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Selects: How Polar Bears Work · Stuff You Should Know

0:00
Speaker 1: Good morning everybody. It's Saturday and it's Chuck, and that
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Speaker 1: means it's time for a select episode where we hand
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Speaker 1: pick and curate some of our favorite episode of the
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Speaker 1: years to be rereleased on Saturdays. In case you don't
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Speaker 1: have anything going on. This one goes all the way
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Speaker 1: back to September. It's about polar Bears. They are super
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Speaker 1: fascinating and cool and you will walk away with more
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Speaker 1: than one dinner party fact that you can throw with
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Speaker 1: your friends how polar Bears work. Right now, welcome to
0:33
Speaker 1: Stuff you Should Know, a production of I Heart Radio. Hey,
0:43
Speaker 1: and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles W.
0:46
Speaker 1: Chuck Chuck Bryant scratching out a significant amount of this article,
0:53
Speaker 1: like literally as we started recording. That's important stuff. There's
0:57
Speaker 1: like numbers and dates and way eats and temperatures and
1:02
Speaker 1: that that's it's important stuff you just scratched out. I
1:04
Speaker 1: feel like it's all covered in the body of the
1:06
Speaker 1: text of the article, though, well, I mean that's one
1:09
Speaker 1: way to do an intro. Is anybody in journalism can
1:12
Speaker 1: tell you you can write the article and then go
1:15
Speaker 1: back and summarize. If you're an intro. I've never been
1:19
Speaker 1: partial that the intro to me is just like this
1:24
Speaker 1: stream of consciousness. It tells you where the rest of
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Speaker 1: the article is going to go because you don't know, man,
1:30
Speaker 1: because it's all jazz baby. Uh yeah. Polar bears. Polar
1:38
Speaker 1: bears another polar bear club. Although they may have clubs,
1:43
Speaker 1: they're one of the least studied mammal populations on the planet.
1:47
Speaker 1: Because it's cold, no one wants to go hang out
1:48
Speaker 1: and watch them, yeah, pretty much, and because it's also
1:51
Speaker 1: extremely dangerous to to study polar bears up close and personal.
1:56
Speaker 1: Yeah they look cuddly, um, but they will, especially New
2:00
Speaker 1: well yeah remember New. Yeah, I got a little bit
2:02
Speaker 1: about New very sad. But you're gonna say they look
2:07
Speaker 1: cute and cuddly, but don't leave his hanging. Well, you
2:10
Speaker 1: go up to hug one like you want to, and
2:12
Speaker 1: you get your face eating. Oh yeah, if you're lucky,
2:16
Speaker 1: that's all that happens, you know. I saw pictures of
2:18
Speaker 1: a guy who um survived a polar bear attack. Oh
2:22
Speaker 1: my goodness. Yeah, he was messed up like I guess
2:28
Speaker 1: it was still attach, but three quarters of his scalp
2:33
Speaker 1: was now flipped back double like there's a whole clear
2:36
Speaker 1: through his achilles tendon and his ankle, so like as
2:41
Speaker 1: achilles tendon was intact, and then the front of the
2:44
Speaker 1: top of his the front of his ankle was intact,
2:47
Speaker 1: but in between the two was gone. That could have
2:50
Speaker 1: been a claw, poke or a fang. Yeah, it could
2:53
Speaker 1: have been like flicking it with its thumb and middle finger.
2:57
Speaker 1: Very strong. It's one of nature's cruelest things to an animal.
3:00
Speaker 1: So huggable, uh and deadly. So yeah, you know if
3:05
Speaker 1: you're if you hug up polar bear, it's bad news. Yeah,
3:07
Speaker 1: it's like one of those black widows that marry and kill. Right. Well,
3:14
Speaker 1: that's just my interpretation of polar bears. You know, you
3:18
Speaker 1: mean the ursus maritimus. Yeah, and maritimes is Uh, it's
3:25
Speaker 1: a legitimate thing to call it because technically a polar
3:27
Speaker 1: bear is a sea animal, a sea mammal. Yeah, because
3:32
Speaker 1: they spend most of their time actually on the sea,
3:35
Speaker 1: that's right, and in the sea sometimes, as we'll find out. Um, well,
3:40
Speaker 1: I guess we're knee deep in this thing. Huh. Yeah,
3:43
Speaker 1: because you skip the intro. Uh. So the polar bear
3:47
Speaker 1: what they think? Um, and I enjoy our animal casts
3:51
Speaker 1: a lot, and there's some of my favorite ones. I
3:53
Speaker 1: just wanted to say that although the polar bear doesn't
3:56
Speaker 1: despite its huggability, doesn't compete with the jellyfish with octopus. Um,
4:01
Speaker 1: but it's up there. Sure it is because you can
4:04
Speaker 1: hug a jellyfish, you know, I than an octopus. That's
4:07
Speaker 1: a great hug. Yeah, eight times as good. They won't
4:10
Speaker 1: let go. I guess four times is good. Yeah, alright,
4:13
Speaker 1: so the polar bear two times is good because polar
4:17
Speaker 1: bear has four. No, I mean as a human hug.
4:21
Speaker 1: Uh so, Jerry even like that one. Um. So the
4:25
Speaker 1: polar bear evolved, as best as we know, a couple
4:29
Speaker 1: of hundred thousand years ago from the brown bear. Actually,
4:32
Speaker 1: I saw the scientific consensus between five million and six
4:36
Speaker 1: hundred thousand years really because I saw the two thousand
4:39
Speaker 1: all over the place, did you really? Yeah? But it
4:41
Speaker 1: might be one of those you know how the internet is,
4:44
Speaker 1: Like I think Science Magazine used the term scientific consensus.
4:49
Speaker 1: Oh wow, so I was like through done the gauntlet.
4:55
Speaker 1: Uh well, let's just say let's go with a scientific consensus, okay, um,
5:01
Speaker 1: and not our own article on our own website. But
5:05
Speaker 1: they did evolved from the brown bear. Uh, they think
5:08
Speaker 1: and um. One of the ways that they back this
5:13
Speaker 1: up is by saying, polar bear can go have sex
5:16
Speaker 1: with a brown bear and they can make a baby
5:18
Speaker 1: bear and that bear can actually have babies. Yeah, which
5:22
Speaker 1: means everything jibs. Do you remember? I think it was
5:25
Speaker 1: our evolution in Isolation episode that was a good one.
5:29
Speaker 1: We talked about speciation events, and we talked about this
5:32
Speaker 1: how the how the brown bear just kept ranging further
5:35
Speaker 1: and further north, and as as they're kind of habitat changed,
5:41
Speaker 1: they actually evolved to too, into a different species, the
5:44
Speaker 1: polar bear. I remember that now, but I remember a
5:48
Speaker 1: species or a speciation event taking place when the two
5:52
Speaker 1: groups could no longer reproduce. That was my memory of it,
5:57
Speaker 1: but I guess not because I went back in double check.
6:00
Speaker 1: It's like, polar bears are different species, but it can.
