American Harvest Mouse | Episode 19

[00:00:00] Hello, everyone, and welcome back to another episode of renowned podcast.

[00:00:22] We are your co creators and co

[00:00:25] hosts for the show Mark Schultz and and Alison Hager

[00:00:29] Alison, hi, how are you?

[00:00:31] Great. How have you been? We've had a little hiatus. It's

[00:00:33] good to talk to you. Yeah, you too. Do you want to jump in and

[00:00:37] remind everyone what our noun of this episode is? Yes, our

[00:00:43] our compound noun for this episode is? Yes, our compound noun for this episode

[00:00:46] is the American Harvest Mouse,

[00:00:49] which is a little bit of a departure for us

[00:00:50] based on Mark's fantastic new noun generator,

[00:00:53] which is up on the website.

[00:00:55] If anyone wants to go look at it.

[00:00:58] So this was a little fun, I think.

[00:00:59] It was a little different than what we're used to

[00:01:01] with our one word nouns.

[00:01:04] Yeah, that was generally broader or like

[00:01:06] a concept or something. So yeah, I totally agree with you. This was a different way to go.

[00:01:12] Oh, cool. Well, shall we roll? Let's roll.

[00:01:20] Three, dead in the middle. Three. So, roll again. Die.

[00:01:30] It happens a lot.

[00:01:31] We tie and then I get a six.

[00:01:33] I got a six to.

[00:01:34] Oh, hey.

[00:01:36] When do we go to jail?

[00:01:37] Okay.

[00:01:38] Okay. That's the three of doubles.

[00:01:40] Four or.

[00:01:42] Why?

[00:01:44] Okay, we said it at the same time. So you know, I'm not even messing with you.

[00:01:48] That I'm going to run. I'm going to run the probability of that because it's pretty high or low.

[00:01:56] Pretty low. What am I trying to say? Hello.

[00:02:01] One at the same time. Five. Okay. All right. All right. Wow. This is like a new one for me this year. I know.

[00:02:07] That was amazing. I feel like we should play those numbers in lottery. I mean,

[00:02:11] I think I think lotteries are a waste of money, but honestly with that we should probably do

[00:02:16] 164 or 364. Excellent. All right. So we'll put 15 seconds on the clock for your just the hits as we jump in here.

[00:02:30] All right, 15 seconds to tell me about the American harvest mouse and go.

[00:02:37] This is about to be a very wealthy mouse. Who said this? Why did they say this?

[00:02:43] And what does it matter? That's what we'll be exploring today.

[00:02:46] Nice, four seconds left. Oh, interesting.

[00:02:49] All right. Are you ready?

[00:02:53] Okay. Did you forget for a second?

[00:02:58] And I'm like, all right, I have to go. Okay, I am ready.

[00:03:02] All right. and go.

[00:03:06] Even the smallest and humblest of mammals can leave a significant footprint in the course

[00:03:11] of human knowledge and our preparation for the future.

[00:03:15] Six seconds left.

[00:03:16] I love that.

[00:03:18] The tiniest of mammals.

[00:03:20] Right.

[00:03:21] Like chugladriel.

[00:03:22] Even the smallest.

[00:03:23] Seriously.

[00:03:24] Can change the course of whatever she says.

[00:03:28] Cute, cute, Blanchek.

[00:03:30] I'm watching the tower right now, interestingly.

[00:03:33] Product, cute Blanchek.

[00:03:35] Very different role than Galadriel.

[00:03:36] I don't know that I've seen it.

[00:03:39] Anyway, yeah.

[00:03:40] I'm only always afraid to do how to rock find it.

[00:03:42] Okay, down the mouth's hole we go.

[00:03:44] Yeah. So Mark, I'm praying that as normal, you did the.

[00:03:49] Sure.

[00:03:49] Okay.

[00:03:50] Excellent.

[00:03:51] Because I found so many different like theories on it and it just got confusing.

[00:03:56] So I thought, you know what?

[00:03:57] I'll leave it out because Mark will do it and he'll do it way better.

[00:04:01] Um, okay.

[00:04:03] So we're going gonna just jump right in

[00:04:05] to talking about the American harvest mouse.

[00:04:08] So there are two broad types of harvest mice.

[00:04:11] There's the old world and the new world,

[00:04:13] but our noun was specifically American harvest mouse.

[00:04:15] So that's referring to the new world

[00:04:18] and the genus is right through don'tomists,

[00:04:23] which means grooved teeth.

[00:04:26] So, and it comprises about 22 different species,

[00:04:30] but we only have about an hour in total.

[00:04:32] So I'm just gonna talk about one of these species,

[00:04:36] and that is the salt marsh harvest mouse,

[00:04:39] which is right through dontomus, rather ventress.

[00:04:44] All right, so these are, as Mark already commented,

[00:04:46] these are tiny, adorable animals,

[00:04:49] and I will post up on our website some of the cutest pictures

[00:04:53] you've ever seen of little tiny harvest mice

[00:04:55] sleeping inside of flowers,

[00:04:58] because they climb in to eat the pollen.

[00:05:00] Okay.

[00:05:01] We've probably all seen that there's like memes

[00:05:03] on Instagram and stuff about it.

[00:05:04] Now we can actually post it.

[00:05:05] And now I know it says specifically a harvest mouse. Like I never knew that. So they weigh less than an ounce. They're usually between like two and 2.8 inches long and less than an inch tall. So this is how like absolutely itty bitty. These adorable little critters are. Their tails, however, are generally 120%

[00:05:26] the length of their bodies.

[00:05:27] So they have these incredibly long tails

[00:05:29] and not just our salt harvest mouse,

[00:05:35] but all harvest mice have prehensile tails.

[00:05:38] So that means they can use their tails like a limb.

[00:05:41] And this is important.

[00:05:42] There are only a few mammals that have a prehensile

[00:05:46] tail. And this is the only mouse genus that has the harvest mouse. So it's really good

[00:05:52] for climbing long stalks of grain, thus where they probably got their name. In our case,

[00:05:58] talking about the salt marsh harvest mice, they can climb the really tall long marsh grasses.

[00:06:04] So we're just going to call them

[00:06:05] salties for short because it just gets really exhausting saying they very long compound noun.

[00:06:11] So salties, they can eat very salty food and they can actually drink seawater. They can swim for more

[00:06:18] than two hours straight. They are the only mammal in the world that lives exclusively in marshes,

[00:06:25] neurons. So it's just incredibly like Mark and what you were saying when we

[00:06:29] first created this podcast, this idea of like any random noun could open up

[00:06:33] knowledge for you that you just had no idea or make connections.

[00:06:36] And for me, it's just like, wow, this is a pretty unique creature.

[00:06:39] I just, we tend to think of mice all just lumped together. It's like mice.

[00:06:43] These, these guys are incredible.

[00:06:45] They're drinking saltwater. So line them up for our sci-fi

[00:06:47] future where we need humans to be able to drink saltwater.

[00:06:52] Or they just take over, which, which I think they deserve because

[00:06:56] they weren't discovered until 1908. And just 60 years after

[00:07:01] that, they were already in danger. They were added to both the federal and California lists

[00:07:06] of endangered species.

[00:07:07] They live only in the San Francisco Bay Estuary.

[00:07:11] It is the only place in the entire world they live,

[00:07:14] which is a much diminished area of marshland.

[00:07:17] In fact, between the time they were discovered

[00:07:20] and now between 75% to 90% of their habitat

[00:07:23] has been destroyed by human development.

[00:07:26] With sea levels now rising, that's not helping.

[00:07:29] It's compounding the problem.

[00:07:31] So these little guys are in pretty dire straits.

[00:07:34] The preservation of the salt marsh harvest mouse habitat

[00:07:38] was actually a subject of discussion

[00:07:40] in the 2009 economic stimulus package.

[00:07:44] So the mouse was mentioned numerous times in Congress

[00:07:46] by Republicans such as Mike Pence and Dan Lungren

[00:07:51] to highlight the wasteful spending of the bill.

[00:07:54] So of course, as I think we all know,

[00:07:56] most of the Republicans were very against this bill.

[00:07:58] And so they actually used the salties as an example

[00:08:01] of how ridiculous the Democrats were being.

[00:08:03] And they claimed that 30

[00:08:05] million dollars of the economic stimulus package being proposed would be spent on habitat restoration

[00:08:12] to protect the mouse. The rumor was apparently started by Mike Steele, who's the press secretary

[00:08:16] for John Boehner. So this was the salties 15 minutes of fame. And that was where my quote came from.

[00:08:22] Like one of them said, like, yeah, some like that's a drop in the bucket. Anyway, so oh, I'm sorry, we don't even want to

[00:08:30] spend that to save a species, whatever. Right. And I will talk about what, but so it was, it was

[00:08:35] a huge lie. It was just it was it was absolutely not only a lie, but also even lying, it doesn't

[00:08:40] make sense. It doesn't make sense. Right? Well, shit, I agree. So Republican staffer, like trying to defend the statement

[00:08:45] claims that someone at an unnamed agency,

[00:08:49] he couldn't even point to what agency said to him

[00:08:53] or to his representative that 30 million

[00:08:57] might go to federal wetlands restoration.

[00:09:01] Right.

[00:09:01] We should.

[00:09:02] Has a lot of species.

[00:09:04] Exactly. A lot of species and a lot of other impact. Wetlands are like a critical, like lot of species. Exactly.

[00:09:05] A lot of species and a lot of other impact.

[00:09:07] Wetlands are like a critical, like one of the most critical.

[00:09:09] I think we also talked about wetlands in our episode around CO2.

[00:09:15] Was it highway?

[00:09:16] It was highway maybe.

[00:09:18] Yeah.

[00:09:19] Like the fact that how you handle the carbon dioxide like cycle and so on.

[00:09:24] You need wetlands. They're one of the most important.

[00:09:26] So they took that and turned it into this outright lie to just make the

[00:09:31] package sound really stupid and wasteful. And San Francisco, the San Francisco Bay Area,

[00:09:36] of course, the wetlands are home to lots of a nature species, but with our salties there,

[00:09:44] to lots of a nature species, but with our salties there, I guess these Republican congressmen

[00:09:47] just like naturally concluded that quote,

[00:09:50] the bottom line is if this bill becomes law,

[00:09:52] taxpayers will spend 30 million on a mouse.

[00:09:57] So does anyone really want his or her representative

[00:10:00] regardless of your political leanings?

[00:10:03] Do you really want your representative

[00:10:04] like wasting time in money debating something they know isn't true? I mean, it's

[00:10:08] so angering to me like the waste of time, right? That this created. Anyway, John Carter said

[00:10:15] the Bill Coneyard of $30 million earmark for a mouse in California. They're just so many examples.

[00:10:22] So I'll stop, but I will post in the references, some of the articles I read and just all the

[00:10:26] ridiculous things.

[00:10:27] It was Tom McClintock of California who said this is about to be a very wealthy little

[00:10:31] mouse.

[00:10:32] Okay.

[00:10:33] So that 30 million actually came from as I know.

[00:10:36] I'm still fuming at it.

[00:10:37] I'm still feeling sorry.

[00:10:38] I knew it was going to be like, I knew it was going to be sitting on a husk of a planet

[00:10:42] with like everything burned out and it's just dust and dirt. And yet they're still going to be sitting on a husk of a planet with like everything burned out. And it's just dust and dirt.

[00:10:45] And yet they're still going to be like $30 million for dirt for dust.

[00:10:49] Why are you fixing that?

[00:10:50] Well, also, all these are going to be like, well, see a suckers because we can drink salt water.

[00:10:56] For real.

[00:10:57] Give us a couple million years.

[00:10:59] We'll be the dominance.

[00:11:01] So it after some digging, it actually turns out that that $30 million figure for wetlands

[00:11:07] restoration came from the California Coastal Conservancy.

[00:11:10] It's a state agency and they recommended to numerous federal agencies who were looking

[00:11:18] for lists of what they call shovel ready projects, meaning, okay, if we do get some money, where

[00:11:23] is the biggest need?

[00:11:25] And the California Coastal Conservancy said,

[00:11:26] we are ready to go with this.

[00:11:28] The planning's been done.

[00:11:29] All the engineering assessments have been done.

[00:11:31] So this became part of the stimulus bill.

[00:11:34] The projects actually range from Napa County

[00:11:36] to Silicon Valley and California.

[00:11:38] They involve moving levees, creating islands,

[00:11:41] converting salt ponds that are industrial back to marshes.

[00:11:45] It would benefit dozens of species. It would, of course, the salt is, but also salmon and steelhead trout and ducks and egrets.

[00:11:51] So this really, really broad.

[00:11:54] And the work would also provide increased flood protection to homes and businesses around the San Francisco Bay, which helps human.

[00:12:01] So if you are someone who says, I don't care about the animals, well, guess what? With rising sea levels, flooding is becoming a huge problem in all the coastal

[00:12:08] areas in this country around the world. And this would really help that.

[00:12:12] And also we talked about all the vegetation, all the CO2 recycling, like the whole system.

[00:12:18] Exactly. There's so many levels of benefit here for humans and animals. In fact, in 2003, so about 20 years ago, the Bush administration

[00:12:27] endorsed and helped fund the largest of these projects, right? So, so now that it's become such

[00:12:36] a divided issue is really really frustrating. So that's just yeah, exactly. Identity politics,

[00:12:42] it's not even a divided issue. They just won't even think about it because they won't even think about it.

[00:12:46] Right.

[00:12:46] We're back in the day.

[00:12:47] There were some more thoughtful consideration of it between the parties.

[00:12:51] So so the head of the California Coastal Conservancy, actually, he has a quote that says,

[00:12:55] this isn't school kids planting little springs of plants.

[00:12:58] We are talking about thousands of acres, building levees and islands with heavy

[00:13:02] equipment, and it's at least 100 new jobs.

[00:13:05] Just layering on some more info there. But okay, let's go back to our salties. So

[00:13:11] why should we care that they're endangered? Why should we think that it's important to put this

[00:13:16] money in? Why should we care about them or any endangered species? Well, according to the

[00:13:22] International Union for Conservation of Nature's red list

[00:13:26] of threatened species, which we will link on the website, there are over 26,000 species

[00:13:32] in danger of extinction right now. That is just, I knew it was a lot, but to me that

[00:13:37] is an incredibly daunting number. This includes 40% of amphibians, 34% of conifers, 33% of our refort building corals, 25% of mammals,

[00:13:52] and 14% of birds. In the US, over 1600 species are listed as threatened or endangered. So

[00:13:58] this is a really big deal. And because, as we've discussed before before on different episodes of this podcast, every species is connected to myriad other species, right?

[00:14:08] We all learn in like Earth's school about the food chain.

[00:14:12] Absolutely. I was like, I was like, gonna start singing a circle of life in this piece. Yeah.

[00:14:16] Right. I'll hold my cat up and you can sing.

[00:14:19] Well done.

[00:14:21] So I'm curious if that list takes into account.

[00:14:24] And I would assume it doesn't, which makes it more shocking, right?

[00:14:27] That you have that many, but then you only have probably, I don't know,

[00:14:31] one, I don't know what to call it, one step removed from that, those that would

[00:14:35] rely on them. So they for which they don't include. Yeah.

[00:14:38] Right. So it would just be dominoes, house of cards, whatever you want to call it.

[00:14:41] Absolutely.

[00:14:42] So our salties are one example of this,

[00:14:46] right? And they're a pretty dire example. But you know, again, like if you're wondering why you

[00:14:51] should care, I'll give you the off-sighted example is the impact of wolves in Yellowstone, right? So

[00:14:57] they were hunted to near extension in 1930 by ranchers. And without them, the elk and the deer

[00:15:02] population that they preyed upon thrived and they're

[00:15:06] grazing decimated like the stream side willows and askins which provided habitats for songbirds

[00:15:12] and the stream banks were incredibly susceptible to erosion without the trees which led to

[00:15:17] a decline in songbirds which allowed mosquitoes and other pests that bring illness to multiply. So you see like this very quick chain that happens

[00:15:28] in the 1930s which absolutely you know decimates entire ecosystems as well as impact humans.

[00:15:35] When the wolves were reintroduced to the park in 1995, plant life returned to the stream banks,

[00:15:40] the birds came back, the beavers came back, the fish came back, the insect population dropped very quickly. So you can really see the impact it has. If you don't care

[00:15:49] about the wolves and the songbirds, like what do they do for us? Consider the honey bee.

[00:15:54] That's just insane. That has to make. Yeah. Yep. You know about the issues here. So bees

[00:15:59] pollinate over 250,000 species of plants, including most of the 87 crops that humans rely on for food.

[00:16:08] So the vast majority of what we rely on for food

[00:16:11] relies on honeybees, almonds, apples, cucumbers,

[00:16:14] basic things.

[00:16:16] But of course, in recent years,

[00:16:17] huge populations of honeybees have been wiped out

[00:16:20] by what they call colony collapse disorder.

[00:16:24] It's probably in response to numerous stressors.

[00:16:26] I don't think they've nailed down exactly what it is yet.

[00:16:29] And then of course livelihoods are destroyed.

[00:16:31] So according to a study for the UN,

[00:16:32] the continued loss of species could cost the world 18%

[00:16:37] of global economic output by 2050.

[00:16:39] So these are all my arguments for people who say

[00:16:41] they don't care if something goes extinct

[00:16:43] because things change and like we should be more concerned about humans.

[00:16:46] Well, right?

[00:16:49] If you're concerned about humans, you should be concerned about everything.

[00:16:51] Yeah, it's the depths, mary, mary, mary.

[00:16:53] And it's like, yeah, it does adapt.

[00:16:55] We may not be here for it to adapt.

[00:16:57] Like when it's adapting, it was really adapt.

[00:16:59] Adaptations may be getting rid of us.

[00:17:01] Right.

