00:00.00 Alex And we are back with archae animals episode 64 we're talking cute animals galore and what's our next animal somona. 00:10.84 Cpt Granarius And it is perhaps the cutest of them all pretty sure. They've also won a prize like happiest animal and it is the Quaka Sattonics bracurus. 00:18.17 Alex Yes, they have eyes or that. 00:27.88 Alex Now we did discuss the quaka I think very briefly during our Oceana Zooareology episode but they're basically a macropod species which is a family of marsupials that also include kangaroos and wallabies. And as Simona said they're the happiest animal because they do have like a facial thing where they they always look like they're smiling like I think you I think it's referred to as like the most selfie worthy animal because of that. 01:01.82 Cpt Granarius Because they do tend to be concentrated on the one Island and they're super obituated course people are now like flocking there to take selfies with them but they don't seem to mind too much So I guess you know that's that's fine So long as you're respectful. 01:15.78 Alex So like every other animal will basically go to be talking about. They're usually kind of found as natural deposits in the archaeological record really useful for environmental concerns. But that's more or less it. However, quaka remains. Found in mid nineteenth century whaling station sites along the australian coast have actually shown signs of consumption. So archaeologists who've worked on these sites believe that the european settlers were growing bored of their mainly. Salted mutton rations. They decided to hunt and eat the local quaka population. So yeah, among all lot of the the many horrible things that ah settlers have done. That's pretty bad too. 01:59.91 Cpt Granarius Unbelievable. 02:09.41 Cpt Granarius Moving swiftly on to keep and. 02:11.43 Alex I wish I had a nicer story to tell about the quoca but that was like mainly the the 1 archeological like case study I could find which really bumed me out as well. 02:22.63 Cpt Granarius Well we go to balance the good with the bad. Don't we yeah that do too much cuteness. You know it might send an overload so we need to like ground us with some some horrible stories and but. 02:26.12 Alex True true. 02:33.72 Alex Just like they probably ground the the Quaka sorry. Ah, yeah. 02:42.31 Cpt Granarius Oh moving very swiftly on on to an Amphibian us made it to the list. That's ah well guess it it but it must have been increasing increasing in popularity recently said, but but must have seen means about it. It's the axolotal. Um, be stomach a mexicanum. 03:03.78 Alex Yeah I mean I feel like I say a lot of like Instagram videos of axotls because they're also I feel like they're gaining popularity as a pet I mean people have always kind of had ox lotls as pets but I feel like I see more of them. 03:16.28 Cpt Granarius Oh. 03:19.38 Alex There's ah 1 person who I think has an ax lotl and they basically take like ah a dry era marker and like drawer like hair and like a little bikini on the axolotl like just on the glass. No no, no, no, it's. 03:30.94 Cpt Granarius I Was gonna say I thought I was drawing on the actual animal of like. 03:38.56 Alex It's just drawing like it's It's kind of funny. But yeah I feel like I've seen a lot more axotal content and that you know what they're very very cute to be honest, so they're you know we just talked about the quaca being one the happiest animals but I think ax lotal also because they've just kind of got like a natch anat. Natural.. That's the word I'm trying to use a natural smile kind of. 04:03.79 Cpt Granarius Sort of um but if you want to hear more about the ax aotal ah from an actual scientific standpoint we have covered it in our Amphibian episode. Ah. But yes, biologically it's basically a species of salamander that it's um, its uniqueness is that it remains aquatic throughout its life as opposed to many other Amphibians sort of move more towards land or towards you know a more amphibious lifestyle in the name as they grow up. 04:31.67 Alex I Think in that of so we also talked a bit about the fact that axotls like many other Amphibians can regenerate their limbs and kind of what that would mean on a zoo archeological. Aspect is you know? could you see that in this archaeological record and I think we both decided we don't know because we don't work with xotls. 04:57.71 Cpt Granarius Ah, absolutely because if they reform the limb does it go through the fusion process again. 05:02.40 Alex Yeah, like we talked to bitx I think I found like um, a study about kind of that's kind of looked at how that process works from an osseological perspective and I think you probably could. But between the how. Their their size and you know how long it takes for regeneration to happen like identifying that would be potentially difficult. 05:25.94 Cpt Granarius Guess yeah, the the yeah and I'm not sure whether it goes through the whole like fusion process or or the bones are reformed already fused as they would't an adult. Um yeah I don't know and and so what's the life expectance because so you know bone remodels. 05:35.48 Alex Are. 05:43.90 Cpt Granarius After a number of years usually about 10 years in humans that is sure it's not too dissimilar in other species as well. So would ah no now I'm not getting into that. 05:55.60 Alex it's fine. no it's fine just listen to our old episode where we probably have this exact same conversation. But yeah and you know base as you can tell maybe by their latin name mexicanum they are a culturally significant Aml in Mexico as well as. More or less being native to Mexico Zoo archaeological evidence points to a longstanding tradition as a food source where they are often either grilled or boiled or roasted and often served with peppers particularly among the aztecs and it's observed that they're kind of regenerative. Properties may have impacted local mythology and folklore as well as its symbolic value in Mexico also apologies in advance because a lot of the archeological stuff. We'll talk about is about eating these animals which you know it's just what happens. But yes. 06:46.29 Cpt Granarius Well, as we said that the good and the bad is like oh and then nerve the hold the ax a lot all like this cute amphibious creature boil a mashroom put them in a stew. Yeah. 06:58.60 Alex Yeah I mean you know ah chickens are cute night chicken So can't judge. 