March 20, 2026 • 52 mins
Squirrels are rodents, sure, but they’re rodents with personalities the size of Las Vegas and Detroit put together. Get to know your bushy-tailed (and sometimes not so bushy) neighbors who live interesting hidden lives right out in the open.
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Speaker 1 (00:05):
Longtime listeners of Stuff You Should Know are well aware
that I've come a long way with my feelings on squirrels.
Time was I saw them as a common pest who
invaded my.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
Bird feeders at Baby se Red.
Speaker 1 (00:18):
But then along came my precious four legged daughter, Momo,
who taught me to appreciate squirrels and ways I never
thought possible. Now Momo takes me and her mom to
feed the squirrels in the park every morning, and now
a day goes back and I don't lift my gaze
to the skies and thank Mother Earth for our squirrel friends.
Squirrels are great squirrel's.
Speaker 3 (00:38):
Ahoy, Welcome to Stuff you Should Know, a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
Hey, and welcome to the podcast.
Speaker 1 (00:57):
I'm Josh, and there's Chuck and Jerry is here, and
this is one of the greatest episodes we'll ever do
as far as I'm concerned.
Speaker 2 (01:06):
Squirrels.
Speaker 4 (01:09):
Oh, I really want to squirrels. I've been seeing that
all day.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
It's so wonderful. That is so wonderful.
Speaker 4 (01:15):
It is that song isn't But you.
Speaker 2 (01:18):
Know, uh yeah yeah.
Speaker 1 (01:20):
If you go back and listen to BC Boys, you're.
Speaker 4 (01:22):
Like, Wow, they come a long way. Though, and renouncing
that stuff.
Speaker 1 (01:26):
Yeah, for sure. So we're talking not about the BC Boys, surprising,
and we're talking about squirrels in the morning. It's squirrels
there evening, it's squirrels.
Speaker 4 (01:35):
Squirrels two syllables, right.
Speaker 1 (01:38):
I don't care however you want to say it the
squirrel sure or Boston I guess probably they say it
similarly as well. Yeah, but if you want to get fancy,
you can bust out their Latin name. They're members of
the rodent Order. But for their family, their squore a day,
scure a day, Nope, secury day.
Speaker 4 (02:01):
I look this one up, all right, Sierrade.
Speaker 2 (02:08):
Like mine more?
Speaker 4 (02:08):
Okay? Did you just toot on my renvation?
Speaker 2 (02:12):
Yeah, even though it was correct.
Speaker 4 (02:14):
Did you give me a bronx cheer?
Speaker 2 (02:16):
How? How is it? Suride?
Speaker 4 (02:19):
Well, let me do the person online? Sierra diye?
Speaker 2 (02:23):
Okay? Is that Emma who said that?
Speaker 4 (02:25):
Or at Sierra Day was another? But I think we've
heard from people that Dae is die.
Speaker 1 (02:30):
Okay, And that's fine if that's what it's called. I'm
just gonna call them squirrels from now on.
Speaker 2 (02:36):
But there's actually.
Speaker 1 (02:37):
Exactly like three hundred species of squirrels and it's it's
kind of hard to wrap your head around because usually
if you live in a place with squirrels, meaning you
live on a continent outside of Antarctica.
Speaker 4 (02:51):
Yeah, like everywhere.
Speaker 1 (02:52):
Basically, they're probably a lot of squirrels living around you,
and they probably all look basically exactly alike. Because it
seems seems like when they fill an ecological niche, brother,
they fill it, and there's not much room for competing species,
it seems like from my experience.
Speaker 4 (03:11):
Yeah, I mean, there are enough who helped us with this.
Speaker 2 (03:14):
This this is a grabster.
Speaker 4 (03:16):
Yeah, so Grabster points out that you know, you can
find mountain squirrels and city squirrels, and forest squirrels and
jungle squirrels and desert squirrels. You can find squirrels and
Alaska that hibernate with the lowest body temperature of any mammal,
(03:36):
that have body temperatures below freezing at times.
Speaker 2 (03:39):
That's so cool.
Speaker 4 (03:39):
You can go to Africa and find one of the
cutest squirrels, the African pigmy squirrel, which is as small
as a tiny little mouse. Where you can go to
Buttan and find the giant flying squirrel of Button that
with their head and body and is over two feet
long with that tail, they're huge.
Speaker 1 (04:00):
No, two feet long without the tail, oh, without stressing, Yes,
they're distressingly large.
Speaker 4 (04:05):
Yeah, because the squirrel tail will get into this. But
that's one of their signature features generally, although depending on
the species, because there are three hundred species, like you said,
more than or almost three hundred, some of those tails
are a little diminished. But usually when you think squirrel,
you think of that big, bushy tail.
Speaker 1 (04:24):
Yeah, and not only when you think of squirrel you
think of the tail. But the Greeks themselves, right, somebody
decided that a Greek term would make sense. But scurios
or scourios, which roughly means something like shadow tail ed,
says shady Butt. I also saw shadowtail, which is a
reference to how squirrels sometimes hide in the shadow cast
(04:46):
by their own tail.
Speaker 2 (04:46):
It's pretty clever, but.
Speaker 1 (04:49):
The squirrel is usually kind of The bushy tail of
the squirrel is what makes a squirrel a squirrel. One
of the other things that really differentiates it from other
rodents is the way that it's jaw and muscle are
attached to its skull. There's actually a name for it,
seriomorphous zygomasoteric system. They look at you hooked on phonics
(05:11):
works for me.
Speaker 4 (05:12):
You even recorded the new pronunciation. That's right, you worked
it right in there with a syria dye.
Speaker 1 (05:18):
I adapted, yeah, because you should have heard it before
when I was workshopping it.
Speaker 4 (05:22):
That was the first take. Everybody, we're not lying.
Speaker 1 (05:25):
So so those are two things that really kind of
differentiate squirrels. But as we've really gotten better and better
at taxonomy with the introduction of geno mapping, sure we
can see, like, oh, this animal that doesn't look anything
like this animal is actually really closely related. And as
(05:47):
with just about every other animal we've studied using modern
genetic taxonomy, squirrels are Our understanding of squirrels has really
kind of changed shape of who's related to whom, who's
descended from who. But there's there We're kind of going
to go the old school way, which is differentiating them
based on their habitat and their behavior. So there's three
(06:12):
groups of squirrels that we're going to cover, even though
there's technically five subfamilies now, ground squirrels, tree squirrels, and
flying squirrels. And before we go any further, I officially
dedicate this episode to Momo, one of the great lovers
of squirrels of all time, who changed changed me in
my heart towards squirrels.
Speaker 2 (06:31):
I used to be a squirrel hater. Chuck, do you
remember squirrels? You remember?
Speaker 1 (06:35):
Oh? Yeah, the bird feeder Momo pointed out to me, said, Dad,
squirrels are great. I'm going to teach you to love them.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
And she did.
Speaker 4 (06:42):
Yeah, dogs and squirrels. It's what was the Disney It
was either Pixar Disney had an animated movie where the
dog would just stop and go squirrel anytime there's a squirrel.
I can't remember which one was.
Speaker 2 (06:59):
I don't remember.
Speaker 4 (06:59):
It wasn't that long ago. But before we move on
to ground squirrels, it is kind of fun to learn
that because of that DNA analysis that we now have
at our fingertips and fossil evidence, we know that squirrels
went to western North America thirty five to forty million
years ago because squirrels like to get around. As we
(07:20):
will see, they crossed a land bridge to Eurasia about
ten million years after that, and then as soon as
they could as soon as Eurasia met up with Africa
about twenty million years ago, they went, all right, we're
in Africa now too. Because squirrels like to get around.
They as you will see, Well, we'll just tease that
(07:40):
and say, squirrels like to get around.
Speaker 1 (07:41):
Yeah, I mean, you put one tree next to another,
squirrel's going to go from tree to tree. Put another tree,
squirrel's going to go the next tree. And if you
put trees all the way across one continent to another,
they're going to migrate. That's just what they do, and
that's what they did. But if I thought I loved
squirrels before, now that I know that they're actually native
from plenty five million years back to North America, I
(08:03):
just think that's that's just the tops.
Speaker 4 (08:05):
Yeah, and we talked about it before when you were
having your bird feeder issue. But you know, Atlanta is
a city in the forest, and we have tons and
tons and tons of squirrels. Kind of everywhere along the
East Coast does, but Atlanta just has a lot of squirrels.
And as I was reading, you know, from my upstairs office,
there's a window not right in front of my face
(08:27):
but sort of above me and our huge, big, beautiful
oak in our front yard. I'm doing this on squirrels.
I just look up for a second and I see
four squirrels running around that tree together, playing like circling
it like a barber pole.
Speaker 2 (08:41):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (08:41):
I take my daughter to school this morning, and I
count the squirrels that I see on the way. I
counted twenty two squirrels that I just saw on a
you know, twelve minute car ride.
Speaker 2 (08:51):
You hit one of them there.
Speaker 4 (08:53):
I have before. It's the worst thing ever. It is,
But they're everywhere in Atlanta, And it hit me a
while ago about how easy it is living here or
anywhere where there's a lot of squirrels, just to sort
of be like, yeah, the squirrels. But it kind of
hit me like how crazy it is that there are
(09:13):
these little mammals. They're not hiding in holes generally like
mice and stuff like that. Like they're just out all
over the place at all times. We're surrounded by these
little mammals.
Speaker 2 (09:25):
Yeah, out and proud.
Speaker 1 (09:26):
And if you come close too close to one of
their trees when you're walking by and the squirrel doesn't
like it, he's gonna sit there or she and chatter
at you and basically tell you to beat it. You
punk get away from my tree. That's how. That's one
of the great lovable things about squirrels. They have such
huge personalities. They're just so great.
Speaker 2 (09:45):
Chuck.
Speaker 4 (09:46):
Remember my famous squirrel attack not too long ago, and
when I went outside, I got it on my doorbell
camera and that squirrel leaped through the air and hit
me in the leg. It was a complete accident. Of course,
I don't think the squirrel was trying to kill me, But.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
You don't know.
Speaker 4 (10:01):
They're just they're all over the place. We're gonna get
to all the fun stuff about the black squirrels of
New York and why squirrels stop in the middle of
the road when they go to across the street. Like
there we found reasons for all this stuff, which I love.
It's not that squirrels are dumb, and we're gonna reveal
all that in this episode.
Speaker 1 (10:19):
Okay, I'm a little excited. I'm a little worked up.
I know it's a ted early, but first break. Okay,
we're so squirrel positive that, I mean, that's a great
way to put.
Speaker 4 (10:29):
It, Chuck, all right, so are we taking a break?
I say, all right, I need to calm down to
and I guarantee you I'm gonna go like blow my
nose in the other room. I'm gonna see a squirrel.
Speaker 2 (10:38):
I'll be right back, all right, Chuck.
Speaker 1 (11:02):
So, as promised, we're gonna break squirrels down into three groups, crown, tree, flying,
or aerial. And I propose that we start with the
ground squirrel. Sure, many species of which you probably not you,
but I mean you, dear listener, and may all include
two I didn't realize were actual squirrels, like groundhog.
Speaker 4 (11:26):
Chuck did not know that was a squirrel.
Speaker 2 (11:28):
Chipmunk.
Speaker 4 (11:30):
I had a feeling that might be a squirrel.
Speaker 1 (11:32):
Gosh, they're so great too, Yeah, chipmunks. What about a groundhog?
Speaker 4 (11:38):
You already said groundhog?
Speaker 1 (11:39):
Did I yeah, okay, I'm swirling. I'm swirling still. And
my love squirrel prairie dog. Yeah, well that's what was
coming out of my mouth next.
Speaker 2 (11:50):
To Patty Dog.
Speaker 4 (11:50):
Yeah, prairie dog didn't know it.
Speaker 2 (11:51):
What about that meerkat?
Speaker 4 (11:54):
I didn't know that.
Speaker 2 (11:55):
Well, that's because.
Speaker 1 (11:56):
They're not but okay, prairie dogs, chipmunks, and what's the
other one, marmots? Yeah, marmots and brought them in groundhogs.
Those are all ground squirrels. They're squirrels friends, and that
makes them pretty awesome. But one of the reasons why
they you wouldn't think they're squirrels is because in a
lot of those species they lack that characteristic bushy tail. Yeah,
(12:20):
but then also they live almost a totally different life
from their tree dwelling more famous cousins.
Speaker 4 (12:27):
Yeah, I mean, they might climb a tree, but generally
you're not going to see a groundhogger prairie dog up
in the tree. If they need to, you know, for
a brief time, if they're trying to find food or
something or like on the run from something trying to
kill it, they might go up in a tree, but
they generally hang out on the ground, hence the name
they love their rocky terrain chipmunks for just speaking for them,
(12:52):
are pretty solitary unless they're trying to reproduce. But I
know that you've found some stuff, was it on the
prairie dog that have their big families and colonies.
Speaker 1 (13:02):
Yeah, I mean that's one of the main characteristics of
ground squirrels in general, aside from a couple, but that
they're much more communal than tree squirrels, and in particular,
the largest town a prairie dog town, is what they're
called the largest prairie dog town on record is in Texas,
because of course everything's bigger there, But it was a
colony of black tailed prairie dogs. And this town, Chuck,
(13:26):
stretched one hundred miles wide, wow, by two hundred and
fifty miles long, and contain four hundred million prairie dogs.
My gos again, crownd squirrels all living in this kind
of large community. Jeez, I mean that's it's like a
Chinese megacity or something like that times ten.
Speaker 4 (13:46):
Yeah, So are these the ones that tend to stay
grouped with their own sex?
Speaker 1 (13:53):
No, those tend to be either tree squirrels or flying squirrels.
These are more the because they live in communal groups
and kinship is a big deal. Ground squirrels, like prairie dogs,
tend to have a really good ability to smell the
scent of other ground squirrels, so they can tell like
(14:14):
who's a blood relation who's not. They've done studies to see,
you know, like if a ground squirrel. They have a
lot of really sophisticated calls too, because they're alerting others
to the presence of a rattlesnake or a hawk or something.
So they're really talkative and they have a lot of
sophisticated different communication and they found that like a prairie
(14:37):
dog that will stand up and take the time to
risk its own life to alert others, it's actually alerting.
The others that it's alerting are actually related by blood.
And the groundhog or the prairie dog knows this because
it can smell its blood relations among all these other
you know, extended family members in the town.
Speaker 4 (14:57):
There's not much cuter than a squirrel up on its
hot rear haunches. Yeah, whether it's I mean, obviously those
prairie dogs, you know, they do it for a living.
But even our eastern gray squirrels sit upon those back
legs if they want to work a nut with their
little front pop ads.
Speaker 1 (15:15):
Yeah, or a chipmunk on its back legs. It's doesn't
get much cute.
Speaker 4 (15:18):
It's little busy hands. Goodness me. Yeah, all right, So
we can move on to our tree squirrel. This is
they're known as arboreal squirrels obviously because they are tree squirrels.
And this is when you're talking your eastern gray squirrel.
This is not a groundhog, this is not a prairie dog.
This is your dyed in the wool. Cute, little fluffy
(15:40):
tailed sort of you know, they're called gray, but there's
sort of a light brownish color generally, although the colors
do range, as we'll see. And these are the ones
that you're gonna find all over Atlanta, jumping around, climbing around,
leaping it podcasters in their front lawn. Yeah, they spend
most of the time. I mean, you see them on
(16:01):
the ground plenty, but they live in trees. They nest
in trees called drays or drays or Drey's spelled with
a year an a right.
Speaker 1 (16:11):
And you probably if you've ever looked up and seen
a mass of like sticks and twigs and a leafless
tree in the middle of winter, you're looking at a
squirrel's nest called a dre And this is where you
were you were asking about them staying in like same
sex groups apparently in the winter. Even though the tree
squirrel does not live in a communal society like a
(16:34):
ground squirrel does, they're still social. They still interact with
one another. They play, they chase, they chase one another off.
Speaker 2 (16:42):
They like mate. But when it.
Speaker 1 (16:44):
Gets really cold, tree squirrels will kind of group their
heat together by staying in a dre communally up to
like thirty members. It's able, Yeah, it is very adorable.
I want to do a little exercise here real quick, Chuck.
I want you to use your imagination.
Speaker 2 (17:03):
Close.
Speaker 1 (17:04):
Imagine a very cold winter day. The wind's blowing, snow's
being carried on the wind, and it's passing by just
outside a woodpecker hole, and we're inside that woodpecker hole's dark.
The light is very very faint because it's it's kind
of an overcast, snowy day to begin with. But we're
also inside a tree, in an old woodpecker hole, and
(17:25):
it's lined with a bunch of different leaves, and there's
half a dozen or so squirrels, all kind of snuggled together, sleeping,
sharing their warmth as the winter day passes by outside
and they snooze an afternoon away fat on acorns that
they all just ate. Oh boy, isn't that amazing?
Speaker 4 (17:43):
I almost fell asleep. You're real, Robert Fross, my friend,
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (17:46):
Thank you. I like to think Robert Redford crossed with
Robert Cross.
Speaker 4 (17:51):
But sure, well you know Robert Redford if you look
in the mirror, but Robert Frost when you pick a.
Speaker 1 (17:56):
Bent up with the touch of Robert Goolay if.
Speaker 4 (17:59):
You say it surely, Oh man, that really did almost
put me to sleep. That's quite nice. I love that scene.
So here's a little fun adaptation that squirrels have. If
you see a tree squirrel running down a tree face
first with little resistance, it's just like it was made
(18:20):
to do it. It's because it is. And they have
those little claws of course that really helps. But if
you look closely, or if you look up a picture
rather and you see like a still image, you will
notice that they have the ability to and Ed says
they can turn their feet around. They really kind of
just turn their whole back legs around backwards to where
those claws are gripping on the way down. And that's
(18:45):
why they're you know, it's like the perfect adaptation to
be able to run up and down a tree.
Speaker 1 (18:50):
So if you ever watched one do that up close, sure,
so anytime I've seen that there, if you look their
legs because they're turned around and it kicks kind of
their elbows out a little bit, uh huh, and they
climb down, it looks a little different. And I've noticed
that it triggers the part of my lizard brain. That's
like a spider alert. It's like that's triggered by that.
(19:14):
So it's like a giant, furry spider is coming down
to some little part of my brain that sends off
an alarm, and it's really off putting sometimes until you
know the larger part, the executive functioning part of my
brain is like, it's a squirrel, don't worry, But there's
that one just zap of Like this is weird and
scary for a second, but it happens to me from
(19:35):
time to time when they come down the tree like that.
Speaker 4 (19:38):
Well, it can be a little startling, you know, if
you're going to take out the trash or something and
your trash can is next to a big live oak
like ours is, and there are two or more squirrels
that are they seem I don't know what they're doing.
It seem like I have a beef with one another.
But maybe they're just playing chase. But when they're really
boogying up and down and around a tree right as
you walk upon it is it can be a little
(19:59):
bit like, oh okay, I.
Speaker 1 (20:01):
Read that when one was chasing the other. It's a
part of the mating ritual.
Speaker 4 (20:05):
Oh Okay, so that's embarrassing for them, right.
Speaker 1 (20:10):
I don't know if that's across the board, but I
saw that in at least one.
Speaker 2 (20:14):
Place, all right.
Speaker 4 (20:14):
I like knowing that. Here's another cool thing about squirrels.
All kinds of squirrels have scent glands, and it depends
on the species where that scent gland is located. It
can be near their little bum hole. It can be
near their mouth in the corners of their mouth, can
be on their back. But in the case of the
tree squirrel, they have their scent glands on their feet
(20:37):
and sweat glands on the bottom of their feet. And
they are a squirrel that buries their food over large.
Large areas sometimes like up to twenty five acres can
be their habitat where they're bearing and hiding food, and
they are literally every time they walk to bury something,
they're leaving a little scent trail that they can go
back and pick up. Ideally, but it's not a perfect system.
(20:59):
Sometimes they will lose stuff and not be able to
go back. But what they have then done is planted
a tree.
Speaker 1 (21:05):
Yeah, which brings up their huge ecological role, which is
like planting new forests, like keeping forests healthy by forgetting
about nuts. And the nut is actually a seed and
it grows into a new tree that the squirrel helped
move away from the tree.
Speaker 2 (21:21):
It's amazing its range.
Speaker 4 (21:22):
They're known as the gardeners of the forest.
Speaker 1 (21:24):
Yeah, and we taught we did a whole short stuff
on squirrels bearing nuts, and I remember one of the
things that came up was there was a study that
found that they if they know they're being watched by another.
Speaker 2 (21:35):
Squirrel, they'll fake dig a hole.
Speaker 1 (21:37):
And then won't drop the nut in it, And then
we'll go somewhere else and mislead a squirrel.
Speaker 2 (21:42):
It's that they think is watching them.
Speaker 4 (21:43):
Yeah, they'll look around first and be like, did anyone
see that? Yeah, I think I'm good.
Speaker 2 (21:47):
Tod was watching. I better not drop the nut in
this hole. He'll come along.
Speaker 4 (21:52):
So that's what the the I'm sorry, not flying, but
the tree squirrels. That's how they use their scent. The
ground squirrels, we should say, mainly use the scent glands
to mark their territory. And you know, because they're all
about their clan and their colony, to sort of mark
their territory and find out if someone is a part
of their clan.
Speaker 2 (22:11):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (22:11):
And then also as far as sense go, I saw
some somewhere that some kinds of ground squirrels that are
prey to rattlesnakes will actually find shed rattlesnake skin rub
it on themselves. Oh wow, chew it up and rub
it on themselves to give themselves a rattlesnake scent to
throw off rattlesnakes.
Speaker 2 (22:29):
They camouflage their scent.
Speaker 4 (22:30):
That's pretty cool.
Speaker 2 (22:31):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (22:32):
I wonder if they ever wear it and just like
fashion a couple of holes and stick their arms through.
Speaker 2 (22:36):
Yeah, and they bragged that they killed it.
Speaker 4 (22:38):
Yeah, have you man? I shouldn't even mention this. Yeah,
I'm gonna mention it.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
Have you?
Speaker 4 (22:44):
Because it is granted it is roadkill. But have you
ever seen the pictures of the squirrel roadkill with the
little G I Joe action figures? No, just look it up,
I can. They aren't squirrels at some one killed. It's
someone will take a roadkill picture of a squirrel and
they'll take the little G I Joe figures as if
(23:06):
they were big game hunters, and they'll have their guns
and they'll have like one leg up on the squirrel's head.
As if it was their trophy. And the squirrel looks
positively giant next to the little action figures, and it's
kind of funny.
Speaker 2 (23:19):
I'll have to check that one out.
Speaker 4 (23:20):
I don't want to encourage people. Maybe I shouldn't have
even said anything.
Speaker 1 (23:22):
Well, I don't know if you're encouraging people to like
swerve onto a squirrel, you know, one guy or.
Speaker 4 (23:29):
Kill a squirrel to do that. But maybe just took
it up on the internet. If you want to see that,
don't recreate it.
Speaker 1 (23:34):
If you kill a squirrel and we find out about it,
we're coming to your house.
Speaker 4 (23:38):
I know. Okay with a ghost of that squirrel. Yeah,
that will introduce to your attic you go.
Speaker 2 (23:47):
So have we moved on to flying squirrels.
Speaker 4 (23:49):
Yet, Yeah, let's do it. Those are you know the
old story when we had one growing up for a
little while. You probably don't remember, but my uncle gave
us his flying squirrel to watch for a while, and
he would leap from the curtains on the other side
of the room onto my shoulder. And then when we
went out of town, apparently they said the squirrel got out.
But now that I'm an adult, I realized that the cat
(24:10):
ate the squirrel. Oh man, yeah, just to recap that
childhood trauma. That's well okay, But for a little while,
we had a flying squirrel in our home.
Speaker 2 (24:21):
For a brief shining moment.
Speaker 4 (24:23):
That's the upshot.
Speaker 1 (24:24):
So a flying squirrel, and I thought this. I thought
they were fairly rare. Apparently they're as common as tree
squirrels in some places. The reason that you think they're
rare is because they're nocturnal, so we're usually sleeping when
they're out and about.
Speaker 4 (24:38):
I love thinking about those things just flying around all night.
Speaker 1 (24:41):
Yeah, and flying is right, man, I saw Ed says
the thing glide up to one hundred and fifty feet.
I saw three hundred in some cases.
Speaker 2 (24:49):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (24:50):
And that's what they're doing. They're gliding. They're not flying.
They have no means of like propulsion. But they have
a skin flap. They've evolved a skin flap that is
you know the batsuit that people like you know, skydive with.
Speaker 2 (25:03):
That's that is based basically one.
Speaker 1 (25:06):
Hundred percent on the flying squirrel's membranes between its front
legs and hind legs that it can you know, spread
out when it jumps and it just catches the air.
And they can move it this way and that and
use their tail as a rudder and go one hundred
and fifty feet in a pretty purposeful direction too.