[00:17:01] It's like we've been stable because everything else has been the same.

[00:17:06] Exactly.

[00:17:07] So with the bee populations using that example,

[00:17:10] the collapse of the bee populations has hurt already many,

[00:17:15] it's a $50 billion a year global honey industry.

[00:17:18] So that has already been like massively impacted.

[00:17:21] Atlantic Cod is another good example.

[00:17:24] So off the coast of Newfoundland,

[00:17:26] right? There, this has been the basis of like the fishing economy since the 15th century.

[00:17:31] Overfishing has like destroyed the life of local fishermen. So there you go. This,

[00:17:37] all my reasons that you should absolutely care about this and why the salties are like a really

[00:17:41] good mascot for this because number one, they are in dire straits and number two, they are so unique.

[00:17:45] And number three, they are so cute.

[00:17:48] So there's actually a prominent theory right now that we are in what is called by

[00:17:55] scientists, the sixth mass extinction that Earth has ever seen.

[00:18:00] So a mass extinction is a very short period of geological time in which a high

[00:18:04] percentage of biodiversity gets wiped out.

[00:18:08] And in this definition, it's important to note that in geological time, a short period can span thousands or even millions of years.

[00:18:14] The planet has experienced five previous mass extinctions.

[00:18:18] The last one occurred 65.5 million years ago, probably the most famous, the one that wiped out all the dinosaurs.

[00:18:25] That was of course the result of an asteroid impact.

[00:18:29] But experts now believe we're in the midst

[00:18:31] of a sixth mass extinction,

[00:18:34] but this time we're the asteroid, right?

[00:18:37] Like there's nothing coming in externally that's doing this.

[00:18:40] We are doing this as humans, right?

[00:18:42] With the burning of fossil fuels, et cetera.

[00:18:44] So if you are wondering what you can do about it, that's doing this. We are doing this as humans, right, with the burning of fossil fuels, etc. So,

[00:18:45] if you are wondering what you can do about it, I am aware that I've gone down a path again that

[00:18:50] sounds pretty fatalistic and dire. But if you're wondering, yeah, like, okay, is there anything

[00:18:57] I can do about it? Absolutely. The biggest things you can do to help are eat less meat. It's the

[00:19:02] biggest thing we can all do. Buy paper products certified by the Forest Stewardship Council

[00:19:07] on any paper product you buy, toilet paper, tissue,

[00:19:10] et cetera, paper towels, you can look for stamp on the back.

[00:19:14] That means they're harvesting from sustainable forests.

[00:19:16] Things are being replanted.

[00:19:17] And I'll post a list of more things you can do on our website.

[00:19:21] So that is my story, how our salties took us down this path

[00:19:24] of talking about a much

[00:19:25] bigger and I think very important issue about the potential mass extinction that we're in the

[00:19:29] midst of. So Mark, hopefully yours will be cheerier. Yeah mine is a little drier but I think in

[00:19:38] combination with yours that you've given you know a call to action and passionate and an important thing to be aware of.

[00:19:46] I think mine is a little bit more book heavy

[00:19:49] because it led me to remind myself of things

[00:19:52] from Earth science and way back when to be like,

[00:19:54] I've forgotten X, Y, Z about this.

[00:19:57] So yeah, I'll go in there.

[00:19:59] It will be different.

[00:19:59] It will be different.

[00:20:00] For a second, because you focused on the salties,

[00:20:03] I do think I mentioned them, but in a slightly

[00:20:05] different way. So at first, I thought, Oh, maybe we looked at the same information, but it's a little

[00:20:10] bit different. It's a little bit different. Okay, take us away. Okay, excellent. So as always, I would

[00:20:16] like to start off with a little trivia to shake it up. So which of the following is not a characteristic of the American harvest mouse?

[00:20:27] Nocturnal, omnivorous, arboreal, solitary, or arboreal?

[00:20:37] So nocturnal, omnivorous, arboreal, solitary.

[00:20:43] It's ar very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very,

[00:20:47] very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very,

[00:20:51] very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very,

[00:20:55] very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very,

[00:20:59] very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very,

[00:21:02] very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very went down this deep thing. I, you know, I didn't interesting. All right.

[00:21:09] Uh, yeah, it says the American harvest mouse is a small, nocturnal and

[00:21:11] omniverse rodent that lives on the ground.

[00:21:14] Uh, and is solitary or it does say or lives in small family groups. So not large social systems.

[00:21:16] Um, but solitary and like maybe a few others, but not totally alone.

[00:21:21] Got it.

[00:21:22] Right.

[00:21:22] No, that makes sense.

[00:21:23] Okay.

[00:21:24] Um, yes, a little stroll down Etymology Lane here as always.

[00:21:30] So let's start with our little friend, the mouse.

[00:21:33] This word has deep roots in various languages.

[00:21:36] I sort of assumed it would.

[00:21:37] I figured when we think of something like this

[00:21:39] that's been around us certainly in our environment

[00:21:42] since the very beginning, probably a revolution,

[00:21:44] like that

[00:21:46] it's probably really deeply rooted and it is we have it in so many languages in slightly

[00:21:52] different variations so I lusted them out here so those languages that pronounce it roughly like

[00:21:59] moose rhyming with goose right so Old English was moose m-u-s old frisian or frisian was moose rhyming with goose, right? So old English was moose and US. Old Frisian, or Frisian was

[00:22:07] moose. Old Saxon, old high German was moose. Middle high German. Old Icelandic, Swedish,

[00:22:17] Danish, Sanskrit, ancient Greek, classic Latin, all moose, which I think is kind of amazing.

[00:22:24] That's amazing. They found that too, because that's where I got confused, because I read some things that

[00:22:28] said it like came from the Sanskrit, but then other things that it didn't come from the Sanskrit.

[00:22:32] It's a thoroughly Indo-European word.

[00:22:34] And then I just went, oh, I think it's so ancient that because you have it in at least that

[00:22:39] pronunciation everywhere, I'm not sure that anybody really knows.

[00:22:42] I think it's like a way back. At least I

[00:22:46] didn't find it. So then a few more that are interesting, very similar but slightly different,

[00:22:52] pronounced moise rhyming with boys is Dutch, M-U-I-S moise. And then pronounced more like Miech M-E-E-S-H phonetically. So Miech would be old Slavonic

[00:23:08] or church Slavonic Russian M-Y-S. Well, that's probably not the actual names. And I'm recalling

[00:23:16] it what there is. And then one pronounced roughly like Malcolm M- O U. I'm sorry. That is Armenian M O W K N.

[00:23:29] Hopefully I'm not butchering that, but in the phonetics, it's supposed to be out as an Oh,

[00:23:33] no, sorry, low. So moken moken. The O W is in low as in low. So moken. And then the last

[00:23:41] one is most likely we where English borrowed it from.

[00:23:45] We are partly a Germanic language.

[00:23:47] So, mouse, M-A-U-S in German is mouse like house.

[00:23:53] The way we say it.

[00:23:54] Okay, so then, interesting, Alison, go ahead.

[00:23:57] You were going to say it.

[00:23:58] I just wanted to add one little thing only with the etymology part though.

[00:24:01] I go into the etymology a bit like you did of the scientific.

[00:24:07] Oh, okay. Good. Then that. So one of the things when I was reading about the etymology that I found adorable is that in Latin, right? So many of the lanes. It's most they didn't differentiate really between rats and mice.

[00:24:18] They didn't have different words for them. So they called, they called rats most maximus and they called mice most minimus.

[00:24:26] Oh, and I just think it's the cutest thing.

[00:24:29] And I was hoping that you would do like an AI generated like Roman Emperor mouse name.

[00:24:35] Oh, yes, I can do that.

[00:24:37] Let's do that for our cover art.

[00:24:39] Sure.

[00:24:39] I think I were nice.

[00:24:41] Excellent.

[00:24:42] Excellent.

[00:24:43] Oh, excellent.

[00:24:48] Okay, so let's journey a little bit into the scientific name,

[00:24:50] right through Adanthemus, which is the genus.

[00:24:53] And as Alison got into it, a little bit of this

[00:24:55] will be rehashed.

[00:24:56] It's our grooved tooth, new world harvest mouse.

[00:24:59] So the term marries, two Greek words,

[00:25:04] The term marries two Greek words, rythros, meaning groove,

[00:25:08] and odantos symbolizing tooth.

[00:25:12] Don't even get me started on the dont, dantos, for teeth.

[00:25:16] You have dental, you have don't, is the French word for teeth.

[00:25:20] So obviously it all branches out. So, Rhythros, Groove, and Odanto symbolizing tooth. So, as you

[00:25:30] might have guessed, the name speaks very distinctive grooves that are adorning the teeth of the mice.

[00:25:37] Also, as Allison said, the grooves are more than just aesthetic. They're essential for the mouse's

[00:25:41] survival. So they play a crucial role in grinding and crushing seeds, which is a significant part

[00:25:49] of their diet.

