August 22, 2022 • 59 mins
The size of a black bear, this Ice Age giant didn't build dams, but it guarded the water with a fearsome call just the same. Meet the world's most complete fossil giant beaver with Heather Lerner, the ancient DNA expert who brought her to life!
Get three extinct animals raised to life as monsters in D&D: https://www.scintilla.studio/extinction
Episode transcript: https://scintilla.studio/monster-extinction-giant-beaver/
Guides:
Dr. Heather Lerner, Curator of the Joseph Moore Museum
https://twitter.com/moore_museum
Join the conversation: www.twitter.com/SparkOtter
"Extinction Theme" by Alexandre Miller, The Boy King of Idaho
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Heather Lerner (00:01):
This is the tooth.
Lucas (00:03):
That's the tooth?!?
Heather Lerner (00:04):
That is one tooth.
Yep.
Lucas (00:07):
This is the left encisor.
It is the size of a banana
Heather Lerner (00:12):
Big banana.
You're looking at this and thinking
with the size of teeth like that, I
could take down some big trees.
Right?
Are you thinking that?
Lucas (00:23):
I am well, I am now.
Heather Lerner (00:24):
Okay.
Well, you shouldn't be
thinking that cuz that's wrong.
I was mean right?
Lucas (00:31):
Ah,
Heather Lerner (00:32):
here she is.
Wait,
Lucas (00:33):
What?
Ah!
This one right here?
Heather Lerner (00:41):
I love this orientation.
She is coming right at you.
Lucas (00:45):
Welcome to Making a Monster:
Extinction, investigating the stories
of vanished species as we gather
them into a bestiary for 5th edition
Dungeons & Dragons called Book of
Extinction, coming to Kickstarter
in March of 2023 and previewing
now on the Mage Hand Press Patreon.
This is the sound of GenCon, where I spent
this last weekend sharing the book with
(01:05):
gamers and makers from all over the world.
But tucked away not too far from
the biggest 4 days in gaming is a
surprising gem of natural history.
Welcome to Richmond,
Indiana podcast listener.
I'm here on the trail of an ice age giant.
We're at the Joseph Moore
Museum at Earlham College.
(01:28):
Prehistoric megafauna are an integral
part of the fantasy genre, giant monsters
who awaken the kind of fear humans
only feel in the presence of an apex
predator more powerful than themselves.
This week I want to introduce you to
one of the most unexpectedly fascinating
creatures among that pantheon of ice
age beasts and her fascinating journey
(01:49):
through near time alongside an Egyptian
mummy, a mastodon, and maybe the most
dedicated graduate students in history.
Our guide on this journey
is Doctor Heather Lerner.
Heather Lerner (02:01):
So I'm Heather Lerner.
I'm the director of the Joseph
Moore Museum, which is a regional
natural history museum at Earlham
College; also an associate professor
of biology and museum studies.
I was recruited from the Smithsonian
where I was working in ancient DNA.
And I came out here for an interview and
got to go into the museum and see the
(02:22):
world's most complete fossil giant beaver.
And I will confess at that
moment, I was, let's see, eight
months pregnant with twins.
And I thought the giant beaver
was pretty cool, but I mostly
identified with the giant ground
sloth , which, um, was not exactly
the reaction they were looking for.
Lucas (02:43):
Heather gave me an inside
tour of the Joseph Moore Museum,
including a lot of stuff the
general public doesn't get to see.
And in the interest of better
understanding the ancient megafauna in
Book of Extinction, Heather will introduce
us to the giant beaver in the order in
which a scientist of her caliber would
- starting with today and working backward
Heather Lerner (03:02):
The giant beaver
is just an incredible creature.
And from the first moment that
I knew about it in my interview
here, I thought, "I know how to
get DNA out of really old things.
And I would love the challenge
of trying to sequence DNA from
the extinct giant beaver and see
(03:23):
what we could learn from that."
So I started there and then
started thinking, well, what,
why would that be useful?
Just cuz you can do something
doesn't mean you should do something,
which I have to tell my children.
just cuz you can doesn't mean you should.
Um, so I spent a while really
learning about beavers.
(03:44):
so we know there are two
species today of modern beavers.
There's the North American and the
Eurasian, they're closely related
to each other and to nothing
else , which makes it very hard to
figure out things about their past.
Why do they look the way they do?
Why do they do the things they do?
If we don't have that evolutionary
(04:05):
record, it just really hinders the
explanations that we can come up with.
So, um, one of the things you can do
to try to figure out close relatives
is to add in extinct species.
And it turns out that what beavers
are closely related to are a lot
of other extinct species , um,
(04:28):
which includes the giant beaver.
And the giant beaver is pretty cool
because it's part of the group of beavers
that you would be more familiar with in
terms of living an aquatic lifestyle.
That's what you think of when
you think of beavers, right?
Ponds, streams, that kind of thing.
Yeah.
Um, it turns out this is super cool.
(04:48):
There's a whole group of extinct
beavers that are called fossorial
or upland digging beavers.
Right.
Who knew?
It turns out people
who study fossils know.
So, um, there are maybe seven to
twelve genera of extinct fossorial,
(05:10):
terrestrial, upland, burrowing, beavers.
And they go back far enough in
time that we are not probably
gonna get DNA out of them.
so figuring out those relationships
is probably in terms of using
DNA, a loss cause, but Casteroides
ohioensis the giant beaver.
(05:33):
Was around until not that long ago.
So maybe 10,000 years ago.
And that is a tractable question
using ancient DNA techniques.
That's a timeline in which
things are preserved well
enough that you can get DNA.
So we set about trying to sequence
the giant beaver to help us figure
out those relationships in particular,
(05:56):
when did beavers become aquatic?
Since we know there's this whole Upland
group, when did this thing that we
associate with beavers become true.
So you can use lots of clues, like, um,
their body shape from the extinct species
and sort of piece things together there.
But unless, you know, when those
(06:18):
species really lived, it can be hard
to get that timeline of evolution.
So using DNA, we can really anchor
that those trait evolutions in time.
So that's what we did.
We sequenced the mitochondrial genome,
um, of the extinct beaver and,
(06:38):
um, we're able to figure this out.
Lucas (06:41):
I just want, I just wanna
pause on how cool that sentence is.
That's an incredible amount of work.
Heather Lerner (06:49):
It was
years in the making.
Yeah, so first we spent a year building
an ancient DNA lab here, which meant
all the physical labor of cleaning
out an entire room and taking every,
everything out of there all like
demolition work, plus painting everything
and, uh, trying to get it to be a
safe place to look at ancient DNA.
Because it turns out that we
(07:09):
are shedding DNA all the time.
as we walk around, we are just
discarding our DNA everywhere.
So if you wanna work on old things that
don't have a lot of their own DNA, you
don't wanna be adding your DNA to the mix.
I did not wanna sequence myself.
We wanted to sequence giant beaver.
So we needed that ancient DNA room.
So we spent a year doing
that, got that done.
(07:30):
And then we were gonna start the process
of taking the fossils, using a drummer
and drilling out the hardest pieces of the
fossils, which would be the pieces that
had the most resistance to degradation.
So they might have the best DNA in there.
Most intact.
We wanted to start that process and
there was a two week power outage.
(07:51):
We only had three weeks set to be together
to work on the project for that summer.
And that was two thirds of our.
Wow.
So we didn't do it that year we
ended up working on raptors instead,
which was a great fun project.
Um, but it did delay us a couple of
years to be able to, to be able to do
that process but it gave us time to
learn more about beavers because it
(08:12):
turns out there's lots to know which
I'm very excited that you want to
know all about beavers you do, right?
Lucas (08:18):
I do.
Yeah.
Heather Lerner (08:19):
Okay, good.
Lucas (08:19):
That's what I'm here for.
Heather Lerner (08:20):
That's great.
we're gonna have a great time.
So I'm gonna take you
into the collections.
We'll start with the modern beaver
just to kind of orient you and then
we'll take some of those things
with us and go find the fossils.
Lucas (08:32):
Perfect.
Heather Lerner (08:33):
Okay.
Let's do it.
Lucas (08:34):
Great!
Heather Lerner (08:42):
So the room
we're in is the mammal division.
Um, and we have, oh, maybe five
or 6,000 mammal specimens in here.
Right.
It doesn't, you just look like that.
Right.
. Yeah.
And that's because the way that we
prepare them is to, um, we remove
all the insides and then we keep the
skins preserved and then we put the
(09:04):
fossil or the skeletons in a box.
So it's all very tight and compact.
Yeah.
You, when you're thinking of museums are
thinking of taxidermy, which is posed
animals, so that they look lifelike
and that's an art form, and that is
amazing and important, but I can't
fit a lot of those posed puffed up
animals in this room, this size, right?
(09:27):
So we, we have study skins and there
are, you know, depending on the
size of the animal, there can be
a hundred of 'em on a single tray.
So we are gonna go look for
Castor canadensis which is
the modern beaver, right.
So that you can see it and touch it.
Yes.
Lucas (09:44):
Okay.
I get to touch stuff.
Okay.
Whoa.
Heather Lerner (09:53):
We're gonna take
this out and put it over here.
Okay.
So this is a tray that has
a modern beaver pelt on it.
So it's just kind of folded
up like a little blanket.
Um, and you can see the tail here
on top can see that leather really
tail . Yes, we are excited about the
(10:15):
giant beaver, but it turns out modern
beavers are fairly big themselves.
Big . So what I want you to notice,
because you did wash your hands,
so I'm gonna allow you to touch it.
Lucas (10:24):
Thank you.
Heather Lerner (10:25):
You can feel that
fur, what do you think of the fur?
Lucas (10:28):
Oh man.
Nowhere in my life, have I ever laid a
hand on mink, but I know that aquatic
animals have a hugely different
fur to, uh, to terrestrial animals.
Exactly.
Um, so we've got two different
lengths and textures here.
Already, um, kind a
Heather Lerner (10:49):
Got that
guard fur on the outside,
. Lucas: And then a softer, it's so plush
underneath , I'm getting chills cuz
that's the kind of weirdo that I am like.
And I think you can
really identify with the people who
were trapping and selling beaver pelts.
This is incredibly warm, resilient, fur.
(11:12):
This is gonna get you through a winter
and winters were harsh, and we didn't
have access to all sorts of materials to
keep warm and protected from the elements.
It was a major concern.
And so just feeling this, I think you can
understand why they were so desirable,
but also just with them being so
(11:34):
desirable, why beavers faced such threats.
Um, so I wanted you to feel that.
The other thing I wanted to show you
is something that I learned when we
spent all this extra time learning
about beavers before sequencing.
They do have this amazing thing
and it's on their hind feet.
Um, and it's this adaptation
(11:55):
to two of their toes.
Um, and so this first toe here,
so there's this fleshy pad and
then there's this, this nail.
And what happens is when they, when
they bend their, their paw like this,
they trap their fur in between there.
And it's a comb and they do
(12:16):
that with this one as well.
And it's not as easily.
No, here it is.
Is that it?
Here it is.
Okay.
It's this one that has the
big fleshy pad and the claw.
And so it can squeeze that.
Lucas (12:29):
So it's that the claw is the
same, uh, or rather the opposite,
um, concave shape to the pads.
Convex.
Heather Lerner (12:37):
Yeah.
So they nest within each other.
If you like, take your pointer finger
from each hand and sort of make a
little arc and attach them to each
other and you can squeeze between that.
Right.
Right.
And as they bend their, um, they flex that
squeezes, the pad against the, against the
nail your pad is attached to your nail.
(12:57):
You're not gonna run something between
your pad and your nail on your finger.
Huh.
Right.
Like you're not gonna, I mean, you
might run your fingers through your
hair but imagine if you could flex
down and actually turn that into a
tight comb, that's what they're doing.
Amazing.
And they do that with both of those toes.
So that one that has the fleshy
pad and the nail, and then this
one that has like a split nail.
So there's a hard piece
(13:18):
here and a hard piece there.
And, and, you know, That's
gonna do different things.
It's like two different types of comb
that they have so they can spread
oil and they can remove debris and
clean themselves, essentially with this
little tool that's on their hind feet.
Lucas (13:35):
In terms of, I guess, yardage,
if we're thinking about textiles.
Hmm.
Um, how much would you get from one?
Heather Lerner (13:42):
That's a good question.
A little more than a
yard and it's doubled over.
So I'd say about a yard of fabric.
Yeah.
Amazing from just that one individual.
And this does look like an adult.
It is, it was a good
size and it was a male.
its weight was 57 pounds, 12 ounces.
(14:05):
Its total length was 46 and a half inches.
So that's pretty long.
Wow.
Yeah.
So we record information about the
animals when we collect them as much as
we possibly can, because like I said,
you can't go back and get that later.
So any information we have about the
habitat, it was in the things, it was
doing photographs, video recordings,
(14:27):
um, measurements, anything we can
get, we will keep with the animals
so that we have the most information.
Lucas (14:33):
So then there's a
digital record that's attached
to this particular specimen.
Incredible.
Heather Lerner (14:39):
And like I said, we, in
addition to having the skin that you've
just been looking at or the pelt, um, we
also try to keep, um, the skeleton and so
this box has the skull for this one in it.
Oh
Lucas (14:54):
wow.
I wasn't ready for this.
Heather Lerner (14:57):
So you can.
Re-articulate the jaws there.
And then you can see the, see that skull.
Lucas (15:05):
Amazing.
Heather Lerner (15:06):
So that's a chomping.
Yeah.
And you can see the teeth here,
have this orange across them in the
front , um, that's probably related
to some iron deposit there and that's
common in rodents, um, to have that.
And that gives it real firm firmness to
(15:27):
the teeth that even our teeth don't have.
We have enamel, but we don't have
that particular hard structure.
Um, and that is so it's taking
Lucas (15:35):
iron from its environment and it's,
Heather Lerner (15:37):
it's sequestering it
there yeah, we, we keep the iron in
our blood and they probably have iron in
their blood too, of course, being mammals.
But, um, they must be depositing
some of their teeth too.
Lucas (15:48):
That's incredible.
They have metal teeth, you're telling me?
Heather Lerner (15:52):
Yeah, basically.
Yeah.
That's a good way of thinking of it.
Yes, that is correct.
yeah.
And that really, um, provides that
strength that they need for all
of the chewing that they would do.
Um, So I'm gonna put this back and we're
actually gonna take one of these skulls
with us and go find the skulls that
(16:12):
we have of the extinct giant beavers.
So you can see those right together
and we will eventually make it to the
world's most complete fossil giant beaver.
Lucas (16:21):
Let me paint another picture
here because we, this looks like
somebody's garage, but a garage that
they would've spent a lot of time in
and there are long, low tables in it.
And, uh, more of the filing
cabinets around the walls.
I'll also state for the record.
One of these cabinets is
labeled dinosaur bones.
(16:42):
yes.
You know, I need a career change.
six year old me would've
been losing his mind.
Heather Lerner (16:56):
This entire cabinet
is dedicated to our giant beaver
to the most complete, and this
holds a copy of every bone in it.
So these are,
Lucas (17:08):
It's the best jigsaw puzzle!
Heather Lerner (17:10):
It is.
It's actually really fun to put together.
Done that a few times.
Um, so this is the first
copy that we ever made.
Um, and it is made from creating
molds of each individual bone.
Um, except for the feet
we did those all together.
So many little bones in a foot, right?
And if you go find a giant beaver in
(17:32):
another museum, it's potentially a copy of
ours because we cast it in the 1980s, and
then many museums got copies from that.
Right.
And then we also created a new copy
of it a few years ago with the help of
two researchers who were then at the
Virginia Museum of Natural History who
came here and we made all new molds
(17:53):
because molds deteriorate over time.
And so do copies, um, and
some things had changed.
We needed to modify the skull a little
bit because it had been built up.
On our original, some clay had been added
and we needed to change that because
after finding more skulls, we knew
that some of the sutures were wrong.
(18:15):
Okay.
So in your skull, you have different bones
that come together to form that, right?
And they fuse together as
you grow and stop growing.
Once you stop growing, they fuse together.
So those lines we guessed
at based on modern beavers.
And it turns out when we found war
(18:37):
fossil skulls, we needed to change
that because they were not correct.
So this entire cabinet here is a copy
Lucas (18:46):
and I'm gonna look, it
would've been plaster of Paris.
Uh,
Heather Lerner (18:51):
yeah, probably.
Lucas (18:53):
Yeah.
And now we're working in,
in silicone or, or 3d,
Heather Lerner (18:56):
We've
done two different things.
One is that we are using silicone
molds, um, and then casting in resin.
Um, the other thing is that, so if you
come and play our giant beaver escape
game, which I know you would love, um,
you actually get to handle some of the
copies and those copies used to be cast,
(19:19):
which are very good for research, right?
They are very high quality,
scientifically accurate.
The kind of thing I will study off of
rather than bother the specimen itself.
And one of those disappeared.
So just a few weeks ago, we 3d,
scanned and printed copies because
now we can always reprint, but
(19:40):
the molds deteriorate over time.
And in fact, we don't have the molds
here, so I can't just make a backup copy.
Now that that one piece is gone.
Huh?
I'm gonna get into this cabinet here.
And I should be able to show you
the one that we actually sequence.
So in here you'll see
that we sampled for DNA.
Lucas (20:00):
whoa.
Heather Lerner (20:01):
So anytime we
do something, we put a note in.
Lucas (20:04):
So round plug, meaning that
you drilled a very, very small, uh,
Heather Lerner (20:10):
almost like a core sample.
Exactly.
So, so
Lucas (20:14):
then you would have a
tiny rod of, uh, fossil material.
, uh, not just like drilling it out and then
sort of taking the fossil saw dust, but
Heather Lerner (20:23):
rather a
whole take the actual plug.
We do grind it up then, but we do
take the plug . And one of the reasons
you're trying to do that plug is that
you wanna get past the really hard
enamel on the outside of the teeth
into the soft protected material
where the DNA should be preserved.
And what's very cool about teeth is
that it's one of the few places in your
body that you retain pluripotent cells.
(20:46):
So cells that can become anything.
Cells that are very open to suggestion.
They generally don't do anything else, but
you know, whatever they do in your teeth.
Um, but if you need cells that are
activate-able, that's a place to get them.
And what that does mean is that
they are less, um, less bound up.
(21:09):
And so that DNA can be super good.
And it means that there's
a lot of DNA in there.
So that's why we're aiming for teeth.
This I believe is the one that we got
DNA out of, which is somewhat surprising.
You see, we sampled it on the
14th of May, 2015, Micha Ahmed and
Jacob Paris and me, they get their
(21:31):
names written out and I'm just HRL.
So that's the one that we got,
uh, two thirds of the genome
from, the mitochondrial genome.
Yeah.
And actually this is the ulna,
the tooth did not end up working.
Okay.
And what what's interesting about
that is we did a lot of work trying to
figure out exactly where we would have
the most, the highest likelihood of,
(21:52):
um, getting DNA and what turned out
to happen is that wasn't so useful?
The most important thing was it
was collected more recently, which
meant that it had had less time out
of its deposition environment to
accumulate damage or to deteriorate.
(22:13):
So like I said, we're trying to keep
things so that stable temperature
and humidity, because when you have
fluctuations is when DNA gets damaged.
Well, we don't really have stable,
uh, temperature and humidity here.
And so over time, things just deteriorate.
Um, so one of the things we're
really actively working on trying
to improve conditions so that
(22:33):
things will be useful for longer.
So the most recently collected specimen
is the one that worked , but I know
an awful lot about DNA preservation.
So let's take this one over.
This is the tooth.
Lucas (22:49):
That's the tooth?!?
Heather Lerner (22:50):
That is one tooth.
Yep.
Lucas (22:54):
This is the left encisor.
It is the size of a banana
Heather Lerner (22:58):
Big banana.
Thin, but very long.
Yeah.
Okay.
So let's just do this for a second.
We want you to see the
modern beaver, right.
You remember with the
little chompers, right?
(23:18):
Okay.
And then let's put that
next to the giant beaver.
Lucas (23:23):
This skull came from a four foot
50 pound beaver, and yet it is, um, the
size of two clenched fists, I would say.
Heather Lerner (23:32):
Well, it
fits in my outstretched hand.
Right?
, Lucas (23:35):
you know, the base of the skull
is at the base of your Palm and the tip
of the nose is at your index finger.
Yeah.
And then this one.
Heather Lerner (23:45):
Like we don't
watch it like a football here.
You're looking at this and thinking
with the size of teeth like that, I
could take down some big trees.
Right?
Are you thinking that?
Lucas (24:00):
I am well, I am now.
Heather Lerner (24:02):
Okay.
Well, you shouldn't be
thinking that cuz that's wrong.
I was mean right?
This is, it was, it was exactly.
Okay.
So what's really interesting about
this, um, is that they probably
didn't have that, um, same.
They didn't have that
same tooth structure.
(24:23):
They probably were not able
to chew off pieces of wood.
They were not chopping down trees.
We have two lines of evidence that tell
us this oh three, maybe number one.
We have not found any pieces of
wood, fossilized wood, with the
marks of giant beaver teeth on them.
(24:44):
That's, you know, absence of evidence
is not, right, evidence of absence.
Sure.
So we're gonna hold off on that,
but we haven't found that, um, we
haven't found any big dams or lodges
in context with a giant beaver.
Okay.
So that's more absence of evidence.
(25:07):
Um, the other thing is that you can,
like I said, these organisms hold
a signature of their environment.
You can look and see
what they were eating.
I could figure out what you are eating
from the stable isotopes in your hair.
Lucas (25:21):
Okay.
That was significantly less creepy
than I thought it was going to be,
talked about plugs drilled from teeth.
Heather Lerner (25:29):
I'm not, I'm not
gonna take a plug of your teeth.
that's Nope.
I'm really far more interested in
the fossils, but if we wanted to
and people have done this, they have
looked at the signature of the foods
people are eating from their hair and
fingernails and you can see where like
what your favorite fast food is because
(25:51):
different fast food places are getting
their beef from different places.
Lucas (25:56):
Wow.
Heather Lerner (25:56):
And that holds the
signature of the environment, the food,
it was eating the place it was living.
Lucas (26:03):
You literally are what you eat.
Heather Lerner (26:04):
Yes, you are.
that?
Yeah, that is correct.
So, um, there was a really neat study
that came out in 20, 20 same year as
our, um, as our DNA study and they
were looking at a different species of
(26:24):
beaver, not so giant about two-thirds
the size of the modern beaver.
And that's a Dipoides, is the genus.
And they were curious, what
was this, this animal eating?
And then they were comparing it to
Casteroides, to our extinct giant
beaver and to Castor the modern beaver.
What they're doing is trying to figure
out, um, there are different options for
(26:46):
what these species could be eating, right?
You're in an aquatic environment.
And we have evidence that Dipoides
was in an aquatic environment.
It, um, evidence of,
uh, chewed, chewed wood.
So that's pretty strong, right?
Find Dipoides, you find some things
that look like maybe it was a lodge?
(27:08):
They could be eating bark, they could be
eating, you know, the, the layer right
underneath the bark, the stuff that has
good nutrients in it could be eating that.
So they could have been eating any
of the other plants that around them.
We know that they're vegetarian or
we assume they are given rodents,
um, long evolutionary history of
(27:28):
being vegetarian, um, or herbivores.
So they could have been eating
mosses and lichens and other things
that would be in this Tundra area
where the species was found, they
could be eating trees or shrubs.
They could also be eating
the, like the leafy vegetation
that would be in the ponds.
Right.
So macrophytes, that green fleshy stuff.
(27:49):
And so you can look at the
carbon and nitrogen isotopes in
those different types of plants.
And then you can look at the tissues of
that animal and see how they compare.
And there's a lot of other
science going on behind there.
Right?
You don't just lay down exactly
what you're eating your body,
modifies it a little bit.
And so you have to do some corrections
(28:10):
and things, but from this, they
were able to show that it does look
like Dipoides, I know we're taking a
detour here to a different species,
but it is important and relevant.
You can cut it if you need
to , but it looks like that one
was basically a generalist in the
sense that yes, it could do some
(28:30):
woody plants and those macrophytes.
Pretty cool.
Yeah.
They were also using information
from Casteroides and this is
where it gets really interesting.
doesn't look like they
were eating woody things.
Their signature shows much more
(28:52):
strongly in the macrophyte.
So then you start looking at those
teeth again and thinking, okay,
so not having the super strong
orange piece on those teeth, maybe
they really weren't doing that.
Maybe they weren't cutting down trees.
Maybe that absence of evidence is
because they're, they weren't doing it.
(29:13):
So start looking at those teeth again,
when you see this, um, the front teeth
have this sort of, um, inverted V shape
or like a little, little mountain shape
and where they, the two teeth meet is
almost like if you're gonna cut a piece
of paper and you just open the scissors
(29:34):
a little bit and sort of push it at
the paper and slice that paper apart.
Like this is a good slicing thing.
And you think about reeds,
you think about grasses?
You wanna cut those?
You just slice right through it
with this kind of a tooth structure.
Cool.
Right.
Lucas (29:51):
So rather than having a
metal knife in its mouth, it
has, uh, a pair of bone scissors.
Yeah.
Heather Lerner (29:57):
Amazing.
it also has these wonderful molars and
those look like nice grinding teeth.
They're not in my opinion, that
dissimilar from the modern beaver.
Um, but modern beavers are
also gonna be eating that,
um, fleshy vegetation as well.
So in the summer, when you can
get it, you wanna eat stuff that
(30:18):
has the highest reward value.
So the most nutrients and,
you know, we need fiber.
Everybody needs fiber, but you
don't want it all to be fiber.
Like you don't wanna go heavily on the
tree side, if you don't have to really go
for the fleshy stuff, if you can get it.
So they're eating the fleshy plants,
but then they're caching those
(30:40):
twigs underwater to keep them cool.
And to last over the winter.
And that's why we have beavers
today is that they have that
adaptation of being able to make
it through those long dark winters.
And when they create those dams and
they create bigger bodies of water,
(31:01):
those bodies of water don't fully
freeze over so they can maintain an
open access underneath the water.
It can hide their food down
there, cause all the green plants
they're, they're not edible.
They're not growing in the winter.
They're covered in snow.
But if you can keep 'em in your
underwater refrigerator, all winter.
You can survive because
they don't really hibernate.
(31:23):
They kinda slow down, but they do
need to eat throughout the winter.
It's kind of a bummer that the giant
beaver doesn't seem to have been
using trees and building dams and
lodges because that probably is a
major contributor to its demise.
It wasn't able to handle
(31:44):
the warming of the climate.
It wasn't able to handle the
drying out of the climate.
It needed those big waterways,
you know, the, you find a lot
more Casteroides in the areas
south and around the great lakes.
So they just, they weren't able to
make it through that changing climate.
And so they did become extinct.
The end of the Pleistocene.
(32:06):
There's another really cool adaptation,
but I think we should go see the
most complete fossil giant fever.
Okay.
Let's do it.
Lucas (32:15):
We weren't in the museum?
Heather Lerner (32:17):
We were behind the
scenes now we can go to the public side.
Lucas (32:22):
Let's go over here.
Pass the whooping crane pass.
Oh,
Heather Lerner (32:28):
I'm gonna say it.
Lucas (32:30):
Uh, the, the, the most
complete skeleton of a fo-, shoot.
Heather Lerner (32:35):
Yep.
World's most complete fossil giant beaver.
Lucas (32:38):
World's most complete
fossil giant beaver.
I got it.
Heather Lerner (32:40):
You got it.
Lucas (32:42):
I think,
Heather Lerner (32:43):
it is really nice to say,
Lucas (32:46):
ah,
Heather Lerner (32:47):
here she is.
Wait,
Lucas (32:49):
what?
. Ah,
This one right here.
Heather Lerner (32:58):
I love this orientation.
She is coming right at you.
Lucas (33:02):
Oh, she?
Heather Lerner (33:03):
Yep.
We can tell from her pelvis
and her size that she's a she.
So when I first got here, she was turned
sideways and you could just see her from
the side, which you haven't even seen yet.
Yep.
And then we were doing some, you know,
renovations, new exhibit kind of stuff.
This whole exhibit is all new
signage, um, designed by our students.
(33:26):
Um, and we rotated her.
And for the first time we saw her
coming at us and we said, "Oh, that's
the way you need to approach her.
You need to think about a giant
beaver approaching you, or you
approaching a giant beaver."
Lucas (33:44):
Yes.
Heather Lerner (33:45):
And there she is.
This is her.
Lucas (33:48):
This is her.
Heather Lerner (33:49):
Yep.
This is not a copy.
In fact, we don't have an assembled copy.
I showed you that cabinet again, it's
all in different boxes so that we can
get them out and lay them out and, and
measure different things and look at them.
Right.
Like I said, taxidermy, not
so great for scientific study.
Also mounted, specimens, not
so great for scientific study.
It's a little hard to see every
(34:10):
single piece and rotate it and measure
all the things you wanna measure.
We have done it, you know, for
the Mastodon, we did measure all
the different parts so that we
could determine the size of it.
Question is scale.
I, uh, yes.
Lifting up that femur a little different,
but, um, so we actually have her on
exhibit in most places you will not see.
(34:31):
Well, I mean, nowhere else will you see.
The world's most complete, complete
fossil giant beaver , but we do
have her right here on exhibit.
Lucas (34:40):
Incredible.
Heather Lerner (34:41):
You made a comment
before about seeing the skull of
an animal and thinking, gosh, it
seems bigger when I see it alive.
And if you think about it, very few
people are just the size of their bones.
In fact, no one is except a skeleton.
You have all sorts of muscles and
tendons and cartilage and fluid
(35:05):
and a whole layer of fat and skin
all over the top of those bones.
So just that alone is gonna add, you know,
depending on the particular organism,
half inch to an inch all the way around.
So it's really much bigger when
(35:26):
this animal was fleshed out and we
have some great illustrations, um,
Corbin Rainbolt was a student here
and he is a renowned paleo artist.
Um, and he did the artwork for our,
for this exhibit when he was a student.
And he has also continued to work with
us afterward and done drawings for us
(35:47):
because lots of times I need something
that shows the difference between
a modern and an extinct organism.
And so I, I need them in
context with each other.
I need a particular orientation and,
and Corbin does that kind of work.
In fact, what I'm wearing is
. . .Lucas: Hey!
A giant beaver mini skirt.
Lucas (36:09):
She's been here the whole time!
Heather Lerner (36:13):
Yep.
Pretty cool.
Lucas (36:15):
That is fabulous, Heather!
Heather Lerner (36:18):
And you can
get your own on red bubble.
You can also get a t-shirt and
other thing, a notebook or whatever.
exactly you day before.
I dunno.
You may have to buy a
couple different sizes.
So this is the world's most
complete fossil giant beaver.
(36:41):
It is not however, the type specimen.
Lucas (36:45):
I got it wrong.
I thought that's what it was.
Heather Lerner (36:47):
It's not.
The type specimen is
no longer in existence.
It was lost in a fire.
And this one was also
almost lost in a fire.
So these are all these stories
are all wrapped up together.
um, she was found by some
farmers in the Eastern part
(37:08):
of Randolph county in Indiana.
They were opening up a ditch
to drain a swampy area.
It was locally known as "The Dismal."
And the contractor who was doing
this work came upon the skeleton.
And this is neat.
It said, "On account of its standing in
its natural position and its wonderful
tusks, it awakened a desire to save
(37:30):
all the parts that might be found."
That was written by Joseph Moore in
1890 when he described this specimen.
This contractor found this animal
and thought this doesn't look
like anything I've seen before.
look at those giant chompers, right?
Yeah.
And they wanted to know what it was.
They brought the skull into town,
(37:53):
the farmer whose property, it was
brought it into town and started asking
around and nobody knew what it was.
No one had seen anything
just like this before.
And you remember that giant
football in my arm for that skull.
If you found that you would be
wondering what the heck as well.
So no one knew what it was.
Somebody said, put it up
in the window of the bank.
(38:13):
Someone coming in or out will surely know.
So they put it up in
the window of the bank.
No one knew.
Finally someone said, take
it down to Earlham college.
If anyone will know it'll be Joseph Moore.
So they brought it down to
him and he immediately said,
"Well, I am not totally sure.
(38:36):
However, I do believe it's a giant beaver.
But the giant beaver has been described
from a fragment of tooth and jaw.
That's all that's ever
been found of it before.
And you have a whole skull school.
Is there anymore?"
And they said, "Oh yes, the
whole thing, it's right there!"
(38:58):
So they went back.
The contractor knew exactly where it was.
They dug the entire thing up.
It is seven eighths
complete, as I've said.
And so you can look at her and you can
see a slightly different coloration.
where you can see what's real.
And then that darker color, right, that
other matrix that we use to fill in the
parts that we're missing so that you have
(39:19):
what looks like a full skeleton here.
But very little of that
is that dark color, right?
There are a few of the
vertebra and the neck there.
Um, there's a little bit of the,
of the shoulder blade, um, a little
bit in the toes, but for the most
part, this is a complete skeleton.
So she, Joseph Moore purchased her
(39:44):
with some of his own money, some money
that was donated and brought her here
and she's remained here ever since.
Like I said, two different sets of
molds have been made from her so
that she can be shared throughout
the world and be studied more easily.
Um, but we did almost lose her in 1924.
(40:04):
Um, she was in Lindley hall, which was
where the museum was housed at the time.
And that night, um, just after
I wanna say midnight, um, the
building went up in flames.
The floors were wood and
they had just been oiled.
And so it went up hot and fast.
(40:26):
Students were awoken by the sounds
of this and ran out of their dorms.
Students worked in the museum
then just as they do today.
And they knew the incredible
value of this giant beaver.
And they ran into the burning building,
picked her up and carried her out.
We have a, a copy of a letter written by
(40:50):
one of those students after spending hours
doing this, went back to his dorm room and
sat down and wrote home to his mommy and
poppy to tell them about what happened.
And to say, I just, I don't
think I can settle down to sleep.
I don't know what the rest
of the semester's gonna be
look like, gonna look like.
This building burned.
(41:11):
This building also housed the
registrar and all the records.
A lot of the work was really saving
the, the specimens of the museum.
So we do, we are the caretakers
for an Egyptian woman, um,
Ta'an, she's, um, she's mummified
and she is in the museum here.
She was rescued.
The giant beaver was rescued
and you know, anything else
(41:31):
they could get their hands on.
In 1952, Jim cope, reestablished this
museum in the space that we have here.
And she was put back on display.
So there was about 25 years when
she was off exhibit, um, or at least
not in the Joseph Moore museum.
Right.
So she's back on display.
Lucas (41:51):
Wow, incredible.
Heather Lerner (41:55):
So our students now know
the most important specimens that we have
and the order that you would save them.
they also know.
To be very careful with their own
selves and do not die in a fire.
that fire, the 1924 Linley fire did claim
the life of at least one firefighter.
And, um, it was deemed to be arson.
(42:18):
There are several hypotheses.
One was a disgruntled janitor who had
been fired, who would've known the
schedule of the oiling of the floors.
And would've known the best time
to take the whole building down.
Um, another hypothesis, since
all the registrar records were
burned, was that it was a student
hoping to erase their record.
(42:41):
And we don't know to this day, who did it.
Wow.
I wish someone's diary with a
confession would be found, right?
Yeah.
Lucas (42:52):
That is an incredible story.
Part of the reason that I knew I had
to come up here was I'm writing a
book for fantasy authors, essentially.
And to tell them that, Hey, there
was an Egyptian woman and a giant
beaver who survived a fire in
Indiana in the fifties like that
is, uh, you can't write this stuff.
Heather Lerner (43:15):
She, she has some
pretty incredible history and some
real, real champions who would
risk their own lives to save her.
