Guys: Episode 87 - Bird Guys with Joe Pera

Hello to everyone, and also single guys.

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Enjoy the show.

Welcome to guys,

a podcast about guys.

I am Brian.

I'm here with a guy that I'm being nice on this episode, a real nice bird man, Chris.

Hi, Chris.

A real nice bird man.

A real ornithologist.

Okay, because I was going to say, I feel like he could be nice, but also, you know, display a bit of creativity as well.

You don't have to just call me a bird man.

Nope.

Not doing that.

And for our guest, we have the very extremely funny Joe Parra.

Hey, Joe.

Thanks for having me, guys.

It's going to be fun because we have some bird guys to talk about.

And I like to ask this up top.

It's sort of I'm becoming more professional as a podcast host and stuff is I'll try to ask what is your do you like birds Joe?

Do you hate birds?

Do you find yourself ever looking at birds?

I like birds.

I

got a couple books on them for a project, but it's I didn't remember too many of the names.

I just,

it's hard, it's hard.

I feel like it's a nice thing, but maybe something I will get into further later on in life.

Right now, I'm just too busy going to

motocross events on the weekends.

That's so different from birds.

It feels like an older person thing, though.

It sort of famously is.

It feels like a retirement thing.

It's something where you have a lot of time to travel around and stuff, you know?

I would not say that to people in the birding community.

I read somewhere it's the biggest hobby in the United States right now.

It looks like that.

It's really like the people seemed younger than I expected.

There's still very many 70-year-olds doing it.

It's not.

But there is young people coming into the birding arena now.

Like it is becoming a younger person.

Listen,

I like birds.

I love wildlife watching.

I'm sort of obsessed with it.

I could see myself becoming a birder like pretty early, like within the next sort of five to 10 years.

Can I say that?

I just want to say real quick, there is a controversy going on in the community about wokeness and birding.

Like you would think that that would be the place that would be saved from people yelling about woke but guess what there is a controversy in the bird figure out what it would be even i'm trying to like even imagine what they could be saying is woke

uh so eponymous bird names are being changed So what that means is, like, the Cooper's hawk is named after a guy named Cooper or something.

I didn't look up his name.

They're going to change that to better describe the hawk.

You know?

So they'll be like, oh,

that seems smart, though.

That just seems like it's sort of a better way.

That doesn't really seem like it's woke.

I mean, if they were, they're just changing it to a better description.

But I would say that all three of us on this call are probably considered pretty woke.

So I don't think anybody on this call is going to be able to say it's not woke.

We're not going to have the argument about

glasses on, yeah.

well what what is what is what did cooper do uh i see it's not it's not always what they did uh oh so we're not tearing down the confederate monuments of the birding

sometimes we are because joe let me tell you back when birding started it was a lot different they would shoot and kill the birds well that's and then they will be like check out this bird i think though that's no that was what bird watching was a guy would shoot and kill a bird and he'd bring it to a scientist and the scientist would be like, oh, that's a, and then name it after the, usually the guy that shot the bird.

That was,

that's, yeah, that's the whole dilemma about the Natural History Museum in New York.

It's like, it's very cool to see all those animals stuff, but it's also such a waste.

Yeah, they're all stuffed.

Yeah.

It's kind of scary.

There's no winning.

No, it was such a funny way to approach nature, I guess.

Very sad, but also just like,

shoot this thing stuff and bring it back.

The celebration of life is not really a celebration of life.

I was just picturing, like, because some of them are literally named after the

scientist that named it, but the other ones are named after a fucking guy that shot a bird.

They were like, oh, this guy, he shot the first one of these.

This is the new one.

I can help you out, though.

Started the process of eliminating them entirely.

Let's name the bird after him.

Get ready to say goodbye to it.

This is from NPR.

Get ready to say goodbye to a lot of familiar bird names like Anna's hummingbird, Gamble's quail, Lewis's woodpecker, Beewick's wren, and Bullock's Oriole, and more.

That's because the American Ornithological Society has vowed to change the English names of all bird species currently named after people, along with any other birds' names deemed offensive or exclusionary.

So it seems like a good thing.

But that's the woke part is the

changing names that feel

exclusionary or whatever, right?

We're supposed to be exclusionary.

It seems like it's more about

people

placing ownership on the birds as opposed to like approaching them.

Yeah, that's

it seems

makes sense what they're doing.

Yeah, it says the move has come as part of this is where the

people get mad, though.

The move comes as a part of a broader effort to diversify birding and make it more welcoming to people of all races and backgrounds.

That's pretty woke.

That's pretty woke.

Okay.

Yeah, no, no, I understand what they're saying now.

So that's what they're upset with is that birding used to be us.

I mean, I do think of birding as an old white man's game, definitely.

Like, I guess maybe just from that movie with Steve Martin that I saw, though, because I think that's really the only

real example of birding I can think of.

But yeah, I mean, listen, I think birding is something everyone can appreciate.

I don't think, you know, I really don't think there's any reason why it shouldn't be diversified.

Here's a hint at how good birding people are.

I'm going to read you this paragraph that you will never read in any other article on any other website ever.

I've been seeing some of these birds and using these names every year for the last 60 years, says Ken Kaufman, a prominent author of field guides he says he initially opposed the idea of changing so many names but has come around

i saw

he evolved his views on it and you're not supposed to do that no no no

i guess it would be a pain if you're like a 70 year old birder and you gotta learn new names for everything Yeah.

Well, Joe, and a lot of them do a thing called the lifer list, and they have a list that of all the birds they've seen in their life.

Right.

And a lot of them, and they're changing the names of 70 to 80 birds.

So a lot of them are like, I'm going to have to go to my lifer list and write the new name.

My piece of paper and

a data entry that I'm going to have to do.

And it's just sort of, you know, I mean, that's easily 40 to 45 minutes worth of paperwork.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Cross them out one by one and rewrite them in red pen next.

That's oh, well, now we're going to go to Reddit where they were having a conversation about this.

Live departure 5186 says, just when I have most of the birds on my life list, is it not enough that everyone gets a trophy and no one knows our history and hatred is the rule of the day?

Rude people everywhere.

It's unbelievable that kids want everything for free and don't want to work.

Now their feelings get hurt because of a bird's common name.

Thanks for nothing.

What a waste.

Okay, so not all the bird people are nice and cool then.

Right?

Because this person seems pretty annoying.

Well, he fit everybody gets a trophy into an article about changing the names of 70, 80 birds.

Yeah, see, that's what I was thinking.

I was thinking there'd be some curmudgeons because I was picturing it all as these like old people.

So I was thinking there would be some curmudgeons that would be, you know, but even the old people tend to be nice still who are birders, right?

Most of the, because this guy, bipedal meat puppet says uh while we're at it how about the ring-necked duck barely perceptible ring but that bill the way i heard it the specimen sent back to the lab was missing the bill edit and i'm fine with renaming descriptive names will be great going forward so he's fine with it yeah but he wants to go further and rename other birds that maybe don't look the way that their name says because he has some suggestions on something that they could add to the list like the ring duck or whatever that he said you know, he, I just love the way that they, I love them reminiscing about like a bird that they, you know, and just the way they talk about it with such reverence.

I really do like it a lot.

It's beautiful.

Birds and dogs says there are so many like that where the bird was named while looking at a dead specimen in a lab.

Semi-palmated sandpiper and plover are just terrible names for those adorable birds.

Red-bellied woodpecker also comes to mind.

So now they

that is nice.

How do you know?

How do you not like the name red-bellied woodpecker?

That's such a great name.

Does it not have a red belly?

Most don't.

Most don't.