Speaker 4 (25:27):
Did you say what the name of the flap was?
Speaker 2 (25:29):
No?
Speaker 4 (25:30):
Do you want to?
Speaker 3 (25:31):
No?
Speaker 2 (25:31):
I probably screwed it.
Speaker 4 (25:35):
I'm gonna go with potagium.
Speaker 2 (25:37):
That's great. What do they call that? Pada gayum?
Speaker 4 (25:41):
I wonder what they call that in the in the
Flying Suit Bizz Extreme Flying Suit Biz. I don't know, and.
Speaker 1 (25:48):
I think they call them batsuits, but that's that's a misnomer.
Speaker 4 (25:51):
If you ask me those I gotta say. I mean,
I'm not into any of that stuff. I would never
do it, but those videos are amazing and it's oh,
I know, as humans have come I think to flying
it feels like agreed.
Speaker 2 (26:05):
Yeah, I would have to have.
Speaker 1 (26:07):
Probably a lobotomy to to actually try that. It would
take that radical of a personality change for me to
try it.
Speaker 4 (26:14):
Well, And I mean sure that kind of thing that's
the most extreme, like years and years of training, yes,
skydiving training and stuff like that. You know, like run
jump into a batsuit?
Speaker 2 (26:23):
No, no, no, definitely not.
Speaker 1 (26:24):
But even if you do, you know, once you get
to that point, like, I can't imagine how dangerous that is.
You know, if you smack into something you're going really fast.
Speaker 4 (26:32):
Yeah, yeah, your toast. Yeah, and that happens sadly.
Speaker 1 (26:36):
But I get the impression that it's the rush is
worth the risk.
Speaker 4 (26:41):
That's right. And speaking of risk, there are endangered flying squirrels,
the Carolina Northern flying squirrel. And we talked a little
bit about these little land bridges that are starting to
pop up in the United States over overpasses and freeway crossings.
Speaker 2 (26:59):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (27:00):
I just read today there's one in LA that's opening
up that's like one hundred and sixty feet wide. I
can't remember the name of it. It's named after someone
and to allow cougars and you know, mountain lions to
pass and all kinds of animals, and they're using you know,
they have done studies for squirrels in that they found
(27:20):
tagged like radio tagged squirrels are foraging and building on
the other side of these massive freeways thanks to these bridges,
Like it's been proven to work.
Speaker 1 (27:30):
Yeah for sure. I think it's called the Robert Evans
Memorial Animal Land Bridge.
Speaker 4 (27:36):
Baby. Yeah, if only.
Speaker 3 (27:41):
So.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
That actually kind of leads us to a quote I
ran across Chuck because if you put like I was saying,
if you can kind of connect a tree to another tree,
which really ties into that rewilding episode because you're you're
using you're connecting core to core via corridor basically is
what they're doing with that. That there was an old
saying that before, well not too long ago, I think
(28:06):
into the eighteenth century, maybe even early nineteenth century, that
there was so many chestnut trees in North America that
a squirrel could make it from Maine to Georgia without
ever touching the ground.
Speaker 4 (28:18):
Yeah, where did we cover that in?
Speaker 3 (28:19):
Was it?
Speaker 1 (28:20):
I don't remember?
Speaker 4 (28:21):
I remember that Factoi. That's a great one.
Speaker 1 (28:24):
So it really kind of goes to show like there
used to be a lot more forests in the United States,
but there were also a lot more squirrels because there's
a there's a positive correlation between mass producing trees, which
are chestnut, beech oak trees that produce nuts that squirrels
(28:45):
and other forest animals eat, and the number and population
density of squirrels in an area. You have a lot
of mass producing trees, you're going to have a lot
of squirrels because again, they fill their ecological niche to
base bursting.
Speaker 4 (29:01):
Yeah, and they you know, bursting with food because they
are opportunistic eaters, is what Ed says. And that's a
pretty good way to say it. Because while they well,
obviously if they can get fruit or nuts and seeds,
that's the stock of their diet. But they will eat
whatever keeps them alive. They will eat insects and fungus,
(29:22):
and they actually spread fungus, which is great. Yeah, they
eat roots. They have they have found little tiny eggs
and little tiny birds and little tiny lizards in the
guts of squirrels, so they you know, technically are omnivores,
which is just to say squirrels are remarkable. That's staying alive,
(29:42):
and they will eat your garbage. They will eat whatever
they need to, but that's only if they're not finding
the nuts and the seeds and stuff like that, which
there are generally plenty plenty of in the United States.
Speaker 1 (29:53):
And one reason that they're they're suited for nuts, or
that nuts are suited for them, is because they have
two sets of incisors. I believe it up and a
down is the technical term, and they grow constantly throughout
their lifetime. I think they grow something like, is this
even possible that I'm seeing it six inches a year?
Speaker 4 (30:13):
Well, I mean they're constantly grinding them down, so I
think if a squirrel was in a coma, they could
have six inch fang.
Speaker 2 (30:20):
That's crazy.
Speaker 1 (30:20):
And then apparently if they don't continuously grind them down
and they kept growing, they would grow through the top
and the bottom of their face all a Lisa Simpson
that time she needed braces.
Speaker 2 (30:33):
But that's crazy.
Speaker 1 (30:34):
So they use these very very hard nuts, like a
chestnut or pecan or walnut shell to impart. It's a
food source. But as they're getting to the food source,
they're keeping their teeth ground down, which apparently they have
to do all the time.
Speaker 4 (30:49):
That's pretty amazing. Squirrels also like a little sweet treat
every now and then. They have found red squirrels in
Maine that will tap sugar maple trees. They make little
bite marks in the tree and then and they just say,
all right, do your thing, and they come back a
few days later and that trap has hardened up and
run out a little bit. And that is just a little,
tiny sweet treat for a squirrel.
Speaker 1 (31:10):
That's right, It's pretty awesome. They also found that Squirrels
can learn by observing other squirrels doing something, particularly finding
new ways to get food. Their adept at that.
Speaker 4 (31:21):
Oh okay, so they see Todd doing something, they say,
not a bad idea, let's give that a shot.
Speaker 2 (31:27):
Yeah, that Todd really came around.
Speaker 4 (31:30):
Yeah, and if you'll notice, I think we kind of
skipped over this if we didn't mention Australia squirrels I
think used to be in Australia but aren't so much now.
And is it a mystery or is it just the
obvious that the Australians were like SIPs on mate.
Speaker 2 (31:45):
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (31:46):
I didn't see that anywhere, but I know that they
introduced the Eastern gray and then in Perth they introduced
the Indian palm, which is like if you mashed together
an Eastern gray squirrel in a chipmunk, that it would
be an Indian palm.
Speaker 4 (31:59):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (32:00):
Well, but apparently they both died out. I don't know
if it's a mystery or not, like you're saying, but
supposedly there's some feral colonies that escape from zoos, at
least in Perth. So there are wild squirrels in Australia,
but they were introduced in the nineteenth century, which is
actually a trend, as we'll see. But I say before
we tackle all that, we take a break. How about that?
Speaker 4 (32:22):
All right, Well we'll take the break and we'll talk
about squirrel migration right after this.
Speaker 1 (32:48):
Okay, Chuck, so as I was saying, like back before
pre colonial days in particular, but also even into the
nineteenth century, I think even the nineteen sixties, there were
reports of a massive numbers of squirrels basically stampeding. Yea,
they call them squirrel migrations, and they have been documented
enough times that it's not an anomaly, but they are
(33:10):
fairly rare. And today they've kind of figured out that
there aren't dense enough populations of squirrels to ever have
a genuine like squirrel stampede like they had before. But
there used to be so many of them that every
once in a while, thousands to tens of thousands to
tends to tens of thousands of squirrels would pass generally
(33:31):
in like a big wave over an area. And apparently
it was quite a thing to see.
Speaker 4 (33:37):
I imagine it was. And this happened because there would
just be a really big fruitful year for squirrel food
tons of availability, and they would you know, they would
boom in numbers because they go to where the food is.
And usually if that is followed by or I guess historically,
when that was followed by a really bad year like
(33:59):
the rain you know, didn't work out so great for
producing nuts and seeds and stuff and fruit, that all
of a sudden, you've got a ton of squirrels in
an area that are all looking around, going, oh, what's
the deal. And they're opportunitists, so they said, all right,
we're getting out of here. We're going to where the
food is. Let's go everybody. And they would do it
all at.
Speaker 1 (34:19):
Once, yeah, all at once for some reason. And so
there's migrations. They would be they'd be running through the forest,
they'd be running across fields, they'd be swimming across rivers,
and apparently, in at least one account, I saw they
would be gulped up by bass in the rivers. And
I can't imagine seeing anything worse than a squirrel being
eaten by a fish.
Speaker 4 (34:40):
That seems unnatural.
Speaker 1 (34:41):
Yeah, but there were so many of them. And this
is also at a time where squirrels were roundly among
basically everyone living in America viewed as vermin as invaders,
as things that were unwanted, but also a tasty food
source too. Yeah, So anytime there was a squirrel stamp,
the yokels would run out with their sticks and bags
(35:03):
and beat squirrels to death and then cook them and
sell their pelts and do all sorts of things with them.
And one of the reasons why they were viewed as
vermin chuck is because on these squirrel migrations and other
times where they were just you know, if you were
unlucky with your planting, those squirrels might see as a
food source the crops you just planted all those seeds
and would dig them up and ruin your year's crops
(35:25):
in a day or so. So people didn't like squirrels
for a very long time. And this idea of squirrels
being everywhere, these little mammals living among us, like you
were talking about earlier, that's fairly new, and that's actually
very deliberate and purposeful, because squirrels were basically gone up
until about the mid to late nineteenth century in America.
Speaker 4 (35:47):
Yeah, I mean, between being hunted because people hated them
on their farms, like you said, people and people still
and like generally in certain parts of like Appalachia, still
eat squirrel on the menu. It is a little gamey
from what I'm told, I'm never going to eat a squirrel,
but they still use pelts. But that kind of, you know,
just like they would eat any larger mammal and use
(36:09):
their pelts. They would just get crafty with you know,
as small as a squirrel. And certainly in times of
you know, real need, you know, small rodents would come
in handy on the menu back then. But they were
almost gone. We started growing more urban in the eighteen hundreds, obviously,
(36:29):
and they were killing squirrels as fast as they could.
And in the eighteen forties and fifties there were so
few squirrels that they were introduced to city parks, but
not many. At first. They were just like this weird
curiosity where you would go out kind of like bird
watching and you would like try to spot a squirrel
running around because it was such a novel thing. But
(36:52):
then by the time Frederick law Olmsted, who by the way,
deserves his own podcasts, came along and really introduced the
idea of these really large city parks and urban parks.
They introduced a lot of squirrels to these parks and
they really really like that. That's kind of why we
have the squirrels we have today, was from this movement
to reintroduce them in a big way to urban parks.
Speaker 1 (37:14):
Yeah, and I mean we talked kind of a lot
about that whole idea in our Central Park episode, This
idea that you know, they just kept building the city
and building the city and building the city, and people
started going crazy because there weren't green spaces. So that
brought the parks in, and then the idea of adding
animals to the park just to kind of naturalize it
even more. That squirrels played a huge role in that.
(37:38):
And not only you know, in Central Park, but also
it started out and I believe Philadelphia and then followed
by Boston, and so by the mid to late nineteenth century,
that's when squirrels started to re establish themselves and the
way that people saw squirrels started to change too, And
there was this idea that they weren't vermin anymore. Don't
(37:59):
you them, Please try not to hit them with a stick. Instead,
let's go to the park, spend some time outside and
bring some nuts with you and maybe feed the squirrels,
and not only you feed the squirrels, but you got
a little kid. That little kid wants to hit that
squirrel with a stick so bad because kids are awful
like that.
Speaker 4 (38:16):
Good luck.
Speaker 1 (38:17):
You can actually use squirrels feeding squirrels as a way
to teach kids to have compassion, to be upstanding morally,
to have charity. And that was kind of how the
whole interaction between humans and squirrels was kind of framed
around that time, like the late nineteenth early twentieth century.
Speaker 4 (38:37):
Yeah, the Boy Scout co founder Ernest Thompson's Seaton said
that squirrels, in introducing them to boys in general, would say,
would cure them of their tendency toward cruelty. But I said,
good luck a second ago. How do you hit it?
I mean, I guess if there's a stampede. But you
show me a kid that can get a squirrel and
hit it with a stick, and that's a future OLYMPI
(39:00):
In sure, there's no way. Those things are so fast.
But don't try to do it, kids, definitely.
