(upbeat instrumental music)
(water splashing)
(Coyote screaming)
(logo chimes)
(rock crumbling)
(ominous instrumental music)
- [Coyote] At some point in life,
we have all feared being bitten by a vampire.
Thankfully, fears often replaced by logic
because we know vampires
are just creatures from folklore.
But if you are a fish living in the Great Lakes,
that folklore is a nightmare that is too real.
(ominous instrumental music)
Speedy, slimy and armed with a suction cup mouth
with razor sharp teeth,
the sea lamprey is nature's largest parasitic
bloodsucking creature.
And today,
we're going to find out just how horrific
a swarm of 1,000 sea lamprey be like.
(button pressing)
(water splashing)
(Coyote screaming)
(ominous instrumental music)
Now in the past,
we tried an experiment
to get me eaten alive by sea lamprey.
to do that,
we place my hands into a tank filled with them,
but nothing happened.
They swim around,
and I didn't take a single bite.
Set up the ante,
we induced a suction,
which involved me adhering one to my arm,
one to my stomach,
where you've got some guts,
and of course in horror film fashion style,
we adhere one to my neck.
The thing was,
the second these fish drew blood,
they realized that I was a mammal,
not exactly the fish buffet line,
which is exactly what they would want
to be feeding on.
So with our first experiments,
what we learned is that sea lamprey
do not eat human flesh.
Today, we're gonna perform
something slightly different,
with two new experiments
surrounding the concept of fight or flight.
Now, this is something
that you've probably heard of before in nature.
Now almost all instances
when you encounter an animal,
I'd say almost 100%,
an animal is going to flee
in the opposite direction,
that's called flight.
But if an animal finds itself
in a situation that it can't get away from,
that's is fight.
You ever hear the phrase,
don't back a Badger into a corner?
That's because badgers are armed
with teeth and claws.
You get a badger mad,
trust me, you're gonna know about it.
Now listen,
since we're going to introduce something
known as an alarm cue pheromone,
that pheromone causes sea lamprey
to go absolutely berserk.
You're probably wondering yourself,
well, Coyote,
are you going to add this alarm cue
to these sea lamprey?
Yeah, guys, we absolutely are.
But first I'm thinking you wanna know
what exactly is an alarm cue pheromone?
That's is a great question.
More than a decade ago,
scientists working with
the Great Lakes Fishery Commission,
hypothesize that pheromones,
which are natural odors to animals
used to communicate,
could disrupt the spawning activity
of sea lamprey,
helping to keep their populations in-check.
So how and why does it work?
Well, at the end of the sea lampreys lifecycle
or during an attack from a predator,
they release a natural scent
that other sea lamprey interpreted
as the presence of death or danger.
This alarm cue,
the same one I am holding
immediately causes healthy sea lamprey
to quickly avoid the area,
sending them fleeing away
from the perceived danger,
and ultimately pushing them
out of certain environments.
So what happens when you add
the scent of death to a tank full of sea lamprey
who have nowhere to run?
That's a good question.
Let's find out.
Ladies and gentlemen,
let me introduce you
to the alarm cue.
That concoction right there
is basically sea lamprey kryptonite.
(suspenseful instrumental music)
Here we go with the smell test.
(suspenseful instrumental music)
(Coyote retching)
Gah.
That is terrible.
Absolutely terrible.
And you wanna know something?
The sea lamprey has a better sense of smell
than I do.
I better give it one more sniff.
(seagulls chirping)
(Coyote retching)
Nope.
Yup, uh-huh.
That's it.
I can exactly see without question
why this would cause sea lamprey
to run in the opposite direction.
Practically makes me wanna run
the opposite direction.
Okay.
This is it.
Time to officially add 250 milliliters
of alarm cue.
Three, two,
alarm cue.
(suspenseful instrumental music)
(water splashing)
Okay.
It's starting to disperse.
Whoa, whoa, whoa.
We got action here.
They just started getting crazy.
Got to put the top back on.
Wow.
Look at them swarming around the aquarium.
Holy mackerel.
Look at this.
Absolutely crazy.
Seconds ago,
before we added the alarm cue,
they were completely still and calm.
And now,
they are looking every which direction
to try to escape from the aquarium.
Well, they're hitting the glass.
Now, you may be thinking to yourself,
Coyote, aren't you gonna
to stick your hands in there,
and see if they'll shred them
down to the foam, blood and guts,
and nastiness everywhere?
Not quite guys,
because I think that now that we know
the alarm queue works,
it will be much more entertaining,
and far more educational
to actually place me into a dunk tank.
Yes, that's right.
A dunk tank with 1,000 sea lamprey.
I go in,
the alarm cue goes in,
and anything is possible.
Stay tuned because part two of this experiment
is going to be crazy.
(ominous instrumental music)
Sea lamprey originally invaded the Great Lakes
from the Atlantic Ocean
through a series of man-made shipping canals
in the 1800s.
(suspenseful instrumental music)
And without any predators
or population control at the time,
their numbers exploded.
(ominous instrumental music)
The battle to control invasive sea lamprey
in the Great lakes is hard fought.
