Mephitology (SKUNKS) Part 2 with Jerry Dragoo

What happens when you've been sprayed nine times in the face by a skunk? Part 2 with Mephitologist Dr. Jerry Dragoo answers that question. Also on the agenda: pet skunks, lavender skunks, skunk family planning, Pepe Le Pew on trial, why some of us enjoy the stench, how to handle a skunk approach, if skunks can smell themselves, and the very bizarre circumstances by which this guest first rose to international skunk fame. Also: the proper way to watch a skunk.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Alie Ward?

  Oh, hey, it's still your brother's best friend's girlfriend, who is a chatbot, Ally Ward, and it's part two of Metatology. It's all about skunks with a guest. If you listen to part one, you know I have hunted them down for years. I begged them to be on, and they said yes, despite a lot of humble shyness. So in part one, you learned a lot of skunk basics. You heard some yarn spinning, some good stories, and now we're going to get to some more salacious gossip about skunks with this Albuquerque-based career skunk scientist and researcher who founded the Institute for the Betterment of Skunks and Skunk Reputations. Also, stick around for the post-show secret this week, in which I reveal his reaction

• 0:43Alie Ward?

  to part one of this series. But before we get into it, thank you to all the folks over at patreon.com/ologies for supporting the show for a dollar or more a month and for submitting your questions to the ologists ahead of time. Thanks to everyone out there finding each other in their merch from ologiesmerch.com. And thank you to sponsors of ologies who make it possible for us to donate to a charity of choice each week. This episode is sponsored by Seed. Bloating, irregular bowel movement, gas. When your gut is off, it gets your attention. Seed's DS1 is a three-time award-winning probiotic, clinically shown to improve regularity, reduce bloating, and alleviate gas, so you can move

• 1:23Alie Ward?

  and eat freely. Take better care of your gut with Seed. Get 25% off with code 25OLOGIES at seed.com/ologies. These statements have not been evaluated by the FDA. These products are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. We have to say that. Father Ward, you say, there's no way you would need a career coach. You have it all together. That's a lie, and you know it. I actually hired a career coach, and without them, I wouldn't have started ologies. It was one of the best investments I've ever made. And if you're like, I don't know where to find a career coach, I can help you. You need an experienced pro who asks the right questions, sets you down a path where you're most likely to succeed. And that's what you can expect from a coach at today's sponsor,

• 2:06Alie Ward?

  strawberry.me. This is so cool. They match you with a certified coach who's been vetted to work closely with company founders. And yeah, sometimes I'm like, oh, wait, that's right, I am one. And if you're founding a business, even if you're along the way and you're maybe stuck in a rut, or you have to make a decision about expansion, or what direction you want to take your company, that's what I did. I went to strawberry.me, and I was like, okay, can you help me pare down some stuff? I think I have too much on my plate. I'm not sure what to say yes to and what to say no to. And they were super helpful in helping me streamline, and now I get to sleep more, and I enjoy that. So get the help every entrepreneur needs. Go to strawberry.me/ologies. That's strawberry.me/ologies. You're the boss.

• 2:49Alie Ward?

  And as always, thanks to the listeners who just leave reviews for the show, which help us so much. And yes, I do read all of them, and I prove it with this still sticky one. It's fresh from Cete, who wrote, I have a skunk that likes to visit my yard. He's adorable. I want to know more about him. Searched ologies for a skunk episode. No luck. The next week, skunks, part one. Can Ally read my mind? Cete, I can, which is how I know you're excited for this part two. Also, Podcast Lover 531, we do have a whole episode about ants. It's called Myrmecology, M-Y-R-M ecology, with Dr. Terry McGlynn, and we will link in the show notes. It's another favorite of mine. What happens when you're bitten by a bullet ant? Terry will tell you firsthand, specifically first thumb. So

• 3:31Alie Ward?

  yes, thank you, everyone, for leaving reviews. Okay, let's get back to skunks, part two, in which we're going to cover pet skunks, advice for if a skunk approaches you, if they can smell themselves, pepe la pue, or courting rituals, sort of, why some of us enjoy the smell, the very bizarre circumstances by which this guest first rose to international skunk fame, and the cliffhanger question we left off with in part one, which was, what happens when you've been sprayed nine times in the face by a skunk, with charming, dryly hilarious, and deeply knowledgeable, metatologist Dr. Jerry Dregu.

• 4:30Alie Ward?

  And what happens when you've been sprayed nine times in the face by a skunk? Was there a first time it happened where you said, well, that'll be the last time? Or were you like, it's fine?

• 4:45Speaker 01

  So the first time I was starting off, I was an undergraduate still here at UNM.

• 4:51Alie Ward?

  Jerry's advisor had him head to the southern part of New Mexico to try to trap one or all four species of skunk there.

• 4:58Speaker 01

  And so I went out one weekend. I took my trap, had 12 traps. It's that all of my head sardines, and I ran out of sardines on the 11th one. So I had banana peel that I just threw at the last one.

• 5:08Alie Ward?

  Some time elapsed, and?

• 5:10Speaker 01

  And I started checking my carnivore traps. And I was thinking, okay, I've got 12 skunks. What am I going to do? Well, of course, the first one was empty.

• 5:17Alie Ward?

  Oh. The next 10 skunk traps were empty.

• 5:21Speaker 01

  And finally, I got to the 12th trap, the one that had the banana peel.

• 5:24Alie Ward?

  Yeah.

• 5:25Speaker 01

  And I caught a skunk, striped skunk.

• 5:26Alie Ward?

  Huh.

• 5:27Speaker 01

  And it's like, now what do I do? I was not given instructions on what to do now.

• 5:32Alie Ward?

  Oh, no.

• 5:33Speaker 01

  Okay, so I know that if I can stay calm, I should be able to do everything. And I've managed. It took me like, maybe 45 minutes, and I finally got him covered up, lifted the trap up, put it on the tailgate of my bumper. I was driving a VW Bug at the time. Put it on the tailgate of my bumper, and I bunch courted it in, just drove back to my campsite, set him out there, and took the cover off because I didn't want him to anything. And so I was writing my field notes. And then I just stood up suddenly, and there was, it was like, this liquid across my chest, on my notebook. And it's like, I looked up, and I thought it was raining. Looked over, it's a skunk in the trap, both ends pointed at me.

• 6:12Alie Ward?

  No.

• 6:13Speaker 01

  Well, this ain't so bad. And so I did my work. Three days later, they wouldn't let me in the museum.

• 6:19Alie Ward?

  Oh, no. Okay, so we covered this last week, and again, in Dr. Ted Stankiewicz's episode on animal defenses. But I'm going to tell you again, in case you missed it, in case you need to grab a piece of paper, if you want to jot this down in your notes app, maybe you want to pull over on the highway, you write it in Sharpie on that balled up fast food napkin in your cup holder, jot it down. So tomato juice, flim flam, does not work, and no water at the start. Do not just hose down yourself or a pet. What you need to do first is oxidize the sulfurous thiols. You need to get yourself a mixture of hydrogen peroxide, baking soda, and liquid soap. Okay, here's the recipe. You ready for this?

• 7:03Alie Ward?

  32 ounces of hydrogen peroxide, that's like a quart, 1/3 of a cup of baking soda, and a tablespoon of like, liquid dish soap or pet shampoo. No water, all right? You just mix those three things together. You rub it into the fur of a pet or yourself. Let it sit a minute, and then you rinse it out. And do it more than once if needed. And if you or the pet gets wet again, and you smell it, that means you missed some spots. So do it again. You got to make a new batch of this every time you need it, because it does not keep well. So I'm going to tell you again, 32 ounces hydrogen peroxide, that's a quart, 1/3 of a cup baking soda, and a tablespoon of dish soap, right? Picture

• 7:43Alie Ward?

  it, if you're like, numbers, don't do it for me. Picture it, two pint glasses, all right, of hydrogen peroxide, a little fistful of baking soda, and a palm full of soap, okay? Imagine it. Two pint glasses, a fistful of baking soda, and a palm full of dish soap. Memorize it. One dark, stinky day in the future. This formula is going to save your ass.

• 8:08Speaker 01

  You want to make sure you don't get it in the eyes, because hydrogen peroxide in your eyes is not good. So do not get that in your dog's eyes. You can stay away from the face as much as possible, although more than likely, that's where it got sprayed. But, you know, rub the nose a little bit. The soap should help break up the oily stuff, and the hydrogen peroxide will, and baking soda will oxidize the sulfur compounds.

• 8:27Alie Ward?

  Oh, oh.

• 8:29Speaker 01

  That'll kind of neutralize the odor.

• 8:30Alie Ward?

  Oh, okay. So it's not the worst thing that's ever happened to you. Some people, as Dispenser said, will skunks befriend cats, which we've, they're more so than dogs. Marlon J. says, I see skunks in my yard hanging out with foxes, raccoons, and possums, even a bobcat. None of these animals seem to be too concerned with being sprayed. Just one big friendly neighborhood party. Any insights or thoughts on that? Are they in the wild, like, friendly?

• 8:56Speaker 01

  Yeah. They tend to be solitary most of the time, but they're not antisocial.

• 9:02Alie Ward?

  Okay.

• 9:02Speaker 01

  And so, again, as long as they're not fighting over resources, and animals all about the same size, it's going to be, you're going to be in a fight. It's one thing, they get sprayed, and you're in a fight. But it's another thing, if you're a bigger animal, you can just chomp it. And so they're not as threatened by all those other animals. And those animals also aren't as threatened by the skunk, because a skunk is not going to attack a bobcat.

• 9:21Alie Ward?

