0:09

This is Side Door, a podcast from

0:11

the Smithsonian with support from PRX. I'm

0:13

Lizzie Peabody. Patty

0:24

Storms and Morty Bacar are

0:26

really proud of their backyard.

0:28

There's a vegetable garden, shade

0:30

trees, bushes for pollinators. We

0:33

also love to make

0:35

sure that something is blooming at all

0:38

times and to create

0:40

a lot of texture. I

0:43

went to see their garden for myself on

0:45

a rainy summer afternoon. We stood on their

0:47

screened-in porch, looking out on the centerpiece of

0:49

the yard, a jacuzzi-sized pond.

0:52

There's a little rock waterfall and stream. We

0:54

have birds bathing in the stream

0:57

and the frogs and

0:59

now the fish. Snapping

1:01

turtle. Their

1:03

garden has won awards. It was featured in the 2021

1:05

Lewis Delaware Garden Tour. A

1:08

big deal in this little coastal community.

1:11

And the people who went on that tour

1:13

got a chance to see Patty and Morty's

1:15

prized fish. Thirty of them,

1:17

including two large koi fish. Both

1:20

rescues. We became very attached

1:22

to the fish. And it

1:24

sounds funny to some, I'm sure, but

1:27

they have personalities. There

1:30

were some that would come quicker

1:32

or do funny things when we

1:34

arrived. So you really got

1:36

to know them and we felt that they

1:38

were really part of the family. One

1:42

morning, just like any other morning, Morty

1:44

poured himself a cup of coffee, slid

1:46

open the back door, and walked into

1:49

his garden. But as he

1:51

gazed out onto his little backyard oasis, he

1:54

noticed something different. Something

1:56

strange. I

2:00

saw some colored

2:02

objects, few of them,

2:04

on the stepping stone and on the patio.

2:07

As Morty got closer, he saw what

2:09

they were. They were heads. Big

2:12

heads. Both

2:15

koi fish heads and a dozen

2:17

or so other smaller fish pieces

2:20

just lying there, evidently

2:22

torn apart by something.

2:24

I was devastated, you know, I love animals.

2:27

Morty could have done this. It

2:30

was at night, so I knew it's not blue heron. Fuck,

2:33

don't do that. I

2:35

couldn't, don't like to get in the water. So

2:39

I read everything about it and I just, it

2:41

was at a loss. Morty

2:44

was determined to put an end to

2:46

the fish massacre. So he put a

2:48

big net over the pond, weighted it

2:50

down on all sides with heavy rocks,

2:53

and he set up motion sensing cameras aimed

2:55

at the water. Satisfied with

2:57

his work, he dusted up his hands and

3:00

went to sleep. So the next morning,

3:02

the net was pulled aside and had a hole

3:04

in one side and a

3:07

bunch of heads. So now more fish

3:09

heads. By

3:12

now, two-thirds of the fish

3:14

were gone, including their favorites.

3:17

Morty and Patty needed eyes on a culprit.

3:19

They pulled out the ST card, loaded it

3:22

into the computer, and there on the screen.

3:25

Nothing on the film. Nothing

3:28

on the film. Really? No.

3:31

And then the camera captured the whole thing. So

3:33

it said whatever that is, it's very

3:36

stealthy. What the heck was

3:39

this thing? Oh, it's steam.

3:42

Patty and Morty were stumped. So

3:44

they set up another camera that would take a

3:47

snapshot every 20 seconds, all

3:49

night long. The next morning,

3:51

they woke up. The fish were

3:53

gone. All of them. One

3:55

of them left. But this time, when they looked

3:58

back at the previous news footage, they were It

4:01

was a black, weak head just popped up

4:03

for a second and then it was gone.

4:06

And there was no doubt

4:09

what it was. Staring

4:11

back at them with its tiny eyes

4:14

and a button nose was an otter.

4:17

A North American river otter, to be precise.

4:20

It must have made its way up from a nearby canal. Morty

4:24

was furious, but Patty, one

4:27

of my favorite animals, has always been otters.