Because actually, this guy explains

the red-bellied actually gets his name because the red-headed woodpecker was discovered first.

Honestly, more appropriate in my opinion.

There's a very faint red belly.

And once you start noticing it, it makes them more adorable.

So, yeah, so it does seem like a good name then.

You know, it's like, yeah, it's not super obvious, but it does have a a red belly and it sort of tells you that it's something you should be looking for as well and then once you notice it it's more adorable it is and and it's funny to say like hey man this duck's bill doesn't have a ring on it let's name it the ring bill or something than the big bill duck or something i can't i i am not creative enough to start naming birds i would just call them all like They all look the same to me.

Every single bird looks exactly the same to me when I'm outside.

I'm out walking around.

I'm checking out, and I see the birds, and I'm like, well, that's a bird.

Some of them are different colors and sizes.

You recognize that, right?

Some of them are

pretty big.

Hey, bird blind.

Maybe bird blind.

I mean, and his defense.

Yeah, and right now he's, I want to say Brian is he does have a broken foot at the moment.

We should mention that it has not been mentioned, I believe, on any kind of a main episode.

This would be the first main episode we recorded since he broke it.

So, you know, things aren't going.

You know, he's got a lot going on.

And it was a pretty, I mean, the story is the craziest story how he did it.

It's not crazy.

I'll tell it real quick.

There was a cool red van.

There was a cool red van parked in a

parking lot by my house.

And I stepped in a pothole and broke my foot because I was looking at the van.

Okay.

That's a cool.

That's a cool story, right?

Like, that's so badass.

Can you identify van makes and models, Brian?

No, I couldn't.

Oh, okay.

I was going to say, if you know all the vans, but not all the birds, that would be so funny.

He doesn't know the vans.

He just saw a van that was like, it's like, it's very childlike.

I feel like he saw, maybe it was like a really bright red or something.

And he

was beautiful, like a beautiful, probably brand new red paint job.

And then it had something on the side of it painted in black, but I couldn't figure out what it was.

And that's probably, I need to go back by there.

I got a little scooter now.

I'm going to go back by there and check out what was on the side of the van.

He's got a scooter, one of those knee scooters, you know, that

it's humiliating.

It's great.

It's humiliating.

I decided when I first heard about it, I was like, it seems like it should be something for a dog.

I don't even know why, but it just seems like it should be for a pet or an animal, not like a human being.

And we suggested, and we're still pushing for this, that Brian buys a rascal.

So he could drive around in a rascal.

And we've looked into it, and the prices aren't that high.

And it's very...

Yes, they are.

The one I want was $3,000.

It's an investment, though.

For six months of my life, yes.

This guy goes, I just really want Stellar's Jays to be Stellar, S-T-E-L-L-E-R,

which is a name.

I know.

I've heard of this type.

This is the first type of bird I think that I've heard of.

Well, he wants it to be named Stellar J, S-T-E-L-L-A-R.

And he goes,

while we're at it, can we rename Ruby-crowned kinglets?

I've seen a thousand, and I've seen the Ruby Crown maybe twice.

Names don't have to be.

They can't be.

They're going to, it's over.

They decided the ones already.

Stop trying to add ones to it.

You know, they're going to name every.

They're going to rename every bird.

All of a sudden, it's like, that's a fucking gray sea fellow.

And it's like, that's a seagull, you piece of crap.

Oh, there's no such thing as a seagull.

Oh.

I saw the most handsome seagull in California.

I don't know.

I'm from Buffalo.

The seagulls there are kind of, and in New York, they're kind of like home you know they're there's yeah they're they're they're they're eating garbage and stuff but this bird this seagull and it was in san francisco i was walking around for a show and it was so it's so

it's perfect coat of feathers it it was it pulled the muscles from the water and uh to to break them open it it flew up in the air right on the dock and dropped them like eight feet and the muscle cracked open and it ate the muscle right out and i was like this is, I don't know.

He was like my life.

It was like it.

He was like a strong, like one of the bigger, more popular, like, would you think he's the most popular guy in his town or whatever?

You'd think it's just maybe a case for moving out west.

It's healthier there than in New York City.

Not

beach garbage rant.

I think you're right.

Our Pacific Ocean seagulls are, like, I live on the west coast as well, on

the Pacific Ocean in Vancouver.

And I will say, having gone out out to New York, yeah, we've got much more handsome seagulls than you, healthier seagulls,

and stronger in every way.

And one thing is really crazy, people have seen this, and you'll know if you're around seagulls a lot, a crazy thing that they do is eat starfish.

And it is a why, you'll see it all the time.

Stanley Park in Vancouver on the seawall at a certain time of year, you go there and you can see them like putting it down their throat and you see the actual starfish like going down and it is the craziest thing to see.

Wow.

So, yeah, I saw a whole conversation about they were like, we should rename a bird seagull because there's no such thing as a seagull.

If you put seagull on your life list,

you've put nothing on your life.

That's not a bird.

What is the thing?

The thing that Joe and I are discussing right now, what is that called?

I didn't see what they call it.

They just were like, we would name a, we should name a bird a seagull because a seagull, it's almost like saying, look, it's animals.

You know what I mean?

Like, it's a.

There's a bunch of different types of seagulls, so you're not being specific enough.

Is that the whole idea?

Right.

They're called gulls.

Oh, okay.

Okay.

Gotcha.

And they fly by the sea, so you can call it a seagull, but that's not what it is.

And there are several different types of gulls.

That might be the reason why, Joe, right there, they might be completely different gulls on the east and west coast, you know?

I mean, I know they look similar, but

they might be different species, subspecies.

Listen,

I love, I don't mind that I'm not big on language policing, but I can't have people on this show saying seagull because that's not a real animal.

And we're trying to be accurate over here.

And yet you didn't get the real name for us.

This guy goes, mixed feelings.

I understand the logic of naming organisms after their inherent characteristics rather than making them a tribute to some naturalist from long ago.

The name should stand on its own two feet, not be a fan club for someone else.

But now here he goes.

But then I hesitate because I have no idea what sort of bird name folks will someday consider exclusionary.

Will somebody new to birding find titmouse offensive?

Or perhaps

it's

pretty slow.

Because that's the direction our culture's headed in.

I don't think that I don't think anybody's arguing that our culture is headed into being like titties.

We're embarrassed by them.

We don't like them.

you know i mean i think we're heading in the opposite direction people are starting to like titties yeah they seem pretty popular i think amongst most groups to be honest i think even in all of the you know the sort of divisiveness in our world now i think one thing we mostly agree on is that we like titties you know they're good they're fine yeah i mean brian likes them a bit more than others oh shut up don't do this with joe on the show he's not going to do it people actually get really mad at me about bringing up stuff that they say i can't I can't even listen to the show anymore because Chris always bringing up stuff that Brian did before.

But I will say very quickly, Joe, that Brian, when he was younger, he used to suck on his girlfriend's titties for three hours and then go home and masturbate afterwards.

And she was willing to have sex.

He just didn't want to.

He was too afraid.

I'm the most.

Sorry, Joe wanted to respond to that.

No, I was just a bit embarrassed.

No, it's fine.

He's got to be a little bit cautious about, you can't be like a horny guy on a scooter, on a one-legged scooter.

People get nervous him going around,

think he's looking at this, going around looking at butts and breasts on his one-legged scooter.

That is a great point with Brian.

You do need to be concerned with that.

Brian is known as a horny guy.

I'm not known as a horny guy.

Oh, dude, I did my show, my other show yesterday, and one of the, we do a new metal podcast, and one of the bands bands was called Orgy.

You can't even imagine how many jokes they made at my expense because of that.

I wonder why that would be.

We don't even get into it, but I'll tell you what, if I was talking about a band called Orgy, nobody would say a word about it.

I don't know why that is, anyways.

Oh, you're good, Brian.

It's just don't you're this is very quaint that

people don't let people tease you for

the orgy stuff.

You say, I'm an old-fashioned guy.

I just like

suck sucking on breast for three hours.

What's wrong with that?

In this day and age,

that's almost a wholesome thing.

It is kind of wholesome.

Thank you.

Here's another argument I saw.

Are birdwatchers ever called birders?

I came across an online definition which referred to birders as those who catch or hunt birds.

I always thought that birder is just another name for birdwatcher.

Me too.

Yeah, I thought of birders.

I don't, I think of hunter, someone who kills birds as being a hunter.

I think of birder as bird watcher, right?

So, this is from birdforum.com.

Um, and these are the birdiest of all bird guys, they love birds.

He goes, Love birds, that's nice.

Uh, he goes, I would say that birder is a more serious form of a bird watcher.

If you see birds while traveling, you're a bird watcher.

If you travel to see birds, you're a birder.

I don't associate those terms with hunting.

I think, like, I've been traveling more, and I think after doing this episode, I might look at birds when I'm not in where I live.

I live in Columbus, Ohio, and I live downtown.

All the birds are just trash birds.

It's like pigeons and then those little brown things that just fly around.

They're all little brown birds.

It doesn't.

Yeah, I do have, I have that going for me being in Vancouver that we're very, very close to the ocean and lots of like, you know, nature.

And so there are tons and tons of different birds that I can go see.

And let me tell you, if I move to the place I'm looking at moving on, Vancouver Island, it's the salmon capital of the world.

So you can imagine that brings a lot of bald eagles and a lot of

birds of prey.

And yeah, there is gulls.

There was definitely gulls there, Brian.

I saw gulls for sure.

Did you call them seagulls while you were there?

I didn't even refer to them.

Because I'll bet you if you called them

seagulls, those bikers.

I just looked at them.

No one ever asked me what are those, or I never had any need need to discuss them.

Yeah, those 1% bikers were probably like, actually, they're not called seagulls.

They're called gulls.

Yes, Joe, just to, while I was in town looking for a house, there was a

motorcycle run.

A thousand bikers came through town at the same time.

So our hotel was overrun with bikers.

Beautiful.

Yeah, it was 1% or I was laughing.

Well, the guy told me, I talked to a guy, and he said he's not a 1%er.

That's a gang, you know, a motorcycle gang guy.

He said, absolutely not.

I'm not down with that shit.

But then I looked up the name, and he was lying to me.

He wasn't, and actually he wasn't a motorcycle gang.

Is it true?

I think somebody, when I was in Vancouver, somebody was telling me that the hell's angels still have a big influence on the ports in Vancouver.

Is that true?

That they don't?

That they do.

Oh, they do.

Yes.

Yes.

We discussed this, actually.

We did Mafia Guys recently.

Might have been in the last episode that came out.

I'm not sure.

No, two ago.

Two episodes ago.

No, it's okay.

No, no, don't be sorry at all.

But yeah, no, that's it.

It absolutely they do.

They control all of it.

That's why they're like an organized crime group out here, not like a biker.

You know what I mean?

Not like old school bikers that you're thinking.

Not toys for tots.

Well,

that's what this was, though.

That's what this was.

This was a toy drive that the bikers were doing.

So not all of them were, like, a lot of them were just hobbyist bikers, and they were doing a nice community thing there for sure.

Sure.

Well,

yeah, to cover for the crimes that they do.

You know, you do a nice community.

I've seen sons of anarchy.

I know what goes on.

You know, this guy goes, so do you folks refer to yourself as birders or bird watchers?

Using the term bird watching or birding.

And by the way, should that one word bird watcher or two?

I know these are frivolous questions.

I'm thinking of making a blog or website, and I'm wondering what would work best for SEO.

That's so sweet.

Again, it's just like, hey, listen, I know these questions I'm asking don't seem important.

Here, let me just explain to you.

I want to do a bird watching blog, and I just don't want to be disrespectful and have it a compound word if it's not.

I mean, that's just nice and

thoughtful of your fellow bird watchers.

So here comes a guy, and we haven't done these guys yet, and they just made the list because of this post.

It reminds me of spelunking.

Spelunkers call ourselves cavers, and a sure sign of a noob is someone who says, are you into spelunking?

Birders refer to themselves as birders.

That said, I've always preferred to be understood as someone who values watching birds over ticking off a list.

That's a big controversy in the world.

Is like, there are people who just like to see birds and see what birds do.

And then there are the list guys.

And they are maybe

so among the list guys, they admire each other in a way, and they're competitive.

You know what I mean?

So, like, they're like, oh, I got 100 birds on my lifer list.

And another guy's like, I got 60.

I'm trying to get to, you know, 500 or something.

Like, whatever.

list it's not that bad i hope you just started if that's the case i could walk outside my fucking front door and see 45 this afternoon i mean give me a break 45 different birds that you can see with your own eyes and identify i'm not joking or sneer i live right on the river i live right on the river and i there is just there are so many different types and not 45 probably but probably like 15 to 20 i could go see today they also you if they're nocturnal birds if you hear them you can put them on your list a lot of people say you don't have to see the nocturnal birds because it's really hard to see in the dark.

I think you'd want to see an owl before you put it on your list instead of saying, oh, it hooted.

That's an owl.

If it's a guy who does a really good impression.

Oh, you have never heard an impression like my owl impression.

It's let's hear it.

That's what they sound like here.

Good lord, that's not, that wasn't good or bad enough to be good.

You know what I mean?

thank you bird watcher sounds a bit passive and limited compared to birder we don't just watch

what do you do oh they oh they take pictures take pictures document yeah oh yeah because you taking pictures is obviously a big part of it right yeah this guy this guy goes hello emc i definitely prefer bird watcher and bird watching stay safe arthur pinewood Oh, thank you, Arthur.

That to me sounds like the name of the guy who does bird watching, Arthur Pinewood.

I imagine they all have that name.

It sounds like,

again, and it might be a reference.

It might be like some famous, you know, it might be the character from that famous Steve Martin.

What's that Steve Martin film?

Do you know the one I'm talking about?

It's literally all about bird watching.

Yes.

Why did there?

What made you want to watch with Jack Black, too, right?

Jack Black.

What using what made you want to watch that film?

Yeah.

I am a huge movie fan, and I watch a lot of movies, but also

Steve Martin is like the reason, you know, I was obsessed with Steve Martin when I was younger.

So I do still have like a soft spot.

Like, I'll watch Only Murders in This Building and stuff for him and Martin Short.

And, you know, I don't really necessarily love every minute of it, but I still, I still love watching those guys, you know.

But

the movie was, I remember enjoying it.

I think it's like a movie.

It's like a middle.

And if I had to guess, it would be 50% on Rotten Tomatoes.

That would be my guess.

And I think it was like pretty boring, but like relaxing, you know?

And it was before, like, Jack Black was like, he wasn't even very annoying in it at all, if I recall.

2011.

2011, what was the Rotten Tomatoes on that?

Of course.

Oh, hold on.

Let me do this.

It is a 42%.

But a 41% audience score.

That's back when audience scores were.

I'm not going to get into my audience score

rant here, but that's when you could rely and depend on an audience score.

Nowadays, it's completely, it's bullshit.

They've figured it out.

They gamed it.

Trend Void says, To be honest, I'm an

opportunist and will look at anything that appears interesting.

So he's just a looker, really.

He goes, Some of my best viewing this spring was watching small snow and dirt avalanches coming down the mountainsides.

