[00:00:00] Dinesh: One way to look at ancient civilizations is, is to see the rivers around which they emerge. Water has always been a a vital resource for humans. The Sumerians to the Minoans, all of them, all of them, grew and thrived around the river by no means. It's a coincidence that ancient civilizations originated around reverse.

[00:00:44] 10,000 years later, though we have moved away from rivers and built cities and deserts, our need. And reliance on water for survival hasn't changed. However, this episode is not only about our reliance on water, but also about how it allows life in general to thrive. From trees, insects, to birds. This is a field recording of a walk around Jakkur Lake in Bangalore.

[00:01:11] Karthik, the Chief naturalist at Jungle Lodge helps us look past what just meets the eye, understand the butterflies, spiders, and ants much deeper. And, and Vishwanath affectionately known as The Rain Man, talks to us about the plans for lakes of Bangalore and how our expectations from our lakes. It can shape the solutions.

[00:01:37] Jakkur Lake is this massive water body. You can, you can see this tiny island at the center where all the migratory birds hang out, distant from any sort of human activity. And then there is this beautiful unpaved path, which has these big trees shading them. So we are here on this unpaved path next to the lake, listening to Vishwanath and Karthik.

[00:02:13] Vishwanath: So when the lake was, the water level was decreased for the, we tend to be made, the boats in the surrounding area dried up, and those fellows were supplying water in tankers. Were drilling deeper and deeper and deeper. So the, the result is almost immediate. Uh, if you spin the lake, the groundwater improves.

[00:02:31] Quickly. And as I was telling you, lake, we charge about seven and a half million liters per day. Seven and a half million liters of water per day upstream in terms of the aquifer, in terms of the groundwater. So if we charge the groundwater and upstream, the groundwater is more full than downstream. 'cause downstream, the area has hard rock, almost immediate, right below the earth.

[00:02:52] So if you take about 10 feet, you'll take hard off. So therefore, that influence zone is less, where upstream it's up to a hundred feet. 

[00:02:58] Participants: So, which means that for each. So it is different. So we need to, so we cannot just share that 

[00:03:05] Vishwanath: we can't. So the recharge rate also varies. The afer defense varies. As the lake silts up, the rate of recharge comes down.

[00:03:14] So you have to descent it to, you have to have a full protocol for its manager down water. So one of the characteristics of Bangalore is that it's a ridge line running through the city, meaning one third of the city is in the basin. And two thirds of the city is what? An Dutch ana. The Dutch AMI is an independent river, which goes all the way to the bay of on its own right?

[00:03:37] So the mix of the Dutch ami are by shallow and have a particular recharge, uh, space like Jakkur or really wide lakes, which are shallow. But the ones in the qua of the community are small lakes, but deeper, right? And they have a different form of reach. This, uh, lakes in the Dakshin Pinakini meet with clay at about 25 to 30 feet level, many places.

[00:04:06] So therefore, the influence is only up to 30 feet. It's only in pockets that it penetrates below the clay and therefore the borewells also get char. But that's very specific. So it's very clear that the Dakshin Pinakini actually flows from west to east, whereas the or the British quality is north to south broadly.

[00:04:29] That's the type of hydrology and hydrology. 

[00:04:31] Yeah. You see seven and a half 

[00:04:32] million liters per per day, meaning that much water is getting added to the Yes. So we are putting in from the wastewater people plant probably 15 million liters. 

[00:04:44] Then there's a level of, uh, is that that amount of ion how, 

[00:04:48] yes. So it overflows and fits the next.

[00:04:50] So there's some amount of elaboration and some amount of overflow

[00:05:07] Karthikeyan: towards me. And look up here.

[00:05:13] How often have we seen spiders, um, together? 

[00:05:18] Participants: No. 

[00:05:19] Karthikeyan: No, not very well. 

[00:05:20] Participants: The family. 

[00:05:22] Karthikeyan: Even as a family, have we usually seen spiders together? No. Why do you think they don't live together? Why do you think spiders can't live together? They're not so, 

[00:05:35] Participants: not so 

[00:05:37] Karthikeyan: they're cannibals. 

[00:05:39] Participants: Oh. Anything that moves 

[00:05:40] Karthikeyan: is to eaten. It could be brother, sister, father, mother.

[00:05:42] Doesn't matter. They eat any, anything that moves. Right. But the one spider, you can see the web on this tree, which is sort of given up, this cannibalistic tendencies, lives in a colony, and therefore it gets called a social spider. 

[00:05:57] Oh, it's called social spider. It's 

[00:05:58] called a social spider. So they live in a colony and you don't have, uh, like a typical land colony where you have division of labor, different caste systems.

[00:06:08] You don't have any of those. Just a bunch of individuals that have come together and. And they come out in the evening and pick up whatever insects that are being caught, uh, break them into pieces, take them back into the nest and make a meal of them. There's something else very interesting. In case of spiders, there is a huge, um, variation in the size of a male and the female.

[00:06:35] Huh. But in case of spiders, it's, the difference is very, very stark. The males are really, really tiny. You see a male leader. 

[00:06:43] Participants: Oh, wow. 

[00:06:44] And that's the female? Female. 

[00:06:46] Oh, that,

[00:06:52] so that's the male? Male, the female. That's the female. Oh wow. That's enormous size difference. Female 

[00:06:59] Karthikeyan: males and females. The role of the male is basically to inseminate the female, and that's about it. He doesn't have any other role. So that's the male and that's the female. 

[00:07:09] Participants: And this is the spider that spends its entire lifetime on the, this is 

[00:07:12] Karthikeyan: the Orna.

[00:07:13] Augmented pre.

[00:07:18] It's a beautiful, yeah, it'll look like a ladder to 

[00:07:20] Participants: the, see from the side. It look like a ladder. Ladder, like a bag. And come back 

[00:07:28] Karthikeyan: from the, uh, think of plants as organisms, which are rooted to one place. And incapable of doing anything. Right. But let's not forget that plants have been on the planet for a very, very long time and they have figured out ways and means of protecting themselves.

[00:07:45] Right. Otherwise, there won't be any plants. If every everybody was to go about eating plants, there would be nothing left. So plants are quite capable of protecting. Um, it could be. I'm sure all of us have seen plants with spines or thorns on it. Yeah, that's a physical way of. Protecting themselves, right?

[00:08:02] But what plants are really good at doing is producing chemicals which can then keep a lot of other, um, predatory animals away. And one such fantastic example would be this, the milk feed, giant milk wheat color crop is and gets the name milk feed, because we all know that when you break, it uses this sap, essentially a concoction of very complex alkaloids, right?

[00:08:26] You not find too many animals feeding on this plant. Usually left out generally, except maybe for goats, which would nibble on them once in a while. But otherwise, a plant which is normally, uh, avoided by most, I was actually looking for a particular species of, uh, butterfly caterpillar, which is managed to figure out how to beat the plant at its own game.

[00:08:48] It feeds on the leaves of this plant to be able to complete its lifecycle. Right. And since the plant is, um, unpalatable. The butterfly also is unpalatable because it feeds on the leaves and it inbibes the, uh, unpalatable, um, chemicals and has it in its body so it can afford to show off. So the caterpillar is brightly colored.

[00:09:11] It's not ally colored. It's not trying to hide and anything else. So it's brightly colored, 

[00:09:15] Participants: something 

[00:09:16] white? No, that's not the green and yellow. Yeah, it's the yellow black 

[00:09:23] Karthikeyan: stripes. Yellow and black. So, uh. Look at how these things are all connected. You have a toxic plant, a caterpillar has managed to beat the, um, plant in its own game, and then how it uses that to its own, for its own survival and things like that.

[00:09:52] Can I have your attention for a second here please?

[00:09:58] I'm sure all of us have seen these white patches on trees. Have we wondered what they could be?

[00:10:09] Yeah. What are Chens? 

[00:10:12] Participants: algae and a Fungi delivery. 

[00:10:14] Karthikeyan: It's a combination of two organisms, algae and fungi. Um. I think if we are seeing a lot of trees growing around, um, on the planet today, I think some credit should go to lichen because this combination of algae and fungi, which we call lichen, growing on rocks and stuff like that, that is what enabled, um, rocks to break down 

[00:10:37] Participants: to 

[00:10:38] Karthikeyan: a limited extent.

[00:10:39] Of course, weathering also had a role to play, but lichen also had a role to play in breaking down rocks to forming soil, which then enabled the more. Um, uh, recent plants to, um, find a roof. Yes. Uh, 

[00:10:53] Participants: the cities, sorry, evolutionary also, it's like a combination of two. Two, 

[00:10:59] Karthikeyan: right? Yeah. All. No. When the very primitive plants came onto Earth, they did not really have a place to, um, they probably didn't have roots.

[00:11:08] They didn't know how to hold onto stuff, so they took the, uh, help of fungi, which gave them a place to. Um, stay and they could photosynthesize. So they produce sugars which rely a fungi wanted. So we found a nice association between the two organisms, but not parasitic. They're not parasitic. Uh, you'll not see a lot of this in the city because presence of sulfur dioxide in the air inhibits growth of lichen.

[00:11:36] Uh, so whether you see this or not. Can tell you whether you, the air you breathe is of good quality or not, just by the sheer presence of lichen, 

[00:11:47] Participants: right? 

[00:11:49] Karthikeyan: Lichen is extracted. Used for, um, used in the kitchen as well. I don't know how many of you have gone to a shop and bought something called a Kalhu? 

[00:11:57] Participants: What do you call 

[00:11:58] Karthikeyan: in Kannada?

[00:11:59] Kalhu is nothing but like it, which is used as a flavoring agent for your Palau and whatever. 

[00:12:05] Participants: Oh, but how do they break that? They seem very fragile. How do they break the locks? 

[00:12:09] Karthikeyan: So there are basically three kinds of like in one, which is, uh, flush with the surface. These are called the crusts, like, and you get something called the foose, like in which, uh, come out, uh, leaf like things, which is what you bite, right?

[00:12:22] And you also have ones which are thread, like, which is the fruity cost, like, and you have three major kinds of like ones and the folios. Green meaning leaf like is what is uh, sold in the market. Uh, 

[00:12:35] Participants: for, you said it, it breaks rock. It can be peeled off. No, you said it breaks rocks. Break 

[00:12:39] Karthikeyan: rock 

[00:12:40] Participants: strong enough.

[00:12:40] The plant, when an 

[00:12:41] Karthikeyan: organism is growing, it does produce certain acid, right? The acids work on the rock and Oh, okay. 

[00:12:48] Participants: Basically the soil formation. They played the biggest role when the earth was evolving. If you go a geological history, when nothing was, no, we didn't have these trees and all, whether like fungi came first, Al I see.

[00:12:59] And then they became, they left water and came on land and then they started growing and then soil formed and then they evolved into other plants. If you do a botany masters, then you got the. The bio fights, the lichens and all, and then farms, phys, and then farms, and then NGOs. So that's again ge, biological history, also volution, and they're still here.

[00:13:26] That school we may go, but they will be here. There they are the most resistant and hardened they can with Theand. Lots of hot.

[00:13:48] Karthikeyan: If you looked at this tree, you'll see these, um, clusters of leaves, right? And this is made by, um, an aver one. Somebody mentioned right at the beginning, and we were talking about the number of species of island. Incredibly, uh, amazing And in fact the name, uh, scientific name given to them is Eco Pillar Eco.

[00:14:11] The Environment and Pillar is el least. It basically means that the environment and this hand,

[00:14:24] imagine if you are Gap, you are sitting on one leaf and the next leaf is about six inches apart. For land. It's a very, very large space. And for it to be able to bring these two leaves together to be able to make this, uh, nest takes a lot of effort, lot of teamwork, lot of coordination, and that they do very well.

[00:14:42] And how do you think they bring the leaves together 

[00:14:45] Participants: to begin with 

[00:14:47] Karthikeyan: it? Stuck to each other, how they form a bridge. They form a bridge. They form a link, and then they slowly reduce the number of links bringing the leaves together. And once that happens, um, under set of ants will bring the, the larva. The larva are like tiny gum cubes.

[00:15:04] The, the saliva of the larva when it comes in contact with air. A hard silicon thread. So they touch like a spin and a weaving loom. Catch two get held together and that's how they build these beautiful nest. I can see all the answers all on top. Yeah. But we all heard of, and we are planning cities and things like that.

[00:15:31] We talked about satellite councils. Right. And did that millions of years ago. Right. Um, in fact, these two probably belong to the same colony control. The actions, um, activities of the colony are controlled by one queen and will be sitting in one of them. Right. And once the space and the main colony becomes less for the growing colony, they build satellite ness and, uh.

[00:15:59] Scientists have figured out that momentary satellite nest, the efficiency of foraging becomes. Better. Better because the ants don't have to come to the main nest to drop off stuff. They'll probably drop off stuff in the nearest. Um, you know, there nesting doesn't go away to find more food. 

[00:16:14] Participants: Back commuting time.

[00:16:17] Actually there are two here also small ones, ones 

[00:16:20] Karthikeyan: here. So satellite townships are nothing. New as far as 

[00:16:27] Participants: do they do this any, the specific species of lead plants?

[00:16:53] Karthikeyan: No, he is he. He saw a very handsome butterfly, orange and white butterfly. He is trying to spot it and very nice to see that butterfly because the carbon battery I was talking about. It is the larval host plant of this butterfly. Of the commander. Yeah. 

[00:17:10] Participants: Also mo, 

[00:17:12] Karthikeyan: also mo

[00:17:15] Oh. 

[00:17:17] Participants: So 

[00:17:18] Karthikeyan: often people asking if, uh, the way a caterpillar looks, um, has any bearing on the way a but. Absolutely nothing. If you look at the caterpillar of the uh, commander, it looks really, really ugly and the butterfly is really smart. Yeah, very handsome looking butterfly. But the pupil of the commander is what is something which takes the cake.

[00:17:43] It looks like a rally. It 

[00:17:45] Participants: looks 

[00:17:45] Karthikeyan: absolutely like a dry leaf. If I place a leaf and the butterfly the next to each other, you would probably get food. That's how beautiful the

[00:17:58] So in insect you have. Two kinds of development, right? What we learn in school, uh, as a, you know, lifecycle of an insect where we talk about the butterfly, the egg powder, right? That's the complete be is where the eating, growing, uh, individual looks completely different from the adult, uh, reproductive individual.

[00:18:21] Whereas in case of these, uh, where, which undergo incomplete. The young one looks like a miniature of the ING is bothering you. When you see a baby cockroach, you know it's a cockroach. Yeah. When you see a caterpillar, you don't, it's a butterfly. Right? You see the difference? Why should they be doing that?

[00:18:43] Why should a butterfly caterpillar, and

[00:18:50] they're using very, very different resources at different times of life, right. And, uh, as an adult it's primarily feeding a nectar and then, um, trying to reproduce and things like that, spotted this butterfly sitting at the crow and that it's sitting inside, fight of all of us being even alive, 

[00:19:12] Participants: the spiders.

[00:19:13] But 

[00:19:13] Karthikeyan: this is a butterfly we'll see in really large numbers. Couple of times a year in Bangalore, they migrate, they're known to migrate from the, when the starts there. Those who go towards the Eastern yards and then they go back to the Western yards as far as, uh, what we understand now, 

[00:19:30] Participants: do they live for that long?

[00:19:32] Karthikeyan: No, they go and then they eventually it's the next generation that will probably come back. Yeah. Like it happens with the Monarch and the North American situation. Uh, the, uh, generation that migrate south to Gulf of Mexico is winter advances, um, stays there. Hyber sort of, um, in Semi Hyber Nation, they spend several months there.

[00:19:54] On the way back, they lay eggs and die. So it's the third generation which comes back again, third or the fourth generation that comes, makes that long journey back for,

[00:20:20] yeah, I stopped here to draw attention to this. That was playing around the dragonfly. I'm sure all of us know dragonfly, like you said, many of us have probably caught it and played with it at some point of time, and we also called it, uh, the helicopter or hula or whatever else, right. But believe me, dragon flies have been on the planet for the longest time.

[00:20:41] Uh, they're amongst the, um, very first aerial predators and fossils of dragonflies that have been found. Measure a whopping, two thirds of a meter. It's about two feet. Imagine one of those flying around here, right? It'd be amazing to watch one of those, but dragonflies have their, um, lifecycle, intricately connected to water.

[00:21:07] They all dragonflies. Jamel flies have to have water to breed in. These guys will mate legs in water. Their young ones called AYAs, spend a lot of time in water. They're amazing predators in water as well. They'll pick up mosquito lava, they'll pick up TA poles, they'll pick up tiny fish, all of that, right?

[00:21:25] And as adults, dragonflies feed on a lot of flying insect, including mosquito. So having dragonflies around can be a useful thing, can be a good thing. Okay. But this particular dragon pie that's been flying around is an interesting, um, uh, species. It undertakes a phenomenal journey, which starts from India, goes all the way to Africa and back.

[00:21:50] Participants: Yeah. 

[00:21:51] Karthikeyan: Not from, from, yeah. And over overseas, not over land. Right. So they 

[00:21:58] Participants: Exxon seas, right? 

[00:22:00] Karthikeyan: No, it's salt water. They have no business on salt water. Let me come to it. The, they basically, like I said, need water to breed. They don't, as adults live for very long, so they have shorter life cycle. So they need to continuously follow wherever there is water and be able to breed and keep the species going.

[00:22:19] So these guys start their journey, uh, go all the way to North Africa, legs and die. The next generation will, uh, come out. They'll fly to South Africa. Legs and die. The third generation will come back to North Africa, legs and die. Fourth generation will come back to India. Right? So they're basically following rains, the monsoons, and they're breeding continuously.

[00:22:43] And this whole journey is of 16,000 kilometers. Right? It takes four generations and one year. Isn't it incredible? And our cities will lose these. Uh, species. If you don't have good water bodies, I have foreigners coming to India. We should welcome them open hands. But anyway, um, it's an amazing insect, um, that this incredible journey flies across the sea.

[00:23:11] Like you said, it does not lay eggs on water, uh, salt water. It has needs fresh. And we get them in good numbers in bango, but even we have one generation, it's called the Globe schema. So it goes from India to North Africa. North Africa, that's one generation. Second generation goes to the South Africa, third generation comes back to North Africa, and fourth comes back to India.

[00:23:33] Participants: So when across sea, how does it survive? They're light. They just 

[00:23:39] Karthikeyan: need wind currents to um, they can maneuver. But the other nice thing about Dragon phase is their wings. Their wings are so beautiful and, um, aeronautical engineers are still struggling to figure out if they can achieve something like that.

[00:23:53] All four wings are independent. That is how they have that kind of dexterity to be able to fly backwards, forwards, che in any band like that. And that is something that we've still not been able to achieve. And we are studying dragonfly, but we have not been able to achieve. That's a dragonfly for you.

[00:24:12] Participants: What is the difference between Dragon fly and a dam? 

[00:24:15] Karthikeyan: Uh, difference between a dragon fly and damsel fly? Anybody? 