4:29

So once Morty sort of overcame

4:32

some of his sadness,

4:36

I said to him, We have

4:38

an otter! How cool is that?

4:46

The North American river otter is making

4:48

a comeback, popping its head up in

4:50

areas where it hasn't been seen in

4:53

decades and receiving mixed

4:55

fanfare. This time

4:57

on Side Door, we are hot on the trail

5:00

of the river otter, one of the most elusive

5:02

critters in the country. Why do

5:04

we know so little about these animals, even

5:06

though they play a major role in our

5:09

waterway ecosystems? And we

5:11

explore how these ferociously adorable predators

5:13

might hold a key to understanding

5:15

our impact on the environment. It's

5:19

everything you ought to know about

5:21

otters. After

5:23

the break. There

5:31

is nothing funny about otter

5:33

research. Okay, I'm actually going to have to

5:35

walk around you because I need a little bit more space

5:38

to do this properly. You're going

5:40

to do the poop dance for us? Yeah. Okay,

5:42

so there might be a few things funny about otter research.

5:45

Like when the head of the Coastal

5:47

Disease Ecology Lab at the Smithsonian Environmental

5:49

Research Center showed us the otter's poop

5:52

dance. It's something they do

5:54

right before they mark their territory. And

5:56

I have to say, Katrina Lohan really

5:59

nailed the performance. So imagine that my

6:02

feet are down on four legs. Katrina

6:04

stomps her back feet. They kind of just stomp,

6:06

stomp, stomp, and then a little wiggle, and then

6:08

they squat. It's

6:11

kind of like when you see a dog walk in

6:14

a circle and you know it's about to lie down.

6:16

This is like that, but it's sort of a pre-poop

6:18

ritual. Do they make noises when they

6:20

do the dance? So we

6:22

occasionally hear them farting on the cameras,

6:24

but we don't hear a specific vocalization

6:27

every time they perform the poop dance.

6:29

Okay, it's not a song and dance.

6:31

It is not a song and dance,

6:33

no. It's not like Otter Karaoke here. I'm

6:37

at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center, what

6:39

we call CERC for short. It's

6:42

on the Road River, right as it empties into

6:44

the Chesapeake Bay, about an hour outside D.C. Now,

6:47

notably, the otters here at CERC are

6:49

river otters, not to be confused

6:51

with the infamously cute sea otters.

6:54

You know, the ones you see all

6:56

over stickers, notebooks, pillows, and they're usually

6:58

doing something adorable, like forming a heart

7:01

with their bodies or floating on their

7:03

back, smiling, holding hands with their fluffy

7:05

little faces. I mean,

7:07

sea otters literally stop traffic

7:09

with their cuteness in the film Finding Dory.

7:12

You need to stop, stop, where is Kyle Carter? Whoa!

7:19

Here, show, show, show. River otters,

7:21

on the other hand, are known for,

7:24

well, all I can say is I will forever associate

7:26

them with the poop dance, and now you probably will

7:29

too. The fact is, river

7:31

otters might not have much of a

7:33

public reputation because they're incredibly hard to

7:35

spot, despite the fact that

7:37

historically, they've lived in nearly every body

7:40

of water in America, including the Chesapeake

7:42

Bay. But otters either completely

7:44

or nearly disappeared in about half of

7:46

all states over the past two centuries,

7:48

the result of humans encroaching on their

7:50

habitat and hunting them for their pelts.

7:53

But in conversations we've all had with people

7:55

who have been in these areas for years

7:58

or their entire lives. It seems

8:00

pretty clear that we are seeing more

8:02

activity throughout the Chesapeake Bay

8:04

in these last years than

8:07

we had in previous decades. This

8:09

is Alejandra Morales-Picard, a psychologist at

8:11

Montgomery College, who's working with Katrina

8:14

to research otters in the Chesapeake

8:16

Bay. She says it appears

8:18

that otters aren't just popping up here, but

8:20

in places all over the country. It's

8:23

hard to know whether

8:25

some of that is being driven by the fact

8:27

that there's just more people in these coastal environments

8:29

and more people with cameras. It's

8:31

hard to know for sure because

8:34

to do observations on

8:36

wild otters is, I don't

8:38

want to say impossible, but it is

8:40

extremely difficult. That's because

8:42

wild otters are nocturnal, they can live on

8:44

land or in the water, and in

8:47

both fresh or salt water. I

8:49

mean, Katrina Lohan studies otters for a living.