Most of the birds.

Most of the birds I

like that guy.

Yeah, he's a looker.

I'll watch.

If something moves, I'll take

stop whatever I'm doing.

I'll watch it.

He's busy working and then just some stuff falls down the side of a hill and he just completely stops his day.

Oh, this is nice.

Most of the birds I really enjoy looking at are eagles and ravens.

I mean, that'd probably be my favorites, too.

I saw both of those, saw both of those this weekend, ravens and eagles, bald eagles,

But I'll watch little birds who have names I don't know, though.

The black-capped chickadees are also special to me.

I believe I'm neither a birder or bird watcher either, though I will never look away if they seem interesting enough.

If this guy

is

he's on the site, I'm sure.

I bet some of the hardcore birders were having a laugh when he said, I love eagles and ravens.

Yeah, I know he's

like, oh, yeah.

Like, oh, yeah, you like Oasis and you only know Wonder Wall.

You know what I I mean?

Yeah, congratulations.

You're a real birder.

I put up a bird feeder to watch the birds, but it was more fun watching the squirrels trying to get it.

So I guess that makes me a squirrel watcher.

That's funny.

That's a bit of humor.

Yeah.

I saw, yeah, squirrels are, I mean, squirrels are kind of like birds of the ground.

Oh, not the ones in my neighborhood.

They are scary.

Is that true?

Yes.

In what way are they, like, will they actually

like, are they, are you just intimidated by them or are they have they been aggressive?

Well, you know, I don't like animals, but also they stand on my fence and go

So he's just

he's just sort of showing his teeth to us in a weird way up this whole

like they're just they're just making their noises They're doing their regular they're communicating or whatever it's a disgusting noise.

It's like hawking up a lug or something.

It's like hawking up a tour or something.

No, these

sound.

It's not a pleasant sound.

It sounds like they're like, I want to get to your garbage because they also, I have a bucket outside for compost.

The fuckers will chew the lid off.

I have like a pile of lids in my basement because I have to keep changing the lid because the squirrels are chewing the lid off and screaming at me all the time.

You think I don't need that in my life?

Wow.

Yeah.

Yeah, I've never had an issue with squirrels.

Around here, they're very...

like timid like they don't really they'll come up and eat out of your hand or whatever like if you have you know nuts or whatever they'll come eat it out of your hand they're really sort of friendly around here and nice well this guy goes i first came across the term birding in bill oddy's book i think from the late 80s also defining twitching etc with twitching is a other form of bird watching not going on the website twitch and joking around about bubba the love sponge and he goes still think of it as a bit new

nouveau

What is twitching, though?

What does it explain?

It's looking at birds and putting them on your list.

But so why is it not like that?

That sounds like the other stuff.

But it's hardcore.

Like twitching is hardcore over, and it's more European, but it is like

the birders are just guys that like looking at birds.

You know what I mean?

Twitching is like, I got a list.

I got to get this list filled out before I die.

in order to hand it off to somebody else so they can be like, man, my uncle looked at a lot of birds.

Well, they can, or they can add to the list and continue it on there's presumably going to be new and exciting birds that are going to pop up in the future and then they can add those birds you know so i i think it's a good idea to have an idea

of what you're going to do you know and like that that's what i thought it was putting together a whole list like 200 birds and i got to go find these birds you know That's so funny.

New types of birds.

You should get on the forum, Brian.

Do you ever get into the, do you ever comment on them?

You should just pop onto the one of the birder forums it'd be like I'm in my basement breeding different types of birds there will be new types of birds that you guys have never seen

these birds I'm breeding

are faster than any

faster and stronger than any birds you ever see

They are more colorful, and you have to pay me money to come see these birds.

Come in my basement and twitch.

You're allowed.

I'll let you in.

And you can, I wanted to look.

It seems as though parrot guys are like a different thing

than birders.

Because I did look at breeders and stuff, but they were depressing.

That guy that likes watching mountains and stuff, he came back and he wanted to say this.

What's his name?

I like him.

I want to know his name.

He's Trinivoid.

Trinovoid.

Trinovid.

And he's replying to a guy saying ravens and eagles both seem to exist in a social animal category along with humans and wolves.

So he's telling him, like, brother, those aren't real birds.

Those are basically humans, he's saying, like, those are, those are like, you could, you could get a ride with one of those.

They could drive a car.

And he goes, as someone who's seen and heard lots of all three, eagles, ravens, and wolves, I always find it fascinating.

You're going to love what he has to say, too, I promise.

He goes, I always find it fascinating to hear them in real life and how they sound completely different in cinema.

Sure, wolves howl when they're trying to gather from distance, but it changes to a more abrupt yipping sound that people tend to associate with coyotes as they get closer together and then suddenly silence.

Ravens, too, oh at times, but if you only see them on TV, then you think it was the only sound they were capable of.

Contrarily.

Yeah, I don't, they do that with things a lot.

You know, they just simplify things in like movies or television, you know, just like a simple kind of concept.

I think about that when I'm getting sounds like eagle sound or cricket sound or whatever.

It's not like the actual one that you want that like really invokes that feeling of crickets for people is not a real like accurate sound of crickets.

It's like things are brought up and down and it's like, yeah, it's a different sound.

I think you mean inaccurate.

I don't think you mean different.

It would be more inaccurate than different.

Like you're getting it wrong.

What do you mean?

Well, this guy goes, contrarily, they often make baby-like gibberish sounds as well as an endless array of vocalizations, including one of my personal favorites, the giant drop of water sound.

Then there's my favorite raven story, which I read about at the library on Prince Wales Island, regarding the naming of

claw owk and how it came to be after the Tlingots noticed that the ravens were made an uncommon cry.

Clawwalk.

Ridiculous was my first thought.

But a few days later, in a bike ride in Clawwalk, I heard it.

Claw walk, claw walk, claw Claw Walk.

A couple decades later, after having paid close attention to ravens the entire time and over wide-ranging exposures to ravens, I've never yet heard them make that sound anywhere else.

Not even in the Prince of Wales communities of Heidelberg, Hollis, Kaufman, Cove, or Craig.

But they do it in Claw Walk.

Eagles, however.

That was a British guy.

I think this guy's British.

Yeah, he goes, Eagles.

Started to really get super British.

Yeah, we heard a raven, like, I didn't even know what it was.

I was like, holy, this is weird sound, like, just this weekend.

And it was Ariel, my, yeah, my partner, she was like, she reckoned, she's like, that's a raven, you know, and it does.

They make fucking weird sounds, man.

Like, really weird sounds sometimes that don't sound like a bird, really, at all.

Eagles, however, totally different.

Anyone that's ever seen eagles on TVs thinks they scream.

Never, ever, ever have I heard eagles accurately voiced in common media.

Agreed.

Agreed 100%.

Again, I get eagle audio because I'll play it sometimes when someone says something really patriotic on my channel or whatever.

And yeah, it's nothing, it's not what a real eagle sounds like.

It's not even close.

The fake scream heard on TV is totally inferior to the actual chittering sound that they make, and I love it so much.

All Raven fans should try to go to Prince of Wales Island someday and hear the Ravens in and around Claw Walk.

At the same time, see some of the least shy eagles of anywhere else I've ever seen them, inclusive of the rest of Alaska.

I didn't see a lot of birds.

Wait, so that's Alaska?

It's not England?

Well, no, he went to Alaska.

But he's from England.

Yeah, okay.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I didn't see any birds in Alaska at all.

That can't be true.

It was cold.

But there's cold birds can, there's birds that are in the cold weather.

I was hoping to see a penguin.

You were literally a penguin.

Listen, I didn't see, and I'm serious.

