on the phone for and you were you were waiting for some people to take you out on a boat, you were going to go tag whale sharks? It's very funny because it seems like everywhere I go,

there's no world in which I don't end up working, contributing my limited skill set. So I should rock up here in Bahia, right? And Bay of L.A. is notorious for having one of the highest densities of whale sharks, predictable whale shark migrations in the world. And so I was like, I love it here. I come here for that is one of the main reasons I come here. But I rock up here.

I run into my buddy Mike and he's like, dude, Rafa, the world's leading whale shark researcher gets here tomorrow and he's staying literally the exact same dates you're staying. He leaves on the 17th. And he's here to do whale shark research every single day. And the whole whale shark group is here and blah, blah, blah. Would you like to be involved? And I was like, yeah, you know, I'll come and meet everybody and go to the meeting. I'm not going to miss the opportunity to meet the world's leading whale shark researcher.

which very, very promptly turned into, hey, Forrest, do you want to work with us on this project every day for the next three weeks? To which I, of course, said yes, out of enthusiasm and then realized that that was not the best use of my time. But you and Pat tend to do that a lot, right off the bat, very excited into it. And then the next day it's what did I get myself into? Well, yes, but also no, because I'm stoked. I've been out on the boat every day. I have a boat here at the house that I'm staying out of my friend Randy's house.

And so we're using my boat so they don't have to pay for a boat a lot of the days. And their goal is to tag four new sharks and find this one. There's a big female that hangs out around here that they put a tag on like two years ago. But for whatever reason, they didn't put anti-fowling on the tag. So the tag is no longer transmitting because it's covered in algae and growth. So they have to try and find this gal and grab onto her and scrub that tag so that it starts transmitting again. And so I've been out looking for her, but we haven't found her yet. What's the method to like find a specific whale shark?

Well, there isn't. And it's actually really interesting. I'll tell you more about it. Well, there isn't because typically it's like, all right, the whale sharks come into this bay because it's really nutrient dense on the south end of the bay. And they congregate there. And any given day, you can have like eight, 15, 20 sharks there depending on the day. As far as the method for finding one, you just go to that area, right?

because it's like this is where they concentrate. And you're like, oh, it's not that one. It's not that one. Oh, that's a new one. It qualifies. Let's put a tag on it. But, but, and this is what's really fascinating. This year, Hurricane K hit Baja, California.

About a month ago, right? And when Hurricane K hit, there was quite a lot of damage in Bahia. Took out some houses, the arroyos, the dry riverbeds flooded like crazy. And nobody can find the goddamn sharks. And so I was sitting down with Rafa, the whale shark research. We were talking about like theories and hypotheses. and he came up with this idea that because there was this big influx, so there was a hurricane, a ton of water flushed, fresh water, rain dumped, fresh water sweeped over the desert and dumped

into this bay, okay? With it came a bunch of micronutrients and sediment. And what that's done is it's caused a giant bloom of plankton and zooplankton in the bay. So now in the area where there's typically sharks, like all the sharks, on an average we've seen one or two per day, but we're seeing them everywhere. They're like out by the island. They've been right in front of this house. They're up in the north and we're just finding them sporadically. And so Raffa's theory, which I think is totally accurate, is this giant flood happened, pushed all these nutrients into the bay. And the whale sharks are like, well, screw it. I'm

not going to stay in the corner. There's food everywhere because of all these micronutrients that have been introduced into the bay. And so instead of being concentrated in a predictable area, they're spread out everywhere. And it's making the work and the research very difficult, but it's interesting because it's a phenomenon that hasn't been seen before, at least of. Wow. So, and they typically, like, you can find them in a large concentration because they're all going to the same food source, but they don't hang out in groups, right? Well, yeah, correct.

I mean, they're hang out of groups in the sense of they're all on the same food source, like you just identified. But the way you see them is you're cruising along in a boat and you see this very weird, giant mouth. I mean, Kyle, maybe Google Shark like Google Shark, Google Search Whale Shark feeding. And you'll see, you just see the mouth coming out of the water or sometimes you see the fin or the tail

thin. And so you just look for these things sticking out of the water. But yeah, typically you'll have like a bunch in an area all feeding together, but they're not like a schooling fish that travels together in a group. Oh, yeah, it's just a big mouth. Yeah, so that's what you

I was trying to think if there was a way to, it's really interesting. when you see it above water. I got some photos of it somewhere. But anyway, it's really cool. You just see like the white band of the upper jaw sort of out of the water. And it looks like this big archway coming out of the water and just sort of slurping up micronutrients. It's really cool. Yeah. So how are you going to identify the females? So what do you do? You get there. You're like, okay, we got one. And then someone jumps in the water because they have like specific markings or something? Yeah. So they do on the on the left side between,

the gill plate and the pectoral fin for every single shark they take photos. What's that? No, they have breasts, I would imagine. Yeah, you're great. On the left side of every shark between the gill plates and the dorsal fin, they have spots like all over their body. But it's like a human fingerprint. No set of spots are the same.