6:02
Speaker 1: It can reproduce with brown bears. And it does make
6:05
Speaker 1: sense because humans and Neanderthals or neanderthals if you're a
6:10
Speaker 1: pet ant um could could reproduce and have fertile offspring,
6:15
Speaker 1: and there are definitely two different species of humans. Yeah,
6:18
Speaker 1: that's true, right, Yeah, they were, well, you know, occasionally
6:22
Speaker 1: people get together and have a few drinks and science
6:26
Speaker 1: is created, you know. Yeah. Yeah, uh so there are
6:32
Speaker 1: way more um brown bears, everyone knows. And we're gonna
6:35
Speaker 1: talk a lot about this. That the polar bear. I'm
6:38
Speaker 1: not sure the official designation. I don't think it's officially listed. Well,
6:43
Speaker 1: it depends on where you are, yeah, as the official
6:46
Speaker 1: listings is threatened or you know, the like, it depends
6:49
Speaker 1: on the country it's in. Yeah, but they are they're
6:51
Speaker 1: not doing great. There's only about twenty five thousand polar bears,
6:55
Speaker 1: and their habitat is shrinking literally physically shrinking. Yeah, that's
7:00
Speaker 1: the big problem is that the the melting of Arctic
7:03
Speaker 1: sea ice as we'll see as the Arctic sea ice
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Speaker 1: is where they live. They live on ice floating out
7:11
Speaker 1: in the Arctic ocean, um, and they don't like to
7:14
Speaker 1: be on land. When they are on land, it's a
7:16
Speaker 1: problem for them. So the decrease in Arctic sea ice
7:21
Speaker 1: that's going on because the climate change UM is affecting
7:26
Speaker 1: them tremendously and affecting the rest of the ecosystem. But yeah,
7:30
Speaker 1: definitely because UM say, like if they get stranded on land,
7:34
Speaker 1: they start hunting on like for land mammals, which affects
7:39
Speaker 1: the ecosystem, and that now their competition that's not normally
7:42
Speaker 1: there for for prey. You know, there's all sorts of
7:46
Speaker 1: ripple effects that are coming out of it. But one
7:48
Speaker 1: thing I did see is that the the polar bears
7:52
Speaker 1: that are really really far north are actually benefiting from
7:56
Speaker 1: the melting um ice. Oh really, because it's easier for
8:01
Speaker 1: them to hunt now because there is just less area
8:04
Speaker 1: to cover. Um it's the ice is thinner. Oh, so
8:08
Speaker 1: they can hunt more easily on it. Interesting. Yeah, uh,
8:12
Speaker 1: well it's a good thing you said north, because you're
8:15
Speaker 1: not gonna find polar bears, but the South Pole where
8:19
Speaker 1: Santa lives and penguins and Santa lives at the north
8:22
Speaker 1: north Pole with the polar bears. That's right. We've all
8:25
Speaker 1: seen the Coca Cola commercials. Yeah, but that has penguins
8:28
Speaker 1: in it. Yeah, the penguins and polar bears would never meet. Yeah,
8:32
Speaker 1: that's true, because that maybe at a zoo. Yeah, that
8:35
Speaker 1: is true. They had polar bears at the San Diego Zoo.
8:39
Speaker 1: There's a polar bear in China in a mall in
8:42
Speaker 1: China that has a zoo, and it is one of
8:46
Speaker 1: the saddest things I've ever heard of. I signed a
8:48
Speaker 1: petition last night to free it. His name is Pizza
8:52
Speaker 1: and it is It's the Pizza the polar Bear. It's
8:56
Speaker 1: the it's the saddest. I think it's build as the
8:59
Speaker 1: saddest pole. They're bear on the planet. Man, it's so sad.
9:02
Speaker 1: Look into it, chuck outside the Yeah, I guarantee you will.
9:05
Speaker 1: And you know what, I bet we could get a
9:07
Speaker 1: lot of people to sign that petition. We'll see if
9:10
Speaker 1: it matters. The petitions matter. Do they make a difference? Uh?
9:16
Speaker 1: I think if they're accompanied with the right like press,
9:20
Speaker 1: like media pressure, right or like a mafia thug right
9:25
Speaker 1: to deliver the papers. I got a petition for you.
9:29
Speaker 1: I highly recommend you read it. Uh So. Polar bears
9:34
Speaker 1: do live only in the Northern Hemisphere. Those twenty five
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Speaker 1: thousand are in nineteen distinct populations in five just five countries,
9:43
Speaker 1: including the United States. Yeah, it's funny because their habitat
9:46
Speaker 1: is at the top of the world where five countries
9:50
Speaker 1: basically come together. Well Alaska, yeah, that's the U. S part.
9:54
Speaker 1: Canada obviously. I think two thirds of all polar bears
9:57
Speaker 1: actually live in Canada. Even though they if you asked
10:00
Speaker 1: him that, they wouldn't be able to tell you. Russia
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Speaker 1: is another big one, Norway in Greenland, that is correct, uh,
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Speaker 1: And it is tough living up there for humans, but
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Speaker 1: not for polar bears. They love it. They're well adapted
10:17
Speaker 1: over the years. Just supposedly if they run for any
10:22
Speaker 1: bit of time, they have to like stop and lay
10:24
Speaker 1: down because they'll overheat and they will exhaust themselves. Yeah,
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Speaker 1: identified a lot when I was reading this with polar
10:32
Speaker 1: bear like, I kind of like these guys. They are
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Speaker 1: incredibly well adapted. Um, which is another reason why I
10:38
Speaker 1: think they don't think it's any less than six hundred
10:41
Speaker 1: thousand years that they evolved from brown bears, because it
10:45
Speaker 1: would take so long for these just they're really different
10:49
Speaker 1: from brown bears. Like brown bears are basically herbivores, polar
10:53
Speaker 1: bears are carnivores. They seal blubber like brown bears eat
10:58
Speaker 1: berries in the occasional human on accident maybe, but polar
11:02
Speaker 1: bears are like, give me some seals, I want them.