[00:24:19] Participants: Yeah. Dance. Generally speaking of damel, fly sit, the wings are folded. Yeah. 

[00:24:25] Karthikeyan: So when a dragonfly comes out of its nimble skin and opens its wings, that's the only time when the wings are held above the body closed.

[00:24:34] Once it opens the wings, it can never close it back. So when you see a dragon flag come and sit, it'll hold its wings like that, and the wings will. Go forward, but never backwards. Whereas in case of damsel fly, it always sits with the wings held over the board,

[00:24:59] right? I think people have dispersed a little bit. Nevertheless, I'm sure all of us know this, right? And we often call it, though it's not built by the name. Probably came from the fact that we call termites as white hands, but they're not even remotely related to an, they're probably more closely related to cockroaches than and, and termites.

[00:25:23] Okay. How often do you think you have seen a male termite? 

[00:25:27] Participants: I haven't seen a, maybe I've seen, but I don't know to recognize 

[00:25:31] Karthikeyan: it. Okay. 

[00:25:31] Participants: Sometimes I've seen them fly. 

[00:25:33] Karthikeyan: Right. You'll see male termites only when you see them fly and those insects, which get attracted to light and then eventually they drop off the wings.

[00:25:41] That's the only time you'll probably see a male termite otherwise. 

[00:25:44] Participants: So they, with these, these things, huh? 

[00:25:47] Karthikeyan: Yeah. The ones that pair off top the wings and go away and just with the first things of, um, the season. Yeah. And they've. Have to have rains because that's when the soil is sought for them to dig into.

[00:26:00] And the reason why they have to have wings is to be able to find partners from some other mo, some other termite colonies. Otherwise, if males and females from the same colony are coming up, they're all brothers and sisters. So in breeding is not a great thing for them. So they need to find members of another colony.

[00:26:16] That's the only reason why they need beans. Otherwise, that would without drinks. Once they've found a member of, um, their species from another colony. They literally pull up their wings. They don't need them anymore. They'll find a place where they can start a colon and what the female will go on to becoming the queen.

[00:26:34] The male. After meeting with her once, I think he will eventually die out after a few days, this roll in death. But the beauty here is in case of the termites, the female is able to, uh, retain the sperms in her body for as long as she lives. She does not require multiple, um, uh, meetings, uh, for her to continue to lay eggs.

[00:26:56] And she uses the sperms that she got from the first meeting only during the certain times of the year. The rest of the time she's producing, uh, only females, sterile females. Right? Yeah. And that's why I said if you see a termite. With does not having wings very often what you're seeing, the tiny white ones are all females.

[00:27:18] Participants: So a whenever female. Yeah. 

[00:27:21] Karthikeyan: And it's a completely female dominated society. Everything inside the termite mount is controlled by the queen, though. She's sitting somewhere right down there at the base of the termite mount, and probably there's as much below because all the mud has been excavated. Right.

[00:27:37] And they've also added their own excreta and their Salva to build these structures. And it's so hard, it's not going to meze down with the heavy downpour, right? Plants take root, plants can take root. Sometimes t plants grow around the plant and stuff like that. So 

[00:27:54] Participants: what snakes come, 

[00:27:56] Karthikeyan: snakes do get into it.

[00:27:58] That's something that is a very common thing. But, uh, see, termites, that's a completely closed system right now, right? There are probably a few million individuals, which are. Inside there. If I put all of you in one room, close all the windows, what happens? It gets warm, right? And same thing could happen here, but what happens here is the fact is that the hot air rises with the elk of this large area, loses the heat and cool air goes back.

[00:28:27] And so there's a continuous, um, in a cycle of, uh, air inside. And the temperature inside is maintained constant and reptiles being cold blooded animals, they like their body temperature to be maintained at some optimum, so they find this to be a great place to go into. They're not going there to feed on determinates or any of those things.

[00:28:47] There 

[00:28:47] Participants: are the openings, sorry, take. 

[00:28:50] Karthikeyan: Yeah, there are tunnels underneath underground, 

[00:28:53] Participants: they can cohabit long. 

[00:28:56] So my grand, my grandparents who are farmers, uh, often said that if we have ans like this on the land, it's good to buy because there's groundwater. 

[00:29:04] Karthikeyan: That's the question I wanted to ask. Question. That's what I was saying.

[00:29:07] Yeah. Lots of people have told this to me, but I've seen termites growing in, uh, termite mounts in places which are quite added and stuff like that. I don't know if somebody has tried to figure out if this is, um, really true. That's the question 

[00:29:21] Participants: full of termite. Yeah.

[00:29:25] Karthikeyan: And in Australia there's one species of termite, which builds something very, very interesting. It builds a termite one, which is like a wall. The broadside face, east and west. Oh, the middle of the day is when it is hottest and that's when the termite mount is, uh, only one thin line of the termite mount is exposed to the sun when it gets cold during the morning and evening is when it is exposed to the sun.

