May 16, 2018

Mysteries of the Salish Sea

1 hour 14 minutes

On this episode of Expanded Perspectives the guys start the show off talking about an interesting article that was recently published in the Scientific American about how new research now shows some flora can detect an herbivorous animal well before it launches an assault, letting a plant mount a preemptive defense that even works against other pest species. Scientist recently squirted snail slime—a lubricating mucus the animals ooze as they slide along—into soil, nearby tomato plants appeared to notice. They increased their levels of an enzyme called lipoxygenase, which is known to deter herbivores. So the question is "how smart are plants?"

Then, an anonymous man, who wrote the message in Spanish, said he was walking home when he noticed the cigar-shaped object. Inside of this strange elongated object appeared to be what looked like a living entity. He tried to video tape the strange craft and creature but was unsuccessful. After the break Cam brings up the strange story of 14 detached feet that have washed ashore in southwest Canada and northwest United States. Who do they belong to? Where did they come from? And why only feet?

Like nearly all of the 13 human feet that had mysteriously washed up on Canadian shores before it, the 14th foot appeared, unexpectedly, on the banks of the Salish Sea in British Columbia. This time, a man walking the beach on Gabriola Island discovered the appendage trapped in a mass of logs, according to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. The law enforcement agency described the foot as “disarticulated” — that is to say, disconnected from the human body to which it had belonged. It did not specify if it was a left foot or a right foot. Curiously, Foot No. 14 was clad in a hiking boot; all but one of the others had been wearing athletic sneakers. So continues the mystery of the human feet floating ashore in the Pacific Northwest, a phenomenon that has captivated residents, scientists and area law enforcement since 2007. In August of that year, not one but two disembodied human feet, both right ones, were found on islands in the Salish Sea, a network of coastal waterways between Vancouver Island and Canada’s westernmost province. Over the past decade or so, 14 feet in all have washed ashore in British Columbia, of which eight have been identified as belonging to six people. The discoveries are frequent enough that the British Columbia Coroners Service even put together a map charting where each of the feet had been found. (Some other feet have appeared on American shores farther south, in Washington state.) Officials say there is a reasonable explanation for why so many of the feet have been found in sneakers: Namely, that the materials used to make modern-day running shoes allow the feet to remain buoyant after they become separated from the rest of the body in the sea.

All of this and more on this installment of Expanded Perspectives!

Show Notes: