Ba-Gawk! How Peacocks Work
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Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of iHeartRadio. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh, and there's Chuck. Jerry's here, too. And I can't think of anything hilarious to say, so I'm just going to say this is Stuff You Should Know.

That's right. Live show listener request edition because Peacocks came to us. Did you get her name? Or can we just say the wonderful young girl at our Atlanta live show? I really want to say Sarah.

But I'm not sure. So whoever you are, young girl who suggested peacocks at the Atlanta show, write in to tell us your name so we can tell everybody. Yeah. So this is a great idea. We're talking about peacocks, which is, if you want to look at the word itself, peacocks.

It's English and it is derived from the Latin word pavo. And in old English, that was pronounced pawa, P-A-W-A. And that was shortened over the years to po, eventually pocock, then powcock. And I guess peacock. And it's linked a little bit to this old expression, proud as a po, which is, you know, how a peacock kind of struts around all prideful. And then eventually it became peacock.

Yeah. And you would think it would have become peacock like in the 1950s or 60s, but no, it became peacock as far back as the 1300s. Yeah. So that's it for etymology of peacock, but there's a little more about the word peacock because a lot of you are getting things wrong and you need to be corrected harshly sometimes. A peacock is specifically the male of the species. Obviously. Yeah.

The peahen is the female. So if you see a brown kind of drab looking peacock and you say, look at that brown peacock. Well, you just sound like a hayseed.

It's a peahen, and she's not drab. She's camouflaged. That's right. They're little babies called peachicks. And if you want to talk, as we're going to, about the species as a whole, we're going to be saying peafowl. And then we will, you know, when we say cock, we're going to mean male. When we say hen, we're going to mean lady. And when we say chick, we're going to mean baby. Okay. I think we've really laid it out. There are three main species, speaking of laying this out, of the peafowl.

And you have the most common that if you live in the United States and you've seen one maybe in a zoo, maybe in a park, or maybe just strutting around your neighborhood.

Yeah, we have some walking around our area too. Oh, yeah. Is it, I mean, the same ones from many years ago? Because you told the story years ago about the sound of the peacock. Sorry, no. Those were Yumi's grandma's peacock, neighborhood peacocks. Oh, okay. And for some reason, the ones that live around me,

are not a disturbance at all. I mean, they make their sounds, but it's few and far between. It's not annoying at all. It's kind of cute. And it's just a different experience than it was around Yumi's grandma's house. All right. Fair enough. I mean, I've talked before about my neighborhood peacocks. I have not seen them in a few years, so I don't know if they're still around. And the house is on my morning dog walk.

So I haven't seen those peacocks around in a little while, those peafowl. So I'm not sure if they're around, but we used to see them occasionally and it was all great fun. But where I started 10 minutes ago saying is if you see one of those in the United States, you're probably almost certainly looking at a blue peafowl or an Indian peafowl.

Yeah, for sure. They are not native to the United States, although they thrive in coastal warmish areas, kind of muggy areas, you could say, too, although also arid areas. Anyway, California and Florida, let's just specify that. They do really well there, but they're native to India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. Yes, exactly.

They're the most common, a little less common, but still more common than the third group is the green peafowl or the Javanese peafowl. So native to Java, Southeast Asia and Myanmar. And then what's our little third grouping? The Congo peafowl. That's right. It's like a little mini turkey. He looks like they look like.

They're native to the Congo Basin in Africa. And the Indian and Javanese peafowl prefer kind of openish fields and maybe kind of tree-lined streets,

That's why they love neighborhoods, parks. It replicates their native habitat. The Congo peafowl prefer to live in the forest itself. Yeah, that's right. So that's where they like to live. No matter which kind of peafowl you're talking about, they're all going to be omnivores. They eat lots of seeds and berries and plant life and stuff like that, as well as some insects. But they'll also munch down on a mouse or a little cute lizard or a snake.

If they want to, if they're feeling peckish, I guess. Get it? Peckish? Mm-hmm. So they are among the largest flying birds in the world. Something a lot of people don't realize about peafowl is that they can fly. Apparently, the green peafowl, yeah, I said that right, is a pretty strong flyer. The Indian or blue peafowl is not peafowl.

Great, but they can make it to the roof of a two-story building pretty fast if a dog like Momo barks at them. I can tell you that. Yeah, I've seen that too. So they can fly, and they are very large too. Blue pea fowl, the most common one, they're the biggest of the three. The adult male can measure 50 inches. It's a little over four feet. God knows how many meters we're talking about. Let's say 1.2. Yeah.

And it's trained so that what you think of as the tail feathers are actually not the tail. They actually protrude out of the back of the peafowl or the peacock in this case.

They can be five to seven feet long. So they are a big, big bird. Not big bird size, but they're still a big bird. That's right. And as you'll see, that big, beautiful train is a big part of the mating ritual. So when you see that thing fully displayed, when that peacock wants to have a little good time with a peahen, that thing may go five to seven feet in every direction.

It's amazing. Very, very large. They also use it to defend their territory. I saw a guy laying pavers once, and he was apparently laying pavers on a peacock's territory because the peacock had his train like fully fanned out. Oh, really? And was like shaking and staring at the guy like, I'm going to kill you if you don't stop laying pavers right there. Oh, wow. The guy just completely ignored him. It was...

Pretty funny to see because that peacock was quite serious. I bet. So the blue adult male peacock is about a 13-pounder. If you don't count wild turkeys, which are usually put into a different family, although they can be in the pheasant family, they are the largest. The peacock, that is, is the largest in the pheasant family. You're not going to take a shot at the family name for the turkeys? I wouldn't going to, but you can. Miliagrididae. Oh, great.

I think I got it. I didn't even practice that one. Good job. But those turkeys, did you say they can weigh up to 30 pounds? I didn't say that about the turkeys, but yeah, they're big. That's a big turkey. It's like baby Huey types. Yeah, I got that turkey family living at my camp. There's six or eight of them now. They hang around together. I get them on the camp cam. It's just lovely.

Well, are they used to your presence or because those things run, they have really sharp eyesight and they scatter quick. No, no. I mean, sadly, all the wonderful camp activity is when I'm not there. I have a feeling that they peer through the woods and they're like, oh, the guys are down there again.

Right. They'll leave tomorrow. Have you considered spending a weekend like standing up against a tree and not moving, seeing what happens? No. I'll do that, though. You should. Buy yourself some nice camouflage clothing first, though. It'll help a lot. I've already got that stuff. Okay. So I also said that the blue peahens are sometimes considered drab. And, I mean, compared to the males, they are not quite as easy on the eyes, right? Mm-hmm.

But they're brown and they're drab because the female blue peahens are responsible for guarding their nests. And even though they spend a lot of time roosting in trees, very often they sleep overnight in trees, they build their nests on the ground in little depressions on the ground lined with sticks.

And so they have to defend that nest at all times. The easiest way to defend it is to not be seen. So they steer clear of being seen by things like leopards and tigers and mongoose and all that by blending in with the surrounding terrain. And momos.

Yeah, Momo doesn't actually want to predate the peacock. She just wants it to know, like, this is Momo's yard, peacock. Let them know who's boss. Right, exactly. Momo's boss. So the green peafowl, you know, we're going to talk a little bit about all of them, even though the blue are the most common. But the green, if it's not mating season, you may not be able to tell them apart. They both have that really nice green neck.

that sort of light green here and there. And during mating season is when you're going to see the male's train grow a lot longer, but then they molt and they shed those. So more or less, they look about the same when it's not mating season. Yeah, and they're both very, very beautiful. They have amazingly beautiful feathers as well. Very pretty.

The little Congo peafowl, they're kind of cute. Dark blue neck feathers and dark green and black train. Females are also brown. But they're just not. Nothing can beat a blue peacock. Yeah.

They just can't. I'm sorry. That's a hill I'll die on if I have to. Yeah, it's fantastic. And if you have one in your neighborhood and as a pet in captivity of one of your neighbor's duds, you may just get used to that sound and get used to seeing them because they could live 40, 50 years when kept as pets. I'm not suggesting that they be kept as pets. I'm just saying that people do that. They live about 10 to 25 years in the wild. Yeah.

They can also kind of haul pretty fast. They can run up to 10 miles an hour when they need to. Okay. You got to get a good running start if you want to get off the ground, I guess. That's right. With their little, like, aviator goggles on. Yeah. Totally. You want to take a break? Yeah. All right. Well, we're going to do that, everybody. Watch this. Stuff you should know.

Yeah.

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So I think it's high time that we talk about what everybody thinks of when they think of peacocks, which is that amazing train of feathers spread out in a fan behind them. And it's correct to say him. And this is all part of the mating ritual, right? That's the whole point of those feathers. Again, the peacocks will use it to try to ward off or intimidate trespassers in their territory. But

For the most part, the whole thing is to impress the peahens. That's right. And when a male wants to impress a peahen, that peacock will prop up those feathers into a big, beautiful fan. Dave likens it. Dave helped us with this, too, like an inverted umbrella. So it's sort of, you know, when you see it, it's sort of pointed back from their butthole area toward the hen. Yeah.

And they will shake those feathers, and the shaking isn't just like, hey, look how pretty and iridescent this gorgeous train is. Science has discovered semi-recently that those –

Those vibrations are in lockstep with the peafowl's head feathers that they used to think were just for show, but now they realize they vibrate at the same intensity and that they can actually, you know, sort of feel when those tail feathers are vibrating in their direction through their head feathers. Yeah, they're like receivers. Isn't that neat? Super cool. They resonate at the same rate. The male peacock, when he shakes those feathers, that fan...

he can shake it at more than 25 times a second. And that resonance, I think it's like 25.6 hertz to be exact. That just happens to be tuned in almost precisely to the crest feathers on the peafowl's head. And in addition to the sight, apparently peahens have amazing sight. So they're seeing everything that the peacock's showing them, but also they're feeling it. Like that's transmitting, that vibration or resonance is transmitting to their head.

So it's quite a like you're not going to turn down a peacock if you're a peahen. They're pretty amazing dudes. That's right. And before we get emails, I'm sure Josh will admit that when you said it just happens to vibrate the same frequency, that is no accident at all. It's called natural selection, baby. Oh, yeah, sure. I mean, you're just being cheeky, but I'm sure somebody would write in and say, no, Josh, it didn't just happen to vibrate that way. It's by design.

Intelligent design people, you mean? No, no, no. Creationists? No, by design as natural selection. It's very teleological. I don't even know what that means. What's that mean? It means that everything has a purpose. So it was like designed to be a certain way. I love that. See, people, when you don't know a word, it's okay to say, I don't know what that means. It sure is, Chuck. That's a great example to set.

So, and you didn't talk down to me. You told me the definition. Now I'm a little bit smarter because of you. Yeah. I wasn't like a dummy. Listen up. Teleological. All right. So we need to cover this part of the mating ritual because the fact of the matter is the peacock loves to get around the block, if you know what I mean. They have a social structure called a lek, L-E-K, which is basically a harem.

And the male is going to mate with several females. But here's the part that's a little maybe not intuitive. Even though the male is mating with many females, the male isn't running the show as far as who he gets to do that with.

Yeah. So he's putting on this huge show not to be like, I'm hypnotizing you, baby. Do my bidding. He's doing it because he's like, check me out. Don't you like me? Like, look at this. Isn't aren't I amazing? And the female can either be like, I've seen better.

Or she could be like, yeah, you're right up my alley. You just happen to be vibrating at my resonance. That's teleological. So, yeah. So one of the ways that a male will make himself seem even more virile than he is, there's something called the hoot dash noise. And.

And just the hoot is the noise part. It's called a hoot dash because right after the male hoots, he dashes toward the female and they start mating, right? It's actually quite disturbing to see. A lot of mating in the animal world is really disturbing to see. I saw a video, too. It's like the dash was very close to the hoot.