And so you always photograph that section of each individual shark. How they're going to find the female is pretty easy because they'll just find the only giant female swimming around with a tag that's covered in algae growth. So, you know, they don't, they don't even have to be like match it up or anything. They just like, oh, look at that tag. It's bright green, right? It's covered in algae growth. So we got to go scrub it.

But that was one of the big goals for the project. I mean, they're only six days in, but we have nobody's founder yet. So still looking. Very cool. What would you, how big would you guess the largest recorded whale shark ever lengthwise is? I'll go three football pole length, so 30 feet. What an odd metric? That's all I measure everything.

Forrest, what's your guess? Largest whale shark ever documented, 46 feet. 61.7 feet. I was close. I was so big. Can you fucking imagine that, dude? Holy shit. Yeah, that's huge.

I met basketball hoop lengths, not football. Did I say football? Dude, average is 18 to, like between 18 and 32. Yeah. So you're talking twice, probably the biggest one you've ever seen is the largest ever recorded. Well, and to add to that, and we don't need to make this whole pot about whale sharks, but it was really cool. Day before yesterday, we go out, we're literally 25 feet in front of the launch ramp. And I see a fin and I'm like, oh, weird.

And I was by myself spotting for the research group at this point. And I'm like, I was with the family, but I wasn't with the research group. I'm like, weird. That like doesn't look like a whale shark fin. because it was like this big. I get there, it is like a five-foot-long whale shark. It is tiny, which is like, it's weird to say this because you're used to seeing baby animals of everything.

But when you see a whale shark that you could literally scoop and pick up, it is very bizarre to see. Like, you're not expecting a whale shark that is like five feet long, ever. You know, like a small one's like 15 feet. But to see one that's five feet was unbelievable. I called the researchers they came over there like, oh, way too small for a tad. So let me riddle you this.

Knowing that the biggest one ever got over 60 feet, knowing that the biggest one ever got over 60 feet, how old do you think that five-foot-long whale shark was? And this is based on Rafa, the world's leading researcher. Four months old, is my guess. I'll go two weeks old. Between eight and 13 years old. How?

So it's like a little person, whale shark? So they're not as fast growing as you'd think. So they're born pretty big. Oh, wow. And then they're relatively slow growing. No shit. Yeah. And how long do they live?

And I said this, they live like 50 years. But I said the same thing you guys did. I was like, oh, I bet that, you know, a year old at the most. He's like, no. He's like, that's like maybe eight, 10, 13 years old. I was like, oh, wow, that's amazing. Yeah. So yeah, I learned something totally new.

Yeah. they don't even reach maturity until they're 30. It's good to hear you're still learning new things as the wildlife expert. I do want to do a little thing in honor of, you know, world Animal Day. It took you a minute to think of that, didn't it? Well, you know, kind of blanked out there. A little bit. I'm in one mode when Forrest is explaining something for 10 minutes and then I have to shift focus.

It's not easy when you have a layman brain like mine. I'm actually like learning when he's talking and then I'm like thinking about it and then I have to like switch to something else. But I do want to get this in. We need to discuss it's World Animal Day. What is your favorite best animal encounter that you've ever, ever had in your life? Oh, wow. Wow, that's a really good question. Why don't you start, Peter?

Oh, yeah. Great. I got to think. So before before I. moved into this house that I'm living in, which was last year. We drove up to it and checked it out. We were going to buy it and everything. And then it was nighttime.

And there's just this white, pure white cat sitting on the, in front of the door. And then we came more times. And the cat always just sitting right there, as if it owned the house. And so I'm like, dude, this cat is awesome. And then, like, you could pet him. He was totally cool. and everything and just the nicest cat. And so, and then we move in.

Everything's cool. And come to find out, it's the neighbor's cat that just wanders the neighborhood. And he's deaf. And his name's blue. But he's deaf. And it's like crazy now because he's always, is he your boy? Yeah. I always say that too.

Except he doesn't get along with the R.Cat that we have in the house. They literally attack each other through the window. But, uh, because basically our cat came in. and took over his turf. And he's like the neighborhood badass, dude. I swear to God. This cat probably could fight off a coyote. But he's deaf.

So, like, you can call him. You can make noises at him. He never paid attention. And I was always like, fuck you then. But, like, he would be super friendly sometimes. And I never knew until the neighbor finally told me, oh, yeah, he's deaf. And I'm, oh, no, actually his tag said,

I'm blue and I'm deaf. And I'm like, oh, okay. So my favorite thing was meeting the deaf cat blue. That's nice. Yeah. That's nice. I mean, this is what you get from a guy who doesn't go on to many adventures.

Yeah, you've lived 37 hard years. Yeah. And that was your, that was the one that stuck with you. Yeah. I haven't heard that in a minute. That's funny. Forrest, what animal, what was yours? Your best animal encounter that you've ever had?

Wow, there are two enormous great Danes that just walked in. Look at this. Hi, guys. I have no idea where these dogs are from. Do you see them? Check its color. Is he deaf? Oh, there comes a third one.

Hi. Hi. They look friendly. They got some tags on them. This is why people tune in right here. I just have no idea whose dogsies are or where they've come from or are. Are they going in the house? Well, there's a screen.

So no. But I just cooked my dog some food right up there, which is just boiled yellow tail. But this guy's just, sorry, I'll get to my favorite. This might be it. Maybe I'm having my favorite animal. World Animal Day, dude. Your dog's eating like a fucking king down there in Baja, huh? He loves it.

Yeah, he gets boiled fish for like every meal. Oh, there they go. Well, that was fun. Sorry, that was distracting. I mean, look, the answer for me is Fern, but I'm not going to tell that story because everybody that listens to this has heard it or seen it, or if you haven't watched Extincter Alive.

Oh, here comes a guy who owns the dogs. If you haven't watched Extincter Alive, you know, the Fernandina tortoise. But I'll tell one that I haven't thought of in a long time the second he said it, it clicked in my brain. So when I was a little kid, I was probably 10 years old. I was with my grandfather, who was pretty much my hero, and we went to Monopools in Zimbabwe. And Monopool is just this incredible national park. And my grandfather said to me, he's like, all right, we're going to go for a hike around Longpool. And, Kyle, maybe you can find

this, might not even be available, Longpool, Mona, M-A-Pools, Zimbabwe. It is this massive long pan, which is like a seasonal lake, right? Fills up during the wet season and dries during the dry season. And all the animals come down there to drink. It's 10 years old, my grandpa's like, I'm going to go for...

What? Damn it. Sorry, go ahead. Change your Instagram handle to the... Never mind. No, go ahead. It ruins the story. No, it's not true.

It's because there's a delay on forest fucking AirPods coming through the Bluetooth, so it comes through a half-second later and then it like interrupts his next piece so I can't do it and it's my thing. I've adapted like an animal in nature. I have adapted to the delay. But it's not your thing. You're like the snarky asshole smart guy.

I'm like the funny interrupt guy who you guys hate. You know what I mean? Yeah, okay. Fair enough. All right. So I'll try not to do it. Just stalling for Kyle to find this picture of Longpool. Exactly.

Yeah, well played. So we're cruising around Longpool and I'm 10 years old. I'm not up to the. task of this hike. And it's like 105 degrees out. And it's just my granddad and I. And this is in like deep bush Africa. Like there's lions everywhere. There's everything. But it's a hot day and we're not seeing anything. It's probably the first time I've ever been on a long walk just my granddad and I. And he starts telling me, well, that's the Zambezi River in that photo. But it doesn't really matter. It's just this big flat piece of water. It's beautiful, though. And so we walk around and we see a bunch

of crocodiles. And, you know, there's a hip, there's a couple hippos in it and stuff. But we're not seeing a lot of wildlife in general. And Kyle, you will be able to Google this in a minute. So we get to the end and you can either go like another mile and a half down to the very end of where it gets dry or we can cut through the mud. And my grandpa's like, come on, we're cutting through the mud. Now, my grandpa was a decorated World War II hero, right? He was a tough old bastard. And he takes us through the mud. And I'm like nipples deep in the mud and he's like waist deep and we're cruising through and I lose my shoes and there's crocodiles like five feet away and my grandpa's like hitting him with a stick and he's like, this was a bad idea. And we're having this like grand all time. And I'm exhausted.

We get out of the mud and the car's like, it's like a half mile away. And my grandpa's like, you have to run. And I'm like, what? I'm not running? It's like, what are you talking about? He's like you have to run. Not because he was scared, but because he was trying to toughen me up. And I've this, it's like a seven hour hike and I'm 10 years old, right? And I'm, like, unbelievably exhausted. I'm, like, whining for him to pick me up and stuff. Maybe not. I don't really remember.

But I was just, I know I was miserable. And he's like, run. We're finishing the hike on a run. And we've barely seen any animals the whole day. So we do this run. And he's like, come on, come on. You know, like, like, motivating me to go the whole time and, like, pushing me to make me do it. And we get to the end.

And we're like 25 feet from the car. And we, again, we haven't seen any real wildlife the whole day. And we're 25 feet from the car. And he goes, stop. and I think he's just like letting me take a break and I like stop in my tracks and he goes forest come here quietly so I like back up to him

and we turn and there's this huge bull elephant just standing in the trees right beside us like in the shade and the dappled lighting and my son just woke up and my wife just got back from a walk good timing I like that's what I'm not vacation mode and uh and um we go stop and I

yeah and we stop and and we look and he goes, sit down. So we sit down quietly and we're like 20 foot away from this elephant. And this is a unique behavior that only occurs in monopoles and nowhere else in the world. And Kyle, you can look this up. The elephant jumps up on his back legs and reaches up into the tree. And Kyle, look up standing or just right up monopoles like that. It's the only place in the world this happens is in this national park.

And the elephant does exactly what he's doing in that image right there. and we're like 20 feet away from him, and he gets up on his hind legs, and we're sitting on the ground, and we watch this happen. He feeds in the Marula tree like five or six times like that, and then he kind of lands and snuffs and walks off into the bush. And my grandpa was like, there you go.

You earned that. That's why you got that. And I was like, oh, that was the coolest thing I've ever seen in my life. And I was like 10 years old, and I don't know why that memory came back to me when you brought it up. That's awesome, dude. That's really fucking cool. That's interesting.

So that's, because there's Marula trees all over, but that's, I guess, the only place where they learned how to get the taller ones. Is it a learned behavior, you think? That's a good question. There's a group called the Zambezi Elephant Fund that's been sort of researching it. And they're trying to figure out if it's something that is instinctual or it's something that's learned. And nobody really seems to know. But it's the only place in the world that it's documented to happen where the elephants get up on their hind legs and reach up into the trees to get the fruit. And no idea why, you know, there is obviously more fruit up higher.

But yeah, no idea why that's the only place that happens. Don't mean to interrupt, but I think Jess has taken her top off behind you in the, she just moved now, but. I think she realized she was in view. This is a public podcast, so what are you going to everyone? What about you, Pat? What's your favorite animal? I mean, look, I could come up with stories from Extincter Alive or,

or, you know, from Greenland. But mine also involved a cat. Nice. It was, yeah, I was in, sure, a nice moment. I was waiting for a boat. I was in Thailand. The boat was late to come pick us up on this little island. And there was like a little convenience store

where you could buy snacks. And there was this just really melnourished little kitten. And it was just sickly thin, right? It just wasn't, didn't have a lot going on. And you could buy at this little snack counter, you could buy cuttlefish that was just like cut into strips to eat. I don't know if it was boiled or how they cooked it or whatever. I'm sure it was disgusting.

Yeah, I didn't need any cuddlfish. I respect them too much. So I just bought a big pile of cuddlfish. I just sat on this bench and this little kitten just fucking ate cuddlfish out of my hand. And then like you could tell it was so happy. And it just felt really good. And I was just drinking a couple beers while I was waiting for my boat feeding this little kitten cuddlfish. And, you know, I didn't think about what happened to it after,

but, you know, I feel like it might have given him the leg up that it needed to, like, get on the right track. Yeah. Yeah. Of course. He also made his life better, you know? Yeah. And he was eating. So it's like, I feel like if an animal is eating, they're not at death store yet.

They're still, like, in survival mode. Yeah, he wasn't a death store. He just needed a little helping hand to fatten him up a little bit. Good. Like me. Yeah. Yeah. But I also thought I'd never seen just like boiled cuttlefish at like the equivalent of like a 7-Eleven before.

Yeah. Yeah. So I thought that was kind of interesting. Do you remember when we were in Vietnam, Patrick, we'd go to that 7-Eleven that was across the street from the hotel when we stayed in Hanoi. Because we ended up staying in Hanoi like four or five nights, if I remember. Yeah. It was like a hub for us. Yeah, it was.

And there was that like 7-Eleven or maybe it was an AMPM across the street. And they had green tea flavored Kit-Kats. Do you remember that? Oh, yeah. Yeah. I've seen those all over Asia, actually. Really? I have not.

I'll tell you something. I've seen them. Yeah. Not good. It's not good. No, it sounds gross. It's like, it's weird. It's almost like, you know, like yogurt covered things?

Yeah. When they come to like white yogurt covered raisins or it's chalky. It doesn't really taste like green tea. Not great. How dare you? The yogurt covered raisin might be my favorite, like, bad treat. I love. The white, it's not yogurt.

It's like bad white chocolate covered raisins, but they're called white yogurt covered raisins. Yeah. It's a delight. It's clearly not yogurt. It's big in, I think, like, yogurt is big in like Indian culture and other and Middle Eastern cultures and stuff. They kind of use it.

