The Humboldt Squid - A Dance with El Diablo Rojo

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It's just like it's fluff, you know, and it kind of I just kind of get tired of talking about it. I don't know, but I was glad they reached out to me. All right. We won't bring it up anymore then. No. Were they glad they reached out to you? Yeah. I don't know. They might be because the producer that reached out said they might want to have me back on to talk about the winner. But yeah, it didn't seem like they loved my answers to some of their questions. So I was a little surprised that she said that. Yeah, they're like, look how cute bears can be in your legs. Like they kill each other sometimes babies. And I think that's beautiful. Yeah. And then we have me. I'm West's little brother Jeff Larson. I'm a bit of a bear biologist myself. And then we have Mike Smith, our sound guy, 2% bear biologist Jeff. Got a little bit in me. Sure. Yeah. Yeah. I like that. Welcome to the episode everyone. Today we're talking about a weird critter. We're going to talk about something weird. Yeah. Well, this is the first of our October episodes. And Jeff, you may remember this. We like to get a little spooky around here. I don't want the October. You don't remember much. Do you? Okay. Mike, do you remember that? I do. Yeah. I think it's a pretty natural human response. Let's leave start falling down. You're like, I want to start talking about dead things. Yeah, it gets a little spookier outside. It's darker. The leaves fall off. Things are dying. And we just start getting a little spooky, right? This is when I like talking about sex because like deer and elk and moose are all rotten season. And you like spooky sex. Sure. Okay. Yeah. Who are you talking to about it? Because it's not me. Yeah. And you don't have anyone else to talk to. Ready? Yeah. Right. You don't. Anonymous online forums. Hey, anyone else? Here are slash Lxxx. I'm one of those comments. You're so beautiful under the girls who post on the right community. Any chance you'd ever go out with a guy like me, that's kind of what I said. They're just how well that your pictures of. I mean, actually, I'm going to look right now if they're hysteria, are slash rot, rut, rutting probably trying to. Well, I'll keep researching that and get back to you guys. Anyway, we like to do some spookier episodes this month. Last year we did one of like one on werewolves. I think we did some creepy crawlies. We had Sammy from Too Scary Didn't Watch. We'll probably have Sammy back on this month too. Is that short for Sam wise? I have to assume so. It's got to be what else would it be short for? Yeah. Yeah. I would long for Sam. Like her own, her name is only Sam. Oh, sometimes people do lengthen them. Yeah. I'll text her after this and ask her both of those questions. What was I about to say about Sammy? Sam wise, Gamji. Yeah. I don't know. Okay. We like her. Probably it. Yeah. Great guest. We love having her on. We'll probably have her on. But this first episode is one that was kind of unexpected. I'm not holding back this year with her. Okay. What are you going to say? Oh, man. You just have to find out. All right. You bring a weird energy so far on this episode. A little creepy. Then to spend in too much on horror. A little creepy. Slash, right. All right. But this is kind of it's good that he has that creepy energy. Mike, because this is kind of a creepy animal to a lot of people. And it was one that I've been wanting to cover for a long time. And then this week I was like, maybe we should finally do them. And then I was like, you know what? This is perfect because it's October. And these guys are kind of, they look like space aliens. They look like a creepy space alien. Which are you sure about that? Yeah. Do you think aliens you are our part of horror? Yeah. I'm sure that's what they look like. Positive way. What? Yeah. I don't think it's possible. We just base, base aliens off a strange looking animal that lives on earth. I mean, it's possible. That does make more sense. But I'm pretty sure these guys look like aliens or like elder gods. So do you guys, when you guys watch horror movies, do count space horror? Like is sci-fi horror in your horror back pocket? I do. For sure. Like a event horizon. I that's a horror movie to me. Yeah. Like sci-fi horror. I don't know. Yeah, but that one involves demons and stuff too. Yeah. It's sweet. Yeah. I think aliens for sure. Horror. Yeah. I only ask because when I lived in Salt Lake, there was this. It was called an October evening. They did it in the Masonic, the Masonic temple. And am I saying that weird? Masonic. Okay. Like the Mason temple. It's kind of like, anyway, Malady, but for Sonic, the head dog, Mason, when I'm spreading my coat out over a puddle for Sonic, that's got to be the worst move. You put your whole coat just in a puddle. And you do that. Still get your feet wet. I know. And then your coat's just soaked. A puddle. Yeah. It's a terrible move. I would. I do it for such a silly. It had gone way too far. It's such a silly move that I kind of want to try it. I just do it with a really nice coat. She would just be like, what are you doing? Yeah. What? It just wouldn't even register to like, yeah, anyone like common sense they'd refuse David walk on it. I could just take like one step to the right and go around it. Maybe that's the better move. No, they can't. You need to sacrifice your coat. Anyway, they would do this, this Halloween horror night. It was always really fun. They had really cool presentations. They'd show short films by local filmmakers. I look forward to it every year. And then one year it was all sci-fi themed and it was like just aliens. And it really sucked the energy out of it like big time. So since then I've kind of wondered if aliens count as like an October scary thing. But today they do. Okay. Because we're talking about humblet squid. You don't think that movie Paul is a horror movie? No, I don't at all. But alien I think is a horror movie or when the blob comes from outer space. But I think that's only the original one that's spoilers for 1957. The blob. Don't you think demons are kind of aliens? Don't they come from like other dimensions? Yeah. They come from hell though. Yeah, I don't know. I guess the line is heller in earth. You think? I mean the movie to the core they didn't see any aliens. I think they missed it. They didn't see any demons. I mean, yeah. All right. I think we're getting a little off the rails here. But another way another way that we can tie this to Halloween is that in a lot of the countries where this squid is found they call them the red devil, especially in Mexico. El Diablo Rojo. So what do you guys think is the creepiest bodily feature that an animal can have? Oh, like what gives you the willies on an animal more than anything? To me, it's like a mouth that looks like a smile that with a bunch of teeth, like a shark. Yeah. Okay. I thought you don't like eyes with lines and I'm like a snake's eyes. Oh, yeah. What about that? Nakes scare me. Yeah. Mike, what do you say? Yeah. Like a proboscis any kind of like weird long nose gives me the willies, I think. Yeah. Or yeah, like a mosquito needle. If I really think about that, I'm starting to willy out. Yeah. I think for me, it's the more legs they have generally kind of the creepier they get. And tentacles for me get more snake mouths for me. Okay. They're mouths. You must be really afraid of Jeff with his three legs. He's got three legs. Oh, was that a never mind? All right. Where do tentacles rank? Thank you. Yeah, sure. I got you, bro. Where do tentacles rank for you guys on creepy bodily features? They don't really get me like some people. Yeah. I mean, they're obviously something I don't want to come into contact with. But yeah, they're not super high on my list. I their TV. I usually with that. I kind of want them to suck me on my skin a little bit. All right. Really? You kind of get Jeff. You really on a roll. All right. Well, our animal today may be one of the only tentacle to animals in the world that poses any real danger to humans without using venom. And we're going to start with the story. You guys ready? Please. All right. On a October night in the late 1980s, a lone Mexican fisherman took a small panga, though little boats, passed the small waves of the sea of Cortez and out into the inky blackness of the open sea. The stars were stretching out almost endlessly overhead. The October air finally had a chilly bite to it after months of stifling heat. You guys have been to the sea of Cortez. It gets pretty hot in the summer. It's got to be early. Mama fall comes around. Yeah. Does he just laugh that much? I think it does. Yeah. It does. As this fisherman navigated over deeper water, he slows the boat and coast to a stop. He in spools a long length of hand line and fastens a shiny, oblong jig covered in hooks to the end and drops it into the water. He then points. It's a night. It's a night. Wow. He then points a bright light down into the depth that the jig would light up as he makes a bounce and dance through the water. And it doesn't take long before the line goes tight and he has his first catch. The fisherman wasn't looking for fish, though. He was trying to catch L Diablo Rojo, the red devil or the humbled squid. And as he pulls in the first squid, its ink shoots all over the bottom of his boat and he knows that it's going to be a successful night. And he immediately has another squid on the