[00:29:50] And it's called the compass termite. And I mean, amazing things that these creatures have managed to do, and you are talking about how destructive they are. Termites on their own can't be destructive. They have a partnership with another microorganism, which is what helps them digest wood. Wood has this very, very tough substance called cellulose.

[00:30:09] Cellulose is very tough to digest, and without this association with the, uh, microorganism, termites can't be so damaging. They'll probably neate it, but they can't digest. 

[00:30:24] Participants: I've seen many systems in gk, one of the places, are they artificially built or they're built? How much time does it? 

[00:30:31] Karthikeyan: Well, the mite colony keeps growing and the mite colony is alive as long as the queen is alive.

[00:30:37] It could be as long as 30, 40 years. Right? Is 

[00:30:41] Participants: that the life? 

[00:30:43] Karthikeyan: Not of the tiny, uh, termites that we see, but of the queen and the life of the queen would roughly be the life of the colony. So once the queen dies, the colony dies. You need a leader, right? And the leader is not, and what 

[00:30:55] Participants: happens to the mound?

[00:30:56] Karthikeyan: Mound will remain. It's a physical structure will remain. Eventually, it'll disintegrate. 

[00:31:00] Participants: So the queen produces another queer 

[00:31:02] Karthikeyan: queen produces several queens every year, right? She'll produce hertel males and females, which will be sent out, and they'll in turn mate and start under calling, where the queen will become a queen.

[00:31:12] So the female will become a. And 

[00:31:15] Participants: the fact this size within two hours, it can be 

[00:31:17] Karthikeyan: not few hours, this is couple of years or definitely not few hours, 

[00:31:21] Participants: but if you break a little motion, 

[00:31:23] Karthikeyan: they will come back and seal it very quickly. Yeah. They know where the draft of air is coming in. So I will send reinforcements to like a service 

[00:31:33] Participants: team.

[00:31:33] Is this hollow inside or 

[00:31:34] Karthikeyan: It is very, very porous inside. It's a network of, uh, tunnels all through. Yeah. And the queen, uh, once she is. Made on, once she's settled down, she can she, once she's mature enough, she'll start producing as many as 30,000 eggs 

[00:31:50] Participants: a 

[00:31:50] Karthikeyan: day. 

[00:31:52] Participants: Yes. 

[00:31:54] Karthikeyan: 30,000 eggs a day. So where, 

[00:31:57] Participants: sir, where, where do they reside?

[00:31:58] Actually it below right at the bottom. 

[00:32:00] Karthikeyan: A little below the 

[00:32:01] Participants: surface. What is there inside? Oh, there nothing. There's just mark 

[00:32:05] Karthikeyan: and inside there'll be chambers for the larva, for the eggs and things like that. Separate rooms. They're separate rooms. 

[00:32:11] Participants: That's the kind of plant city. But then yes, 

[00:32:15] by looking at the, sorry, by looking at the termite mount, can we say whether it is ally or dead?

[00:32:20] Karthikeyan: Typically, if it is ally, you'll not have any openings. They'll come and seal it. Okay? If it is, uh, colonies abandoned, its dead. You'll find opening. Not been seen a cross 

[00:32:31] Participants: section examination of this one. Sorry. 

[00:32:33] Karthikeyan: Cross section examination. I wouldn't want to damage that. Sorry.

[00:32:43] Yeah, so I think we are expected to reach the other point where V Earth is waiting and we have to get there quickly. Um, so that, let's walk up to there. If there's something interesting, we will stop.

[00:33:08] Talk about this on the way back. I just saw this screen and maybe I should talk about it and then let you march off 

[00:33:16] Participants: some big species. 

[00:33:18] Karthikeyan: It a, it's a fake tree. It's a big different species of pig, though. We will come to it. We'll come to it. Yes. There should be one somewhere. There could be one flying around somewhere.

[00:33:31] But how many of us have actually seen a big flower?

[00:33:39] Have you seen a thick club? 

[00:33:41] Participants: No, actually, I think cluster of flus, 

[00:33:46] Karthikeyan: what they see here, which looks like approved, 

[00:33:48] Participants: is a, 

[00:33:49] Karthikeyan: is in fact an in fluorescence. It's a cluster of flus, but all inverted. They're all inside. So inside each of these, uh, fruit like structures are male floss and female floss. You have them all over.

[00:34:00] Mm. There are male floss and female floss inside. 

[00:34:03] Participants: Ah, that's why we found the insects inside of the fix. Now, sometimes, 

[00:34:07] Karthikeyan: yeah, 

[00:34:07] Participants: they come to that. So, 

[00:34:09] Karthikeyan: um, the female flos and the bloom, they send chemical signals to, uh, put out chemical signals, which then attract the, uh, pollinators of the fig and it happens to be something called a fig wasp.

[00:34:22] They're really, really tiny insects. And they get attracted to the fig. They come in, they land on the fig, try to enter the fig through this tiny hole. Uh, here on the opposite end of the stock, the hole is so tight that in the process of entering, she'll lose her wings. So once she goes in, she has two things to do.