11:05
Speaker 1: I bet they would eat some berries if someone offered
11:07
Speaker 1: them up for dessert. Maybe, but there are no berries, right,
11:10
Speaker 1: you know, But it would take a lot because they
11:12
Speaker 1: get kind of big and they need a lot of
11:14
Speaker 1: fat to ward off the cold. Well, yeah, and they
11:18
Speaker 1: have a lot of it. They have two layers of
11:20
Speaker 1: fur and then blubber, full blubber layer. That's about four
11:24
Speaker 1: and a half inches thick of just blubber. Yes, supposedly,
11:27
Speaker 1: like of their weight at any given time or when
11:30
Speaker 1: they're fully um developed or nourished, is a blubber was
11:36
Speaker 1: their own fat. Since you mentioned the weight, we'll go
11:40
Speaker 1: ahead and throw some stats out. Adult males eight or
11:44
Speaker 1: nine ft. Yeah, apparently that's the biggest bear. The polar
11:49
Speaker 1: bear is the biggest of the bears from what I understand,
11:52
Speaker 1: not the bear and Stein bears. Barren Stain. Adult females
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Speaker 1: six to eight feet and the male's way up to
12:00
Speaker 1: thirt hundred pounds nine pounds. Yeah, that's that's intimidating. It
12:06
Speaker 1: is you've seen lost. I haven't this article mentioned it though,
12:12
Speaker 1: of course, because it was probably written. When these stats
12:14
Speaker 1: are accurate. The females can get up to about seven
12:18
Speaker 1: hundred pounds those claus I mentioned about two inches, and um,
12:24
Speaker 1: they live about twenty years. Um. Yeah, I was surprised
12:27
Speaker 1: by that. That's really short twenty years. Sure, I didn't
12:31
Speaker 1: think that was too bad for a bear. Oh, I
12:32
Speaker 1: thought it was very short. What do you think it's
12:35
Speaker 1: a good bear span for your lifespan, like fourty or
12:40
Speaker 1: fifty years. Yeah, that's what I want to see for
12:42
Speaker 1: a bear. Well, we all do. Let's be honest. Twenty years.
12:47
Speaker 1: It's just like live fast, die young type age, you know.
12:51
Speaker 1: So there pause which we mentioned the clause. They have
12:54
Speaker 1: these big, beautiful, fat round paws that act like snow shoes,
12:59
Speaker 1: and they walk and they spread out when they walk
13:02
Speaker 1: on the on the ice and sort of distribute their weight.
13:05
Speaker 1: And in fact, when they're on thin ice they even
13:07
Speaker 1: spread their arms out wider. It's very cute. Uh. And
13:10
Speaker 1: they have these little uh papilla on their bottom paws
13:17
Speaker 1: is old nubs because ice is slippery, and they the
13:20
Speaker 1: front paws are actually slightly webbed for swimming. It's amazing. So,
13:26
Speaker 1: like you said, it's it's a sea bear. It is
13:29
Speaker 1: the Maritimus ursa maritimus. So let's let's talk about some
13:34
Speaker 1: of its like actual habits and the things it does
13:38
Speaker 1: after a break. You want to, yes, Chuck, you mentioned
14:10
Speaker 1: their fur, right, so you know their furs translucent. That's right,
14:14
Speaker 1: they're not. It's not another episode at some point, probably
14:17
Speaker 1: the evolving isolation one, or maybe it's translucent or by
14:22
Speaker 1: or maybe the butterflies wings one. What is I can't
14:28
Speaker 1: remember what it's called iridescence. Iridescence. That was a really
14:31
Speaker 1: interesting episode two. Um, but yeah, they're there there. Um.
14:36
Speaker 1: Fur is actually it's translucent because it's hollow, and it's
14:40
Speaker 1: hollow because it traps air and then their body heat
14:42
Speaker 1: can warm the air. It's kind of like, um, have
14:45
Speaker 1: you ever camped when it was cold and all you
14:47
Speaker 1: need is one of those little thin blow up mats
14:50
Speaker 1: because your body heat warms the air underneath it. Thermarrest,
14:54
Speaker 1: it's a brand name, but sure, right, okay, so it's
14:57
Speaker 1: the same thing. But this is their fur that's doing that. Um.
15:00
Speaker 1: And since it's hollow and translucent, it actually scatters all
15:04
Speaker 1: colors of light and creates this white appearance like a
15:07
Speaker 1: quartzid or something like that. It's amazing. So they're not
15:10
Speaker 1: actually white coated in white fur. It's all an illusion. Yeah.
15:15
Speaker 1: So if you saw a polar bear in New York City,
15:20
Speaker 1: it would be the color of street garbage, right, like
15:23
Speaker 1: a chamelelee it's not true. Street garbage color color is
15:29
Speaker 1: that well, you mustard, it's like a pizza box, and
15:34
Speaker 1: they'll be some recycling and then just some just New
15:38
Speaker 1: York apartment to trit us, it's like the colors of
15:42
Speaker 1: the rainbow. Alright, So the fur is um not all
15:46
Speaker 1: over their body. The parts of their body that don't
15:49
Speaker 1: have this thick insulation and this blubber, the tail and
15:53
Speaker 1: the muzzle and the ears are adapted to be small
15:56
Speaker 1: because it's not as insulated with that blubber. So um,
16:01
Speaker 1: it requires less energy to heat and it has less
16:04
Speaker 1: surface to to lose heat from. Right, That's right. So yeah,
16:07
Speaker 1: these guys are like incredibly well adapted for their environment,
16:11
Speaker 1: which is really saying something because their environment is about
16:14
Speaker 1: is inhospitable the mammal is you can imagine. Um. They
16:20
Speaker 1: are routinely comfortable and apparently have no heat loss whatsoever
16:25
Speaker 1: at temperatures of like negative what was it, like like
16:29
Speaker 1: fifty fahrenheit negative fifty that's the like, that's the temperature
16:34
Speaker 1: they're they're comfortable in um and they actually, yeah, they
16:38
Speaker 1: experienced no change in body temperature a temperature of negative
16:41
Speaker 1: thirty four degrees fahrenheit which is negative thirty seven celsius. Amazing. Yeah,
16:45
Speaker 1: they're just like it's unaffected by it. They're that well
16:49
Speaker 1: suited to the environment. So we mentioned them walking. They
16:53
Speaker 1: can walk a great distances up to thirty I'm sorry,
16:56
Speaker 1: twenty miles KOs a day for days and days in
16:59
Speaker 1: a row. And uh, they have been tracked swimming up
17:03
Speaker 1: to sixty miles, which is amazing. Okay. One other thing
17:09
Speaker 1: I saw um a Canadian geographic article, which is a
17:13
Speaker 1: thing okay, uh, and they get this was a two
17:18
Speaker 1: thou twelve article and they mentioned a recent study so
17:20
Speaker 1: probably two thousand, two thousand and eleven maybe two twelve.
17:23
Speaker 1: Study found polar bears swimming as a result of climate
17:27
Speaker 1: change um up to six d eighty seven kilometers. That's
17:31
Speaker 1: four six miles. That's to get from ice to ice.
17:34
Speaker 1: Y man, that's sad, four hundred and twenty six miles.
17:38
Speaker 1: These things are just swimming like well, I don't think
17:41
Speaker 1: they're supposed to swim that far. No, definitely not, you know, no,
17:44
Speaker 1: but they can. They'll do it. It's amazing. And they're
17:47
Speaker 1: doing that to eat that sweet sweet seal blubber. Yeah.
17:50
Speaker 1: And plus I mean the sea ice is their habitat.
17:53
Speaker 1: This is where they live, it's where they sleep, it's
17:55
Speaker 1: and it's where they hunt most most importantly. Yeah, so, um,
17:58
Speaker 1: they don't. Another big differ prints with the brown bears.