[00:25:50] But the grooves also allow these mice to break down the tough seed shells, which is why it

[00:25:55] kind of grants them access into it for the nutrient rich, you know, parts of the seeds.

[00:26:01] Another benefit of these grooves and beyond nutrition, they also come in handy when it's

[00:26:06] time for that upward mobility that we've talked about.

[00:26:08] You know, I also mentioned right the cute pictures of them like in flowers or on like

[00:26:12] on stalks of grass or something.

[00:26:14] The mice are expert climbers and they build their nests actually in tall grasses.

[00:26:18] The grooves in the teeth provide extra friction.

[00:26:22] So it helps these creatures actually grip grass.

[00:26:24] So not just the prehensile tail that Allison mentioned as well, but the teeth themselves

[00:26:28] are actually helping them grip and stay secure as they ascend, which I thought was so cute.

[00:26:33] These little things are like gripping using their teeth even.

[00:26:36] It's kind of awesome.

[00:26:38] There's even more to the little unique grooves though.

[00:26:42] Recent studies suggest that the grooves might have a social function.

[00:26:45] Male harvest mice with larger grooves in their teeth seem to have better luck in the dating

[00:26:50] game, hinting that the grooves could be a signal of fitness and dominance. So the jocks have more

[00:26:56] of a groove. Look at my groove teeth, baby. That is hilarious. It makes me a little nauseous,

[00:27:01] but also there you go. That's just nature. I also can't stop giggling out how spit

[00:27:06] we are with these things.

[00:27:07] Like, we're talking about it.

[00:27:09] I keep crunching over anyone who's listening.

[00:27:11] I can't see me.

[00:27:11] Like, they're so tiny.

[00:27:14] OK, so a summary about this, right?

[00:27:16] The groove teeth are a defining feature,

[00:27:18] age and their survival, and their success

[00:27:21] in the wild overall for nourishing themselves

[00:27:24] to climbing

[00:27:25] and to showing off and getting mates.

[00:27:28] So yeah, I just, as always like to do the etymology,

[00:27:32] but not just of mouse, but to actually dive,

[00:27:34] especially for something like this,

[00:27:36] which the scientific name, as we know,

[00:27:37] is always much more descriptive

[00:27:40] and particularly chosen to reflect aspects

[00:27:43] of its physiology, so it was cool

[00:27:47] Okay trivia number two as we move along here

[00:27:51] Which of the following is not a common name for the American harvest mouse?

[00:27:59] cutie patootie

[00:28:05] Plains harvest mouse cutie, petootie, little baby boy. I think I'm all the things I could call it though.

[00:28:14] Plains harvest mouse, eastern harvest mouse, western harvest mouse, prairie deer mouse.

[00:28:19] I mean, I have to go with prairie deer mouse.

[00:28:21] Okay, because I knew all the other ones. You're like, that's different.

[00:28:22] Yeah, the American harvest mouse is also known as the Plains Harvest Mouse, the others,

[00:28:27] but not as the Prairie Deer Mouse at all.

[00:28:30] There are deer mice, but it's slightly related, but different animal.

[00:28:35] Okay, so part two, at the risk of being a little dry, but I promise it, it will certainly

[00:28:42] round out our understanding of the American harvest mouse. I got into

[00:28:47] people are just on the edge of their seat with that cell

[00:28:50] bench.

[00:28:50] After I after a molly D marks gonna get dryer. What? I'm gonna

[00:28:56] get into our taxonomy and the fascinating world. So this is

[00:29:02] the first episode where we have an analysis and mention it because we're using

[00:29:06] our new now generator and we got a very specific animal that both she and I went into, you

[00:29:11] know, the scientific name and everything.

[00:29:13] So it's the first time that we got an animal as our now.

[00:29:16] And this immediately got me thinking about where the harvest mount, the American harvest

[00:29:20] mouse sits in the categorization of all organisms on earth, right?

[00:29:24] Boom. I was like,

[00:29:25] well, I want a picture where it is and the whole grand scheme of things. But more, it made me

[00:29:30] realize that I sort of need a refresher on taxonomy itself. It's been a very long time since Earth

[00:29:37] science class for me. Okay, so what is it tax Taxonomy is the science of naming, describing classifying organisms,

[00:29:45] and it includes all plants, animals,

[00:29:47] and microorganisms of the world.

[00:29:50] It is a scheme of classification,

[00:29:52] especially hierarchical classification

[00:29:55] in which things are organized into groups or types.

[00:29:58] So first, I'm gonna give us the full taxonomy

[00:30:01] of the American harvest mouse.

[00:30:03] And then I'm gonna take a quick closer look

[00:30:05] at what this is telling us as we go through it.

[00:30:08] So hopefully it's not going to be,

[00:30:09] I'm not going to talk about every animal on Earth.

[00:30:11] Allison's probably already gripping being like,

[00:30:13] how long are we going here, Mark?

[00:30:14] No, I love it.

[00:30:15] I love taxonomy.

[00:30:17] But I figured this would give us a breakdown

[00:30:22] at every level why our American little harvest mouse falls into the category so that it does.

[00:30:27] So I'm going to go from top to bottom.

[00:30:30] Kingdom, anamalia, or animals, phylum, cordata, or cordates.

[00:30:37] The class is mammalian mammals.

[00:30:40] The order is Rodentia, rodents.

[00:30:44] The family is, and pardon me while I look at my phonetics

[00:30:46] spelling, crechete today, cretete today,

[00:30:51] which is New World mice and rats.

[00:30:55] The sub family is neotomene,

[00:31:00] neotomene, which is the American harvest mice and wood rats.

[00:31:05] And then we get to the genus,

[00:31:07] which we've already talked about right through Donthamis.

[00:31:09] And then if we go to species, as Allison mentioned,

[00:31:12] the American harvest mouse covers like 20 more species.

[00:31:15] So in fact, I think I might have found something

[00:31:17] that was like in the 30s,

[00:31:19] maybe there's plenty of new ones or whatever.

[00:31:21] There's so many that, of course,

[00:31:23] I'm not gonna go into species,

[00:31:25] because there are several. But wait, there's more taxonomy, which I did not know, because

[00:31:33] it was improved in 1990. And I had to think back, when was I in Earth science class? And

[00:31:37] I want to say it was, you know, it was probably like 90, 91, to be honest, but if it was improved at that

[00:31:46] moment, I'm sure it wasn't hitting the textbooks in New York State anytime, like that fast.

[00:31:51] So taxonomy was improved in 1990.

[00:31:54] So that it was an update to include domains.

[00:31:59] And Allison may know this already, I'm not sure.

[00:32:01] But I was taking those like bio classes in middle school and whatever

[00:32:06] in the late 80s or mid 80s. So yeah, I clearly missed this. Yeah, no, and even as I just went

[00:32:12] through, if anyone noticed, if you might be in the age range of Allison and I, I said family and

[00:32:18] then subfamily and I didn't even realize there were subfamilies. So I grew up in a time period where you learn different mnemonic devices.

[00:32:26] Mine was King PC orders famous genie soup. Sorry, I'll never forget it. So that kingdom

[00:32:33] phylum class order family rates and I don't know if it stuck with me as it is intended to forever.

[00:32:38] King PC orders famous genie soup and that's kept it. But now there's domains at the top

[00:32:44] and there's some families.

[00:32:45] I'd have to think of a whole new thing.

[00:32:48] There's another famous one.

[00:32:49] I don't know if you know what else.

[00:32:50] And but I can't remember.

[00:32:51] I knew a different one, but I did not

[00:32:53] stick with it unlike the other.

[00:32:56] OK, so domains.

[00:32:57] There is a three domain system, a brainchild of Carl Woz,

[00:33:04] an auto candler, and Mark Wielis,

[00:33:07] three scientists who introduced it back in 1990.

[00:33:11] So what was their aim?

[00:33:13] They wanted to classify cellular life forms into three distinct domains

[00:33:17] that they felt like the previous taxonomy structure didn't really cover.

[00:33:21] So bacteria, archaea, and eukarya. And I will go briefly

[00:33:27] into what these are, I promise not too much in pressure. Too late, Alison says. Just kidding.

[00:33:33] Based on key differences.

[00:33:35] I'm just kidding, I love this.

[00:33:37] So bacteria, archaea, and eukarya. Based on key differences in ribosomal RNA sequences.

[00:33:46] Anybody?

[00:33:47] Ribosomal RNA has made a big splash in the world

[00:33:50] with COVID and vaccination technology that was used.

[00:33:56] So RNA sequences, cellular membrane, lipid structures,

[00:34:00] and antibiotic sensitivity.

[00:34:02] So you might wonder, what on earth

[00:34:04] is this ribosomal RNA?

[00:34:06] If you think of RNA as one of the key performers

[00:34:08] on the cellular stage, right?

[00:34:10] It's found in cells and it plays a pivotal role

[00:34:13] in protein synthesis, making proteins, right?

[00:34:16] Acting as a scaffold,

[00:34:18] more or less to assist in the formation of bonds

[00:34:21] between different molecules

[00:34:23] as the proteins are being built. So picture this, you're trying to sort

[00:34:28] and classify a collection of organisms.