07:04.80 Cpt Granarius Ah, moving on to something that looks sort of like a chicken but also not quite should we say a duck. Yeah, ah it had to make a here. It's the platypus. Everyone. 07:09.82 Alex Um, but I yeah I was good saying maybe more of a duck. 07:19.42 Cpt Granarius Ornitorincus a athios which of course we would have covered in our Oceania episode. 07:20.69 Alex Another one. Oh. Yes, now. Obviously it has very unique characteristics mainly that it's a mammal that lays eggs and as samona was trying to refer to it does have a flat bill in front which is. Oseologically made up of these kind of almost pincer-like dentary bones which support the leathery bill on top. So if you do see what a plot of a skull looks like it's very interesting because of the fact that. Those 2 bones that really are support the bill do kind of in my head they always look like pincers. 08:08.14 Cpt Granarius The fun fact about the platypus is that when a specimen was first sent to England in one ninety Nine it was assumed to be a hoax. 08:23.20 Alex Yeah, yeah, that's fair, but yeah, no, it's it's interesting because you know we have had a previous episode very old episode actually of 2 episodes actually about kryptids and fake taxidermy. 08:23.54 Cpt Granarius Sorry, but my dog is not impressed by the platypus clearly. 08:41.93 Alex And so this is it was interesting to come across this kind of ah point about platypus is because it kind of it's similar to that except this is obviously real. So yeah, when um people first sent platypus a taxidermy platypus. Ah, to england people looked at it and were like this is clearly a like a mouse or not mouse like ah a big rodent with a duck bill seed on to it. Apparently this is because chinese sailors did pranks like this often which. 09:18.58 Cpt Granarius Ah I feel like Tristan should probably read out the quote the quote in a very obnoxious accent. 09:22.70 archpodnet I oh I'm cold for great 2 seconds I need to pick up the trello board I close my window because like I'm an idiot I know so professional here. Where's it gone. What's it called again. What's the we dig again I can't remember sorry I'll go get the quotes. 09:27.93 Alex Wow! just. 09:31.95 Cpt Granarius Um, ah yeah. 09:39.85 Cpt Granarius Just wow. 09:41.95 archpodnet Segment 2 09:47.55 archpodnet Um, and do you want this like in kind of like the english sailor saying it. Oh yeah, Robert Knox certain aware of the monstrous postures which the artful chinese had so frequently practiced on european adventurers. 09:55.48 Cpt Granarius Well well well. 10:03.97 archpodnet The scientific community felt inclined to class is a rare production of nature with Eastern Mermaids and other works of art. What do you think within too much. Yeah Robert Knox 10:14.91 Cpt Granarius Yeah Robert Knox surgeon 10:22.67 archpodnet Surgeon. 10:23.46 Alex I'd like to think my Chinese ancestors would be proud of me for dunking on the English as much as they clearly did except I'm not doing cool bits like they clearly did with Pranks Prank Taxidermy That's so cool. But. 10:37.10 Cpt Granarius Ah, but. 10:40.31 Alex I Need I desperately need to know more about this like oh man if I had the time and I was like I guess randomly getting more fleshy bits of animal rather than the bones I usually get I'd be all over this. 11:01.31 Alex That's so funny. That's such a good bit being like hey let's send this back to England and say it's omo something tell it's a platypus good jokes. 11:15.26 Cpt Granarius And at least no platypuses were eaten in this episode. They just stuffed. Just. 11:21.30 Alex Just stuffed and assumed to have been fake. 11:26.20 Cpt Granarius Yeah, um, but now to keep it in the same continent again. We have another cute and ie animals out of Oceania find um, ah again, one of the ones that we have to mention and it's the koala fascoactus cos. 11:44.17 Cpt Granarius Which again if you want to hear more about the koala. We also discuss them in our Oceania episode surprise surprise as they are atdmar so pure and in fact, the only living species from the fascoac to their family. 11:59.51 Alex So Koalas obviously have a very strong preference for eucalyptus leaves ah from Bucalyptus trees I think that's kind of what most of us would think about when we think about um Koalas but they. Are often linked to other species of trees as well like the acacia I think is another one.. There's a couple other trees that they will you know hang out in which is you know, sounds like it's not that interesting, but it's actually quite important ah from an archaeological perspective. So Koala remains and their preferred trees have been really useful in examining how past climate change have impacted distribution of both the fauna and Flora here. So Both the distribution of Koala Bears as well as. And I know they're not bears. But you know I mean Quaalas and ah also the trees that they love so much and this is one of those really interesting applications of zoo archeology which we have also talked about in a previous episode. About how they're able to use data from the past to potentially predict responses to the Future. So this data that they've generated from looking at Koala remains in the archaeological record have been. 13:20.80 Alex Used to kind of predict. Maybe what the responses of the population would be to both present and future climate change Unsurprisingly probably wouldn't be great but you know good to know. But. 13:32.31 Cpt Granarius Yeah, yeah, we cover that in a case study for the Oceania episode. So again, if you're interested. Please go back to that and actually if not you know, take it up a notch and go to the entire mini seriesies that we've done where we cover sort of of various regions of the world and the zoo archelogs within. 