Chromatic Creatures - Rainbow Theme
This month, we're celebrating our vibrant world with a Rainbow Theme! Prepare to be dazzled as Quizmaster Andi corrals four unbelievable facts about colorful beasts. But beware! One of the facts is a lie! Join hosts Sups and Tanner on this technicolor safari as they try to spot the true colors of the facts and hunt down the lie!
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It's
Andimating. hot,
TannerI it.
SupsWhy
Tannerwhy bother
Supsabout 300 peacocks?
TannerOh
Andiman.
Tannervote.
Andisuit. Imagine if we were killing 300 bald eagles Oh
Tannerwow. Their mood rings
Andiring
Tannercome on. Yeah. Right.
AndiI know all of those individually,
Supsbut I don't know what happens when you put them
Tannertogether. Yeah Cuz they don't have to worry about predators, they just punch the crap out of 'em.
AndiHello and welcome to, I should have known. The trivia game show that can't be trusted. Each week, our quizmaster will present you with four facts on a topic, but one of those facts is a lie, and we are starting season four. Very exciting. And our first month theme is rainbow. So we've been covering lots of topics related to colorful things and color. I'm your quizmaster today, I'm Andy, and I'm going to be giving you four facts about colorful creatures. but one of them is a lie. So join our other hosts, soups and Tanner, and figuring out which one it is.
TannerAll right.
AndiSo the episode's gonna cover four different creatures. Cool. We're going to be talking about peacocks, chameleons, poison dart frogs and mantis shrimp.
TannerOh.
AndiWhich are. Some of the
Tannerweirdest
Andicreatures on the planet, I swear. But first the P Q Q. Mm-hmm. Our pub quiz question. So this is a new thing for season four. This question at the top of the show is meant to be similar to something you would hear at a pub quiz or bar trivia.
SupsOkay. Bring it on.
AndiHow many kinds of cones do humans have. So we're talking about the human eye,
Tannerright? So there's three kinds of cones. Doctor
AndiTanner.
SupsDon't even have to answer. Yeah.
AndiYes. So there are three of them and they are for red, green, and blue. Mm-hmm. So we're gonna talk a lot about color, vision, and then these are just cool animals. So yeah. Are you ready to go? this. All right. fact number one. Between 300 and a thousand peacocks are still killed every year for their feathers.
TannerOh, no. Starting off with a very sad fact.
Andiwell, I just wanna get the downer out of the way.
SupsOkay. All right. Okay.
AndiSo I will say this is far lower than it used to
Tannerbe, only
Andi300,000. Honestly, we're at the point where it's, improving. Mm-hmm. So peacocks, actually peacocks only refer to the males, and I use that word deliberately in the fact. Mm-hmm. Because only the males have trains, which are the long tail feathers. That's what you think of when you think of a peacock. Mm-hmm. Those are the males. Okay. Collectively, The whole species is peafowl. Okay. If you wanna refer to all of them, and then you have pea hens and pea chicks.
SupsP chicks.
TannerAww. Little tiny pea
Andichicks. Yeah. So there are three species of peacock Oh. Or peafowl in the world. One is relatively new, to us the Congo, and it's not as closely related to the others, but the two main species are the Indian. Or blue peacock. And the green or Javanese? the blue ones are the ones you've seen their chest and their neck is bright blue. Mm-hmm. These are from India. Mm-hmm.
SupsPeacock is the National bird of India.
TannerOkay.
AndiYeah. So So, they are in the pheasant family, so they're related to pheasants and quails.
Tannerwhich are all very ugly in comparison.
AndiWell, pheasants are pretty
Tannersure, but they're brown, not blue.
AndiYeah, they're not blue. Yeah. The bright blue of a Indian peacock is basically unmatched in the animal kingdom. There's really nothing else that color. Mm-hmm. So how do you this? color? yeah. Yeah. the peacocks feathers have very little or no pigment in them.
TannerOkay. So usually pigment is how animals make color in their fur or feathers. Yeah.
AndiBut the way you get this bright blue color is not from a pigment, it's actually an illusion. they have on their feathers, Little barbs, and then they have mini barbs, which are called Barb mules. And then on those, there are these tiny structures that do have some melanin in them, and they are arranged So that when light hits them, it reflects back to us only certain, ranges of the light spectrum. Okay. That's why they look iridescent. Mm.
TannerWhen you turn them and move them, it looks like they're changing color.