  Oh, so then they're sort of like, I know what you're packing.

• 9:25Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 9:25Alie Ward?

  There's, yeah, they're just not as, they're not as threatened by each other.

• 9:27Speaker 01

  Right.

• 9:28Alie Ward?

  I had no idea. I would think that everyone would run from a skunk. But it's good to know that they're like, no, we're chill.

• 9:32Speaker 01

  Yeah, well, just say, you don't have to. The skunk's first behavior is going to be to run away.

• 9:36Alie Ward?

  Yeah.

• 9:36Speaker 01

  So if yours is just to just stand there, and more than likely, they will come up, and they'll walk around your feet, do little circles, and as long as you don't make any sudden movements, you'll be fine.

• 9:45Alie Ward?

  Really?

• 9:46Speaker 01

  Yeah. If an animal, if you are just standing there, minding your own business, animal comes and bites you, that might be a different issue.

• 9:52Alie Ward?

  Okay.

• 9:52Speaker 01

  Okay, that would be that thing. If you get bit by a skunk, you really should have it tested for rabies.

• 9:56Alie Ward?

  Right.

• 9:56Speaker 01

  All that kind of stuff. But for the most part, if it's a normal, healthy animal, just in your backyard, you can probably stand there, and he'll walk around you and do his normal thing. And as long as he's not acting weird and... Threatening and all that kind of stuff then.

• 10:09Alie Ward?

  Is it that sudden movement kind of like a threat on your part? Like that's you saying, I'm gonna go after you. But if you just sort of like stand still and you don't run after them.

• 10:19Speaker 01

  Yeah, and just even just if you slowly walk away. If you don't want them walking around your feet, you can slowly walk away.

• 10:25Alie Ward?

  Okay.

• 10:26Speaker 01

  That shouldn't be a problem.

• 10:27Alie Ward?

  I think a lot of people assume that they're like a grenade that has no pin. They could just at any moment, you know what I mean? But they probably don't want to spray you as much as just be left alone.

• 10:37Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 10:38Alie Ward?

  Yeah, well, um, any other advice to people who encounter a skunk of just, you know, not to panic? You could observe from a distance. No need to chase it out of your.

• 10:50Speaker 01

  Yep, as long as he's not coming after you, there's no reason you need to worry about it.

• 10:54Alie Ward?

  Okay.

• 10:55Speaker 01

  She, he, she, whatever. So it doesn't matter if they're, they're just gonna be out there doing what skunks do. And they don't care if you're there or not, unless you threaten them. Once you threaten them, first thing they're gonna do is try to run away. If they don't have a spot to run, then they'll do their threat behavior. They're stomping. If that doesn't work, then they'll spray you.

• 11:12Alie Ward?

  Third strike, you're out.

• 11:13Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 11:14Alie Ward?

  What about each other? Alish Ullman says, I always see a pair or maybe pairs of skunks roaming around my SoCal neighborhood together. They look like they're foraging in the grass together, but also they really look like they're on a cute date. Are they lovers, best friends, mama, daughter? Is this common? Whenever my boyfriend and I see them, we whisper, we are the skunks. So I hope they love each other. Ranger France wanted to know, in all caps, do I have to be worried about finding packs of skunks? So they're pretty solitary from what you said, right?

• 11:45Speaker 01

  Yeah, but they're not antisocial.

• 11:46Alie Ward?

  Okay.

• 11:47Speaker 01

  So they're hanging out together. It could be mom and young. It could be sisters. Highly unlikely that's a male and a female because the females tend to tolerate each other a lot more.

• 11:59Alie Ward?

  Right.

• 12:00Speaker 01

  And males are just out doing what males do.

• 12:02Alie Ward?

  So probably not a cute date, but either way, it is a cute hang.

• 12:06Speaker 01

  Well, I'm.

• 12:07Alie Ward?

  But we don't know.

• 12:07Speaker 01

  Well, I don't know. I don't ask the preferences. It could be a cute date for all you know.

• 12:12Alie Ward?

  They could. They could be doing just an alternate type of child rearing too. So it could be a very cute date. Thank you for pointing that out. Okay, so skunks are like my Catholic family. They may have two babies or 12 babies. Now, these babies make their debut in late spring. The stink badger, we talked about last week, those babies can come a little earlier. And yes, patron Kelsey Corey, it is true that female skunks can delay implantation until conditions are better to ensure survivability of their young. So the western spotted skunk specifically can breed in the early spring like all the rest of the skunks, but they use this strategy called delayed implantation where they just kind of pocket that embryo for months in the uterus until they're like, is now a good time?

• 12:57Alie Ward?

  Okay, great. And then when the weather or the food sources or the stress levels are all good, something called nedation occurs. And the word nedation comes from the root, meaning to nest. And they're not the only ones. More than 130 species of other mammals, that includes like some rodents, some weasels, some seals and some bears can also delay implantation until the time is better and they're better prepared to raise kids, which means that yeah, some rats have more agency over their family planning than humans in the United States. Well, speaking of the young and real quick, any romantic breeding rituals? Do they do anything cute while they're romancing each other? Do they stand on their legs?

• 13:38Speaker 01

  I'm thinking about a podcast you did with the otters.

• 13:43Alie Ward?

  Oh, no. Sometimes it doesn't end well, even for the otters. And according to a hellscape of a study titled Patterns of Mortality in Southern Sea Otters, about 11% of dearly departed sea otters spotted by researchers died by mating trauma. 11%. And the violence is not just male to female. Within same species boy bottles, sea otters can also hit below the proverbial anthropomorph.

• 14:12Speaker 01

  And you did not like the otters. You got, you. But they're, they're induced ovulators.

• 14:17Alie Ward?

  Okay.

• 14:18Speaker 01

  So they have to have that aggressive biting and everything to stimulate the hormones to release, to ovulate. So that's why a lot of those animals do that kind of stuff. It's because otherwise they just, hey, wanna go out for a drink? And that's not gonna work.

• 14:35Alie Ward?

  Yeah, so mustelids, so the like weasels.

• 14:38Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 14:38Alie Ward?

  Have to show that aggression in order to induce ovulation.

• 14:42Speaker 01

  Yep. It has to stimulate to get those hormones going.

• 14:45Alie Ward?

  Wow, horrifying new fact that I didn't know I didn't need to know. And yes, during the mating season in February, March, a male skunk or a buck can wander up to five miles in one night just looking for, we'll call it love. And females tend to be one and done when selecting the daddy of their babies. But the males are called promiscuous by scientists, not even petty ones, because they'll do it with anyone who won't spray them in the face. And no, female skunks do not spontaneously ovulate on a schedule like our species. They do ovulate just after mating.

• 15:26Alie Ward?

  So they are all topped off with the one guy's sperm and then an egg goes down the chute. And according to this 1965 paper I found titled Rudding Activities in a Captive Striped Skunk in Oxford Academic, during their rudding season, yeah, male skunks become more energetic, agitated and aggressive, kind of like your cousin's roommate who's weaning off of gas station kratom. And they stomp and they bite, they bare their teeth, they're ready to fight off competitors or just show their potential mates just how strong a catch they are. It's real chud shit. Not romantic, like we see in the movies. Wait.

• 16:09Alie Ward?

  Pepe le pue. Yeah.

• 16:11Speaker 01

  Okay, now Pepe's got a bad rep because, I mean, yes, Pepe does like this cat and you think that's kind of strange. The cat also likes Pepe.

• 16:23Alie Ward?

  You think so?

• 16:23Speaker 01

  Have you ever, well, watch her behavior. She wants, she's doing everything she can to get to know Pepe, but she can't stand the smell. If Pepe gets rid of the smell, the cat and the skunk get along. Watch closely next time.

• 16:37Alie Ward?

  So that it's not.

• 16:39Speaker 01

  It is not an aggressive, he is not being aggressive towards that cat. She is turned off by the smell, not his advances.

• 16:47Alie Ward?

  So this is a Pepe apologist, but also an ethologist in terms of canine and feline behavior and the smell being the barrier between them.

• 16:59Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 17:00Alie Ward?

  This is a whole new way to look at this.

• 17:02Speaker 01

  And it's the odor that's the problem and that's about part of that reputation. And if you watch those cartoons closely, the cat is never turned off by Pepe. It's his smell.

• 17:12Alie Ward?

  I'm gonna revisionist history. I'm gonna go, I'm gonna watch this. I think you might have a point here. I bet we can find who wrote those and see if they have any behind the scenes on it. I bet we can find it out. Okay, so yes, Pepe has been canceled. A few years back, some culture critics were like, hey, Hollywood, maybe you should stop telling on yourself here. But if you do a deep dive on the history of Pepe, if you were, if you were a skunk expert and you have done this, which now I have done to verify this, there are episodes that show some reciprocity in desire. So the object of Pepe's affection, as he calls her, a belle femme skunk fatale, is

• 17:56Alie Ward?

  really a silent and delicate cat called Penelope, or sometimes they call her Fubret. And she has an unfortunate fence paint stripe down her back. It's confusing for Pepe. But in a handful of episodes dating back to the late 1940s, she pursues Pepe because in one, she has a head cold, can't smell him, or in this one heart wrenching gift of the magi turn, Pepe has locked himself in a deodorant plant while Penelope rubs Lindberger cheese on herself to stink. They're each masking their attributes to gain the other's affection, ultimately reversing the role of pursuer.

• 18:40Alie Ward?