Yeah. But that's what that noise is called. So males realize that like the more hoot dashing or hoot sounds that they make, the more females in earshot, but not in eyeshot, I guess, will hear, oh, wow, like Terry really gets it on with a lot of a lot of peahens. I'm going to give him a shot next time he comes around because he must be very virile. Like a third of those hoot dash sounds are faked.

That's right. So when that finally happens, the female peahen will scratch out a little depression in the ground, basically, and line it with sticks. And that's their little nest. They're going to lay four eggs that are going to hatch after four weeks. Mm-hmm.

And those little pea chicks are up and around pretty much right out of the gate. It'll take them a couple of weeks to fly. And those boys that are peacocks aren't going to get those train feathers until their second year. They're like, why don't you just chill for a couple of years and not think about that thing? Yeah. They are so cute, too. Do not rely on the Internet for what a baby peacock looks like.

Apparently, it's been a great example to demonstrate how much AI is just screwing the Internet up. Oh, really? Yeah. If you go on Google image search for baby peacocks, like people think that there's pictures of like a giant or like a miniaturized, cute, big eyed peacock and that that's a baby peacock. They all look like peahens, like little brown peacocks.

Peahens, but even if they're peacocks, that's how they start out. So just check it out. Just search baby peacock for images. And it's a lie? It's a lie for sure. Oh, my God. That's the cutest little iridescent blue baby duckling thing I've ever seen. Right. But it doesn't exist. That's not real. Hey, don't blame me. Blame the AI running the Internet.

Yeah, those eyes are suspiciously large and Disney-like. So one other thing about the pea chicks is that they stay with their mom for two to six months, depending on whether they're in captivity, in the wild. Moms are much more maternal, instinct-wise, in the wild than they are in captivity. So, you know, depends on the situation, how long they hang around them. But just watching, have you ever seen a peahen with her little pea chicks following her?

No, I've just seen the turkey version at the camp. It's very cute. Oh, my God. I'll bet baby turkeys are pretty cute, too. Yeah. The following around is just very cute because, like, mom's up front and there's, like, six little guys and girls just following along. Like, I can keep up. I can keep up. And there's always one straggler that has to, like, run faster to catch up with the group. Yeah, Barney. I love that guy. Who? Barney. Barney.

That's a perfect name. So the dads, as far as blue and green peacocks go, are not around. They're complete absentee dads. But hey, if you're feeling bad for the family unit, just go to the Congo because those Congo peafowl are monogamous. They don't have those leks. They like one lady and they hang around and feed and raise pea chicks with mommy. Yeah. Pretty great, huh? Yeah, it's great.

So I think we should talk a little bit about natural selection, sexual selection, Charles Darwin, kind of what you were alluding to earlier, right? Yeah, because Charles Darwin was bringing a little too much of his human baggage to some of this research. It seems pretty clear, don't you think? Uh-huh, for sure.

And how was he doing that? So Darwin grew up or lived in the Victorian era where women were viewed as passive, submissive. They were just there and had their fingers crossed that a man of adequate dashingness would come along and marry them, right? So that meant that it was the men, the males of the Victorian era human species in England at least,

that were responsible for sexual selection. They chose the winners and the losers among women.

Well, Darwin was looking around the world of nature, basically all the other animals, and was like, that's not really what I'm seeing out there. And in the peacocks in particular, the females are, again, drab, really camouflaged, while the males have these amazing, beautiful displays. That strongly suggests that the males are performing for the females, and it's the females who are doing the sexual selecting.

And he had such a hard time wrestling with this. There's a quote from him that said the sight of a pea feather made him sick. Right. Because he could not give in. And he finally was, you know, science got the better of him. And he's like, that's just how it is. I don't like it. But females in the animal kingdom are typically the ones who select sexually and end up are the drivers of natural selection. They choose women.

what passes on to the next generation based on the kind of male mates that they choose. That's right. And that choosing is based on that flashy display that we're going to talk a little bit more about as far as the colors and stuff go and that vibration. But if there's science behind that,

Or is there science behind that? Yes. In 1994, it seems like it at least, there were some researchers in Britain that found that the bigger peacocks that had more eye spots, you know, they look like eyes. What are they called? Ocelli? Ocelli? Ocelli? In the Italian, it'd be celli because C followed by a vowel is a ch sound. So let's just go with Italian and say ocelli. Okay. Okay.

