It's been a few days since I've done one of these so I picked something from the forest to study. This time, La went to De Drinkplaats and did quite a bit of shapeshifting while I wrote down the animals and their animations. I decided to look at these animals in myth (particularly Christian and European myth, although other places' legends were considered).

Most of you probably know a lot about these animals, so I'm trying to write only the things that are interesting or that you might not know, and I only have so many books.

I have also decided to add some anecdotal evidence, as I have had more than my fair share of animal dealings and I really enjoy bragging. For instance, I have held a three-toed sloth (it was like a backpack--it just grabbed me and stayed there), untangled a hawk (my falconer friend was out of town so I fed his hawks. One had tangled itself up, so I untangled it) and been attacked by a playful leopard cub (zoo camp).




I'm sure most of you looked up stuff about deer when you joined the site. I sure did, so I'll keep it brief.

The earliest Cervid lived almost 16 million years ago. Notable prehistoric Deer are Megaloceros and Eucladoceros. I think we have a few living in The Endless Forest, though they no longer inhabit the human world.

Deer meat is called venison, and it is delicious. I do not hunt deer myself because I have generally had good dealings with them, but I have a friend who hunts one deer every year and eats the entire thing. I have a dislike for hunters who kill for sport, but I have no issue with people who hunt for food.

In the united states, there are about one and a half million deer-car crashes every year. Deer kill about 150 humans per year and do over a billion dollars in property damage. My grandmother has issues with deer sneaking into her yard to eat her plants. They are relatively tame and often allow me to sit on the deck near them while they eat Grandma's flowers.

I once walked to a playground to play when I was eight years old. I got to the playground and a doe was sitting in the sandbox. With the zealousness of a child that age, I walked to the deer and sat in the sand near her. She looked at me like I was an idiot, but we kept each other company for almost half an hour before she stood and left.

In Nara, Japan, a deer tried to eat my coat until I bought some deer treats for it. In Nara, deer are practically domesticated (and they are kind of clingy.) In Shinto, Deer are messengers to the gods, and they are the symbol for the city of Nara.

Spyrre shared that stags, particularly white ones, are said to have strong ties to birch trees. They were said to represent the Horned God Cernunnos, who "became an important intermediary for the Celts between the animal kingdom and man, being guardian of the gateway connecting these two worlds. The Stag figures prominently in Celtic myths and legends. Antlers have been unearthed in Newgrange (Ireland), as well as at various sites in Britain, including Stonehenge and Glastonbury. It was a symbol of the metamorphic process of spiritual growth, high ideals and aspirations." She cites this website.

Spyrre also notes that the zodiac sign Capricorn is translated into Finnish as "Kauris" which means "Deer."

I also learned in Japan that General Tadakatsu Honda put deer antlers on his helmet. This piece of trivia may only interest me, I realize as I type it out.

Deer feature heavily in heraldry (indeed, my family crest and my personal coat of arms both feature stags). In Gaelic poetry, famous warriors are compared to deer.

Scythians featured deer in their art, particularly in art relating to death, as they thought that deer could carry their dead to the afterlife.

Saint Hubert, as we all know, converted to Christianity when he saw a deer with a cross between its antlers. Saint Giles, a hermit, lived with only the company of a doe for many years.

In Greek myth, Hercules' thirst labor was to capture a doe with antlers. In another story, the huntress Artemis turned a man into a stag because he saw her naked. She had her hunting dogs chase and kill him.

In Norse myth, there are four stags who live around the World Tree.




Famously the only mammals capable of actually flying, bats are dramatically varied in appearance. They are also well known for their ability to echolocate by making sounds that humans can't hear and then listening to the way their squeaks bounce back. Echolocating calls travel at anywhere from 14 KHz to 100 KHz. So you can compare, A whitetail deer's hearing range is between 500 HZ and 16 KHz (but it hears best between 1KHz and 8KHz) and humans hear between 20 Hz and 20KHz. Echolocation only works for short distances, however, and most bats use their eyes for long distance vision. Bat wings are very sensitive to touch, like human finger tips. This helps them navigate by feeling wind.

Perhaps the best example of nocturnal animals, bats only come out at night. The reason is not that they don't like light (like Dracula) but rather that birds hunt for bugs during the day, and it would be exhausting to have to compete for food. Most bats eat bugs, but many also eat fruit. Only three kinds of bat drink blood; two kinds drink mammal blood and one kind drinks bird blood.

Bats, according to my encyclopedia of prehistoric critters, have been on earth for over 50 million years. Obviously they've gone through 50 million years' worth of evolution since then, but fossils clearly show mammals that anyone would identify as "definitely a bat."

My friends lived out in the country in an old house. Once, while watching television upstairs, a bat appeared seemingly from nowhere, circled our heads thrice, and vanished again.

In Bram Stoker's Dracula, the titular character turns into a bat (and fog, and a wolf). I'm unsure if Stoker came up with that, or if that is part of the Romanian myth. Even more awesome than Dracula is Brad Kane's Batman, a nocturnal detective/crimefighter. When I was a kid, I wanted to be Batman when I grew up. Those two characters have monopolized the bat symbolism market, making my job difficult.




I'm talking about the black bird. It's either a raven or a crow that a deer can turn in to. I'm not sure which it is, but it looks more like a crow than a raven. I'm relatively certain that it isn't a rook because rooks are ugly. Crows are smaller, have fan-shaped tails, and eat trash and dead things. Ravens are bigger, have diamond-shaped tails, and eat the same things as crows.

I've taken to calling the thing a craven, both because it is a portmanteau of crow and raven and because of horror writer Wes Craven.

