{"podcast":{"title":"The Common Descent Podcast","slug":"the-common-descent-podcast-466591","podcast_index_feed_id":466591,"rss_url":"https://commondescentpodcast.podbean.com/feed.xml","website_url":"http://commondescentpodcast.podbean.com","image_url":"https://pbcdn1.podbean.com/imglogo/image-logo/1598752/CommonDescentLogo.png","author":"Common Descent","episode_count":379,"summary":"Join David and Will as they explore the paleontologists’ perspective on various topics in life and earth history. Each episode features a main discussion on a topic requested by the listeners, presented as a lighthearted and educational conversation about fossils, evolution, deep time, and more. Before the main discussion, each episode also includes a news segment, covering recent research related to paleontology and evolution. Each episode ends with the answer to a question submitted by subscribers on Patreon. New episodes with new topics every fortnight!","last_synced_at":"2026-07-17T04:20:14.679099+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-common-descent-podcast-466591"},"episode":{"title":"Episode 243 - Burrowers","slug":"episode-243-burrowers","published_at":"2026-05-10T00:00:00+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-common-descent-podcast-466591/episode-243-burrowers","show_page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-common-descent-podcast-466591","url":"https://commondescentpodcast.podbean.com/e/episode-243-burrowers/","audio_url":"https://mcdn.podbean.com/mf/web/sy88ba4mj67epvh2/Episode_243_Burrowers.mp3","summary":"A lot of life on Earth happens underground. This episode, we sample the species that have taken to a life of digging in the dirt – and elsewhere – why they do it and what physical adaptations help them along the way. Then, we’ll take a tour of burrows in the fossil record and explore what clues paleontologists can use to determine which ancient critter constructed a given burrow. In the news: malaria history, false octopus, pterosaur tracks, and giant octopus. Time markers:Intro & Announcements: 00:00:00News: 00:05:55Main discussion, Part 1: 00:45:05Main discussion, Part 2: 01:17:55Patron question: 02:12:45 Check out our website for this episode’s blog post and more: http://commondescentpodcast.com/ Join us on Patreon to support the podcast and enjoy bonus content: https://www.patreon.com/commondescentpodcast Got a topic you want to hear about? Submit your episode request here: https://commondescentpodcast.com/request-a-topic/ Lots more ways to connect with us: https://linktr.ee/common_descent The Intro and Outro music is “On the Origin of Species” by Protodome. More music like this at http://ocremix.org Musical Interludes are \"Professor Umlaut\" by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com). Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0","meta_description":"A lot of life on Earth happens underground. This episode, we sample the species that have taken to a life of digging in the dirt – and elsewhere – why the…","key_points":[],"chapters":[],"topics":[],"duration_seconds":8574,"processing_state":"not_requested","actions":[{"name":"request_transcript","method":"POST","url":"https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/the-common-descent-podcast-466591/episodes/episode-243-burrowers/transcription-requests","description":"Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode."},{"name":"read_markdown","method":"GET","url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-common-descent-podcast-466591/episode-243-burrowers.md","description":"Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource."}]}}