Episodi

  • A pod of orcas handed whales' tongues to people for decades

    A pod of orcas handed whales' tongues to people for decades
    Oct 20 2026
    In Twofold Bay, a killer whale pod and human whalers kept a “Law of Tongue” pact-so how did that strange arrangement begin?

    A pod of orcas handed whales' tongues to people for decades

    In this episode, we tell how a single orca-Old Tom-and his pod coordinated hunts with coastal whalers and Indigenous people across generations. We trace the rules, signals, and relationships that governed the partnership and ask what the animals themselves might have understood about the bargain.

    Person: Old Tom
    Location: Twofold Bay, New South Wales
    Event: Cooperative hunting between orcas and humans
    Period: mid-1800s to 1930s
    Practice: The Law of Tongue (orcas took tongue, lips, genital region; Davidsons took blubber and bones)

    - Old Tom produced a repeated flop-tailing signal that summoned Davidson whalers in green rowboats to the hunt.
    - The hunt used three orca roles: cutting escape, preventing deep dives, and disabling the whale’s breathing until harpooned.
    - The Davidsons refused motorized boats and explosive harpoons because the pod required traditional rowing methods.
    - The Katunga people had fed and treated the orcas as kin for millennia, a practice the Davidsons later joined.
    - The partnership included mutual protections: orcas guarded fallen men and the whalers freed entangled orcas.

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    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
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    22 min
  • The tiger pulled him offstage while he was having a stroke

    The tiger pulled him offstage while he was having a stroke
    Oct 19 2026
    A 600‑lb white tiger lunges at a performer in front of an audience - was the animal trying to help him during a stroke?

    The tiger pulled him offstage while he was having a stroke

    In this episode, we reconstruct the night Siegfried and Roy's long-running Mirage show collapsed into chaos and the immediate decisions that followed. We follow the sequence onstage, the emergency response, and the claim that reframes the attack: did the white tiger sense a medical crisis?

    Date: October 3, 2003
    Location: Mirage theater, Las Vegas
    Person: Roy Horn
    Animal: Mantacore (white tiger)
    Event: Onstage mauling and emergency response

    - The show was sold out with roughly 1,500 people in the audience for Roy Horn’s 59th birthday performance.
    - Mantacore, a six-hundred-pound white tiger who had performed the routine hundreds of times, moved toward the audience instead of his mark.
    - Roy Horn reached for Mantacore’s collar, tapped his nose with a microphone, then stepped back - the move described as the hinge between routine and crisis.
    - Mantacore lunged, bit Roy’s neck, and dragged him offstage; trainers used a fire extinguisher and forced fingers into the tiger’s mouth to free him.
    - While being loaded into an ambulance with a severed spinal column and a stroke underway, Roy’s first words were to protect the tiger, and he later maintained Mantacore had sensed his stroke.

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    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
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    17 min
  • A GPS collar recorded Cecil's last 40 hours outside the park

    A GPS collar recorded Cecil's last 40 hours outside the park
    Oct 18 2026
    A GPS collar blinked Cecil’s last coordinates for forty hours after he left Hwange National Park, recording a hunt no one inside the park witnessed.

    A GPS collar recorded Cecil's last 40 hours outside the park

    In this episode, we follow the forty-hour trail a GPS collar left when a collared male lion named Cecil crossed Hwange National Park’s boundary and never returned. We explain the collar’s timestamps, the legal lines around the park, and the sequence of events the data exposed - so what did those coordinates actually show?

    Person: Cecil
    Date: July 1, 2015
    Location: Hwange National Park and adjacent private land
    Author: Adam Cruise (reported for Conservation Action Trust)
    Project: Oxford Wildlife Conservation Research Unit collaring program since 1999

    - Cecil wore a GPS collar that pinged his location every two hours as part of Oxford’s long-term research.
    - The collar’s last pings show a straight path out of Hwange toward Antoinette Farm, then a final period of stillness.
    - Hunters on adjacent private land legally may take lions that have left the park; bait was placed outside the park’s edge.
    - The collar was later found cut from the neck, the head and hide removed, and left abandoned in the bush.
    - The timestamped collar data enabled researchers and a journalist to map Cecil’s last movements and identify the location and method of the hunt.