AndiMm-hmm. Yeah. So it's actually an illusion. They appear blue because the way they're arranged, they reflect that color blue to our
SupsYeah.
AndiSo then going back The reason only the males have the tail feathers, and the reason they're so colorful and beautiful is because PE hens like them. Yeah.
SupsIt's
Andimating. hot,
TannerI it.
Andimost birds have three color vision, like humans, and so they can see the different colors. so the male fans up his ha feathers mm-hmm. And tries to attract the,
SupsAnd she's like, oh
Andiwanna get
Supsso hot.
Tannerthis works for PE hens. They like a big, colorful tail.
AndiMm-hmm.
TannerThat's what you're
SupsYeah. So back to the fact you said that between 300 to a thousand Yeah.
AndiThey're harvested
Supsharvested.
Anditail
Tannerharvest. Why do you need to kill them for their tail
SupsSo tail feathers are a thing. There's something that I can say If you ever go to India, that's like a common thing. You can just buy it off the street.
Tannerthinking globally, 300 to a thousand peacocks are killed in a year to get their feathers. Well that's, That low. That's not
Supsthat many. Yeah.
TannerIn the context of what we talked about before with like killing sharks and stuff
SupsYeah.
TannerMm.
SupsBut it's like so weird. Why would you do it? Like you can just get in naturally.
TannerYeah. Just let them fall off. Yeah. Yeah. But also, why do you have to kill 'em to get them? That's what really bothers me.
Supsmean, humans, yeah.
Tannerjust pluck them.
Andidon't want to tell you, like, Well, yeah. Well, some of the more humane farming is they just pluck them.
TannerOkay. Well I
SupsI think then.
Tanner300.
SupsWhy is it been a fact then? Why? Why
Tannerwhy bother
Supsabout 300 peacocks?
TannerOh
Andiman.
Tannervote.
Andisuit. Imagine if we were killing 300 bald eagles for their Lock
Tannerup.
SupsNot allowed. Okay. Okay. Point taken. Point taken. sorry if I've heard anyone's sentiments. I apologize.
TannerI'm not so sure I believe this, but,
Supsokay.
TannerThree more facts.
AndiSo now we're doing chameleons. Fact number two, chameleons don't change color based on their background.
TannerThat's a lie. I think that's a lie.
SupsOkay. Explain
Andiyourself. So chameleons change color.
TannerYeah. But
Andiit's not based on their background. Like if you put a chameleon against a blue wall, it's not gonna turn blue.
TannerOkay. I, I'm very inclined to not believe that because I'm pretty sure I've seen them do that.
Andichameleons. Chameleons are a group of lizards. There are about 150 species. They range in size from like, about the size of your thumbnail to about the size of a cat.
TannerWhoa. That's a huge difference in
Andisize. Mm-hmm.
TannerMm-hmm
AndiMany of the species are from Madagascar. Oh. But they are native to pretty much all but Saharan Africa. including North Africa in the Swan region and even in the Mediterranean, they are native also parts of West India. native
Tannerlike South American.
AndiNo, they're an old world lizard. Oh. Yeah. So they are most famous probably for their ability to change color.
TannerYeah. But they're also very weird besides that they have the weird toes. Yes. And And they have the eyes that move in different
Andidirections. Yeah. Their eyes are also an important distinguishing thing. They can rotate them. It's really creepy and gross. Yeah.
TannerYeah.
AndiAnd so they have pretty good color vision. Mm-hmm. Which is also why they can change color And some species like the panther can change into very vivid colors, purples, blues, pinks. So this is like very appealing,
Tannervery
Andirainbow.
TannerSo why did they change color and how do they change
AndiYes. So they change color for basically the same reason as peacocks. Mm-hmm. To attract mates. Mm-hmm. prettier colors. You are the more the female is gonna be into you. Females can also change color, usually. Not as vividly as the males. They change color based mostly on light and temperature. Right. So if it's hot or there's high light, then they will turn a lighter color in order to reflect it. Or a darker color, the opposite to absorb more Sense That's a major reason. Also this is crazy, but. I promise this true. They change color based on their emotions. Oh,
Tannerwow. Their mood rings.
Andiring
Tannercome on. Yeah. Right.
AndiYeah. Okay. We're indulging here
SupsGo ahead. Go ahead.
AndiSo they, they change color based mostly on fear. And also sometimes for victory, so the males also fight and so after their fight, the loser turns one color and the winner turns another. I think. So the female knows who's the
Tannerwinner.
SupsOh, wow.
Tannerawesome.
SupsYeah.
AndiYeah. Okay. So the way they do this is kind of amazing. The outermost layer of their skin is translucent. It's clear.
TannerOkay?
AndiAnd in the lower layers of their skin, they have something called phos.
TannerOkay. From the Greek word iris for rainbow.
AndiYes. which are tiny crystal structures inside their skin. They reflect light much, in the same way as the peacock, depending on their arrangement, it changes the color of the light reflected. these phos are controlled by the autonomic nervous system. Which makes the dermis expand or contract based on the hormones or the feedback that the lizard is getting.
TannerOkay. Kind of like in humans, when our blood vessels constrict or expand, like when you feel flushed or when you're embarrassed, you turn red. Mm-hmm. Because more blood is closer to the surface of your skin.
AndiYeah, exactly.
TannerCool. So it has many reasons to change color. Yeah. But not for what's in front of it. So it's not using it for camouflage.
AndiYeah, I would've said chameleons don't change color for camouflage, but they are naturally camouflaged when in a relaxed state. So ar boreal or tree dwelling chameleons tend to be naturally green. So when they're chill, they're
Tannergreen. but when they're like in front of a flower. They don't change color to match the flower is the idea. Okay. Huh? Well then what good are all those eyes?
SupsAren't you No. I've seen quite a few chameleon in my life, and I think most of them were green, so I can. Do that. They were all very
Tannerchill.
SupsYeah.
TannerThat's okay. Yeah. Watching them change color though is kind of really
Supsamazing.
AndiIt's, yeah,
Supssuper
Tannercool. Yeah.
SupsYeah.
TannerOkay. I'm very skeptical of this though, because of the chameleons I've seen. Are changing color based on like what's near them.
SupsYeah.
TannerSo I'm skeptical.
SupsYeah. I don't know.
TannerBut the other reasons they check out. Yeah. For sexual selection, for
SupsI mean, if you can't have any other reasons, to it's because of sex
AndiI mean, makes
Tanneractually
Andithough. Yeah. Primarily two reasons why an animal would be colorful. Yeah. The first one is for sex remaining and the second one. We're gonna talk about with our third So fact number three. Many poisoned dart frogs get their toxicity from their diet.
TannerHmm. What the heck are they
Andieating? So Poison Dart frogs are a group of about a hundred to 200 species. They are from the tropics of the new world, primarily in the Amazon rainforest, but as far north as like Nicaragua, they are named. Because their skin secretes alkaloids, which are poisonous to mammals and birds. And some indigenous groups in the Amazon actually rub the tips of their darts or their arrows on their backs. Mm-hmm. And use those to hunt monkeys and birds. Yeah. Yeah. So that's where their name comes from. Poison Dark frogs are famous not only for their poison, but they also come in a wide variety of bright colors, bright blue, bright red, interesting spots, yellow stripes, like they're very, very colorful. Okay.
TannerOkay. If you've ever seen a super bright red frog, yeah, that's what we're
Anditalking about. Yes. And that's a poison red frog. their toxins actually can. Kill
Supsdude.
AndiOh.
TannerOh,
AndiBut you can touch them if fine.
TannerRight. It's if you ingest it or
SupsLike it's in
Andior into your bloodstream. Yes. So if you have open wounds on your hands, that would be very bad. Yeah. But you can hold them just fine.
TannerOkay.
AndiIt's their skin's not gonna hurt you just by holding them.
Tannerand they can't bite you to inject a
AndiYeah. Don't get it into your mucus membrane. So don't put it by your nose or your eyes or your mouth. Right.
Supsright.
TannerOr
Andiyour crotch
SupsRight? Don't. Is that
Andithat about like frog
Supsyou.
TannerYeah.
AndiAnd then poison dark frogs are very, very colorful and the reason they're colorful is what is called. apo, somatic, or conspicuous coloring. Yeah. Meaning it's a warning right So the reason they're colorful is to tell potential predators, I'm poisonous, don't eat
Supsme. Mm.
AndiSo then they live because they're not getting eaten. Okay.
TannerOkay.
SupsRight. That's smart
AndiSo, their color is formed similarly to the chameleons, they have rito fours and melano fours, which have melanin in them. Mm-hmm. It reflects the light back.
TannerYeah. So the idea between they're brightly colored And they're poisonous. These are actually two biologic systems that just happen to combine. Right. The poison doesn't make them color full.
AndiNo, but the reason that they are colorful is to Yes. Okay.
