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Life is strange, naturally you want to hear about it. Strange by Nature is your guide to the strange, weird and unbelievable side of nature. Professional naturalists present weekly curated stories about just how strange nature can get.
Episodes
Aug 21, 2024
Aug 21, 2024
30 min
I can't believe I am about to type this sentence but Rachel's topic this week is Foot-long Neurotoxic Invasive Terrestrial Flatworms. Yeah. That's...that's a lot.
So as not to leave the neurotoxin train, Kirk follows that up with a discussion of Cobras, cobra venom, neurotoxins, and necrotic flesh. Good news though, there's a possible new cure to talk about.
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Aug 14, 2024
Aug 14, 2024
38 min
This week, Kirk brings us a story about ants that perform surgery on injured colony members. Warning, the only surgery they know is amputation.
Rachel, talks about a fish that was seen living inside of a jellyfish.
Victoria caps it all off this week by getting extra weird talking about inter-species fornication. Why do they do it? It's quite a ride.
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Aug 7, 2024
Aug 7, 2024
42 min
This week, Victoria talks about the bird pirates of the sea, the Great Skua. These birds have an incredible memory for people they don't like and they have also been known to steal other animals eyeballs. Woah.
Kirk is up next with a story about the epic battles waged by Pavement Ants. These colonies go head to head battling colony vs colony but their strange behavior is acutaly making them highly dominant in their urban habitats.
Rachel is up last and she tackles the topic of Fireflies. It turns out there's more to their dispaly than jut pretty lights. They are flashing their butts to find a mate (or maybe a meal.)
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Jul 31, 2024
Jul 31, 2024
32 min
This week it's back to the briny deep as Rachel talks about a program to train sharks to eat lion fish. It's the latest in a strange list of ways people have been trying to control this invasive fish species.
Kirk brings us the strange tale of the 2000 foot tall WEAU TV tower in Wisconsin that was responsible for thousands of bird deaths every year until it fell. The truly strange part is that the antenna wasn't special. "Tower kills" account for somewhere between 4 and 50 million bird deaths in the US every year. It's a sobering story about our responsibility to help migrating birds.
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Jul 24, 2024
Jul 24, 2024
33 min
On this week's show, Kirk talks about the uncomfortable middle path. How does ambiguity shape our choices? Why do things that are not quite one thing or the other make us uncomfortable.
Up second, Rachel takes us to New Zealand to talk about the heaviest parrot in the world. the Kākāpō aka, the Moss Chicken.
Enjoy these two very different and strange topics this week!
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Jul 17, 2024
Jul 17, 2024
36 min
The gang's all together this week. Victoria kicks things off with a story about a bizarre fern that displayed a totally new concept in plants. Ladies and Gentlemen, we present, the Zombie Fern. This bizarre plant can convert dead fronds into roots. It's something we've never seen before and completely strange.
Rachel is up next to tell us the tale of the Wētā. These giant insects from New Zealand are large and amazing, just be careful how you pronounce their name.
Kirk is up last this week and he helps us understand a long-time mystery that may finally be solved. Why did the wounds of soldiers at the battle of Shiloh discover their wounds were glowing and why did those with glowing wounds have a better chance of survival?
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Jul 10, 2024
Jul 10, 2024
40 min
Hello Everyone, ready for another fun episode? Rachel kicks us off this week by talking about Alpha Gal. No, she's not a superhero. Alpha Gal is an allergy to mammal meat you can get from being bitten by a tick. Absolutely terrible.
Victoria delves into the strange phenomenon of animals playing dead and what it may have to do with something called Tonic immobility. Many animals, when turned on their back, go into a trance-like state. It's truly bizarre.
Kirk rounds out the show by talking about research that involved subjecting small lizards to a leaf blower. It's bizarre but they did it for a good reason; to learn about hurricanes and how the effect animal evolution.
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Jul 3, 2024
Jul 3, 2024
38 min
Kirk once again takes us back to space this week to talk about Schloz's Star. Incredibly, scientists discovered that 70,000 years ago, this star actually passed THROUGH our solar system.
Rachel's tale this week is almost as big and mind boggling but it takes place right here on Earth. She tells us why we are spending millions of dollars to drop 14.7 million screwworms into the rainforest in Panama EVERY WEEK!
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Jun 26, 2024
Jun 26, 2024
34 min
Rachel goes back to the ocean to talk about bizarre, small, upside-down, solar powered jellyfish.
Kirk goes the exact opposite direction and takes us to space with a primer on the Heliosphere. It's all just so he can tell us about some strange research that came out that suggests the sun's heliosphere collapsing 2 million years ago may have caused the last ice age or even the evolution of modern humans.
So, wide berth in topics this week but ultimately they both come back to the sun.
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Jun 19, 2024
Jun 19, 2024
42 min
Kirk tells us all about the amazing but extinct Elephant Bird, an incredible bird that could grow to a massive 2000 pounds. Rachel next brings us an absolutely astounding story of a researcher who wanted to answer the question of why snakes strike and bite and that research involved stepping on snakes 40,000 times. Victoria rounds out this week by telling us about mushrooms and the intriguing cases where the edible Morel mushrooms ended up being poisonous.
Join us weekly for more strange nature. Our supporters on Patreon get every episode ad free!