[00:34:43] Her job is cut out. She'll have to pollinate the flowers that attracted us, which are the female flowers, and she'll have to lay her own eggs. She'll do that and she'll die. She'll never come out again. Right. And eventually over a period of time you have the eggs, uh, maturing and you have the males and females coming out.

[00:35:02] Typically, the males come out first. Males are worm, like never grow wings. They're blind. They don't need these things. No point investing in things that you don't need. Right. And when the males have come out waiting for the females, uh, the males have, again, uh, I've simplified the whole story a bit so that it's understandable.

[00:35:20] Males have two things to do. Met with the females and two, make a large hole on the side of the pig. 

[00:35:27] Participants: Mm-hmm. 

[00:35:28] Karthikeyan: Right. When the males are busy making this hole, the females are busy collecting pollen from the male flowers. Now, the female flowers attracted the mothers. The male flowers are now providing pollen for the females to collect, and theyll fly out of the hole that the males are male.

[00:35:43] Right. So when the mother comes in, the female floors are uh, open and their daughters go out. The nail flowers are right, so they collect the pollen, they're mated. Now they're ready to lay, they'll go find another pig, and the whole cycle will continue. Right? Each species of fig has its own species of fig wasp, 

[00:36:05] Participants: right?

[00:36:06] Karthikeyan: That's how specialized there and 

[00:36:10] Participants: Yeah. Yeah, 

[00:36:12] Karthikeyan: and there are a couple of other interesting things about the fig itself. The fig tree does not cover throughout the year. The fig wasp leaves for not more than a week. The next time the fig tree comes into flower, it definitely requires a service of the fig wasp, otherwise the fig will never be able to reproduce.

[00:36:32] What do you think a fig tree would do to make sure it has the surface of the pollinator when it comes to flour next time?

[00:36:42] No trap, no.

[00:36:49] Whole season they have plant. Yeah. Toward the years. 

[00:36:52] Participants: Uh, I mean you supply to the, uh, fruit so that whatever is dormant there can survive. No, 

[00:36:58] Karthikeyan: no. They don't stagger it either. There several other individuals which don't have this one, does not have any fruits at all. It's not staggered. What do you think they do?

[00:37:11] Solutions are not coming out because our understanding and the cap of the capabilities of the tree are limited. I will give you a 

[00:37:21] Participants: They communicate through the roots. 

[00:37:23] Karthikeyan: Yes. I was just going to say that. Let me tell you that trees can communicate, talk to each other so trees can communicate to each other when that is possible.

[00:37:33] They can tell each other, Hey, look, I'm flowering. This is what? September, September, October, November. Somebody else will flower December, January, February. Somebody else will flower March, April, may. Making sure that there's always a fig available for the FWAs to go and, uh, continue its lifecycle. So next time this comes into 

[00:37:55] Participants: flood, 

[00:37:55] Karthikeyan: there is always the FWAs, which is available to service the, uh, pollinate the fig.

[00:38:02] Right now, now that the fig is being pollinated, the seeds are ready to be dispersed, the pig has to do some work as well, right? So it changes. Now it is really hard. Mm. Almost like stone. It changes color to pink or red or white, depending on the species of fig. And it also becomes soft and slightly sweet.

[00:38:22] That is the fee that the tree pays to the, uh, dispersal agents. Dispersal agents are not coming to the tree because they want to help the tree, so they want their stomachs to be filled and that you need to do some marketing. Mm-hmm. Marketing happens by way of changing color, giving a discount, 

[00:38:39] Participants: whatever 

[00:38:39] Karthikeyan: else that you might want to call to attract.

[00:38:42] Uh, your clientele. So that's what the tree does, which eventually brings hoards of birds, which will feed on it, uh, go far away and disperse seeds, right? So this ability of figs to be able to flower at different times of the year makes figs very, very, very important and very special in the ecosystem.

[00:39:01] Right? How many of us have anyone architect here? You are an architect. Yeah. What's the keystone? 

[00:39:10] Participants: Keystone is the top stone in an arch that holds, also holds. I'm 

[00:39:14] Karthikeyan: sure all of us have gone to some ruins and you've seen arches built right. Most of the stones are all, uh, rectangular except for the one stone right on the top.

[00:39:22] It is a triangular stone. You remove that, the whole thing will collapse. That is the importance of fig in the ecosystem, right? That's how they get to, uh, get the name keystone species. All figs. They're able to produce resources which. Keeps the ecosystem in place and they produce resources at times when there's nothing available for organisms to tide over.

[00:39:44] Right. Helps them make through difficult times and that is why things are so important. And 

[00:39:51] Participants: somehow, 

[00:39:52] Karthikeyan: culture also actually we started worshiping them. 

[00:39:55] Participants: Yeah. 