This is 100% serious.

This is not me bullshitting.

We didn't see any animals in Alaska.

Me and me?

Really?

Yeah, we went there.

We didn't see a single animal the whole time.

Because my wife is like into nature.

I've said this before on the show.

My wife is like, oh, I love nature.

I love to go to national parks and

stuff like that or whatever.

Whatever we talks about.

I'm into nature.

And it's so fucking stupid and weird, you know?

yeah she doesn't just want to go to AEW wrestling and wander around for

40 hours a day

that's I mean it's a point that she doesn't just want to go to wrestling vacations but she does have to go to some of them because I go to nature

yeah

most of the vacations I want to be clear most of the vacations are wrestling vacations I think I can only recall one nature vacation it's the one he's describing right now

there was no wrestling in Alaska that was kind of a bummer I did look up to see if there was some wrestling happening there, but you know, it's harder to get a wrestling show together in Fairbanks, Alaska.

Anyway,

what'd you see?

The

Aurora Borealis, which, by the way,

it's, I'm going to tell you the truth, it's not that impressive.

And I'm going to tell you why.

You have to take a picture of it to see it.

Really?

That's what we had to do.

It was out like crazy.

They were like, oh, it's out like crazy tonight.

We went out there and I was like, I don't see anything.

And then I I took a picture, and I have like a hundred pictures of the sky being green, but only because I took the picture of it.

So you said all of them could see it, and you couldn't.

And also, you didn't see any animals, and you can't tell what different birds are.

Is there a chance you can't see?

I can see great.

And we were up on this mountain.

I told you about it.

I was miserable.

We were like, okay, this guy was like, we're going to go up to the top of this mountain.

We're going to look at the Aurora Borealis.

We're going to be up there from 8 p.m.

to 2 a.m.

Wow.

Maybe 4 4 a.m.

Do they bring snacks or you bring snacks?

They had oatmeal.

We were in a big yurt and they had instant oatmeal.

I think that's all they had really was instant oatmeal.

That's not.

Yeah, that's not, I would maybe want a little bit more than that.

Hot cocoa.

Yeah, like a beverage of some kind.

Coffee, yeah, that'll be like Joe's, like you're having to stay up.

So maybe something that gives you a bit more energy.

They got coffee up there.

They're in the end, perhaps.

No protein.

It was literally just instant oatmeal.

They were bragging about the instant oatmeal.

And now I told you the other food at the resort was hot pockets next to a microwave.

It was the worst resort you could ever go to in your life.

I forget Chenna Springs in Alaska.

And we get to the.

I feel like they should.

It seems like it's crazy to even call it a resort.

Yeah, you can't convey a hot pocket.

That's not.

You're like exaggerating.

No.

i'm not exaggerating i went to this hot spring and i was like we gotta get some food and we went into that to that was hot pocket springs that you went to or hot pocket springs yeah it was actually

it was actually sponsored by hot pockets and uh they call it like did you see the packaging of the hot pockets yeah

it was hot pockets they had other stuff too

but it was all frozen like pizzas basically And so they take you to the top of the mountain.

I'll say this.

There was a big ice room that you could go in and you can get an apple tiny in an ice glass.

Right?

I did not because I don't drink, but my wife did.

And then you drink it and then you take it outside and you make a wish and you smash it on the ground.

That's kind of cool.

That's kind of cool.

Oh, Joe, you don't like that?

You don't think that's kind of whimsical and cool?

You know,

the Alaskan appletini tradition.

Yeah, it's like sweet.

Yeah.

For centuries, people in Alaska have been smashing apple teenies and having their dreams come true.

Yeah, I think that actually.

The apple teeny part is undeniably very weird, I think.

Yeah, the apple teeny part of it, it doesn't feel like Alaskan kind of drink or whatever.

The only drink they had in there.

You couldn't be like, I'll take a shot of vodka or something.

It was literally, you get an apple

teeny, or you get nothing.

And I didn't get anything because they didn't have anything without booze in it.

Wait, sorry?

They didn't have beverages?

No,

not in the bar where you smashed the cup.

What was this place?

What was this place?

How much?

How, like, don't you?

Oh, you don't want to know how much I spent to stay at this place.

You, you would, you would hate me.

So, so these people are taking advantage.

This resort is taking advantage of people who want to see the Aurora Borealis and are willing to pay money to go do it because it's kind of like a bucket list thing.

They'll pick you up in Fairbanks and drive you an hour and 45 minutes out of town and you can't go back to town.

There's no other shuttle to get back into town.

So you get there and it's like, well, we're going to be here because I was afraid to drive.

You know, somebody, if somebody, like one of the staff members fucking just completely lost it and just started fucking killing people, you would be like fully out there in the middle of nowhere, nothing you could do.

You're dead.

Yeah, they live there.

The staffers live there.

They don't leave because there's nothing.

There's nothing between it and Fairbanks.

So, and we get up there, we get to the top of the mountain.

He's like, I don't think it's, it got cloudy halfway through the night.

It started snowing.

And the guy's like, and I'm like, I don't think we're going to see it.

And he's like, you want to go, you know, we can't leave till four.

We're up here until four.

So you just

keep in the cold.

And then he goes, he goes like this.

Okay, if we can get everybody to agree

to leave, we can go, we can leave now.

You're not seeing anything else.

This is it.

And he could only get less than half of the people to agree.

And then he goes,

well,

we can take half of you down.

You just got to figure out which half.

Which people get to go down in the thing.

And I was like, let's get in there.

Let's get.

And my wife was like, oh, we'll stay.

And I was like, God damn it.

so she ruined it because she was being too nice and then we ended up staying up she ruined

Joe she ruined her vacation that she had been desperately asking for after going on a hundred uh wrestling vacations where they watch not even real wrestling AEW not even

wrestling so a birder could be defined as someone who could not cope with the not knowing and would have to know

Many birders are not obsessed with lists and of course do watch birds for the the sheer pleasure of it, but it's in the job description to know or work out what the bird is they're watching for the pleasure of it.

So a birder should know.

Should know.

Let's take a look at

another thing here.

I was looking to see why people do this.

Do people bird watch out of curiosity, competition?

Or personal clout, which I really like.

Clout, like just, I don't know what kind of circles you're running in where that is something that gives you clout.

I mean, you'd have to be running in birder circles, and in that case, you would probably already be a birder.

So it doesn't really make sense.

I don't know.

I like clout.

No, I know, but I don't think it takes

a lot of clout, you know?

I don't know.

You make a living getting clout.

I think it's relaxing.

You know what I mean?

It's like a really nice, relaxing thing, and it's like a collecting thing.

For me, this is how I feel, why I want to do it, is because I have this thing of collecting.

I grew up collecting baseball cards and stuff, and I really like collecting things.

And that's like a fun way to do it where you're not accumulating any physical things that you have to get rid of.

And you're going out and exploring and like learning more about the world, and it's super relaxing.

I mean, there's not that many downsides to it.

I personally collect experiences.

Oh, and also Lego, as we can see behind you.

You also collect insane amounts of Lego.

I haven't had a chance to play with my Lego since I I broke my foot.

So that's been a bummer.

That's odd because it seems like you should be able to.

Joe, sorry, what were you saying?

No, no, I think that's a nice sentiment about the relaxing.

Like, I would never, you know, after I did the first season of my TV show, I was just totally spent and I didn't know where to go.

I just wanted to go somewhere warm because we filmed in Milwaukee and Michigan in the middle of winter.

And I booked

a ticket to go to the Everglades by myself.

And it was like a real quiet time of the year.

And

I didn't know any of the birds, but it was, I guess, some, it was a good bird time of year.