So you were asking what
a type specimen is.
Yeah.
And when I referenced how Joseph
Moore said, "Well, I think this is
a giant beaver, but the description
of giant beaver is based off of
the fragment of a tooth and a jaw."
(43:35):
That's it.
He then turned around and wrote a
paper that described this specimen,
but he could not name it because it
had already been named as Casteroides
ohioensis from that tiny little bit.
Lucas (43:51):
Wow.
Heather Lerner (43:51):
So Joseph Moore
has an amazing paper that is really
descriptive about this entire skeleton,
but it is not the type specimen.
Lucas (44:00):
Type specimen is,
Heather Lerner (44:02):
the individual for
which the species is described from.
We define this species to be something
that has these particular morphological.
Which are based on a tooth and a jaw.
What's very interesting is the
extraordinary bias in museum collections,
(44:22):
which mirrors the collecting tradition
that museums are built upon, which
is the collecting tradition of white
men going and documenting the world
around them and primarily collecting
male individuals of species and
(44:42):
describing species based on the males.
So the vast majority of
type specimens are males.
The vast majority of specimens
and collections are also males.
And that holds true even for species
and you might be thinking, okay,
well the males have bigger tusks.
(45:03):
They've got antlers.
They're very pretty, they're flashy.
Right?
We're gonna collect them.
They're also the ones that
may be more aggressive.
So they may be more easy to catch
because they might approach you
and you might be able to shoot
them or catch them or whatever.
Even controlling for that.
We do not collect in equal
numbers, males and females
what I think is really important
(45:25):
is to be able to describe the
variation within a species.
And when you boil it all down to the
type, the one, the original you miss
what makes up the beauty of species,
which is the unique traits, the range
from light brown to dark brown that
you see in the pelts, from the length
(45:47):
of the fur, from the lengths of the
tails, from the behavior, there's so
much beauty and, um, flavor that when
you focus on a type specimen, you lose.
What you didn't know about that I
said I was gonna tell you before,
(46:07):
and then I didn't is a very
cool feature of the giant beaver.
Lucas (46:12):
You're giving me the eyebrows.
And from what we talked about
before that didn't get eyebrows.
I know this is gonna be cool.
Heather Lerner (46:20):
You look
inside of the modern beaver
and you can see the brain case.
Yes.
Right.
You look inside and you can see
there's an opening in the nose.
Right.
You have openings in your
nose too, for obvious reasons.
Um, there's some breathing purposes
going on there and there's maybe
some more airspaces in this skull.
(46:42):
It's a little hard to see because.
Skull, and it has an
exterior bone structure.
This giant beaver.
In my other hand, you can see is
because of the way it's been preserved.
You can see a lot more inside and you
can see there's a big opening in here.
Big open space in there
where the spine would've.
(47:03):
That?
That is where the spine, you can
see on the, on the, where the
vertebra come off, that hole, the,
the FRA at the back of the skull.
So there's a big opening in there and
you can sort of stick your finger down
in and see, it goes pretty far down.
And then you can look up its nose
and you can see in the modern beaver
that opening stops maybe an inch
(47:25):
or so in, in the giant beaver.
There are all of these pockets
of openings and they connect
way back in here into the skull.
So that brain case opening is very
small compared to this other giant
opening in the front of the skull.
(47:47):
But there's this big opening behind the
nose, reminiscent of whales of things that
communicate underwater, things that have
resonant chambers for making big sounds.
I mean, we don't know for sure.
(48:09):
But it really kind of makes you
think that the giant beaver was
making a lot of sounds clicks and
words, and maybe big booms and
maybe it was resonating in there.
We don't know the soft structures
that would've been in there because
those have not been preserved someday
as the Tundra thaws, we're going to
(48:29):
find a fully fleshed, giant beaver.
And the first thing I wanna
know is what's inside that big.
What do those structures look like?
There is a researcher, Beth
Rinaldi, and she got a 3d.
She got a CT scan of giant beaver
skull and was not this one, not this
(48:50):
one and was able to print, essentially
print that empty space and turn it
into a horn so that she could play
the sound of the giant beaver horn.
And when we go downstairs, I'll
see if I have that recording on
my phone and play it for you.
Because I went to her house once I heard
that and I happened to be passing through
(49:10):
Kansas, which, where she was at the
time I sent her an email immediately and
said, I'm going to be there in December.
Can I come to your house?
and she said, sure.
so I showed up and I'm
coming to your house.
Exactly.
And she played the giant
beaver horn for me.
Lucas (49:33):
Stay tuned for more about how
this ice age giant becomes a D&D monster,
but I just want to briefly tell you
how you can take it home to your table.
The giant beaver is one of more than a
dozen Plieistocene megafauna appearing
in Book of Extinction, a bestiary of
extinct species for 5th edition coming
to Kickstarter in March of 2023.
You can get the most recent playtest
(49:54):
release of Book of Extinction by joining
the Mage Hand Press Patreon family of
nerds at Patreon dot com slash m f o v.
The giant beaver appears alongside
the giant short-faced kangaroo, the
glyptodon, and the saber-toothed tiger.
You'll also meet prehistoric
lycanthropes like the dire werewolf,
the cave werebear, and the weremammoth.
(50:17):
That's Patreon dot com slash m f o v.
Patron or not, you can get the first
three monsters in the Book of Extinction
- the passenger pigeon, the great auk,
and the Tasmanian tiger - right now at
Scintilla dot Studio slash extinction.
Pay what you want for it, and anything
we earn will be donated to the
Center for Biological Diversity to
support their protecting endangered
(50:38):
species and wild places world wide.
All those links are in the description.
Heather Lerner (50:51):
So I figured at some
point you were gonna ask me about
my experience playing Dungeons and
Dragons, which is not vast, and what
I thought about this animal as yeah.
You know, a real creature and
what its special traits are.
And also as a, as a magical creature.
So I've been thinking about
that for a little bit, and
I really think that ability.
(51:13):
That sound ability is pretty cool.
And I mean, just as an
actual living creature, the
ability to make those sounds.
And, and first as I, you know, my thought
processes have, have changed over time.
Um, you know, like I was pointing
out before with ASOS, we used to
think they were tail draggers.
Now we think that their tails were upright
(51:33):
and we used to think they were maybe just
green and scaly, you know, we think, oh,
they could have been all different colors.
Right.
They could have had lots of different.
And we've changed our opinion of
what the giant beaver looked like.
I've been understanding more, um,
about her and I think a lot about her
impact on the environment around her.
(51:55):
And I was thinking if you're not cutting
down trees, you're not building dams.
You're not building lodges.
You're not like the ecosystem
engineer of the modern beaver.
What are you really doing anyway?
but I do think.
that she was keeping those
ponds clear of vegetation.
(52:16):
If she was eating a lot of reeds
and macrophytes, all that pond,
weed, those ponds, weren't those
dense places that you think of.
Now, when you're thinking of a wetland
where you can't get up to the water,
there's so much vegetational around it
and they get filled in pretty quickly.
I bet with her insatiable appetite.
(52:39):
She was really moving a lot
of vegetation out of there.
And I would bet with those incredibly
strong back legs, she could have been
moving stuff out of the bottom of the
ponds and keeping them big and open.
And she could have been making sounds that
would've carried in these big spaces and
maybe through waterways as well, because
(53:01):
she would've been clearing the waterways.
Cuz I was thinking you make a sound
underwater in a, in a stream, in a pond.
It's not gonna carry very far, cuz
there's so much stuff around in there
that we'd just soak up that sound.
I maybe not, maybe she was moving
things around and creating a space
that would let her sounds travel.
(53:25):
So I think if she were mythical that
her sounds, if they were clicks and
words, Might do slashing damage.
I think that maybe if it was more
of a resonant chamber, she could be
making a boom that would flatten you.
I think that she's got some powers
(53:46):
with the, with her massive airspace.
Lucas (53:51):
When did you start playing?
What's the what's.
Heather Lerner (53:53):
What, what kind
of a part of your life at first?
Okay.
I first played a game in graduate
school with some friends um, and
I think maybe it was maybe a more
traditional game, definitely more
traditional than my next game ion.
It was, I don't know anything about it.
(54:14):
Sure.
This is my level of experience,
but what I do know is.
Fighting random things.
I just wasn't, I wasn't super into it.
I felt like I wasn't sure
I wasn't doing it right.
I didn't know what I was doing.
There was so much fighting
and there was like weapons
and I wasn't really into that.
And then I became director of the Joseph
(54:35):
Moore museum many years down the road.
And I took students to New Zealand
for a study abroad program.
And one of my students was a DM who
is also a great natural historian.
loves organisms loves knowing about the
natural world and when he understood
or when they understood what I really
(54:58):
like, they were able to design a game
that was perfect for me, which was, I
just wanna hang out with the animals.
I want to talk with them.
I want to do things with them.
And if there are animals
around, I am into it.
but when they're not like, okay,
(55:18):
when's the good stuff happening.
So in this game, my goal was to make
friends with every animal we found.
And so everywhere we went, I
asked if I could look for animals.
I asked if I could talk to animals.
And I got very lucky with some early roles
and we met a giant bear and I rolled a.
(55:39):
And so that bear became part of our group.
that bear, every time you
did a check, that bear was
still fully part of our group.
every time I happened to get a
great role and we approached a
town with this giant bear yeah.
And needed to get in and the gatekeepers
(56:01):
like, well, um, uh, no, right.
I don't think so.
And we, right.
And then I said, I'm sorry,
we don't have a bear.
That's uncle.
And it turned out that my deceit
or whatever that's called, I
rolled really well on that.
And so then uncle Jim was just
uncle Jim came into the town
with us and stuck with us.
(56:21):
okay.
And that made a great game.
So McGee Catlett was that student
and they did an incredible
job as a, as a DM for me.
And it got me very interested in
playing or, and now my husband,
who's a physics professor here.
Just started running
a game for our family.
We have three kids.
And so he's been learning how to run a
(56:44):
game so that we can adventure together.
Lucas (56:47):
Thanks for listening to
Making a Monster (56:48):
Extinction.
Many thanks to Heather Lerner and the
Joseph Moore Museum at Earlham College for
providing this behind the scenes tour and
opening my eyes to the hidden possibilites
in paleo art and DNA reconstruction.
The extinction of megafauna tells
us so much about how we relate to
the natural world, and I'm excited
to add what I learned from this
(57:08):
trip to the Book of Extinction.
Do you like maybe things that get
going on ways to get involved with
the museum work that you're doing,
that you want people to know?
Heather Lerner (57:17):
Yeah, I would say one
thing is you can see her yourself.
We are just off I 70.
So if you're ever traveling across
the country and many people.
You'll be on I 70.
Yeah.
So we're pretty easy to find we're
open every afternoon from one to five
except Tuesday and Thursday year round.
And we also have an escape game that
(57:40):
features the giant beaver and your
goal during the escape game is to
rescue the giant beaver from a fire.
And you actually get to handle
some of the copies of her bones
in the course of the game.
And some of the newspaper articles
about these big events, the fire
and so on, are part of that game.
So the game is all built on real science,
(58:03):
real history surrounding the giant beaver.
So when you play the game, you
learn more things that are actually
real, which is pretty cool.
We that's start doing.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So you can do it in another game setting.
Uh, escape games are pretty fun.
And then we also have an escape game,
uh, that features Ta'an, um, our
Egyptian woman who's mummified here.
(58:24):
Love to have you follow us on
social media and check us out.
Upcoming research (58:28):
we are
always looking for more, more
ancient DNA projects to work on.
We're also working on stable isotopes
of modern songbirds and looking at
migration patterns and what, what makes
songbirds choose to move or feel forced
to move, and how can we figure that
(58:48):
out based on what's in their feathers.
Lucas (58:53):
Now's a great time to hit
that follow button and leave a
five star review on your podcast.
App of choice.
It's a small thing, but it really does
help new listeners discover the pod.
If you want to support The Book of
Extinction and endangered species
conservation at the same time, you
can visit the project's landing
page at scintilla.studio/extinction.