jig after tossing it back in the water. At one point, the action was so strong that the squid were literally hitting the bottom of his boat as they swirl around in the water and the fisherman has to steady himself not to fall in. He's heard the tales of these red devils and he knows how they've earned to their names. About 40 minutes in, he's already pulled in enough squid to completely cover the bottom of the boat. And as he's pulling in the last squid of the night, the tension on the line suddenly increases. He struggles to pull this squid to the surface. And when its body finally breaks the surface, he leans over to pull it into the boat. But what he didn't notice was the much larger red devil that was attacking and feeding on the smaller hooked squid. And as he reached down, it wraps its tentacles around him defensively, shoots backward in the water, and pulls him out of the boat and into the water. No way. The panic fisherman starts swimming for the boat and he had just grabbed onto the side when the squid and other squid grab him from underneath with teeth-lined suckers and bite into them with his razor-sharp beak. The man screams out into the night air and continues gripping onto the boat with all of his strength. But the squid pulled down once again and the screams are cut off with a gurgle. And all the man left behind was a bloody handprint and some of his fingernails in the wood of the boat. Oh, not long after, another pongo would arrive and they find the still-dying catch of all the squid on the bottom of the boat and the fingernails on the side of the wood. Alright, so Scott Castle sat around a fire in San Ignacio, Mexico and listened to this tale as fishermen told the story of the Diablo Rojo and the night that they found that empty boat. And as he listened to this, he studied their faces, listened to their hushed tones, and realized that they were not exaggerating or lying to him. Alright, so quick break. This was a story that this guy heard just in case you didn't gather that from Mexican fishermen. We should have had that guy on this podcast instead of you. Scott Castle. Yeah, yeah. We should have, because pretty much the whole episode's about him and probably would have loved to tell this story. He had been diving since he was 13. He lived a life that was full of adrenaline and risk-taking. When he was 18 in order to escape his alcoholic father, he joined the army and learned how to fly helicopters and he became a special op-smetic. We took part in a lot of the shadowy and kind of covert missions that were happening in Central America during that time. Oh, yeah. And his later life, he actually would like never really talk about his years in the military, but he did drop a lot of hints that he saw, galata, and Arle Shit during his time in uniform. He was in the shit, Jeff, this guy. He's getting in the mix. There's a lot going on in Central America. There was. We're by the way. There is. From them and stuff. Yeah. Noriega. Freakin' Ronald Reagan. Stern up that pot. You know? Volcanoes. Volcanoes. It's not for you to buy the volcanoes. Someone, if you bring up volcanoes around Scott Castle, you will shut that conversation. I got it. I don't know what you're talking about. Squids. Yeah. I don't know. I've never heard of volcanoes. Don't talk to me about volcanoes. When he left the military in the mid-90s, he was still sporting the military muscles and haircut, but his life turned toward being underwater once again. He started work as a commercial diver and instructor, as well as an underwater filmmaker and security consultant. And it's during this time that he heard this campfire story from the Mexican fisherman. It would be one of many such stories that he would hear from fishermen throughout his years when he was obsessed with Humboldt's squid. After hearing this first one, though, he was immediately intrigued and decided he wanted to dive with Humboldt's squid, which for me seems like a very interesting reaction to that particular story. Yeah. But what part of the story got him excited? Was it the fingernails embedded into the side of the boat? He's like, oh, nice. Probably the thing. That's something I need to do. Tannacles on the guy's skin. Yeah, he's a little like you, maybe. What's that called in like those Japanese books with all the octopus and stuff? Oh, yeah, certainly. There's a name for word for it. Yeah, probably. I don't know if there's a specific word for it. Octa. Octenta. There you go. That's gotta be it. Octanti. I mean, it's just like hikis. You guys don't like hikis? No. I don't. Interesting. I like, I think I actually like think hikis are kind of rude sometimes. But that's weird. That's kind of a weird take. Like when you don't, when you don't consent. No, I just feel like you know if you're going to give someone a hiki. Like you know that like that line. And it's kind of like, oh, now they have to like have this mark on them that they're going to be embarrassed about. You know? Sure. Well, then you put it on a spot where they can choose to show it off. For sure. Or to hide it. Yeah, that's why I said sometimes. Because I think they can be appropriate. But if it's like on a knack or something, then I think they're kind of. Well, and they could just say like, yeah, I was diving in a giant squid came up to me. Yeah, humble squid got me. Have you had tentacles on you, Jeff? No. Okay. I've just, I was just wondering. Little tiny ones. That was right. Well, let's make it happen, Jeff. They just felt like little tiny sticky. I'm sure you thought it was kind of fun. Sure. Yeah, but it didn't do anything for me. I'm not saying sexually. I just feel it kind of feels that way. Well, that's your own perverted. Yeah, that's that's our hearing. That's how you guys. All right. I've been having some tooth problems lately. I'm very lucky that my older brother's a dentist, but I do tend to really clench and grind my teeth at night. And that does cause a lot of problems for me. I even recently cracked a tooth because I was doing it so much. And that's why I'm really excited to tell you guys about Remi. I had an old mouth guard that was too thick. It made me gag when I put it in. I really didn't like it. But Remi night guards are just much more comfortable than the one that I had before. And they're a lot cheaper. You can get the same professional quality and comfort as a night guard from the dentist for 80% less the cost by taking your own impression from the convenience of your home. 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And I really do love my Remi night guards. I feel like they're so comfortable in there. I hardly even remember I'm wearing them. I'm not grinding as much. My teeth feel better. Thank you, Remi, for sponsoring this episode. Industry leaders are transforming business with AWS AI. From Phillips advancing patient care to smarter auto design and games that evolve in real time, AWS AI is how innovation happens every day. It's flexible too, with 30-day rolling contracts. That's why they're which recommended mobile provider three years running. Switch today at La Barra.co.uk. So Scott makes his way to La Paz in Baja Mexico and he had heard that the Cia Cortez was a hot spot for finding Humboldt squid. And basically what he decided to do was dive under a boat that was fishing for squid. And you know what? He got a little bit more than he bargained for. Oh really? Yes. But before we get into that, we're actually going to go over their biology. And I want to do. I was wondering what size and stuff they are compared to like a giant squid. That's why I wanted to do it early because I feel like this is an animal that a lot of people don't really have a mental image of aside from just like a squid. So I want to talk a little bit about what they're actually capable of. All right. So basically before we get into the sizes and whatnot, I want to lay out a couple terms that we're going to say a few times just so you understand what a squid's body looks like. The majority of the squid's body is composed of its mantle. So the mantle is kind of that torpedo-shaped part of the squid. It's that oblong part of its body that has the fins on the end of it. Below the mantle, you'll find the siphon, the eyes, and the mouth of the squid. For all intents and purposes, this would be the squid's head because it's where its mouth and its eyes are in stuff. Below the head are eight arms that are covered in suckers and then two longer tentacles that are primarily used for feeding and they only have suckers on the end of them. We get more in, yeah. So they have 10 tentacles? They have 10 appendages. Technically, they only have two tentacles and eight arms, but we're going to talk about that in a second. I just want you guys to have a mental image of all these different things. All right. So these humbled squid. I think I could have just said 10 tickles there. Ooh. And save time. Yeah. A little more efficient. Oh, you need an explanation if I did that. I probably would have needed a short explanation. All right. So these guys are often known as jumbo squid and as far as squid are concerned, they're very big. Their mantle can grow to about 1.5 meters or five feet and at that size, they would weigh about 50 kilograms or 110 pounds. But according to Scott, who at this point is probably the person that has seen the most humbled squid underwater, they can get quite a bit bigger. We're going to talk about that a little bit later. But let's talk a little bit more about their bodies