[00:39:55] Karthikeyan: So that they're protected around villages and the people and the burger. Yeah. I think things are, uh, worshiped right across the world. Anything that we don't understand is enigmatic.

[00:40:07] Participants: But our pigs are available all across the world. 

[00:40:10] Karthikeyan: Yeah. Yes. Lots of species across the topics. Yes,

[00:40:16] we have. It's a large family. Yes. Right. Yeah. 

[00:40:18] Participants: Yeah. 

[00:40:19] Karthikeyan: Before I'm reminded about time, let's quickly head to 

[00:40:22] Vishwanath: where we cannot.

[00:40:46] So that's 

[00:40:47] just a question. 

[00:40:48] What does the lake actually mean to you? Is this lake a good lake?

[00:40:55] No lake. We are talking about the water bottle, right? So there's water here. There's no plant here. So it's, it's a water body. 

[00:41:02] So is the lake good enough? I'm able to walk, I'm able to spot good wildlife. So, uh, for me it's a 

[00:41:08] good, so don't give the logical argument. Okay. Just a, a yes no kind of a thing. Is the lake good enough?

[00:41:14] Yes. Good? Yeah. Yes. Is this good enough, right? Yes. Uh, why is it good enough? Is it because there's a wide expanse of water? 

[00:41:24] Is 

[00:41:24] it because there are birds in it? Because. 

[00:41:27] Participants: It's kind of cool. 

[00:41:28] Gives you a feeling. Feeling of calm. 

[00:41:30] I think all of these together. 

[00:41:32] Vishwanath: All of it, right? I'm just asking just to figure it out.

[00:41:35] Should the water be like a swimming pool? No. Meaning transfer, you 

[00:41:41] need to say, 

[00:41:41] I don't know. Clean. 

[00:41:44] They should, no. 

[00:41:46] This water? No. But are you unhappy that there is no clarity or are you okay with this water? As long as the fish are happy, 

[00:41:55] the fish are happy. There's no smell. You'll see the wide expands.

[00:41:59] It's cooling you. No, no sewage. You don't know whether there's sewage in it or not, right? You're looking at the water body. So is it good enough? So, because this is a difficult question to answer, I, I get to it because the more our imagination of a lay. The more demands we put on the energy to be spent on making it clean or whatever, right?

[00:42:20] Mm-hmm. So if you really want this lake to be crystal clear water, like a climate water, then you'll spend tons of money. But is it okay if you just have a large expanse, which is full of birds? Fish gives you a pleasant, uh, coolness around you walk around it, you enjoy the ambience? Is that good enough? 

[00:42:39] Participants: So what, like for those birds, if you look at the originally, like on the top, no, 

[00:42:43] Vishwanath: no, no, no.

[00:42:44] This lake. The birds are here. Yeah.

[00:42:50] You are unhappy. Is is it good enough for the birds? The birds seem to think so. 

[00:42:58] Participants: How about the fish? 

[00:42:58] Vishwanath: The cos are here. The paint stock is here. The pelicans are here. A lot of the birds are here, but they don't have a choice. 

[00:43:03] Participants: They're the only, what choice do you want to give them? If there was a cleaner lake next to it, would they be there?

[00:43:09] Vishwanath: Would it be cleaner? No, in the sense cleaner. In what sense? You 

[00:43:15] know, better fish. Better fish meaning what? Um, corn and salmon instead of, uh, regular. So there is fish there. There's food here, right? And it's palate soup here. It's actually palate soup, right? And that's good enough for a whole bunch of bad s been showing you all what's there on the sides also, but also there.

[00:43:34] So is, is this a good lake or not? It's good that there is a lake here that answer. Lies what we will do without leaks. The 180 5 leaks of our of our city. How are we going to visualize it? How are we going to protect it, and what do we imagine it to be? Right? So I'm just raising a question and leaving it to you, but if we find acceptance to this model, it's way cheaper than any other model that we can And we can afford it.

[00:44:03] Yeah. We can't swim in it. We can't drink it directly. Yeah. We can't go boating in it because it'll disrupt the birds. So we need to keep away, but we can enjoy it the way it is to be done. And just this path, for example, that it's not paved, it's left as earth has been a hard battle with a lot of citizens to fight, including the government, but also citizens.

[00:44:28] So imagine when it rains, it'll become feature, right? So even in the little list of things around lakes, that's a huge. Argument and di discussion. And so just as a matter of provocation, what's a bad lake? Huh? What's a bad lake? You tell me. I What's a bad lake? A no lake is a baddest lake. 

[00:44:51] Something that.

[00:45:01] Dinesh: One of the things that stuck to me after the visit is Waugh's comment that our expectations from the lakes are going to impact the resources needed to solve the Bangalore Lake problem. So to understand this a little deeper, I reached out to Waugh for a conversation and we will cover that interview in the upcoming episode for now.

[00:45:23] I'm Dinesh and this is innocence theory.