Should you be afraid of these creepy little creatures you find in your basement? Only one way to find out.
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Hey, there, everybody, and welcome to the short Stuff. I'm Josh, and there's shocking it's Jerry's here. She's just kind of lingering quietly in the background. And this is short stuff. I mean there's hiss went away, and that means Jerry's gone. That's right. When she was on, it was hissy and now it's not hissy. She speaks like a cobra commander. I don't know what that means. Do from g I Joe. If you watch the cover, watch had kind of before his talk, you know, have you ever seen a silverfish? That's my line? Oh sorry, Chuck, I thought we were mixing it up. Chuck, have you ever seen a silverfish? I don't know what his silver fish is? Yes, you do? You lie? Is it from g I Joe? That's right, he was cobra Commander's right here man, silverfish. It's actually kind of no. I have seen I have seen silverfish, and they I think a lot of people get freaked out by silverfish and I don't, And I don't know if I should. Well, I know I shouldn't, but I don't know why people do. I guess I think just because they're weird looking, they're very prehistoric looking, which makes sense because apparently they've been around since the Devonian period for four million years, and they haven't really changed much since then. So I think that it probably is triggers some innate, primal part of our evolved brain, that is that that came from whatever those ancient silver fish used to eat, you know what I'm saying. Sure, I do know that they've remained pretty unchanged, largely because they haven't really had to. I mean, I guess they were perfect little beings. Um, And they're very hardy. I think they can live six months with just water or just food. I think as long as they have one of those two, they're doing fine. Yeah, yeah, which is pretty interesting. But I mean that's a long time to go without either one. But it's a long time for an insect. A list it is. Um. Yeah, and I didn't see how long they live for in general, but they do seem fairly hardy. But to kind of circle back to what you were saying initially, if you know whether or not people should be scared of them, you shouldn't. They're actually not at all harmful to people, and the worst they can do is maybe, um degrade some of your old books, eat some of your favorite startch callers. Nothing really terribly untoward. And they also, um don't really tend to break out in infestations. And if they do, you've had silverfish a long long time. If you've noticed that, you have a silver fish infestation, because they reproduce very very slowly. Yeah, I mean, I don't think I've ever seen more than one same here in a place. They're like lone wolves. You know, I guess an infestation might creep me out a little bit. But um, you did mention books, and that that's because back in the day books, well there are still books, like we just wrote one and are selling a book, but it is not put together with glues that use animal byproducts. We made darn sure of that, right. Actually we didn't have to because that's just the old way of putting books together. And the silver fish eat these things, not because oh I love to eat books or even like the paper. It's it's really kind of the starchy, sugary glues and animal proteins used to put this stuff together, right exactly, So there s o l with new books. But you know the problem is if you have an antique book collection, it's probably worth some money in the silverfish love that stuff. But for those of us who don't collect antique books like we said, you know, um, they love starch that you would say, spray on like a caller, and they can inadvertently ruin your clothes, Like they don't set out to ruin your clothes, but them just kind of sucking on and chewing up that starch can can harm the fibers as it stands. Um, we should just leave bowls of mashed potatoes in the attic. Yeah, as an offering party, in offering to the silverfish gods, should we take a break? Be sure? All right, well let's take a break and we'll describe these things, because we're going to start describing things and we'll be right back. So chuck. Yeah, that was ah that that dude wrote in to say, hey, um, not all of us can go on the internet and look at pictures of what you're talking about, so please do describe it. That's why you were referencing. Sure, do you want to talk about what a silverfish looks like? You're they're skinny, Uh, they're pointy. Uh in the abdomen region, they got a little round head. Some people say they look like little carrots that that mate it with the fish because they have these little silvery tiny gray scales and they kind of shimmer and they kind of wiggle like a fish swimming, and I think that's where they got their name. Plus also if you look at their tails, they have those like three little kind of pointy appendage. I guess is that what they are. They're not. They look they look stingy, but they're not. But I don't know if they could sting other things that aren't humans, I don't know. But yeah, they definitely don't sting or bite or anything like that. And they don't want to be anywhere near you. So again, you don't need to to be worried about them. But if you, if you kind of use your imagination and just kind of connect those three stingers and fill it in a little bit, it looks a lot like a fish's tail. Yeah, you know, all the more reason to call them silverfish, and all the more reason to fry them up with somehow puppies and tartar sauce and have mushy peas. Maybe if you're from England, yeah, I guess I have a little party. So um, you're going to find silver fish in places like we said that have a high starch content, but also very humid places and at a certain temperature. They apparently prefer high humidity like between um and then temperatures of around seventy eight degrees fairre at heights, so they kind of like it a little tropical, you know what I mean? Yeah, like in the summertime in your basement or crawl space, you might see them. Um, I think the things that freaked me out of those I don't know what they are. They're not crickets, but they are cricket, like in the ones that jump in very unpredictable directions. Spiders, No, there, crickets sort of that they but they leap up in the air and you never know which way they're gonna go, Like usually cricket will just leap forward like in a grasshopper, like they're trying to go somewhere. These things are just a little unhinged, right, So, um yeah, I read a really good description of how silver fish move. They move really really fast and then stop and just kind of hang out for a little bit, and then they move again really really fast, and it's almost like this, um weird, kind of disjointed movement from one place to the other. But again, usually when they're moving and they see you, they're trying to get away from you. They're not coming at you. Yeah, and you know, their reproduction cycle is pretty long, so you're probably not gonna see infestations. Um. I think if you do have them, they say, you're probably you probably have too much junk lane around or maybe you've got a bunch of storage and cardboard boxes, which is not a good for many reasons, not a good way to store things. And uh, they definitely suggest that you store things in plastic bins. Um now that we have these sort of modern things available to us with lids, and it's a lot harder for I mean, it's just a better way to store things, period. And one reason I also saw why it is hard to uh, why it is hard to end up with a silverfish infestation is because, like you were saying, it's a long reproductive um time. But also silverfish um. Female silverfish only lay about a hundred eggs over the course of their lifetime, which seems really low, um as far as insect eggs go, don't you think it seems like it? And I guess they only lay about three or six at a time, and it takes about three to six weeks for them to hatch. So if you see a silverfish, you probably don't have much to worry about. But if you do want to get rid of them, chuck, what do you do? I mean, surely you have to like tape up your house and like go get a fogger and like get all the furniture out, and then it's a real problem, right, I mean, you know me, I tend to just leave them alone. But they do say that you can just vacuum them up and get ready or clutter reduce the humidity if you can. Um But I say, don't really sweat it so much because there's probably not many of them. And if you do have a real infestation, you can call a professional, right, But I mean, but I don't recommend it. If you don't have a like an antique um book collection at steak, then yeah, maybe just coexists, right yeah. And if you're storing your antique collection in a cardboard box in your Carls stage, then you don't care about it exactly. You got anything else about silverfish? Nothing else? Leave him alone, everybody? Uh? And since I said leave him alone, I guess that means that this short stuff is apt. Stuff you should know is a production of iHeart Radios. How stuff works for more podcasts for my heart Radio becausit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.