Why Do Animals Sploot?

When animals sploot (that is, lay flat on their bellies with their limbs spread out) on a hot day, they're taking advantage of a cool surface. Learn about humans' sweating versus other animals' splooting in this episode of BrainStuff, based on this article: https://animals.howstuffworks.com/mammals/splooting.htm

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to brain Stuff, a production of iHeart Radio, Hey
Rain Stuff Lauren Vogel Bomb Here. Do you ever come
home on a hot day and just lie down on
your cool kitchen floor? Does it sometimes happen that someone
else then walks into the room and expresses concern for
your health? Well, welcome to the life of a squirrel.

(00:25):
In the summer, the squirrels get hot just like the
rest of us mammals, and when this happens, they lie
flat on their bellies with their front legs stretched out
before them and their back legs kicked out behind. This
position has been dubbed a splut by pet enthusiasts on
the Internet, and perhaps originally to describe the same behavior
spluting in dogs and cats. The Collins English Dictionary contains

(00:49):
a brief definition for splute, suggesting that it's perhaps altered
from splat. Scientists call it heat dumping. Although all mammals
have sweat glands, it's actually pretty rare for mammals to
use them to cool down the way that we humans do.
Most mammals only have sweat glands on the soles of

(01:10):
their feet and palms of their hands. This is intended
to help provide grip during emergency climbing or leaping. But
because many mammals have much thicker coats of fur or
hair than we humans do, cooling by producing all over
sweat that can then evaporate wouldn't work as well as
it does for us. This is why many animals like cats, dogs, birds,

(01:33):
and lizards pant, and why some splute. But while it
makes a lot of sense on a hot day to
expose the maximum amount of your body surface area to
a cool surface, when wildlife does it, people tend to
freak out a little. The New York City Department of
Parks and Recreation received enough concerned calls about splitting squirrels

(01:57):
in the summer of two that they felt cold to
tweet a photo of a squirrel belly down on the
ground and all four paws outstretched like Superman, with this message,
if you see a squirrel lying down like this, don't worry.
It's just fine. On hot days, squirrels keep cool by splouting,
stretching out on cool surfaces to reduce body heat. It

(02:19):
is sometimes referred to as heat dumping. Splouting can be
observed in many warm blooded animals when the temperature soars.
The only real necessity is that the surface upon which
the animal is spluting be cooler than the surrounding air.
You can observe everything from grizzly bears spouting on rocky beaches,

(02:39):
to rabbits, chipmunks, and even young birds stretching out to
cool off. The reason for the face down position is
that most mammals and birds have less fur and feathers
on their underside than on their back, which allows for
the cool surface to make more contact with their skin.
Adult birds tend to stay in an alert up right position,

(03:01):
but they will fluff out their feathers and extend their
wings while crouching over a cool surface to increase air flow.
It's a bit more efficient than simply moving into the shade,
and definitely a lot more pleasant than what some storks
and vultures do to cool off, which is poop on
their own legs. Being mostly liquid, the poop acts much

(03:23):
like our sweat and helps them cool down as a evaporates.
Today's episode is based on the article it spluting It's
what all the cool squirrels are doing this summer on
how stuff works dot com, written by Jesslin Shields. Brain
Stuff is production of iHeart Radio in partnership with how
stuff works dot com, and it's produced by Tyler Clang.

(03:44):
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