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    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
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    20 min
  • The Tamworth pig that swam a river and vanished for a week

    The Tamworth pig that swam a river and vanished for a week
    Oct 17 2026
    A half-wild Tamworth pig swims a river, vanishes into English woodland and ignites an international media scramble-how did one fence gap do this?

    The Tamworth pig that swam a river and vanished for a week

    In this episode, we follow what happened when two five-month-old Tamworth pigs escaped an abattoir in Malmesbury, swam the River Avon and disappeared into a four-acre thicket. We trace the week-long search, the unusual public reaction that drew nearly one hundred journalists from three continents, and the clues that hinted these were not ordinary farm pigs.

    Person: Owner Arnoldo Dijulio
    Location: Malmesbury, Wiltshire
    Date: January 8, 1998
    Event: Escape and eight-day search
    Topic: Tamworth pigs, river crossing, media response

    - Two five-month-old Tamworth pigs, nicknamed Butch and Sundance, pushed through a gap in V&G Newman’s abattoir fence and ran to the River Avon.
    - The pigs entered cold January water and swam to the opposite bank, then vanished into a dense thicket near Tetbury Hill covering roughly four acres.
    - Tranquilliser darts struck Sundance twice and fell uselessly before the third dart held, revealing thick skin that complicated capture efforts.
    - Nearly one hundred journalists from Britain, America and Japan converged on the town of about 5,000 people to cover animals valued at £40-£50 each.
    - RSPCA Inspector Mike Harley spent days in the field; evidence gathered during the search would later prompt new questions about the pigs’ ancestry.

    To listen to this podcast ad-free and access premium episodes, try our subscription with a 14-day free trial at obomedia.com.

    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
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    20 min
  • The Soldier, The Bear, and the Unanswered Goodbye of Winnie

    The Soldier, The Bear, and the Unanswered Goodbye of Winnie
    Oct 16 2026
    A Canadian vet lieutenant brings a bear cub to London Zoo in 1914-why he never brought Winnie home?

    The Soldier, The Bear, and the Unanswered Goodbye of Winnie

    In this episode, we trace the improbable journey of a black bear cub from a White River train platform to the London Zoo and the wartime choices that left a single unexplained absence in six soldiers' diaries. What decision turned a temporary custody into a permanent donation, and why did Harry Colebourn never return for Winnie?

    Person: Harry Colebourn
    Date: August 24, 1914
    Location: White River, Ontario
    Event: Purchase and transport of a bear cub named Winnie
    Status: Donated to the London Zoo (document signed at 1919 dedication)

    - A hunter brought a motherless black bear cub onto the White River train platform; Colebourn paid twenty dollars and took custody.
    - Colebourn, a trained veterinarian and lieutenant in the Canadian Army Veterinary Corps attached to The Fort Garry Horse, kept six wartime diaries documenting Winnie's movements.
    - Winnie traveled as the regimental mascot: she rode in the baggage car, slept in Colebourn’s tent, was fed condensed milk, and behaved as if she belonged to humans.
    - On October 3, 1914, Winnie crossed the North Atlantic aboard the S.S. Manitou and arrived in England on October 17, then moved to Salisbury Plain for training.
    - On December 9, 1914, Colebourn left Winnie at the London Zoo as a temporary arrangement; a 1919 dedication document uses the word "donated," and Colebourn never brought her back.

    To listen to this podcast ad-free and access premium episodes, try our subscription with a 14-day free trial at obomedia.com.

    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
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    17 min
  • A leather collar has been fastened only four times in 24 years

    A leather collar has been fastened only four times in 24 years
    Oct 15 2026
    A leather collar is buckled at center court - a university's identity passes between bulldogs; what exactly transfers when a collar moves?

    A leather collar has been fastened only four times in 24 years

    In this episode, we follow the four bulldogs who have worn Butler University's custom collar and the people who trained and carried it across decades. We trace the decisions, timing, and care that made a simple strip of leather into an institutional symbol, and ask what the collar actually carries beyond a name. What happens when succession meets tradition?