18:00
Speaker 1: They don't hibernate like uh, the your average bear. Uh
18:05
Speaker 1: you like that. Uh, female sort of semi hibernate when
18:09
Speaker 1: they're kind of pre and post pregnancy, but it's not
18:12
Speaker 1: true hibernation. And like the biological sense you want to
18:16
Speaker 1: talk about mating, Oh sure, specifically polar bear mating. So again,
18:26
Speaker 1: they they are a fairly not closely studied um mammal population. Right,
18:34
Speaker 1: So scientists actually aren't entirely sure how females signal to
18:38
Speaker 1: males that they're um ready to reproduce. And the reason
18:44
Speaker 1: why is, um, the females don't appear to actually go
18:49
Speaker 1: into any kind of heat. They have something called induced ovulation, right,
18:54
Speaker 1: which is once they're mating, they start to ovulate. It.
18:58
Speaker 1: Actually the intercourse is what causes the ovulation, right, and
19:01
Speaker 1: not always sometimes it takes several times. Yeah, you've gotta
19:04
Speaker 1: be good, you gotta know what you're doing, right, um,
19:08
Speaker 1: and once the once they actually do um, I guess sure,
19:16
Speaker 1: once the once the egg is fertilized. The embryo doesn't
19:20
Speaker 1: actually start developing right away either. Yeah, that's super interesting.
19:24
Speaker 1: It's an eight month gestation. But the first four months
19:27
Speaker 1: it's just sitting there. Yeah, just the fetus is just
19:29
Speaker 1: like waiting while the mom eats and eats and eats
19:34
Speaker 1: and prepares for that long uh, that long period as
19:37
Speaker 1: we'll see where where you know, she has a little
19:39
Speaker 1: cub and uh yeah, a couple of couple of times,
19:43
Speaker 1: usually twins, thank you. You know all you've seen polar
19:47
Speaker 1: bear cubs, right, it's pretty adorable twins. They're born blind,
19:53
Speaker 1: without teeth. They probably make cute little noises. They're not insulated,
19:59
Speaker 1: so they need mom. Like if polar bear mom dies
20:02
Speaker 1: right away, polar bear cubs will not survive. Oh yeah,
20:05
Speaker 1: there's their toasts. Zero chance. Yeah, like you said, they're
20:08
Speaker 1: born blind and without teeth. They've really thin for no insulation.
20:13
Speaker 1: They weigh about a pound in her a foot long,
20:16
Speaker 1: which is really tiny for a bear that's going to
20:18
Speaker 1: grow into pounds. Um And yeah, that mom makes a
20:24
Speaker 1: den when she's um carrying her her embryos and starts
20:30
Speaker 1: to fatten up. She goes and makes a little winter
20:32
Speaker 1: den sometimes it's snow den, which, by the way, you
20:35
Speaker 1: should see that movie snowdon It's good. Yeah, the documentary
20:42
Speaker 1: of the movie. Well both yeah, yeah, okay. Um, and
20:46
Speaker 1: so she'll make a little snow cave, snow den that
20:49
Speaker 1: kind of thing, um, or use an actual cave. But
20:52
Speaker 1: for the most part, she's usually just digging out a
20:54
Speaker 1: little space for herself. And then um, she'll give birth
20:59
Speaker 1: and then nurse the cubs for at least their first
21:02
Speaker 1: twenty months. Yeah, they have to hang out with mama
21:05
Speaker 1: for a while and drink that milk. Yeah, I think maybe, um,
21:08
Speaker 1: a couple of years, maybe up to four years they
21:10
Speaker 1: spend with mom, like learning to hunt and all that
21:13
Speaker 1: kind of stuff. Um. But yes, she doesn't leave the
21:18
Speaker 1: snow den for like the first um several months. Yeah,
21:23
Speaker 1: dad splits after a week, He's like, my work here
21:26
Speaker 1: is done. I might even go get someone else pregnant.
21:29
Speaker 1: They're not monogamous. The women, the women, the females, um,
21:36
Speaker 1: their lady lady bears. They they made successfully usually between
21:41
Speaker 1: the age of six and eight years old, and they
21:44
Speaker 1: only for mammal don't reproduce a lot, which is one
21:46
Speaker 1: of the reasons there's only two of them. They only
21:49
Speaker 1: have about five litters over their lifespan, whereas some mammals,
21:53
Speaker 1: you know, I mean they just have litter upon litter
21:55
Speaker 1: every year of multiple, multiple little cubs. Yeah, which is
21:59
Speaker 1: another reason and why you know, a loss of the
22:02
Speaker 1: to the polar bear population is it's a big deal.
22:06
Speaker 1: They don't replace. Their replacement rate is kind of low,
22:09
Speaker 1: that's right. Uh. And there could be you know, a
22:12
Speaker 1: battle over mating with a female because um, it's you know,
22:17
Speaker 1: it's sparks out there. It's not the most happening scene
22:22
Speaker 1: for picking up. It's not a firm bar, it's not
22:25
Speaker 1: a ferm bar. Uh. So if that happens, they will fight.
22:28
Speaker 1: They won't kill each other. Yeah, I thought that was
22:31
Speaker 1: kind of me. Yeah, of course the human to me
22:33
Speaker 1: is like, they know that they're dwindling, so they won't
22:35
Speaker 1: kill each other. Of course it's not true at all.
22:38
Speaker 1: That's funny because the human and me was like they
22:40
Speaker 1: they're like, it's really tough out here, so we all
22:42
Speaker 1: got to stick together. Yeah, you'd like to think that. Um,
22:46
Speaker 1: but what they do is they will they will lower
22:49
Speaker 1: their head but pin their ears back and roar. It's
22:51
Speaker 1: kind of a lot of posturing um. But there could
22:54
Speaker 1: be like an injury that occurs fighting over who to
22:57
Speaker 1: mate with, right, but not to the death. Yeah, I'm
23:01
Speaker 1: sure it happens occasionally. There's probably a jerk bear every
23:03
Speaker 1: now and then. You know, this feels threatened Todd, Yeah
23:07
Speaker 1: he's all on steroids. But when a death will happen
23:13
Speaker 1: is if anyone messes with those cubs, because Mama bear
23:16
Speaker 1: will take you down, like without thinking twice. Right, It's
23:20
Speaker 1: very sweet. So the little bears have been brought up
23:25
Speaker 1: by their mom. The twins Chuck and Buck, they are
23:31
Speaker 1: they have been brought up by their mom and raised
23:34
Speaker 1: to hunt, hunt, hunt, and uh now they know what
23:38
Speaker 1: they're doing. So if you could drop in on either
23:41
Speaker 1: one of those guys and actually there, I was really
23:45
Speaker 1: surprised to hear this. The males will like hang out
23:48
Speaker 1: with one another. Yeah, they're not necessarily territorial. Yeah, they'll
23:52
Speaker 1: even share a meal occasionally. Yeah, they have enough. Again,
23:55
Speaker 1: that's because they're like, it's tough out here, man. Come on,
23:59
Speaker 1: They're like, brother, can you spare a dime. I've had
24:01
Speaker 1: my hundred pounds of blubber today, which is literally how
24:05
Speaker 1: much they can eat. So um. When they hunt. They
24:08
Speaker 1: prefer ice, like a bit of ice, sea ice that
24:13
Speaker 1: they can sit on. And actually what they'll do is
24:15
Speaker 1: they look for holes in the ice. The main prey
24:20
Speaker 1: of the polar bear is the ringed seal. Yes, their favorite.