because this is one of those animals that the more I learned about it, the more I was just really amazed that they even exist on the same planet as us because they look like aliens, Jeff. They probably think that about you. Okay. They have eight arms, eight arms and two tentacles. But again, like Jeff said earlier, if you were to call all 10 of these appendages tentacles, I wouldn't correct you. I think it'd be kind of silly if someone corrected you because colloquially, we see tentacles as like long snake-like appendages with suckers on them. Yeah. If it has suckers on them, it's a tentacle. It's a tentacle. Sure. For the arms common, man. Yeah. Each of the arms has between 100 and 200 suckers on it. Each of these arms. And each of those suckers has a ring of chitinous teeth on it. So chitinous kind of like, it's similar to keratin or like the stuff that beetle exoskeletons are made out of. And that ring of teeth has up to 36 teeth per sucker. So that means a single squid can have up to 72,000 teeth in its suckers. And that's amazing. That's too many. Or their most braces would be so expensive. Oh, the dental bill. They're mostly used for gripping, but they can also cause lacerations and cuts. And when you see photos of like sperm whales that eat a lot of giant squid and colossal squid, you'll see just tons of cuts on their noses from the tentacles of these squid wrapping around their noses. Does it make it sound better or worse for you, Jeff? Do you want a little nibble? I don't let, no, I don't like that too much. You don't want to get a little cut. I don't know. I think about it. The two tentacles are longer and they only have suckers on the end. But the teeth on these tentacles are often more pronounced like hooks. And they use these tentacles to lash out and capture prey, bring them in toward the arms and then the mouth. The tentacles are actually quite elastic and they can extend further than their resting length. They're lightning fast with their tentacles. Yeah. Are they able to autonomously control the teeth or are they just kind of stationary? They're just there on the table. I think they are just there, but I'm not sure. Oh, sure. Yeah. They're like the sticky hands you get from a quarter machine. The quarter machines, right? I think the teeth kind of naturally when the sucker flexes, the teeth kind of naturally grow. Oh, yeah, sure. And again, those teeth are mostly just for gripping. They're not really like dismantling anything. Did they pull something in? Yeah. Gotcha. The beak is their main weapon. It's large, hard, large and hard. Large, yeah. And razor sharp. Three legs. I'm, it's you guys say that one's on one today. That's true. You start to throw it from here. There's anecdotal evidence that the Humboldt squid has a really incredibly powerful bite force that could be even stronger than 1,000 psi. But that evidence from what I've read is like very anecdotal. So I would take that with the grain of salt. Those beaks are what are the most creepy about squid to me. Yeah. Much more so than the tentacles. Oh, it looks like. Yeah. It looks like the beak of a macaque. Like it's a big black beak in the middle of all. They're like fleshy. Yeah. They should do like that hydraulic press social media videos they do. You know where they crush everything. Yeah. They should do that with their beaks. Oh, yeah. I'm just putting stuff in there and see if they can crush it. Sure. So a big squid would be able to bite an orange-sized chunk of flesh out of its prey. And Scott Castle says he has seen them bite through the skull of a tuna like it was nothing. Whoa. They propel themselves through the water with a siphon, which is essentially just a jet that blasts them in the opposite direction that it's facing. That's siphon. Yeah, the siphon is flexible. So it's not like they can only move backward. They can kind of move the siphon around and move in different directions. Uh. And then they have these two small fins on their mantle and they use those fins to steer and move around in the water. And it doesn't seem like a particularly great way to move around like jetting, but they're very fast and it allows them to be really explosive and agile. They're actually like really effective at their movement through the water. Like one of the coolest- The Mario water levels, the bloopers. They like somehow always know where you're going to be. They'll just bloop right at you. They're agile, get pretty realistic. It turns out Mario. Yeah. One of the coolest things about Humboldt's squid is the way they change color and the reasons behind it. When you watch videos of them, you can see them rapidly changing their whole body color from red to white. It's pretty spectacular. We'll clip in a video of that. They do this through specialized cells called chromatophores. Those cells are found right below the surface of the skin and picture those cells is kind of like an elastic balloon with a little bit of inky pigment in the middle. And Humboldt's squid, when these cells expand, that red pigment is spread out along the cell and then becomes brighter. And when they contract, that cell is essentially transparent. And you can see their white muscle tissue below. So that's why they always kind of look like they're flashing between red and white because they're expressing those chromatophores. They're expanding them and then retracting them. And that's why they look red and white. It's really, really cool. It's amazing to see the videos of. It looks like someone's like flashing one with the strobe. But it's cool when you think, no, that's its actual color that's doing that. Yeah, that's awesome. They flash the colors at different speeds and it's thought that it's used for both communication and camouflage. But we don't totally understand the reasons behind their flashing yet. They have very large pronounced eyes. Their eyes are similar to ours in the basic construction. But they're much better at light collection and they have pretty much the same resolution that our eyes have or maybe even better resolution than us. Plus they can regrow their eyes. So, which I think is crazy. Because for us, it's like, when you lose your eye, you don't get that back. It's like such a sophisticated piece of biological hardware. It seems to be really hard to get that built back just the right way. That's really cool. Yeah. So basically their eyes seem to be better than ours in just about every way, aside from maybe aesthetics. I've always wondered if Elijah Wood or Christina Ricci, what they're seeing in the world a different way with their big old eyeballs. You think they can see like a different color than we can? Cash Patel, the FBI Drift. The FBI guys. That easy. The FBI guys. So many colors. Guys, guess how many eggs these creepy little fackers lay throughout their lives? 700 trillion. That's a little high. I'm just sick of lowballing these guesses, so I'd yeah. I guess 7,000. Okay, it's a little low. A female squid will mate multiple times during her short life. They only live about a year. And each time she'll lay a big massive eggs after mating. Each of these masses can have more than a million eggs. And it's thought that a single female humble squid can lay over 20 million eggs during her life. Which is more than any other cephalopod. So cephalopods are like octopi, squid, Mike was close. I was. Yeah. Yeah. How they read that I was a little you said like 70, 100, 100,000, 100,000. Price is right. I probably lost. Yeah. They reproduced their internal fertilizations. You were like these guys. Infinite, infinitely closer than I was almost. You just felt closer to that. I know. Mine sounded a little closer, but because that alien in it, they reproduced through internal fertilization. So they have they have sex. These squids. Good for them. But it hasn't really been documented. So they think they're doing it in really deep water. They have a developed nervous system. They're thought to be intelligent critters, especially for cephalopods. And people like Scott that have spent a lot of time around them seem to think that they're much more intelligent than we realize. They can be somewhat social and often travel in shows in numbers over 1,000. So they can be in really big groups. But those social groups have a dark side too. Bullying. They do have a dark side. Cannibalism is very, very, bullying, cyberbullying. Cannibalism is very common in Humboldt squid. And there are tons of observations of them attacking each other as they feed on other prey. So what kind of happens is when one squid goes to attack something, the rest of them Russian to maybe try and get that food, they often end up just biting and attacking the other squid. In one study in Chile, they determine that other Humboldt squid was the main food source of the local Humboldt squid population. So there's like some populations where this is their main thing that they eat or other Humboldt squid. On purpose? Yeah, on purpose. Aside from each other, they fish, crustaceans, and other cephalopods. They catch their prey with their lightning fast tentacles, bring it into their arms and beak. Their mantle is composed of their organs, a thin internal shell, and an ink sack. We forgot to talk about these. These little bastards love shooting ink all over the place. An internal shell. Yeah, there's like a thin internal, it's like a bone in their mantle. That's the only really hard thing they have besides their beaks and those little teeth. Okay. Yeah, I don't really need to know too much