  Pepe wants nothing to do with stinky cheesy Penelope. Now, in another episode, Pepe douses himself with cologne and Penelope chases him, only for him to realize at last that non-consensual affection is in fact not welcome. But I'm not gonna lie, I've watched clips and he comes on way too strong and quite aggressive. I would claw him in the face and I would ruin his reputation also. A cautionary tale for everyone. And apparently, Pepe, who keeps hearing the word pew come from bystanders, he at some point looks up pew and he self diagnoses as stinky. Kind of like a revelation you would have going down a TikTok rabbit hole on mental

• 19:25Alie Ward?

  illness in the middle of the night. Some people, Magda Hiola, wanted to know if they know that their spray smells lethal and if they mind the smell, do they have a sense of smell?

• 19:35Speaker 01

  Yes, and they prefer, they do the exact same thing. If they get sprayed in the face, they'll rub it in the dirt just like a dog will, because they don't like getting sprayed either. In fact, skunks really don't smell bad.

• 19:47Alie Ward?

  You mean, other than the rub?

• 19:48Speaker 01

  Yeah, well, when they release that, it's what they spray that smells bad.

• 19:52Alie Ward?

  Yeah.

• 19:53Speaker 01

  The skunks themselves are fairly clean. Now, a lot of times, and this is when you get them underneath the house, is that they may have a toilet area. And obviously the feces is going past the same nipples. And if there's just a little bit of hint of, if it's just like, it'll pick it up. And so I have people say, yeah, at three o'clock every day, right here, I smell that. He sprays under there. No, he doesn't. I'll tell you what he's doing. Taking a dump.

• 20:21Alie Ward?

  It's just like they need some glade down there or something. Do they get any of the roundworms that raccoons do?

• 20:28Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 20:29Alie Ward?

  Oh, they do?

• 20:31Speaker 01

  They're susceptible to a lot of things.

• 20:33Alie Ward?

  Well, Kristen wanted to know, how fast, do they, can they outrun you?

• 20:38Speaker 01

  Today? Yes.

• 20:41Speaker 01

  I move a lot slower than I used to. There was one time we had a mammal class. We were in the back of a pickup truck and we showed up on the area and we had just getting ready to run traps. We were also doing spotlighting. We had permits in Texas Parks and Wildlife. They're all aware of what we were doing. And we're on Robert Farmer Patton's land and he did a lot of work with skunks in Trans Pecos, Texas. And we were in East Texas on his land, doing trapping stuff there. And so we're all in the truck getting ready to get started and. I just jumped out of the truck. They didn't have my shoes on. They just started running and somebody yelled, "Skunk." There was a barbed wire fence and if I were younger,

• 21:27Speaker 01

  I would have just hurled.

• 21:28Alie Ward?

  Barbed wire?

• 21:29Speaker 01

  Barbed wire, I would have just hurled the fence.

• 21:31Alie Ward?

  I don't like that.

• 21:33Speaker 01

  If I were older, I would have just said, "Ugh, I'm not doing that." But unfortunately, I was at that stupid age between when I was younger and like, you know, two days ago.

• 21:45Speaker 01

  I dove through it.

• 21:46Alie Ward?

  No.

• 21:47Speaker 01

  And of course, it wasn't a clean dive.

• 21:50Alie Ward?

  Of course, I threw a barbed wire fence.

• 21:52Speaker 01

  You would get a score of like three on the.

• 21:55Alie Ward?

  In the Olympics, yeah.

• 21:57Speaker 01

  And so I'm going after this skunk and I had started running from a long way back. And of course, this skunk saw me, so he's running as well. And we're both just getting tired. And for some reason, I was thinking about when I was a real teeny tiny person, everybody was my size. I used to play football. And I remember a coach saying, "If there's ever a fumble, don't try to pick it up. Dive on it."

• 22:22Alie Ward?

  Oh.

• 22:23Speaker 01

  For some reason, that thought came into my head.

• 22:25Alie Ward?

  Oh, no.

• 22:26Speaker 01

  And of course, I just, I dove.

• 22:28Alie Ward?

  Oh, no.

• 22:29Speaker 01

  His teeth went right into my finger. Now, I was wearing gloves.

• 22:32Alie Ward?

  Okay.

• 22:33Speaker 01

  But then that tail just flipped me up across the face. And he's just full.

• 22:38Alie Ward?

  No.

• 22:41Speaker 01

  So I get up and I'm, start carrying him back. And of course, the students are all just standing there, you know, standing there like, "What the?" I come back and then this animal, I was holding it by the tail and he reached up and grabbed the base of his tail, grabbed my finger again and was biting on me. And Gwen comes running through the barbed wire fence and she's got a stick and she's puts it in his mouth, is pulling it up and trying to get it, get, let go of my finger. And the students in back goes, "Wow, that was awesome." "I've never seen anything like that. That was so cool." And then I'm, I'm getting all big chested and everything. "Oh, yeah." And they go, "She must really love him."

• 23:26Speaker 01

  And then of course, I could feel the barbed wire. I could feel the skunk teeth.

• 23:30Alie Ward?

  I mean, did you need like a tetanus and a rabies double booster after that? Or do you have to get, as a skunk biologist, you just like straight up have a rabies shot?

• 23:39Speaker 01

  I've been vaccinated for ages.

• 23:40Alie Ward?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 23:41Speaker 01

  And my titer is still, well, the last time I was checked, it was relatively high.

• 23:45Alie Ward?

  Pretty good. You still, you still have some immunity, at least toward it. And you have a good tetanus shot too? Cause a barbed wire fence, sir.

• 23:53Speaker 01

  Yeah, I've, I've done tetanus as well.

• 23:55Alie Ward?

  Oh, God.

• 23:57Speaker 01

  I'm not anti-vaxxer.

• 24:00Alie Ward?

  You better not be, unless you're pro rabies. Like, let's get as much rabies out there.

• 24:06Speaker 01

  But again, you have to remember, this skunk was acting natural.

• 24:09Alie Ward?

  Yeah.

• 24:09Speaker 01

  It was acting normal.

• 24:10Alie Ward?

  It's normal to bite you.

• 24:12Speaker 01

  If he was chasing after me, yes, I could have outrun him.

• 24:15Alie Ward?

  Yeah.

• 24:15Speaker 01

  But I was chasing him and he was trying to outrun me. And unfortunately, we were both tired and.

• 24:20Alie Ward?

  Yeah.

• 24:20Speaker 01

  If the skunk can't deter you with spray, he will bite and scratch. And it will do all that other kind of stuff that animals do to save themselves, so.

• 24:28Alie Ward?

  I think in the court of public opinion, you started it, for sure. I think a jury of 12 skunks would find that you started it.

• 24:36Speaker 01

  And there was, there was a lot of witnesses there to say that. You know, I was running before they even saw the animal, so.

• 24:42Alie Ward?

  You can't, you do not have a case.

• 24:44Speaker 01

  I, nope. I'm not trying to defend myself. I'm just telling the story.

• 24:48Alie Ward?

  Listen, you were there, you were literally standing on business, though. You were on a field trip, so you gotta do, a skunk biologist has to do what they gotta do.

• 24:56Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 24:56Alie Ward?

  Well, actually, on the topic of rabies, though, this one clearly didn't, but Jess, Amy Arugula, Addie Capello, Lynn and Marissa Winker, wanted to know, Jess asked, "How prevalent is rabies in skunk populations?" Amy wanted to know, "Tell us about skunks and rabies. Is it true that the vaccine doesn't work on them and actually gives them rabies? Do, or are they just getting a bad rap for rabies unfairly?"

• 25:18Speaker 01

  The rabies vaccine protects them from rabies, but not the law.

• 25:25Alie Ward?

  Oh.

• 25:25Speaker 01

  If a vaccinated skunk bites someone, they have to be tested. Because the vaccine hasn't been tested on skunks. And we were trying to do that when, when I was working on skunks. We were trying to get money to do vaccine study. And also, just prevalence of rabies in the different populations. Because I had a colleague in Southern Arizona where he had four different species. And striped skunk rabies, they go through these cycles. And what happens to the rabies when the cycle goes down? And we're thinking there's other species around there that could potentially be carrying it, but since they don't interact as much with humans, you're less likely to see it. So their population could also be cycling at different times.

• 26:05Alie Ward?

  Yeah.

• 26:06Speaker 01

  And so it is possible that if it is there, if it is in that area, they could have picked it up. Not, every skunk has rabies. Skunks have to be exposed to it. Mice have to be exposed to it. Mice are usually eaten by the rabid animal. So that's why you don't see a lot of rabid mice running around.

• 26:23Alie Ward?

  Oh. Is it less common than people might presume?

• 26:26Speaker 01

  Again, it goes through cycles and it depends on where you're at. Like in Southern New Mexico, we've had an instance of fox rabies that went up just several years ago. And so we were having a lot of animals get tested.

• 26:36Alie Ward?

  Are they susceptible to like distemper and parvo too?

• 26:39Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 26:39Alie Ward?

  They are? So according to the Centers for Disease Control, if a skunk bites you, the chances that it does have rabies could be up to 20%, all right? So if you see a skunk stumbling around kind of drunkenly, its tail's maybe dragging, avoid it, call animal control. If you ever handle a skunk, any skunk, wear protective gear and gloves. Because even if a baby skunk, if any skunk nicks or scratches or bites you, it will have to be killed to test for rabies. It can only be diagnosed by euthanizing it and dissecting its brain tissue. And there have been outbreaks of rabies from people capturing a wild one, breeding it, and then selling them as domesticated. Not a good idea.

• 27:22Alie Ward?