Speaker 1 (39:05):
No, don't even practice that. Don't try to qualify for
the Olympics. And that because you'll show up to the
Olympics and'll be like, we don't have that, that's not
one of our sports is what.
Speaker 4 (39:14):
Do you think you says Australia.
Speaker 2 (39:17):
Right.
Speaker 4 (39:18):
So these days, you know, we've kind of come full
circle into just sort of letting squirrels be there. Are
you know, if you're a hunter in the United States,
and that may be the tradition in your family if
you live out in the country, to start off your
child with hunting squirrels with a little twenty two rifle
(39:41):
or something as practice to teach young hunters. I'm certainly
not into that, but I'm not going to judge you
if that's your thing. And like I said, people still
do eat squirrel in certain parts of the United States today.
I guess we can talk. I mean, we found a
lot of extra fun stuff.
Speaker 2 (40:00):
Let's talk about.
Speaker 1 (40:00):
So we were talking about how they're viewed in America.
Depending on where you are in the world, depending on
the squirrel you're talking about, they're actually they can be
viewed quite negatively. I remember in our Rewilding episode we
talked about how Eastern gray squirrels are considered an invasive
species in Italy, where they call them Americans killer squirrels.
(40:22):
And there's also an issue with Eastern gray squirrels in Europe,
where they've killed off most of the Eurasian red squirrels
over there. They've just out competed them. It's not like
they've you know, choked them or anything like that. They
just they're like almost twice as big, they're a lot
more ornery, and they've just kind of diminished the number
(40:44):
of Eurasian red squirrels in the UK so much so
that three quarters of the population lives in Scotland. And
I would just like to direct everybody to the Scottish
Squirrel's website. Go to Scottish Squirrels dot org UK and
this is very important. Slash about and on their about
(41:04):
page the header image is maybe the cutest squirrel you'll
ever see.
Speaker 2 (41:08):
In your entire life.
Speaker 4 (41:09):
Is that the one you sent me?
Speaker 2 (41:11):
And Jerry, Yes, isn't that the cutest squirrel ever?
Speaker 4 (41:16):
It's pretty cute. You also sent something else. If you
go to RSPCA dot org dot UK, slash Advice and Welfare,
slash wildlife, slash animals, slash gray squirrels, slash feeding, or
you could just Google feeding squirrels and using nest boxes,
you're gonna see a squirrel with a chicken wing in
its mouth.
Speaker 2 (41:35):
That's pretty good.
Speaker 1 (41:37):
It's better than a bass eating a squirrel, I'll tell
you that.
Speaker 4 (41:40):
Yeah, that's a good article you sent because it talks
about if you like squirrels around, which I certainly do,
creating a good habitat for them. Trees obviously it is
a good thing to have. Not cutting down trees is
a great thing to do if you can avoid it. Yeah,
And then having squirrel safe bird feeders. And this means
not that the squirrel can't get to that seed, because they,
(42:01):
as you have attested, they will find a way. Life
finds a way, but it don't won't trap the squirrel
inside of it.
Speaker 1 (42:09):
No, that's a big one too. They also kind of
get into they get all Macbeth or Hamlet, which one
was to be or not to be?
Speaker 4 (42:19):
Why you asking me?
Speaker 1 (42:20):
Because they get all Hamlet or Macbeth on whether or
not to feed squirrels. You go, so they're like, you
could feed squirrels, but really you shouldn't. And the RSPCA
takes I think a pretty sensible tact, which is build
a habitat for the squirrels, and that you're planting the
right kind of trees that provide a place for them
(42:41):
to nest in a place for them to get food,
and then just step back and enjoy them.
Speaker 2 (42:45):
That's right enough.
Speaker 1 (42:46):
If you're like you know, me and Moe and you
go on walks or whatever and you want to feed
the squirrels, there are some things that are better for
squirrels than others, and it's basically you want to give
them what they would naturally eat, which is masked, unshelled
nuts like walnuts, chestnuts, acorns, hazel nuts, that kind of thing.
Speaker 4 (43:05):
Some seats probably, huh.
Speaker 1 (43:07):
Yes, but not black safflower seeds. I saw that if
you were one of those people who can't stand squirrels
raiding your bird feeder, black safflower seeds are. They'll eat them,
but they're not crazy about them, and most birds like
them instead. So that's one way to do it. But
you can also feed them vegetables too, and chuck. They
included this little tip that I didn't realize, but if
(43:30):
you're feeding squirrels or leaving food out for squirrels in
your yard and you have a garden that you care about,
you don't really want the squirrel taking the food and
them burying it. Elsewhere. So they said, if you're going
to feed them fruits and vegetables shredded, because the squirrels
is going to eat it there, it's not going to
try to bury it.
Speaker 2 (43:45):
I thought that was smart.
Speaker 4 (43:46):
Yeah, And if you have the nuts, don't give them
like honey roasted almonds, like unsweetened, unsalted stuff. I have
set up, you know, have a campcam at the family
camp trail cam, and it's it's keyed in on my
deer feeder that I got, which is corn. And I've
seen one deer, but almost every night I have scores
(44:09):
of raccoons nice and almost every day, well every day
I have squirrels, crows, and now daily turkeys visiting. Oh
neat lots and lots of turkeys. So I don't care
that the deer aren't visiting. It's all kinds of animals
are coming around. It's always fun to watch on the
camp cam.
Speaker 1 (44:27):
That is very cool. One thing you want to be
careful with with peanuts too, is giving them raw peanuts
because peanuts can carry an aff litoxin, which is very
It's not good. It's not good for squirrels, it's not
good for humans either. It's a type of fungus. I
think that actually is not only carcin carcina just that
(44:48):
can actually like just kill you on the spot neurologically speaking.
So you actually want roasted peanuts but not salted or
anything like that, sow like plain roasted peanuts or what's
even better because it helps with their teeth, are mass
nuts again like pecans, walnuts, that kind of stuff. But
(45:08):
a lot of people say don't feed squirrels because you're
actually what you're doing is, as we've seen, if squirrels
know that there's a lot of food.
Speaker 2 (45:15):
They're going to mate mate mate mate, and.
Speaker 1 (45:17):
There's going to be a lot of squirrels, and they're
going to become dependent on that additional food supply, and
they might start showing up at your neighbor's house, they
might start burrowing into your attic. There's just a lot
of there's a lot of things that to take into consideration.
Speaker 4 (45:33):
I guess, yeah, well, the family camp, there's nothing but
would so I hope we get overrun.
Speaker 1 (45:38):
So I agree with you. So you've found a couple
of cool things, including why squirrels like seem to dash
in front of your car when you're driving.
Speaker 4 (45:47):
Right, Yeah, So and again I love that we've just
finally found answers for this stuff, because this is kind
of a fun, non obnoxious fact to jump on to
drop on someone. If you're driving around a neighborhood and
the squirrel does that thing and people go, why do
squirrels do that, we can say, well, it's actually an
evolutionary instinct to get away from a predator. So if
(46:11):
you run out and you initially freeze when there's a predator,
the predator is sort of like a football player waiting
for the defensive player to make their move, and then
you go the opposite way with a little juke, And
that's what the squirrel's doing. They go out, they freeze
when they see that car, and if it was a predator,
they would wait on the predator to sort of make
(46:31):
a move and then they can quickly go in a
direction that really comes in handy when it's a predator.
When it's a car that's going, you know, generally in
a big, hulking straight line, it's not the same thing.
But a squirrel has a squirrel brain and it doesn't
realize that. So that's why a squirrel will jump out
in a street, see a car and just stop They're
not dumb. They're waiting on you to make some hawk
(46:55):
like move, which doesn't happen in the car. So what
you do is you just slow down and check your
rearview mirror. Don't see him on the brakes or anything.
But you know, they're everywhere. And I've hit I think
maybe two squirrels in my adult life, so it's not
like the most common thing to run over a squirrel.
Speaker 1 (47:14):
Yeah, I ran over one once and my brother in
law said that he was on his way to buy
a birthday present for his young kid who was waiting
forever for their dad to come back for his birthday
present for his party.
Speaker 2 (47:26):
Yeah, it was not helpful.
Speaker 4 (47:30):
And what about these black squirrels. Emily and I were
taking a walk through Brooklyn one day and saw a black, black,
black squirrel, not just a hint of black, and it
was the coolest thing I've ever seen. And I've since
seen a few more here and there in New York.
And we had the answer there too, right.
Speaker 1 (47:48):
Yes, they seemed to be so they used to think
that they were freaks of nature. I think, as one
naturalist put it, like years and years ago, and somebody said,
I don't know if that's true. I think these actually
might have been the dominant version. They seem to be
closely related to Eastern grays, if not just a type
(48:09):
of Eastern gray, like a different breed of that species.
But they were saying they used to possibly be the
dominant version and they got edged out by the Eastern gray,
and so's they're there, they're just kind of infrequently. They
infrequently appear, but there are parts of North America where
they seem to populate more than others, like New York.
(48:32):
You mean, I used to see them in DC, Toronto.
They're all over Toronto, in Ontario in general, from what
I understand. So it seems like from what I could tell,
that they think that they're they were there already and
now we're just kind of seeing them in like this
kind of moment in time where their numbers have diminished tremendously,
where if we went back in time we might see
(48:53):
a lot more. Is Does that seem accurate?
Speaker 4 (48:56):
Yeah? I mean, it's just genetics. It's a recessive gene
that causes an ab normal pigmentation, and you will you know,
you're you're only going to get more of that recessive gene.
If these squirrels or any you know, creature is reproducing
in a in a smaller area. So if you've got
to contain population, like let's say an island like New
(49:17):
York or apparently Roosevelt Island has a lot of them, Yeah,
you're just gonna see more of them. So, uh, DC
is a little not inexplicable, but it makes more sense
in New York because you're just gonna get more, you know,
more of this recessive gene happening in a area.
Speaker 2 (49:37):
So not at all my explanation.
Speaker 4 (49:39):
Then, no, it's your explanation. Now you nailed it. And
this was an article the Mysterious Black Squirrels of NYC
from what turns out to be a really good website
called Untapped Cities dot com and writer Michelle Young. It's
it's really cool read.
Speaker 1 (49:55):
Yeah, so you got anything else on squirrels?
Speaker 4 (49:58):
Nothing and hug a squirrel, Embrace the squirrel.
Speaker 1 (50:01):
But don't do that. Don't if you do feed them,
don't don't let them.
Speaker 2 (50:05):
Meet out of your hand.
Speaker 1 (50:06):
Yeah, because they'll bite you. Even though they're grateful. There's
still bidy. And since I said that, everybody, it's time
for listener mail.
Speaker 4 (50:18):
That's right, And It's a great listener mail because we
get to say hello to a kindergarten class, which is
always fun. Hello, Hi, mister Chuck and mister Josh. My
name is Katie. It's either Fink or Finky, and I'm
emailing with my kindergarten class in Baltimore City. We sometimes
listen to your show, and we were so excited when
(50:39):
you heard you mentioned the Three Sisters in the recent
watermelon episode. We actually spent a whole weekend learning about
the three Sisters this fall and wanted to share with
you our excitement. We hope you do a short stuff
on them soon. We definitely will if you need some
Three Sisters experts. We want to tell you these facts
that we learned this year. Oh yes, and here's a
(51:00):
little short list. Native Americans would plant fish first in
the ground to prepare the soil and make it healthy
and rich. Love that the corn grows so tall it
holds up the beans, and the squash keeps the soil moist,
so the other two sisters have enough water to stay hydrated.
And finally, all three of the sisters are dried so
(51:21):
that people can save them to eat later in the winter,
which is a great benefit, So we really want to
share our knowledge in case you do a short stuff
thanks for reading, love Miss Finkies or Miss Fink's kindergarten class.
And like I said, this is in Baltimore City.
Speaker 1 (51:39):
Man, that's really impressive. Like I remember in kindergarten, I
was learning Red Red.
Speaker 2 (51:47):
Red.
Speaker 1 (51:50):
I wasn't learning about the three sisters and groundcovers like
keeping them moisture in place for the other two. I mean,
come on, that's really impressive this week. I think it
was more like that month.
Speaker 4 (52:04):
February is red month. Right, Oh that's great.
Speaker 1 (52:07):
Well, thank you Miss fink or Finkey's class.
Speaker 2 (52:11):
Hats off to you guys.
Speaker 1 (52:12):
Keep it up, and yes, we will definitely do a
Three Sisters episode someday dedicated to you guys, right.
Speaker 4 (52:18):
Chuck for sure.
Speaker 1 (52:20):
If you want to get in touch with us, you
can too via email at stuff podcast at iHeartRadio dot com.
