(suspenseful music) (woman screaming) - They can't like burrow
into my foot, can they? Could that happen, Mario? (upbeat music) It's a beautiful day for a maggot box. A beautiful day for a maggot. Will they eat meat? Will they eat feet? It's a maggoty day for a maggot box with 300,000 flesh eating maggots. Will they eat meat? Will they eat my feet? Ugh, it's time to feed my maggots. Hello, maggots. Oh boy. How have I find myself
in this seat yet again? Coyote Peterson in front
of a container filled with creatures that very
well may eat him alive. Well, I've always been
curious as to whether or not maggots eat human flesh alive or dead. And today we're going
to answer that question, but before we get into the entertainment and my feet go into this
container with 300,000 maggots, first we need to learn something about these creepy creatures. So we're going to take the Science Train to the Ohio State University and learn a little something
about these creatures. Choo-choo. Do, do, do, do, do, do. Choo-choo. As a graduate of the
Ohio State University, I'm returning to campus to
learn more about maggots before I serve myself up as a meal. So I'll be chatting with Dr. Julie. She studies bugs and how they
survive during the winter, specifically insect diapause which is a state of suspended animation similar to mammal and reptile hibernation. Maggots are an ideal test
subject for her research because like John Snow, they can sense when winter is coming. Okay Julie, let's get right down to it. I think we all wanna know
what exactly is a maggot? - Yeah, so a maggot is an
immature stage of any kind of fly. - So a maggot is a baby
fly then essentially. - Yes. - I could see the
similarity to human babies, soft and squishy and round, and you know- - Yeah, except they have an exoskeleton. - Literally there's an
exoskeleton on the maggot? - On the maggot yeah. - Going from larva to pupa, maggots obviously need to fuel up. What would you say maggots
primarily feast on? - Maggots like to eat rotting stuff like dead carcasses or
roadkill in the woods. - If given the option, will they eat human flesh? - So that's kind of a
tricky question to answer. A lot of them will only eat dead stuff, but there are some that will burrow into human flesh if given the chance. - So maggots will technically eat humans if given the chance. Some species. - Some species. - Some species. How fascinating was that? And now that we've set up the science, it's time to perform an
experiment of our own. Now perhaps you noticed
the beautiful meat socks that I was sporting earlier on. That's right, these are sirloin wrapped in bacon. And if you're envious of
these incredible socks, don't worry, they're for sale right now
at shopbraveywilderness.com because we figured who
doesn't want meat socks for the holidays. Now those socks aren't
necessarily gonna attract the attention of maggots. So what we've constructed today is a real meat sock if you would. Thank you, sir. - Ugh Take a look at that. It's chicken skin sewed
together with bacon. Now we're gonna stick one of
my feet with nothing on it. Live human flesh down
and into the maggots. On my other foot will be the meat sock. Will the maggots be able
to tell the difference between a living human foot and a living human foot
covered in dead meat? Now have you ever heard of meat socks? - I have not heard of meat socks. Tell me more. - You've not heard of meat socks. This is specimen number 001. Take a look at this here. - Wow, that's some pretty fancy sewing. - Yeah, what do you
have to say about that? - That's impressive. I've never seen anybody make
socks out of bacon before. - Now this is the meat
sock that we have composed that my foot will go inside
of to see if the maggots will not only eat the dead rotting skin- - Yeah. - But go through the skin and, thank you for that, into my feet. Have you ever thought about
crafting a pair of meat socks so that you can become a human
experiment for your maggots? - I have not. - We could help. - Yeah. - You come up with this
design and advance it further. - Sure. My maggots really like to eat liver. - Okay. - So maybe some liver socks. - Perhaps the sole of the sock that we could go sort of more of a shoe. - Yeah. - We've got a liver sole
and a chicken skin outer and what we really love
about our design specifically is the bacon brim. - The bacon brim is a nice touch. - My foot is going into the meat sock. Oh, that is very slimy. And my foot is in. Ooh, my foot is encased
in chicken skin and bacon. Okay, here we go. Just do it Coyote, just go for it. Oh wow they're really warm. Generating a lot of heat. Oh, that is a real weird feeling. It feels like warm rice. All right. So I'm working my foot
down and into the maggots. Oh, that is a really,
really, really weird feeling. Now it's time to add in
the delectable meat sock. Oh, that is weird. I can feel them all moving
around the edges of the sock. All right, I'm to slowly