about it. Mainly for like sharks. Yeah, the ink is for a lot of different things, but if you're fishing for squid, I wouldn't wear that tux you just rented for that big gala because there's a good chance a squid is going to gizz some ink all over it. Yeah. So don't wear your tuxes if you're squid fishing. Good tip. Okay. I won't. All right. All right. The ink comes out of your site. They're siphon. It's pretty crazy and it's something they do a lot. Like I think when you hear about these kind of defense systems, like with horn lizards, for example, we've all heard that they can shoot blood out of their eye. It's so rare that they ever do that because it's like so energetically costly and they just have to be like pushed to such a high level. Squid or inking all the time. Like when you watch videos of them being caught, they are just shooting ink everywhere. It's something they do quite a bit and it's used to deter predators and it can be really effective. Hmm. That's cool. They got good defense and offense. They do. Yeah, that's true. Is that ink a byproduct of something in their diet or is it some other process that they mean? It's mucus and melanin are the main two things in it. I don't know how they how they make it. Hmm. Mike, who has the best defense and offense? What? Like in basketball? I don't know. Doesn't have to be. Could be Travis Hunter. Yannis. Travis Hunter. That's a good call. It's got to be Travis, two way player. Yeah. Or Otani, Picharans. Oh yeah. That's a good extraordinary. They're the Tonys of the ocean. Right. And you know, Otani, he's he likes those tanacles too. You have to assume, right? He's Japanese. All right. Hey, call my wife. Calling UK Wild Life. No, call my wife. Here's a cheese knife, Lester. Voice assistance not working for you. With BlackRock investment trusts hands on investing, long term approach to growth and regular dividends, you have a lot working for you. I live in Kent. Get to know BlackRock investment trusts at blackrock.com. You have a lot working for you. Capital at risk, marketing material, BlackRock investment management UK limited, authorized and regulated by the financial conduct authority. They have a lot of interesting things about these humble squid. We could probably talk about their biology for hours. We're going to get back to our story. So Scott jumps in the water in his wetsuit and dive equipment. And because this boat has been fishing for squid, there's already a bunch of squid in the water around the boat. When once, and like we talked about, when one squid finds food or is in distress, a lot of the other squid in the shell are going to follow it and also try to get that food or to cannibalize the squid that's injured. So basically, because this boat was already catching the squid, there were a bunch of squid in the water. And when he entered, he was immediately transfixed by them. We talked about those chromatophores, but really it's worth watching a video because it seems like something that animals just shouldn't be able to do. And Scott was immediately witnessing it firsthand. And it was unlike anything he'd ever seen before. He was so overwhelmed by what he was seeing that he didn't really notice that all of these huge three to five-foot squid were swarming all around him. And when he pulled his camera up and started recording, the first squid rushed in, immediately attacked his camera, and wrapped those two thie tenacles around the bulky camera and pulled it toward his razor-sharp beak. Whoa. But this isn't a show about animals attacking cameras. So you better believe the story doesn't end there. The squid that attacked the camera pushed backward and smashed the camera against Scott's face that immediately shocked him out of his days. And as he looked around, he realizes that he's completely surrounded by squid. Yeah. It's a good move when celebrities, the paparazzi guys, the camera, and their face, and they just shove it right back into their eyeball. I think that should be allowed. I think there should be no, like, not even in the people's public court of opinion, should we ever feel bad for paparazzi? It shouldn't be allowed. That's what I think, too. I think everyone should have like a four-inch buffer zone that if that four-inch gets invaded, you're allowed to do whatever. I don't think that covers you, though. Yeah. Because the paparazzi will just yell at the celebrity still. Yeah. Another squid rushes in and wraps his head and ride arm up in its tentacles, ripping his arm backward and dislocating his shoulder. A third wraps its tentacles around his body and bites into his chest with its beak, easily tearing through his neoprene wetsuit. Oh, wow. So like, once one squid goes for him, they're all just like, game on. Yeah. And basically, what they're doing is they are just trying to figure out if he's food. Like, they're just rushing in and kind of exploring to figure out if he's food or not. So at this point, that he was invading water, privacy with his camera. I don't think so. Yeah. At this point, he has three large squid wrapped around him. His shoulder is dislocated. He's bleeding from a bite and he can feel those sucker teeth ripping it as wetsuit. And to make matters worse, the squid were pulling him deeper and deeper without him really realizing it. But something was about to make him figure out that fact. He went from 40 to 70 feet so quickly and without equalizing that his right ear drum exploded in his ear. I guess there used to be footage somewhere of this whole thing. I couldn't find it anywhere. But you can hear him scream at the moment that his ear drum explodes. Underwater. Basically your scream. Yeah. Underwater no one can hear your scream except for the squids. Not true. That's the thing. Everyone watching the video. All right. Yeah. So basically, he found himself in the middle of what felt like an underwater dive bar brawl and he was getting this shit kicked out of him by some of the rowdy locals. Yeah. But he managed to hurt the arms on him. Yeah. He managed to pry the tentacles off his body, separate himself from the squids. And we pulled them off. They just floated there and flashed their colors and stared at him. And he realized that the squid were studying him and he could see the incredible intelligence behind their eyes. Like these squid were taking in all the information and kind of strategizing their next move. He's shaken from this attack and he doesn't really give them the chance to rush in again. He surfaces, climbed back onto the boat. He's injured in a lot of pain. But the main thought running through his head was how beautiful and intense the experience had been. And he was totally hooked on humbled squid. So for all intents- Again, a curious reaction to the events of the day. I mean, it gives a lot of credit to what I've been saying all episode. Yeah, that once you get tentacles on you, you need them again. It's just a cool feeling. This dude's just a different breed. Like he really likes adrenaline you can tell. And now for all intents and purposes, he becomes the expert on filming humbled squid underwater. He's been a part of a number of different documentaries that feature red devils. During that time, he upgraded his armor. So he uses molded guards that are made out of caviar. He kind of looks like a stormtrooper. Sometimes he dives with full chain mail underneath that caviar. So we end. During these years of filming, he's had a lot of other crazy experiences with squid. Does he have the ink bags? Just to like shoot and squirt away. Yeah, he has a little siphon too. No, he doesn't. That'd be a good idea though. You should dive with him. Another one of the stories I wanted to tell was from the 2000s when he decided to descend to 250 feet below the surface to try and film humbled squid as they fed and hunted in the darkness. So he straps on his armor. He rolls into the water with the weight. And he slowly descends deeper and deeper until it's almost too dark to see. As he sank, he's transfixed by the sight of squid swimming in and out of a cloud of plankton. And then as it gets darker and darker, he has to turn on a halogen light for illumination. And he looks up and he sees all these bioluminescent jellyfish. And he feels like he's like in space from all these jellyfish that look like stars above him. And then something happens in the darkness that really terrifies him. As he's sitting there watching these jellyfish, he sees a huge trail of bubbles in his light like in the distance rising up from the deep. And it's moving toward him. It moves closer and closer until it passes through him and then continues moving beyond him. So basically like he's 250 feet down in the pitch dark and he knows there's a huge animal somewhere below him. That's making this bubble trail. And he can't see it. He has no idea what it is. Oh man. That would scare me. Like there's not a ton that scares me. But if I'm in like dark water and I see a massive bubble trail like move toward me and go through me, that would freak me out. So I don't blame them for being a little terrified. Bubbles in paranormal activity. That's what it gets worse. Yeah. They better not make paranormal paranormal activity bubbles. Dude. That would be so bad for you. I will not watch it. All right. So he's already on edge. He's sitting there waiting for squid. When suddenly he looks up to see about 30 squid approaching him. As he turns in the water to watch them, they all of a sudden shoot away. So he knows something scared them off. His