[Intro]
Hank Green: Hello and welcome to the SciShow
Talk Show, that day on SciShow where we talk
about stuff with cool people who are doing
cool things. Today we have Ellen Whittle,
the first student we've ever had on SciShow
Talk Show. Ellen is studying bats, because
Ellen loves bats. (Ellen laughs) I was just
talking to Ellen before the show, and she's
a little bit enthusiastic about bats.
Ellen Whittle: Little bit.
Hank: How did that happen?
Ellen: Yeah... so, um, actually, the love
came after the working with bats -
Hank: Oh!
Ellen: But first of all, thank you for having
me.
Hank: Of course.
Ellen: So I... got into caving first and caving,
bats, kind of goes hand in hand sometimes!
So I started to run into bats and see them
around and I was - I was just blown away.
Like, they're incredible. The fact that I'm
going through a cave that I can barely stand
to be in for two hours, and they're living
in it all winter to escape what's harsher
outside. So I was just, I thought that was
incredible. So I, I've been working with the
Big Fork High School Cave Club, I'm a chaperone
for them and I go out with them and we do
surveys of caves to try to find these winter
hibernacula. Uh, were the bats are staying.
Hank: Hibernacula?
Ellen: Yeah.
Hank: So is that, is that a plural? Is the
plural -
Ellen: Hibernacula's plural, hibernaculum
is one, and I always screw it up.
Hank: Hibernacula? So that's, that's like,
that's that's such a, that's an awesome word!
Uh, that's what Batman should call his lair.
Awesome. Uh, so what are you studying? Are
you doing it by yourself or with students
or a mixture?
Ellen: So what I'm doing now is a senior thesis
project on how bats use artificial roosts,
human structures, in Montana, and I'm doing
that as a, as a research project. I'm the
only, like, technician but I'm doing it for
the Montana Natural Heritage Program. Uh,
the Forest Service also supported the project,
um, so I've visited Forest Service bridges
purposely for them, they provided a vehicle
and, and means to go check all these bridges,
so theirs different parties interested in
it.
Hank: So you basically, so bridges are your
main...
Ellen: My research is bridges.
Hank: OK. Bat structures.
Ellen: Yeah.
Hank: So artificial structures are not being
built specifically for bats but they're using
them. So you've been visiting a lot of bridges.
Ellen: Somewhere around 420.
Hank: That's a lot of bridges.
Ellen: It is, actually, a lot, when you consider
it's in the space of about two and a half
months.
Hank: What do you find under bridges usually?
Ellen: Really gross stuff. Um, a lot of bugs,
which sometimes are the gross things, sometimes
not, um, people sometimes -
Hank: Oh yeah?
Ellen: And when I'm really lucky, there's
bats.
(Hank laughs)
Hank: But not usually?
Ellen: No.
Hank: How many, how many of your bridges had
bats. Or evidence of the bats.
Ellen: Oh, well evidence of bats is a different
story. Roughly half had evidence of bats,
so droppings, urine stains, that kind of thing.
Which - it's pretty funny to get excited about
poop. You're like "Oh my god! Poop!" like
uh, this is exciting, because I've been to
these bridges all day and not seen any poop
-
Hank: It's bat poop!
Ellen: It's bat poop.
Hank: Not human poop.
Ellen: Exactly, yeah. There's different kinds
of poop you get excited about, you don't get
excited about some poop. Um, yeah, so about
50% I would say, and, and it gets - bats definitely
use more than 50% of the bridges out here,
it's just that, if you've ever been over a
little wooden forest service bridge lately,
it's directly over the water, so their droppings
fall right in the water, you're not going
to find it. The detectability is, like, zero.
Um, so, that's something that when I work
into the statistics part of it, I have to
figure out what's my detectability and if
it's zero, I have to basically discount those
bridges. But, as of right now, out of all
the bridges, probably about half had bats
signs. And day-roosting bats, which is what
we really wanted to look for, um, we found,
oh, probably about 15 bridges had day-roosting
bats in them.