[00:34:30] You would look for some common trait, right?

[00:34:34] So they went this deep into it.

[00:34:36] In this case, we're looking at what's called a 16S-RRNA gene.

[00:34:41] This gene is relatively conserved among organisms

[00:34:44] with both, you know, conserv, and A gene. This gene is relatively conserved among organisms with both, you know,

[00:34:47] conserved and variable regions within it. So basically, it becomes a key that you can use to

[00:34:52] sort of differentiate. So by amplifying the gene through a call, a process that's called PCR,

[00:34:58] we can compare its sequence with a database of known sequences. And the similarities and the sequences then can

[00:35:06] reveal evolutionary relationships and help us group organisms into these three domains. So they

[00:35:11] basically unlocked away to be a bit more specific, right, than just kingdom is basically being, I

[00:35:19] think, or say animals and plants and I'm missing one. There's another one. Come back to me.

[00:35:25] Oh, animals plants.

[00:35:26] I think bacteria and fungi, right? Yeah, yeah.

[00:35:28] Yeah.

[00:35:28] We're going to

[00:35:32] Okay, so what are these domains? Let's break it down really briefly. Bacteria,

[00:35:37] we're going to know this, but tiny single-celled organisms, omnipresent in environments ranging

[00:35:42] from soil and water within our bodies, microscopic entities,

[00:35:46] void of a nucleus, the exhibit, an array of shapes, et cetera, et cetera.

[00:35:52] Arcaya, so just like bacteria, these guys are tiny and they lack a nucleus.

[00:35:57] However, they're distinct genetic and biochemical characteristics allow them to thrive in extreme

[00:36:02] environments. So you might have heard news around these living

[00:36:05] in like deep sea vents around like lava

[00:36:07] and like just wildly high temperatures, et cetera.

[00:36:11] But despite their hardiness, they can also live comfortably

[00:36:14] in everyday habitats like soil

[00:36:16] and even the human gut has some yay.

[00:36:20] Just tell how thrilled, actually, I'm sure you are,

[00:36:23] geeking out on this.

[00:36:24] Hey, and because so much of our, you know, our makeup is not us.

[00:36:29] Right. Totally. Right.

[00:36:31] I forget what the percentage is, but it's incredibly high, how much of our bodies are

[00:36:35] actually made up of other organisms mostly bacteria.

[00:36:40] Okay. And then lastly, we have the eukarya, a group including multicellular complex life

[00:36:45] forms like animals, plants, fungi, etc. and protests. And they are characterized by the presence of

[00:36:52] a true nucleus and other membrane-bound structures within the cells, adding an extra layer of complexities.

[00:36:58] Right, so we are a part of that group, obviously. Okay, so now I'm going to zoom in on the American harvest mouse and traverse

[00:37:07] the taxa, oh, I really went to town writing this and traverse the taxonomic levels to understand

[00:37:12] the unique traits that make up its identity. So let's kick off with anamalia, animals,

[00:37:18] such as the harvest mouse are made up of eukaryotic cells. Yeah, we have a new vocabulary,

[00:37:23] we know understand what that is, and our multicellular in nature.

[00:37:27] They are heterotrophic, meaning they obtain their nutrients from external sources and

[00:37:32] can move around freely.

[00:37:34] They have sensory organs and unlike plants, they lack cell walls.

[00:37:38] And that totally hit me as I was like, oh, yeah, I can see my desk in Earth Science

[00:37:42] bus, to be honest, probably.

[00:37:43] And I was like, oh, gosh, like, I can see, bus, to be honest, probably. And we'll say, oh gosh.

[00:37:45] Like, I can see, you know, we have flashes of old textbooks

[00:37:48] and things like that.

[00:37:49] I can literally probably see a diagram of like this

[00:37:51] as a plant cell wall and animals don't have that.

[00:37:55] They reproduce sexually with both complex nervous systems

[00:37:58] to boot.

[00:38:00] OK, moving down a level.

[00:38:01] We enter into our American Harvest Mouse's next level,

[00:38:05] Cordata, for Cordates. They possess what's called a nodocord or a flexible rod-like structure,

[00:38:14] running along the body's length that provides support. They also have a dorsal nerve cord,

[00:38:20] which develops into the central nervous system, right? And I always thought that it was

[00:38:25] all about the spine and that like the nerve cord, but they also have a pharyngeal slits or clefs,

[00:38:33] which is interesting. And not to mention they boast post anal tail and a closed circulatory

[00:38:39] system. So cordate, so that right that the length of that isn't just the spine and like the nervous system, but off tail related there as well.

[00:38:50] Okay, they're moving down a level into the class, mammalia, which comes from the Latin word mama signifying breast.

[00:38:58] I think we're probably at this level getting into more popular science types of things where we understand mammals and breast milk, etc.

[00:39:02] into more popular science types of things, where we understand mammals and breast milk, et cetera.

[00:39:05] Mammals like our harvest mouse have hair or fur.

[00:39:08] Our warm blooded have mammary glands

[00:39:11] for producing milk for their young.

[00:39:13] They also have a muscular diaphragm,

[00:39:15] three middle ear bones and specialized teeth.

[00:39:19] I totally, I feel like I knew that the middle ear part,

[00:39:23] which I know is so pivotal for balance. And so it's not hearing so much. It's like balance.

[00:39:31] And something else regulates like regulating our senses. But I didn't

[00:39:34] realize that was a defining feature of mammals, which I think is pretty cool.

[00:39:38] Isn't it also that mammals give live birth?

[00:39:41] Um, except for platypuses that I don't have here, but I'm pretty sure it is because reptiles are eggs.

[00:39:49] I just remember that from middle school, but don't.

[00:39:51] I mean, nobody quote me on that.

[00:39:53] No, that's quite, quite possible.

[00:39:56] The last thing I had here was specialized teeth, which I think certainly comes to the

[00:40:00] fore with our little grooved teeth buddy, who's not only using it to crush seeds, but

[00:40:04] to play Indiana Jones on.

[00:40:07] I mean to attract the ladies.

[00:40:09] I'm in and that hello.

[00:40:11] Look at my grooves.

[00:40:15] Ending the advanced cognitive abilities thanks to their complex brains.

[00:40:19] So complex that they can eventually be so egotistical as to destroy the planet and make

[00:40:23] up excuses with their cognitive abilities.

[00:40:28] Teaky.

[00:40:29] Yay, the end of the world.

[00:40:30] Just kidding.

[00:40:31] Kind of.

[00:40:32] Now to the order down to the order Rodentia derived from the Latin verb Rodare meaning to

[00:40:39] gnaw.

[00:40:41] Rodents have a pair.

[00:40:42] It's just constant etymology.

[00:40:44] I can never resist it to gnaw.

[00:40:47] But if you ever heard of where the rodents come from,

[00:40:49] rodents have a pair of continuously growing incisors.

[00:40:51] That freaks me out.

[00:40:52] They never stop crying.

[00:40:54] Used for gnawing and chewing.

[00:40:56] They may have cheat pouches.

[00:40:58] Cute for storing food and exhibit adaptations

[00:41:01] for digging and burrowing.

[00:41:03] Many are active during the night or at dawn or dusk.

[00:41:07] Crapuscular, love that word.

[00:41:09] Rodents are known for their high reproductive rates

[00:41:12] and diverse habitats.

[00:41:14] And they play a significant role in their ecosystem.

[00:41:17] Republicans, yep, won't swear on our podcast.

[00:41:22] I mean, I guess I can.

[00:41:23] Anyway, moving down taxonomy as we continue on

[00:41:26] to the family of rodents called Crichet today. So this combines Greek and Latin roots. And it's a

[00:41:36] fun mix. It's a fun mix. I don't know. It's like I'm selling a car of cricos, the Greek word for ring and Crichetus, the Latin term for hamster,

[00:41:48] which I think is hilarious. For hamster. Yeah, ring hamster. So these creatures,

[00:41:56] although commonly known as hamsters, are more than meets the eye ranging from small to medium

[00:42:02] in size, the Crichetidae day family hosts an array of body types.

[00:42:06] Though most members share a rounded body shape with short legs and a stubby tail,

[00:42:12] which makes them cute to us, right? I mean, honestly, I'm making that cute face again.

[00:42:16] Also, I have another idea like ring hamsters making me think like there's this fellowship

[00:42:20] that's trying of rodents that's trying to get a ring to Mordor and like one's a hamster and one's a harvest mouse and I'm gonna need you to make that too.

[00:42:28] Done. Better take notes. Got a, got a list.

[00:42:33] Okay, so their diets are as varied as their sizes. Some critique today members primarily feast on plant material, designating the cells as herbivores while others enjoyed more diverse

[00:42:46] designating the cells as herbivores, while others enjoyed more diverse menu, including plant matter, seeds, insects, and even other small organisms, which of course makes the mamma bores. So where do

[00:42:52] these little critters live? They're remarkable architects. Many Crichet today rodents excel at

[00:42:58] burrowing, nesting, creating intricate systems for shelter, safety, and raising their offspring. Perhaps even making nests.

