LULU: Three, two, one. Imagine 

ADE: you sprout massive wings 

SFX/MUSIC ENTERS, moving and grooving

LULU And you grow a –

SAMMY: spiky, strong, slithery tail.

FWOO

Natalie: You suddenly feel fearless.

LULU: You breathe in [big breath]

Natalie: A burning heat begins to build 

Adé: and as you breathe out, you are exhaling fire!

LULU: You have become

Adé: a dragon.

WOOSH big wing sound like a dragon taking off

LULU: Okay, now is the part where I make you sing the theme song with me. 

Translator: Perfect.

LULU: [sings] Terrestrials, terrestrials, we are not the worst, we are the – 

Interpreter: Best 

LULU: you got it!

Interpreter: laughs 

LULU / SONG: BEST-RIALS.

LULU: Terrestrials is a show where we uncover the strangeness waiting right here on earth and... no, dragons do not exist on earth. But on January 29. Dragons will rise all over the planet. Dragons in the form of massive dragon puppets! That will dance through cities all over the world to celebrate Lunar New Year, which is just another way of marking the passage of a year based on the moon. 

And so today, in honor of Lunar New Year, for a special Terrestrials episode, we wanted to dive deep on dragons, to learn what they have to do with the dawning of a new year, why the dragon myth has arisen independently from so many cultures, and finally explore if there is any, any tiny chance that dragon-like beasts could have ever been real.

LULU: I am your host Lulu Miller, joined as always by my songbud.

ALAN: Wooohoohoo!

LULU: Alan. 

ALAN: [sings] Ready to set it on fire chicka-chow

LULU How's your breath, Alan?

ALAN: It's fiery. 

LULU And joining us today to make sense of dragons is China's official keeper of the dragon dance tradition, 

Teacher Lu: Lu Dajie

LULU: Mr. Lu Dajie

LULU: and is it fair to call him one of China's… best dragon dancers?

Interpreter: I think it's fair, but I'll ask him.

MR L (speaking Mandarin): Yes

Interpreter: Yes. 

LULU: That other voice you are hearing is our Mandarin-speaking translator. 

YY: yes!

LULU: So over his lifetime, Mr. Lu has taught easily thousands of people how to do the dragon dance that ushers in the new year, 

LU DIJAE (mandarin): Dragon Dance is a full body workout. 

Interpreter: Well, it's a full body workout, Lulu.

SFX CROWD and DRAGON DRUMMING FADES IN

LULU: Now, if you've never seen a dragon dance, picture a crowd of people out in the streets gathering to celebrate the lunar new year. and then suddenly from down the street, a huge colorful beast rises above with a dragon head and a long body like a snake. Now beneath the dragon are all these dancers, who use long poles

Interpreter: Bamboo poles

LULU: to push the dragon up and down, up and down, as though it's flying –

Interpreter: through the clouds, up in the sky, down to the ground 

LULU: and even breathing fire. Using?

translator: Fireworks. 

SFX: pew, pew, pew. 

translator: Or incense burning.

LULU: Haha so clever! and these dragons come in all sizes, some of them are just a few people long, some are a full city block, or sometimes over a mile long…. 

Interpreter: Like 4,000 meters, something like that.

Lulu: Whoa. Wait so were there hundreds of people inside that one?

Interpreter: yes yes

LULU Wow, wow, wow.

Interpreter: so cool.

LU DIJAE: Laughs

Interpreter: The dragon in Asian culture is very different from a (fading down)

LULU: Mr. Lu explained That in his tradition, the dragon holds the power of all the animals, of all of nature, and so going back to ancient times, farmers would pray to the dragon as a New Year dawned because 

Interpreter: They would bring you, the right wind and the amount of rain or maybe you were in a drought and dragon has those powers to give you a harvest, a good fortune. 

LULU: It's a creature that's about luck, about generosity

Interpreter: It's actually pretty common during the performance some audience will try to sneak whiskers off the dragon or like touch the scale and rub it off on their children and, um, just to get this, you know, sense of fortune. 

LULU: Wow. So take little pieces for good luck?

Interpreter: Yeah, yeah, poor dragon.

LU DIJAE: (speaking Mandarin) I dedicated most of my life to Dragon Dance. 

LULU: Even though Mr Lu is clear that the dragon of Chinese legend is just that. A legend. There is this eerie thing.

Interpreter: it happens in, you know, all across the world in different cultures.