And I just kind of walked around by myself and looked at all of these birds.

And it was a real sense of peace looking at these birds and seeing them.

And I don't know.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I think that that's.

kind of

I get I think if it was for me, it's like that

getting in the bird zone where you just,

I don't know, be so at peace just looking at a bird and watching it do its thing and then, you know, walk away and get a,

I don't know, stop at a fresh fruit and vegetable stand on your way home.

That's, that's, that's a good day.

And that's, I think, if I were to do,

I get that aspect of birding, but once, yeah.

Everglades is a fun, which seems like it would be a really good spot with a lot of birds as well, you know?

I mean,

winter.

Yeah.

Every time I do something, Joe, I'm like, we should,

well, you know, it would be cool is if we went somewhere warm.

So when I watched this, this season of your show, when I watched your show, I was like, man, he was like, I'll go somewhere cold.

That's crazy.

I do like going somewhere cold.

It's about going places when they're quiet.

Like

Everglades is...

It was pretty quiet in April.

I think that was when I went.

And it was, yeah.

And if you go up to Michigan, northern Michigan in January, February, it's not, people are, it's kind of quieter there than in the summer.

So I just kind of like going where places are, I travel opposite of vacation ceases.

That makes sense.

That's an interesting approach.

I like to go to somewhere where there's 1,000 motorcycle guys driving

out.

That's my idea.

The first time we saw the Aurora was up in northern Michigan in a city called Alpena we stayed in.

And

it was not, we went to Mackinac Island and stuff.

We did the tourist stuff, but we were in Alpena.

And I was like, I'm going to get this really romantic situation set up for my wife.

And I rented a camper, which I thought, hey, you know, it's an Airbnb.

It's a camper.

We'll be out in the middle of nowhere.

We'll stare at the stars.

It's going to be beautiful.

It's the darkest city in this part of the country, closest to Columbus, is Alpena, Michigan.

And we get there and the camper's in some guy's driveway, and

he keeps walking out and talking to us.

And also,

it said he had Wi-Fi, and I had to work, but the Wi-Fi was in the house and didn't work in the camper.

And when he was bringing me in, he was like, Yeah, we got Wi-Fi.

It doesn't generally reach out to the camper, but I'll tell you what, I don't even like watching TV when I'm on vacation.

I'm not watching TV, dude.

So I had to do my podcast in the parking lot of a mire

on their watch.

That was Street Fire.

Street Fighter.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

So this guy goes, a single Carolina wren is more entertaining than the entire Kardashian family.

Oh, no.

They did it.

The Kardashians catching strays again.

In my opinion, I don't even know why they're famous.

In my day, you had to do something to be famous, like be a fucking yellow-tailed warbler, you know?

That shit's fucking...

I love this.

I love people.

I don't know when this post is from, but I love people who are still fucking ripping on the Kardashians.

A single Carolina wren is also somehow more dramatic than the entire Kardashian family.

I'm not sure, but I think they're kind of known as being over-dramatic.

I don't know that that one lands really.

This guy goes, we had a few in our backyard this year, so it all just turns into like comparing the Kardashians to a Carolina wren, which I kind of like.

We had a few in our backyard this year raising fledglings, and the cats watched them way more intensely than any form of TV.

You're definitely right.

So, yeah, yeah, the cats were into it.

And yeah, so the cats prefer this to the Kardashians.

Yeah,

here's a guy you guys are both going to love.

Mahatmaga.

There's a lot of time you can't say his guy's name.

He's a lifer, kingrail.

I definitely am drawn to the competition slash numbers aspect of it.

It was very rewarding to be a top 100 birder in my extremely populous state last year.

Oh, so they have lists.

I was going to ask that there is real things that you can go and you can say, like, hey, I'm the number one fucking birder in all of California.

That's cool.

He's a top 100 in his

extremely populous area.

Yeah, like, but I don't know how

that could be really good, but there might be only 300 people that are like registered to do it, you know.

Right.

That means either he's number 100 or 99, by the way.

Yeah, or

84, I feel that you know.

No, you would say I'm in the top 85.

No, you wouldn't.

If you were 84, you know, 100 or 75.

I think we can give him between 75 and 100, perhaps.

He would have said 75.

I definitely, and he goes, the number one thing that primed me for being an

enthusiastic

enthusiastic.

Hey, Joe, you just got to experience one of the most famous parts of the podcast.

It's known as a Brian Flub.

A bunch of people are slamming the table right now chanting flub, flub, flub, flub, flub.

They love it.

He once called me Griss.

That one.

And that one's so great because it's like, now I just have to deal with the fallout of it.

Now, like, people are calling me Griss.

Like, I didn't say something wrong.

I just fucking sat here, you know?

It was an accident because the name of the guest was a little harder to know.

So

he got all his focus on that name, and then he forgot my name.

I mean, it's almost like this, this show when I said, how you doing, Joe?

I'm Brian.

Yeah, yeah, well, that was the first time.

I think that was before we started, actually.

Oh, that was on the show.

Oh, was it?

I thought that, no,

I thought it was before we started, but

Joe said, How are you doing?

And Brian said, I'm Brian.

How are you doing?

I'm Brian.

Can I tell you?

That feels like that's how the Lego guys behind you talk.

Can I tell you that, and Chris will experience this in October.

When I perform live and do live shows and stuff like that, after the show, every single person that I talk to, I shake their hand and say, hi, I'm Brian.

They came to see me.

But just don't do it.

Well, why don't you just don't not do that?

Because

I can't imagine somebody not like somebody knowing my name.

But they watched you on the stage.

I understand, but it just doesn't happen.

This is the closest thing I have found as an adult to the way Pokemon made me feel as a kid So that's why they do it that does that does make sense the Pokemon Go or what you know like collecting the things in a way where you're not physically collecting them that makes sense.

Well, I said I have one more story for you one more news

that also might be that might have something to do with the

younger people getting into it a bunch of people who are like super into Pokemon and they're getting a little older now and then they're like hey, what's the adult version of this?

And then they're getting into birding.

That's you know how that that's how Pokemon started?

The creator was kind of feeling

down about a lot of the woods around Tokyo where he grew up disappearing and so wanted to kind of have that feeling of exploration and seeing animals in the video game.

That really is true.

Yeah, so that's very, it might not, I'm pretty sure it's Tokyo, but

after World War II, they cleared a lot of the woods that he used to walk around in as a kid.

And that's, that's, he wanted to capture that feeling, so that's very cool that it's kind of come full circle to like bringing people back

to going to see,

yeah.

Well, let me just say that uh, uh, Rax King from the Tattoo Guys episode sent me an article that her friend Willie Blackmore wrote, and this is in Audubon magazine, which is a bird magazine, Audubon Birds.

I don't know if you know that, Chris.

I don't.

They do bird, the Audubon Society does bird stuff, they're the bird people.

Isn't the Audubon that like really fat, the highway where you can drive as fast as you want?

Yes, Chris, but there is also the American Audubon Society, which is a bird society.

Okay, but I'm not wrong, right?

You're not wrong.

On May 11th, 2018, Andrew Farnsworth saw something that was almost unbelievable.

A migration ecologist at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Farnsworth has seen more than his fair share of rare birds.

But there was one species native to the lower 48 that he'd never recorded, a Kirtlands warbler.

And he assumed doing so would require a trip to its breeding grounds in Michigan's jackpine forests.

The rare warbler is all but unheard of in New York State.

That a Kirtlands came practically to his front door when it stopped over in Central Park, not far from Farnsworth's Manhattan apartment, was nothing short of extraordinary.

I think it was a report at about 5 p.m., he says, I took a cab to 60th and

5th and bailed out and then ran fast.