massage the meat sock down and into the maggots. Oh they are very, very dense and very, very squiggly. Now the clock begins. My feet are completely submerged and now it's time to sit back and find out whether or not maggots will feast on human flesh. The life cycle of a fly breaks down into four distinct phases. First, a female lays a batch of eggs in some type of decaying organic matter. The process is quick, as these eggs will hatch
in less than 24 hours. This is the second stage known as larva or maggot. These hungry baby flies gorge themselves in order to grow and eventually molt into their next stage, pupa. During this stage, they develop a cocoon like shell that looks like a mouse turd, where they go dormant
and do not move or eat. Inside the cocoon they metamorphasize, growing wings, antenna and legs. Just like Jeff Goldblum
in the mid eighties, they hatch out as a fully grown fly and the cycle repeats itself. My feet have been in
here for about 30 minutes and I can feel that the
maggots are beginning to work their way into the meat sock. So they're now maggots in between the chicken skin and the human skin. And I don't know where things
are gonna go from there, but I'm a little nervous
about this foot at this point. The thing that doesn't
translate is the smell. This smell of these maggots which just smells like rotting flesh is just made me completely
grossed out at this point. If you examine a single
maggot under a microscope you will see that they lack any weaponry for harvesting flesh. No teeth, beaks, Freddie Krueger hands or
venom laced probascus. Whoa, whoa, whoa. Something might be happening
with the meat sock foot. I'm experiencing some sort of pain on the inner curve of my foot. Instead maggots have creepy mouth hooks that allow them to grapple and
pull their rough skin bodies scraping like a cheese
grater over dead flesh as they squirm through a carcass. I might be getting bitten. It's tough to tell, but it definitely feels
like a pinching sensation. During this process, they also secrete
enzymes called peptidases that liquefy flesh proteins. And when you have thousands of maggots doing this all at once, it makes for a deliciously
disgusting corpse stew that can easily be slurped down. No teeth needed for this meaty feast. I'm just afraid that once
I take the meat sock off I'm gonna see like a magnet has burrowed. They can't like burrow
into my foot can they? Could that happen, Mario? It's something that everyone's gonna find out at the end of this episode. It has been several hours with my feet submerged into the box of 300,000 maggots. We are going to pull my
feet up and out of the box to analyze what they look like. Now the first foot we're gonna
pull out is my left foot. Remember, this one had no meat sock on it. Wow, my foot's like completely asleep because it hasn't moved in so long. So I'm gonna bring it
up very, very slowly. It's so warm. Oh, that feels so weird. Look at all the maggots
that have collected in between my toes. Eh. It does not appear as if this foot has taken any impactful nibbles or bites. Now we're gonna take out
the foot with the meat sock. Now, it's important to
note that I've taken a couple of nibbles on this foot and the maggots have
definitely gone to town on at least eating the bacon. So let's see if any of
the rest of the meat sock has any holes burrowed into it. Here we go. Look at that. The maggots have worked
their way into the seams and all into the bacon. The sock itself is pretty
filled with maggots. Should we take off the sock? Okay. Oh, oh. Look at all the maggots pouring out of it. Oh. All right, so now what I want to do is analyze where I think I was bitten. Okay, right here, there is a very, very hard to see. Looks like a little red dot there. Some sort of nibble. Nothing though that has
actually burrowed into my foot. Wow. Look at that. The maggots have completely
engulfed the meat sock that quickly. Hold on, don't get too lost in there yet. Look at that. They completely sucked it down into there. Let's watch that again. All right I'm just gonna go
ahead and keep filming this. So what you're witnessing here are the maggots quickly engulfing the meat sock. It's exactly what they would do in nature whether with decomposing
animal or plant matter. They essentially envelop it and slowly begin to feast. Okay, my feet were
inside the box of maggots for several hours and as you can see, they're both still fully intact which I think helps us
answer today's question. Do maggots eat living human flesh? And the answer to that is absolutely not. And while it's fair to
note that I was nibbled on a couple of times, those nibbles did not break skin and certainly did not draw blood. In my opinion, maggots get a bad rap. I mean they're creepy, they're squirmy and they're
always associated with death, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. Remember, these are natural decomposers. They're cleaning up the environment by breaking down plant and animal matter. So what we learned today is
they're not going to eat you if you stumble upon them. And the next time you
see a big swarm of them consuming an animal carcass, remember they're simply doing their job. I'm Coyote Peterson The Brave. Stay wild. We'll see you on the next adventure.