Speaker 3 (52:29):
Stuff you Should Know is a production of iHeartRadio. For
more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Longtime listeners of Stuff You Should Know are well aware
that I've come a long way with my feelings on squirrels.
Time was I saw them as a common pest who
invaded my.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
Bird feeders at Baby se Red.
Speaker 1 (00:18):
But then along came my precious four legged daughter, Momo,
who taught me to appreciate squirrels and ways I never
thought possible. Now Momo takes me and her mom to
feed the squirrels in the park every morning, and now
a day goes back and I don't lift my gaze
to the skies and thank Mother Earth for our squirrel friends.
Squirrels are great squirrel's.
Speaker 3 (00:38):
Ahoy, Welcome to Stuff you Should Know, a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
Hey, and welcome to the podcast.
Speaker 1 (00:57):
I'm Josh, and there's Chuck and Jerry is here, and
this is one of the greatest episodes we'll ever do
as far as I'm concerned.
Speaker 2 (01:06):
Squirrels.
Speaker 4 (01:09):
Oh, I really want to squirrels. I've been seeing that
all day.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
It's so wonderful. That is so wonderful.
Speaker 4 (01:15):
It is that song isn't But you.
Speaker 2 (01:18):
Know, uh yeah yeah.
Speaker 1 (01:20):
If you go back and listen to BC Boys, you're.
Speaker 4 (01:22):
Like, Wow, they come a long way. Though, and renouncing
that stuff.
Speaker 1 (01:26):
Yeah, for sure. So we're talking not about the BC Boys, surprising,
and we're talking about squirrels in the morning. It's squirrels
there evening, it's squirrels.
Speaker 4 (01:35):
Squirrels two syllables, right.
Speaker 1 (01:38):
I don't care however you want to say it the
squirrel sure or Boston I guess probably they say it
similarly as well. Yeah, but if you want to get fancy,
you can bust out their Latin name. They're members of
the rodent Order. But for their family, their squore a day,
scure a day, Nope, secury day.
Speaker 4 (02:01):
I look this one up, all right, Sierrade.
Speaker 2 (02:08):
Like mine more?
Speaker 4 (02:08):
Okay? Did you just toot on my renvation?
Speaker 2 (02:12):
Yeah, even though it was correct.
Speaker 4 (02:14):
Did you give me a bronx cheer?
Speaker 2 (02:16):
How? How is it? Suride?
Speaker 4 (02:19):
Well, let me do the person online? Sierra diye?
Speaker 2 (02:23):
Okay? Is that Emma who said that?
Speaker 4 (02:25):
Or at Sierra Day was another? But I think we've
heard from people that Dae is die.
Speaker 1 (02:30):
Okay, And that's fine if that's what it's called. I'm
just gonna call them squirrels from now on.
Speaker 2 (02:36):
But there's actually.
Speaker 1 (02:37):
Exactly like three hundred species of squirrels and it's it's
kind of hard to wrap your head around because usually
if you live in a place with squirrels, meaning you
live on a continent outside of Antarctica.
Speaker 4 (02:51):
Yeah, like everywhere.
Speaker 1 (02:52):
Basically, they're probably a lot of squirrels living around you,
and they probably all look basically exactly alike. Because it
seems seems like when they fill an ecological niche, brother,
they fill it, and there's not much room for competing species,
it seems like from my experience.
Speaker 4 (03:11):
Yeah, I mean, there are enough who helped us with this.
Speaker 2 (03:14):
This this is a grabster.
Speaker 4 (03:16):
Yeah, so Grabster points out that you know, you can
find mountain squirrels and city squirrels, and forest squirrels and
jungle squirrels and desert squirrels. You can find squirrels and
Alaska that hibernate with the lowest body temperature of any mammal,
(03:36):
that have body temperatures below freezing at times.
Speaker 2 (03:39):
That's so cool.
Speaker 4 (03:39):
You can go to Africa and find one of the
cutest squirrels, the African pigmy squirrel, which is as small
as a tiny little mouse. Where you can go to
Buttan and find the giant flying squirrel of Button that
with their head and body and is over two feet
long with that tail, they're huge.
Speaker 1 (04:00):
No, two feet long without the tail, oh, without stressing, Yes,
they're distressingly large.
Speaker 4 (04:05):
Yeah, because the squirrel tail will get into this. But
that's one of their signature features generally, although depending on
the species, because there are three hundred species, like you said,
more than or almost three hundred, some of those tails
are a little diminished. But usually when you think squirrel,
you think of that big, bushy tail.
Speaker 1 (04:24):
Yeah, and not only when you think of squirrel you
think of the tail. But the Greeks themselves, right, somebody
decided that a Greek term would make sense. But scurios
or scourios, which roughly means something like shadow tail ed,
says shady Butt. I also saw shadowtail, which is a
reference to how squirrels sometimes hide in the shadow cast
(04:46):
by their own tail.
Speaker 2 (04:46):
It's pretty clever, but.
Speaker 1 (04:49):
The squirrel is usually kind of The bushy tail of
the squirrel is what makes a squirrel a squirrel. One
of the other things that really differentiates it from other
rodents is the way that it's jaw and muscle are
attached to its skull. There's actually a name for it,
seriomorphous zygomasoteric system. They look at you hooked on phonics
(05:11):
works for me.
Speaker 4 (05:12):
You even recorded the new pronunciation. That's right, you worked
it right in there with a syria dye.
Speaker 1 (05:18):
I adapted, yeah, because you should have heard it before
when I was workshopping it.
Speaker 4 (05:22):
That was the first take. Everybody, we're not lying.
Speaker 1 (05:25):
So so those are two things that really kind of
differentiate squirrels. But as we've really gotten better and better
at taxonomy with the introduction of geno mapping, sure we
can see, like, oh, this animal that doesn't look anything
like this animal is actually really closely related. And as
(05:47):
with just about every other animal we've studied using modern
genetic taxonomy, squirrels are Our understanding of squirrels has really
kind of changed shape of who's related to whom, who's
descended from who. But there's there We're kind of going
to go the old school way, which is differentiating them
based on their habitat and their behavior. So there's three
(06:12):
groups of squirrels that we're going to cover, even though
there's technically five subfamilies now, ground squirrels, tree squirrels, and
flying squirrels. And before we go any further, I officially
dedicate this episode to Momo, one of the great lovers
of squirrels of all time, who changed changed me in
my heart towards squirrels.
Speaker 2 (06:31):
I used to be a squirrel hater. Chuck, do you
remember squirrels? You remember?
Speaker 1 (06:35):
Oh? Yeah, the bird feeder Momo pointed out to me, said, Dad,
squirrels are great. I'm going to teach you to love them.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
And she did.
Speaker 4 (06:42):
Yeah, dogs and squirrels. It's what was the Disney It
was either Pixar Disney had an animated movie where the
dog would just stop and go squirrel anytime there's a squirrel.
I can't remember which one was.
Speaker 2 (06:59):
I don't remember.
Speaker 4 (06:59):
It wasn't that long ago. But before we move on
to ground squirrels, it is kind of fun to learn
that because of that DNA analysis that we now have
at our fingertips and fossil evidence, we know that squirrels
went to western North America thirty five to forty million
years ago because squirrels like to get around. As we
(07:20):
will see, they crossed a land bridge to Eurasia about
ten million years after that, and then as soon as
they could as soon as Eurasia met up with Africa
about twenty million years ago, they went, all right, we're
in Africa now too. Because squirrels like to get around.
They as you will see, Well, we'll just tease that
(07:40):
and say, squirrels like to get around.
Speaker 1 (07:41):
Yeah, I mean, you put one tree next to another,
squirrel's going to go from tree to tree. Put another tree,
squirrel's going to go the next tree. And if you
put trees all the way across one continent to another,
they're going to migrate. That's just what they do, and
that's what they did. But if I thought I loved
squirrels before, now that I know that they're actually native
from plenty five million years back to North America, I
(08:03):
just think that's that's just the tops.
Speaker 4 (08:05):
Yeah, and we talked about it before when you were
having your bird feeder issue. But you know, Atlanta is
a city in the forest, and we have tons and
tons and tons of squirrels. Kind of everywhere along the
East Coast does, but Atlanta just has a lot of squirrels.
And as I was reading, you know, from my upstairs office,
there's a window not right in front of my face
(08:27):
but sort of above me and our huge, big, beautiful
oak in our front yard. I'm doing this on squirrels.
I just look up for a second and I see
four squirrels running around that tree together, playing like circling
it like a barber pole.
Speaker 2 (08:41):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (08:41):
I take my daughter to school this morning, and I
count the squirrels that I see on the way. I
counted twenty two squirrels that I just saw on a
you know, twelve minute car ride.
Speaker 2 (08:51):
You hit one of them there.
Speaker 4 (08:53):
I have before. It's the worst thing ever. It is,
But they're everywhere in Atlanta, And it hit me a
while ago about how easy it is living here or
anywhere where there's a lot of squirrels, just to sort
of be like, yeah, the squirrels. But it kind of
hit me like how crazy it is that there are
(09:13):
these little mammals. They're not hiding in holes generally like
mice and stuff like that. Like they're just out all
over the place at all times. We're surrounded by these
little mammals.
Speaker 2 (09:25):
Yeah, out and proud.
Speaker 1 (09:26):
And if you come close too close to one of
their trees when you're walking by and the squirrel doesn't
like it, he's gonna sit there or she and chatter
at you and basically tell you to beat it. You
punk get away from my tree. That's how. That's one
of the great lovable things about squirrels. They have such
huge personalities. They're just so great.
Speaker 2 (09:45):
Chuck.
Speaker 4 (09:46):
Remember my famous squirrel attack not too long ago, and
when I went outside, I got it on my doorbell
camera and that squirrel leaped through the air and hit
me in the leg. It was a complete accident. Of course,
I don't think the squirrel was trying to kill me, But.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
You don't know.
Speaker 4 (10:01):
They're just they're all over the place. We're gonna get
to all the fun stuff about the black squirrels of
New York and why squirrels stop in the middle of
the road when they go to across the street. Like
there we found reasons for all this stuff, which I love.
It's not that squirrels are dumb, and we're gonna reveal
all that in this episode.
Speaker 1 (10:19):
Okay, I'm a little excited. I'm a little worked up.
I know it's a ted early, but first break. Okay,
we're so squirrel positive that, I mean, that's a great
way to put.
Speaker 4 (10:29):
It, Chuck, all right, so are we taking a break?
I say, all right, I need to calm down to
and I guarantee you I'm gonna go like blow my
nose in the other room. I'm gonna see a squirrel.
Speaker 2 (10:38):
I'll be right back, all right, Chuck.
Speaker 1 (11:02):
So, as promised, we're gonna break squirrels down into three groups, crown, tree, flying,
or aerial. And I propose that we start with the
ground squirrel. Sure, many species of which you probably not you,
but I mean you, dear listener, and may all include
two I didn't realize were actual squirrels, like groundhog.
Speaker 4 (11:26):
Chuck did not know that was a squirrel.
Speaker 2 (11:28):
Chipmunk.
Speaker 4 (11:30):
I had a feeling that might be a squirrel.
Speaker 1 (11:32):
Gosh, they're so great too, Yeah, chipmunks. What about a groundhog?
Speaker 4 (11:38):
You already said groundhog?
Speaker 1 (11:39):
Did I yeah, okay, I'm swirling. I'm swirling still. And
my love squirrel prairie dog. Yeah, well that's what was
coming out of my mouth next.
Speaker 2 (11:50):
To Patty Dog.
Speaker 4 (11:50):
Yeah, prairie dog didn't know it.
Speaker 2 (11:51):
What about that meerkat?
Speaker 4 (11:54):
I didn't know that.
Speaker 2 (11:55):
Well, that's because.
Speaker 1 (11:56):
They're not but okay, prairie dogs, chipmunks, and what's the
other one, marmots? Yeah, marmots and brought them in groundhogs.
Those are all ground squirrels. They're squirrels friends, and that
makes them pretty awesome. But one of the reasons why
they you wouldn't think they're squirrels is because in a
lot of those species they lack that characteristic bushy tail. Yeah,
(12:20):
but then also they live almost a totally different life
from their tree dwelling more famous cousins.
Speaker 4 (12:27):
Yeah, I mean, they might climb a tree, but generally
you're not going to see a groundhogger prairie dog up
in the tree. If they need to, you know, for
a brief time, if they're trying to find food or
something or like on the run from something trying to
kill it, they might go up in a tree, but
they generally hang out on the ground, hence the name
they love their rocky terrain chipmunks for just speaking for them,
(12:52):
are pretty solitary unless they're trying to reproduce. But I
know that you've found some stuff, was it on the
prairie dog that have their big families and colonies.