But the more of those they have and the larger that they are and the more just big and beautiful they are, it looks like the larger offspring they're going to have, they're going to be more likely to survive. So it seems like they are more genetically fit. Yeah. And those eye spots play a real starring role in this whole sexual selection mating process, right? So the feathers in and of themselves are pretty amazing. But the eye spots, these little dots with different colors on them that are like a

like scattered all across the train feathers, the fan, they are of a slightly different structure, slightly different density than the rest of the feathers surrounding them. So when that train resonates at 25.6 Hertz, they appear to stand still and float against the background of the other feathers that are vibrating at the same frequency, but are just of a slightly different density.

And this is so important. These Ocelli, the eye spots, are so important. The scientists have figured out that other species that also have eye spots, they don't share a common ancestor with Ocelli.

Peacocks that had eye spots, Chuck, eye spots evolved separately over different times among different species. They're that important for mating. That's right. And thanks to our listener mail in the Ruby Ridge episode, it's called Convergent Evolution and not Co-Evolution.

Very nice. I say we take a break then since we're done talking about eye spots, right? Yeah. We'll finish up with Act 3 right after this. Oh, wait, wait. There was one more thing about eye spots. Wait. Stop the presses. Jerry, roll tape. Researchers have figured out for sure that eye spots play a big role because some poor schmo of a peacock had his eye spots covered up. And they said, go out to ladies night and see what happens. And he got nothing. Nothing.

From nobody ever while his eye spots were covered up. Yeah. The quote is, their copulation success declined to almost zero. Almost. They were just being nice. They were. All right. Now, are we breaking? Yes. I don't have any other breaking news. All right. Everybody take five and we're back. Stuff you should know.

Yeah.

in a good way. He'd also tell you that this podcast is his favorite podcast too. Thanks, Capital One Bank guy. What's in your wallet? Terms apply. See CapitalOne.com slash bank. Capital One N.A. Member FDIC. All right, we're all set for the party. I've trimmed the tree, hung the mistletoe, and paired all those weird-shaped knives and forks with the appropriate cheeses. And I plugged in the partition. Partition? It's a home cocktail maker that makes over 60 premium cocktails, plus a whole lot of seasonal favorites too. I just got it for

So how about a Closmopolitan or a mistletoe margarita? I'm thirsty. Watch. I just pop in a capsule, choose my strength, and... Wow. It's beginning to feel more seasonal in here already. If your holiday party doesn't have a bartender, then you become the bartender. Unless you've got a Bartesian, because Bartesian crafts every cocktail perfectly in as little as 30 seconds. And I just got it for $50 off. Tis the season to be jollier.

Add some holiday flavor to every celebration with the sleek, sophisticated home cocktail maker, Bartesian. Pick up your phone and shake it to get $50 off any cocktail maker. Yes, you heard me. Shake your phone and get $50 off. Don't delay. Attention, parents and grandparents. Are you searching for the perfect gift for your kids this holiday season?

Give them the gift of adventure that will last all year long. A Guardian Bike. The easiest, safest, and quickest bikes for kids to learn on. What sets Guardian Bikes apart?

Designed especially for stability, they're low to the ground with a wide wheelbase and ultra-lightweight frames, offering superior control and balance. This design gives young riders the ability to learn in just one day, without tears or frustration. Guardian bikes are the only kids' bikes designed and assembled in a USA factory, ensuring top-notch quality and durability. They were also featured on Shark Tank and are the New York Times Wirecutter Top Kids Bike Pick for 2024.

Make holiday gifting stress-free with Guardian Bikes. With guaranteed one to two day shipping for just $29, you can trust your gift will arrive in time to create magical memories this holiday season. Plus, sign up for their newsletter to receive a free bike lock and pump with your first purchase. The perfect stocking stuffer for any kid on your list. Visit guardianbikes.com to secure the ultimate holiday gift today. Happy riding!