24:24
Speaker 1: They'll they'll eat other stuff. They'll eat just about anything,
24:27
Speaker 1: a whale, carcass, alive, beluga whale that they can catch, um,
24:30
Speaker 1: walrus is whatever, but they really go nuts for ringed seals. Okay,
24:36
Speaker 1: so um. Ringed seals have a thing where whenever it's um,
24:41
Speaker 1: the ice is thin enough for them to dig through.
24:44
Speaker 1: And by thin enough, we're talking like six feet right.
24:47
Speaker 1: The seal has these um basically appendages on its flippers
24:52
Speaker 1: that are sharp and they use it to carve holes
24:55
Speaker 1: through the sea ice. And these are the seals breathing holes.
24:59
Speaker 1: And they make about ten to fifteen of them every season,
25:03
Speaker 1: and then they'll keep them like open throughout the season.
25:06
Speaker 1: They maintain them. So they're hunting down there, they're eating
25:08
Speaker 1: their own stuff. They need to come up for air sometimes, well,
25:11
Speaker 1: polar bears stake these things out because they know that
25:15
Speaker 1: a steal has to come up forever very like five
25:17
Speaker 1: to ten minutes. Yeah, it's like whack a mole almost exactly,
25:21
Speaker 1: and they it's well, it's sad in a way, but
25:25
Speaker 1: it's also, uh it's sad for the seal, but it's
25:28
Speaker 1: necessary and it's pretty sharp too, but it's it's an
25:31
Speaker 1: amazing waiting game that requires tons of Like you can
25:34
Speaker 1: watch videos on YouTube of a bear, and this is
25:37
Speaker 1: like a a thousand pound bear, like very gingerly because
25:42
Speaker 1: you know, the seal can see what's going on or
25:44
Speaker 1: feel it, and they very quietly walk up to these
25:47
Speaker 1: holes and just wait like a cat almost hours, yeah, days,
25:52
Speaker 1: just waiting and smelling. They can smell like twenty miles
25:55
Speaker 1: so you can bet they can smell down into that hole.
25:58
Speaker 1: And then there's one that slow mobie ado of this
26:00
Speaker 1: bear like leaping up in the air and the whole
26:05
Speaker 1: basically everything but his butt and his hind legs goes
26:08
Speaker 1: down into that water grabs that seal with those claws
26:12
Speaker 1: and yeah, it's like these curse these breathing holes that
26:17
Speaker 1: I need. Uh, I couldn't have had guilt. Yeah, and
26:22
Speaker 1: the bear eats well, like I said, about a hundred
26:24
Speaker 1: pounds and a meal. And it's also horrific because they're
26:29
Speaker 1: white and the blood from the seal really stands out
26:32
Speaker 1: against Yeah, and on the ice and snow, it's like
26:34
Speaker 1: it does. It looks like a horror movie. But bears
26:38
Speaker 1: have actually evolved to clean up very like immediately after eating.
26:43
Speaker 1: So they'll eating eating, eat like you said, they'll eat
26:45
Speaker 1: like a hundred pounds of blubber at a time, and
26:47
Speaker 1: when the hunting is good, they'll just eat the seals blubber. Sure, right, um.
26:52
Speaker 1: And actually what's interesting is the omega threes in that
26:55
Speaker 1: seal blubber actually cut down on the type of cholesterol
27:00
Speaker 1: that would allow plaque to build up in their arteries,
27:02
Speaker 1: so they can subsist basically on a diet of fat
27:05
Speaker 1: seal blubber. You know, it's amazing. Um. And right after
27:09
Speaker 1: they finished this meal, they're covered in blood and it's
27:12
Speaker 1: really again horrific. They'll take a bath. Depending on the
27:16
Speaker 1: time of year, they'll take a bath in the in
27:18
Speaker 1: the sea itself, or they'll take a snow bath, and
27:22
Speaker 1: then they'll take a little nap well, because they need that,
27:24
Speaker 1: like you said, they need that furtive remain translucent and
27:27
Speaker 1: clean in order to stay warm and dry. So uh, yeah,
27:31
Speaker 1: they clean up to keep themselves warm, not just because
27:34
Speaker 1: they look like something out of a West Craven movie, right,
27:37
Speaker 1: but also because they have to remain camouflaged too. Yeah, exactly. Uh. Well,
27:43
Speaker 1: before we take a break, I do want to mention
27:45
Speaker 1: the very funny thing if a polar bear does not
27:49
Speaker 1: get that seal in the hole, they can throw a
27:52
Speaker 1: little hissy fit. Oh yeah, and they've been known to
27:55
Speaker 1: like pound the ice and frustration. Uh. And I don't
27:58
Speaker 1: think like people are you know, putting or stuff on
28:00
Speaker 1: the bear like they literally like when they miss the
28:03
Speaker 1: seal start throwing things around and beating on the ice
28:07
Speaker 1: because they're angry. Like imagine waiting at an air hole
28:10
Speaker 1: for two days the seal finally comes up and you miss. H. Yeah,
28:14
Speaker 1: I can. I don't think it's anthropomorphizing either. Yeah, it's
28:18
Speaker 1: pretty funny. Um. All right, let's take a break and
28:20
Speaker 1: we'll talk a little bit about their dwindling ice and
28:24
Speaker 1: numbers after this. Sorry JH, all right, we're back. One
28:55
Speaker 1: thing we did not mention that I think it's obvious,
28:58
Speaker 1: but we might as well say it is. The polar
29:00
Speaker 1: bear is nothing hunts the polar bear. Right there, the king,
29:04
Speaker 1: Daddy's and Mama's of their land. The apex predator. Yeah,
29:08
Speaker 1: which is a pretty good place to be. Um. The
29:12
Speaker 1: bad place to be if you're a polar bear is
29:15
Speaker 1: where you live and hunt, because, like we said, it's
29:18
Speaker 1: it's shrinking, and um, it creates a lot of problems.
29:22
Speaker 1: You mentioned a little bit about the ecosystem. You know,
29:24
Speaker 1: they'll go in there and they'll eat birds and eggs
29:26
Speaker 1: and things like that when they have to caribou maybe
29:29
Speaker 1: on the shore. Yeah, but they're they're not supposed to
29:31
Speaker 1: be eating that stuff. Uh. And they're not supposed to
29:34
Speaker 1: be encountering humans as often as they are either, which
29:37
Speaker 1: is a problem in some parts of the world. But yeah,
29:40
Speaker 1: Well there's actually um a town in Manitoba called Churchill
29:43
Speaker 1: that's developed a like basically it's made itself a tourist
29:48
Speaker 1: destination for polar bear tourism. Um. But it's like one
29:53
Speaker 1: of the few places in the world that's like an
29:55
Speaker 1: established settlement where Westerners can come and um view them. Yeah. Uh.