mind immediately turns to whatever deep sea monster made these bubbles. And he's bracing himself from an attack from some unseen predator. When he realizes that as he was turning in the water, his peripheral vision picked up a big dark shape behind him that he hadn't really registered at the time. Slowly he turns around and he imagines it being maybe a false killer whale or some other undersea predator. And he's shocked to see the biggest humble squid he's ever seen. Simply floating there and watching him. To him, this was the first true Diablo rojo that he'd seen underwater. And it was the kind of squid the fisherman would tell stories about. He guesses it's like a seven to eight foot squid. It's floating in the water about 10 feet away. And as they both study each other, Scott's locked into trance when suddenly it shoots forward and slams into him, knocking the air out of him. The arms wrap around his body in his camera and he can feel and hear the beak as it bites at his chest plate. And he hears the scraping sound of the thousands of these little teeth as they scrape over his makeshift armor. Yeah, the squid backs off. I know, just getting a huge hug from like an eight foot squid at 250 feet of water. The squid backs off again. And now behind the big squid, Scott can see dozens of four to five foot squid hanging out at the edge of his light. And he wonders if maybe he's dealing with like a dominant alpha squid or something. He has no idea. This big squid is holding all the little ones at bay. Yeah. I know, I know very little about squid. So I'm not going to say like, oh, they don't have alphas or whatever. I have no idea. For all I know, this is a dumb thing. It makes sense at least that the bigger ones really good at getting food and the other ones can like join in when he's wasting or something. Yeah, yeah, or something. So this squid is absolutely massive. It's a mantle he says is more than three feet thick. It's too big for him to get his arms around. He guesses it probably weighs about 250 pounds. It's covered in injuries and scars. So Scott names it scar. And they continue staring at each other. And after hundreds of experiences with Humboldt squid, this is the first time one is stuck around after trying to feed on him. Because that first like contact was it trying to figure out if he's food. Usually after they do that, they kind of just take off. So I want to read from his own account what happens next. This is from an article he wrote on a website called Deeper Blue and the article's title Dancing with Demons. So this is verbatim from Scott. He swims slowly around me in a circle, keeping close enough to touch during the entire circumference. Although his closeness was a bit unnerving, I find him fascinating. For the first time, a giant Humboldt squid paused to explore me instead of trying to feed on me. Then leave. I reach my hand out to him and I could see his huge eye focus on it. He stops and slowly turns toward my hand and he's as closer to it. He begins color flashing, which was the most intense and dramatic I've ever seen. His color patterns move from tail to arm tips, with waves of red and white resembling ripples from a pebble dropped in the water. He reaches out his right outer arm to touch my hand. Inches away we both pause staring at each other. What will the other do? We both seem to be testing the other. My hand is outstretched to a true Diablo Roho. My heart is pounding. Had this giant ever seen a man before? What does he want to know? Why is he attacking me repeatedly like the others? For 12 incredible minutes we circle, reach out with draw, touch, and test each other. His color flashes are never the same twice and he shows no fear of me. By this time I am being surrounded by up to 100 very large Humboldt squid, but they all stay away. Scar seems interested in my camera housing, so I show it to him. He comes up and spreads his arms completely over it and bites the lens. Scar is so huge, his arms engulf the entire camera housing, and reach beyond it to lay upon my hands, forearms, and head. Scar tenses his whole body instantly as he detects the difference between the housing and me. A second later he withdraws and stops cold. His eyes stare at my forearm and camera housing as if he realizes the difference for the first time. He flashes the unique pattern I have come to know, he flushes deep red, then blanch bright white and stays that way for several seconds. The blanch white pattern has preceded many a retreat after attacks on me. What does this revelation mean to Scar? Whatever the reason for his blanch white reaction, his behavior changed, begins a more purposeful series of circling and touching. Touching my arms, CCR cover, legs, fins, and finally my face. It occurs to me this might well be the first encounter of its kind for both species. I can only describe it as a dance, dance of peace, curiosity, and discovery. Scar and I have just completed the dance of such beauty that my words fall short of explaining it. Two intelligent beings from entirely different worlds, separated by extremes of morphology, behavior, space, and time. So basically this continues and then Scar looks at him one last time and jets off. It's an insane experience. For me, it must be just about the closest thing a person can feel to making contact with an alien because these look exactly like space aliens. I don't know, but truly I feel like this has to be another word. It does sound very alien. Yeah, he's amazing. Especially if you take him at his word, I do kind of question it a little bit as far as he's saying that it just wanted to learn what he is. And to me, it's like, yeah, it did try to bite you five different times and it's using its tentacles and he has this makeshift armor. So to me, part of why it's studying them is just to see if there's any way to eat him. Yeah, he's definitely anthropomorphizing. He's definitely saying that he thinks he understands it's thought process, you know, but it still does some kind of beauty and for sure and like knowledge, there's it's probably somewhere in the middle. Yeah, so he's buzzing from this interaction, but what he doesn't realize is now this big alpha squid is gone and nothing is stopping the hundred or so other squid from checking to see if he's food or not. Oh no. Almost instantly he has the air knocked out of him again as he slammed in the side by a huge squid and feels its tentacles wrap around him. Another wraps up his arm and he can feel the beak biting through his armor and into his wrist as he tries hard as he can to pry these squid off of him. And then another grabs his fins and starts tugging him down deeper. Whenever Scott would move to pry off one of the squid, it would open up another spot for another one to latch onto him. And in a matter of seconds, he's in the middle of a writhing massive squid and the sound of them biting and scraping it as armor, camera and dive equipment is deafening. It's the only thing you can hear. That's insane. He tries to shake them off, but as he does it, his halogen light is like flashing all over the place and creating the strobe effect, which just makes the whole thing even more nightmare-ish and dozens of attacks are launched and he realizes he needs to get out of there and he starts quickly ascending and luckily when he gets back to this plank and cloud, the squid stop their attack. It's like when Agent Smith just dogpies on Nia. Yeah, or all those squid, those squid-like monsters from the matrix that attack the machines. Sentinels. Yeah. As he nears the boat, he realizes that blood is leaking from his wetsuit and the bite on his wrist had actually gone all the way through his chainmail and his armor and the beak could split the tissue on his wrist from the immense pressure of the bite. But he considered a worthwhile price for probably the most memorable undersea interaction of his entire life. One of the most probably in history of any of them. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. There was footage of that, you said, at least partially. He had some footage of scar. Yeah, but I don't maybe know if I saw this exact footage or not. I didn't dig too much. I probably should have. He's logged over 300 dives with Humboldt squid. And in all of the interviews I've read with him, he states pretty emphatically that he is confident Humboldt squid definitely have the ability to kill a human. And that he's interviewed dozens of fishermen. He's heard their campfire stories. And he 100% believes them. Some of them say they firsthand saw people got killed by Humboldt squid or pulled under water and died. A lot of squid experts are quick to say that from their experience, the squid are merely investigating potential food and wouldn't actually kill a person. But what Scott says to that is that these experts have never dove with the really big Diablo Rojos. And then if you went to Africa and only saw cubs, you probably wouldn't think that lions could kill people either. That's kind of what he's saying about the squid that they're interacting with are the small ones. So shots fired squidologists. Yeah. Squid experts. Yeah. All right. Grow a pair and go swim with the big ones. I mean, the bigger lion cubs, I would think it would kill probably kill a person. That's true. Yeah. Well, take that Scott. Yeah. Yeah. It's shots fired at Scott now. Okay. So that's the story and the biology. But because it's spooky season and because squid are often featured in some of I think mankind's oldest nightmares, I