  So if you are exposed, even potentially exposed to rabies, you're looking at a 100% fatality rate for the animal, also for you. Your chances of surviving rabies, if you get it, are literally pretty much zero. You cannot escape rabies without a series of pretty expensive post-exposure shots. So be careful. And we mentioned rehabbing, though, in part one. And licensed and trained wildlife rehabbers are usually pre-vaccinated against rabies. Now, what about skunks? Can't you just vaccinate them? Well, in the wild, that's pretty rough. You cannot go around shooting a bunch of rabies vaccines into wild ones. We talked about that in part one.

• 28:06Alie Ward?

  But domesticated, you could try to get an exotic vet to administer the same type of rabies shot your dog might get, but it's off-label use. It's not technically legal. There are flock cameras everywhere. I don't know what they're gonna get you on. Well, this brings me to pets. Because, and I know that your stance on pets is a, a yes and a no. It's not that do skunks make good pets, but do people take good care of?

• 28:33Speaker 01

  What makes a good pet is a good pet owner.

• 28:34Alie Ward?

  Yes, right. You can't even keep a pet skunk, right? Unless you're a wildlife rehabber? Is that true?

• 28:42Speaker 01

  It depends on what state you're in.

• 28:44Alie Ward?

  Okay.

• 28:44Speaker 01

  Some states will only allow you to have a pet if it was born at a, like a fur farm. The fur farms used to raise skunks and they'd sell the pelts. And now they're selling pets.

• 28:56Alie Ward?

  Just take the "L" out.

• 28:57Speaker 01

  And so they can also do the, they can look at, do some of the genetic manipulation, get the different color patterns and everything. And so it's actually some states that say you cannot own a black and white skunk. But if you have one that's a different color pattern, you can probably keep that because it probably came from a, a fur dealer.

• 29:14Alie Ward?

  So yeah, fur dealers, they're kind of like dog breeders. They have sold skunk pelts for hundreds of years. Not as many these days, but they would sometimes spell them under these little white lies, little white striped lies, calling them American sable, which is not true, but it sells more than skunk. And other breeders have selectively just churned out skunks in colors. It sounds like a frozen yogurt menu. There are lavender, apricot, champagne, black swirl skunks, black chip, smoke, white on white, mahogany, and more. Do they try to do genetic manipulation to decent it? It ought to breed out decent glands or?

• 29:55Speaker 01

  That would be really, really hard.

• 29:56Alie Ward?

  Yeah, I imagine.

• 29:57Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 29:58Alie Ward?

  Yeah.

• 29:58Speaker 01

  Cause again, remember, this is something that's been around for a long, long time.

• 30:02Alie Ward?

  Yeah. Some people asked, Cece Goldstein wanted to know, "Are there ethical concerns in having a pet skunk? I've always wanted one, but I don't know if one would want to be my pet." And a lot of people wanted to know that. Okay, and we will get to that in a moment, but first, let's donate to a cause of jury searching. And this week, we're helping out friends of Big Bear Valley, which has educated different groups, governmental agencies, and the public on local, state, and federal environmental laws. So they actively work to protect the Big Bear Valley's wildlife and habitats and biodiversity. You can find out more about them and you can watch their 24/7 live bald eagle nest cameras, which I have done. A lot. It's so wonderful. I dropped a lot of gossip last week in the midroll break

• 30:47Alie Ward?

  about that. You can find out more about them at friendsofbigbearvalley.org, which we have a link right in the show notes. So, thank you to Jerry and sponsors of the show for making that donation possible. This podcast is brought to you by Squarespace. If you haven't heard me gushing about Squarespace for years, it's an all-in-one website platform. Whether you're trying to grow a business you have, or if you're just a baby business getting started, it has everything you need. That's where I secured my domain name. It helped me build a professional site. I can update it so easily. I've been using Squarespace since before Ologies existed. After procrastinating for years, I literally built my website in one evening. They have templates. They have

• 31:29Alie Ward?

  flexible editing tools. Squarespace also makes it easy to share your work. You can book clients. You can get paid. They have built-in tools for scheduling and invoicing and email, all in one place. Whenever someone I know needs a website, whether they're a scientist that needs to put their work up, or someone who's just starting a business, I'm like, dude, Squarespace. So, head to squarespace.com/ologies for a free trial. And when you're ready to launch, use offer code OLOGIES to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. You can do it. The other day, your podmother, Jared, was like, why do we have to eat every day? Like, three times a day. But Hungry Root, they get it. And they get to know your likes and your dislikes, your goals nutritionally, what works with your lifestyle, and then

• 32:14Alie Ward?

  they recommend groceries and recipes just for you. They help you discover new meals, ingredients you may not have chosen for yourself, but could end up being like, this is my new favorite. Hungry Root, they just help you spend less mental energy planning meals, shopping for groceries, and cooking, so you can just put that time towards what matters to you. And I teamed up with Hungry Root to create an online cookbook. It's called Pod Mom and Dad's High Protein and Low Dairy Menu. And we have a protein-packed chicken avocado rice bowl, sweet potato, and Chipotle salad. They also have some really great veggie options, too, like this Moroccan vegetable tajine. That's hecka good. You can explore

• 32:53Alie Ward?

  my digital cookbook, Pod Mom and Dad's High Protein Low Dairy Menu, for free at hungryroot.com/ologies. And for a limited time, get 40% off your first order, plus a free item in every box for life with code OLOGIES. Trips are full of unexpected discoveries. Maybe you see a sea slug, or you find out that your friend still sleeps with a stuffed animal. But when it comes to your vacation rental, there should not be any surprises. When you book a Verbo vacation rental, if what you expect isn't what you get, Verbo Care has you covered. If something's broken or just not right, Verbo will work to make it right. Plus, you get 24/7 live human support with every booking. Grab your stuffy. We're going on vacay. So, book today on the

• 33:37Alie Ward?

  Verbo app. If you know, you Verbo. Terms apply. See verbo.com/trust for details. Here's some things that I love to wear, okay? I like wearing all black because it matches. Also, a sleeveless Mongolian cashmere sweater. Those are some things that I find myself reaching for all the time. And they have a permanent place in my wardrobe, and they are Quince. That's exactly what Quince does so well. They make these elevated essentials. They use premium materials and designs that are just timeless. They're made to be worn again and again. They're those quality pieces that are there to stay in your closet. And as the weather gets a little more crisp, Quince, they've got everything you need to

• 34:18Alie Ward?

  round out that wardrobe. They've got warm, responsibly sourced down jackets, cozy cashmere scarves. And because they cut out the middlemen, you get very high-quality stuff for a lot less money. So, find the fall pieces that you will reach for most at Quince. Download the Quince app for app-exclusive offers, or go to quince.com. You can get free shipping on your order and 365-day returns, now available in Canada and the UK, too. And then, when Quince asks where you heard about them, just let them know it was Ologies' Ally Ward, because she loves them. It's the best way to support the show, too.

• 34:54Speaker 02

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• 35:24Alie Ward?

  Okay, skunks as pets. What would it take? Is it okay for the skunk? Asked Sam and Katie, Jill Landry, Emma Ruhoff, Jason Struthers, Jen A., C.C. Goldstein, Tina in Cincinnati, Mary Kirby, R.J. Deutsch, Jessica Munsey, Joey D., Becky the Sassy, Seagrass Scientist, and first-time question askers Hannah O'Quinn, Mark Reed, and Claire Widener, as well as Jessica Farrell, who asked, I know a lot of people talk about removing their scent glands and keeping them as pets. Ethics of both those things just sounds sus to me. Also... Greg Wallach said, when I was young, some neighbors had a pet skunk. Do they want to hang out with us? And I also always think about this. I think there's so many cats and dogs out there that would love to be your pet, that are legal to own. But how

• 36:09Alie Ward?

  do they become pets? If they're orphaned, or yeah, if they're, they were from a breeding facility, like a fur farm?

• 36:17Speaker 01

  Yeah. Typically, that's where they will sell them from there and say, here, here's some young ones.

• 36:21Alie Ward?

  Yeah.

• 36:22Speaker 01

  We, at the zoo here, are probably gonna get three young ones that were bred at the zoo that they're coming from.

• 36:29Alie Ward?

  Oh.

• 36:29Speaker 01

  And so, they're gonna be coming here. I'm not sure what the timeline is on this, but...

• 36:33Alie Ward?

  Yeah.

• 36:34Speaker 01

  Obviously, they're not gonna be pets, but they're gonna be ambassador animals.

• 36:37Alie Ward?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 36:37Speaker 01

  So, they will be, you know, show people around, this is what skunks do, and that kind of stuff. They will have all been de-scented.

• 36:43Alie Ward?

  Oh.

• 36:44Speaker 01

  And a lot of people, that's the first thing that you have to realize, though, if you de-scent an animal, you have taken away its protection. If it gets out, it can't defend itself.

• 36:55Alie Ward?

  Oh.

• 36:55Speaker 01

  Unless somebody just recognizes, oh, it's just a skunk. I'm not gonna worry about it.

• 36:59Alie Ward?

  Yeah.

• 36:59Speaker 01

  But coyote comes along, nothing happens, he's gonna take him down.

• 37:03Alie Ward?

  Do they know they're de-scented, do you think? Or do you think that they're...

• 37:07Speaker 01

  No, they still go through the...

• 37:08Alie Ward?

  The motions.

• 37:09Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 37:09Alie Ward?

  Right? They're looking at you with both ends.

• 37:11Speaker 01

  They'll do the stomp and then look at you.

• 37:12Alie Ward?