And that's why they're not as fat and terrible as we Americans are is because instead of just dousing it in sugar, they use like yogurt, which has some healthy components to it. And then we just, when we do it, you know, It's like chocolate covered almond. Okay. Dude, I'll tell you a weird, a weird sweet treat I had it in Japan.

I went to the Sukiji fish market. It's like a thing to do if you're in Tokyo. It's like you've seen pictures of it. It's like the biggest fish market in the world. But it's open from like five to seven in the morning and then it closes. So you're just shoulder to shoulder with people like shoving through these things. And it's fucking 5.15 a.m.

You just like slurp down an oyster for 50 cents. And you like cruise over here. You just eat some raw fat. You just get a big belly full of raw fish. And we ate so much raw fish way too early after drinking all night the night before. Oh, God. That me and my traveling partner were like, oh, God, like, I feel like shit. It's like, what's the right thing to do?

And then we saw this little guy selling those little mochi balls. Uh-huh. Yeah, yeah. You know those things? And we're like, yeah. It's so fucking good, man. Something about that texture. Yeah.

But, uh, red bean flavor. You got like six flavors We got like a strawberry Oh my God I've seen the red bean flavored I've never dabbled I've seen it at fancy sushi restaurants Red bean flavored mochi

And I'm like I don't know if I want my ice cream It is like shit Like you get it next time I will get it next time And this is from the guy who Fucking forest You order bubble gum ice cream When we get ice cream

That was one time And you're never letting that go ever It was a huge is a huge mistake. Two scoops. It's literally just a five-second video in the Galapagos. After we found Fern, we were about to go out drinking. We stopped at an ice cream place.

And I have a video for us saying, two scoops of bubble gum, please. I remember, yeah. He's never let that go. And it was a huge mistake. It was disgusting. Yeah. So speaking of weird sweet treats, Kyle, can you pull up the photo? I just texted you.

I want to get Pat's initial reaction. Oh, hell fucking yes. Dude. Hell yes. Oh, my God. What a great idea. Yo. For those who are only listening, it is a sugar cookie with three beautiful candy

corns embedded in the top. Did you know that candy corns are covered in insect secretion pad? That's right. That's right. It's a fact. Look it up. You disgusting filth pig. I'm sorry.

You have, I know that this was a big divisive issue last. Halloween and man. We morphed out an entire bag between the three of us. Live in the studio. Listen, I like candy corn, but not after hearing that it's just covered in bug secretions. What are you talking about? What do you? I don't remember

this. What do you talk about? No, I swear to God, listen, the lac insect produces a shiny, durable resin that's used as the basis for all kinds of coatings. The words shellac and lacquer both come from the name of the bug, typically found under the name confectioners glaze or pure food glaze. It is in candy corn, sirs.

All right. So apparently this is like a thing, especially in the like heavily dated like conservative versus liberal thing, the like eating bugs thing. Have you guys heard about this? It's like a don't let them eat bugs. Yeah. I hadn't. I just. Well, no, no.

They don't want people to eat bugs? That's apparently that's a thing. It's becoming a divisive thing. Yeah. Yeah. Apparently, and I don't really understand it. I'm not going to get into the politics of it, frankly, because I absolutely don't understand it.

But I will say this. I will say this. We should be eating bugs. And I don't know what side of the coin that falls on. Fucking liberal. Sure, whatever. I don't care. First of all, some bugs are delicious.

Okay? Secondly, not the ones we hit in Vietnam. No, those were gross. That was because you burned them. That's the only reason those tasted of shit. Burnt bugs. No blame. But anyway, it's just really, I didn't know about this whole political side of it, but like, getting grossed out by eating bug parts, my point is that's a mistake.

Bug protein is very good for you. Should it replace a hamburger? Absolutely not. Okay. I want a hamburger. I don't want a beetle burger. But it is that, I don't want that. Whatever college has found, I don't want that.

Nope. I don't want that. I cannot have meal worms, dude. Yuck, yuck, yuck. No, I'm with you. I'm with you. I don't want to eat meal worms. But some bugs, roasted crickets and scorpions, which taste just like crawdads or lobster.

There's some great bugs out there. So don't be grossed out by a little lacquer bug beetle juice on your candy corn. Also, by the way, this fucking lacquer resin, it's also commonly used in basically every bottle of wine and in soda. I'm not drinking anymore. No more wine, no more soda. Oh, yeah. I'm pure hard liquor. Well, so.