13:49.86 Alex So so to so for something a bit different. We're going to talk about an animal that I'm not sure we've actually talked about. 13:52.29 Cpt Granarius Treat yourself. 14:02.60 Cpt Granarius Potentially in passing a few times. 14:04.53 Alex Yeah, but like is not 1 of those animals that we really would have dedicated a whole episode to. 14:15.74 Cpt Granarius No again I feel like it's one that we may have covered sort of in the North America episode perhaps in one of its iterations so to speak um castar species. 14:20.41 Alex Maybe? ah. 14:25.76 Alex Is a beaver so simmona kind of implied. There are 2 main at least existing species. The ah you can. 14:35.99 Cpt Granarius Yeah, the that the north the north american beaver castor Kindnna Densis and the eurasian beaver cast of feeber. 14:41.66 Alex Go for it. 14:47.91 Alex So it's the second larger species of verdant after the copy barro of course and obviously they're probably most interesting and maomical feature. Besides their massive massive incisors that they share with. A lot of their other rodent family members. But the other thing is probably their tail which is actually made of flattened cautal Vertebrae which is something for some reason I've literally never thought about given that they are quite flat unlike a lot of other. Animal tails which are more you know three dimensional I guess um and they're covered with a ah hairless leathery outside and they mainly store fat inside which they can draw upon if they need to for you know, extra energy. 15:43.60 Cpt Granarius It's just one species that you don't particularly think of because while I think in the mainland. Ah it is still so a relatively healthy species number wise I think it is used was and still used for sustenance or some of the Baltic countries. Ah. 16:00.70 Alex Um, yeah. 16:01.14 Cpt Granarius They are turbo endangered in Britain. So even though think they were found here aent in the past as always we've done a brilliant job of obliterating anything that moves. Ah so think there's a few sort of pop populations in Scotland and a few of the places where they've been introduced but they're not. So into great. 16:19.98 Alex Were they like what I feel like they were like recently reintroduced to some areas or am I making that up. 16:25.98 Cpt Granarius Potentially I think a few locations in Scotland. 16:32.59 Alex They're definitely one of those species are always on the like let's reintroduce them list though for sure. 16:39.29 Cpt Granarius No, they they belong here and they're very useful. 16:43.89 Alex Yeah, and ah archaeologically they're also really useful as they're a taphenomic agent. So Obviously they make burrows which can cause a lot of post-depositional sedimentary activity. And obviously they can create ecofax through gnawing wooden materials and they're also found in the archeological record in kind of hunting context as Well. They're very much desired for their pelts but also castor is it Castorium. I say it I Shallloto Pilot pronounce that castorium which is used for perfume and medicine as flavoring and it's probably best to not think about where it's from which is their castor sacks which is like. 17:17.89 Cpt Granarius Think so Caska Sodium. Yeah. 17:36.61 Alex Like next to their urethra I think yes and food flavoring. Yum Yum! Ah, and to really round off this great like interesting fact about them. They poop in the water. 17:37.93 Cpt Granarius Who lovely perfume Archie look. 17:54.58 Alex And not only do they poop in the water because of what they you know? chew on they their poop often just creates balls of sawdust. It's not something I've ever thought about in my life and I'm sure it's not something you've ever thought about in your life. But now we all collectively know about this. 18:13.98 Cpt Granarius I'm not allowed to speak for yourself. Are you to like keep me up at night I'll wake up three o'clock in the mornings like but how do but how to be this poo. What does the poo look like and now I know sawdust. 18:22.64 Alex What what's the ratio. It saw the fact that it's also specified as like balls of Sawdas. So now. It's like if you ever come across a ball of Sawdas and you're like oh that's interesting and you go to lean and pick it up to have a second thought. You may not know where that's from but now you actually kind of know where that's from. 18:44.85 Cpt Granarius So so while you reassess the ball of sawdust that you found in your pond in the garden. We'll take a break. 18:50.10 Alex It is weird I've never really thought about that. 18:56.51 archpodnet Yeah I think they use synthetic castor and flavoring night I I don't think it no longer needs to come from Beavers Science you know it's still weird. 19:05.91 Alex Yeah, you know there's a freak out there who's like it's not. It's not good unless it's coming from a beaver stack. 19:13.79 archpodnet I Don't know what I yeah I don't want to know about this? Oh yeah, well look I don't want to know about the guy who goes around squeezing beefers for the cast or sack oil. Let's get the next. 19:15.92 Cpt Granarius Suck Well well actually it's a caster sack. Ah. 19:19.66 Alex I yeah. 19:25.11 Alex Oh boy, boy.