Greetings, MerFriends. This is Professor Darya Aban from Atlantis University, curator of the Aquatopia Amphigory of Lost Creatures. It’s the Dog Days of Podcasting — the annual challenge where podcasting personalities from land and sea attempt to post an episode a day during the month of August. You landwalkers call our mostly aquatic planet Earth. Your record-keeping is similarly questionable. Therefore I bring you this lecture series, introducing you to some of Aquatopia’s more notable creations.
Today’s species both know how to make an impression. The Featherfox does it with a flourish, while the Glasshart simply waits for the sun to go down.
FEATHERFOX (Vulpes plumosus)
The Featherfox is a small woodland predator whose coat consists of dense overlapping plumage rather than fur. Its russet and cream feathers provide excellent insulation and shed water particularly well, making the species common in wet forests and along marshy coastlines. Otherwise, it hunts, dens, and behaves much like an ordinary fox.
The tail feathers form a broad fan that is usually carried closed behind the animal. When startled, threatened, or courting, the Featherfox raises and spreads the fan in a sudden display. The effect is considerably larger and more dramatic than the fox itself, which appears to be precisely the point. Shed feathers are sometimes found near dens and were once prized for hatmaking, although collecting them from an occupied den remains strongly discouraged.
The Featherfox saves its brightest display for moments when it wants to be noticed. The Glasshart is considerably harder to hide after sunset.
G — GLASSHART (Cervus luminarius)
The Glasshart is a coastal deer distinguished by translucent, faintly bioluminescent antlers. During daylight the antlers resemble cloudy crystal, but after dark they produce a soft blue-green glow that becomes brighter when the animal is startled or calling.
Glassharts graze inland during the day and move into marshes and brackish shallows after dusk. Herd members appear to use changes in the brightness and rhythm of their antlers to signal across open water, although the meaning of individual patterns remains uncertain. Older accounts describe lantern-horned deer appearing along dangerous stretches of coast and credit them with either guiding lost travelers home or leading them into bogs. Both are possible. The Glasshart itself appears largely indifferent to the outcome.
Ignorance drowns. Wisdom swims. Remember to check out the megafeed at DogDaysOfPodcasting.com to hear everyone participating and visit BathtubMermaid.com to listen to this episode. Keep swimming and resist. Class Dismissed.