  Oh, that's a great thing that you brought up, because I didn't know that they did this. Warning signs. So, Elsie Lovesings, Jennifer Lewis, Addie Capello, Ashley Oki, Katie Kennedy, Omenik, Kaymy, Dana wanted to know. One, Katie just asked, stomp? And Omen Kick said, stomp, stomp. So, a lot of people were very excited. Dana wanted to know what's up with their aggressive tippy taps. So, is that the primary warning sign? Is the little tap, tap, tap, tap?

• 37:40Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's, that's the first sign. Because, again, the first thing they're gonna do is run away. They can't run away, they turn around and face you, and they'll do the stomps. And the spotted skunk, that's the one that actually gets up on the front feet.

• 37:50Alie Ward?

  Yeah.

• 37:51Speaker 01

  But yeah, they'll do the, just stomp like that. And then, if you don't, then they, they can get more aggressive. And hog-nosed skunks, I've seen them just get up on their back feet and just come down like, boom, and slam the ground.

• 38:02Alie Ward?

  Like, I am warning you.

• 38:04Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 38:04Alie Ward?

  This is coming.

• 38:05Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 38:06Alie Ward?

  Right? Do they do that as babies, too? Or do they learn that?

• 38:10Speaker 01

  Um, I've got videos of the young ones running along, and then they'll just throw their weight on the front feet, and they'll come up, just like a spotted skunk, but they're totally out of control.

• 38:19Alie Ward?

  Really?

• 38:20Speaker 01

  No idea what they're doing. And a lot of times, they'll roll over and fall back down.

• 38:22Alie Ward?

  They're just babies!

• 38:24Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 38:24Alie Ward?

  And my friend Simone, somehow, her yard, I think because she's got orange trees in a little, in a little basement, tends to be very skunk-heavy. And there was an orphaned baby that she was keeping on a heating pad to give to the rehabber. And she said that they told her, if you hold it with its tail tucked up over its butt, that it can stop it from spraying you. Is that true, or is it gonna, does that help, sort of, like an oven mitt?

• 38:51Speaker 01

  Yeah, the little ones, you really don't have to worry about.

• 38:52Alie Ward?

  Okay.

• 38:53Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's more...

• 38:56Alie Ward?

  Ally Belts wanted to know, how old are skunks when their stink glands become active? Cheyenne, Gabia, Julia Loves Fun Facts, if I'll be listening, all wanted to know as well.

• 39:05Speaker 01

  The earliest I was sprayed was at three days old.

• 39:08Alie Ward?

  Three days?

• 39:10Speaker 01

  But it wasn't, it was not that big a deal. It was more like a, kind of like a fart.

• 39:15Alie Ward?

  Yeah, just like a...

• 39:16Speaker 01

  Yeah, it was just kind of a...

• 39:17Alie Ward?

  Oh.

• 39:18Speaker 01

  And it's like, oh, I think it sprayed.

• 39:19Speaker 02

  Adorable.

• 39:20Speaker 01

  But now, as they start growing up, it get, becomes very liquidy, or very thick. And so, it's harder for them just to really let it go. But when it comes out, it's a big, old, thick ball of...

• 39:31Alie Ward?

  Oh.

• 39:33Speaker 01

  When we were filming the nature program, we had the younger animals.

• 39:37Alie Ward?

  Yeah.

• 39:38Speaker 01

  We'd get out there, and I was holding the animal, and it sprayed three or four times. And I said, okay, that's enough. I gave it some cheese, walked back. And I could hear them looking at the video going, oh, whoa. And I said, okay, I gotta see this. I ran inside, and they're just, oh, man, get out of there.

• 39:52Alie Ward?

  Oh, no.

• 39:53Speaker 01

  After about the fifth or sixth one, I'd give them the cheese, and I'd come back inside, and we'd just all stand there and look at this.

• 39:59Alie Ward?

  And yes, of course, we're gonna post a still image from this PBS documentary, Is That Skunk?, on our Instagram. And we'll also link it on our website at allyward.com/ologies, methodology. But I dug around the PBS website, and I found a 2009 article. It was written by this episode's producer, James Donald. It was titled, "The Answer: How We Got the Skunk Spray Shot." And the producer describes this slow-motion shot. It was filmed at 1,000 frames per second. And he says it might be the most disgusting shot ever to air on PBS. So, to pull it off, what they did is the camera and the camera crew stayed in Jerry's

• 40:39Alie Ward?

  garage, and they filmed Jerry, who was outside through the glass pane. So, there was a separation there. And James Donald writes, "After a couple of sprays outside, the odor started to seep through the seams of the window. However, it was never very bad. Andrew and I felt lucky that we weren't outside with Jerry." However, Donald continues, "Soon, we discovered that we were not safe from the stench. Jerry was so excited by the thought of seeing a skunk spray in HD that he occasionally ran into the garage to look at the footage. And after one extreme spraying adventure, Jerry ran into our room, only to have all of the air in the room leave upon his entry. Andrew and I were brought to tears. I eventually

• 41:23Alie Ward?

  had to dispose of the shirt I was wearing," he writes, "even though I never got within a foot of Jerry throughout the filming. And the other camera crew member had to do the same. He said Jerry's eyes were watering all night, even though he couldn't smell a thing." So, the resulting slow-motion footage, it's...

• 41:42Alie Ward?

  Okay. It reveals like a slightly convex anus. Okay. So a little bit of a cone shaped because it's working, right? It's got two nubby, thumb shaped, tiny maroon nozzles, also known as nipples, protruding. And then just a fountain of glimmering, bright yellow, golden skunk stink exploding like liquid glitter. It's astounding. Susan is preparing to post a still on our Instagram, and we just had a lengthy text exchange over whether or not it needs to be censored or if it will be flagged. That's without even smelling it. It's just looking at it. This camera crew endured so much.

• 42:25Alie Ward?

  Jerry is like a superhero who can defy gravity. He will never know the weight of the smells this world has to offer.

• 42:35Speaker 01

  They got used to it.

• 42:36Alie Ward?

  Yeah.

• 42:36Speaker 01

  So then we went back out and I got mom. And mom, I could not feed her cheese like that because she was, well, she was wild.

• 42:45Alie Ward?

  Mm hmm.

• 42:45Speaker 01

  And so I got her and I had her scruff down and got her tail up, blew her some kisses.

• 42:49Speaker 03

  On the butt.

• 42:51Speaker 01

  And she's the one that you saw that picture of.

• 42:53Alie Ward?

  Oh, my.

• 42:54Speaker 01

  And I could just hear them looking at that video. And I came back inside and they almost lost it.

• 42:59Alie Ward?

  Oh, my.

• 43:00Speaker 01

  After I had been sprayed by the younger ones, I came out after mom and they were just like, ah.

• 43:06Alie Ward?

  You're just like, just another Tuesday.

• 43:07Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 43:08Alie Ward?

  For a drag you, come on. Well, what about moms? PeachMD, first time question asker, Ricky G, EatingDogHairMagda, Jill Landry, Claire Geben. Other folks who asked are Marla J, Ranger France, Addie Capello, and Potato Puffer. They want to know, PeachMD asked, are skunks good parents? How long do their babies need to be cared for before they go off on their own? Marla J wanted to know if the dads stick around at all. What is their reproduction like and their rearing?

• 43:36Speaker 01

  We're going to stick with the striped skunks for now.

• 43:38Alie Ward?

  Okay.

• 43:38Speaker 01

  Because we know a little bit more about that. They have different numbers of babies each time.

• 43:43Alie Ward?

  Mm hmm.

• 43:44Speaker 01

  But in all cases, dad does not stick around.

• 43:46Alie Ward?

  Okay.

• 43:46Speaker 01

  He's just there for the, I don't want to say the important part, but the.

• 43:51Speaker 01

  Because.

• 43:52Alie Ward?

  Important to him.

• 43:52Speaker 01

  Yeah. Females should be able to figure out how to do this without males.

• 43:56Alie Ward?

  Yes.

• 43:58Speaker 01

  That's a whole other, that's a whole philosophical thing. It has nothing to do with skunks, really, so.

• 44:03Alie Ward?

  Yeah, that's cross species.

• 44:04Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's the skunk stories. So they will have them and moms will take care of them and they will do as best they can. If for whatever reason, they get pulled away, because mom will actually grab one, move to a new den, go back, grab another one, move to a new den and they'll do that. But if one of them disappears and then comes back two or three days later, she may not recognize it.

• 44:24Alie Ward?

  Oh, really?

• 44:24Speaker 01

  And just say, get away from me.

• 44:25Alie Ward?

  Oh.

• 44:26Speaker 01

  I mean, it's possible if they still have some, they may take it in. But if the whole litter disappears,

• 44:32Alie Ward?

  Hmm.

• 44:33Speaker 01

  the hormones kick in and say, I'm starting over again.

• 44:35Alie Ward?

  Oh, wow.

• 44:36Speaker 01

  And so it's like, you're no longer part of this. But as long as they're taking care of them, they will take care of them.

• 44:40Alie Ward?

  Yeah.

• 44:41Speaker 01

  And let's see, late April, early May, when you start seeing the young born.

• 44:46Alie Ward?

  Mm hmm.

• 44:47Speaker 01

  And first thing, they stay in the den with mom because they're nursing. And once they start waking up and their eyes open, their ears open and their teeth start coming in, mom will start taking them out a little bit and teach them how to forage. And so you'll see a lot of them. And early May, late April, I guess, you'll start seeing a lot of the young ones when they start coming out.

• 45:05Alie Ward?

  Mm hmm.

• 45:06Speaker 01

  And that's a lot of times mom may get hit by a car or something. And that's when people say, oh, there's a bunch of baby skunks in my yard. What do I do?

• 45:11Alie Ward?

  Yeah. What do you do?