But real quick, that's dumb that that's a political issue. Because so friend of, friend of Forrest and mine, Courtney Borgerson, like, that's, she's like dedicated her life to sustainable insect farming in Madagascar, which is one of, you know, it's a place where there actually are real food shortages with real people starving that don't have access to food. And, you know, so she's been working on the sustainable insect thing for years. She'd be a great guest on the pod. She'd be a great guest to it on the pod. We should do that.

We had a, I can offer a little bit of insight on the insect divisiveness because it's been eking its way into the conspiracy subreddit. So anytime, this is the conspiracy subreddit is the best spot to watch out for the next political divisiveness thing that has nothing to do with politics. So what's that word? Divisiveness? Divisive. The British makes.

Divisiveness. Do you call it a strawberry or a strawberry? Strawberry. Let's hear about it. I honestly don't know anything about it. I'd like to hear about it. I mean, so basically it's this thing in the conspiracy realm. It's fresh.

It's a new conspiracy. And people are talking about how, you know, it's the haves versus the have-nots. Oh, they're going to make us all eat insects now. That's like the big new thing. So they can have all the meat and all this stuff for themselves, you know, because it's always about. about like the rich versus the poor. So the conspiracy is that they're trying to get us hooked or like to want the insects

and to want to eat them so they can enjoy all the delectable meats and cheeses and other things that are out there. Hold on. First of all, that's awesome. Those are delectable. First of all, that's awesome. Secondly, so what? If you were like, if you were poor and you were like, oh, man, bugs are.

If you were rich, who cares? And you were like, bugs are delicious. That's great. You're saving money. You're saving the planet. That's a good thing. That's what rational person thinks, you know. But everything's got to be like anything that can be a fire to be stoked online.

You got state actors, China, Russia, just stoking the conspiracy subreddits. It's like this is an issue. It's a left, right thing. It's, that's what's happening. Look, I'll tell you what, man. I've had a couple beyond burgers. I've had, there's like a chicken one that's like a buffalo chicken patty that's plant-based. You know, once in a while, I don't know.

wife buys them. They're fucking good. They're delicious. They're great. Cover a Beyond Burger and fucking the same mustard and mayo and pickles. Delicious. I'll eat it. I don't care.

If they can find a way to economically grind up meal worms, shape them into a thing, put some spices in, and it tastes like a Beyond burger, if you tell me that, you know, we can get people eating that, sure. Why not? This is a business opportunity. Less farmland, you know, less cows farting into the ozone. Sure. I'll eat it.

I eat burgers and I eat meat because that's the most readily available thing that tastes like that. It's true. But insects are high in protein also. Yeah, and low and fat for the most part. Yeah, that's interesting. We're on the insect ring here. I love the collective they. Don't you love the collective they?

The they then? The there they's? No, just like they're trying to make us do that and they're trying to put us down. It's like, who are they? And why are they so busy, like, doing this? Well, Gavin Newsom is the they. That's who's doing it all. Everything bad.

Right. It's just, it's just your, it's anything you're against they're doing. So you're like, they're doing this. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I'm good for, I'm good for a rant about the man keeping me down every once in a while, like when I have to pay taxes and shit. I don't quite get it. Wait, I was going to ask you, though, what's the most delicious

insect you've ever tasted and you can't say ants. Mopani worms. Kyle, Google Mopani, M-O-P-A-N-I. They are these giant caterpillars that live on the Mopani tree where I'm from in Zimbabwe. And yeah, I know. You don't think of eating a catmiller. And every year when they, yeah, those big batches. Oh, that's a mouthful.

Wow. If you were just listening, that is about the width, if you put your two hands together, holy shit. That's massive. It's like a cat shit size. It's the exact size of a cat shit. It is. It's a cat shit size.

And they put it on a skewer. They put them on a skewer and roast them. And it's like, it's like creamy shellfish with a little crunch on the outside. It's, uh, interesting. Yeah. It's good, man. I'm telling you. It's good.

I'm not going to get upset about it. I won't get mad about it. But I'll say I like Pat's idea better of crushing up the insects and putting them to some kind of molded meat type shape. because you have one of those and it's like creamy burst of cream of mushroom soup on the inside is I don't know if I could do it. Yeah, when you describe it that way, that's gross.

It's just, it's a mental thing. You have to get past what it looks like. You've got to get past what it looked like before death. Right. Because a cow, they're cute as shit. Right. Cows are cute. I'm going to show you guys something that,

here, I'm sitting his pants down again. No, that was pre-recording. Could you get over the mental aspect of this? And I see it every time I go to Malawi and you know me, I try everything. We'll never, just won't try it. Just won't try it. Kyle, pull it up, please. Oh, boy.