[00:43:05] Would you call that construction mark?

[00:43:06] Yes, I certainly would.

[00:43:10] More advanced than just piling things together.

[00:43:13] Oh.

[00:43:14] Especially right. Our American harvest mouse.

[00:43:17] What I didn't dig into what I would love to see how they build their little nests in the sky, basically, from their perspective.

[00:43:24] Right. Like above ground and grasses. I would love to see how they build their little nests in the sky basically from their perspective, right?

[00:43:25] Like above ground and grasses, kind of crazy.

[00:43:30] So one feature that truly sets this family apart

[00:43:33] is the prominent and expandable cheek pouches,

[00:43:35] perfect, restoring and carrying food, as I mentioned.

[00:43:39] Now, if you're a night owl,

[00:43:41] you might catch these little guys kind of in action.

[00:43:44] Most of the crochets today are nocturnal.

[00:43:49] What else? What else?

[00:43:50] So they don't believe in family planning.

[00:43:54] They boast those really high reproductive rates, actually, as we mentioned.

[00:44:00] So a little bit, you mentioned now, like the new world.

[00:44:03] So despite being commonly known as New World rodents,

[00:44:07] their habitats are pretty diverse.

[00:44:10] You can find critte today members in grasslands,

[00:44:13] forests, wetlands, as we talked about,

[00:44:16] and even agricultural areas.

[00:44:19] So the New World is simply a term used to distinguish them

[00:44:21] from Old World rodents,

[00:44:23] which is of a different family,

[00:44:30] Muradai. Muradai? Yeah. M-U-R-I-D-A-E.

[00:44:36] So, very related, but I think they just use that in the taxonomy to say the others from other parts of the world. So, while Criches today call the Americas their home,

[00:44:40] Muradai, so usually found in Europe, Asia, and Africa.

[00:44:44] Muraday, so usually found in Europe, Asia and Africa.

[00:44:50] Which is bringing like five old vibes to me now to be like... Absolutely.

[00:44:50] Like a new world of whole thing.

[00:44:53] I was actually looking up to see like are there any either animated movies or children's books

[00:45:00] where the mouse character was specifically a harvest mouse, right?

[00:45:02] Was it a little a harvest mouse or was he a field mouse or was he a deer

[00:45:05] mouse, right? But I couldn't find much.

[00:45:07] Right.

[00:45:07] Exactly.

[00:45:08] He certainly wasn't a little white skater mouse from the 90s film or whatever.

[00:45:12] That comes me off. Anyway, I'm just cranky old man now.

[00:45:16] Forget it.

[00:45:17] Older. Like I had the very specific book with the great beautiful illustrations

[00:45:21] that you can see as a little hat and he was very thin.

[00:45:24] And oh gosh,

[00:45:25] anyway, so let's delve deeper into Crichet today and meet the subfamily. Neatomeday derived from

[00:45:32] the Greek work term for newer. Neatomeday includes over 300 species, mainly small rodents,

[00:45:41] and they're distinct for their cranial characteristics and they inhabit a variety of habitats

[00:45:46] from deserts to forests to grasslands.

[00:45:48] Interestingly, summer pests, while others contribute

[00:45:51] significantly to scientific research.

[00:45:53] I wouldn't say any of them are, you know,

[00:45:56] it's probably being a little harsh,

[00:45:57] but the scientific research part,

[00:46:02] I'll get into it a little bit more soon.

[00:46:04] So moving further down, coming to the end here to the taxonomy ladder,

[00:46:08] we land at the genus that we talked about right through Dontomus,

[00:46:11] or Rethr Dontomus that we discussed.

[00:46:14] And I won't go any further than that, as I mentioned,

[00:46:16] because there's more than 20 of the species level.

[00:46:19] Okay, trivia number three, our final trivia for my rabbit hole. Which of the following is the smallest species

[00:46:28] of harvest mouse?

[00:46:30] Is it western harvest mouse, salt marsh harvest mouse,

[00:46:35] full-vis harvest mouse, or plains harvest mouse?

[00:46:40] Salt marsh harvest mouse.

[00:46:41] Yeah, exactly.

[00:46:43] Like a softball question.

[00:46:44] I was well, right, I was well prepared for that one.

[00:46:48] The salt marsh harvest mouse, as Allison mentioned,

[00:46:51] right through Don Thomas, rather than Tris, is the smallest species of harvest

[00:46:56] mouse, as you already said. I wonder, do our dessert data compare 2.5 to 3.5

[00:47:01] inches in length? Oh, I had 2.2 to 2.8. But yeah, that's basically, yeah, yeah.

[00:47:06] Great. Okay, very final mention in my last part here. So that's putting taxonomy aside. Everyone

[00:47:16] give you a second to heave a deep sigh, really. But I mean, I was joking aside, I love to doing

[00:47:22] that because I really, it refreshed, you know,

[00:47:27] what I consider one of the clearly one of the most foundational classification systems

[00:47:30] that we have to understand animals in the world around itself.

[00:47:35] The American Harvest Mouse is a seemingly modest creature, but it's significantly contributed

[00:47:40] to various scientific fields.

[00:47:43] It's proven to be a remarkable resource for understanding

[00:47:45] genetic diversity, speciation, environmental adaptability, and disease dynamics.

[00:47:53] Lesson up GOP. So beginning with, not just the salt, Marsh, but the whole species, all 20 some

[00:48:01] odd. So beginning with genetics, the American harvest mouse serves as an excellent specimen for

[00:48:06] studying diversity and speciation, right?

[00:48:08] Delving into its genetic makeup, researchers have deciphered population structure, traced

[00:48:14] evolutionary relationships, and even documented the creation of new species within the genus

[00:48:19] right through Donthamus.

[00:48:20] So it's always exciting when we can find and really identify new species altogether.

[00:48:27] This exploration provides fascinating lens

[00:48:29] into intricate workings of evolution itself.

[00:48:35] I have to pause and hopefully the chances

[00:48:38] he would ever hear this are so nil,

[00:48:39] but I had a trainer like 15 years ago or something.

[00:48:42] Good guy, you know, but a trainer a little bit tiny,

[00:48:46] not to, you know, pigeonhole, a little bit of a meathead. And at one point, I think he just

[00:48:50] was brought up in a very Midwest sort of like limited education place. And when I, I don't know

[00:48:56] how we were talking about evolution, well, he was training me. But he just, I mentioned evolution,

[00:49:00] and he was like, well, yeah, but they've totally just proven that right. And he like legitimately thought

[00:49:05] it was disproven. And I think I like dropped my weight. I'm

[00:49:08] like, I'm sorry. No, no, it is evolution is still going

[00:49:13] strong, bud. What? Anyway, so the fact that, you know, my last

[00:49:19] sentence, there was intricate lens into the workings of evolution

[00:49:21] itself. Yes, yes, it is brought Prothax and traumatic, traumatic memories.

[00:49:25] There's theirs. What? Okay, so next we turn our attention to the mouse's adaptability to various

[00:49:30] environments. I love that Alston mentioned drinking salt, saltwater, he said, for the salt marsh in

[00:49:39] particular. But just in general, I think they've been studied to see how they adapt, which sadly

[00:49:44] will probably be relevant

[00:49:45] for more and more species as we either try to save them or we try to adapt ourselves.

[00:49:51] So this adaptive view, sorry, yes, so ranging from, you know, where they live, grasslands,

[00:49:58] wetlands, and forests, and the adaptability is demonstrated in a study titled Effects of Natural and Anthropogenic Change

[00:50:07] on Habitat Use and Movement of Endangered Salt Marsh Harvest Mice.

[00:50:12] So there you go, with the salties.

[00:50:14] I knew I was mentioned somewhere in a slightly different way

[00:50:17] by Smith and colleagues.

[00:50:19] So the research explored how male salt marsh harvest mice

[00:50:23] seek refuge during high tides,

[00:50:25] during high tide events and how human induced environmental changes influence

[00:50:30] the mouse's behavior.

[00:50:33] So the findings underscored the importance of healthy intertidal vegetation,

[00:50:39] from biodiversity conservation, intricate, you know,

[00:50:42] I'm sure this study was probably used in the justification

[00:50:45] for everything that you're just talking about, right? Is your cat losing his mind?

[00:50:51] I'm so sorry. It's not watching my cat was in my lap. And he just sneezed about 12

[00:50:57] times in a row. Oh, I thought he was shaking his tail. That's so cute. I mean, he was that

[00:51:02] he was like sneezing 12 times. I don't know. Maybe it's getting all excited

[00:51:06] by all this talk about mice.

[00:51:07] Right. Just years it. That's really good.

[00:51:10] Gosh, if anyone can hear that, I'm so sorry.

[00:51:13] I barely heard it myself. That's really fun.

[00:51:15] Okay. So sorry. Go ahead.

[00:51:17] Oh, no, of course. I just, I think the probably some, this research I would think was used partly as the justification for the bill you were talking about.