SupsBut, it can be that they are lying
Tanneryeah.
Andithere are some animals that imitate this behavior Not all of them are toxic actually. And the toxicity for some species they eat probably some kind of meat. Yeah. And the reason that they tested this is that when you capture them in captivity, if they're not fed these beetles, they lose those alkaloids in their skin secretions.
SupsI see.
TannerOh. So it's kind of one of those accidental discoveries. Yeah. We caught a frog, we fed, it flies. It's not poisonous anymore. What did we do?
AndiYeah,
SupsOkay.
TannerSkeptical.
Supsthere's something fishy about this one.
TannerYeah. Yeah.
SupsYeah.
TannerBecause you think that they are poisonous from some other way.
SupsYes. Okay.
Tannermaybe. how else are things poisonous?
Supsmaybe it's naturally toxic. Mm.
TannerHmm.
SupsOkay. We've got one more to go. Yeah. And gonna
Andiabout. One of the strangest creatures on the planet. Okay, we're the mantis shrimp, particularly the peacock mantis shrimp, because it's the colorful one. So fact number four, the mantis shrimp has the fastest predatory strike on the planet.
TannerMans shrimp. Predatory strike. They're predatory shrimp.
Andiyeah.. I know all of those individually,
Supsbut I don't know what happens when you put them
Tannertogether. Yeah
Andifirst of all, they're not actually shrimp.
SupsOkay.
Tannergreat know.
SupsYeah, that's totally not confusing.
AndiThey are a kind of crustacean. They're called Stamato pos or Stamato pods. Okay. Which comes from the Greek for mouth foot
TannerOh, gross. It
Andiand also their name mantis is because they have a dactyl club. And it's a large, kind of like a claw arm thing that they have. Yeah. And they have two in the front and they use it to either, Stab or smash
TannerKind of like a lobster has claws. These things have
AndiDactyl clubs.
TannerDactyl clubs. Okay.
AndiYeah. So they use these clubs to punch through the shelves of their prey. Mm-hmm. Especially bi valves. So like clams, they or smash the shell, and then they slurp out the creature inside. It's nasty.
TannerMy God. This is gross.
AndiIt gets wilder so its strike is 23 meters per second.
SupsOh Wow. And that's
Andithrough water? Yeah. Remember we're talking about through water. Oh my God. So there's drag But it's not just the punch. The punch is so fast that it creates something called a cavitation bubble.
TannerOh,
AndiSo because of water is thicker than air, When you move that fast, the pressure drops so low basically creates a vacuum and then that vacuum collapses in on itself. Mm-hmm. Like a dying star and creates basically an explosion of bright light and hot temperature about the temperature of the surface of the sun. So not only do you get punched, but you also
Tannerand deafened. blinded
Andiand, and deafened and stunned. And
Supspossibly burned to that.
AndiAnd, yeah, maybe
Tannerburned. How can what?
AndiHow
Tannerit do
Andithat It's
Supsnot, It's a lie.
TannerSo, no,
Supsit's
TannerSo they
SupsVery violent.
Tanneryeah,
Andiso,
Tannerthey hunt. They're predatory. They're carnivores. They have this punch. the rainbow fit in? Where's the
AndiGood question. So if that wasn't weird enough, the peacock connecta shrimp is named because it is very colorful. It's bluish. Greenish has spots of purple spots of blue. They call 'em leopard spots. And the reason they can even bother having them is because they have between 12 and 16 light receptors in their eyes. We have three, remember they have 12 to 16 so they can see very different ranges of light. Lots of
TannerMm-hmm.
AndiSo this is why they look like this.
Tannerso they're super colorful, all these different colors, all these different patterns because they can see
Andithat.
TannerSo it's interesting to them
Andiagain.
TannerMating Mating. Okay. Cuz they don't have to worry about predators, they just punch the crap out of 'em. So, back to the fact, fastest prey, predatory strike.
AndiHonestly, I wanted to say fastest strike, but I couldn't find anyone on the
Supsinternet
Andithat, but I couldn't find a faster predatory one. Yeah.
SupsI mean, what? did you say? It's 23 meters per second. Yeah, yeah. Come on. are you comparing I dunno.
TannerCobras? Tigers. Like cats. Yeah. What's
Supsfast.
TannerMaybe Birds, eagles. What else is predatory? I, you know, barracuda or something. You know, an eel. Like I could think of a lot of really scary, fast predators, but 23 meters
Supsthat's fast.
TannerYeah. Humans can strike pretty fast, but nowhere near 23 meters.