8:51

And the only ones I have actually seen

8:53

are the ones at the National Zoo. So

8:56

how do you study wild otters

8:58

without ever seeing them? Until

9:04

a few years ago, researching otters at

9:06

CERC would have been Otter the Question,

9:09

because nobody knew there were otters around here at

9:11

all. And then in

9:13

2018, one of Katrina's colleagues was

9:16

walking along the boat docks when

9:18

she came across a strange-looking splatter.

9:20

It looked like a massive bird poop full

9:23

of sequins. And when she got

9:25

closer, she saw the sequins were actually fish

9:27

scales. I could see

9:29

how you would not necessarily recognize their

9:31

poop splats as being poops, because I

9:33

think for a lot of us, we

9:36

have an image of wildlife poop that

9:38

kind of looks like fox or dog

9:40

poop that has this log-like shape, rather

9:42

than this weird splat that is what

9:44

the river otter leaves behind. Looking

9:48

closer at this weird splat, Karen's

9:50

coworker noticed something besides the fish

9:52

scales and gunk. She

9:54

found these bright red worms in the

9:56

poop. Parasites. And

9:59

that is Katrina Lohan's jam. As

10:02

a disease ecologist, she was very interested

10:04

in the kinds of parasites that otters

10:06

might be carrying around. Because

10:08

those parasites could teach us more about

10:10

the diseases living in our bays, rivers,

10:12

and other waterways. Think

10:16

about it. Modern humans go to great

10:18

lengths to separate our bathroom duties from

10:20

the rest of our daily habits. We

10:23

wash our hands, take showers, our toilet

10:25

has its own special room. We do

10:27

all of this to prevent spreading germs

10:29

and parasites. Otters, well,

10:32

they have a different style. They

10:35

like to have poop parties. They

10:37

socialize and let themselves be known to

10:39

other members of the population who live

10:41

in the same area. Otters

10:43

are like, hey, smells like Gabby's

10:45

having a poop party. Maybe we should drop in. And

10:48

the place where otters host these poop

10:51

parties is called their latrine, which

10:53

is not just their bathroom slash dance

10:55

hall. They

10:57

will also eat at their latrines. They

11:00

will also play in their latrines. And

11:02

they will even mate in their latrines.

11:04

Why? Why? This is a great

11:06

question that I cannot answer for you. We

11:09

don't know why otters choose to boogie,

11:11

play, eat, and mate in their latrines.

11:14

But this makes otter latrines a treasure

11:16

trove for Katrina's research. These

11:18

little poop lovers are teeming with parasites.

11:20

And their poop is like a shortcut

11:22

for learning what sort of diseases might

11:24

be in a specific area, like the

11:26

Chesapeake. Because they can become

11:29

infected with some of the same parasites as

11:31

people, we can learn about what

11:33

parasites are present in an area from

11:35

the otters, rather than from having to

11:39

survey the human population in that area. Once

11:42

Katrina learned that otters were turning a

11:44

Smithsonian dock into a latrine, she

11:46

jumped out of her seat to get studying them.

11:48

A camera on the dock captured hours

11:50

and hours of footage, otters eating

11:53

fish, wrestling with each other. What we call

11:55

romping, which is then playing with each other,

11:57

it looks similar to how dog

12:00

dogs would play together. But the

12:02

cameras also caught some surprising interactions

12:04

between otters and other animals. Like

12:07

this one guest star. So

12:10

here we have an otter that pulls up what we

12:12

believe to be a shad, which is a very large

12:14

fish, and it is a very large fish. Alejandra

12:18

Picard shows me the footage from one

12:20

of these night cameras at Cirque. The

12:22

time code says it's a little before

12:24

midnight. The otter's all alone on the

12:26

dock, gnoshing on this fish.