    Person: Butler Blue IV
    Person: Butler Blue II
    Person: Butler Blue III (Trip)
    Date: February 29, 2020
    Location: Hinkle Fieldhouse, Indianapolis

    - The collar was first created as a durable, named emblem to identify a live English bulldog mascot for Butler University.
    - Butler Blue I was a white female chosen from a Lizton, Indiana litter in 2000 after a campus naming contest.
    - Butler Blue II, a male who arrived in 2004, wore the collar during two Final Four runs and became widely photographed.
    - Trip (Butler Blue III), born December 23, 2011, assumed the collar and served seven years through thousands of appearances.
    - Handler Michael Kaltenmark planned succession around bulldogs' limited lifespans and the collar was kept at the university while handlers and a longtime fan family prepared the next dog.

    To listen to this podcast ad-free and access premium episodes, try our subscription with a 14-day free trial at obomedia.com.

    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
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    19 min
  • A retired one‑horned goat tied outside the Pentagon

    A retired one‑horned goat tied outside the Pentagon
    Oct 14 2026
    A retired one‑horned goat sits tied outside the Pentagon - how did a cadet mission end with her in traffic?

    A retired one‑horned goat tied outside the Pentagon

    In this episode, we trace how a November 2021 incident left a fourteen‑year‑old, one‑horned Naval Academy goat alone on a traffic median across from the Pentagon. The episode outlines the long running Army-Navy mascot rivalry and the institutional decisions and missions that produced that moment. What chain of traditions and operations led cadets to drive a mascot into the night?

    Person: one‑horned goat (Bill), age 14
    Event: autumn 2021 mission by Army cadets
    Institution: United States Naval Academy mascot tradition since 1893
    History: 38 previous goats named Bill
    Incident examples: 1953 convertible horn damage; 1960 goat flown in B-26 bomb bay

    - A live goat has been the Naval Academy mascot since 1893, always called Bill and inheriting a uniformed legacy.
    - The Army-Navy rivalry escalated from pranks into organized missions and institutional responses across decades.
    - In 1953 cadets hid a Navy goat in a convertible; the animal’s horns shredded the car’s roof and the episode made headlines.
    - In 1960 a Navy Bill was transported covertly in the bomb bay of a B-26 bomber rather than openly on a passenger ticket.
    - In autumn 2021 a group of Army cadets drove into the night on a mission connected to that century‑long practice, leaving a retired one‑horned Bill tied on Army Navy Drive.

    To listen to this podcast ad-free and access premium episodes, try our subscription with a 14-day free trial at obomedia.com.

    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
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    16 min
  • Cecil earned $9,800 a day - and a hunter paid $45,000 to kill him

    Cecil earned $9,800 a day - and a hunter paid $45,000 to kill him
    Oct 13 2026
    A collared Hwange lion crosses a boundary - a hunter leaves the GPS collar discarded in the dirt. What happened?

    Cecil earned $9,800 a day - and a hunter paid $45,000 to kill him

    In this episode, we trace the events and numbers that intersected when Cecil, a thirteen-year-old collared lion from an Oxford study, left park protection and was shot after a bait was placed on a neighboring farm. We lay out the permits, the GPS evidence, the economic calculations, and the conflicting views that turned one animal into two different stories; what question does that split leave hanging?

    Person: Cecil
    Date: July 1, 2015
    Location: Antoinette Farm / Hwange National Park boundary
    Author/Study: Oxford University Wildlife Conservation Research Unit (WildCRU)
    Payment: $45,000 paid by Walter Palmer for the hunting permit

    - The bait was placed at the park boundary after dark, scent crossing into protected Hwange and drawing Cecil out.
    - Cecil carried a GPS collar tied to an ongoing Oxford wildlife study; the collar was later found discarded beside his body.
    - A professional guide, Theo Bronkhorst, held a valid operator license and Walter Palmer had paid and signed the hunting paperwork.
    - Guide Bryan Orford calculated that Cecil generated about $9,800 per day from photographic tourism, making live value exceed one-time trophy fees.
    - Zimbabwe's High Court dismissed charges against Bronkhorst, ruling no crime under wildlife law despite the bait, boundary crossing, and collared research animal.

    To listen to this podcast ad-free and access premium episodes, try our subscription with a 14-day free trial at obomedia.com.

    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
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    21 min