SupsNo.
TannerI mean, ask all those peacocks.
SupsOkay. Okay. Right.
TannerBut 23 meters is kind of outlandish.
SupsYeah, but
Tannernot the fact. The fact is that it's the
Supsfastest, yeah,
TannerI believe that,
SupsI mean, because it's the fastest, the number has to be something outlandish. Yeah, right. Yeah. And that's why I feel like, cause this is so crazy. It must be true Uhhuh.
Tannerif
Supsit's not 23 meters, what is it?
TannerI dunno. I'm just like running through animals in my
Supshead Yeah, I know, right? All right. We've got four colorful creatures doing four totally different things, but all of them have some mating thing going on with colors. Before Tanner and I, we guess, which one is probably not a very colorful fact. Could you repeat the four creatures and the facts?
AndiYeah. fact number one, between 301,000 peacocks are killed every year for their feathers. Fact number two, chameleons don't change color based on their background. Fact number three, many poison dart frogs get their toxicity from their diet. And fact number four, the mantis shrimp has the fastest predatory strike on the planet. One of those is a lie.
Tanneroh boy.
SupsOkay, so here's where I'm at
Tanneruhhuh.
SupsThink I know about Chameleon
TannerYeah. fact. Yeah, I am. I'm agreeing
Supswith you. I think
Tannerthat's exactly right. I think that all the things she said could be true. They changed for their mood and all this temperature and stuff, but also they changed based on the background. Yeah. Because they
SupsYou wanna get eaten.
Tannercause with poisoned dark frogs, the way she worded that one. Yeah. She said many. Mm-hmm. So I think that's true. Many could have it from their diet. The Manta shrimp is too fast to be anything else. I think peacocks could be higher, but I'm really hoping
Supsit's
TannerYeah. Okay. Yeah. I also think it's chameleons.
SupsYeah. Chameleons,
Tannerit's so hard
Andito believe Okay. I'm sorry. You guys are wrong. Oh no. no. It is a very very common misconception. No, and there are many, basically faked videos of chameleons doing this. Okay. If you've ever seen a video of like a chameleon grabbing a pair of
TannerYes, I've shown
Andiseen that
Tannermy English classes when we practice colors. That's the one I'm
Andithinking of. that's fake. That's not real. They don't do that. Yeah. Can you imagine if they actually could do that? that's Amazing Yeah. That would be yeah. It's, too amazing to be true. It's a very common misconception, though. So common that. pretty much every source I looked at Mentioned how, like, you know, contrary to popular belief. the lie. It's very funny that you thought there would be more peacocks murdered because actually, as far as I know, there are zero peacocks murdered for their feathers because they dropped them after meeting
Supsseason here. Yeah,
AndiI
Supswas,
Tanneryay. Humanity.
SupsI was going to get to that. in India, just before the start of monsoon, there's a saying that when peacocks are like this, fanning their feathers, of course they want to mate, but it's also a signal that the montros are about to start. And there is like a particular season where peacock feathers are so famous that it's available almost every everywhere
TannerRight. It just
AndiRight. Yeah. Cause they Yeah. Yeah. The males drop them after mating season is done and then they grow back bigger the next year. So that's why a male with a bigger tail fan is more fit. Yeah.
TannerRight.
SupsBecause after
TannerOh, okay. So it's very similar to antlers on Deere in America. Exactly.
AndiYeah, so you can just pick 'em up off the ground. So you can buy peacock feathers, you know, With a clear conscience. They don't have to be killed for you to take them. You don't even have to steal
Tannerhear from drop
Supswait. Be
Tannerpatient.
AndiYes. faith and humanity is restored.
SupsGood. This is excellent. Yeah. but also like the chameleon one.
TannerLike I totally
Supsthought that I
AndiYeah.
Supscha
Andicommon misconception. I
TannerI know.
SupsYeah. I should
Tannerknown
SupsI should have
AndiI should have Known. I Thanks for listening to this episode of, I should have known we will be continuing Rainbow Month and we'll be finishing it up next week with another episode. so be on the lookout for that. we are on YouTube in celebration of season four, so it's not exactly videos of us in recording the episodes, but we have the episodes themselves you can listen or watch. On YouTube and you can like, subscribe and comment. Let us know if you knew the peacock lie I'm very curious if anyone else knew or any other colorful animals that you didn't hear about that you'd like to please let us know. And as always, thanks for listening. Nature is gay