30:02
Speaker 1: But even in Churchill, they they occasionally have to like
30:07
Speaker 1: shoot the polar bears if they just won't leave. And
30:11
Speaker 1: apparently a little p s a here. If you ever
30:14
Speaker 1: encounter a polar bear, do not lay down and play dead.
30:18
Speaker 1: That's not what you want to do. Yeah, is it
30:20
Speaker 1: like regular bears? You try to make yourself look big,
30:22
Speaker 1: look big, make a lot of noise, chase them off. Um.
30:26
Speaker 1: Apparently they'll break out. There's another town um in uh
30:30
Speaker 1: I think Norway. Uh. That what they'll like, rev their snowmobiles.
30:37
Speaker 1: They'll get the town helicopter out and try to scare
30:40
Speaker 1: them off like that. Yeah, that's the one small bard
30:43
Speaker 1: which has people and three thousand polar bears. Yeah, so
30:47
Speaker 1: they've probably gotten pretty used to fending for themselves. Yeah,
30:50
Speaker 1: they have. Um for the most part, the bears will
30:54
Speaker 1: leave because from everything I saw, the polar bear in
30:58
Speaker 1: particular isn't interested in in encountering humans. It's not their thing. No,
31:03
Speaker 1: it's like almost any wildlife, they're forced into that situation. Yeah.
31:07
Speaker 1: If you look at bear attacks though, um, like a
31:10
Speaker 1: grizzly bear will attack you while you're just sleeping quietly
31:13
Speaker 1: in a sleeping bag near anywhere near and it comes
31:17
Speaker 1: into your camp. It'll mall you your dad the polar bear.
31:20
Speaker 1: List of polar bear attacks do not include stuff like that.
31:24
Speaker 1: It's it's a polar bear that you've startled or you're
31:28
Speaker 1: very hungry or it's very hungry and you have been
31:31
Speaker 1: have meat in your pockets. Yeah that was Yeah in Churchill, Manitoba.
31:36
Speaker 1: There um their stats they have had two people killed
31:40
Speaker 1: in three hundred years by polar bears. Yeah, it's that's
31:43
Speaker 1: pretty good track record for one of two towns where
31:46
Speaker 1: not bad. One of them was because these kids, uh
31:51
Speaker 1: saw a bear and started throwing rocks at it. Not
31:54
Speaker 1: a good idea. So the bear was like, all right,
31:56
Speaker 1: jerk's here I come. Uh. And then the second one,
31:59
Speaker 1: a dude had meat in his pockets, you know. Yeah,
32:03
Speaker 1: he was eating at a diner. He wanted to go box,
32:07
Speaker 1: just put that meat loaf in your pocket. And he's like,
32:10
Speaker 1: I guess I will this one time and the one time.
32:13
Speaker 1: But actually, if you do look at the polar bear
32:16
Speaker 1: stats right for attacks fatal attacks by polar bears in
32:20
Speaker 1: the United States and Canada, And remember sixty of all
32:23
Speaker 1: polar bears uh live in Canada, so this is a
32:27
Speaker 1: substantial amount of the polar bears. Um. There there have
32:31
Speaker 1: been eight fatal attacks in the United States and Canada
32:35
Speaker 1: by polar bears since nineteen Four of those took place
32:39
Speaker 1: in zoos where humans climbed into the enclosure with the
32:43
Speaker 1: polar bear. So this one lady that wanted to swim
32:45
Speaker 1: with them. Yeah, they was jumped in and got bitten
32:48
Speaker 1: on like the arm and back and was like screaming
32:50
Speaker 1: and they fixed her out. Oh she survived. She survived.
32:53
Speaker 1: A bad idea. Um, apparently that's the thing. There's a
32:56
Speaker 1: dude in Toledo before I was born who was down
33:00
Speaker 1: in the polar bear enclosure at the Toledo Zoo and
33:03
Speaker 1: they think he was probably on drugs. And I'm sure
33:06
Speaker 1: he was like, this is gonna be great. I'm gonna
33:08
Speaker 1: go hang out with that polar bear. Yeah, but think
33:10
Speaker 1: of it. Eight people died in the US and Canada
33:13
Speaker 1: since nineteen seventy two, half of them at the zoo. Yeah,
33:16
Speaker 1: only four in the wild. Yeah, so that's the real
33:18
Speaker 1: stat It does say a lot, it does. Um. And
33:22
Speaker 1: you know we said make yourself look big. If you
33:25
Speaker 1: don't know what that means, that means. The big trick
33:28
Speaker 1: is to, uh, you probably got on a winter coat
33:31
Speaker 1: if you're living in one of these places. So just
33:33
Speaker 1: grab the bottom of your winter coat and pull it
33:36
Speaker 1: up over your head with your arms and basically, yeah,
33:41
Speaker 1: you just appear like large, and that's one of the
33:44
Speaker 1: big survival tips for any bear. Really just makes you
33:47
Speaker 1: look bigger and scarier, because bears are you know, actually,
33:50
Speaker 1: polar bears are pretty smart supposedly, Is that right? Yeah?
33:53
Speaker 1: I was about to say they were dumb, but they
33:55
Speaker 1: they're one of the smarter mammals. I mean, how so
33:58
Speaker 1: where where did you see? That? Was just on a
34:00
Speaker 1: polar bear site. You know, they were just literally ticking
34:03
Speaker 1: off all the like cognitive abilities. But I think there's
34:06
Speaker 1: they're supposed to be much smarter than like your average
34:08
Speaker 1: brown bear. Yeah, Yogi Bear, Yeah he's pretty smart. You
34:13
Speaker 1: can talk where's the tie? I think he's driven a
34:17
Speaker 1: car before you can get inside a picnic basket. I
34:21
Speaker 1: love that. When I was a kid, did you watch that?
34:23
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, Yogi Bear? I liked Yogi Bear from like
34:26
Speaker 1: the original series all the way through the weird stuff
34:29
Speaker 1: in like the seventies. I don't remember the weird stuff
34:32
Speaker 1: like um, the laugh Olympics. Oh yeah, yeah, sure, all
34:36
Speaker 1: that spin offs and whatnot. Yeah, so Chuck. We've talked
34:41
Speaker 1: about it indirectly a couple of times, but the polar
34:44
Speaker 1: bears habitat is shrinking. Tremendously right. The ice is literally melting,
34:49
Speaker 1: and like I was saying in that one Canadian geographic article,
34:53
Speaker 1: they were saying, the bears, the bears in the south
34:56
Speaker 1: are really having trouble, and there are far more human
35:00
Speaker 1: bear encounters than they normally are. Because if a bear
35:04
Speaker 1: makes his way to shore and um, summer strikes and
35:08
Speaker 1: the ice recedes, they're stuck. He's stuck. They have to
35:11
Speaker 1: wait around until winter comes again or late fall and
35:14
Speaker 1: the ice starts to come back towards shore so they
35:16
Speaker 1: can swim toward it or swim right exactly. Um. So
35:22
Speaker 1: that's that's creating a problem, especially for the ones that
35:24
Speaker 1: are in the southern range. But the ones that are
35:27
Speaker 1: in the northern range are enjoying like easier hunting than
35:30
Speaker 1: ever because the ice is thinning out for them, so
35:34
Speaker 1: they the seals can get through it more easily. So
35:36
Speaker 1: there's more seals, so there's more hunting up north. The
35:40
Speaker 1: thing is that's not necessarily sustainable, Like they may be
35:43
Speaker 1: enjoying like a heyday right now, but eventually that ice
35:47
Speaker 1: will melt too, and well they'll be gonners because a
35:52
Speaker 1: bear can overheat from from running right. So as the
35:56
Speaker 1: temperatures increase, the bear is actual physical health is in danger.