That's S C I N T I L L A dot studio
(59:16):
slash extinction to download the
first three monsters in the book.
You can pay what you want for them.
And whatever we earn from that sale
will be donated directly to the
Center for Biological Diversity.
You can also keep up with the project
by joining our email list where I'll
be sharing more of the incredible,
true stories that surface through this
research or follow this podcast for more
episodes of Making a Monster (59:37):
Extinction.
This is the tooth.
Lucas (00:03):
That's the tooth?!?
Heather Lerner (00:04):
That is one tooth.
Yep.
Lucas (00:07):
This is the left encisor.
It is the size of a banana
Heather Lerner (00:12):
Big banana.
You're looking at this and thinking
with the size of teeth like that, I
could take down some big trees.
Right?
Are you thinking that?
Lucas (00:23):
I am well, I am now.
Heather Lerner (00:24):
Okay.
Well, you shouldn't be
thinking that cuz that's wrong.
I was mean right?
Lucas (00:31):
Ah,
Heather Lerner (00:32):
here she is.
Wait,
Lucas (00:33):
What?
Ah!
This one right here?
Heather Lerner (00:41):
I love this orientation.
She is coming right at you.
Lucas (00:45):
Welcome to Making a Monster:
Extinction, investigating the stories
of vanished species as we gather
them into a bestiary for 5th edition
Dungeons & Dragons called Book of
Extinction, coming to Kickstarter
in March of 2023 and previewing
now on the Mage Hand Press Patreon.
This is the sound of GenCon, where I spent
this last weekend sharing the book with
(01:05):
gamers and makers from all over the world.
But tucked away not too far from
the biggest 4 days in gaming is a
surprising gem of natural history.
Welcome to Richmond,
Indiana podcast listener.
I'm here on the trail of an ice age giant.
We're at the Joseph Moore
Museum at Earlham College.
(01:28):
Prehistoric megafauna are an integral
part of the fantasy genre, giant monsters
who awaken the kind of fear humans
only feel in the presence of an apex
predator more powerful than themselves.
This week I want to introduce you to
one of the most unexpectedly fascinating
creatures among that pantheon of ice
age beasts and her fascinating journey
(01:49):
through near time alongside an Egyptian
mummy, a mastodon, and maybe the most
dedicated graduate students in history.
Our guide on this journey
is Doctor Heather Lerner.
Heather Lerner (02:01):
So I'm Heather Lerner.
I'm the director of the Joseph
Moore Museum, which is a regional
natural history museum at Earlham
College; also an associate professor
of biology and museum studies.
I was recruited from the Smithsonian
where I was working in ancient DNA.
And I came out here for an interview and
got to go into the museum and see the
(02:22):
world's most complete fossil giant beaver.
And I will confess at that
moment, I was, let's see, eight
months pregnant with twins.
And I thought the giant beaver
was pretty cool, but I mostly
identified with the giant ground
sloth , which, um, was not exactly
the reaction they were looking for.
Lucas (02:43):
Heather gave me an inside
tour of the Joseph Moore Museum,
including a lot of stuff the
general public doesn't get to see.
And in the interest of better
understanding the ancient megafauna in
Book of Extinction, Heather will introduce
us to the giant beaver in the order in
which a scientist of her caliber would
- starting with today and working backward
Heather Lerner (03:02):
The giant beaver
is just an incredible creature.
And from the first moment that
I knew about it in my interview
here, I thought, "I know how to
get DNA out of really old things.
And I would love the challenge
of trying to sequence DNA from
the extinct giant beaver and see
(03:23):
what we could learn from that."
So I started there and then
started thinking, well, what,
why would that be useful?
Just cuz you can do something
doesn't mean you should do something,
which I have to tell my children.
just cuz you can doesn't mean you should.
Um, so I spent a while really
learning about beavers.
(03:44):
so we know there are two
species today of modern beavers.
There's the North American and the
Eurasian, they're closely related
to each other and to nothing
else , which makes it very hard to
figure out things about their past.
Why do they look the way they do?
Why do they do the things they do?
If we don't have that evolutionary
(04:05):
record, it just really hinders the
explanations that we can come up with.
So, um, one of the things you can do
to try to figure out close relatives
is to add in extinct species.
And it turns out that what beavers
are closely related to are a lot
of other extinct species , um,
(04:28):
which includes the giant beaver.
And the giant beaver is pretty cool
because it's part of the group of beavers
that you would be more familiar with in
terms of living an aquatic lifestyle.
That's what you think of when
you think of beavers, right?
Ponds, streams, that kind of thing.
Yeah.
Um, it turns out this is super cool.
(04:48):
There's a whole group of extinct
beavers that are called fossorial
or upland digging beavers.
Right.
Who knew?
It turns out people
who study fossils know.
So, um, there are maybe seven to
twelve genera of extinct fossorial,
(05:10):
terrestrial, upland, burrowing, beavers.
And they go back far enough in
time that we are not probably
gonna get DNA out of them.
so figuring out those relationships
is probably in terms of using
DNA, a loss cause, but Casteroides
ohioensis the giant beaver.
(05:33):
Was around until not that long ago.
So maybe 10,000 years ago.
And that is a tractable question
using ancient DNA techniques.
That's a timeline in which
things are preserved well
enough that you can get DNA.
So we set about trying to sequence
the giant beaver to help us figure
out those relationships in particular,
(05:56):
when did beavers become aquatic?
Since we know there's this whole Upland
group, when did this thing that we
associate with beavers become true.
So you can use lots of clues, like, um,
their body shape from the extinct species
and sort of piece things together there.
But unless, you know, when those
(06:18):
species really lived, it can be hard
to get that timeline of evolution.
So using DNA, we can really anchor
that those trait evolutions in time.
So that's what we did.
We sequenced the mitochondrial genome,
um, of the extinct beaver and,
(06:38):
um, we're able to figure this out.
Lucas (06:41):
I just want, I just wanna
pause on how cool that sentence is.
That's an incredible amount of work.
Heather Lerner (06:49):
It was
years in the making.
Yeah, so first we spent a year building
an ancient DNA lab here, which meant
all the physical labor of cleaning
out an entire room and taking every,
everything out of there all like
demolition work, plus painting everything
and, uh, trying to get it to be a
safe place to look at ancient DNA.
Because it turns out that we
(07:09):
are shedding DNA all the time.
as we walk around, we are just
discarding our DNA everywhere.
So if you wanna work on old things that
don't have a lot of their own DNA, you
don't wanna be adding your DNA to the mix.
I did not wanna sequence myself.
We wanted to sequence giant beaver.
So we needed that ancient DNA room.
So we spent a year doing
that, got that done.
(07:30):
And then we were gonna start the process
of taking the fossils, using a drummer
and drilling out the hardest pieces of the
fossils, which would be the pieces that
had the most resistance to degradation.
So they might have the best DNA in there.
Most intact.
We wanted to start that process and
there was a two week power outage.
(07:51):
We only had three weeks set to be together
to work on the project for that summer.
And that was two thirds of our.
Wow.
So we didn't do it that year we
ended up working on raptors instead,
which was a great fun project.
Um, but it did delay us a couple of
years to be able to, to be able to do
that process but it gave us time to
learn more about beavers because it
(08:12):
turns out there's lots to know which
I'm very excited that you want to
know all about beavers you do, right?
Lucas (08:18):
I do.
Yeah.
Heather Lerner (08:19):
Okay, good.
Lucas (08:19):
That's what I'm here for.
Heather Lerner (08:20):
That's great.
we're gonna have a great time.
So I'm gonna take you
into the collections.
We'll start with the modern beaver
just to kind of orient you and then
we'll take some of those things
with us and go find the fossils.
Lucas (08:32):
Perfect.
Heather Lerner (08:33):
Okay.
Let's do it.
Lucas (08:34):
Great!
Heather Lerner (08:42):
So the room
we're in is the mammal division.
Um, and we have, oh, maybe five
or 6,000 mammal specimens in here.
Right.
It doesn't, you just look like that.
Right.
. Yeah.
And that's because the way that we
prepare them is to, um, we remove
all the insides and then we keep the
skins preserved and then we put the
(09:04):
fossil or the skeletons in a box.
So it's all very tight and compact.
Yeah.
You, when you're thinking of museums are
thinking of taxidermy, which is posed
animals, so that they look lifelike
and that's an art form, and that is
amazing and important, but I can't
fit a lot of those posed puffed up
animals in this room, this size, right?
(09:27):
So we, we have study skins and there
are, you know, depending on the
size of the animal, there can be
a hundred of 'em on a single tray.
So we are gonna go look for
Castor canadensis which is
the modern beaver, right.
So that you can see it and touch it.
Yes.
Lucas (09:44):
Okay.
I get to touch stuff.
Okay.
Whoa.
Heather Lerner (09:53):
We're gonna take
this out and put it over here.
Okay.
So this is a tray that has
a modern beaver pelt on it.
So it's just kind of folded
up like a little blanket.
Um, and you can see the tail here
on top can see that leather really
tail . Yes, we are excited about the
(10:15):
giant beaver, but it turns out modern
beavers are fairly big themselves.
Big . So what I want you to notice,
because you did wash your hands,
so I'm gonna allow you to touch it.
Lucas (10:24):
Thank you.
Heather Lerner (10:25):
You can feel that
fur, what do you think of the fur?
Lucas (10:28):
Oh man.
Nowhere in my life, have I ever laid a
hand on mink, but I know that aquatic
animals have a hugely different
fur to, uh, to terrestrial animals.
Exactly.
Um, so we've got two different
lengths and textures here.
Already, um, kind a
Heather Lerner (10:49):
Got that
guard fur on the outside,
. Lucas: And then a softer, it's so plush
underneath , I'm getting chills cuz
that's the kind of weirdo that I am like.
And I think you can
really identify with the people who
were trapping and selling beaver pelts.
This is incredibly warm, resilient, fur.
(11:12):
This is gonna get you through a winter
and winters were harsh, and we didn't
have access to all sorts of materials to
keep warm and protected from the elements.
It was a major concern.
And so just feeling this, I think you can
understand why they were so desirable,
but also just with them being so
(11:34):
desirable, why beavers faced such threats.
Um, so I wanted you to feel that.
The other thing I wanted to show you
is something that I learned when we
spent all this extra time learning
about beavers before sequencing.
They do have this amazing thing
and it's on their hind feet.
Um, and it's this adaptation
(11:55):
to two of their toes.
Um, and so this first toe here,
so there's this fleshy pad and
then there's this, this nail.
And what happens is when they, when
they bend their, their paw like this,
they trap their fur in between there.
And it's a comb and they do
(12:16):
that with this one as well.
And it's not as easily.
No, here it is.
Is that it?
Here it is.
Okay.
It's this one that has the
big fleshy pad and the claw.
And so it can squeeze that.
Lucas (12:29):
So it's that the claw is the
same, uh, or rather the opposite,
um, concave shape to the pads.
Convex.
Heather Lerner (12:37):
Yeah.
So they nest within each other.
If you like, take your pointer finger
from each hand and sort of make a
little arc and attach them to each
other and you can squeeze between that.
Right.
Right.
And as they bend their, um, they flex that
squeezes, the pad against the, against the
nail your pad is attached to your nail.
(12:57):
You're not gonna run something between
your pad and your nail on your finger.
Huh.
Right.
Like you're not gonna, I mean, you
might run your fingers through your
hair but imagine if you could flex
down and actually turn that into a
tight comb, that's what they're doing.
Amazing.
And they do that with both of those toes.
So that one that has the fleshy
pad and the nail, and then this
one that has like a split nail.
So there's a hard piece
(13:18):
here and a hard piece there.
And, and, you know, That's
gonna do different things.
It's like two different types of comb
that they have so they can spread
oil and they can remove debris and
clean themselves, essentially with this
little tool that's on their hind feet.
Lucas (13:35):
In terms of, I guess, yardage,
if we're thinking about textiles.
Hmm.
Um, how much would you get from one?
Heather Lerner (13:42):
That's a good question.
A little more than a
yard and it's doubled over.
So I'd say about a yard of fabric.
Yeah.
