265 - Road Killing It

Science... sort of

00:00:00 - This episode Ryan and Ben are joined by Dr. Rachel Brown Reid to tell us about her work with road killed coyotes. But first, we have to make sure Ben is up to speed with the basics of stable isotope analysis. Rachel and Ryan do their best to explain.

00:32:56 - Now that we've supped from the font of knowledge, how about just having some sips of a normal drink? We make the mistake of letting Ben go first. He's having some sort of nonsensical overly complicated health drink. Whatever. Rachel keeps it local with a 2011 B.C. India Style Brown Ale from Urban Chestnut Brewing Company, her favorite brewery in a region with lots of good options. Ryan rounds out the segment with a Tart Mango Cart from Golden Road Brewing given to him by listener and pickle-friend of the show Jerrold D.

00:44:19 - Rachel just had a paper come out, which you can read for free from PLoS One where she's analyzed stable isotopes of scat from road killed coyotes. What did she learn? Listen and find out! Also, sometimes coyotes and badgers team up and we think that's great. Also also, be sure to check out episode 206 which features Rachel's husband talking about his ecology research in Costa Rica.

01:22:13 - PaleoPOWs are a lot like coyotes: they're tricksters. Ben begins by thanking Randy D. for becoming a Gravity Pusher patron on Patreon, which means he gets a thesis title. The title of Randy's research is: Temporally-integrated listening habits of mesopredator canids under SO31 transformation. Thanks, Randy! Ryan fields some lightsaber questions from new listener ToRy, with Ben's help of course.

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Music for this week's show: Old Coyote - The Weepies Forgot About Dre [Feat. Eminem] - Dr. Dre Coyotes - Don Edwards