Nature Myths, Debunked

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More often than not, it’s a would-be predator’s face and mouth that bear the brunt of the porcupine’s spiked defense. Faced with danger, the rodent hunches low, raises its quills and turns its backside to the attacker. A quick lash of the porcupine’s tail or an imprudent poke of the intruder’s nose is all it takes to plant a face full of quills. But contact is required.

The notion that porcupines can actually launch their quills like missiles goes back to at least the first century, when Pliny the Elder (as translated by Philemon Holland in 1601) wrote: “The porkpen hath the longer sharp pointed quilles, and those, when he stretcheth his skin, he sendeth and shooteth from him.”

Honestly, quill-throwing is quite unnecessary when you’re a porcupine—the spikes alone are protection enough. Though slow-moving, clumsy and not exactly the brightest button in nature’s jar, a porcupine can waddle through life in relative security thanks to its ever-so-effective prickly armor.

“A snake in the water can’t bite.” My apologies if you’ve taken comfort in this notion while splashing around in the old swimming hole. Water snakes certainly can open their mouths without drowning while swimming—and regularly do so as they hunt for frogs, fish, tadpoles, salamanders and other aquatic prey. I’m afraid the news gets worse, too: Most water snakes are armed with sharp teeth—the better to grab their slippery quarry—and many will readily bite when provoked; never mind that you’ve done so unintentionally.

If you live in the Southeast or lower Midwest, be especially wary of any snake swimming with its head held well above water. Among aquatic snakes, that’s a tell-tale characteristic of the venomous cottonmouth, aka the water moccasin. Bites from water snakes can be painful, but the cottonmouth’s is potentially deadly.

Now for the good news: Snakes—including the swimming types—don’t want anything to do with humans. Most of the time they’ll quickly slither away at the first sign of a two-legger. If you’re reasonably cautious in turn, you’ll have nothing to worry about.

Come on: Last one in is a rotten apple!

“Moss grows on the north side of trees and therefore can be used as a compass.” In part, this one’s no myth at all; moss definitely grows on the north side of trees. The only problem—especially for backwoods navigators—is that moss also can and does grow on the east, west and south sides of trees, and/or any point in between, depending on where the tree lives. So moss doesn’t make an especially reliable compass.

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