Amazing from just that one individual.
And this does look like an adult.
It is, it was a good
size and it was a male.
its weight was 57 pounds, 12 ounces.
(14:05):
Its total length was 46 and a half inches.
So that's pretty long.
Wow.
Yeah.
So we record information about the
animals when we collect them as much as
we possibly can, because like I said,
you can't go back and get that later.
So any information we have about the
habitat, it was in the things, it was
doing photographs, video recordings,
(14:27):
um, measurements, anything we can
get, we will keep with the animals
so that we have the most information.
Lucas (14:33):
So then there's a
digital record that's attached
to this particular specimen.
Incredible.
Heather Lerner (14:39):
And like I said, we, in
addition to having the skin that you've
just been looking at or the pelt, um, we
also try to keep, um, the skeleton and so
this box has the skull for this one in it.
Oh
Lucas (14:54):
wow.
I wasn't ready for this.
Heather Lerner (14:57):
So you can.
Re-articulate the jaws there.
And then you can see the, see that skull.
Lucas (15:05):
Amazing.
Heather Lerner (15:06):
So that's a chomping.
Yeah.
And you can see the teeth here,
have this orange across them in the
front , um, that's probably related
to some iron deposit there and that's
common in rodents, um, to have that.
And that gives it real firm firmness to
(15:27):
the teeth that even our teeth don't have.
We have enamel, but we don't have
that particular hard structure.
Um, and that is so it's taking
Lucas (15:35):
iron from its environment and it's,
Heather Lerner (15:37):
it's sequestering it
there yeah, we, we keep the iron in
our blood and they probably have iron in
their blood too, of course, being mammals.
But, um, they must be depositing
some of their teeth too.
Lucas (15:48):
That's incredible.
They have metal teeth, you're telling me?
Heather Lerner (15:52):
Yeah, basically.
Yeah.
That's a good way of thinking of it.
Yes, that is correct.
yeah.
And that really, um, provides that
strength that they need for all
of the chewing that they would do.
Um, So I'm gonna put this back and we're
actually gonna take one of these skulls
with us and go find the skulls that
(16:12):
we have of the extinct giant beavers.
So you can see those right together
and we will eventually make it to the
world's most complete fossil giant beaver.
Lucas (16:21):
Let me paint another picture
here because we, this looks like
somebody's garage, but a garage that
they would've spent a lot of time in
and there are long, low tables in it.
And, uh, more of the filing
cabinets around the walls.
I'll also state for the record.
One of these cabinets is
labeled dinosaur bones.
(16:42):
yes.
You know, I need a career change.
six year old me would've
been losing his mind.
Heather Lerner (16:56):
This entire cabinet
is dedicated to our giant beaver
to the most complete, and this
holds a copy of every bone in it.
So these are,
Lucas (17:08):
It's the best jigsaw puzzle!
Heather Lerner (17:10):
It is.
It's actually really fun to put together.
Done that a few times.
Um, so this is the first
copy that we ever made.
Um, and it is made from creating
molds of each individual bone.
Um, except for the feet
we did those all together.
So many little bones in a foot, right?
And if you go find a giant beaver in
(17:32):
another museum, it's potentially a copy of
ours because we cast it in the 1980s, and
then many museums got copies from that.
Right.
And then we also created a new copy
of it a few years ago with the help of
two researchers who were then at the
Virginia Museum of Natural History who
came here and we made all new molds
(17:53):
because molds deteriorate over time.
And so do copies, um, and
some things had changed.
We needed to modify the skull a little
bit because it had been built up.
On our original, some clay had been added
and we needed to change that because
after finding more skulls, we knew
that some of the sutures were wrong.
(18:15):
Okay.
So in your skull, you have different bones
that come together to form that, right?
And they fuse together as
you grow and stop growing.
Once you stop growing, they fuse together.
So those lines we guessed
at based on modern beavers.
And it turns out when we found war
(18:37):
fossil skulls, we needed to change
that because they were not correct.
So this entire cabinet here is a copy
Lucas (18:46):
and I'm gonna look, it
would've been plaster of Paris.
Uh,
Heather Lerner (18:51):
yeah, probably.
Lucas (18:53):
Yeah.
And now we're working in,
in silicone or, or 3d,
Heather Lerner (18:56):
We've
done two different things.
One is that we are using silicone
molds, um, and then casting in resin.
Um, the other thing is that, so if you
come and play our giant beaver escape
game, which I know you would love, um,
you actually get to handle some of the
copies and those copies used to be cast,
(19:19):
which are very good for research, right?
They are very high quality,
scientifically accurate.
The kind of thing I will study off of
rather than bother the specimen itself.
And one of those disappeared.
So just a few weeks ago, we 3d,
scanned and printed copies because
now we can always reprint, but
(19:40):
the molds deteriorate over time.
And in fact, we don't have the molds
here, so I can't just make a backup copy.
Now that that one piece is gone.
Huh?
I'm gonna get into this cabinet here.
And I should be able to show you
the one that we actually sequence.
So in here you'll see
that we sampled for DNA.
Lucas (20:00):
whoa.
Heather Lerner (20:01):
So anytime we
do something, we put a note in.
Lucas (20:04):
So round plug, meaning that
you drilled a very, very small, uh,
Heather Lerner (20:10):
almost like a core sample.
Exactly.
So, so
Lucas (20:14):
then you would have a
tiny rod of, uh, fossil material.
, uh, not just like drilling it out and then
sort of taking the fossil saw dust, but
Heather Lerner (20:23):
rather a
whole take the actual plug.
We do grind it up then, but we do
take the plug . And one of the reasons
you're trying to do that plug is that
you wanna get past the really hard
enamel on the outside of the teeth
into the soft protected material
where the DNA should be preserved.
And what's very cool about teeth is
that it's one of the few places in your
body that you retain pluripotent cells.
(20:46):
So cells that can become anything.
Cells that are very open to suggestion.
They generally don't do anything else, but
you know, whatever they do in your teeth.
Um, but if you need cells that are
activate-able, that's a place to get them.
And what that does mean is that
they are less, um, less bound up.
(21:09):
And so that DNA can be super good.
And it means that there's
a lot of DNA in there.
So that's why we're aiming for teeth.
This I believe is the one that we got
DNA out of, which is somewhat surprising.
You see, we sampled it on the
14th of May, 2015, Micha Ahmed and
Jacob Paris and me, they get their
(21:31):
names written out and I'm just HRL.
So that's the one that we got,
uh, two thirds of the genome
from, the mitochondrial genome.
Yeah.
And actually this is the ulna,
the tooth did not end up working.
Okay.
And what what's interesting about
that is we did a lot of work trying to
figure out exactly where we would have
the most, the highest likelihood of,
(21:52):
um, getting DNA and what turned out
to happen is that wasn't so useful?
The most important thing was it
was collected more recently, which
meant that it had had less time out
of its deposition environment to
accumulate damage or to deteriorate.
(22:13):
So like I said, we're trying to keep
things so that stable temperature
and humidity, because when you have
fluctuations is when DNA gets damaged.
Well, we don't really have stable,
uh, temperature and humidity here.
And so over time, things just deteriorate.
Um, so one of the things we're
really actively working on trying
to improve conditions so that
(22:33):
things will be useful for longer.
So the most recently collected specimen
is the one that worked , but I know
an awful lot about DNA preservation.
So let's take this one over.
This is the tooth.
Lucas (22:49):
That's the tooth?!?
Heather Lerner (22:50):
That is one tooth.
Yep.
Lucas (22:54):
This is the left encisor.
It is the size of a banana
Heather Lerner (22:58):
Big banana.
Thin, but very long.
Yeah.
Okay.
So let's just do this for a second.
We want you to see the
modern beaver, right.
You remember with the
little chompers, right?
(23:18):
Okay.
And then let's put that
next to the giant beaver.
Lucas (23:23):
This skull came from a four foot
50 pound beaver, and yet it is, um, the
size of two clenched fists, I would say.
Heather Lerner (23:32):
Well, it
fits in my outstretched hand.
Right?
, Lucas (23:35):
you know, the base of the skull
is at the base of your Palm and the tip
of the nose is at your index finger.
Yeah.
And then this one.
Heather Lerner (23:45):
Like we don't
watch it like a football here.
You're looking at this and thinking
with the size of teeth like that, I
could take down some big trees.
Right?
Are you thinking that?
Lucas (24:00):
I am well, I am now.
Heather Lerner (24:02):
Okay.
Well, you shouldn't be
thinking that cuz that's wrong.
I was mean right?
This is, it was, it was exactly.
Okay.
So what's really interesting about
this, um, is that they probably
didn't have that, um, same.
They didn't have that
same tooth structure.
(24:23):
They probably were not able
to chew off pieces of wood.
They were not chopping down trees.
We have two lines of evidence that tell
us this oh three, maybe number one.
We have not found any pieces of
wood, fossilized wood, with the
marks of giant beaver teeth on them.
(24:44):
That's, you know, absence of evidence
is not, right, evidence of absence.
Sure.
So we're gonna hold off on that,
but we haven't found that, um, we
haven't found any big dams or lodges
in context with a giant beaver.
Okay.
So that's more absence of evidence.
(25:07):
Um, the other thing is that you can,
like I said, these organisms hold
a signature of their environment.
You can look and see
what they were eating.
I could figure out what you are eating
from the stable isotopes in your hair.
Lucas (25:21):
Okay.
That was significantly less creepy
than I thought it was going to be,
talked about plugs drilled from teeth.
Heather Lerner (25:29):
I'm not, I'm not
gonna take a plug of your teeth.
that's Nope.
I'm really far more interested in
the fossils, but if we wanted to
and people have done this, they have
looked at the signature of the foods
people are eating from their hair and
fingernails and you can see where like
what your favorite fast food is because
(25:51):
different fast food places are getting
their beef from different places.
Lucas (25:56):
Wow.
Heather Lerner (25:56):
And that holds the
signature of the environment, the food,
it was eating the place it was living.
Lucas (26:03):
You literally are what you eat.
Heather Lerner (26:04):
Yes, you are.
that?
Yeah, that is correct.
So, um, there was a really neat study
that came out in 20, 20 same year as
our, um, as our DNA study and they
were looking at a different species of
(26:24):
beaver, not so giant about two-thirds
the size of the modern beaver.
And that's a Dipoides, is the genus.
And they were curious, what
was this, this animal eating?
And then they were comparing it to
Casteroides, to our extinct giant
beaver and to Castor the modern beaver.
What they're doing is trying to figure
out, um, there are different options for
(26:46):
what these species could be eating, right?
You're in an aquatic environment.
And we have evidence that Dipoides
was in an aquatic environment.
It, um, evidence of,
uh, chewed, chewed wood.
So that's pretty strong, right?
Find Dipoides, you find some things
that look like maybe it was a lodge?
(27:08):
They could be eating bark, they could be
eating, you know, the, the layer right
underneath the bark, the stuff that has
good nutrients in it could be eating that.
So they could have been eating any
of the other plants that around them.
We know that they're vegetarian or
we assume they are given rodents,
um, long evolutionary history of
(27:28):
being vegetarian, um, or herbivores.
So they could have been eating
mosses and lichens and other things
that would be in this Tundra area
where the species was found, they
could be eating trees or shrubs.
They could also be eating
the, like the leafy vegetation
that would be in the ponds.
Right.
So macrophytes, that green fleshy stuff.
(27:49):
And so you can look at the
carbon and nitrogen isotopes in
those different types of plants.
And then you can look at the tissues of
that animal and see how they compare.
And there's a lot of other
science going on behind there.
Right?
You don't just lay down exactly
what you're eating your body,
modifies it a little bit.
And so you have to do some corrections
(28:10):
and things, but from this, they
were able to show that it does look
like Dipoides, I know we're taking a
detour here to a different species,
but it is important and relevant.
You can cut it if you need
to , but it looks like that one
was basically a generalist in the
sense that yes, it could do some
(28:30):
woody plants and those macrophytes.
Pretty cool.
Yeah.
They were also using information
from Casteroides and this is
where it gets really interesting.
doesn't look like they
were eating woody things.