wanted Mike to do a quick Mike Smithology moment and talk about the most famous squid cryptid, which is the Kraken. Glad you asked me to do this, Wes, because I found some really cool stuff out about them. But I'm just going to stick to the basics and prompt anyone who wants to learn more. Just type Kraken into an internet search engine. Plenty of material out there to read and learn from. Yeah. So it'll probably come up just like right when you have crack. Right. It probably start. You can just go from there. So that's an interesting proposition because that's where exactly where I'm going to start with this. So there's an old Norse word crack, K-R-A-K-E, meaning a twisted or unhealthy animal, which likely served as the inspiration for the name of the Kraken. So Jeff, I hesitate to give you credit for being right, but on a technical level, you were right. So I have to, I have to. So the legendary sea monsters origins lay off the coast of Norway in Greenland where the inhabitants would tell tales of ships and sailors who mysteriously disappeared while at sea. In Norse mythology and Scandinavian folklore, the Kraken was depicted most often as a giant octopus or squid with tentacles that were so big, strong and long that they could wrap around an entire ship and drag it under the water. One of their earliest written references to the Kraken appears in the 13th century Icelandic or Kar-Oter saga where the Kraken is described as being so large that it could be mistaken for an entire island and sailors who got too close to what looked like landfall would be stunned to see it. An island rise from the water and reveal itself as a living creature and then pull the ship down into the depths. This is the one I found super interesting just because of I'm a big fan of the pirates of the Caribbean movies the first three even. The first one obviously is the best, but I have a lot of time for two and three. So a common myth from Scandinavian folklore, pain, subtraction, hard for four to do. I don't hate it. I really like number four. That's the Penelope cruise one. I don't remember ever being that person. I remember being that for the Matrix four. I know that you used the right for pirate four. Okay, I'm just going to like you, paint me as a person who really likes that mediocre movie, but sure. So a common myth from Scandinavian folklore paints the Kraken more as a cunning predator, controlling fish up towards the surface, which in turn would tempt sailors to come closer towards what looked like a fruitful fishing spot. But when their ship was right where the Kraken wanted it, it would create a huge whirlpool right underneath them, which would drag the boats under the sea before anyone had a chance to escape. Just like in Deadman's chest, the third pirates maybe like that big climactic whirlpool. That is actually that has its origins in actual folklore and mythology. So this is something. Well, so unlike Odin and Thor, the Kraken was not revered as a god to these Norse folk, but instead served as a reminder of the power and the danger of the sea and the relationship between humans and nature. So that's the the genesis of the myth of the Kraken. Yeah, it's really cool. It's really cool stuff. Yeah, I like it. And you can see how a story like that would evolve and turn into what it has, but yeah, it's up to like be at sea forever and see an island and then you go up to it and it's just a cracking. Yeah, just a huge cracking. Yeah, there is a so one of the book that was written in the 13th century, apparently the narrator in this book, he posits that the Kraken is infertile because otherwise we'd see a bunch of them, right? It goes to the Kraken's. Yeah, more many more crack up Kraken is. I think it's just a humble squid that got really big. So I mean, there are giant squid and colossal squid, which are much bigger than a humble squid. And we'll talk about them at some point, not that they attack people, but at some point we'll do another humble squid squid. Everyone knows that they just keep growing if they don't die. I don't know. We know very little about them. Like only recently have we got in any footage of living so it is possible. So that one was as big as an island and they thought it was an island and ate their whole boat. Sure. Yeah. Maybe one sailor is just a really dumb one and there's like a kind of thing in the water and he thinks it looks like an island for some reason. Yeah. Or their ship was like tiny. Right. Yeah, maybe that maybe the sailor was tiny. Like a baby sailor. The ship band. It's just a little baby. Yeah. Right. Oh, baby Vikings. That's a show that someone should make. All right. Let's get into our categories. The first one is your favorite squid from pop culture. It's got to be squid word, right? For me at least. You said, I figured you might take it. So I chose someone different maybe. Maybe it's the same. But I chose handsome squid word. Handsome Squidward. Handsome Squidward. It's important. Or that painting a squid would be really good too. So I could do that. What is that? What do they call it bold in something? That's so funny. You could do the Mario squid. That was very good. Oh, that's a good pick. Yeah. Bluepig. I never really watched SpongeBob. So I didn't pick Squidward. I was either going to pick the crack in Pirates of the Caribbean or like a kind of weird, I thought of old boy, but that was an octopus, not a squid that he eats. True. The boys too. Oh yeah. One that I thought of though that's kind of a weird one is, did you guys ever see the Watchmen TV series? The one that was on HBO? No. Yeah. I really liked it. And there's like squid rain that happens in that world. Yeah. Sometimes it would just rain squid on them. In the Watchmen universe, there's like a huge squid that attacked New York in the 80s and killed like three million people. So I just kind of like that. That's cool. This universe that's kind of grounded in reality, there's also just like squid that rain out of the sky. So I don't know. Do you think one of those squid hit buildings seven people like why aren't people talking about that? Probably makes more sense than the story they're telling right now. Favorite use of tentacles in a movie? I went with Pirates of the Caribbean number two was a Deadman chest. Yeah. David Jones. Where he has his tentacles play the piano. That's a great thing. That's a good thing. In the first Independence Day movie, the weird scientist at Area 51, he gets the tentacle coiled around his neck and then the alien is like talking through the scientist through the window to Bill Pullman. That's a good one. Yeah. So I love that movie so much. Yeah. So mine, I would say I picked the mist. Do you guys remember the movie the mist? Sure. That's probably because I'm in horror movie mode right now. But there's the part where like I just think it's a fun part of the movie because no one really knows what's going on yet and then the tentacle comes under the garage and kills that one kid who's being all cocky. And you see it like touch him and lift off a bunch of flesh and stuff from the hooks and the tentacle. Yeah. And I really like that part of the movie because it's still when like some of the people in the store don't believe them. But the other people had seen this tentacle do this. So it's kind of an interesting part of it. Anyway, it's a great movie. You're right. So the second Pirates is Deadman's chest. I think the third one is that world's end. I got that confused earlier. So correct. And the one you like is what to call it in the fourth one. Fourth four. It's called four. What is that one called? I don't know. I think they even made a fifth one. I have not seen the one with Penelope Cruz is what I call it. Yeah. I've seen the fifth one was really bad with Javier Bardet. All right. Ian McChain was black beard and four though. I know. Yeah, you're right. You're right. Where does Callamari rank on your appetizers? Like if you're ordering appetizers, where is it on your list? Jeff and I actually just got an order not too long ago. And that was the first time probably I can't even remember. I rarely ever get it. I do like it, but it's just I don't like it enough to yeah, it's pretty low. I like it when me and my got it, but it is honestly just like fried. So it's mainly just the fried that tasted good. Like it wasn't so much that is Callamari. Yeah. Yeah. It's really low on mine. I don't like it at all. You don't need seafood, which is great. Yeah. But I mean like squid squid are pretty sustainable, but I've kind of just lost my taste for seafood because I haven't been eating it for so long. I want to issue another correction corner real quick. So yeah. In the subscribe episode I did, we just recorded yesterday. I erroneously called an island a flaccid donut when in reality it was closer to a Callamari ring. So that's I apologize. You guys called me out and I can't can't blame you for doing that. I can't blame you for just seeing donuts and everything. Donuts and donuts. Okay. Yeah. I'm glad we could meet somewhere in the middle on this one because I really felt like I was being attacked and I deserve to be is where I landed. You know, all right. This category is called I'm just squitting or I'm just squitting around. Would you rather uncontrollably shoot a bunch of ink out of your butt whenever you even get slightly scared? And I'm talking like a bunch of ink like you have to go change your pants and there's ink everywhere. Yeah. This second option is going to have to be