I live in the Pacific Northwest, and we have lots of crows and ravens, and even some real-life cravens. All three have been nasty to me at some point in my life. When I was in high school a pair of crows moved into a tree in our yard and proceeded to harass my family until my father shot one. Please remember that they were very mean crows.

My friend once had a raven for a pet. It was voluntarily domesticated and more or less moved in with my friend on its own to steal his food. It would spend nights in his house and leave during the day, only to return for dinner. He alleges that its favorite television show was Jerry Springer, but I have my doubts.

Spyrre knew a crow that was fond of eating cheese, and even became demanding when she didn't feed it. Ysrael had a guardian crow when she was in elementary school that would follow her home.

Ysrael reminded me that ravens can be taught to speak the way that parrots do. A raven has the largest brain of any bird.

Native American myth from where I live features Raven (proper noun here) as a trickster character. Assorted coast Salish tribes attribute various feats to Raven, such as putting the sun in the sky. Odin, a Norse God, had two ravens named Hugin and Munin (Thought and Mind, respectively) who sat on his shoulders and whispered news to him. I'm sure you've all read The Raven by Poe (we were all angst ridden teenagers once).




Rabbits are woodland critters well known for their adorable, long ears and their skill at "multiplying."

I know that in many places rabbits are eaten regularly, but the cost-benefit-analysis of rabbit-eating shows that it simply is not worth the calories to hunt a rabbit and eat it. You lose more than you gain. I will say that rabbits taste like stringy chicken.

In addition to being absolutely adorable, rabbits can be extremely destructive. Rabbits are not indigenous to Australia and do millions of dollars worth of damage to Australian crops each year. In the early 1900s, a fence was built vertically across the continent of Australia so keep rabbits from invading farther. It took six years to build and cost more money than you can shake a stick at, but did its job relatively well until, in the 1950s, a rabbit-only disease was released to control the rabbit population.

When I was little, I had pet rabbits. They were generally nice, but they had extremely sharp claws, worse by far than any cat or dog. Additionally, I will say that I would let a dog bite me any day of the week before I permit a rabbit to bite me. Ysrael seconds this point, having had an unfortunate experience with rabbits in the past.

In myth, the rabbit is thought of as the poster boy for fertility, as best evidenced by the ubiquity of The Playboy Bunny. The Easter Bunny is the modern remnant of Pagan fertility celebrations on the Spring Equinox. There are many stories about rabbits, and most of us know of Peter the Rabbit. Many of us read or saw Watership Down, which is a story about rabbits relocating their home. I have not seen it since I was a small child and was frightened and disturbed by it.




Squirrels are the rats of the trees the way that pigeons are the rats of the skies and koi are the rats of water. They hand around and eat trash.

I gotta be honest with you, no amount of squirrel factoids can hold my interest. I simply do not like them. In Washington DC, I saw a squirrel attack a rottweiler. Not even making that up.

Spyrre raised two baby squirrels. She says, "they were sweetest babies I had seen," and that they were very energetic.

I could only find one legend that included squirrels. In Norse myth, there is a squirrel called Ratatoskr who climbs the World Tree to deliver messages.




Frogs and toads are very alien looking creatures. They have big eyes, long back legs, and they start life as little balls with tails, slowly growing limbs while their tail shrinks like some horrible space monster. They are grand jumpers and exist anywhere there is water (or even just moisture). At night, tree frogs in my neighborhood croak.

A lot of people will say that frogs and toads are distinct, but taxonomy says, "nope." Both frogs and toads are members of the Order Anura.

Being amphibians, frogs and toads can breath underwater and in open air.

Frogs do not taste very good. I don't know what the fuss is about. They are not difficult to capture. The trick is seeing them in the first place. While it's possible to track them by the sound they make, actually seeing them is difficult because of their well-adapted camouflage.

Some Native American tribes saw the frog as a bridge between the words of earth and water because of its ability to survive in both environments. In China, there is no man-in-the-moon, but rather a frog in the moon. In Scotland, frogs are lucky. In medieval Europe, the Catholic Church spread the rumor that witches used frogs as familiars and demonized the creatures.

I'd like to share one of my favorite fables. This one is from Africa, though I'm not sure where:

Man wanted to live forever, so he sent Dog to ask God if Man could live forever. Frog overheard and thought that if Man lived forever, he would drink all of Frog's water, so Frog decided to go to God and ask for Man to have a short life.
Dog was a fast runner, so Frog made a stew. Dog was distracted, and Frog was able to get to God first.
Frog said, "Please allow Man to die. Man is cruel and takes all of my water."
Dog arrived late and said, "Please allow Man to live forever. I love him, and he is good to me. I never want him to leave."
God was moved by Dog's plea, but he granted Frog's wish because Frog got there first.




Doves are small herbivorous birds with a strong sense of direction. My friends have a flock of homing pigeons, and when we were kids we would take them miles and miles away and release them--and they'd go straight back home. Pigeons can be trained to carry messages. Several notable birds have been awarded military medals for message-carrying services in wartime.

I know that it is possible to eat them, but I could never do that--as I mentioned in the squirrel section, pigeons are the rats of the skies.

Perhaps more than any other creature in the list, the dove features in religion. In Genesis, Noah sends a dove to look for land, and the dove finds land. When Jesus of Nazareth was baptized, it is said that the Holy Spirit took the form of a dove and flew to him.

In Islam, pigeons are respected because they distracted the enemies of Muhammad.

Doves are universally accepted at the symbol for peace.




I hope you learned at least one thing here you didn't already know. If you have real life stories about these animals or you know a myth that I haven't covered (I'm sure there are quite a few I've missed) please share it.