LULU: Hmm. Dragons appear in legends and artwork from all kinds of cultures, European, African, Iranian, Central American, Nordic, And they sprang up in these legends before the world was really connected, before these different cultures had really met each other.

Which makes me wonder why would this strange, winged, fire breathing, scaly beast arise spontaneously from so many different places? Could it maybe mean that perhaps a dragon-like beast once existed for real? 

 ANA/ALAN: Hmmmm

LULU: And that is why I've brought in my trustee producers-slash-investigators onto this case. to solve this question. So.

LULU: Ana, 

ANA: Hello

LULU: Alan, 

ALAN: What's happening? 

LULU: you know, I'm going away on maternity leave to take care of my new baby. I want you to solve two things for me while I'm gone. 

ALAN: Ok

ANA: Ok.

LULU: Okay, one is, (laughing) is there any chance dragons were ever real?

ALAN: Ooh. 

LULU: Or was there some dragon-like beast 

Ana: Right.

LULU: That lived, that could have inspired the myth?

Alan: Yeah

LULU: And if not, could we build a dragon out of the things that evolution has already made, like do the elements of a dragon exist in nature? 

ALAN: What elements? What traits are we talking about? 

LULU: Okay. I made you a list. I made you. a list. 

MUSIC IN

LULU:  ah hem (medieval voice) your quest to build a dragon -- if ye buds choose to accept it -- requires you to complete six challenges. First Challenge: your mashup creature needs the body of a huge reptile. 

ALAN: BIG BODY!

LULU: Challenge two, impenetrable scales, not to be slayed by sword nor fearsome beast 

ANA: scales!

LULU: Challenged three: our creature needs teeth so sharp they can crush bone..

ALAN: SHARP TEETH!

LULU: Challenge 4: WINGS that can hold up such a gigantic creature.  (OR every self-respecting dragon needs... WINGS!)

ANA:  Wings! 

LULU: Challenge five: ye must find the fiercest talons in all the land.

ANA/ALAN; Talons!

LULU: And finally challenge six, the most important dragon trait. I want you, my brave and noble buds, Ana and Alan, to look for any sort of creature that can breathe fire.

ALAN: Fire. That's the, that's going to be the toughie. That's going to be the tough one.

ANA: It just doesn't seem like it would work at all.

ALAN: Yeah. I would imagine that any creature that's breathing fire would, uh, burn its lips. LAUGHS

LULU: If you can find me a creature that produces fire, I'm going to be so excited. Do you accept this challenge?

ALAN: Oh yeah. 

ANA: Absolutely I do.

LULU Um, okay. So you're going to do a bunch of research.... build us the best dragon possible. from things nature has actually already created... I'm gonna go have a baby. And we'll all be back after this short break. 

ANA: What if your baby is the one that breathes fire 

LULU: that would make NURSING kinda hard

MUSIC FADE OUT

BREAK

ANA: Terrestrials is back. And this is Producer Bud Ana

ALAN: And songbud Alan.

ANA: And we are on a dragon hunt.

ALAN: That's right. While Lulu is off spending time with her new baby, she tasked us with building a dragon out of parts of other animals.

ANA: It’s gonna be hard. But we gotta do it for Lulu.

ALAN: For Lulu!

ANA: Woo! Ok what do we need again?

ALAN: We need [sings] body, scales, teeth, wings, talons, and fire! 

ANA: Oof! Pressure’s on! Alright let's go build this dragon!

ALAN: Alright challenge #1. A HUGE Reptilian BODY.  

Chad & Arthur: When you called me earlier, I was playing with a 12 foot alligator.

ANA: Wait, did he just say he was playing with a 12 foot alligator??

ALAN: Yes. That’s right! Do not try this at home, folks. Arthur here has been running boat tours through Louisiana swamps, tracking down alligators for the last thirty years. 

Arthur: I ain't got chased by a dragon, but got chased by quite a few alligators.

ANA: Wait REALLY?

ALAN: Yup. Which is terrifying because some Alligators can weigh over 1000 pounds.

Arthur: A big one's gonna grab you, pull on to you, and they call it a deathroll twist, and rip off whatever they bite.

ALAN: And he says the scariest thing of all about their bite is the pressure. 

Ana: CHOMP

ALAN: Those jaws can squeeze with more than 2000 pounds of force.

Chad: tremendous bite down force

ALAN: Arthur’s son Chad says some alligators don't even have sharp teeth because their jaws are so strong, they can just smoosh their prey to death. 

