Robot Bunnies, Radioactive Rhinos, Just Weird

Sonny and Bruce explore fascinating wildlife conservation technologies including robot bunnies deployed in Florida to catch pythons and radioactive isotopes being added to rhino horns to catch poachers.

• Robot bunnies in Florida give off heat signatures to attract pythons, with researchers planning to add scent attractants
• The " Rhisotope Project " in South Africa adds harmless radioactive isotopes to rhino horns that set off detectors at border crossings
• Current weather in the Midwest reaching 95 degrees with 47% humidity, compared to Phoenix at 103 degrees with only 24% humidity
• Seven-day earthquake report shows 2,030 total earthquakes, with significant 6.0+ magnitude quakes in Turkey and Russia
• Lily starts school on Wednesday, ending her summer break

If you're new to the show, we'd love to hear from you! Text us through your podcast 2.0 player, email us at theuglyquackingduck@gmail.com, or leave a voice message through the speak pipe button on our website.

Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome to the Worst Podcast Ever
• 3:28 Animals: Robot Bunnies Catching Pythons
• 7:07 Radioactive Rhino Horns Fighting Poachers
• 10:55 Weather Report from the Midwest Hideout
• 13:54 Seven-Day Earthquake Report
• 19:14 Closing Thoughts and Value for Value

Transcript

Bruce: 0:05

Hello everyone and welcome to the Ugly Quacking Duck podcast, the worst podcast in the known universe.

Sonny: 0:14

That's right. We are well known to be the worst, the worst, worst, worst. Hello everyone, I'm Sonny.

Bruce: 0:26

Oh hello, sonny. Oh hello, sonny, and I am Bruce and we welcome everybody to the Ugly Quacking Duck podcast. Thank you for coming. If this is your first episode, won't you send us a text and let us know All you have to do? If you're on a podcast player version 2, or podcast 2.0, however you want to say it, if you'll look at the podcast details on that player, there'll be a place there you can just hit, text us and tell us that you're fresh here and you hopefully will come back again. But let us know, all right.

Sonny: 1:12

It's hard to believe that we're already here, but it's been a week Wow.

Bruce: 1:18

Yeah, august is flying by really quick. It's time of recording. It's August the 10th, already school be starting up, or already has for many people. But I know, like lily, she starts school on the 13th, so that's what monday? Let's see, this is sunday. No, uh, 11, 12, wednesday, wednesday, oh boy, and then her summer break is over with and we've only got her on here twice, I believe.

Sonny: 1:53

Yeah, she's shirking her responsibilities. She's such a bum.

Bruce: 2:00

Oh yeah, she is a bum, but we love her to death and I hope she does well in school this year.

Sonny: 2:08

Yeah, that's important, Do well.

Bruce: 2:13

Lily, yes, do well, lily. Well, sonny, you been doing all right I have.

Sonny: 2:20

How about you, Bruce?

Bruce: 2:22

Yep, I'm doing good. I've had a few days off from work. They gave me the days off in a row, believe it or not.

Sonny: 2:32

No.

Bruce: 2:34

Yeah, they did, so I've enjoyed them. I am done a little bit of yard work and got way too hot, Been pretty miserable, but I got a little bit done and now I'm going to work on the podcast before I go back to work Monday. Well, that was really weird, but a little icon said assign the button to a certain sound popped up in my display on my mixer and I hadn't touched anything. That was really weird. So I hope nothing goes wrong with the audio. We're always having problems. Anyhow, Sonny, what have you been up to this week?

Sonny: 3:17

Nothing, just goofing off.

Bruce: 3:20

Okay, well, I won't tell on you anymore then.

Sonny: 3:25

Yeah, speaking of telling, do you have any stories maybe?

Bruce: 3:32

Yes, I do. I'm glad you mentioned that. That brings us right into some stories. I actually have a few stories, or a couple, and we're going to talk about animals this week animals.

Sonny: 3:47

I like talking about animals all right.

Bruce: 3:52

Well, that's a good thing. So you know, I've run across this article, on the internet, of course, and it's kind of interesting. Where would you think you would not see a robot?

Sonny: 4:08

In a swimming pool.

Bruce: 4:11

Actually, that's way off, because they have robot cleaners that will get underwater and clean the swimming pool. So, nope, one more chance. How about it?

Sonny: 4:25

All right, another guess, I will say in the woods.

Bruce: 4:34

Well, that's pretty close. I'll give you applause for that. This story is about a robot bunny, believe it or not, and it's deployed in Florida, which is not really the woods, but they have made a bunny robot to try to catch pythons. Try to catch pythons. Apparently the pythons are getting really thick and they're hard to catch in Florida. So these researchers have developed this robot that they can put in a cage and it will just sit there and it actually gives off heat signatures, like a regular rabbit would, and they're hoping it will draw in the snake, the pythone-n-t-s. They will be adding a scent to the robot, hopefully to lure these pythons in. But they use 40 solar powered, remote controlled, remote-controlled robot bunnies in South Florida to see if they could catch some of those pythons and get them out, and I think they're probably going to relocate them. But I thought that was a cool article. They're actually using them for something good instead of, you know, killer robots, like sci-fi always has. But anyway, robotic bunnies, there you go.

Sonny: 6:33

Well, I hear those pythons stay hid really well and they're having very much trouble catching them.

Bruce: 6:46

You got that right, yeah, so they've done something unique to try to catch them and I hope them well. That sounds like an interesting story anyway.

Sonny: 6:57

Yes, it does. Now you said you had a couple stories, so what's the other one?

Bruce: 7:04

All right, right, well, let's see if I can bring it up. All right, sonny. Where would you think the least likely area to find nuclear radiation? Or, oh boy?

Sonny: 7:21

another question for me to answer. Um in a baseball.

Bruce: 7:30

Um, now we're talking about animals.

Sonny: 7:33

Well, have you ever seen a baseball player?

Bruce: 7:38

Oh, a joke, I like that. Wait a minute. Way to go there, sonny.

Sonny: 7:48

I like it Okay. Radioactivity with animals involved, I guess in the woods.

Bruce: 7:58

That's the same answer you said a while ago, but it's partially correct.

Sonny: 8:04

I knew it would be. I just kind of figured. You know, animals, woods.

Bruce: 8:10

Okay, Well, yeah, Apparently there has been a lot of problems over the years for rhinos, and they're killing them and harvesting their horns. They're getting money for them for the rhino horns, and poachers have been a really, really active bunch when it comes to that. So they decided to add a little bit of radioactive isotopes into the rhino horn. I've got a picture up on the web where they drilled a hole in it and just added a little bit Now supposedly. Yeah, I was going to ask the web where they drill a hole in it and just add a little bit.

Sonny: 8:59

Now supposedly. Yeah, I was gonna ask wouldn't that harm him or her? Wouldn't it hurt the rhino?

Bruce: 9:06

well, I was getting ready to say supposedly the isotopes are completely harmless to the animal, supposedly. I don't know, I never. I never trust anything when it comes to radioactivity, but that's what they say. They say the horn will. The radiation will not harm the animal, however, because they got radioactivity in the horn when the, because they got radioactivity in the horn when the poacher decides to take it across the borders, the custom officials, all of them, use these radioactive isotope detectors and probably because of nuclear weapons and stuff, and that will throw them off or set them off, I should say and lo and behold, they caught a poacher, so it may be worth it. I hope it doesn't harm the animal, but if they can catch them poachers and scare them from taking them lives, that's more power to them. That's a neat trick. So we have a robot bunny in florida trying to catch pythons and they call it the rice riso top project, and I would assume that's over in africa yeah, south South Africa to try to catch poachers. So, yay, we got some good things going on today.

Sonny: 10:46

Hey, that's pretty neat. I like that. That's a good job. Yay, well, bruce, you said it was hot. You were outside today early. What's the weather like?

Bruce: 11:02

Well, I'm glad you asked Sonny. Here locally we are broadcasting or recording I should say not really broadcasting from where Sonny?

Sonny: 11:14

We are in our Midwest hideout. We are in the studio in Southern Illinois Midwest.

Bruce: 11:24

Yep, you got that right. We are in our hideout, our studio. We like to go in there and hide. It's not really, you know, actual hideout, it's just where we go in and hide and then we do our podcast too. So we are recording today, like I said, it's sunday 8, 10, uh, it's right now 2 15 while we're recording and we're going to talk a hair bit about weather. But this morning I went out early and did a few of my projects and it was 91 degrees. When I come in about 10 o'clock is already at 91 and now it's 95. Here now the uh, the weather temperature on the weather channel shows 92, which is, uh, always different than mine, not sure why well, what's your phone temperature saying you like looking at that one I do.

Bruce: 12:27

I use the phone temperature one quite a bit. It says it's 93, so 92, 93 and my home temperature or thermometer or whatever you want to call it it says 95. The wind's 10 miles an hour and the air quality is 31, which is good. We've got a lot better air quality today. Our humidity is only 47%. Now if you look at Phoenix that's where we like to compare there are 103 degrees right now, 24 degrees humidity, where ours is 47, 10 miles an hour. So they got the same wind and the air quality there is 51. So it's quite a bit higher. I don't know if it's because of the fires or what going on there, but it's quite a bit higher than normal don't know why did the poodle buy a clock?

Bruce: 13:34

oh my wow, just had to slip that one in, didn't you?

Sonny: 13:44

I did.

Bruce: 13:45

It was a good one too all right, if you want to believe that, I'll let you. Hey, let's talk about the earthquakes real quick. Uh, I've got a report. It's going to be a quick report, so let's shoot it down.