[00:51:28] I don't know that for sure, but talking about how important they are to, you know, to support the vegetation the biodiversity of the area etc.

[00:51:37] So however the study also highlighted the need for more comprehensive research, including females the young sub, subadults, etc. They just focused

[00:51:46] on males for some reason. I don't know why. Because they got those groovy teeth.

[00:51:51] Right. So then moving into the field of comparative genomics, the American, I just love how the

[00:52:00] American harvest mouse shows up in these like major pillars of science. So comparative genomics, the harvest mouse has gained some prominence.

[00:52:09] Researchers, by comparing its genetic makeup with other rodent species, have identified

[00:52:14] similarities, differences, and trace the evolutionary pattern.

[00:52:18] So these insights help unravel sort of broader evolutionary history of rodents and shed light

[00:52:24] on the genetic basis

[00:52:26] of a lot of those rodent traits, which looks great.

[00:52:30] Anything we can shine a light on and understand more,

[00:52:32] all about it.

[00:52:34] So lastly, they also play a critical role

[00:52:36] in disease research, acting as a natural host

[00:52:39] for certain pathogens, including Hantibiruses.

[00:52:43] So this interaction has expanded our understanding of

[00:52:46] zoonotic diseases in general and their transmission dynamics between animals and humans. So, you know,

[00:52:53] can't get more relevant than that, frankly, lately, unfortunately. And with climate change,

[00:53:01] that those types of jumps are expected to become more frequent.

[00:53:04] with climate change that those types of jumps are expected to become more frequent.

[00:53:12] As an environmental indicator, changes in the populations of American harvest mice overall can reflect broader implications for environmental transformations, including habitat loss and

[00:53:17] fragmentation. And finally, in reproductive and behavioral studies, the Mysis prolific breeding capabilities, short lifespan and adaptability can make them ideal for investigating influences on reproduction and behavior, perhaps behavior like flaunting their large groove teeth if they have them. In conclusion that these humble little guys and girls and gals underscore the grand lessons we

[00:53:46] can learn from even the smallest creatures, which is partly why my just the hits today was about

[00:53:51] this. Even the smallest creature can change the course of history. It provides invaluable,

[00:53:58] they provide invaluable insights into genetics, environmental adaptations, as I mentioned, diseases, etc.

[00:54:06] And that is my mouse burrow poll something for this week.

[00:54:11] I loved it.

[00:54:11] I loved the refresher on taxonomy, absolutely.

[00:54:14] And you said tiny creatures.

[00:54:16] Again, it just reminded me about all creatures great and small, which is a

[00:54:20] series of books by James Harriet, who was a British veterinarian, rural, you know,

[00:54:24] farm veterinarian, um, back in the earlier part of the 20th

[00:54:28] century. And PBS has done an amazing series on it from the 80s when I grew

[00:54:32] up, but it's been rebooted in the past several years. And you can watch

[00:54:35] it on your PBS channel. And it is delightful. It is so well done.

[00:54:41] And I highly recommend it. So actually,'ll make it. I've never seen it.

[00:54:45] I'll have to check it out.

[00:54:46] Mark, it is truly delightful.

[00:54:50] All right, well this was great because honestly,

[00:54:52] I can tell that both of us have become totally smitten

[00:54:55] by these little critters,

[00:54:57] like all the research and all the pictures.

[00:54:59] And like I said, I'll put some links

[00:55:00] to some of the most adorable pictures

[00:55:02] you've ever seen of mice up there.

[00:55:05] Yeah.

[00:55:06] But okay, here's my big question.

[00:55:07] I already know what Mark Steak's going to be, but I still think it needs to be asked.

[00:55:11] So tying in also with my whole, we're talking specifically about an animal here and then

[00:55:16] tying in with my whole extinction theme.

[00:55:18] So there are people, a very large number of people in this world who believe humans are

[00:55:24] the kings of the earth,

[00:55:26] that we are ordained by God to rule over the animals.

[00:55:29] Says something like this in the Bible

[00:55:31] and there are people who believe,

[00:55:31] look, we animals are here for us to eat,

[00:55:35] for us to utilize and if things go extinct,

[00:55:37] that's fine, we've already talked about why it's not fine

[00:55:40] if you wanna broaden your thinking.

[00:55:42] But I of course don't see it this way.

[00:55:44] I don't think that we are that much more superior,

[00:55:47] but can an argument be made that we are in fact superior

[00:55:52] to the other animals because we have consciousness?

[00:55:58] Which is always what's listed as setting us apart.

[00:56:01] I mean, other animals have degrees of consciousness.

[00:56:03] Thank you, I totally agree.

[00:56:05] Okay, done.

[00:56:06] Jack, that was interesting.

[00:56:07] Right.

[00:56:08] And I think it's all a spectrum.

[00:56:10] They're not perhaps as, well, no, I'm curious as conscious.

[00:56:14] Yeah, no, I think that's fair.

[00:56:17] But yeah, we're no way.

[00:56:18] I mean, we talked about octopo, wait, I'm going to say it wrong because you corrected

[00:56:24] me once octopoises, not octopoises.uses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octopuses octop If anything, I feel like we being the most conscious,

[00:56:45] the most, I will say we're the most cognitively gifted

[00:56:53] or unless we find out that we're the most gifted

[00:56:57] of a combination of cognition and the ability to act on it

[00:57:01] in a certain way, like perhaps we're gonna find that

[00:57:04] like octopus is wildly

[00:57:07] smart but can't, so I don't know what your cat's gonna do.

[00:57:11] It's so funny I watch you over my shoulder

[00:57:13] like about to count.

[00:57:14] He's never in frame that much.

[00:57:16] We talked about mice for the last hour and he is.

[00:57:20] And now yeah, we're talking about consciousness

[00:57:22] and animals understanding.

[00:57:23] Well, apparently his English has gotten very good.

[00:57:26] He breaks the whole thing and finally speaks.

[00:57:31] It's like, oh, we can talk the whole time.

[00:57:33] You met.

[00:57:34] So yeah, obviously you called it.

[00:57:37] I agree that we are not.

[00:57:39] And there's a whole host of reasons why

[00:57:42] to also say that we are like the absolute best. Well, how are we defining that we're

[00:57:49] The best even when you saw me just struggling with was a combination we can think and then act on it in certain ways

[00:57:53] But I'm sure you could look at certain animals that do certain things much better than we do

[00:57:58] that are more gifted in in a lot of

[00:58:00] other ways

[00:58:02] That being said I do think we have a responsibility as being certainly

[00:58:07] the dominant species dominant in terms of our, gosh, what do I want to say, our power, our

[00:58:18] ability to have impact and clout, like we can certainly.

[00:58:22] Well, almost like stewardship, like we have, we feel like we have this responsibility because of our level of cognitive ability

[00:58:30] and opposable thumbs to be a steward of the earth and the animals versus dominate them

[00:58:38] and use them to our will.

[00:58:39] So yeah, I think, I think you and I totally agree.

[00:58:41] And you mentioned octopuses.

[00:58:42] I mean, they've done study after study

[00:58:45] on how conscious they probably are.

[00:58:48] And to your point, we're just defining it one way.

[00:58:50] We don't understand enough to understand, right?

[00:58:52] Like how they view the world and how they view themselves.

[00:58:55] But there are enough studies with them

[00:58:56] that we know that they have a sense of self consciousness,

[00:58:59] which is fascinating.

[00:59:01] And they're still doing studies on dogs and dolphins

[00:59:03] and all of that to test the same thing.

[00:59:05] So I guess then the flip side of my question is, at this point, like, do we just deserve to go extinct as a species?

[00:59:12] Because we're doing it to ourselves.

[00:59:15] Something about it, and I'm not sure what it is, the deserves trips me up because that it feels like there's some level of

[00:59:32] logic or judgment hanging above it that can make sense of deserves versus not. And I don't think that exists. But I do feel like maybe it's not deserves. I wonder if because evolution is evolution,

[00:59:49] evolution is evolution, we, what am I trying to say? It's like if you look at this, what am I trying to say? If you look at the system of species surviving over time, right, and

[00:59:55] you just look at it as massive, almost like this color coded thing, certain species have,

[01:00:01] you know, we say the term, we had a good run. They have a good run because they had a combination of specific physiological traits and a level of cognition or a level of something that suited them to have a good run and then fade out.

[01:00:15] Perhaps our Achilles heel is what we kind of talked about are the way that we don't take on stewardship, the way that

[01:00:26] we don't equalize with our environment.

[01:00:29] It's like the cue, the matrix and the famous line from agent Smith being like you are a

[01:00:34] virus, right?

[01:00:35] You just consume and leave waste behind.

[01:00:38] It's like, does that make sense?

[01:00:40] Makes complete sense.

[01:00:41] Yeah.

[01:00:42] And so I don't know that we deserve it, but I think it might just be in our nature to I mean, that's the talk about not trying to be fatalistic. Yeah, it's just we're not

[01:00:50] gonna we're not gonna have the right combination of like communal thinking or

[01:00:59] empathy for our environment to not put instant gratification and certain needs first without thinking

[01:01:07] of the bigger picture.