All right. We are back to finish up with peacocks, and we're going to talk a little bit about something we did an entire episode on, and that is iridescence. This was many years ago that we did an ep on iridescence, and if you want to really deep dive on the science of it, you can go listen to that ep. But...

What we're looking at in the case of peacock feathers and why they look iridescent and are just so shiny and majestic looking is because of the shape. It's a physical shape of something and not necessarily a color of something, right? Yeah. The pigments that are in the peacock's tail feathers are melanin. And melanin typically looks brown to us. It's what gives human skin kind of a brown cast to it.

That is melanin pigment. And it's no different in a peacock's feathers, but the structure is totally different, like you said. There's a crystalline structure of overlaying barbs that if you look in an electron microscope, you can see quite clearly. And those barbs, those crystal barbs of melanin, there's like little gaps between them. And in fact, it creates what's called a partial band gap.

which means that electromagnetic waves do not penetrate some area depending on where that light is hitting. To put simply, Chuck, depending on which angle, which direction light hits,

hits these melanin rods, the crystalline melanin rods, it's going to reflect or absorb all different kinds of light. And so the same structure can reflect or absorb different kinds of light depending on where the light hits it, which means if you're looking at it one way and you move slightly to the left, you're looking at a different part of that structure and it's reflecting different colored light. And that's how iridescence comes along.

That's right. Partial band gap, not to be confused with the partial gap band, which is the sad tour when two out of three of those guys went out on the road.

It wasn't a very good tour, was it? It wasn't a very good joke. But I couldn't help myself. Yeah, I mean, that's iridescence in a nutshell. That's basically how it works across nature. It's just about, you know, the structure of the thing. And, like, you know, what did we talk about? We talked about fish and...

Butterfly wings, mainly, I think, on that episode. It's so neat. And, yeah, it's just the structure. If you take a bunch of crystals and pile them on top of each other in little weird repeating patterns, they're going to become iridescent. It's gorgeous. Apparently, Isaac Newton figured it out all the way back in 1704. Yeah, pretty impressive. Yeah, based on peacock feathers. He said...

Check these out, man. I know what's going on. You'll just have to find out. That's right. We do need to talk about their Yelp because it's a, you know, I mean, you used to do a pretty good impression. You want to try it? Help! Help! It always sounds like help.

That's what it sounds like to me. It's uncanny and unnerving. Yeah, it is. And I always laughed at that years ago until we got our own neighborhood peacocks. And then I would hear it occasionally. And I was like, yeah, Josh is right. Or is Josh in that backyard right now? I was like, it's one of those two things that's happening. Yeah, it's pretty shrill.

It can get annoying if you live near one. I don't mind it so much because I didn't live next door to one, but it's usually in the morning and evening. During mating season, it can pick up a bit. So I don't know if there were complaints or if these local peacocks just, you know, met their natural end. You know, I don't know if they were taken out or if they were moved to a farm. You know what I'm saying? Yeah, I know what you're saying. Or if they just had little pea strokes and died. They were elf-struck.

So they also, they honk too. Like I can't even do the honk. Like a goose? That's that hoot dash thing sounds kind of like a honk. Oh, yeah. It does sound a little honkish. Yeah. So they can do that a lot too. And if you put it all together, yeah, it can be very annoying. But Chuck, I cannot...

figure out what the difference is between Yumi's grandma's neighborhood and my neighborhood. Because I have a completely different opinion of the annoyance level of peacocks now. I don't understand why, but there's the facts. Well, maybe you aged into it. I guess so. I'm older, wiser, gentler, more peacock loving. Sure. I think we all get that way. Sure. All right. So let's talk about the history of these things.

Jumping back a little bit, a few thousand years ago, the ancient Phoenicians were the first folks to say, hey, these things are great. Let's move them around to different places because these things strutting around a palace is really something to see. So they brought them from India to Syria. They were traded around the Mediterranean at that point. And they did become like a status symbol. If you were nobility or royalty or had a lot of money or lived in a palace, then you probably wanted some peacocks strolling around your property.