Bruce: 14:01

Well, ready yes, let's do it yay okay, well, if you guys are new to the show, uh, this episode we try to cover a seven-day earthquake report each episode. Now, what we've been doing here recently is doing our normal coverage of the seven-day report and then we do a 2019 seven days and a 2018 seven days of the same week, but we won't be reporting them on the episode. Those two years will be printed up on a report on theuglyquackingcom. If you'll go to the support page, scroll down to the bottom. You'll see them. What we recommend you do is you know, I'm sorry, that's not right. That's the support page. The bottom is where you can print off the reporting paper that we use, and that way, you can fill it out yourself, but you will see the actual report. We'll post it on our post page and there's already a couple on there, and by the time you're hearing this, we should have the other one up for this week. But what we're going to report on today is just 8, 10, 25, 7 days back. So are you ready?

Sonny: 15:36

I am let's have it.

Bruce: 15:39

All right, I'm glad you are there. So if we go back seven days from today, the all magnitude or basically all the earthquakes for them seven days, the account is 20 sorry, 2030, 2030. And then if you look at the 2.5 and over earthquakes for the same period is 375 and then for the 4.5 and over is 199. Now if you look at we report on the 6.0 and above earthquakes because there's so much damage occurred when we have those. We had a 6.1 in Turkey, a 6.0 in Russia, and that is that peninsula offset Russia, which would be what? West of Alaska's peninsula, that whole fire row, what do they call that? A circle of fire area? And then there was a 6.2 in Russia.

Bruce: 16:54

So they're still having those earthquakes. They're just not as major as they was a few weeks ago when we had what? 6.8 and 8.8. But they're big and they're having 5ives and fours also. I mean, if you'll look on the earthquake map, that whole peninsula is covered with earthquakes. I'm just reporting the bigger ones. So there you go. That's the seven-day report for now All right Way to go.

Sonny: 17:29

Bruce, I like that you keep it shorter because you don't bore me to death.

Bruce: 17:36

No, well, I'm glad I don't bore you to death, but yeah, I thought it was a little bit better. And if anybody's still interested in getting the 2019 seven day report for this this time period and the 2018 report for this time period and the 2018 report for this time period, you can go look it up on our webpage, theuglyquackingduckcom, and just look up the posts and you'll see them. I try to do one on every episode and if you go and to the home page the uglyquackenduckcom home page and subscribe, you will receive an email every time I do a post and all you have to do is look at the email. I think it's just right there on the email page. You may have to scroll a little bit, but you hit the See More I think that's what it says and click on it and it will take you to our webpage and you can read all about it. You can download that file if you don't want to fill it out yourself, but there is that ability if you want to follow along.

Bruce: 18:50

Anyhow, that's the earthquake report. I hope you enjoyed the news we had this week and the joke. That was pretty good.

Sonny: 19:04

Yes, it was good, Bruce, and thank you for keeping it short.

Bruce: 19:09

Well, I'm glad I could make you happy and, yeah, we're going to keep it short. Well, I'm I'm glad I could, uh, make you happy and uh, yeah, we're gonna keep it short. I'm gonna take a sip of coffee and we're gonna say our goodbyes. And while you're here again, if you are a newcomer, uh, we are glad to have you here and we'd like to know that you are new listener to the show. So send us a text if you got a podcast 2.0 player. Uh, if you don't, you can just email us at the ugly quacking duck doc. No, the ugly quacking duck at gmailcom. That's the best place to do Now. You can also go on our website and there is a contact page and you can leave us a comment. It's actually a comment page. It says comment. You can do it if you got a microphone hooked up to your computer or on your phone. You can just leave us a comment and hit that speak, pipe, speak, pipe button and record us a message and we'll listen to it. And if you don't tell us not to, we'll play it on our next episode. So be part of the show. There you go.

Bruce: 20:25

Speaking of that, let's talk real quick about value for value. We believe in value for. So we ask you to help us out, and there's three ways you can do it. First of all, you can come back. You can tell us you're listening. You can also tell someone else. That is a major thing. And then you can also help us with knowledge and artwork. Help us to plan out our episodes. Then you can help us financially.

Bruce: 20:55

We're asking you to help us financially because all this equipment and the hosting page and the website cost money and, yes, we do this for the fun of it. We like doing podcasting, but that doesn't mean it doesn't cost. Everything costs nowadays. Think about helping us out one way or the other. If you are one of those type people that would like to pray for us, we would really appreciate that. Uh, prayer helps out a lot. It helps us know what to do to keep going when we don't feel like it. So we are asking you to definitely pray for us. So I guess that means there's four different ways you can help us out, but, above all, come back, just keep listening to us. Be part of the show, be part of the family and the friends. That's what we're asking for. Sunny, anything you want to add?

Sonny: 21:56

nope, I appreciate them coming around and I like doing the episode after episode two. It's my fun and we're hoping to keep going for a long time.

Bruce: 22:11

All right, let's say goodbye then. Everybody, thank you for being with us. We wish you the best. May the Father's love go with you. We say 73, and, sonny, when you're ready, we're going to say bye. Bye, all right, that's it. See you later, folks. Ha ha ha, woo-hoo.