#1403 - Forrest Galante

Joe Rogan (0:03)

And, what's happening, brother, how are you?

Forrest Galante (0:05)

Hey Joe, I'm good, man. It's great to be here, thanks for having me.

Joe Rogan (0:07)

I've been following your exploits on social media, and the yellow caiman.

Forrest Galante (0:12)

Yes.

Joe Rogan (0:13)

Dude, that is a wild looking creature.

Forrest Galante (0:15)

Isn't it? It's unbelievable.

Joe Rogan (0:17)

It was thought to be extinct?

Forrest Galante (0:18)

Yeah, so this one's, it's a little confusing.

It's a species that was last seen when the last one died in a zoo in the 80s. And because of the region that it occupies in Columbia, which has always been controlled by FARC rebels, nobody had been back down there to look for it. And myself and there's actually this amazing Colombian scientist named Sergio Riena, we're both kind of going and prodding and trying to see if we could get in. And we both found it within a month of each other.

Joe Rogan (0:43)

Oh, wow.

Forrest Galante (0:44)

Yeah.

Joe Rogan (0:44)

Now it was a beautiful looking creature. Look at that thing.

Forrest Galante (0:47)

Right.

Joe Rogan (0:47)

It's such a wild green, yellow color. So wild looking.

Forrest Galante (0:52)

It's super unique.

Joe Rogan (0:54)

Dude, you're just holding that thing by the neck?

Forrest Galante (0:56)

Yeah, we just had a little wrestling match, him and I, so.

Joe Rogan (1:00)

You don't even have body control. Don't you want to take mountain here? Maybe get a back mount, get some hooks in.

Forrest Galante (1:06)

No, he was good. You know, reptiles, they tire out. So they're not like mammals. Once they expend all their energy, that's kind of it.

But yeah, absolutely amazing.

Joe Rogan (1:16)

Are they similar to regular crocodiles or alligators in that they don't have to eat for like a year?

Forrest Galante (1:22)

Yeah, so caiman, I mean, caiman don't have as slow of metabolism as certain other species, but they're a member of the alligator family, so to speak, and they can go very long times without food.

Joe Rogan (1:32)

What a crazy animal. Like, looks like a monster.

I mean, look at the teeth on that thing. Swallows things, basically whole, just spins to take chunks off of things, swallows them whole, it doesn't have to eat for a year, can go underwater for how long, without holding its breath?

Forrest Galante (1:50)

40, 45 minutes, some of them, yeah, some species, yeah.

Joe Rogan (1:53)

So you have no idea it's there.

Forrest Galante (1:54)

Right.

Joe Rogan (1:54)

It's just waiting for you.

And they're fairly small, right? There's like a 90 pound animal when it's fully grown.

Forrest Galante (2:00)

Well, these ones, it's so little is known about this particular species of caiman that it's hard to say. I would say, yeah, 100 pounds is probably about right.

Joe Rogan (2:07)

There's a great photo, Jamie, from the Nature is Metal Instagram page from yesterday.

Forrest Galante (2:13)

That page is nuts.

Joe Rogan (2:16)

I love that page. There's a great one of a jaguar with a caiman in its mouth. That one. Look at the eyes on that fucker.

Jamie (2:23)

Yeah.

Joe Rogan (2:23)

Go expand.

Jamie (2:25)

Look at that.

Joe Rogan (2:26)

Oh, the thing of nightmares.

Forrest Galante (2:28)

Look at those bangs right in the throat, like just death grip. And you can see that that caiman is death rolling in that scene, right? It's trying to get away. It's rolling and that jag is just locked in.

Joe Rogan (2:40)

The eyes on that thing. My God.

Forrest Galante (2:42)

Unbelievable.

Joe Rogan (2:43)

It's like nature has created, like in those kinds of eyes, that's the perfect vision of terror. Like those eyes. Like you're locked into those eyes. Like there's no forgiveness.

There's no emotions. There's just ferocity and aggression and death.

Forrest Galante (3:02)

It seems like nothing but testosterone is behind that. You know, I mean, testosterone is probably the wrong chemical, but it just seems so focused and motivated. And like you say, it looks like death.

Joe Rogan (3:13)

Yeah, I'm sure there's some testosterone involved in that equation too, but there's a bunch of other cat shit in there.

Forrest Galante (3:18)

Literally.

Joe Rogan (3:19)

And they have, apparently the thing in the caption was saying that the caiman has one of the greatest bites per pound of any of the big cats, and they regularly eat these.

Forrest Galante (3:29)

The jag, yeah.

Joe Rogan (3:30)

Jaguar, rather, has one of the greatest bites, and they regularly eats these caimans.

Forrest Galante (3:35)

Yeah, no, they're amazing. And you know, back to the one that we found, it's so great because, like, I'm the hide and seek guy, right, like I look for them, and now there's the scientist Sergio Riena down in Columbia who's gonna manage that species' ongoing existence. Oh, wow. So it's really cool.