Yeah. You might also want to eat them. I forgot to send you this thing that I found. The Romans ate them, but they specifically liked their tongues. Peacock tongue was a delicacy in ancient Roman times. Okay. In the Middle Ages. Wait, where are you going to send me?

This is what I'm about to tell you. Oh, okay. I thought you were going to send me a peacock tongue. In the mail. Flash ride. So in the Middle Ages in Europe, they would actually eat peacock, like the whole thing. But they figured out a way to remove the skin so that the feathers all came off too. Then they would roast the bird and then they would redress it with its feathers to be served at the

to the lord of the manor by the most beautiful girl at the party, I guess. And then it would just sit there for a little while. They would carve into it, eat it, and have a lot of trouble digesting it because apparently it's really tough. So much so that doctors of the time were like, don't eat peacock. It's really just not good for you. So they would just stick the feathers back in it in an ornamental way.

The picture I saw or the painting I saw made it look like they did a pretty good job of making it look like it was alive again. Yeah, interesting. I think even a lot of meat eaters appreciate the animal not looking like its original form when it's on the plate. Sure, right. You don't really want to recognize it. Yeah, like, you know, I love a Branzino, but I don't like that fish head looking up at me.

Oh, no? You don't like roly-poly fish heads? No, I don't want to see it, but I'll still dine on a Branzino. I got a friend whose brother will take that eyeball out and eat it right at the table in front of everybody. What is wrong with that guy? I mean, supposedly that's the thing to do, you know, use all the animal, but I just don't want to eat an eyeball. Now, did I ever tell you about the time we went to H&F and we just went too far?

No. So for everybody who doesn't know, H&F is a restaurant in Atlanta and they're well known for like using all parts of the animal. Yeah.

And we went and we were like, if you go further down the menu, like it gets more and more hardcore. And we just kind of tried it one time and we got as far as fried chicken heads or beaks, which had a lot of the head attached still. Goodness. Like the whole table just kind of, it just took a dark turn and everybody stopped talking.

It was a bad jam. So I don't recommend the fried chicken beaks at Holman & Finch anymore. That sounds too much like a McNuggan. You remember that? No. I think I sent it to you years ago. It was supposedly in a thing of chicken nuggets, but it was a deep fried little chicken head that got through and they called it the McNuggan.

That is what HNF sells as a dish. All right. This has been very instructive. For sure. I know our poor –

Live show fan Sarah is like, I'm sorry I asked for it. Yeah, I said butthole earlier too. This is going downhill. It is. All right, so back to history and peacocks. Lord Krishna in the Hindu tradition wears peacock feathers as a headdress. And there have been many other examples over the years in Greek mythology and Roman mythology about the peacock. I believe Hera even had peacocks pulling her chariot.

At 10 miles an hour. Yeah, exactly. She was protected by a giant named Argus who had 100 eyes and he was killed by Hermes. And so she brought him back as the peacock. I thought that's a great story. Yeah. There's also the peacock throne, right?

Yeah, the Peacock Throne is one of the most expensive things that's ever been made. If it drives at home, I think it was about twice the cost of the Taj Mahal to build this one throne, which had...

Oh, 2,500 pounds of gold, 500 pounds, not 500 precious stones, 500 pounds of precious stones. Uh-huh. Including the Khori Nur diamond, which is a 105-carat diamond. Pretty amazing stuff. They managed the Mughal Empire in India, managed to hang on to the throne for about 100 years until they were invaded by the Persians, Abbasids.

I believe, who were like, we're taking this throne. This is essentially the reason we invaded was to get this throne. And they disassembled it and basically sold it off for parts, right? Yeah.