12:30

The otter basically has his grips on

12:33

the fish as it's consuming it. And you can

12:35

hear something in the background, and here comes the

12:37

raccoon. Oh!

12:39

Raccoon approaches the otter so fast, the

12:42

otter jumps into the water, and the

12:44

raccoon runs away with the fish. And

12:48

he's like, the fish is so big,

12:50

he's like waddling away as fast as

12:52

he can. Trundling, like trundled, trundled, trundled.

12:58

Otters versus raccoons, a rivalry on the

13:00

docks. But Alejandra has another word

13:02

for it. Klepto-parasitism.

13:04

Klepto-parasitism? Yes, it's thievery

13:06

of so one animal

13:09

attains a prey item

13:11

or, you know, source of food, and then

13:13

another animal steals it. Yes,

13:16

raccoons are known as nature's

13:18

bandits. But this audacious thievery

13:20

boggled Alejandra's mind. Otters

13:22

are apex predators, top of the food

13:25

web in the Chesapeake Bay. Raccoons

13:27

are scavengers. And this is

13:29

quite a risk for a meal. Take

13:32

this second video Alejandra showed me, where

13:34

the otter arches its back, bears its

13:36

teeth, and screams at the raccoon. The

13:40

raccoon turns tail and jets out of there

13:42

as fast as it can, fishless, which

13:45

is exactly what I would have done. But there's

13:47

one final video, and it's really

13:50

special. This is everybody's

13:52

favorite. It's fantastic. There

13:55

are two otters in this video. One is sitting right

13:57

in front of the camera, chomping on a big, fat

14:00

fish. You can hear it crunching the fish

14:02

bones. Seems perfectly

14:04

content. The one in the background

14:06

sees that raccoon coming. He's looking

14:08

around the corner. He's like, mmm,

14:11

something's going on. And

14:13

he's going to bolt and there he goes right

14:15

into the water as the raccoon is charging. But

14:19

the raccoon doesn't go for the fish. It

14:21

runs to the back of the otter and

14:23

deliberately sort of intentionally seems to reach out

14:25

that paw to grab the otter

14:28

in the rear end, essentially. The

14:31

raccoon spanks the otter. That

14:34

causes the otter to spin around, obviously, and

14:36

surprise. If anybody comes behind you and grabs

14:38

you on the rear end, you're going to

14:40

turn around. So he lets go

14:42

of the fish as he spins around. And

14:44

it all

14:47

happens so rapidly. And the

14:50

daring raccoon dashes into the night,

14:52

fish in mouth. Alejandra

14:55

was shocked. Was this raccoon just sitting at

14:58

the end of the dock thinking, hmm, maybe

15:00

tonight I'll try the spank and snatch maneuver.

15:02

I just kept thinking, like, is

15:04

this intentional? Is this really intentional? I mean,

15:06

it seems intentional. It's

15:09

still unclear if this is an actual strategy

15:11

by the raccoon. But these interactions

15:13

can teach us a few things about

15:15

the otter's role in the larger ecosystem,

15:18

because raccoons wouldn't normally be eating fish.

15:20

Because naturally, it doesn't seem

15:22

likely anyway, that these raccoons would have

15:24

access to these massive shad fish if

15:26

it wasn't for the activity of the

15:29

otters bringing them onto the dock and

15:31

actually consuming them there. These

15:35

interactions are just one of many things Alejandra

15:37

and Katrina are keeping an eye on as

15:40

otters return to the area. But

15:42

to better understand these elusive little

15:44

creatures, they're studying another group of

15:46

otters, the ones at the Smithsonian's

15:48

National Zoo. Still

15:52

ahead, we see some otters up close

15:54

and personal. And we try to figure

15:56

out why everyone thinks otters are so

15:58

cute and cuddly. when they

16:01

are clearly ferocious and unhygienic.

16:04

We'll have more on that after the break. In

16:24

1928, the anthropologist Margaret Mead

16:26

published Coming of Age in Samoa,

16:28

propelling her to global fame and

16:30

challenging Americans to rethink the nature

16:32

of adolescence. But decades

16:35

later, a media frenzy erupted. Were

16:38

Mead's findings in Samoa and her insights

16:40

about being human all wrong? The

16:42

newest season of Sapiens, The Problem with

16:45

Coming of Age, is a

16:47

journey of discovery about Margaret Mead's

16:49

epic life and the complicated legacy

16:51

she left behind in Samoa. Listen

16:54

to Sapiens, wherever you get your

16:56

podcasts. Seeing

17:02

an otter in the wild is rare, like

17:04

really rare. But there's a place

17:06

where you can see river otters practically any time of

17:09

day. The Smithsonian's

17:11

National Zoo. So they can be a

17:13

little bit neophobic and scared of new

17:15

things. So I'm going to go in

17:17

real quick by myself, get them in,

17:20

and then I'll bring you guys in. Because if they see you

17:22

with all the scary equipment, they might decide not to come inside.

17:25

Rebecca Sterniolo is assistant curator of

17:27

the American Trail at the Zoo. Hey,

17:30

boys. You ready

17:32

for me? Hey,

17:34

come on, let's go. She let us

17:36

crash an otter snack time to get to know

17:38

the two otters that call the zoo home, Emmett,

17:41

the dad, and Potomac, the son. And

17:44

they are really fun to watch. I

17:46

don't think I've ever seen an animal move quite

17:48

like this. They're

17:51

very cat-like in their movement. Yeah,

17:53

kind of flinky. Yeah, they're very

17:55

cat-like, except it's like a cat mixed

17:57

with a seal. Yeah, yeah. long

18:00

bodies, fluid movements. Yeah,

18:04

their tails are so swishy, they move

18:06

like they're always under water. Like

18:08

a cat mixed with a seal that runs

18:10

like a bear, and a long, swishy

18:12

tail. This is the tomic here. Oh

18:14

my gosh, look, it is loud. So

18:17

you can hold the microphone up there and kind of hear him

18:19

like... Okay. It's

18:26

the sound of the tomic chomping on a raw

18:28

hunk of meat. Because

18:30

zookeepers keep a well-documented log of what

18:32

Emmett and Potomac are eating. That

18:35

can serve as a control group for Katrina

18:37

and Alejandra's research. And I

18:39

can tell Katrina, hey, on Monday, they

18:42

had meat and crayfish, so

18:44

their poop on Tuesday should reflect that.

18:47

Yes, they're comparing wild and captive

18:50

poop. But they're also using cameras

18:52

to watch how Potomac and Emmett spend their day.

18:54

We have a captive audience

18:57

of otters here, and we know that they're going to

18:59

be active in the yard. So it's very

19:01

easy for us to collect data on them, because

19:03

we can always see them, we always know exactly

19:05

where they're going to be, and we have the

19:07

ability to record them 24 hours a day if we

19:09

want. Katrina and Alejandra

19:11

are using this camera footage to learn

19:13

about otter behavior, like where they prefer

19:15

to make their latrines. Their

19:18

outdoor yard has a little river sluice, a

19:20

little wooded area, and a pool where visitors

19:22

can watch them swim and play. Our

19:25

otters right now, their latrine site is in

19:27

the pool, which makes more of a mess

19:29

for us. Sometimes they'll have

19:31

them over in that gravelly area. But

19:34

they tend to always go in the

19:36

same site for at least a week or two

19:38

before they decide to do what Sun Place is.

19:41

But we're hanging out with Emmett and Potomac in

19:43

their indoor enclosure. It's where they come to escape

19:46

bad weather or get a physical exam. Show

19:49

me. Stand.

