Female lab mice have been bred to be passive and breed with ease. 

But, in the wild they're feisty and even pugnacious.

How much of our biological understanding of the world is based on misogyny?

Featuring:

• Lucy Cooke, Zoologist and author of Bitch A Revolutionary Guide to Sex, Evolution and the Female Animal.
• Professor Arthur Georges, University of Canberra.
• Professor Catherine Dulac, Harvard University.

Production:

• Ann Jones, Presenter / Producer.
• Petria Ladgrove, Producer.
• Additional mastering:  Ann-Marie Debettencor.

This episode of What the Duck?! was originally broadcast in July 2023 and was produced on the land of the Wadawarrung and Kaurna people.

Eels are mysterious and have a fascinating history. 

People in pre-medieval England used them to pay rent. Early 17th-century maps featured 'eel ships,' and even Sigmund Freud studied their breeding and reproduction habits for a whole summer.

Dr Ann Jones gets 'eely' curious about eels in today's What the Duck?!

Featuring:

Dr. John Wyatt Greenlee, Historian Cornell University. 

Erin Rose, Budj Bim World Heritage Executive Officer at Gunditj Mirring Traditional Owners Aboriginal Corporation.

Braydon Saunders, Tour Guide Coordinator at Budj Bim Cultural Landscape Tourism.

Tyson Lovett-Murray, Budj Bim World Heritage Ranger at Gunditj Mirring Traditional Owners Aboriginal Corporation.

Wayne Koster, Research Scientist at the Arthur Rylah Institute, Department of Energy, Environment and Climate Action, Victorian Government.

Production:

• Ann Jones, Presenter / Producer.
• Petria Ladgrove, Producer.
• Additional mastering: Timothy Jenkins.

This episode of What the Duck?! was originally broadcast in March 2023 and was produced on the land of the Gunditjmara, Wadawarrung and Kaurna people.

When it comes to sexual organs, the penis is really ‘out there.’  Name another organ that can change its form AND function in a matter of seconds! 

There’s a lot of variety in the animal kingdom; from spikes and nails to coils and collagen – so, this appendage is worth investigating... close up.  

Sex is Weird is a new series of What the Duck?! with Dr Ann Jones following the sexual evolution of the animal kingdom.   

Please note that this program contains adult themes and explicit language. Parental guidance is recommended. It was first broadcast in August 2024. 

Featuring: 

Dr Emily Willingham, biologist, journalist and author.  

Dr Diane Kelly, Senior Research Fellow, University of Massachusetts, Amherst.  

Associate Professor Andrew Durso, Florida Gulf Coast University, Florida.  

Associate Professor Patty Brennan, Mount Holyoke College, Massachusetts, US. 

Dr Bruno Buzatto, Flinders University, South Australia.   

Philippa Holm, HFR Performance Horses, Victoria. 

Production:

Ann Jones, Presenter / Producer.

Petria Ladgrove, Producer.

Additional mastering: Isabella Tropiano.

This episode of What the Duck?! was produced on the land of the Wadawarrung and the Kaurna people.

Aussie classic Babe turns 30 this year, and its story of the little pig that achieves his dream of being a sheep dog is still as uplifting as the day it premiered. But we can't say "that'll do, pig" when it comes to the science....

By now, we know pigs aren't "definitely stupid", but how smart are they? Would an orphaned pig be taken in by a family of dogs? Could a pig really learn to herd sheep? And would Babe really stay so small for so long?

Dr Ann Jones sniffs out the porkies Hollywood told us in this poignant pig picture. 

Featuring:

• Dr Daryl Sparkes, Senior Lecturer (Media Studies and Production) at the University of Southern Queensland
• Professor Chris Johnson, Ecologist and Conservation Biologist at the University of Tasmania
• Associate Professor Suzanne Held, Behavioural Biology and Animal Welfare at the University of Bristol
• Babe (1995), Universal Pictures

Production:

• Ann Jones, Presenter / Producer
• Nat Tencic, Producer
• Rebecca McLaren, Producer
• Isabella Tropiano, additional mastering

This episode of What the Duck?! was produced on the lands of the Wadawarrung, Wurundjeri Woi Wurrung, Taungurung, and Kaurna people.

If you want to hear more "What the Duck?" episodes- please like and subscribe here.

If you have a fear of getting swooped by magpies, mobbed by seagulls or blinded by crows, perhaps Alfred Hitchcock is to blame.

His 1963 horror classic The Birds created a generation of ornithophobes, and played on our fears of death by feathered fiend. 

But how accurate are his creepy corvids? Do birds of a feather flock together exclusively? Can a bird go all 'Here's Johnny' on a locked door? Do birds hold grudges?

Dr Ann Jones gets a bird's eye view of Hollywood's avian lies.

Featuring:

• David Stratton, Australian film critic
• Associate Professor Lucy Aplin, Research School of Biology at the Australian National University
• Dr Corrie Ackland, clinical psychologist, Sydney Phobia Clinic 
• The Birds (1963), Universal Pictures

Further reading:

• Nearly 3 Billion Birds Gone, Cornell University

Production:

• Ann Jones, Presenter / Producer
• Rebecca McLaren, Producer
• Nat Tencic, Producer
• Isabella Tropiano, additional mastering

This episode of What the Duck?! was produced on the lands of the Wadawarrung, Wurundjeri Woi Wurrung, Taungurung, and Kaurna people.

If you want to hear more "What the Duck?" episodes- please like and subscribe here.

Remember that 1998 film Antz? The one about an ant named Z?

The one where the ants had nightmare-inducing human teeth? The one we probably have to blame for the existence of Jerry Seinfeld's Bee Movie?