Give us a couple, Kyle. Can you zoom in more? Yeah, see if you can figure out what's going on here. You are those like bats or rodents? Oh, yeah. It's rats. It is street rats that they catch by the. dozen, stick them on these sticks, and just cook them whole over a fire and let the hair

sing off. And I've only been in Malawi a handful of times, but you see them, they're like, they're like your Starbucks. They're like every couple of blocks down the road. There's a guy standing there with rat on a stick. And I just, I just won't do it. Have you tried one? Now you haven't tried it? I just, I've, I've eaten a type of rat once before called a cane rat, which is like, it's almost like a guinea pig. It's like this big thing. And it was cooked nicely. But the idea of these like 12 rats on a kebab sitting on a roadside in the sun guts in like hair

singed off. I'm a little crazy. It's not for me. Yeah. I would eat pizza rat. I would eat pizza rat. Like what pizza rat is? Kyle, Google Pizza rat. Pizza rat, like what? Pizza rat's way more famous than you forest. Pizza rat got very famous

after an incident like a year ago in New York City where he was filmed. Oh yes. I remember. Paking off with the entire New York City style slice. You got to fold that to get that in a lot. Look at the one with the Chicago Deep Dish style on there. Look to the left. Yeah.

Look at that. Genius. Don't eat it, Rat. You'll feel like shit after. But isn't that? I feel like that is just like, I mean, I guess it doesn't because it's so common. But isn't that just asking to get some kind of like intestinal parasite or something? They carry so much disease and like,

They're very dirty, right? I would rather I would rather eat Malawi bush rat on a stick than anything out of New York City. That's for sure. Any rat, let me be clear, any rat out of New York City,

not any food group from New York City. That would be shenanigan. Can I segue us quickly into a very fast one-off version of one of our favorite games? Yes, please. Yeah. Let's play

The Crypto. game. Malawi, home to one of my favorite cryptids, an incident that Forrest knows well, in which a mysterious beast evacuated an entire town because it was killing so many people. It's called the Malawi terror beast. For us, you know quite a bit about the incident, right? I should go second, but I do know a bit about the incident. So in a town in Malawi, there were multiple incursions over the course of like five years where this terror beast, Kyle, see if you get a photo of our Malawi terror beast that doesn't give away what it may be.

And where this terror beast was coming into villages, snatching children out of people's huts in the night and killing them. And it got so bad, as Patrick pointed out, that they evacuated the town. They literally- Four thousand people. Four thousand people relocated. Not an easy thing to do. That's a good, that's a good fine there, Kyle. This was the artist, child artist's rendering of what the Malawi Terror Beast was.

Peter, I think Patrick knows because we worked on this. What do you think it was? Well, real quick, I just want to add to this. So this was not that old. So this was in 2003, right? These people that live in the Dawa district or Doa of Malawi, you know, they know what the animals are. that live around them. They've seen them.

This was, they described as an aggressive beast that did not act like any of the other animals they were used to. Killed five people, maimed over 20. Wow. And it was so bad, so many, you know, five kids, five kids. Jesus. 20 injured, people losing limbs.

This thing's attacked 25 people in 2003. What could it be? Well, this is clearly a case of a, of a dark witch or a bad witch doctor. That was a prevailing belief and still is actually. Dark shaman, they're able to shift shapes into different animals. We have them here as well at a place called Skinwalker Ranch. That's what these are 100%.

There's no way they would have evacuated a town of 4,000 people. But after the explanation of what it really was, I want to know what happened. Did they come back? Did he go away? did they kill it? But tell us, please. I'm dying to know.

I actually don't remember what the upshot of it was other than, well, the prevailing belief is that it was a hyena. And it's probably like that famous tiger that started eating. Yeah. It's probably like that famous tiger that started eating people because it had a broken jaw and like people were the easiest thing to eat. And I forget the tiger's name. But it was probably a case like that where the hyena was sick or it figured something out

or it couldn't completely. peat or something like that. It figured out that humans are assholes and it's just like I'm going to eat them all fucking kids. And it's incredibly easy to eat. Yeah, exactly. But yeah, so the Malawi terror beast was believed to be a hyena.

And I think it would have been a striped hyena. So, Kyle, pull up a picture of a striped hyena. Yeah. Yeah, the authorities, they killed, they did kill a hyena that had rabies. And they think that that put an end to it. Wow. There you go.

Dude. But look at this animal. You got to admit that's pretty close. Now, Striped hyena are pretty rare and pretty hard and very elusive. So to see one of these versus your regular brown hyena, you know, that pretty much matches the image of that drawing that you saw there earlier. Their faces are so stupid looking. They look like your dumb friend, your dumb friend Randy. Like, look at his dumb face.

Hey, guys. Hey guys. But dude, could you imagine that one of those coming into your hut and taking your kid? Like, what would you even do? That would be the scariest fucking thing

imaginable. Like crazy. Rightfully that they, they evacuated that town of 4,000. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, so have you ever seen a rabbit animal?