But if you go onto the Internet and you search peacock throne, you will see photographs of a peacock throne that looks pretty amazing. And you will say, well, how could this have been destroyed back in the 17th or 18th century? And the reason why is because what you're looking at is the replica that King Ludwig II of Bavaria, our friend,

The fairy tale king had constructed for his castle Neuschwanstein. Ah, look at that. Neuschwanstein? Yeah. Which one? I don't know. I'm just amazed that you brought that around. Nice work. Thanks. Neuschwanstein sounds great. Neuschwanstein. Yeah. Any chance I have to bring King Ludwig II into the story, I'm going to take it. Well, you had that shirt made. That helps. Ask me about King Ludwig II. Yeah.

Endangered, yes or no. Indian bluefowl are not endangered. In fact, they're doing really, really well. And you mentioned, you know, in places in Florida and even Southern California, they can get a little out of hand with their menace. They can tear up foliage and they can poop all over the place and they can destroy habitats that other birds have. So people sometimes now even are trapping them and giving them vasectomies.

Yeah, there's a town called Pinecrest, a suburb of Miami, which is giving peacocks vasectomy. So if you couldn't have guessed, Pinecrest is a rather well-heeled suburb of Miami because a lot of towns can't afford to give peacocks vasectomy.

That green pea fowl, they are under threat, though. Their list is endangered because they are from Southeast Asia and a lot of their natural habitat has been done away with thanks to land development and agricultural mowing down of their environment. And also farmers who will poison them if they come into their fields. Yeah, there's only, I think, 10,000 to 20,000 left of them in the wild.

Hopefully someone steps up because losing any animal to extinction sucks. But losing particularly beautiful ones that their very presence makes the world a better place to live in. Those are you don't want to lose those. That's right. And as for the Congo peafowl, we don't want to forget about those fellas. They are vulnerable. Also, habitat loss and hunting. And there are about 10,000 of those in the wild and alive. I know.

Let's see. I'm trying to think if there's anything else. I don't really think we have anything else, do we? I got nothing else. Oh, a group of peafowl. What is it? Collective nouns? Isn't that what they're called? Yeah. That was another name for them. Something of something. Yes, I remember what you're talking about. I don't remember what it was, too. In this case, peacocks, a group of peacocks are called a pride, an ostentation.

Or a party, a peacock party. I like that. I do too. I like all three of them. Well, since Chuck and I agreed that we like the collective nouns for peacocks, then obviously we have just unlocked listener mail. I'm going to call this main and billboards.

Hey, guys. Long-time super fan of spreading the stuff you should know, Kool-Aid. Ooh, far and wide. Flavor aid, I think. They make any miles I drive to reach anywhere in Maine fly by, so thanks for that. When you ask someone in Maine how far away a destination is, be prepared to often hear about an hour. But that can mean 45 minutes to nearly two hours. Fun fact here, though, about Maine. During a recent episode on Kudzu, you were talking about how it takes over billboards.

And I know you get a lot of listener mail for Maine. I thought you might like to know an exciting factoid. Have you ever been to Maine and marveled at its natural beauty? Well, part of that is due to something that's missing. Billboards, guys. Maine law does not allow billboards...

of any kind. They have a very prescriptive law regarding signs not on business property, aka in Maine vernacular, official business directional signs. The rules are very strict and include a special provision that rolling signs, like ones attached to vehicles, cannot even be used to get around these requirements. And I think it is a $30 license fee to get a sign that can be 48 inches by 12 inches

Or 72 inches by 16 inches. And you can only use two fonts. They must be white with a single color background. And this is literally just to say, like, my pressure washing business is down there or whatever. Mm-hmm. They say that people may consider...

billboards to be detrimental to the preservation of scenic resources. And that is a great law. And that's one reason we love Maine. And that is from, who's that from? That's from Katrina Peterson. Thanks, Katrina. That is a very sensible, awesome law. I love that. It's one of the worst things to see when you're driving down the highway is a bunch of billboards. Yeah. It's terrible.

Great. Thanks for letting us know that. Hopefully, as Maine goes, the rest of the world follows. And if you want to be like Katrina and get in touch with us and let us know of a very sensible local law, we love that kind of thing. You can send us an email to stuffpodcast at iheartradio.com. Stuff You Should Know is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.

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