real bad. Would you rather have your body start flashing red and white really bright like very noticeable whenever you're even slightly turned on? Oh, I'm going option two for sure. You'd rather just announce to the entire everyone you're around that you're turned on. I spend most of my time out of the eyesight of everyone else in the world anyway. That's fair. Yeah. It would make for kind of like some awkward video conference calls when we're recording podcasts remotely. You guys would be like, why are you we're talking about baritacks right now? Why are you? Are you horny? Yeah. I think the key to this is do you get scared more often or get horny more often? You know, right? Definitely scared a lot. I'm sorry. Definitely horny. Get horny a lot more often. So what we're just J.S. in here? Yeah. What's J.S. in just squinting around? Just squinting around. Yeah. I think yeah, so I don't get scared too often and if I do get scared, I think it would actually be something I want because I only get scared for good reasons. So then it might help me out. So you want to hold my pants down real quick and it's income. Yeah, we're squinting. Yeah. Yeah. I think I would do the flashing red and white. Are we talking is startled the same thing as scared because I don't get scared very often either. But I do kind of get startled a lot. Even slightly scared is what I said. So I'd say startled counts. I'm going to the horny one. I think so too, but it's a hard pick. All right. The next category is called squid pro quo and the phrase great work was squid pro quo. Good work here. Squid pro quo means something for something essentially like you are trading something for something. So squid pro quo in this one means you have to trade two body parts with a squid for four daylight hours each day. Which body parts are you picking and during what hours? Wait, I don't understand. You have to trade two body parts with the squid for four daylight hours each day. You can't just say like I'll do it at night and then what happened? You just have you you have those squid parts for just four hours. I'm going to not you have to every day you have to do this exchange. Can I keep that pipe? No, they trade back and they're functional. You can use those parts as like a squid would use them. So which body parts are you picking and during which hours? Do you do like the arms in tentacles count as all of them are one? You could you could trade like one arm one human arm for one squid arm. Not all of their squid arms for one human arm. No one for one for one squid pro quo take two their two best squid arms for my two arms. Yeah. Okay. All right. I like that. What hours of the day are you going to do it? I think it's better. So I'll go peak hours. Let's go noon to four. Okay. So wait, you only get into some really cool stuff. You don't get four hours. Four hours. How many body parts? Two body parts. Oh, yeah. Then this is a couple a little I won't go to gym. I'll go to gym with my arm. I'm going to go from six to ten because that's what I'm going to be watching the most movies and I'm going to take one tentacle and the beak so I can really munch down on some treats like okay with pistachios I wouldn't even really need to shell them. I just crunch them all up. Oh, yeah. I kind of want one of their eyes. Yeah. So I picked the eye in the siphon and the eye just because I want to experience what it feels like to see out of a squid's eyeball and just have like improved eyesight and then the siphon so I can just swim really, really fast and I would do it peak day as well because that's what I like to swim the most. Do your arms go on the squid? Yeah, so you trade them. So oh, I'll switch my name. Okay. I want to switch my brain. My brain is in the squid for four hours. I got full squid for four hours. I like that. All right. Okay. The next category is what would Mike and Jeff do? Let's say you are you jump in the water. You're suddenly attacked by multiple squid. They're latching on to you. What are you doing? Barrel. Barrel roll. Okay. For sure. Barrel. All right. To get all the tentacles off. You want the tentacles off now? I'm not wearing the chain mail. Yeah, that's why I'm not wearing the chain mail. Okay. Yeah, I think I just keep spinning so they can't keep latched on to me. Do you just barrel roll in the whole time? I like it. Yeah. Okay. Mike, what are you doing? I mean, a throw scuba tanks and all their beaks and shoot them. Like Brody doesn't do. I'll use some of a pitch. Yeah. Yeah. I like it. They're going to have to be like little mini tubes, though. They can fit in there. Yeah. They're like bear spray. Like a little bear sprays. No, that's it. So what Scott Castle says you actually should do, and I do think he's probably the leading authority on this is just act the least like prey possible, which what he says is really just kind of staying as still as possible. You can peel them off of you if you need to, but what you don't want to do is like thrash through the water because then they kind of feel like they're attacking prey. So you don't want to thrash or hunt a lot. It's the main thing. Early Metallica would not survive. No, you would not survive if you were also at a Metallica concert at the same time. Right. Okay. A couple of listener questions. I got a few from Patreon here. This one's from Sky. Sky says squid related question. Giant squids have the biggest eyes in the animal kingdom. What do you think are the prettiest eyes in the animal kingdom? And which would you want if you had to replace your own? It's West's, West's eyes are the prettiest. No, that's mine. You guys see. Oh my gosh. Transfixing. Holy macro. All right. Now you're just scaring us. What do you guys think are the prettiest eyes? Mike, you already answered Jeff. What do you think? I mean, probably a type of cat, like a Jaguar leopard or lion, like some hazel, big hazel eyes. Yeah. I like the dark kind of gray of a snow leopard's eyes. That might be my favorites. I think frogs have really beautiful eyes too though. The red eye tree frog. Not the red eyed ones as much, but those are cool. But I even think that when they go like all black, I think that's pretty. It's just really cool. Pretty look. I think if I had to trade with an animal, though, it would probably be a snow leopard. Do panda eyes, do you count the black marking around their eyes? No, never mind. Just the eyes. Yeah. All right. If you guys, this is from Ravioli, if you guys can make a hybrid of any two bear species, what would it be and what would you name it? I'm a big fan of this listener's work. Yeah. I would combine a polar bear and a black bear and I'd name it a panda bear. Okay. Not very. Not very enlightened there, but I like it. I'd combine a panda bear and another panda bear because they got to be having more sex in my opinion. Oh yeah. Then you just have one white bear and one black bear. You think that's what would happen? Or like a white spotted black. Oh, I miss on just the question, I think. I'm not changing my answer though. I think I would combine a sloth bear and a polar bear because I just would want to see what that looks like and I would name it a sloth bear or a pot bear. I'd name it a pot bear. Hoff. Would you have a huge sloth bear? Harry pull. I think you'd have a big old Harry polar bear. It's kind of like gray. That'd be cool. Yeah. All right. One more from Yash. Yash says, thoughts on the movie Paranormon. Big fan. I love Paranormon. I love all the like animation movies. I think it's my favorite part of them. I think I think Kubo and the two strings is my favorite. Kubo's good. What do you mean favorite out of them? From that studio. Yeah. I forgot what it? Lachai. Lachai? Something like that. Yeah. Lachar or whatever. They've did Coraline, Paranormon, Kubo, missing link, box trolls. I think that's it. What's your favorite of those, Jeff? What? That one strong guy in Paranormon is gay, right? Yeah. I think he's a gay. Like he starts out not gay and then at the end he's gay. That's funny. Yeah. It was funny. Is he not gay at the start? I thought the joke was just like she keeps trying to hit on him, but the whole time he's just like not gay. Yeah. I think he's gay. She just doesn't know that he's gay. Maybe the audience doesn't know that. Yeah. Death to the author. Jeff, you could interpret it however you want in its valid. Yeah. I think you're probably right. Okay. All right. I think that's it for Patreon questions. Jeff, did you get any of us or ones? Sure enough did. Okay. From Dizzy Kanski, can animals choke? Yeah. But I think we choke more than they do. But they can choke. Like a lion eating a huge chunk of meat can choke on it. Yeah. Like Greg Norman at the end of a golf tournament. Can they do that? Like they're so close to they can probably choke. Yeah. They can choke their pride. They cheat the Jaguar. Finally, Chase's a down and then misses. It's jump or something. Yeah. Right. That Jaguar we saw in Brazil that moved its foot a tiny bit and then came and got away. Joke. Jeff yelled out. Joke. Kairdert Claude asked can a rattlesnake slither and rattle at the same time? Yes. Yes. To be coiled up. No, they can slither and rattle. Yeah. But it's more it's more common they do it when they're coiled. Mike, you can answer this one too. Aaron M58 West, you can't too. Okay. Kobe or LeBron LeBron for me. Like who do I like more or who do I think is better? Just as Kobe or LeBron question mark. LeBron period. Yeah. Do you like it more? I think I do. Yeah. I think I