I mean, we know, you know, have you actually ever seen one? I never. Not in person. I've seen a video. I'm going to have Kyle pull up a video here.

Oh, God. You know, it's sad to see, but we know animals have rabies. But just to give some context, this is a video of a rabid raccoon. Oh, boy. And you can just sort of see, you know, it's not acting right, obviously. Yeah. It's sad. Obviously, this animal was euthanized.

You know, it's foaming at the mouth. It's gnashing its teeth. I go catch fishes. Do you want to go catch fishes? Yeah. Soon. So imagine Yeah, all right, that's enough

A hyena Yeah Imagine a hyena That size, that strength, that You know, PSI Dude Yeah Just they're crazy

Too rabies literally makes Your brain deteriorate You're afraid of water You're afraid of air Swallowing water You go absolutely insane No matter the species And it's got a hundred percent

Kill rate In humans anyways All right Fucking crazy Here's what I think we do Okay I don't think we've done a battle royale in a minute. I'm going to wrap up.

My kid wants to go fishing. I never say no to that opportunity. So, whenever we're going to wrap up here. Here's what we're going to do. Last game. This game, this battle royale, should we do the jingle? We should do the jingle. Battle royale juggle.

Yeah. Battle royale. Okay, here's the battle royale. You have to set one rabid animal free in the subways of New York City. whoever's rabid animal survives the longest, but also maims the most people, wins. Okay. Just one, and you got to explain why. Okay. Okay. Okay.

All right. Can you go first? Patrick, you're up first. No, I'll think about it. I'll go first. I go first. I got a thread. Okay. Just one animal.

This is simple. People are going to be disappointed because it's so easy, but it's so obvious. I'm selecting a rat because a rabid rat will just be in the subways of America in New York biting people's toes, ankles, people have flip-flops on.

Nobody's going to even know that this is happening or see this fucking thing. It'll be on the platforms like every other rat that's there until it dies, just biting people's feet rabidly. So the goal was

to kill as many people as possible? MAME. I use the word name. So I probably should. Yeah. There's a right answer here. That's fine. That's fine. Because that's not really maiming anyone, though, is it, the rat? It's a good, rats. No, he's maiming. Have you seen the claws on those things? Well, I thought you just said people wearing flip-flops are going to get bit by this rat and not even know what's happening. Well, exactly. That's what I meant. But these claws are vicious. If he chooses to use his claws, these people are going down.

Bloody old. There's a correct answer, and I know it. I'm going to win. Let's go. A moose. Wow. Because I don't, he doesn't need to take the time to stop and bite or use claws. It's just going to run at top speed and just swing its head left to right, smash people into the platform. It might not, you know, it'll kill a few people, unfortunately. But it's also going to maim a bunch of them.

I mean, this thing, you set that thing rapidly free and a crowded New York City subway, it might, it might take out like five million people. The thing about the rat, though, too, is that once the other, once it's infected all the other humans with rabies, they will be mauling each other. So by extension, the rat is now, everybody is mauling and attacking each other. So it's a zombie. It's, it's World War Z. Essentially.

Yep. Okay. Okay. Here's mine. Here's mine. In the cities of New York subway, there's one answer. It's a honey badger. There's a borrowing animal that's built.

Don't like a tank that's absolutely ferocious. It can hide in the subway. It's not going to get run over by any of the trains because it can borrow underneath the tracks. It's going to pop up, maim like a dozen people at a time, disappear again. Authorities will never find it. It's already basically rabid. Like, Kyle, go to that picture, second one down on the left-hand side.

Look at that. That thing with rabies, forget about it. Evil little bastard. Yeah, that guy. That's a nightmare in the subway, straight up. Until my rat bites his fate. then he's fucked. And by the way, if my rat bites the moose or the fucking badger's feet and then starts

maiming people, that counts as my maims, my kills. My maims. Those are my maims, baby. All right, go play with your kid, Forrest. Pat, I know you've got a call as per usual. I'm going to wrap us out because I am excited about the new website. Make sure you go there. Wild Times.com.

And all the links to everything else are there. wild times. Dot club forward slash info to gets all the socials and everything else at Wild Times pod on all the socials. And the Patreon is patreon.com forward slash wild times pod. But don't forget, go to wild times. Club. Check out all the stuff we got there.

Log in. We got all the videos there. It's an awesome website. Adding a forum that you guys can talk to each other on and get into all that shenanigans. And yeah, that's it. I'm happy. I'm excited.

I love you guys. Love you, too, man. No, no, I was talking to the fans. Sorry. The listeners, the brosters, says, me. Okay.