Hank: So you actually saw bats there?
Ellen: Yeah, exactly. Which made my day, made
my week pretty much, every time I found this,
and there was kinda like two different types,
so you've got a bridge that had just a solitary
bat in it, which was exciting enough, and
then you had roosts that had more of a colony,
um, maybe like greater than thirty bats would
be like a colony, so we had a couple - we
had a lot fewer of those. We had probably
um half of those be just solitary bats. That's
usually, like, male bats, like a bachelor
bat, um, they'll be out there on their own,
whereas the females are more likely to be
clustered together or if females are clustered
together to raise their young, that's a maternity
roost, and just, like, amazing to find.
Hank: Right. So much more rare.
Ellen: Yeah. Yeah, it's much more unusual.
We didn't know actually going into it if bats
would even do that in Western Montana, because
previous studies, so Bat Conservation International
has done studies and in 1999 they surveyed
a whole lot of bridges South, in the U.S.,
a whole lot of bridges, and they were trying
to figure out whether they were being used
by bats, and they didn't even survey Montana,
because they said "Montana doesn't have the
right temperatures to support bats."
Hank: Right.
Ellen: So -
Hank: Well, we have bats. They now that.
Ellen: They do, and that's - this is the fun
part of studying bats, its kinda like a grand
mystery, um, where the bats go, because in
the winter-time, like I said, we go check
these caves to find bats, and you know, I
would say we typically find maybe like ten,
a dozen bats, or so, in the caves. When you
add it all up, it's nowhere near the amount
of bats we actually have, so it's like, where
are they going?
Hank: Where are they?
Ellen: Exactly! They're - we don't know where
they're going! There's either a huge cave
somewhere where they all are at, and they're
all like "Haha, you can't find us," or there's
something else, some part of the story we
don't know.
Hank: Wow. I love a mystery.
Ellen: (Laughs) I do too! I wanna help find
out.
Hank: Yeah. So how are bats doing?
Ellen: In Montana they're doing OK, all over
the world bats are declining. Different reasons,
habitat loss - you'd be surprised, you wouldn't
think caves would be a habitat that you would
lose, but it totally is, especially as people
get into them more, there's tour caves, and
that kind of things that start impacting them.
Hank: And then - are, are the structures sort
of sub-par for bat habitat?
Ellen: That is a great question.
Hank: Is that part of what you're trying to
figure out?
Ellen: It is part of what I'm trying to figure
out, um, there's definitely been studies saying
that actually bridges can do just as well
for bats if not better. There is research
to say that. For some species. They can't
serve as habitat for all species though. Um,
Brazilian Free-Tailed Bats are the ones that
are pretty famous for doing really well in
bridges; you have huge colonies down in Texas
of Brazilian Free-Tailed Bats. They do really
well, but that means they have to be able
to tolerate disturbance pretty well, um, like
because there's going to be human traffic
and human, human
Hank: Loud...
Ellen: Human interference. So if they're pretty
cool with that, then they're going to do really
well and they can use bridges really well.
So our question is, like, you know in Montana,
our bridges are maybe not as well trafficked
as like an Austin, Texas bridge, um, so, what
kind of species are using them? We have no
idea. Um, and whether it's good habitat for
bats in Montana. And the fact that I found
maternity colonies at all, that they're raising
their young in the bridges, says that we have
habitat that works for them, because they
wouldn't choose to, to have their colony their
otherwise.
Hank: Um, unfortunately, Jessi is not going
to bringing us a bat today. I think that would
be probably bad for the bat, but -
Ellen: Depends on the bat, some of them are
more gregarious than others.
Hank: Yeah. Um, but Jessi does have an animal
that she's going to bring us; Jessi from Animal
Wonders is going to be appearing where you're
sitting very soon.
(Break)
Hank: Jessi has arrived.
Jessi: Hey!