• 45:13Speaker 01

  Um, and that's hard. It depends on where you are. Because some states, it's illegal to rehab skunks. If you collected them and took them somewhere, they would just have to be euthanized because they're so afraid of rabies. And they're more worried about that. And so other states will say, yeah, a licensed rehabber could take them and they could do something with them.

• 45:35Alie Ward?

  Mm hmm.

• 45:35Speaker 01

  And here in New Mexico, I was working with our local wildlife rescue. And so I was basically their skunk person. So I would go out and pick up a lot of baby skunks. And we would try to raise them until late summer, early fall, when mom would naturally be kicking them out of the house.

• 45:50Alie Ward?

  Mm hmm.

• 45:51Speaker 01

  And so at that time in their life, it's programmed that they need to start looking for a new place to live.

• 45:56Alie Ward?

  Mm hmm.

• 45:56Speaker 01

  And so that's what we would try to get rid of them.

• 46:00Alie Ward?

  Just in general, though, best to just give them a lot of space. Let them do their thing. Don't provoke them or don't dive after them unless you're a wildlife biologist who's wearing gloves, who has a rabies vaccine, right?

• 46:17Speaker 01

  You know, there's a lot of people who wouldn't even go that far.

• 46:19Alie Ward?

  Yeah. I was going to say, yeah, even that, I'm like, I'm good.

• 46:23Speaker 01

  Have you ever heard of a net?

• 46:24Alie Ward?

  Yeah. Addie wanted to know, any info for people who might want to volunteer and help with skunk research and conservation? This person says, maybe a biologist who's rabies vaccinated, which means I imagine this person is. But do skunks need help right now? Do they need our help? How are they doing?

• 46:45Speaker 01

  I think they're doing pretty well, at least the striped skunks. There's going to be some areas like the spotted skunks, there's concerns in different parts of their range that could be habitat modification, climate change. They may be moving further north. I think hog nose skunks are tending to move a little bit further north. They were reported in Colorado in the 30s, but then kind of disappeared. And now I think they're starting to move up that way again. There was one recently seen at the Colorado-New Mexico border in New Mexico. It still wasn't in Colorado. But I was having an argument with one of the editors that we published a story and she was saying that because we have game cameras out, we're seeing a lot more stuff. And so, well, no, that's not, that's probably true. We are seeing a lot more things than we used to.

• 47:25Alie Ward?

  Yeah.

• 47:25Speaker 01

  But I think they're also moving north because in some areas where they weren't seen, I had spent many, many hours driving down, many years driving those roads, looking for these things. And then they had one came up in an area that I had searched for many, many years. And they found it using the same technique, driving around.

• 47:42Alie Ward?

  Ah.

• 47:43Speaker 01

  And so, okay, yeah. But I think the game cameras are picking up a lot of stuff.

• 47:47Alie Ward?

  What are you listening to when you're on these long drives? Are you listening to like some Willie Nelson? Are you throwing on an audiobook? Like when you're on these long drives at night looking for skunks?

• 47:57Speaker 01

  Usually classic Western music.

• 48:00Alie Ward?

  You are wearing a Western shirt. I was like Willie Nelson on the road, maybe some Johnny Cash.

• 48:05Speaker 01

  In the field again. Just can't wait to get in the field again. Trapping mammals with, yeah.

• 48:12Alie Ward?

  Don't tempt allagites. They might just write that whole song for you. A couple more questions from listeners, if that is okay. Oh, tails. We had a great question about the tails.

• 48:23Speaker 01

  They have them.

• 48:24Speaker 04

  I didn't realize that.

• 48:25Alie Ward?

  They have them and they're so cute. Emotional Support Human wanted to know, why do their tails look like something you would use to dust a fan? Aura Victor wanted to know, why do they have such small, little faces? And a lot of people, I couldn't even begin to list, want to know, why are they so cute? But why such big tails, small heads? In your opinion, does that make them cute? I think it does.

• 48:45Speaker 01

  The small head, I'm not sure. That may have been from their primitive ancestors. If they were more going underground

• 48:54Alie Ward?

  Mm hmm.

• 48:54Speaker 01

  and going after burrowing rodents. Because a lot of when that grassland was opening up, you started getting a lot of ground dwelling. So when you think about your weasels, they have the small heads and that allows them to get in there. And I think the tail may have come afterwards as more of a threat and a warning.

• 49:09Alie Ward?

  Yeah.

• 49:09Speaker 01

  Because it's a big, very flowery, like just.

• 49:12Alie Ward?

  Yeah. That spotted skunk, it looks like someone wearing a Las Vegas showgirl headdress. And then absolute stink farts coming out of that headdress, which is horrifying. Mark Rubin did want to know, and Ally Betts, if any predators are immune to skunk spray. Mini me wanted to know as well. Mark wanted to know, what preys on skunks? Who dares prey on a skunk?

• 49:36Speaker 01

  Owls.

• 49:37Alie Ward?

  Really?

• 49:38Speaker 01

  They, if you go to a museum collection and go to the owl cases.

• 49:44Alie Ward?

  Yeah.

• 49:44Speaker 01

  A lot of the, you'll get a skunk smell in there.

• 49:46Alie Ward?

  Stop.

• 49:47Speaker 01

  A lot of times they're coming up from high. And so the skunk doesn't really know they're, and it's coming out, boom.

• 49:51Alie Ward?

  Oh, no. Oh, my God.

• 49:54Speaker 01

  And I've seen a picture, it was the New Mexico Museum, Natural History, and they have a picture of a mountain lion and a skunk around the little watering hole.

• 50:05Alie Ward?

  Oh.

• 50:05Speaker 01

  He went back a couple of days and went up and found the remains. So they will get taken.

• 50:10Alie Ward?

  Do you think some predators are like, it's worth it?

• 50:12Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 50:12Alie Ward?

  Yeah.

• 50:13Speaker 01

  And dogs, for example, they tend to get sprayed and for some reason, they just like it.

• 50:17Alie Ward?

  Is there a good way to teach a dog how to stop pulling a Jerry? Just getting sprayed in the face?

• 50:25Speaker 01

  How do I teach something not to be me?

• 50:27Alie Ward?

  Yeah.

• 50:29Speaker 01

  You think somebody would have tried that technique on me already?

• 50:33Alie Ward?

  They're like, it worked on my, on my lab.

• 50:35Speaker 01

  Animal behaviors did for me.

• 50:39Alie Ward?

  I mean, is it just that they don't mind? It's worth it. Maybe though, it's worth the chase.

• 50:43Speaker 01

  And a lot of times the animals that are going after them are hungry. Dogs usually just do it just to roll around and stuff.

• 50:48Alie Ward?

  Yeah.

• 50:49Speaker 01

  So they're not necessarily going out to necessarily hunt the animal.

• 50:52Alie Ward?

  Yeah. You've got to have a hobby. It's not like they're out there crafting or. Well, last listener question. We have someone who lives on a continent where there is not skunks. Looking at you, Rachel Lakav. And Gabia Shmetite, who pleaded. Wants to know, for those listeners on other continents unlikely to ever run into a skunk in person, what is the smell like? Be as vividly descriptive as you can, please. And also, it smells different from afar than really up close, right? Because I love the smell of skunks. I love skunks. I love the smell of it. Driving, you smell it, it's sad because usually that means there's been a death or if it's far away. But I understand it's much garlic, more garlicky in your face?

• 51:34Speaker 01

  Rose petals.

• 51:35Alie Ward?

  That's a lie, Jerry.

• 51:37Speaker 01

  It all smells like rose petals to me.

• 51:40Alie Ward?

  Don't make me fact check that.

• 51:44Speaker 01

  Remember, I don't smell good.

• 51:46Alie Ward?

  What do you think came first? Your working with skunks or your inability to smell?

• 51:51Speaker 01

  Well, given the first time I was sprayed.

• 51:53Alie Ward?

  Didn't mind it.

• 51:54Speaker 01

  It didn't, it's like, this is what I'm going to do for the rest of my life. Well, at least my younger life, anyway.

• 52:00Alie Ward?

  You're just the man to do it. You're just the one to take it off. So Jerry, fortunately for him, can't tell you what it smells like because he is a professional skunk expert who does not have a sense of smell. Just take a minute, just absorb that.

• 52:16Alie Ward?

  And just what a beautiful, wonderful world we live in. That's evolution, right there, baby. That is natural selection at work. So from afar, though, if you're not Jerry, it might smell like really strong weed and kind of diesel fuel, little simmering onion, and maybe like a hint of a Bunsen burner that's been left on. But to people who have been up close, like wet with it, from what I understand, it carries the aroma of rot, a tire fire, and charred garlic soaked in cat piss, trapped in a dome of broccoli farts.

• 52:58Speaker 01

  Well, we were talking about the smell.

• 53:01Alie Ward?

  Oh, yeah. You described it as roses.

• 53:03Speaker 01

  No, but yeah, there's the woman that we picked up an animal from, and she was, whenever she'd go to visit her grandmother, she would have that skunk smell. So whenever she smelled skunk, it was always a fond memory. And it always made her feel good.

• 53:14Alie Ward?

  Me, too. It reminds me of summer nights. When I first met Jared, he rode a scooter, a Vespa, around LA, even on the freeways, which is just a death, a death wish. But he would ride near my house in the summer and smell the skunk. You could smell everything in LA, you know, when you are on something that doesn't have doors. And so, yeah, it would always remind me of that. But we got a couple of questions from listeners that are like, is it true that if you smell skunk, that means that there was probably a skunk around before? Like, didn't know that, like, the smell lingers.