Their signature shows much more
(28:52):
strongly in the macrophyte.
So then you start looking at those
teeth again and thinking, okay,
so not having the super strong
orange piece on those teeth, maybe
they really weren't doing that.
Maybe they weren't cutting down trees.
Maybe that absence of evidence is
because they're, they weren't doing it.
(29:13):
So start looking at those teeth again,
when you see this, um, the front teeth
have this sort of, um, inverted V shape
or like a little, little mountain shape
and where they, the two teeth meet is
almost like if you're gonna cut a piece
of paper and you just open the scissors
(29:34):
a little bit and sort of push it at
the paper and slice that paper apart.
Like this is a good slicing thing.
And you think about reeds,
you think about grasses?
You wanna cut those?
You just slice right through it
with this kind of a tooth structure.
Cool.
Right.
Lucas (29:51):
So rather than having a
metal knife in its mouth, it
has, uh, a pair of bone scissors.
Yeah.
Heather Lerner (29:57):
Amazing.
it also has these wonderful molars and
those look like nice grinding teeth.
They're not in my opinion, that
dissimilar from the modern beaver.
Um, but modern beavers are
also gonna be eating that,
um, fleshy vegetation as well.
So in the summer, when you can
get it, you wanna eat stuff that
(30:18):
has the highest reward value.
So the most nutrients and,
you know, we need fiber.
Everybody needs fiber, but you
don't want it all to be fiber.
Like you don't wanna go heavily on the
tree side, if you don't have to really go
for the fleshy stuff, if you can get it.
So they're eating the fleshy plants,
but then they're caching those
(30:40):
twigs underwater to keep them cool.
And to last over the winter.
And that's why we have beavers
today is that they have that
adaptation of being able to make
it through those long dark winters.
And when they create those dams and
they create bigger bodies of water,
(31:01):
those bodies of water don't fully
freeze over so they can maintain an
open access underneath the water.
It can hide their food down
there, cause all the green plants
they're, they're not edible.
They're not growing in the winter.
They're covered in snow.
But if you can keep 'em in your
underwater refrigerator, all winter.
You can survive because
they don't really hibernate.
(31:23):
They kinda slow down, but they do
need to eat throughout the winter.
It's kind of a bummer that the giant
beaver doesn't seem to have been
using trees and building dams and
lodges because that probably is a
major contributor to its demise.
It wasn't able to handle
(31:44):
the warming of the climate.
It wasn't able to handle the
drying out of the climate.
It needed those big waterways,
you know, the, you find a lot
more Casteroides in the areas
south and around the great lakes.
So they just, they weren't able to
make it through that changing climate.
And so they did become extinct.
The end of the Pleistocene.
(32:06):
There's another really cool adaptation,
but I think we should go see the
most complete fossil giant fever.
Okay.
Let's do it.
Lucas (32:15):
We weren't in the museum?
Heather Lerner (32:17):
We were behind the
scenes now we can go to the public side.
Lucas (32:22):
Let's go over here.
Pass the whooping crane pass.
Oh,
Heather Lerner (32:28):
I'm gonna say it.
Lucas (32:30):
Uh, the, the, the most
complete skeleton of a fo-, shoot.
Heather Lerner (32:35):
Yep.
World's most complete fossil giant beaver.
Lucas (32:38):
World's most complete
fossil giant beaver.
I got it.
Heather Lerner (32:40):
You got it.
Lucas (32:42):
I think,
Heather Lerner (32:43):
it is really nice to say,
Lucas (32:46):
ah,
Heather Lerner (32:47):
here she is.
Wait,
Lucas (32:49):
what?
. Ah,
This one right here.
Heather Lerner (32:58):
I love this orientation.
She is coming right at you.
Lucas (33:02):
Oh, she?
Heather Lerner (33:03):
Yep.
We can tell from her pelvis
and her size that she's a she.
So when I first got here, she was turned
sideways and you could just see her from
the side, which you haven't even seen yet.
Yep.
And then we were doing some, you know,
renovations, new exhibit kind of stuff.
This whole exhibit is all new
signage, um, designed by our students.
(33:26):
Um, and we rotated her.
And for the first time we saw her
coming at us and we said, "Oh, that's
the way you need to approach her.
You need to think about a giant
beaver approaching you, or you
approaching a giant beaver."
Lucas (33:44):
Yes.
Heather Lerner (33:45):
And there she is.
This is her.
Lucas (33:48):
This is her.
Heather Lerner (33:49):
Yep.
This is not a copy.
In fact, we don't have an assembled copy.
I showed you that cabinet again, it's
all in different boxes so that we can
get them out and lay them out and, and
measure different things and look at them.
Right.
Like I said, taxidermy, not
so great for scientific study.
Also mounted, specimens, not
so great for scientific study.
It's a little hard to see every
(34:10):
single piece and rotate it and measure
all the things you wanna measure.
We have done it, you know, for
the Mastodon, we did measure all
the different parts so that we
could determine the size of it.
Question is scale.
I, uh, yes.
Lifting up that femur a little different,
but, um, so we actually have her on
exhibit in most places you will not see.
(34:31):
Well, I mean, nowhere else will you see.
The world's most complete, complete
fossil giant beaver , but we do
have her right here on exhibit.
Lucas (34:40):
Incredible.
Heather Lerner (34:41):
You made a comment
before about seeing the skull of
an animal and thinking, gosh, it
seems bigger when I see it alive.
And if you think about it, very few
people are just the size of their bones.
In fact, no one is except a skeleton.
You have all sorts of muscles and
tendons and cartilage and fluid
(35:05):
and a whole layer of fat and skin
all over the top of those bones.
So just that alone is gonna add, you know,
depending on the particular organism,
half inch to an inch all the way around.
So it's really much bigger when
(35:26):
this animal was fleshed out and we
have some great illustrations, um,
Corbin Rainbolt was a student here
and he is a renowned paleo artist.
Um, and he did the artwork for our,
for this exhibit when he was a student.
And he has also continued to work with
us afterward and done drawings for us
(35:47):
because lots of times I need something
that shows the difference between
a modern and an extinct organism.
And so I, I need them in
context with each other.
I need a particular orientation and,
and Corbin does that kind of work.
In fact, what I'm wearing is
. . .Lucas: Hey!
A giant beaver mini skirt.
Lucas (36:09):
She's been here the whole time!
Heather Lerner (36:13):
Yep.
Pretty cool.
Lucas (36:15):
That is fabulous, Heather!
Heather Lerner (36:18):
And you can
get your own on red bubble.
You can also get a t-shirt and
other thing, a notebook or whatever.
exactly you day before.
I dunno.
You may have to buy a
couple different sizes.
So this is the world's most
complete fossil giant beaver.
(36:41):
It is not however, the type specimen.
Lucas (36:45):
I got it wrong.
I thought that's what it was.
Heather Lerner (36:47):
It's not.
The type specimen is
no longer in existence.
It was lost in a fire.
And this one was also
almost lost in a fire.
So these are all these stories
are all wrapped up together.
um, she was found by some
farmers in the Eastern part
(37:08):
of Randolph county in Indiana.
They were opening up a ditch
to drain a swampy area.
It was locally known as "The Dismal."
And the contractor who was doing
this work came upon the skeleton.
And this is neat.
It said, "On account of its standing in
its natural position and its wonderful
tusks, it awakened a desire to save
(37:30):
all the parts that might be found."
That was written by Joseph Moore in
1890 when he described this specimen.
This contractor found this animal
and thought this doesn't look
like anything I've seen before.
look at those giant chompers, right?
Yeah.
And they wanted to know what it was.
They brought the skull into town,
(37:53):
the farmer whose property, it was
brought it into town and started asking
around and nobody knew what it was.
No one had seen anything
just like this before.
And you remember that giant
football in my arm for that skull.
If you found that you would be
wondering what the heck as well.
So no one knew what it was.
Somebody said, put it up
in the window of the bank.
(38:13):
Someone coming in or out will surely know.
So they put it up in
the window of the bank.
No one knew.
Finally someone said, take
it down to Earlham college.
If anyone will know it'll be Joseph Moore.
So they brought it down to
him and he immediately said,
"Well, I am not totally sure.
(38:36):
However, I do believe it's a giant beaver.
But the giant beaver has been described
from a fragment of tooth and jaw.
That's all that's ever
been found of it before.
And you have a whole skull school.
Is there anymore?"
And they said, "Oh yes, the
whole thing, it's right there!"
(38:58):
So they went back.
The contractor knew exactly where it was.
They dug the entire thing up.
It is seven eighths
complete, as I've said.
And so you can look at her and you can
see a slightly different coloration.
where you can see what's real.
And then that darker color, right, that
other matrix that we use to fill in the
parts that we're missing so that you have
(39:19):
what looks like a full skeleton here.
But very little of that
is that dark color, right?
There are a few of the
vertebra and the neck there.
Um, there's a little bit of the,
of the shoulder blade, um, a little
bit in the toes, but for the most
part, this is a complete skeleton.
So she, Joseph Moore purchased her
(39:44):
with some of his own money, some money
that was donated and brought her here
and she's remained here ever since.
Like I said, two different sets of
molds have been made from her so
that she can be shared throughout
the world and be studied more easily.
Um, but we did almost lose her in 1924.
(40:04):
Um, she was in Lindley hall, which was
where the museum was housed at the time.
And that night, um, just after
I wanna say midnight, um, the
building went up in flames.
The floors were wood and
they had just been oiled.
And so it went up hot and fast.
(40:26):
Students were awoken by the sounds
of this and ran out of their dorms.
Students worked in the museum
then just as they do today.
And they knew the incredible
value of this giant beaver.
And they ran into the burning building,
picked her up and carried her out.
We have a, a copy of a letter written by
(40:50):
one of those students after spending hours
doing this, went back to his dorm room and
sat down and wrote home to his mommy and
poppy to tell them about what happened.
And to say, I just, I don't
think I can settle down to sleep.
I don't know what the rest
of the semester's gonna be
look like, gonna look like.
This building burned.
(41:11):
This building also housed the
registrar and all the records.
A lot of the work was really saving
the, the specimens of the museum.
So we do, we are the caretakers
for an Egyptian woman, um,
Ta'an, she's, um, she's mummified
and she is in the museum here.
She was rescued.
The giant beaver was rescued
and you know, anything else
(41:31):
they could get their hands on.
In 1952, Jim cope, reestablished this
museum in the space that we have here.
And she was put back on display.
So there was about 25 years when
she was off exhibit, um, or at least
not in the Joseph Moore museum.
Right.
So she's back on display.
Lucas (41:51):
Wow, incredible.
Heather Lerner (41:55):
So our students now know
the most important specimens that we have
and the order that you would save them.
they also know.
To be very careful with their own
selves and do not die in a fire.
that fire, the 1924 Linley fire did claim
the life of at least one firefighter.
And, um, it was deemed to be arson.
(42:18):
There are several hypotheses.
One was a disgruntled janitor who had
been fired, who would've known the
schedule of the oiling of the floors.
And would've known the best time
to take the whole building down.
Um, another hypothesis, since
all the registrar records were
burned, was that it was a student
hoping to erase their record.
(42:41):
And we don't know to this day, who did it.
Wow.
I wish someone's diary with a
confession would be found, right?
Yeah.
Lucas (42:52):
That is an incredible story.
Part of the reason that I knew I had
to come up here was I'm writing a
book for fantasy authors, essentially.
And to tell them that, Hey, there
was an Egyptian woman and a giant
beaver who survived a fire in
Indiana in the fifties like that
is, uh, you can't write this stuff.
Heather Lerner (43:15):
She, she has some
pretty incredible history and some
real, real champions who would
risk their own lives to save her.
So you were asking what
a type specimen is.
Yeah.
And when I referenced how Joseph
Moore said, "Well, I think this is
a giant beaver, but the description
of giant beaver is based off of
the fragment of a tooth and a jaw."
(43:35):
That's it.
He then turned around and wrote a
paper that described this specimen,
but he could not name it because it
had already been named as Casteroides
ohioensis from that tiny little bit.
Lucas (43:51):
Wow.
Heather Lerner (43:51):
So Joseph Moore
has an amazing paper that is really
descriptive about this entire skeleton,
but it is not the type specimen.
Lucas (44:00):
Type specimen is,
Heather Lerner (44:02):
the individual for
which the species is described from.
We define this species to be something
that has these particular morphological.
Which are based on a tooth and a jaw.
What's very interesting is the
extraordinary bias in museum collections,
(44:22):
which mirrors the collecting tradition
that museums are built upon, which
is the collecting tradition of white
men going and documenting the world
around them and primarily collecting
male individuals of species and
(44:42):
describing species based on the males.
So the vast majority of
type specimens are males.
The vast majority of specimens
and collections are also males.
And that holds true even for species
and you might be thinking, okay,
well the males have bigger tusks.
(45:03):
They've got antlers.
They're very pretty, they're flashy.
Right?
We're gonna collect them.
They're also the ones that
may be more aggressive.
So they may be more easy to catch
because they might approach you
and you might be able to shoot
them or catch them or whatever.
Even controlling for that.
We do not collect in equal
numbers, males and females
what I think is really important
(45:25):
is to be able to describe the
variation within a species.
And when you boil it all down to the
type, the one, the original you miss
what makes up the beauty of species,
which is the unique traits, the range
from light brown to dark brown that
you see in the pelts, from the length
(45:47):
of the fur, from the lengths of the
tails, from the behavior, there's so
much beauty and, um, flavor that when
you focus on a type specimen, you lose.
What you didn't know about that I
said I was gonna tell you before,
(46:07):
and then I didn't is a very
cool feature of the giant beaver.
Lucas (46:12):
You're giving me the eyebrows.
And from what we talked about
before that didn't get eyebrows.
I know this is gonna be cool.
Heather Lerner (46:20):
You look
inside of the modern beaver
and you can see the brain case.
Yes.
Right.
You look inside and you can see
there's an opening in the nose.
Right.
You have openings in your
nose too, for obvious reasons.
Um, there's some breathing purposes
going on there and there's maybe
some more airspaces in this skull.
(46:42):
It's a little hard to see because.
Skull, and it has an
exterior bone structure.
This giant beaver.
In my other hand, you can see is
because of the way it's been preserved.
You can see a lot more inside and you
can see there's a big opening in here.
Big open space in there
where the spine would've.
(47:03):
That?
That is where the spine, you can
see on the, on the, where the
vertebra come off, that hole, the,
the FRA at the back of the skull.
So there's a big opening in there and
you can sort of stick your finger down
in and see, it goes pretty far down.
And then you can look up its nose
and you can see in the modern beaver
that opening stops maybe an inch
(47:25):
or so in, in the giant beaver.
There are all of these pockets
of openings and they connect
way back in here into the skull.
So that brain case opening is very
small compared to this other giant
opening in the front of the skull.
(47:47):
But there's this big opening behind the
nose, reminiscent of whales of things that
communicate underwater, things that have
resonant chambers for making big sounds.
I mean, we don't know for sure.
(48:09):
But it really kind of makes you
think that the giant beaver was
making a lot of sounds clicks and
words, and maybe big booms and
maybe it was resonating in there.
We don't know the soft structures
that would've been in there because
those have not been preserved someday
as the Tundra thaws, we're going to
(48:29):
find a fully fleshed, giant beaver.
And the first thing I wanna
know is what's inside that big.
What do those structures look like?
There is a researcher, Beth
Rinaldi, and she got a 3d.
She got a CT scan of giant beaver
skull and was not this one, not this
(48:50):
one and was able to print, essentially
print that empty space and turn it
into a horn so that she could play
the sound of the giant beaver horn.
And when we go downstairs, I'll
see if I have that recording on
my phone and play it for you.
Because I went to her house once I heard
that and I happened to be passing through
(49:10):
Kansas, which, where she was at the
time I sent her an email immediately and
said, I'm going to be there in December.
Can I come to your house?
and she said, sure.
so I showed up and I'm
coming to your house.
Exactly.
And she played the giant
beaver horn for me.
Lucas (49:33):
Stay tuned for more about how
this ice age giant becomes a D&D monster,
but I just want to briefly tell you
how you can take it home to your table.
The giant beaver is one of more than a
dozen Plieistocene megafauna appearing
in Book of Extinction, a bestiary of
extinct species for 5th edition coming
to Kickstarter in March of 2023.
You can get the most recent playtest
(49:54):
release of Book of Extinction by joining
the Mage Hand Press Patreon family of
nerds at Patreon dot com slash m f o v.
The giant beaver appears alongside
the giant short-faced kangaroo, the
glyptodon, and the saber-toothed tiger.
You'll also meet prehistoric
lycanthropes like the dire werewolf,
the cave werebear, and the weremammoth.
(50:17):
That's Patreon dot com slash m f o v.
Patron or not, you can get the first
three monsters in the Book of Extinction
- the passenger pigeon, the great auk,
and the Tasmanian tiger - right now at
Scintilla dot Studio slash extinction.
Pay what you want for it, and anything
we earn will be donated to the
Center for Biological Diversity to
support their protecting endangered
(50:38):
species and wild places world wide.
All those links are in the description.
Heather Lerner (50:51):
So I figured at some
point you were gonna ask me about
my experience playing Dungeons and
Dragons, which is not vast, and what
I thought about this animal as yeah.
You know, a real creature and
what its special traits are.
And also as a, as a magical creature.
So I've been thinking about
that for a little bit, and
I really think that ability.
(51:13):
That sound ability is pretty cool.
And I mean, just as an
actual living creature, the
ability to make those sounds.
And, and first as I, you know, my thought
processes have, have changed over time.
Um, you know, like I was pointing
out before with ASOS, we used to
think they were tail draggers.
Now we think that their tails were upright
(51:33):
and we used to think they were maybe just
green and scaly, you know, we think, oh,
they could have been all different colors.
Right.
They could have had lots of different.
And we've changed our opinion of
what the giant beaver looked like.
I've been understanding more, um,
about her and I think a lot about her
impact on the environment around her.
(51:55):
And I was thinking if you're not cutting
down trees, you're not building dams.
You're not building lodges.
You're not like the ecosystem
engineer of the modern beaver.
What are you really doing anyway?
but I do think.
that she was keeping those
ponds clear of vegetation.
(52:16):
If she was eating a lot of reeds
and macrophytes, all that pond,
weed, those ponds, weren't those
dense places that you think of.
Now, when you're thinking of a wetland
where you can't get up to the water,
there's so much vegetational around it
and they get filled in pretty quickly.
I bet with her insatiable appetite.
(52:39):
She was really moving a lot
of vegetation out of there.
And I would bet with those incredibly
strong back legs, she could have been
moving stuff out of the bottom of the
ponds and keeping them big and open.
And she could have been making sounds that
would've carried in these big spaces and
maybe through waterways as well, because
(53:01):
she would've been clearing the waterways.
Cuz I was thinking you make a sound
underwater in a, in a stream, in a pond.
It's not gonna carry very far, cuz
there's so much stuff around in there
that we'd just soak up that sound.
I maybe not, maybe she was moving
things around and creating a space
that would let her sounds travel.
(53:25):
So I think if she were mythical that
her sounds, if they were clicks and
words, Might do slashing damage.
I think that maybe if it was more
of a resonant chamber, she could be
making a boom that would flatten you.
I think that she's got some powers
(53:46):
with the, with her massive airspace.
Lucas (53:51):
When did you start playing?
What's the what's.
Heather Lerner (53:53):
What, what kind
of a part of your life at first?
Okay.
I first played a game in graduate
school with some friends um, and
I think maybe it was maybe a more
traditional game, definitely more
traditional than my next game ion.
It was, I don't know anything about it.
(54:14):
Sure.
This is my level of experience,
but what I do know is.
Fighting random things.
I just wasn't, I wasn't super into it.
I felt like I wasn't sure
I wasn't doing it right.
I didn't know what I was doing.
There was so much fighting
and there was like weapons
and I wasn't really into that.
And then I became director of the Joseph
(54:35):
Moore museum many years down the road.
And I took students to New Zealand
for a study abroad program.
And one of my students was a DM who
is also a great natural historian.
loves organisms loves knowing about the
natural world and when he understood
or when they understood what I really
(54:58):
like, they were able to design a game
that was perfect for me, which was, I
just wanna hang out with the animals.
I want to talk with them.
I want to do things with them.
And if there are animals
around, I am into it.
but when they're not like, okay,
(55:18):
when's the good stuff happening.
So in this game, my goal was to make
friends with every animal we found.
And so everywhere we went, I
asked if I could look for animals.
I asked if I could talk to animals.
And I got very lucky with some early roles
and we met a giant bear and I rolled a.
(55:39):
And so that bear became part of our group.
that bear, every time you
did a check, that bear was
still fully part of our group.
every time I happened to get a
great role and we approached a
town with this giant bear yeah.
And needed to get in and the gatekeepers
(56:01):
like, well, um, uh, no, right.
I don't think so.
And we, right.
And then I said, I'm sorry,
we don't have a bear.
That's uncle.
And it turned out that my deceit
or whatever that's called, I
rolled really well on that.
And so then uncle Jim was just
uncle Jim came into the town
with us and stuck with us.
(56:21):
okay.
And that made a great game.
So McGee Catlett was that student
and they did an incredible
job as a, as a DM for me.
And it got me very interested in
playing or, and now my husband,
who's a physics professor here.
Just started running
a game for our family.
We have three kids.
And so he's been learning how to run a
(56:44):
game so that we can adventure together.
Lucas (56:47):
Thanks for listening to
Making a Monster (56:48):
Extinction.
Many thanks to Heather Lerner and the
Joseph Moore Museum at Earlham College for
providing this behind the scenes tour and
opening my eyes to the hidden possibilites
in paleo art and DNA reconstruction.
The extinction of megafauna tells
us so much about how we relate to
the natural world, and I'm excited
to add what I learned from this
(57:08):
trip to the Book of Extinction.
Do you like maybe things that get
going on ways to get involved with
the museum work that you're doing,
that you want people to know?
Heather Lerner (57:17):
Yeah, I would say one
thing is you can see her yourself.
We are just off I 70.
So if you're ever traveling across
the country and many people.
You'll be on I 70.
Yeah.
So we're pretty easy to find we're
open every afternoon from one to five
except Tuesday and Thursday year round.
And we also have an escape game that
(57:40):
features the giant beaver and your
goal during the escape game is to
rescue the giant beaver from a fire.
And you actually get to handle
some of the copies of her bones
in the course of the game.
And some of the newspaper articles
about these big events, the fire
and so on, are part of that game.
So the game is all built on real science,
(58:03):
real history surrounding the giant beaver.
So when you play the game, you
learn more things that are actually
real, which is pretty cool.
We that's start doing.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So you can do it in another game setting.
Uh, escape games are pretty fun.
And then we also have an escape game,
uh, that features Ta'an, um, our
Egyptian woman who's mummified here.
(58:24):
Love to have you follow us on
social media and check us out.
Upcoming research (58:28):
we are
always looking for more, more
ancient DNA projects to work on.
We're also working on stable isotopes
of modern songbirds and looking at
migration patterns and what, what makes
songbirds choose to move or feel forced
to move, and how can we figure that
(58:48):
out based on what's in their feathers.
Lucas (58:53):
Now's a great time to hit
that follow button and leave a
five star review on your podcast.
App of choice.
It's a small thing, but it really does
help new listeners discover the pod.
If you want to support The Book of
Extinction and endangered species
conservation at the same time, you
can visit the project's landing
page at scintilla.studio/extinction.
That's S C I N T I L L A dot studio
(59:16):
slash extinction to download the
first three monsters in the book.
You can pay what you want for them.
And whatever we earn from that sale
will be donated directly to the
Center for Biological Diversity.
You can also keep up with the project
by joining our email list where I'll
be sharing more of the incredible,
true stories that surface through this
research or follow this podcast for more
episodes of Making a Monster (59:37):
Extinction.
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