Hank: Carlos!
Jessi: (Laughs) Carlos the colorful!
Hank: Hello, Carlos!
Jessi: Carlos is a Sinaloan Milk Snake -
Hank: What was the first word?
Jessi: Sin-a-lo-an.
Hank: Sinaloan.
Jessi: So they're from Mexico.
Hank: OK.
Jessi: (?), Sinaloa, and Chihuahua.
Hank: OK.
Jessi: Um, they come from arid regions, grasslands,
Rockies - are you so strong?
Hank: Do they like milk?
Jessi: They got their name because, um, yeah,
people were finding them in their barns and
the, you know, the old wive's tale is that
they were stealing the milk from the cows.
Hank: (Laughs) I'm just picturing this snake
attached to an udder, but not biting it, just
suckling.
Jessi: (Laughs) Just sucking on it.
Hank: Yeah. Well, maybe a bunch, like every
nipple has another snake hanging off it...
Jessi: (Laughs) Just hanging... oooh... that
would be... weird.
Hank: Super terrifying. Yeah.
Jessi: Poor cow.
Hank: Yeah. Poor cow... would this eat a bat?
Jessi: Um... if the bat was small enough,
I mean...
Hank: There are some pretty small bats out
there.
Jessi: He could eat - he can fit something
twice the width of the biggest part of his
body, so if the bat's, you know -
Ellen: Oh, yeah, he could definitely eat some
bats.
Jessi: Yeah. Um, he is terrestrial, so he's
not arboreal, so he's not going to be climbing
up, you know, finding stuff, but if he did
happen to go into a cave and there was a bat
down there, he probably would... um, milk
snakes are actually pretty, you know, general
eaters, they're not going to just eat other
snakes or other lizards or other birds, they're
going to eat pretty much whatever they come
across.
Hank: Whatever's there.
Jessi: Mhmmm. Yeah.
Hank: So -
Jessi: I wish I had a - I wish I shared a
bat with you, but -
Hank: No, you don't have any bats.
Jessi: I know.
Hank: That's OK.
Jessi: Bats are amazing, though. And - poop!
Ellen: Yeah!
Hank: Poop!
Ellen: Yes. Poop's the best.
Jessi: Yes.
Hank: There's a lot of poop work over here.
Ellen: It's a biologist's best friend. It's
awesome.
(All laugh)
Jessi: So if you saw this snake out in the
wild, what would you think? What would you
do?
Hank: Uh, as with all snakes in the wild,
I would go "Look, a snake!" and then I would
stay pretty far away from it.
Jessi: Nice. That's good.
Hank: That's basically my, my - yeah.
Jessi: Good.
Hank: In fact, that's how I also operate with
mammals, uh, birds, reptiles, fish...
Jessi: Well, that's good!
Hank: "Oh! Hey! OK!"
Jessi: Leave them alone!
Hank: Barracuda.
Jessi: Yeah...
Hank: Sharks are fish!
Ellen: Are there a lot of those in Montana?
(Hank and Jessi laugh)
Ellen: I don't know much about this.
(Hank laughs).
Jessi: Alright, so, so -
Hank: Yeah.
Jessi: Yeah, so if you saw it, that's a good
advice for any wild animal, anyway, to observes
from afar -
Hank: But with this particular color combination,
I would think "Stay away."
Ellen: Well, isn't there a - isn't there a
- there's a poem you can recite to figure
out -
Jessi: Yeeeesss.
Hank: Yeah - red and yellow
Jessi: Kill a fellow
Hank: Or red, any color, any kind of color
of snake, just don't -
Jessi: I think we should let her try. (Laughs)
Go.
Ellen: I can't remember. It's like, red and
yellow, kill a fellow, and then, like, uh,
red and black, make... no.... attack... I
don't know.
Jessi: Yeah! That's really close. That - I
know it as "friend of Jack," which is kind
of arbitrary.
