Never Pull a Frozen Crocodile Out of Ice

in january 2018 a massive blizzard hit the east coast of the united states despite the work of meteorologists no one expected the consequences to be that bad hundreds of canceled flights car accidents multi-million dollar losses and 300 000 people were left without power [Music] only alligators knew of the impending disaster they froze themselves so the cold wouldn't kill them when george howard manager of swamp park saw alligator noses sticking out of the frozen lake he panicked losing several animals at once was something terrible george rushed to the alligators and wanted to pull them out before it was too late fortunately he stopped at the last moment a quick search on google and he found out that if he had rescued the animals they would have died alligators are cold-blooded meaning that the temperature of the environment is very important for them they can't just hunker down like a sparrow to wait out the cold so they seek shelter more often than not when the weather turns bad alligators go ashore bury themselves in the ground or clay and wait for the weather to improve but not these guys they came up with something better but how do you predict a sudden onset of cold weather i mean alligators don't have internet access to check the weather forecast besides even professional meteorologists can't always predict the weather right but alligators can they know that in a few days there will be a cold snap so they stick their noses out of the water and meet the frost face to face that's because alligators have unique sensors that no other vertebrate has to find them all you have to do is look closely at their skin you see these dots they sense everything with unbelievable accuracy weather forecasters make mistakes in their weather predictions but alligators are never wrong here's your host steve with the most accurate weather forecast in the world there's going to be a cold snap all along the east coast of the united states so i recommend freezing yourself off to survive and now for the sports okay but why stick your nose out of the water maybe it works like an outside thermometer that can tell what the temperature is at any time well not really in fact alligators just need air because they don't have gills so they need to breathe through their noses [Laughter] yes they can hold their breath but only for 24 hours and who wants to end up under water without oxygen when the surface freezes but if the alligators were okay why couldn't george howard have pulled them out maybe the animals would have been insulted that he was violating their personal space i was serious when i said that trying to save the alligators would have killed them it's like trying to move a person who suffered a serious back injury before the ambulance arrives by the way don't do that and even though there's nothing wrong with the alligator spine they escape the cold by immersing themselves in the water because it's much warmer if the animal ends up outside the water at the wrong moment the combination of frost wet skin and cold bloodedness will instantly kill it if you have ever swum in bad weather you know how it works you get out of the water and immediately freeze fortunately we can dry ourselves with a towel get dressed and jump around alligators don't have that option and while you're imagining an alligator wrapped in a towel let's figure out why the water is warmer after all there must be some scientific explanation and indeed there is the air above the surface heats up faster and moves upward new masses of cold air take its place the ground cools down but unlike the land water heats up slowly because of its low thermal conductivity and its high heat capacity that's why water gives up heat very slowly and by the time winter has come you can still be under water if you're an alligator of course as soon as the air temperature drops below 54 degrees fahrenheit the alligators enter a dormant state they temporarily shut down their bodies sticking their noses out of the water and wait for things to change for the better by the way why doesn't the cold hurt their noses anyone who's touched snow with their bare hands knows how quickly your fingers freeze and here we're talking about a nose shouldn't there be at least some way to i don't know cover it relax the alligator's nose is just cartilage wrapped in thick skin and it won't freeze in a short period of time yeah it wouldn't work with humans if a person spends too much time with their nose out it'll freeze and while it's possible to teach the human body to tolerate extreme cold and maybe train your nose too the mind just might not be able to take it everyone has their own level of mental toughness and hardly anyone knows this better than david blaine the famous magician spent 63 hours 42 minutes and 15 seconds in a six-ton block of ice battling the cold and fatigue after only three hours he decided he wasn't going to make it at some point the magician's brain began to malfunction he couldn't think straight and he began to hallucinate blaine survived but called the ordeal unbearable and we're talking about a person who spent a week in a plastic coffin at the same time alligators can survive like this in the water even if the temperature reaches 39 degrees fahrenheit and they can spend not just one or two days in such a strange position with their nose towards the sun some are able to endure for a week or even more and then well it all depends on the weather if it gets warmer the alligator will just thaw out and go back to its usual gator life but if the cold remains the water temperature will drop and the animal will simply freeze joining the mammoth everything freezes as i said before alligators go into dormancy in order to stay alive it's known as brumation a hibernation process but for reptiles not to be confused with mammalian hibernation bears go into a deep sleep during which they don't eat or drink and any awakening before that time is extremely stressful for them alligators slow their metabolism and heart rate they don't need food and all they need to do is breathe sometimes they dive under water to drink some water but then they stop moving again and just wait but it can't go on like this for long any living organism has its limits and if the roommation doesn't stop on time well you get the idea but you know what surprises me the most is not even that alligators know how to go into standby mode but that they feel warm in cold water i mean do you have any idea how cold 39 degrees fahrenheit is probably no human being would last even 24 hours in the water at that temperature but then i remembered about polar bears they not only live at extreme temperatures but even build dens right in the snow where they give birth to cubs and the little cubs don't die from the cold okay okay bears are fluffy so they're warm what about people who build houses out of snow the temperature inside an igloo is comfortable enough to live so it's warm inside the snow all thanks to the properties of the igloo the inner layer melts forming a solid crust the entrance is deliberately dug below the floor level so as to not lose precious heat at the same time the snow provides the necessary ventilation an ingenious invention that only people who have tamed the cold could have come up with hello peter uh hey hey bill uh what are you doing out here in all this snow by the way some scientists even believe that cold can prolong life some experiments conducted on rotifers tiny worm-like creatures concluded that low temperatures increased their lifespan by six to one hundred percent wait but why such a big gap it seems to have something to do with the genes if you don't have the right dna the cold doesn't help cold loving genes just like elsa's dna am i right in fact scientists don't know yet what these genes are and when they appeared maybe during one of the ice ages and by the way alligators or rather their ancestors managed to survive even those cold snaps i wouldn't be surprised to know that's when they learned the trick of sticking their noses out from under the ice researchers claim that alligators have no idea how to do this life-saving procedure in the water they just do it it's written somewhere in their genes just do it maybe by those ancestors who survived the ice age after all alligators haven't changed much since then seriously look at any animal and its ancient ancestors usually the difference is huge but not with alligators because they found the perfect shape there's simply no need to evolve because it doesn't get any better think about it alligators have the ability to hold their breath to survive in the cold and to trot or in the case of crocodiles to gallop moreover they have a long life and impeccable hunting skills alligators are real survival machines and they don't seem to care at all what's going on around them dinosaurs meteorites ice age fire they simply don't care yes even fire alligators simply take shelter in mud pits and thus escape the fire with their entire families move aside bear grylls you know we've seen a crocodile here and trust me he is not going to be alone this animal knows everything about survival even hurricanes don't scare them alligators tough skin works like armor and their sensors pick up any change in pressure these predators are ready for anything i wouldn't be surprised to know they enjoy it see you later

Channel: WATOP

Views: 7,801,779

Keywords: WATOP, Wa Top

Id: T5EaMKv7aDg

Length: 9min 5sec (545 seconds)

Published: Sat Jun 19 2021