And the discovery of an alarm cue
as a powerful repellent
could be one more step
toward placing a stake
in the heart of these bloodthirsty vampire fish.
So what happens when the applicator
of the alarm finds themselves in a scenario
where the sea lamprey
cannot evade the perceived threat?
This is the chaos you have waiting for,
and to perform the experiment,
I have traveled to Millersburg, Michigan,
where I'm once again,
working with my friends
at the Hammond Bay Biological Station,
a research laboratory,
jointly managed by the Great Lakes
Fishery Commission and the US Geological Survey.
We have set up a plastic carnival dunk tank,
and it's been filled with 1,000
blood-sucking sea lamprey.
(ominous instrumental music)
Okay.
I am suited up.
I have my red solo cup of alarm cue.
It's time to get dunked
into a tank full of vampire fish.
Here we go.
(birds chirping)
(ominous instrumental music)
(footsteps thudding)
There is no turning back now.
Beneath me is a dunk tank
filled with 1,000 sea lamprey,
and I got to tell you,
sitting in the hot seat looking down into them
is a whole lot different
than being outside of the tank.
It's all of a sudden become very real.
So here's what's gonna happen,
inside of this cup,
I have alarm cue.
As we saw earlier,
adding alarm cue in with the sea lamprey
causes them to go into a complete frenzy.
You'll also notice that I'm wearing
this brightly red colored life preserver.
Now, the reason for the life preserver
is that if the lamprey attack,
and they start to adhere to my body,
believe it or not
that weight could keep me under water.
So I've got a little tab here
that I could pull to help me get to the surface.
Hopefully, that won't happen,
but you never know
when it comes to angry sea lampreys.
Now, my goal is to stay in here
for at least two minutes.
However, if I'm being bitten and eaten alive,
I may not make it that long.
Okay.
Mario,
I'm gonna need you to come into the scene
because what's gonna happen
is you are going to actually be the one
who deploys me down and into the lamprey.
And as soon as he hits that deployment button,
the seat will drop,
and Coyote becomes the buffet line.
You guys ready?
Take off my flip flops,
and I'm gonna put on a dive mask.
I have no idea how crazy these lamprey
are gonna get,
but if we learned anything earlier,
there's going to be splashing,
and tails absolutely everywhere.
And for the comedic purposes,
I might as well keep my hat on as well,
because that will be fun to see
you go down beneath the lamprey.
I'm Coyote Peterson,
and I'm about to be eaten alive by sea lamprey.
(water splashing)
Three, two,
hit.
(button hitting)
(water splashing)
(Coyote screaming)
(suspenseful instrumental music)
(Coyote screaming)
(Coyote squirming)
Oh, they're definitely
biting down on my legs too.
Oh.
I feel like I am literally
in an entire (screams)
path of slime right now.
Being eaten alive by a leech.
Oh.
Ah, there's one adhere to my arm now.
Look at this.
(Coyote screaming)
(Coyote chuckles)
They're bitting on my legs and my arms.
Ow, ow, ow.
Now that I'm not moving,
the lamprey have come to a standstill.
They figured out that they're not able to escape,
and they're also not attacking,
which tells me that even with the alarm cue,
sea lampreys are not necessarily
going to eat humans alive.
So while they may be completely alien-looking
in design,
totally bizarre,
an absolute living nightmares as vampire fish,
yet, they have no interest in consuming humans,
even when I was in here,
splashing around, thrashing left and right,
absolutely nothing.
All they wanted to do was simply escape.
But what we have learned from the alarm cue
is that it is incredibly effective
with pushing lamprey in a certain direction.
So the work that's being done
with this research to drive lamprey
out of river systems
where they may become detrimental to fish
or other native species
is something that hopefully will work
in the fight against sea lampreys.
Or when it comes to putting them inside
of a dunk tank,
and getting them to you to human alive,
you saw it firsthand guys, it ain't gonna happen.
So that tells the sea lamprey
will stick to their diet of fish.
I'm Coyote Peterson.
Be brave.
Stay wild.
We'll see on the next adventure.
(water splashing)
(upbeat instrumental music)
The battle to defeat sea lamprey
in the Great Lakes is ongoing,
but with the discovery of an Achilles heel,
the sea lampreys amazing sense of smell,
scientists are taking a strong upper-hand
by herding sea lamprey into specific areas
using alarm cues,
we may greatly reduce the need
for lampricides treatments,
combined with trapping,
and cross-stream barriers
to prevent spawning migrations,
sea lamprey populations have declined by 90%,
which ultimately results in healthier,
Great Lakes ecosystems.
If you would like to learn more
or have a desire to join the fight against
the invasive seal lampreys,
contact the Great Lakes Fishery Commission,
and help keep our lakes free
of blood-sucking vampires.
(upbeat instrumental music)
Hey, Coyote Pack.
Are you interested in learning more
about our planet's bizarre biological landmines?
If so,
you can sign up for free varsity tutors class
with me as the instructor.
Just check out the link
in the video description below.
Which one of the following
is not a real animal adaptation for survival?
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(birds chirping)