Speaker 1 (13:02):
Yeah, I mean that's one of the main characteristics of
ground squirrels in general, aside from a couple, but that
they're much more communal than tree squirrels, and in particular,
the largest town a prairie dog town, is what they're
called the largest prairie dog town on record is in Texas,
because of course everything's bigger there, But it was a
colony of black tailed prairie dogs. And this town, Chuck,
(13:26):
stretched one hundred miles wide, wow, by two hundred and
fifty miles long, and contain four hundred million prairie dogs.
My gos again, crownd squirrels all living in this kind
of large community. Jeez, I mean that's it's like a
Chinese megacity or something like that times ten.
Speaker 4 (13:46):
Yeah, So are these the ones that tend to stay
grouped with their own sex?
Speaker 1 (13:53):
No, those tend to be either tree squirrels or flying squirrels.
These are more the because they live in communal groups
and kinship is a big deal. Ground squirrels, like prairie dogs,
tend to have a really good ability to smell the
scent of other ground squirrels, so they can tell like
(14:14):
who's a blood relation who's not. They've done studies to see,
you know, like if a ground squirrel. They have a
lot of really sophisticated calls too, because they're alerting others
to the presence of a rattlesnake or a hawk or something.
So they're really talkative and they have a lot of
sophisticated different communication and they found that like a prairie
(14:37):
dog that will stand up and take the time to
risk its own life to alert others, it's actually alerting.
The others that it's alerting are actually related by blood.
And the groundhog or the prairie dog knows this because
it can smell its blood relations among all these other
you know, extended family members in the town.
Speaker 4 (14:57):
There's not much cuter than a squirrel up on its
hot rear haunches. Yeah, whether it's I mean, obviously those
prairie dogs, you know, they do it for a living.
But even our eastern gray squirrels sit upon those back
legs if they want to work a nut with their
little front pop ads.
Speaker 1 (15:15):
Yeah, or a chipmunk on its back legs. It's doesn't
get much cute.
Speaker 4 (15:18):
It's little busy hands. Goodness me. Yeah, all right, So
we can move on to our tree squirrel. This is
they're known as arboreal squirrels obviously because they are tree squirrels.
And this is when you're talking your eastern gray squirrel.
This is not a groundhog, this is not a prairie dog.
This is your dyed in the wool. Cute, little fluffy
(15:40):
tailed sort of you know, they're called gray, but there's
sort of a light brownish color generally, although the colors
do range, as we'll see. And these are the ones
that you're gonna find all over Atlanta, jumping around, climbing around,
leaping it podcasters in their front lawn. Yeah, they spend
most of the time. I mean, you see them on
(16:01):
the ground plenty, but they live in trees. They nest
in trees called drays or drays or Drey's spelled with
a year an a right.
Speaker 1 (16:11):
And you probably if you've ever looked up and seen
a mass of like sticks and twigs and a leafless
tree in the middle of winter, you're looking at a
squirrel's nest called a dre And this is where you
were you were asking about them staying in like same
sex groups apparently in the winter. Even though the tree
squirrel does not live in a communal society like a
(16:34):
ground squirrel does, they're still social. They still interact with
one another. They play, they chase, they chase one another off.
Speaker 2 (16:42):
They like mate. But when it.
Speaker 1 (16:44):
Gets really cold, tree squirrels will kind of group their
heat together by staying in a dre communally up to
like thirty members. It's able, Yeah, it is very adorable.
I want to do a little exercise here real quick, Chuck.
I want you to use your imagination.
Speaker 2 (17:03):
Close.
Speaker 1 (17:04):
Imagine a very cold winter day. The wind's blowing, snow's
being carried on the wind, and it's passing by just
outside a woodpecker hole, and we're inside that woodpecker hole's dark.
The light is very very faint because it's it's kind
of an overcast, snowy day to begin with. But we're
also inside a tree, in an old woodpecker hole, and
(17:25):
it's lined with a bunch of different leaves, and there's
half a dozen or so squirrels, all kind of snuggled together, sleeping,
sharing their warmth as the winter day passes by outside
and they snooze an afternoon away fat on acorns that
they all just ate. Oh boy, isn't that amazing?
Speaker 4 (17:43):
I almost fell asleep. You're real, Robert Fross, my friend,
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (17:46):
Thank you. I like to think Robert Redford crossed with
Robert Cross.
Speaker 4 (17:51):
But sure, well you know Robert Redford if you look
in the mirror, but Robert Frost when you pick a.
Speaker 1 (17:56):
Bent up with the touch of Robert Goolay if.
Speaker 4 (17:59):
You say it surely, Oh man, that really did almost
put me to sleep. That's quite nice. I love that scene.
So here's a little fun adaptation that squirrels have. If
you see a tree squirrel running down a tree face
first with little resistance, it's just like it was made
(18:20):
to do it. It's because it is. And they have
those little claws of course that really helps. But if
you look closely, or if you look up a picture
rather and you see like a still image, you will
notice that they have the ability to and Ed says
they can turn their feet around. They really kind of
just turn their whole back legs around backwards to where
those claws are gripping on the way down. And that's
(18:45):
why they're you know, it's like the perfect adaptation to
be able to run up and down a tree.
Speaker 1 (18:50):
So if you ever watched one do that up close, sure,
so anytime I've seen that there, if you look their
legs because they're turned around and it kicks kind of
their elbows out a little bit, uh huh, and they
climb down, it looks a little different. And I've noticed
that it triggers the part of my lizard brain. That's
like a spider alert. It's like that's triggered by that.
(19:14):
So it's like a giant, furry spider is coming down
to some little part of my brain that sends off
an alarm, and it's really off putting sometimes until you
know the larger part, the executive functioning part of my
brain is like, it's a squirrel, don't worry, But there's
that one just zap of Like this is weird and
scary for a second, but it happens to me from
(19:35):
time to time when they come down the tree like that.
Speaker 4 (19:38):
Well, it can be a little startling, you know, if
you're going to take out the trash or something and
your trash can is next to a big live oak
like ours is, and there are two or more squirrels
that are they seem I don't know what they're doing.
It seem like I have a beef with one another.
But maybe they're just playing chase. But when they're really
boogying up and down and around a tree right as
you walk upon it is it can be a little
(19:59):
bit like, oh okay, I.
Speaker 1 (20:01):
Read that when one was chasing the other. It's a
part of the mating ritual.
Speaker 4 (20:05):
Oh Okay, so that's embarrassing for them, right.
Speaker 1 (20:10):
I don't know if that's across the board, but I
saw that in at least one.
Speaker 2 (20:14):
Place, all right.
Speaker 4 (20:14):
I like knowing that. Here's another cool thing about squirrels.
All kinds of squirrels have scent glands, and it depends
on the species where that scent gland is located. It
can be near their little bum hole. It can be
near their mouth in the corners of their mouth, can
be on their back. But in the case of the
tree squirrel, they have their scent glands on their feet
(20:37):
and sweat glands on the bottom of their feet. And
they are a squirrel that buries their food over large.
Large areas sometimes like up to twenty five acres can
be their habitat where they're bearing and hiding food, and
they are literally every time they walk to bury something,
they're leaving a little scent trail that they can go
back and pick up. Ideally, but it's not a perfect system.
(20:59):
Sometimes they will lose stuff and not be able to
go back. But what they have then done is planted
a tree.
Speaker 1 (21:05):
Yeah, which brings up their huge ecological role, which is
like planting new forests, like keeping forests healthy by forgetting
about nuts. And the nut is actually a seed and
it grows into a new tree that the squirrel helped
move away from the tree.
Speaker 2 (21:21):
It's amazing its range.
Speaker 4 (21:22):
They're known as the gardeners of the forest.
Speaker 1 (21:24):
Yeah, and we taught we did a whole short stuff
on squirrels bearing nuts, and I remember one of the
things that came up was there was a study that
found that they if they know they're being watched by another.
Speaker 2 (21:35):
Squirrel, they'll fake dig a hole.
Speaker 1 (21:37):
And then won't drop the nut in it, And then
we'll go somewhere else and mislead a squirrel.
Speaker 2 (21:42):
It's that they think is watching them.
Speaker 4 (21:43):
Yeah, they'll look around first and be like, did anyone
see that? Yeah, I think I'm good.
Speaker 2 (21:47):
Tod was watching. I better not drop the nut in
this hole. He'll come along.
Speaker 4 (21:52):
So that's what the the I'm sorry, not flying, but
the tree squirrels. That's how they use their scent. The
ground squirrels, we should say, mainly use the scent glands
to mark their territory. And you know, because they're all
about their clan and their colony, to sort of mark
their territory and find out if someone is a part
of their clan.
Speaker 2 (22:11):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (22:11):
And then also as far as sense go, I saw
some somewhere that some kinds of ground squirrels that are
prey to rattlesnakes will actually find shed rattlesnake skin rub
it on themselves. Oh wow, chew it up and rub
it on themselves to give themselves a rattlesnake scent to
throw off rattlesnakes.
Speaker 2 (22:29):
They camouflage their scent.
Speaker 4 (22:30):
That's pretty cool.
Speaker 2 (22:31):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (22:32):
I wonder if they ever wear it and just like
fashion a couple of holes and stick their arms through.
Speaker 2 (22:36):
Yeah, and they bragged that they killed it.
Speaker 4 (22:38):
Yeah, have you man? I shouldn't even mention this. Yeah,
I'm gonna mention it.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
Have you?
Speaker 4 (22:44):
Because it is granted it is roadkill. But have you
ever seen the pictures of the squirrel roadkill with the
little G I Joe action figures? No, just look it up,
I can. They aren't squirrels at some one killed. It's
someone will take a roadkill picture of a squirrel and
they'll take the little G I Joe figures as if
(23:06):
they were big game hunters, and they'll have their guns
and they'll have like one leg up on the squirrel's head.
As if it was their trophy. And the squirrel looks
positively giant next to the little action figures, and it's
kind of funny.
Speaker 2 (23:19):
I'll have to check that one out.
Speaker 4 (23:20):
I don't want to encourage people. Maybe I shouldn't have
even said anything.
Speaker 1 (23:22):
Well, I don't know if you're encouraging people to like
swerve onto a squirrel, you know, one guy or.
Speaker 4 (23:29):
Kill a squirrel to do that. But maybe just took
it up on the internet. If you want to see that,
don't recreate it.
Speaker 1 (23:34):
If you kill a squirrel and we find out about it,
we're coming to your house.
Speaker 4 (23:38):
I know. Okay with a ghost of that squirrel. Yeah,
that will introduce to your attic you go.
Speaker 2 (23:47):
So have we moved on to flying squirrels.
Speaker 4 (23:49):
Yet, Yeah, let's do it. Those are you know the
old story when we had one growing up for a
little while. You probably don't remember, but my uncle gave
us his flying squirrel to watch for a while, and
he would leap from the curtains on the other side
of the room onto my shoulder. And then when we
went out of town, apparently they said the squirrel got out.
But now that I'm an adult, I realized that the cat
(24:10):
ate the squirrel. Oh man, yeah, just to recap that
childhood trauma. That's well okay, But for a little while,
we had a flying squirrel in our home.
Speaker 2 (24:21):
For a brief shining moment.
Speaker 4 (24:23):
That's the upshot.
Speaker 1 (24:24):
So a flying squirrel, and I thought this. I thought
they were fairly rare. Apparently they're as common as tree
squirrels in some places. The reason that you think they're
rare is because they're nocturnal, so we're usually sleeping when
they're out and about.
Speaker 4 (24:38):
I love thinking about those things just flying around all night.
Speaker 1 (24:41):
Yeah, and flying is right, man, I saw Ed says
the thing glide up to one hundred and fifty feet.
I saw three hundred in some cases.
Speaker 2 (24:49):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (24:50):
And that's what they're doing. They're gliding. They're not flying.
They have no means of like propulsion. But they have
a skin flap. They've evolved a skin flap that is
you know the batsuit that people like you know, skydive with.
Speaker 2 (25:03):
That's that is based basically one.
Speaker 1 (25:06):
Hundred percent on the flying squirrel's membranes between its front
legs and hind legs that it can you know, spread
out when it jumps and it just catches the air.
And they can move it this way and that and
use their tail as a rudder and go one hundred
and fifty feet in a pretty purposeful direction too.
Speaker 4 (25:27):
Did you say what the name of the flap was?
Speaker 2 (25:29):
No?
Speaker 4 (25:30):
Do you want to?