19:53

Can you stand? Good. Oh

19:55

my gosh. That's just his cutest behavior. And

19:57

that chirping noise you hear in the background, that's

19:59

Potomac's. That's

20:07

another reason why Katrina and Alejandra are

20:09

observing Emmett in Potomac. There

20:11

have hardly been any studies of wild river otter

20:14

sounds, so there's still a lot to learn about

20:16

the noises they make and what they could mean.

20:19

Emmett, for example, makes a low grunting noise.

20:21

Is that sort of grunting and running around

20:23

because they're ready to go back in their

20:25

enclosure? Yeah, it's a happy sound, honestly.

20:28

Yeah? They're kind of

20:30

sharing to each other. I

20:33

have to admit that after learning about otters

20:36

fighting with raccoons, devouring an entire pond's worth

20:38

of fish, and holding poop parties, I kind

20:41

of thought they seemed like vicious little monsters.

20:44

But once you see them up close, what

20:47

is it about them that makes them so dang their adorable

20:50

noses? They

20:52

look like little stuffed animals. You know,

20:54

they kind of have that large, flat

20:56

nose, tiny

20:59

little eyes. They're tiny little

21:01

ears. Yeah. I was not

21:04

prepared to be so charmed by these

21:06

otters. I think when you see

21:08

them hunting their goldfish, you'll be

21:10

reminded, oh yeah, they're predators. They

21:13

snag their goldfish and then bite their heads off.

21:18

There's a famous line in Jurassic Park. Pee-weeks

21:21

doesn't want to be fat. He wants to hunt.

21:25

Well, the same goes for otters. Rebecca

21:27

picks up a pail of water. Half

21:29

a dozen fish about the size of my hand are swimming

21:32

around inside. She walks toward

21:34

the edge of the pool in the otter's outdoor

21:36

yard. So we'll bid

21:38

them farewell. Thank you for your service,

21:40

goldfish. Okay. They're

21:43

like, wow, this pool's so big. They

21:45

just sent them to basically an ocean. We won

21:47

the jackpot. Where do we go? Then

21:50

Rebecca releases the otters from their inside

21:52

enclosure. Like heat-seeking missiles.

21:55

They bolt into the air. Here's

21:58

a thing. Oh my gosh, he

22:00

just slid into the water. Oh

22:04

wow, they can just turn on a dime underwater.

22:09

Look at him chasing the goldfish. They're

22:11

just little torpedoes that push off the

22:13

side and just keep swimming.

22:15

You can see the little white underbelly is

22:17

just kind of flashing through the water. Yeah.

22:19

Yeah. That counter shading. Yeah. You

22:22

do feel kind of bad for the fish, but

22:24

mesmerized at the otter's hunting skills. Oh

22:28

my God, he's got two in his mouth and one

22:30

in his hand. Yeah, the whole one in their mouth.

22:32

And then sometimes they'll get two or three in their

22:34

hands. They'll put them on the side of the pool.

22:37

And then see. Oh

22:40

my gosh, he's got two in his mouth and one. Oh

22:44

wow, they are really good at catching these fish.

22:48

Yeah, he's like, you just stay up there so I

22:50

can eat you later. Oh my gosh, well, he's arranging

22:52

his own little meal buffet here on the edge of

22:55

the pool. OK.

23:00

Emmet and Potomac have no idea they're

23:03

giving researchers a unique window into the

23:05

lifestyle of the elusive otter. But

23:08

they're helping at a crucial time because

23:10

a recent survey found that half of

23:12

all states are reporting an increase in

23:14

wild otter populations. It's

23:16

still not clear what is driving the return

23:18

of the river otters. Katrina says it could

23:20

be a sign that steps we've taken to

23:22

lessen our negative impact on the environment are

23:24

working. Things like reducing pollution

23:27

runoff in waterways or taking

23:29

a more sustainable approach to fishing. If

23:31

they're in a certain area, there is a fish

23:34

population large enough to sustain the number of river

23:36

otters that are present there. So that's always a

23:38

good sign. Katrina

23:41

and Alejandra hope their research will show that the

23:43

presence of otters can tell us about the health

23:45

of a waterway, that otters can

23:47

be used as a sentinel species. A

23:50

species that essentially could warn us

23:54

or could be used as markers of

23:57

the environment. Otters

23:59

could be like. canaries in the coal mine, but

24:01

you know, an otter in the water.