Considering the movie is all about ants, you'd think it'd get SOMETHING right about ants. But Hollywood has once again LIED TO US.

Do male ants have any jobs outside the boudoir? Can ants breathe? Do ants have creepy little human teeth?

Ann Jones sets out to be pedANTic and find the facts in the fiction.

Featuring:

• Dr Kirsti Abbott, ant lover and head of science at the Museum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territory
• Antz (1998), DreamWorks Pictures

Further reading:

• Social isolation causes mortality by disrupting energy homeostasis in ants

Production:

• Ann Jones, Presenter / Producer
• Nat Tencic, Producer
• Rebecca McLaren, Producer
• Isabella Tropiano, additional mastering

This episode of What the Duck?! was produced on the lands of the Wadawarrung, Wurundjeri Woi Wurrung, Taungurung, and Kaurna people.

If you want to hear more "What the Duck?" episodes- please like and subscribe here.

In 1985, a real American black bear consumed a bunch of cocaine that'd been dropped from a plane into the forest, and died.

Nearly 40 years later Hollywood stepped in the rewrite the story. What would happen if the bear survived? Maybe it'd go on a coke-fueled rampage. That's how it works, right?

Cocaine Bear (2023) launched a lot of memes, but does it get anything right about bears, or how they'd act under the influence of blow...or did Hollywood lie to us?

Would a black bear really eat a drug dealer alive?

Do bears do 'snow' *wink* angels?

Dr Ann Jones cuts through it all to get some serious answers. 

Guests:

• Nate Bowersock, Black Bear and Furbearer Biologist, Missouri Department of Conservation, Chair, The BearWise Program
• Dr Ben Kilham, founder Kilham Bear Centre
• Nat Tencic, What the Duck?! producer 

Production:

• Ann Jones, Presenter / Producer
• Nat Tencic, Producer
• Isabella Tropiano, additional mastering

This episode of What the Duck?! was produced on the lands of the Wadawarrung, Wurundjeri Woi Wurrung and Kaurna people.

If you want to hear more "What the Duck?" episodes- please like and subscribe here.

Quick! Think of a ‘dinosaur movie’. Chances are Jurassic Park (1993) was first to mind.   

Steven Spielberg’s genetic nightmare/theme park gone wrong classic is so iconic that it inspired a generation of kids to study palaeontology, and reinvented our modern popular idea of dinosaurs. But does that idea still stack up?   

Could you really clone a triceratops from DNA found in an ancient mozzie?  

Did dilophosaurus really look like a frill-necked lizard?  

And aren’t dinosaurs supposed to be feathery?   

Ann Jones cracks into how Jurassic Park did (and didn’t) lie to us. 

Featuring: 

• Dr Travis Holland, Senior Lecturer in Communication at Charles Sturt University, host Fossils and Fiction Podcast 
• Tim Richards, Lecturer at the University of Queensland
• Associate Professor Cameron Webb, Mosquito Expert, NSW Health Pathology & University of Sydney 

This episode of What the Duck?! was produced on the lands of the Wadawarrung, Wurundjeri Woi Wurrung and Kaurna people.

If you want to hear more "What the Duck?" episodes- please like and subscribe here.

When you really think about it, sex to make babies is WEIRD! You take an outie that has to get stuck inside an innie that links into a production line of eggs to assemble a perfect tiny being. It’s so damn complicated!

So why does it work like that?

Join us at What the Duck for the first episode of a series where we figure out how living things went from splitting ourselves in half to double the population, to periodically feeling compelled to copulate in such a vigorous, sometimes highly embarrassing, manner.

Earth - this is your sexual history!

Please note that this program contains adult themes and explicit language. Parental guidance is recommended. 

This is a summer repeat of Episode One -  please find the rest of the "Sex is Weird" series here.

Featuring:

• Emeritus Professor David Siveter, University of Leicester, UK.
• Assistant Professor Emily Mitchell, University of Cambridge, UK and curator of non-insect invertebrates, University Museum of Zoology, Cambridge, UK.
• Dr Marissa Betts, geologist and palaeontologist at the University of New England, Armidale, Australia. 
• Dr Emily Willingham, biologist, journalist and author.
• Associate Professor Patty Brennan, Mount Holyoke College, Massachusetts, US. 

Production:

• Ann Jones, Presenter / Producer.
• Petria Ladgrove, Producer.

Additional mastering: Isabella Tropiano and Russell Stapleton.

Thanks also to Will Ockenden, Belinda Smith, Corey Hague and Joel Werner. 

If you want to hear more "What the Duck?" episodes- please like and subscribe here.

This episode of What the Duck?! was first broadcast in September 2024 and is produced on the land of the Wadawarrung and Kaurna people.

Could a legless lizard be 'minimalist of the year' for famous podcaster T. K. Coleman?

Ann Jones leads an unlikely gang of animal experts on a tidy dance through the philosophy of minimalism. There are moths without mouths, flies without wings, and a worm-lizard that will even declutter its own tail. 

Move over Marie Kondo, Minimalist Mother Nature is in town. 

Featuring:

• T. K. Coleman, Co-host of the Minimalists Podcast.
• Dr. Bryan Lessard, aka Bry the Fly Guy, entomologist and author of 'Eyes on Flies'.
• Dr. George Binns,  Entomologist, Macquarie University.
• Dr. David Wong, Ecologist.

Production:

• Ann Jones, Presenter / Producer.
• Petria Ladgrove, Producer.
• Additional mastering: Russell Stapleton.

If you want to hear more "What the Duck?" episodes- please like and subscribe here.

This episode of What the Duck?! was first broadcast in March 2024 and is produced on the land of the Wadawarrung and Kaurna people.