• 53:48Speaker 01

  Well, that depends, too, on how they're spraying. If, obviously, if they get hit, that's going to be real pungent right there. But if anything that gets up into the atmosphere will blow around a little bit. And if they're being chased by a coyote and just do the cloud stuff, that could actually blow for miles. And so as long as it's still up in the air, you might pick it up somewhere.

• 54:06Alie Ward?

  Now, skunks in the winter will cozy into the state of torpor, which is kind of translated as laziness. So in the coldest winter weather, they might just kind of lay about, living off their fat stores. They're quite literally chilling. Now, on warmer days, then they may go toddle out to snack a bit. Now, spring and summer, it's high skunk season. You've got mating in the early spring, during which male skunks shoot their shot at doing the nasty with females, who will shoot their shot of anal gland spray in the faces if they are not having what he is laying down. Now, we're going to talk more about this kind of so-called courtship.

• 54:47Alie Ward?

  But once the babies arrive in, like, May, they might be roaming about with mom in the summer. Also, as we learned, a skunk in the road thinks that, like, little tiny cute stompy stomps and spray could protect against, like, vehicular skunk slaughter. But if you live in a skunk-rich area, you know all too well about the striped sacrifices on the road's shoulders and the kind of cloud of those thiols that accompany them. Well, what happens when it hits us in the nose? So according to the 2016 Journal of the American Chemical Society paper titled "Smelling Sulfur: Copper and Silver Regulate the Response of Human Odorant Receptor OR2T11 to Low Molecular Weight Thiols."

• 55:31Alie Ward?

  Our survival as mammals relies on the supersensitivity to sulfuric thial compounds. And it helps keep us from eating rotten food and trying to hug carnivores. And skunks have evolved to say, go on, get, using those volatile sulfur compounds. And we have evolved to not want them on us. And the paper classifies some olfactory categories, like floral and aromatic, et cetera. But one class of those garlicky odors are called alleaceous, and they include substances like acetylene and hydrogen sulfide and mercaptans, or thiols.

• 56:13Alie Ward?

  And skunky butts, and also cannabis, AKA skunk weed, have those mercaptans and thiols. And yes, we have a two-parter on cannabis. It dropped a few months ago. It is a very popular episode. We'll link it to show notes. Worth a listen. But if you've ever been out on a summer night, and you thought, is that a skunk attack? Or is that a teenager in the bushes blazing up some ganja? And why do I like it either way? Well, there's an Oxford academic textbook. It has a chapter titled "Odors as Cognitive Constructs: History of Odor Classification and Attempts to Map Odor Percepts to Physical and Chemical Parameters." It explains essentially, it's really hard to study how smells hit us.

• 56:58Alie Ward?

  But perceived odor qualities may best be viewed as cognitive constructs with variability due to individual experiences. What does that mean? So it continues that the majority of odor qualities are based on learned associations, meaning if skunks are out in the summer, and it's a beautiful night, maybe you smell a puff of it, or a puff of something else, and it creates this kind of safe, pleasant memory, so you'll take a deeper breath of it in future encounters. So go, not like that. That's what research has concluded. And yeah, among the up to 10 million olfactory receptor cells we have, we have 10 million receptor cells.

• 57:41Alie Ward?

  There are 400 classes of them, and this aside is not going to do it justice. Yes, we do need the olfactology episode that I have mentioned 500-plus times in the outro music. But as long as we're still talking smells, I asked Jerry what truly stinks about his job.

• 57:57Speaker 01

  The hardest problem I had was getting grant money. I mean, because I couldn't get people to fund it. I could not get grant money.

• 58:02Alie Ward?

  And that's probably the hardest part of the job. You would probably rather get sprayed in the face with a, by a skunk than have to do a grant.

• 58:11Speaker 01

  Well, the thing is, I've done a lot of grants, and I just can't get them funded.

• 58:14Alie Ward?

  What do you think it would take for people to understand how important skunks were for the ecosystem, for human interactions, for rabies research, pest control? Like, is that part of what drives your actual want for the betterment and the reputation of skunks?

• 58:31Speaker 01

  Yeah, it would be nice if people were aware, because it's not just skunks. It's everything. Everything would be better if, I mean, if we worked on habitat, that would help a lot of different species. If we considered global warming as a real thing, that would help a lot of species, ourselves included.

• 58:49Alie Ward?

  Yeah.

• 58:50Speaker 01

  But I don't know, I think that's the, we don't have that kind of leadership in this country right now that cares about science, or facts, or

• 58:58Alie Ward?

  The future.

• 58:59Speaker 01

  Research.

• 58:59Alie Ward?

  Yeah. Living things.

• 59:01Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 59:01Alie Ward?

  For example. And I know you've got some data centers that are potentially going up around here, too. We were watching in the hotel room last night, we saw a commercial about a data center. I imagine, yeah, environmentalists, ecologists, biologists couldn't be having a harder time. It's, and I hear that from so many people that I talk to.

• 59:22Speaker 01

  I've listened to a lot of your podcasts where you talk about what's the hardest part? Well, getting funding.

• 59:26Alie Ward?

  Getting funding.

• 59:26Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 59:27Alie Ward?

  That data center, by the way, it was funded by OpenAI. It's costing $500 billion. $500 billion. And yet, Drago can't get a couple grand for a skunk grant, despite the international press and the global interest in skunks and their ecological roles. It ain't right. And it's so surprising how, how the work is such a joy, but convincing people that it's worth it is the hardest part. And that is just so frustrating.

• 1:00:00Speaker 01

  And people are interested, and they keep asking me, and I get, reporters are contacting me, and I'm giving this information. I give presentations around town, and, you know, it's like museums, and I go up to Los Alamos and talk there, and, you know, I go down to the Gila and talk there, and people are always interested.

• 1:00:17Alie Ward?

  Wait, hold on one second. Didn't we say in episode one that Jerry started Drago.org because of some press he got? Let's talk about it. Tell me about People Magazine. We've got plenty of tape.

• 1:00:28Speaker 01

  Okay. So I know what you're thinking. 50 most sexy people.

• 1:00:35Alie Ward?

  That's right, yeah. No?

• 1:00:36Speaker 01

  Not exactly.

• 1:00:37Alie Ward?

  What?

• 1:00:39Speaker 01

  So after I finished my dissertation, I submitted the article for publication to the Journal of Mamalogy. Basically, I reclassified the skunks. The original title was "A Skunk by Any Other Name."

• 1:00:52Alie Ward?

  Nice.

• 1:00:52Speaker 01

  But the people I was working with, my advisor said, no, we need to call it "Systematics of Mastodile-Like Carnivores." Exactly.

• 1:01:00Alie Ward?

  Boring.

• 1:01:00Speaker 01

  And then, next thing I know, maybe a couple of weeks later, I started getting questions. Somebody called up and said, hey, I've been talking to some people about this article you wrote.

• 1:01:13Speaker 01

  Okay, and so getting all these backstories and different perspectives about the classification. And an AP reporter, Martha Mendoza, I believe, she published an AP story. He goes out, so it's in lots of newspapers, lots of news stories. I get a call from a fellow, Mike. So he comes in, and he says, we want to interview for People. I said, really? Okay, so first of all.

• 1:01:37Alie Ward?

  What?

• 1:01:40Speaker 01

  All right, so he comes in, we spent like, I don't know, four or five hours at our kitchen table, and he was asking me all these skunk questions. And it's like, okay, for maybe 30 minutes. And we spent the rest of that time talking about all the people that he'd interviewed and everything that he'd done. This is way cooler than what you're talking about. So, so then he says, oh, yeah, well, it's probably going to come out on this issue. I forget what it was. But I was watching a bad movie on TV and was working on some DNA sequence and stuff. And they interrupted my bad movie with a news thing, so I hit the mute button. The movie came back on, I unmuted it, listening, listening, and then they interrupted again. And this time, I recognized a newscaster. He had a, like, a white shirt, no tie or anything.

• 1:02:23Alie Ward?

  Yeah.

• 1:02:24Speaker 01

  Five o'clock shadow. And I said, oh, this must be important. Princess Diana was in an accident.

• 1:02:30Alie Ward?

  Oh, I remember.

• 1:02:31Speaker 01

  Yeah. So I called up the reporter and said, what's going to happen to my story?

• 1:02:36Alie Ward?

  Oh, dear.

• 1:02:37Speaker 01

  Because it's going to get bumped.

• 1:02:38Alie Ward?

  Oh, no.

• 1:02:40Speaker 01

  So the next time that issue came out, I went over to the magazine store, I looked at it, and there's all these stories of Princess Diana. And so it's like, ah, yeah, I looked through there, I said, nothing. So I set it down. So then I went back, the next issue, and there's this "Goodbye Diana." And I said, I'm not even going to look at that one. I just turned around, walked out, and I get a call from Boston Radio Station. Hey, you were just in People Magazine, we want to interview you. I was like.

• 1:03:07Alie Ward?

  What?

• 1:03:07Speaker 01

  It's like, and so I went back to the, across the street, I picked up 146.

• 1:03:12Alie Ward?

  No.

• 1:03:13Speaker 01

  There I am.

• 1:03:14Alie Ward?

  About skunks?

• 1:03:15Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:03:16Alie Ward?

  Probably one of the most collected People Magazine issues.

• 1:03:20Speaker 01

  I grabbed like 12 of them, and I think the checkout guy thought I was some kind of Diana freak or something. And I say, no, I'm on page 146 of every one of these.

• 1:03:32Alie Ward?

  Talking about skunks?

• 1:03:33Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:03:36Speaker 01

  And of course, Gwen, in the picture, she's in the background.

• 1:03:39Alie Ward?

  You still have a copy of it somewhere, right? Yeah, at least 12.

• 1:03:42Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:03:42Alie Ward?

  Of course.

• 1:03:43Speaker 01

  Somewhere.

• 1:03:43Alie Ward?

  You must.

• 1:03:44Speaker 01

  It's a September 97 Goodbye Diana issue.

• 1:03:48Alie Ward?

  Yeah.

• 1:03:49Speaker 01

  People Magazine.

• 1:03:50Alie Ward?

  So grants and also Princess Diana's untimely death. Also, just a shout out to Julie at Indiana Skunk Rescue, who has rehabilitated and adopted an unreleasable skunk and named her Princess Diana because she is very sweet, like her namesake. I'm still sad about Princess Diana, who I hope is resting in peace with our American saint, Dolly Parton, who we lost today. I've cried so much about it already. So with good, there is bad, but with bad, there is good. Has there been something, though, in your life that just really lights you up about the work? Is it being able to be out in the field?

• 1:04:35Alie Ward?

  Is it being able to be a voice for animals that are maligned? Like, what is it about this work that kept you interested so long?

• 1:04:44Speaker 01

  Well, being out in the field and working with the animals, that's the most exciting part. But then to be able to bring the stories back and share those, because some people are interested.

• 1:04:55Alie Ward?

  Yeah.

• 1:04:56Speaker 01

  They keep asking questions and laugh when I tell jokes.

• 1:05:01Speaker 01

  Or even laugh when I tell the truth.

• 1:05:06Speaker 01

  The truth is often funnier than.

• 1:05:07Alie Ward?

  In your case, it's more absurd than I feel like any other biologist I've talked to. And I think that there's such a reverence for skunks because they are so bold while being so cute, while also being so threatening, that it reminds you that these creatures that have been like this for millions of years and have evolved to occupy this niche of behavior, they can be so much more powerful than us standing on two legs and, you know, trying to chase after it. I feel like they're such an ambassador for how powerful nature can be and how much respect it deserves. And I've always loved skunks for that.

• 1:05:47Speaker 01

  Ernest Thompson Seton.

• 1:05:50Speaker 01

  So in 1939, he wrote a book called Wild Animals at Home. And the well-meaning skunk is chapter six. And this is his first paragraph. "I have a profound admiration for the skunk. Indeed, I once maintained that this animal was proper emblem of America. It is first of all peculiar to this continent. It has stars on its head and stripes on its body. It is an ideal citizen, minds its own business, harms no one, and is habitually inoffensive as long as it is left alone. But it will face anyone or any number when aroused. It has a wonderful natural ability to take the offensive, and no man ever yet came to grips with a skunk without being sadly sorry for it afterwards."

• 1:06:33Speaker 01

  "Yeah, nevertheless, in spite of all this and the fact that several other countries had prior claims on the eagle, I could not source my view sufficient popular support to change the national emblem."

• 1:06:46Alie Ward?

  If we had skunks on the seal, ugh.

• 1:06:49Speaker 01

  Sitting on top of a flagpole.

• 1:06:51Alie Ward?

  I am all for that. I think you are my favorite methatologist.

• 1:06:57Speaker 01

  Have you ever Googled methatology?

• 1:07:00Alie Ward?

  Yeah, I found you. Why do you think I'm sitting in a conference room in Albuquerque? Wearing a skunk shirt and striped socks.

• 1:07:07Speaker 01

  I did that the other day as I Googled methatology, and my was the only thing that came up.

• 1:07:13Alie Ward?

  And look at that, here we are. We're new buddies. All it took was six years and persistent begging. Oh, God, you must have met a lot of interesting people doing this. People that you wouldn't have met otherwise, but someone's got a skunk story or someone's got a question.

• 1:07:27Speaker 01

  Well, everybody has a skunk story. People come up, "Hey, I saw a dead skunk on the road, and I thought of you." I was like, "The dead skunk reminded you of me? Or did you see me and that reminded you of a dead skunk? I'm not sure."

• 1:07:46Alie Ward?

  You need to dye the sides of your hair black.

• 1:07:49Speaker 01

  Before it turned as white as it was, I used to have a hooded skunk look. It was kind of a grayish color. And then I got older and then.

• 1:07:58Alie Ward?

  You have an opportunity here aesthetically to really pull something off. I hope that this inspires people, too, to just sit outside and watch their skunks little.

• 1:08:09Speaker 01

  That's the best way to enjoy it. If you see a skunk in your background, just get a lawn chair, open a beer, sit back, kick your feet up and watch them.

• 1:08:17Alie Ward?

  I love them. Thank you again so much. Amazing.

• 1:08:24Alie Ward?

  So ask elusive people to elucidate life's mysteries because in some cases, skunk facts await you. In my case, that is the truth. A million thanks to my favorite methatologist ever, Dr. Jerry Dragoo. Find out more about him at dragoo.org. And you can follow him on Blue Sky at JW Dragoo. He just joined because I pestered him into it. You can say hello there so that we can further pressure him to post some skunk pictures and tell some stories. So that's, again, linked in the show notes. Thank you also to Gwen Dragoo. We're all in love with you by proxy, too, just so you know. You can find more links in the show notes of this episode as well as other episodes that you might enjoy.

• 1:09:07Alie Ward?

  If you go to aliward.com/ologies/methatology, we have a ton of links up. If you ever need kid-friendly, swear-free episodes of Ologies, we do have classroom-safe Smologies episodes. Those are in their own podcast feed. You can just search S-M-O-L-O-G-I-E-S, Smologies, wherever you get podcasts, and you can subscribe there. We have Ologies merch at ologiesmerch.com. And you can also join up on Patreon at patreon.com/ologies for a dollar a month. You'll hear what episodes are about to be recorded, and you can submit questions ahead of time for the ologists. We are at Ologies on Instagram and on Blue Sky. I'm at Ali Ward. Ali just has one L on both. Erin Talbert admins the Ologies Podcast Facebook group.

• 1:09:52Alie Ward?

  Aveline Malik makes our professional transcripts, which are linked on every show page. Kellyard Dwyer does the website. Scheduling producer Noelle Dilworth is our very own high-speed camera. Aiming our weekly nozzles is managing director Susan Hale. And the dual stripes down my furry back, our editor Jake Chaffee and lead editor Mercedes Maitland of Maitland Audio. Nick Thorburn stomped out the theme music. And if you are with me this far, I'm going to tell you a secret. This week, as promised, it's that I emailed Jerry to tell him the episode was up, and it was great. And he sent me a note back saying, "I thought this was part two. Sleep procrastination, the cure."

• 1:10:35Alie Ward?

  Oh, Jerry, he's always humble and funny. But he confessed, "I haven't heard it yet. Too afraid to hear how I sound." Gwen said I was hilarious, but I don't know if she listened to the show or if it was just a random comment. He also told me he wished that we'd gotten to meet some skunks. So if you go to the Albuquerque Zoo, you can say hello to the three new ambassador skunks. If you happen to see them, say hi for me. And say hi to Jerry if you see him. If you don't see him, you can also cruise the parking lot and give a little nod to the Subaru Baja with the license plate that says "Skunks." That's his. Oh, another secret, too. If you live in the southwest states in the United States, if you're hearing this in 2026,

• 1:11:17Alie Ward?

  get your roof and your windows checked now if you can. We have a meteorology episode we did a few years ago. We talk about El Nino and La Nina. It's with Dr. Marshall Shepard, who's a legend. But this El Nino storm, starting in October, is set to be a wet one. And by the time it hits, the roofers are going to be busy, and it's going to be expensive. Also, if you need a job, I mean, be a roofer. Be safe, though, because gravity's no joke. Okay, go wave at a skunk for me. Be polite. Okay, bye-bye. Oh, wait, oh, my God. I told you last week I would give you an update on what happened to Jared. We went to the ER. We were there for a very long time. We thought he had appendicitis. All signs pointed to it.

• 1:12:01Alie Ward?

  They did a CT scan, and it turns out my man has diverticulitis. So he didn't need an operation. That's cool. But he does have some divots in his intestines, and he hasn't eaten a solid meal in almost a week now. Just Jell-O and broth. He doesn't love it, I'll be honest with you. And I thought that seeds and pits were off the table because they can get trapped in these little potholes in your intestines. But I read some new research from 2025, and apparently that's not the case. So if you have a flare-up, you have to take antibiotics and stuff. Anyway, it sucks. Poor dude's been doubled over in pain.

• 1:12:45Alie Ward?

  But he asked the nurse, who was, I think, younger than both of us, at the ER, "Why me? Why? Why did this happen to me?" And she just said, "You're getting older, honey." And it was so brutal, but so iconic. And I can't tell you how many times we've said to each other, "You're getting older, honey." We say it a lot now. Okay, but he's on the mend. He's doing okay. And again, if you want the skunk shirt that we talked about in this episode and we put on our Instagram, go to jbstink.com. J-B-stink.com. He makes great shirts. There's also one that says, "I like bugs." Okay, he's fine. All right, bye-bye.

• 1:13:50Speaker 05

  And I think it smells delicious.

• 1:13:56Speaker 05

  Oh, look. You just got added to a meeting about coordinating another meeting to prepare for the pre-meeting ahead of the follow-up meeting, which will, of course, require a recap meeting and then another meeting. Hit your booking point?

• 1:14:18Speaker 05

  Book with Southwest and enter airplane mode.

• 1:14:22Speaker 06

  Home is for impressing, but also resting and entertaining guests in, burning some sage in, decorating and staging. This season, visit HomeSense to get all the things that make your home home. HomeSense, abundantly affordable.