Speaker 3 (25:31):
No?
Speaker 2 (25:31):
I probably screwed it.
Speaker 4 (25:35):
I'm gonna go with potagium.
Speaker 2 (25:37):
That's great. What do they call that? Pada gayum?
Speaker 4 (25:41):
I wonder what they call that in the in the
Flying Suit Bizz Extreme Flying Suit Biz. I don't know, and.
Speaker 1 (25:48):
I think they call them batsuits, but that's that's a misnomer.
Speaker 4 (25:51):
If you ask me those I gotta say. I mean,
I'm not into any of that stuff. I would never
do it, but those videos are amazing and it's oh,
I know, as humans have come I think to flying
it feels like agreed.
Speaker 2 (26:05):
Yeah, I would have to have.
Speaker 1 (26:07):
Probably a lobotomy to to actually try that. It would
take that radical of a personality change for me to
try it.
Speaker 4 (26:14):
Well, And I mean sure that kind of thing that's
the most extreme, like years and years of training, yes,
skydiving training and stuff like that. You know, like run
jump into a batsuit?
Speaker 2 (26:23):
No, no, no, definitely not.
Speaker 1 (26:24):
But even if you do, you know, once you get
to that point, like, I can't imagine how dangerous that is.
You know, if you smack into something you're going really fast.
Speaker 4 (26:32):
Yeah, yeah, your toast. Yeah, and that happens sadly.
Speaker 1 (26:36):
But I get the impression that it's the rush is
worth the risk.
Speaker 4 (26:41):
That's right. And speaking of risk, there are endangered flying squirrels,
the Carolina Northern flying squirrel. And we talked a little
bit about these little land bridges that are starting to
pop up in the United States over overpasses and freeway crossings.
Speaker 2 (26:59):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (27:00):
I just read today there's one in LA that's opening
up that's like one hundred and sixty feet wide. I
can't remember the name of it. It's named after someone
and to allow cougars and you know, mountain lions to
pass and all kinds of animals, and they're using you know,
they have done studies for squirrels in that they found
(27:20):
tagged like radio tagged squirrels are foraging and building on
the other side of these massive freeways thanks to these bridges,
Like it's been proven to work.
Speaker 1 (27:30):
Yeah for sure. I think it's called the Robert Evans
Memorial Animal Land Bridge.
Speaker 4 (27:36):
Baby. Yeah, if only.
Speaker 3 (27:41):
So.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
That actually kind of leads us to a quote I
ran across Chuck because if you put like I was saying,
if you can kind of connect a tree to another tree,
which really ties into that rewilding episode because you're you're
using you're connecting core to core via corridor basically is
what they're doing with that. That there was an old
saying that before, well not too long ago, I think
(28:06):
into the eighteenth century, maybe even early nineteenth century, that
there was so many chestnut trees in North America that
a squirrel could make it from Maine to Georgia without
ever touching the ground.
Speaker 4 (28:18):
Yeah, where did we cover that in?
Speaker 3 (28:19):
Was it?
Speaker 1 (28:20):
I don't remember?
Speaker 4 (28:21):
I remember that Factoi. That's a great one.
Speaker 1 (28:24):
So it really kind of goes to show like there
used to be a lot more forests in the United States,
but there were also a lot more squirrels because there's
a there's a positive correlation between mass producing trees, which
are chestnut, beech oak trees that produce nuts that squirrels
(28:45):
and other forest animals eat, and the number and population
density of squirrels in an area. You have a lot
of mass producing trees, you're going to have a lot
of squirrels because again, they fill their ecological niche to
base bursting.
Speaker 4 (29:01):
Yeah, and they you know, bursting with food because they
are opportunistic eaters, is what Ed says. And that's a
pretty good way to say it. Because while they well,
obviously if they can get fruit or nuts and seeds,
that's the stock of their diet. But they will eat
whatever keeps them alive. They will eat insects and fungus,
(29:22):
and they actually spread fungus, which is great. Yeah, they
eat roots. They have they have found little tiny eggs
and little tiny birds and little tiny lizards in the
guts of squirrels, so they you know, technically are omnivores,
which is just to say squirrels are remarkable. That's staying alive,
(29:42):
and they will eat your garbage. They will eat whatever
they need to, but that's only if they're not finding
the nuts and the seeds and stuff like that, which
there are generally plenty plenty of in the United States.
Speaker 1 (29:53):
And one reason that they're they're suited for nuts, or
that nuts are suited for them, is because they have
two sets of incisors. I believe it up and a
down is the technical term, and they grow constantly throughout
their lifetime. I think they grow something like, is this
even possible that I'm seeing it six inches a year?
Speaker 4 (30:13):
Well, I mean they're constantly grinding them down, so I
think if a squirrel was in a coma, they could
have six inch fang.
Speaker 2 (30:20):
That's crazy.
Speaker 1 (30:20):
And then apparently if they don't continuously grind them down
and they kept growing, they would grow through the top
and the bottom of their face all a Lisa Simpson
that time she needed braces.
Speaker 2 (30:33):
But that's crazy.
Speaker 1 (30:34):
So they use these very very hard nuts, like a
chestnut or pecan or walnut shell to impart. It's a
food source. But as they're getting to the food source,
they're keeping their teeth ground down, which apparently they have
to do all the time.
Speaker 4 (30:49):
That's pretty amazing. Squirrels also like a little sweet treat
every now and then. They have found red squirrels in
Maine that will tap sugar maple trees. They make little
bite marks in the tree and then and they just say,
all right, do your thing, and they come back a
few days later and that trap has hardened up and
run out a little bit. And that is just a little,
tiny sweet treat for a squirrel.
Speaker 1 (31:10):
That's right, It's pretty awesome. They also found that Squirrels
can learn by observing other squirrels doing something, particularly finding
new ways to get food. Their adept at that.
Speaker 4 (31:21):
Oh okay, so they see Todd doing something, they say,
not a bad idea, let's give that a shot.
Speaker 2 (31:27):
Yeah, that Todd really came around.
Speaker 4 (31:30):
Yeah, and if you'll notice, I think we kind of
skipped over this if we didn't mention Australia squirrels I
think used to be in Australia but aren't so much now.
And is it a mystery or is it just the
obvious that the Australians were like SIPs on mate.
Speaker 2 (31:45):
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (31:46):
I didn't see that anywhere, but I know that they
introduced the Eastern gray and then in Perth they introduced
the Indian palm, which is like if you mashed together
an Eastern gray squirrel in a chipmunk, that it would
be an Indian palm.
Speaker 4 (31:59):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (32:00):
Well, but apparently they both died out. I don't know
if it's a mystery or not, like you're saying, but
supposedly there's some feral colonies that escape from zoos, at
least in Perth. So there are wild squirrels in Australia,
but they were introduced in the nineteenth century, which is
actually a trend, as we'll see. But I say before
we tackle all that, we take a break. How about that?
Speaker 4 (32:22):
All right, Well we'll take the break and we'll talk
about squirrel migration right after this.
Speaker 1 (32:48):
Okay, Chuck, so as I was saying, like back before
pre colonial days in particular, but also even into the
nineteenth century, I think even the nineteen sixties, there were
reports of a massive numbers of squirrels basically stampeding. Yea,
they call them squirrel migrations, and they have been documented
enough times that it's not an anomaly, but they are
(33:10):
fairly rare. And today they've kind of figured out that
there aren't dense enough populations of squirrels to ever have
a genuine like squirrel stampede like they had before. But
there used to be so many of them that every
once in a while, thousands to tens of thousands to
tends to tens of thousands of squirrels would pass generally
(33:31):
in like a big wave over an area. And apparently
it was quite a thing to see.
Speaker 4 (33:37):
I imagine it was. And this happened because there would
just be a really big fruitful year for squirrel food
tons of availability, and they would you know, they would
boom in numbers because they go to where the food is.
And usually if that is followed by or I guess historically,
when that was followed by a really bad year like
(33:59):
the rain you know, didn't work out so great for
producing nuts and seeds and stuff and fruit, that all
of a sudden, you've got a ton of squirrels in
an area that are all looking around, going, oh, what's
the deal. And they're opportunitists, so they said, all right,
we're getting out of here. We're going to where the
food is. Let's go everybody. And they would do it
all at.
Speaker 1 (34:19):
Once, yeah, all at once for some reason. And so
there's migrations. They would be they'd be running through the forest,
they'd be running across fields, they'd be swimming across rivers,
and apparently, in at least one account, I saw they
would be gulped up by bass in the rivers. And
I can't imagine seeing anything worse than a squirrel being
eaten by a fish.
Speaker 4 (34:40):
That seems unnatural.
Speaker 1 (34:41):
Yeah, but there were so many of them. And this
is also at a time where squirrels were roundly among
basically everyone living in America viewed as vermin as invaders,
as things that were unwanted, but also a tasty food
source too. Yeah, So anytime there was a squirrel stamp,
the yokels would run out with their sticks and bags
(35:03):
and beat squirrels to death and then cook them and
sell their pelts and do all sorts of things with them.
And one of the reasons why they were viewed as
vermin chuck is because on these squirrel migrations and other
times where they were just you know, if you were
unlucky with your planting, those squirrels might see as a
food source the crops you just planted all those seeds
and would dig them up and ruin your year's crops
(35:25):
in a day or so. So people didn't like squirrels
for a very long time. And this idea of squirrels
being everywhere, these little mammals living among us, like you
were talking about earlier, that's fairly new, and that's actually
very deliberate and purposeful, because squirrels were basically gone up
until about the mid to late nineteenth century in America.
Speaker 4 (35:47):
Yeah, I mean, between being hunted because people hated them
on their farms, like you said, people and people still
and like generally in certain parts of like Appalachia, still
eat squirrel on the menu. It is a little gamey
from what I'm told, I'm never going to eat a squirrel,
but they still use pelts. But that kind of, you know,
just like they would eat any larger mammal and use
(36:09):
their pelts. They would just get crafty with you know,
as small as a squirrel. And certainly in times of
you know, real need, you know, small rodents would come
in handy on the menu back then. But they were
almost gone. We started growing more urban in the eighteen hundreds, obviously,
(36:29):
and they were killing squirrels as fast as they could.
And in the eighteen forties and fifties there were so
few squirrels that they were introduced to city parks, but
not many. At first. They were just like this weird
curiosity where you would go out kind of like bird
watching and you would like try to spot a squirrel
running around because it was such a novel thing. But
(36:52):
then by the time Frederick law Olmsted, who by the way,
deserves his own podcasts, came along and really introduced the
idea of these really large city parks and urban parks.
They introduced a lot of squirrels to these parks and
they really really like that. That's kind of why we
have the squirrels we have today, was from this movement
to reintroduce them in a big way to urban parks.
Speaker 1 (37:14):
Yeah, and I mean we talked kind of a lot
about that whole idea in our Central Park episode, This
idea that you know, they just kept building the city
and building the city and building the city, and people
started going crazy because there weren't green spaces. So that
brought the parks in, and then the idea of adding
animals to the park just to kind of naturalize it
even more. That squirrels played a huge role in that.
(37:38):
And not only you know, in Central Park, but also
it started out and I believe Philadelphia and then followed
by Boston, and so by the mid to late nineteenth century,
that's when squirrels started to re establish themselves and the
way that people saw squirrels started to change too, And
there was this idea that they weren't vermin anymore. Don't
(37:59):
you them, Please try not to hit them with a stick. Instead,
let's go to the park, spend some time outside and
bring some nuts with you and maybe feed the squirrels,
and not only you feed the squirrels, but you got
a little kid. That little kid wants to hit that
squirrel with a stick so bad because kids are awful
like that.
Speaker 4 (38:16):
Good luck.
Speaker 1 (38:17):
You can actually use squirrels feeding squirrels as a way
to teach kids to have compassion, to be upstanding morally,
to have charity. And that was kind of how the
whole interaction between humans and squirrels was kind of framed
around that time, like the late nineteenth early twentieth century.
Speaker 4 (38:37):
Yeah, the Boy Scout co founder Ernest Thompson's Seaton said
that squirrels, in introducing them to boys in general, would say,
would cure them of their tendency toward cruelty. But I said,
good luck a second ago. How do you hit it?
I mean, I guess if there's a stampede. But you
show me a kid that can get a squirrel and
hit it with a stick, and that's a future OLYMPI
(39:00):
In sure, there's no way. Those things are so fast.
But don't try to do it, kids, definitely.
Speaker 1 (39:05):
No, don't even practice that. Don't try to qualify for
the Olympics. And that because you'll show up to the
Olympics and'll be like, we don't have that, that's not
one of our sports is what.
Speaker 4 (39:14):
Do you think you says Australia.
Speaker 2 (39:17):
Right.
Speaker 4 (39:18):
So these days, you know, we've kind of come full
circle into just sort of letting squirrels be there. Are
you know, if you're a hunter in the United States,
and that may be the tradition in your family if
you live out in the country, to start off your
child with hunting squirrels with a little twenty two rifle
(39:41):
or something as practice to teach young hunters. I'm certainly
not into that, but I'm not going to judge you
if that's your thing. And like I said, people still
do eat squirrel in certain parts of the United States today.
I guess we can talk. I mean, we found a
lot of extra fun stuff.
Speaker 2 (40:00):
Let's talk about.
Speaker 1 (40:00):
So we were talking about how they're viewed in America.
Depending on where you are in the world, depending on
the squirrel you're talking about, they're actually they can be
viewed quite negatively. I remember in our Rewilding episode we
talked about how Eastern gray squirrels are considered an invasive
species in Italy, where they call them Americans killer squirrels.
(40:22):
And there's also an issue with Eastern gray squirrels in Europe,
where they've killed off most of the Eurasian red squirrels
over there. They've just out competed them. It's not like
they've you know, choked them or anything like that. They
just they're like almost twice as big, they're a lot
more ornery, and they've just kind of diminished the number
(40:44):
of Eurasian red squirrels in the UK so much so
that three quarters of the population lives in Scotland. And
I would just like to direct everybody to the Scottish
Squirrel's website. Go to Scottish Squirrels dot org UK and
this is very important. Slash about and on their about
(41:04):
page the header image is maybe the cutest squirrel you'll
ever see.
Speaker 2 (41:08):
In your entire life.
Speaker 4 (41:09):
Is that the one you sent me?
Speaker 2 (41:11):
And Jerry, Yes, isn't that the cutest squirrel ever?
Speaker 4 (41:16):
It's pretty cute. You also sent something else. If you
go to RSPCA dot org dot UK, slash Advice and Welfare,
slash wildlife, slash animals, slash gray squirrels, slash feeding, or
you could just Google feeding squirrels and using nest boxes,
you're gonna see a squirrel with a chicken wing in
its mouth.
Speaker 2 (41:35):
That's pretty good.
Speaker 1 (41:37):
It's better than a bass eating a squirrel, I'll tell
you that.
Speaker 4 (41:40):
Yeah, that's a good article you sent because it talks
about if you like squirrels around, which I certainly do,
creating a good habitat for them. Trees obviously it is
a good thing to have. Not cutting down trees is
a great thing to do if you can avoid it. Yeah,
And then having squirrel safe bird feeders. And this means
not that the squirrel can't get to that seed, because they,
(42:01):
as you have attested, they will find a way. Life
finds a way, but it don't won't trap the squirrel
inside of it.
Speaker 1 (42:09):
No, that's a big one too. They also kind of
get into they get all Macbeth or Hamlet, which one
was to be or not to be?
Speaker 4 (42:19):
Why you asking me?
Speaker 1 (42:20):
Because they get all Hamlet or Macbeth on whether or
not to feed squirrels. You go, so they're like, you
could feed squirrels, but really you shouldn't. And the RSPCA
takes I think a pretty sensible tact, which is build
a habitat for the squirrels, and that you're planting the
right kind of trees that provide a place for them
(42:41):
to nest in a place for them to get food,
and then just step back and enjoy them.
Speaker 2 (42:45):
That's right enough.
Speaker 1 (42:46):
If you're like you know, me and Moe and you
go on walks or whatever and you want to feed
the squirrels, there are some things that are better for
squirrels than others, and it's basically you want to give
them what they would naturally eat, which is masked, unshelled
nuts like walnuts, chestnuts, acorns, hazel nuts, that kind of thing.
Speaker 4 (43:05):
Some seats probably, huh.
Speaker 1 (43:07):
Yes, but not black safflower seeds. I saw that if
you were one of those people who can't stand squirrels
raiding your bird feeder, black safflower seeds are. They'll eat them,
but they're not crazy about them, and most birds like
them instead. So that's one way to do it. But
you can also feed them vegetables too, and chuck. They
included this little tip that I didn't realize, but if
(43:30):
you're feeding squirrels or leaving food out for squirrels in
your yard and you have a garden that you care about,
you don't really want the squirrel taking the food and
them burying it. Elsewhere. So they said, if you're going
to feed them fruits and vegetables shredded, because the squirrels
is going to eat it there, it's not going to
try to bury it.
Speaker 2 (43:45):
I thought that was smart.
Speaker 4 (43:46):
Yeah, And if you have the nuts, don't give them
like honey roasted almonds, like unsweetened, unsalted stuff. I have
set up, you know, have a campcam at the family
camp trail cam, and it's it's keyed in on my
deer feeder that I got, which is corn. And I've
seen one deer, but almost every night I have scores
(44:09):
of raccoons nice and almost every day, well every day
I have squirrels, crows, and now daily turkeys visiting. Oh
neat lots and lots of turkeys. So I don't care
that the deer aren't visiting. It's all kinds of animals
are coming around. It's always fun to watch on the
camp cam.
Speaker 1 (44:27):
That is very cool. One thing you want to be
careful with with peanuts too, is giving them raw peanuts
because peanuts can carry an aff litoxin, which is very
It's not good. It's not good for squirrels, it's not
good for humans either. It's a type of fungus. I
think that actually is not only carcin carcina just that
(44:48):
can actually like just kill you on the spot neurologically speaking.
So you actually want roasted peanuts but not salted or
anything like that, sow like plain roasted peanuts or what's
even better because it helps with their teeth, are mass
nuts again like pecans, walnuts, that kind of stuff. But
(45:08):
a lot of people say don't feed squirrels because you're
actually what you're doing is, as we've seen, if squirrels
know that there's a lot of food.
Speaker 2 (45:15):
They're going to mate mate mate mate, and.
Speaker 1 (45:17):
There's going to be a lot of squirrels, and they're
going to become dependent on that additional food supply, and
they might start showing up at your neighbor's house, they
might start burrowing into your attic. There's just a lot
of there's a lot of things that to take into consideration.
Speaker 4 (45:33):
I guess, yeah, well, the family camp, there's nothing but
would so I hope we get overrun.
Speaker 1 (45:38):
So I agree with you. So you've found a couple
of cool things, including why squirrels like seem to dash
in front of your car when you're driving.
Speaker 4 (45:47):
Right, Yeah, So and again I love that we've just
finally found answers for this stuff, because this is kind
of a fun, non obnoxious fact to jump on to
drop on someone. If you're driving around a neighborhood and
the squirrel does that thing and people go, why do
squirrels do that, we can say, well, it's actually an
evolutionary instinct to get away from a predator. So if
(46:11):
you run out and you initially freeze when there's a predator,
the predator is sort of like a football player waiting
for the defensive player to make their move, and then
you go the opposite way with a little juke, And
that's what the squirrel's doing. They go out, they freeze
when they see that car, and if it was a predator,
they would wait on the predator to sort of make
(46:31):
a move and then they can quickly go in a
direction that really comes in handy when it's a predator.
When it's a car that's going, you know, generally in
a big, hulking straight line, it's not the same thing.
But a squirrel has a squirrel brain and it doesn't
realize that. So that's why a squirrel will jump out
in a street, see a car and just stop They're
not dumb. They're waiting on you to make some hawk
(46:55):
like move, which doesn't happen in the car. So what
you do is you just slow down and check your
rearview mirror. Don't see him on the brakes or anything.
But you know, they're everywhere. And I've hit I think
maybe two squirrels in my adult life, so it's not
like the most common thing to run over a squirrel.
Speaker 1 (47:14):
Yeah, I ran over one once and my brother in
law said that he was on his way to buy
a birthday present for his young kid who was waiting
forever for their dad to come back for his birthday
present for his party.
Speaker 2 (47:26):
Yeah, it was not helpful.
Speaker 4 (47:30):
And what about these black squirrels. Emily and I were
taking a walk through Brooklyn one day and saw a black, black,
black squirrel, not just a hint of black, and it
was the coolest thing I've ever seen. And I've since
seen a few more here and there in New York.
And we had the answer there too, right.
Speaker 1 (47:48):
Yes, they seemed to be so they used to think
that they were freaks of nature. I think, as one
naturalist put it, like years and years ago, and somebody said,
I don't know if that's true. I think these actually
might have been the dominant version. They seem to be
closely related to Eastern grays, if not just a type
(48:09):
of Eastern gray, like a different breed of that species.
But they were saying they used to possibly be the
dominant version and they got edged out by the Eastern gray,
and so's they're there, they're just kind of infrequently. They
infrequently appear, but there are parts of North America where
they seem to populate more than others, like New York.
(48:32):
You mean, I used to see them in DC, Toronto.
They're all over Toronto, in Ontario in general, from what
I understand. So it seems like from what I could tell,
that they think that they're they were there already and
now we're just kind of seeing them in like this
kind of moment in time where their numbers have diminished tremendously,
where if we went back in time we might see
(48:53):
a lot more. Is Does that seem accurate?
Speaker 4 (48:56):
Yeah? I mean, it's just genetics. It's a recessive gene
that causes an ab normal pigmentation, and you will you know,
you're you're only going to get more of that recessive gene.
If these squirrels or any you know, creature is reproducing
in a in a smaller area. So if you've got
to contain population, like let's say an island like New
(49:17):
York or apparently Roosevelt Island has a lot of them, Yeah,
you're just gonna see more of them. So, uh, DC
is a little not inexplicable, but it makes more sense
in New York because you're just gonna get more, you know,
more of this recessive gene happening in a area.
Speaker 2 (49:37):
So not at all my explanation.
Speaker 4 (49:39):
Then, no, it's your explanation. Now you nailed it. And
this was an article the Mysterious Black Squirrels of NYC
from what turns out to be a really good website
called Untapped Cities dot com and writer Michelle Young. It's
it's really cool read.
Speaker 1 (49:55):
Yeah, so you got anything else on squirrels?
Speaker 4 (49:58):
Nothing and hug a squirrel, Embrace the squirrel.
Speaker 1 (50:01):
But don't do that. Don't if you do feed them,
don't don't let them.
Speaker 2 (50:05):
Meet out of your hand.
Speaker 1 (50:06):
Yeah, because they'll bite you. Even though they're grateful. There's
still bidy. And since I said that, everybody, it's time
for listener mail.
Speaker 4 (50:18):
That's right, And It's a great listener mail because we
get to say hello to a kindergarten class, which is
always fun. Hello, Hi, mister Chuck and mister Josh. My
name is Katie. It's either Fink or Finky, and I'm
emailing with my kindergarten class in Baltimore City. We sometimes
listen to your show, and we were so excited when
(50:39):
you heard you mentioned the Three Sisters in the recent
watermelon episode. We actually spent a whole weekend learning about
the three Sisters this fall and wanted to share with
you our excitement. We hope you do a short stuff
on them soon. We definitely will if you need some
Three Sisters experts. We want to tell you these facts
that we learned this year. Oh yes, and here's a
(51:00):
little short list. Native Americans would plant fish first in
the ground to prepare the soil and make it healthy
and rich. Love that the corn grows so tall it
holds up the beans, and the squash keeps the soil moist,
so the other two sisters have enough water to stay hydrated.
And finally, all three of the sisters are dried so
(51:21):
that people can save them to eat later in the winter,
which is a great benefit, So we really want to
share our knowledge in case you do a short stuff
thanks for reading, love Miss Finkies or Miss Fink's kindergarten class.
And like I said, this is in Baltimore City.
Speaker 1 (51:39):
Man, that's really impressive. Like I remember in kindergarten, I
was learning Red Red.
Speaker 2 (51:47):
Red.
Speaker 1 (51:50):
I wasn't learning about the three sisters and groundcovers like
keeping them moisture in place for the other two. I mean,
come on, that's really impressive this week. I think it
was more like that month.
Speaker 4 (52:04):
February is red month. Right, Oh that's great.
Speaker 1 (52:07):
Well, thank you Miss fink or Finkey's class.
Speaker 2 (52:11):
Hats off to you guys.
Speaker 1 (52:12):
Keep it up, and yes, we will definitely do a
Three Sisters episode someday dedicated to you guys, right.
Speaker 4 (52:18):
Chuck for sure.
Speaker 1 (52:20):
If you want to get in touch with us, you
can too via email at stuff podcast at iHeartRadio dot com.
Speaker 3 (52:29):
Stuff you Should Know is a production of iHeartRadio. For
more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
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Chuck Bryant
Josh Clark
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