[01:01:08] Right.

[01:01:09] Just like a level of hubris.

[01:01:11] Yeah, exactly.

[01:01:14] Because we're programmed to survive in a certain time period, you know, 1.2, when did we start?

[01:01:20] Really 70,000 was cognition, but as a species, 1.2 million, 2.3 million.

[01:01:27] But anyway, we covered it in one of our previous...

[01:01:30] We absolutely did, and that sounds right.

[01:01:31] I'm not going to say it.

[01:01:32] 2.3 million, but like as our modern cognition, as I couldn't even say it,

[01:01:37] modern cognition, I want to say was 70,000 years ago.

[01:01:40] Anyway, yes.

[01:01:43] Clearly, I have a lot to say about it. I'll shut up.

[01:01:45] Well, oh, sorry. The cat's back. This is just honestly fascinating.

[01:01:50] So, all right, Mark, hit me with your big question.

[01:01:53] Hit me with your best shot.

[01:01:55] Okay, so.

[01:01:57] Big questions. Are animals like the American harvest mouse mouse?

[01:02:03] Sorry. Are animals like the American harvest mouse. Sorry. Our animals like the American harvest mouse,

[01:02:06] a way in to more emotionally resonant storytelling and activism to address climate change. It's funny

[01:02:13] that you and I just talked about the cuteness, looking thinking back at like characters and films

[01:02:19] and et cetera, et cetera. Mark Rylance was quoted. Mark Rland's being, I don't know,

[01:02:25] Allison just clutched herself.

[01:02:26] One of our absolute favorite.

[01:02:28] My hand on my heart to be clear,

[01:02:29] Mark's made it sound dirty.

[01:02:31] Oh, no, no, no, no.

[01:02:33] What?

[01:02:34] Clutch your chest.

[01:02:35] Oh.

[01:02:36] Oh.

[01:02:37] That's my girls.

[01:02:38] Right.

[01:02:39] Mark Ryland's was quoted in 2021 saying, we are not lacking information about what we need

[01:02:44] to do to help the climate crisis.

[01:02:47] We also really need the arts to remind us how we are part of the same family as the nature that

[01:02:55] surrounds us. He's advocating for emotionally centered stories and artistic experiences to

[01:03:00] make people care or to incite change.

[01:03:08] My mind just, it didn't when I was writing this, jumps to watershed down.

[01:03:11] And now that is a very broad,

[01:03:14] it's an allegory for different types of societies

[01:03:17] and living and left versus right.

[01:03:19] There's a lot going on in there.

[01:03:20] But one of the things it starts with

[01:03:21] is sort of the bulldozing of their original habitat,

[01:03:29] which kind of can think of the impact on the habitats of a lot of species we've been talking

[01:03:35] about today, et cetera.

[01:03:37] Anyway, so to incite change, he really thinks that artists have this responsibility

[01:03:46] to create and to incite that sort of change.

[01:03:50] And it seems to be such a prevalent truth

[01:03:52] around the human condition, right?

[01:03:53] To at least to me, that logic has less power

[01:03:56] over our habits and actions than emotions.

[01:04:00] And why is that?

[01:04:01] I've talked about our, you know,

[01:04:03] that might be another reason why we're faulted in some ways.

[01:04:08] So that was really my big question is, you know,

[01:04:11] when Mark Rylin says something like that

[01:04:13] and it makes me think we spent the week talking

[01:04:17] about this cute little mouse and it became a,

[01:04:20] for us just doing our research, if you agree Alison,

[01:04:23] like this adorable little thing that then reflects

[01:04:28] such broad climate and environmental impacts

[01:04:33] and damage that's being done.

[01:04:36] For me anyway, it reminds me of,

[01:04:38] could an animal like this be a way into that type

[01:04:41] of emotional, big social bell that needs to go off.

[01:04:46] Yeah, I think the answer is absolutely. I think first of all, Mark

[01:04:49] violence said it. So of course it's true. Hello. Yeah. Also, it's, it's been

[01:04:55] known for decades now in the charity world. You're not not specifically

[01:04:59] related to animals necessarily, but also, you know, to animal welfare

[01:05:02] charities, but to all charities. If you want to garner more donations, if you talk about famine, and you talk about a population

[01:05:13] undergoing famine, you're going to, you know, maybe garner X amount of donations.

[01:05:18] If you tell the story about one child who's going through it and show pictures of that

[01:05:21] child, your donations go up exponentially, and they're doing exactly what you're talking about, Mark.

[01:05:26] They're playing on our emotions and our ability to relate to that one child or that one stray

[01:05:35] dog versus wrapping our heads around.

[01:05:38] Oh, OK, thousands of people are dying from starvation.

[01:05:42] It's easier to stay distant from that if you don't personalize it. So yeah, I think absolutely the arts are important. And I think artists are important in

[01:05:48] this space, as well as just emotional storytelling. And I think that's probably why I went down the

[01:05:53] path of the Salty's because I did a lot of reading on a bunch of species, but this was what resonated

[01:05:59] with me, right? And that's exactly why, because there are these cute little mascots for a broader issue.

[01:06:06] And what's happening to them is horrible, but it also signifies larger things.

[01:06:10] So I think that the more we can tie the fatalistic stories that we tell in with something like

[01:06:20] that, the more people can relate to it.

[01:06:22] If I'm telling you a story about when I I was looking for examples, for instance, other examples of extinction and why they matter,

[01:06:27] like the wolves, the wolves are big scary predators, but people also tend to like them and be

[01:06:31] impressed in all of them. But I could have told you a story about these condors and of these

[01:06:36] vultures in India, but they're hideous. And people just wouldn't like, they wouldn't feel the same

[01:06:42] right amount of residence, even though the impact on the ecosystem

[01:06:46] and on especially disease in humans is probably even bigger.

[01:06:50] So yeah, I'm with bark violence on this one.

[01:06:53] Makes sense.

[01:06:56] All right, well shall we review our ratings on this one?

[01:07:00] Yeah, I was just looking.

[01:07:02] And I think we both were at eight.

[01:07:07] Oh, interesting. We have the same thing. That's right. I had forgotten that. So I'm going to

[01:07:11] stick with an eight actually. I am so different than what we're used to, but I learned so much

[01:07:17] about specifically the salties, but also just this whole genus in general that I didn't know

[01:07:24] and I got to look at a lot of cute pictures.

[01:07:25] So yeah, thumbs up for the American Harvest Mouse.

[01:07:28] Yeah, I'm going to be boring and do exactly the same thing.

[01:07:32] I thought it was good.

[01:07:35] I went into it thinking it would be interesting and it was.

[01:07:37] Yeah.

[01:07:38] Excellent.

[01:07:39] All right.

[01:07:40] Well, as a generator now for next episode, I, this is the first

[01:07:46] time I'm using it. So I'm very excited, Mark's amazing new noun generator. So here we go.

[01:07:53] Oh, I wonder actually, and I was thinking this when I was thinking this after the fact

[01:07:59] with American Harvest Mouse, like, did we not want to have proper nouns?

[01:08:05] To American Harvest Mouse is.

[01:08:07] But anyway, because the word is Somali.

[01:08:10] Oh.

[01:08:11] So, I mean, I'm happy to go with it,

[01:08:14] but I just realized did we ever clarify if we would...

[01:08:16] I don't think we did.

[01:08:18] Do proper nouns or not.

[01:08:19] Then let's do it.

[01:08:21] All right.

[01:08:22] Somali, S-O-M-A-L-I. Cool S O M a L I.

[01:08:30] Cool. No, I I if you agree, I think this is great because yeah, still now proper now and yeah, I think it's gonna bring

[01:08:38] I think it'll be really it could be more of a perfect thing to

[01:08:41] bring more awareness for me. Especially I know you've done a lot of work.

[01:08:47] Yeah, but not Somalia. So, right, but in that kind of exposing yourself as to other like

[01:08:56] countries and other cultures, cultures like that. Yeah.

[01:08:58] Um, I'm going to go. I'm going to go with an aid again because I think that there is just so much to learn here.

[01:09:06] Yeah, I'm going to go with a sex.

[01:09:12] Okay.

[01:09:14] Excellent.

[01:09:16] Oh, yeah, and everyone as else had mentioned, if you wanted to check it out to a fairly new feature on our website on renownedpodcast.com. So you'll see a tab

[01:09:26] for the now generator. You can, you can either we're hoping you're following us

[01:09:32] today, you know, episode to episode, but certainly you can generate your own and go down your own

[01:09:38] little rabbit hole of research. Exactly. Play with your friends at home.

[01:09:40] Exactly. Play with your friends at home.

[01:09:44] All right.

[01:09:45] Well, thank you everyone for tuning in.

[01:09:48] As always, if you enjoyed the show,

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[01:10:12] for the next episode with our new noun Somali. Thanks, Mark. Hi, everyone. Music