Hank: Jack. But no other humans.
Jessi: Exactly.
Ellen: If you're not Jack, stay back.
Jessi: Watch out! Oh, but yeah, there's a
rhyme there, and that rhyme is, is associated
with these coloration patterns, warning patterns.
Hank: Right, so if red is touching black,
Jessi: Yup, it's gonna be -
Hank: And not yellow,
Jessi: - it's gonna be a coral snake.
Hank: OK.
Jessi: Which is highly - highly venomous.
Hank: Wait. Wait.
Ellen: Wait.
Jessi: No, I said it backwards.
Ellen: Red and yellow is -
Hank: So if it's red and black, then, if the
red is touching the black and not touching
the yellow -
Ellen: So apparently we're OK here -
Hank: - then we're safe.
Jessi: Yes. Red touching black, friend of
Jack, it's a milk snake or a king snake, and
then, if the red is touching yellow, yeah,
dangerous fellow - it's the coral snake. But
there's mutations all the time. So don't be
like "Oh, red's touching black - let's poke
it!" you know, you know, just give them their
space, they have this coloration to help,
you know, protect them. Warning coloration.
Mimicry.
Hank: It's pretty. That knot he's tied there
on your hand.
Jessi: Jewelry.
Hank: Yeah, jewelry!
Jessi: You want to feel him?
Hank: 'Course. Ooh, he's moving with me!
Jessi: Into the hole of the couch! (To Ellen)
Do you want to feel him?
Ellen: He's so soft!
Hank: Oh, snakes. I feel like, uh, snakes
were way more terrifying before I touched
one.
Jessi: Yes.
Hank: The first time I touched one I was like
"Oh, that's kind of nice," like, oh, it's
just a thing, it's just another animal.
Jessi: It's different than me, but it's like
you get past that - that wall of fear, yeah.
Hank: Yeah, that's the thing I know not to
be afraid around.
Jessi: Yeah, I think that's where I - my fascination
with snakes was just - I didn't have a lot
interaction with them when I was younger and
then I - I went to a reptile convention and
they're just everywhere and you just get down
and look at them and you're like "Oh!" and
they're just amazing.
Ellen: I feel like that's kinda the problem
with bats, is that you have even less exposure
to them and then you do these guys: there
are pet snakes but you don't - and not advocating
for pet bats - but like people don't see them
unless they're in a situation that they shouldn't
be there, like if they get into your house
and, and they might be ill or something like
that; they've fallen on the ground -
Jessi: And they're flapping and scary and
-
Ellen: Yeah, and they're scary and they, they
belong at night, you know, you can't actually
see them, and I'll tell you what's amazing,
is like if you ever get the chance to actually
like look face to face with a bat and they
look back at you and you're just like ok.
Like, you see the intelligence in their face
and it's like when you're getting up close
with these guys, you're like "wow" you know,
this isn't a scary thing of the night that's,
you know... just...
Jessi: They have a - they have a - they're
a being!
Ellen: Yeah.
Jessi: They're there.
Ellen: Yeah. Exactly.
Hank: Well, awesome. Thanks, Carlos for coming
to visit. When - when and what was the last
thing Carlos ate.
Jessi: Huh. A week ago he ate a very small
little rat. So in a couple of days he'll be
hungry again.
Hank: But not right now.
Jessi: Nope!
Hank: OK, good. Um, thanks for visiting, Carlos,
thanks for bringing Carlos to us, Jessi. Jessi's
channel is at youtube.com/animalwondersmontana,
and Ellen, thanks for bringing all of your
amazing insight and stories and -
Ellen: Thanks for having me!
Hank: Yeah! And also for doing the work you're
doing, because it sounds pretty cool.
Jessi: Yeah!
Hank: Keep it up! And thanks to all of you
for watching this episode of the SciShow Talk
Show; if you want to keep getting smarter
with us at SciShow, you can go to YouTube.com/SciShow
and subscribe.