24:04

Seeing otters around where you

24:06

live is a pretty good indication that things

24:09

are healthy enough to support these animals, which

24:11

then supports other wildlife. Back

24:15

in Delaware, Patty Storms and Morty

24:17

Bacar have accepted that otters come

24:19

with the territory. They've even

24:22

started restocking their pond with fish, snacks

24:25

for their local neighborhood otters.

24:28

And Patty, who's an accomplished artist,

24:30

even memorialized their backyard gown with

24:33

a sketch. I actually gave

24:35

it to Morty on his

24:37

birthday as a almost an

24:40

otter apology. You know,

24:42

look at me, I'm so sorry. Yeah, but

24:45

that's all I do. I'd say it's what you want. What

24:48

do you do is what I'm supposed to do. You've

24:55

been listening to Side Door, a podcast from the

24:57

Smithsonian with support from PRX. To

25:00

learn more about the Smithsonian's research with river

25:03

otters or to see some cute

25:05

photos of Emmett and Potomac, check

25:07

out our newsletter. You can subscribe

25:09

at si.edu/Side Door. We might also

25:11

include a video of Katrina doing

25:13

that poop dance. Just

25:15

don't tell her. Promise that you will not tell

25:18

her. For help

25:20

with this episode, we want to

25:22

thank Katrina Lohan, Alejandra Morales-Picard, Rebecca

25:24

Sterniolo, Morty Bacar, and Patty Storms.

25:27

Special thanks to Emmett and Potomac

25:29

for letting us crash their afternoon

25:31

snack. Our podcast is

25:33

produced by James Morrison and me,

25:35

Lizzie Peabody. Our associate producer is

25:37

Natalie Boyd. Executive producer is

25:39

Ann Canannan. Our editorial

25:42

team is Jess Sadek and Sharon

25:44

Bernant. Tammy O'Neill writes our newsletter.

25:46

Episode artwork is by Dave Leonard.

25:49

Extra support comes from PRX. Our

25:51

show is mixed by Tarek Souda. Our

25:53

theme song and episode music are by

25:55

Breakmaster Cylinder. It is now

25:57

possible to give us direct feedback on any... side

26:00

door episode using the Spotify app.

26:03

Let us know what you think of the show or just

26:05

give us your best otter pun. I bet

26:07

they'll be Otter This World. If you

26:10

have a pitch for us send us

26:12

an email at sidedoor at SI.edu and

26:15

if you want to sponsor our show

26:17

please email sponsorship at PRX dot org.

26:20

I'm your host Buzzy Peabody and pull

26:22

off now. My

26:26

girls have so many stickers of otters like holding

26:28

a heart or forming a heart with

26:30

their little bodies. Certainly

26:33

they don't have stickers of them ripping

26:35

fish heads off and rolling

26:38

around in poop. Although maybe they would like

26:40

that. I don't know they probably would think

26:42

it was funny. Those stickers didn't

26:45

make it through the publishing. No, no, no,

26:47

no. If

26:50

you want to learn more about the world check

26:52

out Rethinking. Each week on Rethinking

26:54

organizational psychologist Adam Grant talks to some

26:57

of the world's greatest thinkers about the

26:59

surprising ways they see the world. You'll

27:02

learn from scientists, business leaders,

27:04

artists, and more. Learn about

27:06

creativity with cellist Yo-Yo Ma,

27:08

the psychology of fiction with

27:10

Jennifer Lynn Barnes, and ambition

27:12

with Bali Parton. Find Rethinking

27:14

wherever you get your podcasts. From

27:23

PRX