Joe Rogan Experience #2203 - Eric Goode & Jeremy McBride

Eric Goode and Jeremy McBride join Joe Rogan to discuss their HBO docuseries Chimp Crazy, the follow-up to their viral hit Tiger King. They explore the bizarre psychology of people who keep captive chimps, tigers, and monkeys, the dangers and ethics involved, and the reality that captive primates suffer in confinement. The conversation widens into zoos, conservation success and failure, predator reintroduction, hunting as a management tool, and crocodiles. Throughout, they reflect on humanity's strange, disconnected relationship with animals and nature.

• There are roughly 242 accredited zoos in the US drawing 750 million visits a year, more than the five major sporting events combined, yet very little revenue goes to conservation.
  00:14:06
• Joe Exotic was offered a federal plea deal of about six or seven years and would already be free, but believed he'd be exonerated and refused it.
  00:33:55
• Fewer than 100 chimpanzees remain in private/roadside captivity in the US, but around 15,000 Americans keep primates as pets per the Animal Welfare Institute.
  01:25:32
• A 19-year-old who shot a chimp attacking his dog was charged with felony destruction of property, jailed six months, and later struggled to find work.
  01:34:56
• As a result of Tiger King, the Big Cat Public Safety Act passed and the filmmakers privately donated a million dollars to tiger conservation in India.
  02:07:41
• Chimp Crazy was edited down from roughly 1,300 hours of footage shot over about 250 days into just four hours.
  01:43:46
• Goode reveals the chimp population they track came down through a lineage from Connie Casey's Missouri breeding facility to Travis the famous Connecticut chimp.
  01:24:29

• Turtles, tortoises, and primates are the most endangered animal groups, with over half of each on the brink of extinction.
  00:03:39
• There are an estimated 5,000 tigers in Texas backyards, more than exist in the wild worldwide.
  00:08:18
• Coyotes spread across every US city partly because, persecuted by wolves, females produce more pups and expand territory when members go missing.
  00:27:04
• Chimps can pick combination locks, so keepers must use multiple layers of locks; one chimp raised in isolation became addicted to pornography.
  00:48:27
• Chimpanzees have the largest testicles of any primate because more promiscuous females drive higher male sexual activity.
  00:51:36
• Outdoor domestic cats kill billions of mammals and birds yearly and helped drive extinctions in Hawaii, Australia, and the dodo on Mauritius.
  01:04:42
• Male dolphins commit infanticide to force females into estrus, so females mate with many males to obscure paternity and protect their young.
  01:11:29
• The largest known fossil crocodile (super croc, from Big Bend National Park) reached 40 to 50 feet with six-inch teeth.
  01:54:40
• Chimp 'smiles' are actually a grimace and sign of aggression, not happiness.
  01:16:42
• American elk once ranged across over 50 states; the Eastern elk went extinct and Rocky Mountain elk were transplanted east.
  02:00:23