think it both. I like it more and I think he's better. Yeah. I don't know. Kobe. Kobe got five. Yeah, five rings. Kobe went out at like he died like a good time. Good public. It's a bad time to say that. But I feel like his legacy was cemented. You know, and LeBron's been in the league for so long now that it's kind of hard not to think about like old LeBron when you think about his whole career. You think LeBron needs a helicopter crashed it. Yeah. If LeBron were to die right now, we would all think he's the greatest of all time. Like without a doubt. Yeah. Tibet's 13S. A place you have vacationed or visited that pleasantly surprised you in the lower 48. I had my answer and then you threw in that lower 48. I had a great time when I went to Santa Fe last year. No, Santa Fe was that is surprising. Yeah. Randomly it was it was in June. So there was this huge pride parade going on. You messed up down this. Yeah. I was thinking about saying New Mexico as well. All right. We'll go ahead. Sorry, I didn't mean you're up to you. You go ahead and say New Mexico and then we can move on. No, I want to hear the rest of your story. That was about it. They just had a sweet parade that I just happened to be in town for. Was it Zazobra? Was it the little red headed demon that they worship in Santa Fe? I didn't catch that particular detail. But maybe in your head is it just like Santa Fe every single day has huge gate pride parade. Yeah. Because the one time you went there, they had what? This is how every day is out here. Amazing. Great food too. I had some amazing Mexican food there. I think North Carolina is mine. I never I had kind of slept on North Carolina and the one I went there as like it is beautiful here. Just like gorgeous. The towns I think are really quaint and beautiful. The food was good. I really like North Carolina. I'm going to go with Pittsburgh. Now granted it was one of the first bigger cities I'd ever visited. So it's probably influenced by that. But I sat thought it had a lot of like old charm to it. Yeah. A really distinct feel. I feel like whenever a movie is filmed in Pittsburgh, I immediately can tell that it's filmed in Pittsburgh. Right. Matt Donohuey asks, what's the deadliest animal of all time? Don't say humans though. That's dumb. I mean it's mosquitoes then. It'd be their mosquitoes are rats probably. Ooh the red black plague. Do like a predator. What's the most deadly predator of all time? Crocodiles. Yeah. Like a saltwater crocodile. Yeah. And then like venomous snakes are more than anything. But what if crocodiles had malaria and they could pass that on like mosquitoes, double whammy? You get killed and get malaria. A lot of listeners wanted our thoughts on the new Anaconda trailer. I'm not interested at all. I watched the trailer and it made me honest. I like I hardly could make it through the trailer. Made you. I know I sound like a cramudge in. It just it just felt like shlock to me. It didn't seem fun. The Anaconda was like 80 feet long, like a dragon. And then I'm just kind of tired of Jack Black to be honest. I've kind of had my fill. Did you see? Did you even see Minecraft? No. I don't think you I don't know if you could pay me enough to see Minecraft. Yeah, you that's crazy. You did see that. It wouldn't even be that much. No. So that was my knee jerk reaction too. It was like oh my gosh, how could we like we're defiling sacred ground here? And then I remember we're not exactly talking about high art now here with the original. So go for it. If it ends up being great. Awesome. Then for me, it has nothing to do with the fact that it's like Anaconda and they're ruining Anaconda. It's just looks stupid to me. It just doesn't look good. Yeah. I think if we could though look through Virgin Eyes at that original movie's trailer, we'd probably have a similar. Yeah, you can't complain about how the snakes look because it's not like they ever looked good. But they're like five times bigger in this new movie and I just don't know why they need to do that. Yeah, it's like. Well, did you see the view of all the snakes in the Amazon that was viral like six months ago? No. There's like the snakes were as big as the river. That was AI. That was three. Yeah, you got AI. Yeah. Last last. Kobe. I'm off. XX. What's one thing you'll never do again? For Zbegolf. I will never. I don't think I could ever work a sales job again. Like if something happened to our current situation and like I had to get a different type of job, I don't think I could ever do another sales job. I hate sales. You know, more power to the people that can do it. But for me, I just can't. Yeah. In a literal sense, I did one time I did a drive, a 32-hour straight drive from San Diego or Louisiana San Diego to New Orleans. I just think I literally couldn't. Yeah. I got lost a little bit and had to make it was longer than it needed to be by about five hours. And I was just like, I can make it. No problem. I just had like a mountain dude and was good for 12 hours at a time. But I think my body just couldn't do that. I don't think I could do that either. Jeff, what's your answer? I don't know. Okay. All right. Jeff couldn't come up with an answer to a listener question ever again. One thing you want to do that. I never do again is this question. I'm the only one that had it beforehand. Yeah. That's amazing. All right. I do maybe you scared me a lot of like when I would go to Hawaii doing like easing swims in the ocean. But I think I might do it again. Okay. All right. We're going to move on. Conservation Corner. Never fall in love again. As far as Humboldt Squid are concerned, they're data deficient when it comes to their IUC enlisting. Oh, that's not there. But they're likely a lot of Humboldt squid in the world. Probably many, many more than they're actually even should be because that's a bad mic. Yeah. Data deficient deficient canotes a ton of them that he said really well. Well, less is now saying there's two men. Yeah. I don't know. There's probably too many because we've removed a lot of their predators from the ocean stuff like sharks dolphins, Marlin, large tuna, things that are caught in our inner and wanes. So their populations are probably higher than ever. And they're spreading into places with historic where historically they weren't found. And that's because this currents change and as the oceans warm, we see them move north and into waters where they typically didn't frequent. And when they show up in new places, they actually can be really devastating to the local fish populations. I read an article about a Humboldt squid explosion, a population explosion in California. I knew I had to catch myself there. Now that sounded bad. And in California, when they showed up, the salmon fishery had an almost 80% reduction in salmon, essentially overnight. And the squid there. The salmon fisheries are bad. Not necessarily good. They did. Not if they're managed well. And the squid contributed to the collapse of a 1.4 billion dollar fishery. So when they show up in new places, they can wreak a lot of havoc. So they seem like they're doing just fine. Okay. All right. Let's give them our claw ratings. New animal. Claws. I'm going to give them seven. I think I would really like to dive with Humboldt squid. It sounds like a real experience. And I think that they're flashing and all that stuff they do is really cool. So I didn't think I would ever give a squid this high of a ranking. But I think they're pretty solid seven for me. That's where my brain went. You think they're the best squid? I think they're the squid I would most want to see besides like a giant or colossal squid. So no. No, that's not bad. But I think the giant and colossal, it's more just that they're so rare that I'd want to see. I think squid generally are really interesting. I think I'll give them a six. Yeah. I agree. I'll go seven. Even even the small ones. Well, I guess we're talking about Humboldt. But like Jeff and I saw a couple of squid when we were diving down. That's cool. It's freaking sweet. I saw some in the Great Bear Reef. I saw them in Bonair. When you see them, they are really cool. How they kind of just like hover in the water and then shoot off. Yeah. They really need. All right. We all like squid here. We're pro squid. All right. Well, thanks everyone for listening. It was a fun episode to put together. And as always, we teased it already in this episode. But if you want more content, check out our Patreon. Mike just did an episode on Amelia Earhart and how she may have died a very terrible death by animals. It was very interesting. We've had some really fun episodes on there lately. So check out our Patreon. It's $10 a month. And you get access to an absolutely massive catalog of bonus episodes of subscriber episodes and some really fun extra content. And if you want it just to show right up in your Apple feed, do our Apple Gris Club instead. Same price, super convenient. Exactly. No one gets anything else. The other doesn't. Well, at least as far as content episodes. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Thanks guys. We'll see you later. Love you. Grey wolf. Yeah. The biggest K9 species in the world. I don't think that's true. I guess they're the heaviest in tallest. Yeah, they're not the tallest, but they're the biggest. Okay. Yeah. Because main wolves are the tallest. Okay. Sure. I beg you to main wolves. That's one tough. Yeah. Because bigger is like weight amhyth. Okay. All right. Love you. Bye. See you. Bye.