After spotting the bird, Farnsworth realized the warbler was only part of the spectacle.

Seeing the speed with which tens and then hundreds of people appeared in a park to see the bird was like a BTS concert or a Beatles concert, he says.

A birder named Kevin Topping first spotted the Kirtlands and posted about it on Twitter.

It's a funny place to post it.

You know, I wish it wasn't X anymore, but you know, Twitter.

Yeah, I mean, that's, I wonder, I wonder if birding was big on Twitter.

It was.

Okay.

Because this is a story about celebrity birds becoming a problem.

I see, I see.

He said,

where it was immediately picked up by Manhattan Bird Alert, a feed that reposts sightings of birds in the park, particularly uncommon species.

The news got out through more traditional means, but none are geared towards speed quite like Manhattan Bird Alert.

By 6.30 p.m., hundreds of people were watching the bird.

The crowd was so large and had formed so quickly that the cops came.

To Farnsworth, who's birded in Central Park for decades, it was clear that something had shifted.

That was a moment of like, wow, this is a whole different level.

The whole social media angle to alerting people has arrived in a very different, sort of explosive way.

Social media has become a powerful, now they explain social media for some, but Willie, we know what that is.

But so while a feverish crowd can form anywhere, a rare bird appears.

Manhattan's most famous green space is a crucible of the phenomena.

Central Park is really one of the best birding spots outside of the tropics, says Todd Winston, a birding guide and urban biodiversity specialist in New York City, Audubon.

The metropolis is in the middle of the Atlantic Flyway, so millions of migrating birds pass through amid a landscape dominated by concrete.

They concentrate in its green oases.

At more than 800 acres, Central Park is one of the largest havens available for migrants as well as residents like

Northern Cardinals that inspire the city's human inhabitants.

I've been to Central Park before.

I walked around in there.

I definitely saw some birds.

It was a it seemed like a pretty nice park to me.

I mean, I'll be honest, I've seen better parks.

But, Joe, you live in New York.

Yeah.

You're there quite often, or do you ever get out to Central Park and walk around?

No, I'm by Prospect Park in Brooklyn.

And it's uh, it's, I think,

I don't want to give bad face, but they got some of like the last remaining like uh trees from

before they knocked everybody or deforested the rest of brooklyn and it's a really it's a really nice feeling park and the

deep

i guess like as serious woods as you can get in a city and so there's good birds and sometimes you i will see a bunch of people gathered around a bird and i try not to i try to lower my conversation because i don't want them getting

can you imagine you walk by and i know you're you're notoriously loud, obviously.

And I can just imagine, but imagine you walk by and you just like everybody's there looking at this bird that hasn't been there in like two years.

And you're just like, yeah, no, I'll be there later, man.

And then it just fucking flies off and everyone turns to you.

Like, what the fuck?

Well, in recent years, Manhattan Bird Alert with roughly 80,000 followers and counting.

has brought new attention to the delights of birding in the park and helped attract new people to the hobby.

It has also elevated a number of individual birds to celebrity status.

And like any star, they're pursued by admirers whose behavior verges on that of a paparazzi.

David Barrett, the man behind Manhattan Bird Alert, sees nothing wrong with propelling a bird to fame.

My sight gets people to like birds, he says.

They've got a bird in their life now and they think more about, well, what is this bird's life like and what could affect it?

And if so, and so they care more.

Yet many of the birders, here's where we get to the issue here.

Yet many of the birders, ornithologists, and members of avian conservation organizations I spoke with paint Barrett as a person who has brought widespread attention to birds in often unethical ways, such as sharing the real-time locations of sensitive species.

Barrett's profile has risen in the media along with that of the birds he's helped make famous, and he's often quoted in news stories as an expert, much to the frustration of other avid amateurs who would prefer that effective science communicators weigh in.

After getting someone interested in birding, you want that entry to move those people toward being conservationists and supporting the birds, says Dr.

Bruce Yolton.

But with David, it's empty.

It's like eating candy or popcorn.

So the actual scientists are very angry at David.

Can I know about some of the famous birds, though?

Are they any of the ones like any of the big famous ones that I know?

So I'm going to teach you a thing.

Before we get out of here, obviously, I'm going to teach you about vagrants.

Now, you're like, Brian, don't talk about vagrants.

No, vagrants are good in the bird community.

And now, Chris, I'm going to remind you of Opie talking to that really boring guy.

Do you remember that time Opie and that boring guy were talking to each other?

So we do a stream.

We do a stream where

some of the times we'll watch Opie from Opie and Anthony show New York City radio guy.

He's not doing so well.

And now he does his interviews with just random guys from his Facebook group.

And one of them was, he talked for about an hour about birds with this guy.

And ticks.

And ticks and stuff.

Or maybe the guy was a bird guy and he was talking about ticks.

Marine biologists.

Whenever we put it on, everybody leaves the stream.

Everybody, all the viewers leave.

Like,

genuinely, 100 people will leave as soon as we play the clip.

So he was talking about what in the heck there was a flamingo flying through New York.

What in the world?

Well, that's a vagrant.

And those are birds that somehow got knocked off course and ended up in a place that that they're not supposed to be.

And I think what's happening is this is happening.

And now these guys, because you're not supposed to have bird feeders, by the way, letting everybody know that it's unethical to have a bird feeder.

Just letting you know.

I know that.

Yeah, it's sad, really.

I mean, a lot of birders have them with the camera on them, but apparently, like

it messes up the bird's ability to forage for food if the food is just hanging in front of your house with a camera.

So, and also there's weird consent things about them being filmed, which that part, I don't know if that was a joke or not.

I think that's a joke.

Pilot

need to get, well, you can't obviously get consent from a bird.

Chris, you have no idea how serious it seemed.

Like, it did not seem like a joke when the guy said.

It could become a parrot, but the parrot, you would have to, like, you would be giving the consent, really, you know what I mean?

And we know minor birds are the actual ones that can sound like humans.

So

they like, you're not supposed to give them, I guess that makes sense because they go to a different place.

So they like migrate.

So you're giving them bird feed and they can just get it so easily.

Then they go migrate to a different place where they might not be able to find it so easily and they might not be able to get food and they might die.

Yes.

And they get fat too.

I saw a few fat birds when I was looking at the camera.

People have Mike Hale, actually, friend of the show, very good friend of the show.

Always on any episode where we're talking about porno.

Yeah, he's our first ever guest that we ever had on Sex Guys, DB, Dog Boner on Twitter.

We know he has a bird camera.

He bought it on Kickstarter because he shows about Kickstarters.

And I was going to let him know.

Probably shouldn't have that.

But he likes looking at birds.

And in my opinion, it's like, I guess if you like looking at birds, what am I going to say?

He's l he listens to the podcast, I think.

So I at least Jesse does.

Jesse will tell him, that's for sure.

So he knows now that you think he's doing something wrong.

Like a hundred guys are walking out of their house right now and bringing their bird feeder in the house.

Yeah, I don't know, though.

Like,

yeah, I guess I've never had a bird feeder, but.

Oh, okay.

Yeah, I believe that.

What?

We know.

It's okay.

It's okay.

You didn't know until now, why I would lie if I really

have you had one, Joe, a bird feeder?

Personally, no, but growing up, we did stick it off.

You know,

suction cup to the window type thing.

The kitchen is I never had one.

I always found them to be, you know, there was always something that struck me as unethical about it.

Oh, shit.

I mean, when I was five, six years old, I couldn't quite put my finger on it, but I was like, this is unethical in some way.

Why and like crazy?

I've never had one, but, and I bet people believe that because I don't care about animals.