Chad & Arthur: Alligators don't chew, they swallow whole.

ANA (nervous): gulp!cWait. THAT’S INCREDIBLE. 

ALAN: Yeah and their power doesn’t just stop with their jaws.

ARTHUR: The tail's super strong. It's solid muscle from one end to the other.

ALAN: They use their tail to whip other predators in defense and can cause serious injuries with their powerful swats.   

ANA: YIKES. Alright, I guess alligator wins for a huge muscly reptilian body.

ALAN: oh definitely, and I think I get bonus points because alligators could also get us Challenge #2, “Impenetrable scales”. 

Chad: So each of the bumps on its back, each bump is an individual piece of bone, so that's like body armor on their back. 

Arthur: You could smack that with a cane knife and it wouldn't penetrate.

 CHAD: Called an osteoderm. 

ALAN: “Osteo” meaning bone, and “derm” meaning skin. 

ANA: Wait BONE SKIN?? they got bone skin??

ALAN: Basically! It’s literal ARMOR!!!

Arthur: Similar to a dragon.

Chad: And the easiest way to tell the difference between an alligator and a crocodile is one you're gonna see later, the other one you'll see after a while. You knew that, right? 

ANA: Buhdumchhh. Well moving right along to challenge #3! We gotta get teeth.

ANA: So allow me to introduce you to the Komodo Dragon – the largest lizard in the world. It lurks in certain jungles in Indonesia and will flash you a deadly smile with its...

PAUSE

ANA: METAL TEETH!

ALAN: METAL… teeth?!
ANA: Yeah
ALAN: That cannot exist–

ANA: Uh yeah it exists! Their teeth have serrated edges that are covered in a layer of IRON … which makes them SUPER sharp - able to tear through pretty much any flesh.

ANA: CHOMP!

ALAN: That is so METAL. I mean, man, I’m picturing them with like grills–

ANA: Yeah I mean their teeth do have a bit of an orange shine from the iron coating! 

SFX ding tooth glint

ALAN: Wow, okay, Komodo dragon wins for teeth.

ANA: Mmhm, and I found out one more thing. You know how you were all braggy about the osteoderms on the alligators backs ?

ALAN: yeah?

ANA: Well alligator bellies are soft, making them vulnerable to attacks. 

ALAN: small gasp!

ANA: Meanwhile, a Komodo dragon has a layer of tightly knit bony armor that covers their entire bodies, bellies included, in a reptilian chainmail that makes them pretty unslayable. 

ALAN: Pretty good. So we got a muscly alligator tail and body, Komodo dragon, teeth, and scales.

ANA What about challenge 4: wings?

ALAN: Well, I thought maybe we could look to the one of the very first creatures on earth to ever experiment with flight... 

ANA: Ooh ok what is it?

ALAN: The dragonfly!

SAMMY: Dragonflies are awesome!

ANA: I know that voice! That’s Terrestrials’ Bug Correspondent Dr. Sammy ramsey!

SAMMY: This is a very nerdy episode concept and I am here for it.

ALAN: Sammy says what is so phenomenal about those fast fluttering dragonfly wings is all four of them can move independently. 

ANA: Whoa

ALAN: Meaning they can fly backwards. They can hover.

SAMMY: They can fly to the left, to the right, to the front, to the back, without changing the orientation of their bodies.

ALAN: This stealthy flying gives dragonflies a kill rate of over 95% !! Even the fastest animal in the world, peregrine falcons, only catch their prey 23% of the time! 

ANA: Ok ok, that’s very cool! Only one problem my guy.

ALAN: What’s that?

ANA: You stick those itty bitty wings on an alligator body?.... 

ANA: PLOP

ALAN: Gator ain’t goin’ nowhere.

ANA: Yeah, but don't worry, I got you.

Adé: Quetzalcoatlus, named after an Aztec feathered serpent god

ANA: This is paleontologist-in-training Adé Ben-Salahuddin who studies dinosaurs and other ancient creatures.

ADE: Indeed

ANA: And he says the coolest wings ever to exist belong to the Quetzalcoatlus, a giant feathery Pterodactyl   — with a wingspan of up to 40 ft long.

SFX swoop

ALAN: whoa! That's the size of a small plane! 

Ana: Uh yeah it’s one of the biggest known flying creatures that Nature has ever created.

Alan: Whoa, fierce!

ANA: Yup. But Adé says their bodies were a little funny lookin’.

Adé: Like a giant bat with the proportions of a giraffe, 

ALAN: Hahaha, I love that

ANA: Now don’t be fooled by the gangly giraffe thing, Quetzalcoatluses are thought to have been very nimble flyers, who could soar down and pluck up smaller dinosaurs and gobble them. 

ALAN: Wow, ok so these are our wings!.

Adé: Yeah. laugh

ANA: One little catch though: as big as quetzalcoatluses were, they had really light, hollow bones, like birds. Which made them light enough to fly. So Adé brought up one more point, which is that if our chunky Komodo gator dragon is going to fly, it's going to have to lose some weight.

Adé: If we were to abide by the rules that nature, like, animals seem to go by, any non-flying limbs are going to be pretty skinny. Something long and thin, like a, I'm thinking flamingo type bird. Uh..

ANA: You’re saying give this guy flamingo legs?

SFX squawk

ADE: If we want a really big animal, we have to give up something.

ANA: So I'm just imagining this like fearsome dragon breathing fire with these little tiny pink legs. Okay, so, disappointing.

ADE: laughs

ALAN: laughs Alright what’s next?

ANA:  I think we gotta hurry cause Lulu will be back from maternity leave any minute! And we still need talons and fire!

Alan: What if I told you we had a shot at getting both talons and FIRE in one creature. 

ANA: No way.

ALAN: What is a fire Hawk?

Natalie: They would be very similar looking to a hawk, very sharp talons. 

ALAN: This is Aboriginal artist and storyteller Natalie Devey. From the Bunuba Danggu Muway clan.

Natalie: So, half of my family's been around Australia for probably over 60,000 years. It's a long time.

ALAN: Natalie inherited a lot of stories from her family about the long history of their land. One story is about a bird called a black kite or a firehawk, that uses fire to hunt. Which sounds scary, but, in Natalie’s family, the bird is a kind of hero. 

 Natalie: So we thank that hawk, because that hawk brought fire to us.

ALAN: The story goes that a grumpy crocodile was hoarding all the world’s fire in his underwater lair... so the hawk asked the other animals to create a diversion and then dove beak first down into the lair to grab the fire.

Natalie: Just full speed. And was able to grab some of the fire and get back out of the water.

ALAN: in the story the firehawk flies thru the air with the fire and shares it with all the land creatures. And in reality, well, this blew my mind, it’s basically the same.

ANA: Wait what??

ALAN  The fire hawk will dive down into forest fires, grab torches in its talons and then use the fire to smoke out rodents and snakes hiding in the forest so it can eat them! 

ALAN: Chomp 

ANA: Mmm grilled meat!

ALAN: Nice and toasty

ANA: That is very cool that it hunts with fire!

Natalie: Yes, indeed.

ALAN: And if you were to look up in the air, I mean you'd see this fierce winged creature with literal fire

SFX hawk cry

ALAN: Sounds pretty dragon-y to me.

ANA: That bird is cool, but he is just kinda like holding fire. Like he's not producing fire.

ALAN: I mean, I know what you’re saying but what if a fire producing animal just doesn’t exist?

SAMMY: Oh, oh, wait we haven't even talked about bombardier beetles yet.

ANA: Ah Dr Sammy! Wait, what did you just say? Bumber deer?

ALAN: Bombardier - like the military term for someone who drops bombs??

SAMMY: Mm hmm And if you poke a bombardier beetle, well, let's just say it's not going to be the best experience for you. 

ANA: Just take it from famous scientist Charles Darwin

ALAN/Darwin: cheerio!

Sammy: Something that Charles Darwin noticed was that beetles are just everywhere. And he was trying to collect them all, like he was playing Pokemon or something. 

ANA: Haha

Darwin: Ooh! A ladybug! Ooo! A scarab beetle!

Sammy: And he made the mistake when trying to grab a different beetle that he saw, but he already had one in his hand. 

Darwin: ooh! What’s that beetle with bright orange legs!?

Samny: He put the beetle in his mouth.

Darwin (talking as though something in mouth): Gotcha! I’ll keep ya safe in here.

ANA: Like, “I don't have a little jar. So I'm just gonna pop this into my mouth.”??? 

SAMMY: This is the perpetual difficulty of being an entomologist. There are over 380,000 beetles, and I only have two hands. And so he put this bombardier beetle in his mouth so that he could grab another beetle. And the bombardier beetle did not take kindly to this experience and ended up rocketing, actually shooting rocket fuel out of its butt 

Darwin: Owww! BLIMEY! OUCH

SAMMY:  onto Charles Darwin's lips, scalding his lips and teaching him a valuable lesson. 