36:02
Speaker 1: Let alone there you know, habitat shrinking. Um. So they're
36:07
Speaker 1: not entirely certain what to do. I looked up hunting
36:10
Speaker 1: polar bears, and I think the only the Inuit people
36:15
Speaker 1: are allowed to well, you can get there are certain
36:19
Speaker 1: places in Canada where he can get an exemption, but
36:21
Speaker 1: it's apparently very rare and controlled and very expensive. Well
36:26
Speaker 1: and expensive and and supposedly they say, is is well
36:30
Speaker 1: within the um the bounds of not harming the overall
36:34
Speaker 1: population number. Well again, I'm sorry to keep going back
36:37
Speaker 1: to this. Well, but that Canadian geographic article, um, I
36:42
Speaker 1: should probably say the name. I think it's called The
36:44
Speaker 1: Truth about Polar Bears. Yeah, totally worth reading, but um
36:48
Speaker 1: it talks a lot about managed hunting programs being a
36:52
Speaker 1: good thing or bad. They were saying it's as long
36:54
Speaker 1: as it's done right, basically everybody involved. I think they
36:58
Speaker 1: even cited the World Wilde I fund as saying like, yeah,
37:02
Speaker 1: we should probably like manage these populations through hunting with
37:06
Speaker 1: with very strict quotas. But yeah, the Inuits traditionally, or
37:11
Speaker 1: the Inuit and I think the Cree are two groups
37:14
Speaker 1: that have like virtually unrestricted honting like native rights, but
37:19
Speaker 1: they're they're apparently trusted to, you know, stay within these
37:23
Speaker 1: these limits. Yeah, and the people that can pay to
37:27
Speaker 1: do it, I think have to be taken in by
37:30
Speaker 1: Inuit guides. And they actually the Innuit families who keeps
37:36
Speaker 1: the the bear meat? Right after the rich American? Yeah,
37:41
Speaker 1: I saw that too, kills the bear, which is that's great?
37:44
Speaker 1: Who cares about the meat? I just want to kill
37:47
Speaker 1: the bear. Yeah, I just want the head on my wall.
37:49
Speaker 1: I founded Jimmy John's. Isn't that the guy? Yeah, he's
37:54
Speaker 1: a big game hunter. Who else was? Who's the other guy?
37:57
Speaker 1: The dentist? It killed Leo the lion. I wonder whatever
38:01
Speaker 1: happened to him. I bet his dentist practice suffered. Yeah,
38:06
Speaker 1: that'd be my guess. Oh, it definitely did. But I
38:09
Speaker 1: wonder if it rebounded since since the initial since the
38:12
Speaker 1: Internet got bored and moved on to something else. Yeah,
38:15
Speaker 1: probably so. I mean, I'm not into any hunting for myself, um,
38:21
Speaker 1: but I've certainly hate big game hunting for anyone. You know,
38:25
Speaker 1: I would like to put a call out like, um,
38:28
Speaker 1: any time I've I've had discussions about hunting or whatever,
38:31
Speaker 1: and I've said, I don't, I don't see the point
38:34
Speaker 1: in our modern world of hunting. UM. It's always been
38:38
Speaker 1: countered with, well, you know, hunting is a lot more
38:42
Speaker 1: humane than the factory sure farming that you're you're eating
38:47
Speaker 1: the meat from. Um. And I've never that's always struck
38:51
Speaker 1: me as a straw straw argument, draw me an argument.
38:54
Speaker 1: But I've never been able to exactly identify why. Or
38:57
Speaker 1: maybe it's not. And that's why I've never been able
38:59
Speaker 1: to idea to five why. But it's it's always confounded me. Yeah,
39:03
Speaker 1: I don't. I mean, I know that people talk about
39:05
Speaker 1: the populations and controlled hunting and all that being good
39:08
Speaker 1: for the population, which I'm sure that's very valid. I'm
39:11
Speaker 1: just talking about me personally. Like when push came to shove,
39:14
Speaker 1: I like hanging out in the the woods, I like camping.
39:16
Speaker 1: I like shooting guns every now and then it targets. Sure,
39:19
Speaker 1: shoot up some tin cans. It's fun. But when push
39:23
Speaker 1: came to shove, I can never like pull the trigger
39:24
Speaker 1: and kill an animal. I shot a squirrel when I
39:26
Speaker 1: was a kid and it was just like the worst
39:28
Speaker 1: day of my life. I think I've told that story
39:30
Speaker 1: was awful. I've got one or two of those under
39:32
Speaker 1: my belt. Yeah, and you either get into it or
39:34
Speaker 1: you don't, I guess. And all of my friends hunted
39:36
Speaker 1: growing up, you know, in Georgia at my church, like
39:39
Speaker 1: every single one of them. But my dad didn't hunt,
39:42
Speaker 1: So I didn't hunt. Yeah, he didn't take a stand.
39:45
Speaker 1: He was just he was into camping and hiking and
39:48
Speaker 1: not shooting animals, leaving nothing but footprints, nothing but photographs.
39:55
Speaker 1: Let's not take only pictures and polar bear heads, leave
39:58
Speaker 1: only footprints, leave only blood in the snow, and leave
40:02
Speaker 1: the polar bear meat behind for the Inuit. So Newt, Oh, yeah,
40:07
Speaker 1: you got anything else? No, let's finish up with Newt.