Yeah, you hate it.

Those squirrels sound like they would have to away with it.

Oh, thank you, Joe.

I hate those squirrels.

We have an albino squirrel around here that I kind of like.

He didn't say that.

Joe didn't say he hates the squirrels, by the way.

He just said they would eat out of the.

Oh, you're welcome to come over and look at the squirrels anytime, Joe.

I promise you'd hate them.

Like,

believe me.

All right.

Well, I think we covered birders, Chris.

How do you feel?

I feel like we did.

We covered birders.

It was a nice episode.

At the beginning, there was some of the woke people.

We don't like that.

You get the woke people come out when things get new names.

They just get really, you know,

in a huff about it.

But everyone seemed nice.

I was going to ask, who is in charge of doing the names or who gives the final stamp of approval on the official bird names?

So this is interesting.

And I do have some people talking about that.

Let me see if I can grab that real quick.

Who would?

Like, would it be that?

Because it wouldn't be a government.

Do you know what I mean?

It's not like this is an animal that's different countries.

It's like an international thing.

Is there some sort of governing body that decides on animal names?

Well, there's a lot of people who do not want it to be a vote.

But there's,

because, yeah, I'm thinking about that now.

I need to look into this myself now.

Like, who decides on animal names?

Like,

there's an it seems like

it's like no one's really fighting for it.

So it seems like kind of like, oh, this person discovered it and they let that person name it, the the person who discovered it, I think, but I don't know.

So

the, the, the, the thing I read

was that like it's the American Ornithological Society or the Audubon Society that's in charge of it.

And a lot of the people are, are very worried that they're going to put it up for a vote.

And then some literally the one I saw was like hockey MIG hawkface.

They're like very worried that they'll put it up for a vote and goofballs will come in.

I saw, I know a guy, I watched this creator named Michael who was doing a video about it, and he's really worried that they're going to let non-birds into the

birding thing, the Hall of Fame, the bird hall of fame.

And they'll be, sorry, that's a reference, Joe, to some of the stupid shit we talk about.

Completely meaningless to you.

Yeah.

So it is going to,

it's weird, right?

Because you probably would want people to have a say and what they're going to name the birds because it seems like having a top-down approach to that, yeah,

is also not cool to me.

Like, I, you know, I did an anarchist podcast for a long time, so I kind of am like, we got to let the people make this decision, you know, but they're totally right.

Then are we naming animals?

How are we naming animals?

Here's what I propose: okay,

every nation in the world sends

five representatives, two scientists,

two amateur birders, and then one random person who just is like,

they select that random from a population.

They send them all to the Ohio State Football Stadium in Columbus.

I'll be there.

Yeah.

if you're lucky enough sorry maybe this podcast will help bump you up on the

and then they just put the birds on the jumbotron board and everybody

and then they say nobody leaves this conference until all the birds are renamed something fair.

Well, here's the guy.

This is the guy that I saw.

That is a good idea.

They have like a debate, like

really pushing then they like, you know, like, hey, like, listen, hey, we'll give you, how about if we concede that we call this the blue jombler and then you give us a red-winged tip of two or whatever, you know?

And there's like, yeah, that I, hey, I mean, it seems more fair than as fair as any other way, you know?

One of the guys shouldn't care, right?

You got the scientist, you got the two birders, and then a guy that doesn't give a crap.

Yeah, right.

And for humorous, for humorous effect, you're like, you say all them, and they all have like scientific names, and then his name is like Jeff.

You know what I mean?

That's funny because it's just one.

So here it is.

I just had the same journey as the ornithologist they they interviewed.

Oh, hell no.

What a pain in the ass.

They've got a point.

I'll have to buy new guides, but my kid or anyone else new to the hobby doesn't have to whip out their phone to understand who this bird is named after.

It'll make the hobby easier to start into.

More people will care, so conservation efforts will go up.

As long as they don't go to public voting, I don't want to have to tell the kid that jaunty blue one there is a pointy-headed peanut goblin.

More behavioral and song names would be great.

One generation of birders sighing into our field glasses can suck it up and learn some new names if it makes the hobby better for new learners.

And then the guy goes, No public voting?

You mean you don't want hockey McHawkface?

So I think you can't.

Yeah, you can't trust people.

You need a system because people are always goofing around on the internet.

They still haven't figured out how to, you know, stop goofing.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I don't know.

You said you did that anarchist podcast.

Is it too crazy to propose

no more bird names?

Okay, that, I mean,

listen, the fans of that show would have been like, yeah, no more bird names, wouldn't it?

We call them what we're feeling that day.

You see it and it's like, you know, you describe it.

I mean, listen, what's the need for it?

What's the need for a name of anything?

You know, I once lived in the Bahamas.

They had no addresses, and it was totally fine.

Really?

Yellow house?

It wasn't completely fine.

Yellow house.

Would have issues.

Yeah, that's literally how you describe it.

You'd say like it's like I live in yellow house three windows.

It's like on the left, the third house past

this like business or whatever.

That's what you'd have to say.

But it became became an issue, I think.

I think it is good to have stuff named and

labeled.

It helps us, I think.

I mean, you let the scientists just do it.

Listen, but then there's a problem with that, too.

The last time you let the scientists do it, they named it after the scientists.

Yeah, that's true.

But they were saying, somebody did mention, like, none of this is going to change the scientific name.

And many of the scientific names have the names of the scientist in them too.

So you still get that.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

These bird guys were pretty nice, I would say.

I think I have decided, I really do.

I think this is the one of all the things that we've done that I really am going to get into.

Maybe not right away, but I'll say this.

Yeah.

The one I'm going to get into is the mafia.

Okay.

So yeah, I'm going to get into the third one.

What's your wheel?

What's your leg wheel?

Yeah, you're wheeling around on your fucking scooter leg.

The least intimidating man in the world.

Yeah, they just push you over.

Yeah, they just think you're on, you're like riding, you're like coming up a hill to like confront someone, and he just pushes you back down the hill.

I could do a drive-by shooting sort of thing, you know?

Yeah.

Or, you know, when I get my foot better, I'm thinking I'm joining the mafia.

I'm not Italian, but you know, I'll join a biker gang then maybe.

Buy a bike, which we know that the mafia does not respect because they're scumbags.

So that we learned about like the fact that the mafia is like these bikers are disgusting and they don't shower enough.

Brian talked a lot of shit about criminals in his town and stuff on the podcast, too, and sort of outed a bunch of businesses that were friends for criminal activity.

So be

when that episode comes out, see what happens with that.

Yeah, I'm going to walk over to Granaro and be like, hey, I talked about you.

I'm going to wheel over to Granaro and say, I talked about you on my podcast.

I'll turn it on and be like, hey, yeah, Granaro is a mafia front.

So, Joe, do you have anything you want to plug?

Not too much.

I got some shows in Philadelphia, D.C., Bethlehem, PA in October, and then other than that.

I don't know, just say say hello if you see me around.

Yeah, watch the TV shows.

Yeah, watch Joe.

Oh, yeah.

I think probably a lot of you guys know Joe, and you probably watched and listened to a lot of his stuff.

But if you somehow don't, then yeah, I go watch.

Um, I'm gonna make one recommendation that's a lesser-known thing.

It was the

um web series that you did with Connor where he was your agent.

Can you tell me

the name of that?

How to Make It in USA.

How to Make It USA, which is very, if you're a fan of, if you somehow haven't seen that, I watched that so many fucking times.

It is one of the funniest web series.

But yeah, all this stuff is great.

Check it out.

Thanks.

Yeah, we really appreciate you doing this.

Next week, we will see you with Pizza Guys.

Bye.

Mama Mia.