Darwin: Well that wasn't very nice, little bugger!

ANA What do you mean rocket fuel? What is,

SAMMY: Oh, oh, so you think I'm playing. When I say rocket fuel, I mean rocket fuel. It is scalding. It's really, really hot.

ANA: wow so this beetle shoots a substance so hot that it can literally burn the flesh of any creatures it touches ...

ANA: Just like a dragon might!?

Sammy: mm hmm

ALAN: whoa!

ALAN/ANA SINGS: Let's take a break to consider that a Bombardier beetle burned Charles Darwin's mouth with scalding liquid out of its butt. 

ALAN: Love this beetle, but how do you think lulu’s going to feel about our dragon shooting scalding fuel out of its butt instead of fire out of its mouth? I still vote for fire hawk’s fire.

ANA: Why choose? Can’t we just have both!

ALAN: It is our dragon. Sounds like we got ourselves a dragon! Let’s go tell lulu!!!

ANA: Let’s do it.

[MUSIC]

LULU Hello friends, 

ALAN: Hi lulu

LULU: This is the baby girl.

ALAN: Aw, you brought the baby to the studio!

ANA: Hi girl!

LULU: This is Ana and Alan. They’re buddies. How are you guys? 

ALAN: Pretty good

LULU: Did you find out some stuff?

ANA: oh did we!

ALAN Boy do we have a dragon for you!

LULU: I’m authentically so excited. Ok first I need to know, I need to know, did you find ANY evidence that dragons or dragon-like thing may have actually existed, a real one?

ANA: To the best of our knowledge...no.

LULU: Okay. Let me just grieve that real quick. But why are all these different cultures that weren't connected coming up with the same myth? That is maybe even spookier.

BABY SOUND

ALAN: The baby agrees!

ANA: Okay, so one of the reasons might be fossils. 

LULU: Ok

ANA: So imagine you’re an ancient person walking around and you come across the skull of an elephant

ALAN: Right, Or the wings of a pterodactyl!

ANA: But you’ve never actually seen an elephant or a pterodactyl and this is before the internet you can't just google, “what is this bone”. It looks like some creature you’ve never seen, and you’re like whoa, so your mind starts going wild. And invent a creature like a minotaur or a pegasus  or a dragon to explain what you’ve seen!

LULU: Ohhh

Ana: And this is happening all over the world.

LULU: So it’s just confusion, people’s imagination running wild.

ANA: That's at least the answer we got from a couple different paleontologists.

LULU: Got it! Ok... but it is sort of a bummer that dragons never really existed
ANA: But in building our own dragon, we did a deep dive into all the creatures that HAVE really existed and honestly - they are even wilder than the dragon human minds have dreamed up over all these years... So sit back and we’ll tell you all about it!

ALAN: In song!

LULU: Wait seriously?

Ana: Yeah seriously

LULU: Whoaa ok!

Rising up from the shadows of our imagination

The awesome fearsome beast of our creation

Piece by piece from the fiercest things in nature

 

ANA AND ALAN: Body scales teeth, wings talons fire!

 

ANA: A forked tongue slithering between jagged iron teeth

Like the metallic mouth of a komodo dragon!

Lulu: Metallic?

ALAN: It’s also got komodo scales: bony Chainmail !

ANA: Super tough body armor. 

ALAN: Mega tough.

ANA: Nothing can harm her.

ALAN: Yeah she’s got mad protection 

ANA: But she’s also gotta fight 

ALAN:Needs a beefy gator body and tail to swing with all her might

ANA AND ALAN: Body scales teeth, wings talons fire!

LULU: laughing

ALAN: To get giant wings we gotta go back in time

ANA: It’s a bird, 

ALAN: it’s a plane

ANA: It’s a giant reptile in the sky!

LULU: laugh

ALAN: soaring over all-of-us with wings of a Quetzalcoatlus  

ANA: This creature gives our dragon a 40-foot wingspan.

LULU: Whoa!

ALAN: Like a dragonfly she can dart and dive. 

ANA: She’s got us flapping terrified!

LULU: laughing

ANA AND ALAN: Body scales teeth, wings talons fire!

ANA: If she’s gonna fly we’ve gotta lighten the load

ALAN: So slap on the scrawny legs of a pink flamingo 

LULU: laughing

ALAN: But on those skinny legs she’s got the fiercest claws of a ferocious fire hawk. So she can hunt and fight. Alright!

ANA: Alright!

Lulu:  Alright! But my buds, you still havent talked about fire.

 

ANA/ALAN: A creature with fire is your burning desire.

LULU: It is!

ALAN: And guess what?

LULU: What?

ALAN: You’re in luck!

ANA: In her fire hawk talons she carries the flames!

ALAN: She hunts with hot torches 

LULU: gasp!

ALAN: and sets forests ablaze!

ANA: But if you want an extra spark? We won’t keep you guessin’

ALAN: Like the bombardier beetle teaching Darwin a lesson.

ANA: We got a secret weapon and it breaks all the rules

ALAN: A scorching caboose that shoots hot rocket fuel!!!

LULU: What??

ANA: That's right, our dragon shoots burning hot liquid out of its butt

LULU: Gasp

ANA/ALAN: Our dragon shoots burning hot liquid out of its butt

Song ends

 

LULU: laughing

ANA: What do you think boss?

LULU: Whoa! Ok wait I need to recap, cause I was laughing and didn't hear one part and I didn’t hear it.

LULU: It's got An Alligator body. 

ANA: Uh huh

LULU: With feathery pterodactyl wings.

ALAN: Yep
LULU:  Metallic teeth and scales of a komodo dragon. 

ANA: Yep

LULU: Talons of the firehawk holding flames and it shoots hot fuel out its beetle bum.
ANA: That’s it. That’s nature’s real dragon.
LULU: I’m loving this thing. But if we’re dealing in honesty, it’s not like breathing fire as we typically think out the mouth flames

ANA: Alright so our paleontologist-in-training ade was also kinda disappointed by our booty rocket fuel..

   

Adé: It's just a clear liquid that steams. got no, it's got no like, pizzazz.

LULU: Yeah! It’s got no pizzazz!

Adé: I propose an alternative. That is from birds.

LULU: Yes?

ANA: [sings] A baby fulmar is a seabird that barfs on its predators and coats them with stinky, sticky stomach oil 

LULU: Ew!

ALAN: [sings] Which is FIERY ORANGE slime!

Adé: Like, people who work with these birds on cliffs, they have to wear protective gear over their eyes, because they aim at specific spots. 

Lulu: Ok that is a lot of pizzazz! 

ANA: Yesssss! 

LULU: Let's add it to our dragon!

ALAN: Oh yeah!

ANA: Now our dragon is a triple fire threat! She's the most slime-barfing, fuel-tooting, fire throwing dragon there is.

ALAN: Woo!

LULU: Big round of applause. 

ANA: Yay!

ALAN: Thanks!

LULU: Go you guys, go evolution, go beetles that spout jet fuel, go metallic teeth. And that’ll do it for today! Biggest thanks to Mr Lu, our dragon dancer. And Happy Lunar new year to everyone! And those of you who’ve never gone out and seen it, I hope you can go out and see some dragons rise! Say thanks to the moon. And finally all of us at Terrestrials, we can’t stop talking about and imagining what this dragon would look like: flamingo legs, pterodactyl wings, beetle bum, all that. So we’ve decided to make a little contest, we would love to see your drawings of this dragon. Our favorite dragon will get a very special Terrestrials poster. So you can email us your drawing, just send it to:

Songbud Alan and Ana: terrestrials@wnyc.org 

ALAN semi musical: Submit your dragons by MARCH 1st!

LULU: Alright my little baby you wanna help me do the credits?

Terrestrials was created by me, Lulu Miller, with WNYC Studios. 

This episode was produced by Ana González, Alan Goffinski, Mira Burt-Wintonick, Tanya Chawla, Sarah Sandbach, Joe Plourde, and me. Fact-checking by Diane Kelly. 

Support for Terrestrials is provided by the Simons Foundation, the Arthur Vining Davis Foundations, the Kalliopeia Foundation, and the John Templeton Foundation. Thank you!

Special thanks to Dr. Sammy Ramsey, Adé Ben-Salahuddin, Natalie Davey, Arthur and Chad Matherne, Dr. Jorge Vélez-Juarbe, Jade Jiang , the folks at the Roger Williams Park Zoo, and you, for listening! 

If you like our strange little show about the earth and the creatures on it with the occasional singing, please rate and review us and share with your friends! It really does make a huge difference.

Happy Lunar New Year one more time. See you in a couple spins and gurgles of this dragonless, old planet of ours….bye! Baby says bye too.