40:09
Speaker 1: Everyone remembers Newt cutest polar bear ever. Uh in Germany
40:14
Speaker 1: and new to die very sadly had a seizure and
40:18
Speaker 1: fell into a pool. And they think that he probably
40:21
Speaker 1: drowned once he fell in, right, I think he had meningitis. Well, no,
40:25
Speaker 1: they finally found out what it is. They couldn't find
40:27
Speaker 1: any kind of pathogen, and so this doctor Harold Pruss
40:32
Speaker 1: for the German Center of Neurodegenerative Disease, got together with
40:36
Speaker 1: um Professor Alex Greenwood at the Leibnitz Institute for Zoo
40:41
Speaker 1: and Wildlife Research, and they said that he had an
40:44
Speaker 1: autoimmune disease. They found out because nothing made sense about
40:48
Speaker 1: the seizure, so they really wanted to investigate, not only
40:51
Speaker 1: for Newt's sake, but to you know, see if they
40:53
Speaker 1: could help other animals. And uh, it turns out that
40:56
Speaker 1: Newt is the very first animal domesticated while ever diagnosed
41:01
Speaker 1: with an anti n M d A receptor encephalitis. Oh
41:07
Speaker 1: that's what it was. Encephalitis, not mangitis. Yeah, which is
41:09
Speaker 1: a non infectious form of it. Encephalitis, which basically is
41:12
Speaker 1: when your bodies on immune system attacks your brain. Is
41:15
Speaker 1: the very first animal ever recorded to have this. So well,
41:19
Speaker 1: poor Newda. But a big breakthrough to learn this that
41:22
Speaker 1: it can happen, because now they can you know, study it,
41:25
Speaker 1: and new It was the the reason that they can
41:31
Speaker 1: make this progress. So maybe something good can come from that. Yeah.
41:35
Speaker 1: Very sad though, Sure have a seizure and falling water
41:39
Speaker 1: and drown. Yeah, got anything else? Got nothing else? I
41:42
Speaker 1: do have one other thing that Inuit. Speaking of the Inuit,
41:46
Speaker 1: they have um obviously a number of legends about polar bears.
41:50
Speaker 1: One of them is that they're actually uh shape shifters,
41:55
Speaker 1: human shape shifters once again their iglues, they shed their
41:58
Speaker 1: polar bis skin and turned back into human like that.
42:00
Speaker 1: The other is that um when when an Inuit kills
42:05
Speaker 1: the polar bear, they will put out like an offering
42:07
Speaker 1: of tools, again with the idea that the polar bears
42:12
Speaker 1: um have some sort of uh they share an afterlife
42:16
Speaker 1: with humans, possibly as humans um, and that they need
42:20
Speaker 1: these tools in the afterlife. And the better the spread
42:23
Speaker 1: of tools you give the polar bear, the more likely
42:26
Speaker 1: this polar bear is to tell other living polar bears, Hey,
42:30
Speaker 1: you should let this guy kill you because he's gonna
42:31
Speaker 1: hook you up with some amazing tools afterward. So go
42:34
Speaker 1: ahead and let him take your life. Very spiritual, it's
42:37
Speaker 1: pretty cool. They call him Nanook. Yes in a n
42:43
Speaker 1: U K Yeah not okay uh. If you want to
42:49
Speaker 1: know more about nannook uh, you can type the word
42:53
Speaker 1: polar bears into the search part how stuff works dot com.
42:56
Speaker 1: And since I said Nanook, it's time for a listener mail.
43:01
Speaker 1: I don't even call this letter from a young fan. Okay, good,
43:05
Speaker 1: we like those right, Yeah, of course, Hey, guys. I'm
43:08
Speaker 1: a fourteen year old fan. Actually, my fifteenth birthday is tomorrow,
43:11
Speaker 1: which is now in the past, so he's already fifteen.
43:15
Speaker 1: I wanted to get it out before then. I've been
43:17
Speaker 1: listening since last July, and I've recently been listening to
43:20
Speaker 1: the older podcast from the beginning about three years in.
43:23
Speaker 1: At this point, I've never written in before because I
43:26
Speaker 1: had no real reason to. I have recently started my
43:29
Speaker 1: freshman year at a new school, and it's been hard
43:32
Speaker 1: for me because I was homeschooled before this and I
43:35
Speaker 1: could listen to you guys whenever I wanted to. But
43:38
Speaker 1: now I'm at a charter school and I miss having
43:39
Speaker 1: you in my ear all the time. Uh. And then
43:42
Speaker 1: he sends his name is Elias, and he sends a
43:45
Speaker 1: couple of ps s. If Jerry were to speak at
43:48
Speaker 1: the normal volume, would your microphones pick her up? Uh? No,
43:53
Speaker 1: I don't think so, Jerry, would they now? She sees
43:56
Speaker 1: are right? Now? These are directional mix Uh. These are
44:01
Speaker 1: omnipresental mikes. Well, that means they should pick up Jerry right,
44:05
Speaker 1: but they're not that good. Okay, Uh no, Alias. These
44:09
Speaker 1: microphones are generally for when we put our mouths right
44:12
Speaker 1: upon them, and they're not meant to hear other things
44:16
Speaker 1: in the room, right, That's that's what they're made for. Yeah,
44:18
Speaker 1: because Jerry's she yells at us through most of the show,
44:21
Speaker 1: no one ever hears it. There's a lot of like
44:23
Speaker 1: shaking and twitching that we do. And then the PPS,
44:26
Speaker 1: which is correct. Recently came across how squatters work. You
44:30
Speaker 1: gave an example of renters who moved out, but it
44:32
Speaker 1: invited a house guess who refused to move out, which
44:35
Speaker 1: classified as a squatter. I was wondering if you could
44:37
Speaker 1: rent for a month, stop paying, and refuse to move
44:40
Speaker 1: out and invoked squatters rights, would that work. I'm not
44:43
Speaker 1: planning on trying it, but it invoked my curiosity. ALIAS.
44:48
Speaker 1: I don't think that would work because it takes many,
44:51
Speaker 1: many years too to finally gain you know, I mean,
44:57
Speaker 1: you might be able to stay there for a little while,
45:00
Speaker 1: but I don't think you would be able to stay
45:01
Speaker 1: there for the years it would take to gain I
45:04
Speaker 1: guess ownership of the property. Oh is that that's what
45:07
Speaker 1: he's asking? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, you you'd be able
45:11
Speaker 1: to stay there throughout the legal process. But like I
45:13
Speaker 1: think it's like thirteen years that you have to stay
45:15
Speaker 1: somewhere well before you can. Okay, but it's years, right, Yeah,
45:20
Speaker 1: it takes a long time. Sure, And I would imagine
45:22
Speaker 1: at some point a landlord would eventually bring in uh
45:26
Speaker 1: Vinny and Vinny and Jimmy Vinne and Toots Vineyan Toots
45:31
Speaker 1: to make sure you leave. Yeah, that would be my guest.
45:34
Speaker 1: The key here, Elias, is to go find yourself an
45:37
Speaker 1: abandoned house that clearly no one wants move in there
45:40
Speaker 1: spruced to place up and start paying taxes on it.
45:43
Speaker 1: Don't do that, But I'm just saying sure. Advice to
45:47
Speaker 1: fifteen year old listeners. Thank you, Alis, Yeah, thanks a
45:51
Speaker 1: lot of lies. That was a good one. If you
45:53
Speaker 1: have a question, then you want to get in touch
45:55
Speaker 1: with us, you can tweet to us at s y
45:57
Speaker 1: s K podcast. You can join us on Facebook at
46:00
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46:03
Speaker 1: send us an email to Stuff podcast at how Stuff
46:05
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46:07
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46:12
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