This is the second installment from my blog thread describing what to call groups of animals … See how many you can guess. Answers listed at the bottom of the page.
- “Double double, toil and trouble, fire burn and caldron bubble,” she cackled. Then the witch threw another cauldron into the caldron. [1]
- The prickle prickled no one that day.
- And the clutch clutched at the edges of the baskets.
- Exaltation exalted the evening with the complex songs of the family Alaudidae.
- A smack smacks into goo on the rocks.
- The romping romp are some of my favorite critters.
Answers:
- Cauldron of bats [2]
- Prickle of porcupines
- Clutch of birds
- Exaltation of larks
- Smack of jellyfish [3]
- Romp of otters [4]
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NOTES: https://www.latimes.com/environment/story/2025-04-05/trump-is-gutting-the [-nations-environmental-programs-heres-how-much-it-will-cost-americans [1] Shakespeare Macbeth, Act IV, Scene 1. [2] Bats are one of the world’s most endangered species. As of 2017, 77 bats are listed as Endangered and Critically Endangered on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Bat Conservation International batcon.org [3] Many species of Jellyfish are listed as vulnerable Barrier Reef.org [4] Sea otters are Endangered IUCN © Jadi Campbell 2025. All photos © Uwe Hartmann. To see more of Uwe’s animal photos and pics from our trips go to viewpics.de. Fun animal names from www.writers-free-reference.com, Mother Nature Network and www.reference.com.
I am a Best American Essays-nominated writer. My books are Broken In: A Novel in Stories, Tsunami Cowboys, Grounded, The Trail Back Out, and The Taste of Your Name. My most recent book
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Author Bram Stoker was born on November 8, 1847 in Clontarf, Dublin, Ireland. In 1897 Stoker gave the world Dracula, the vampire from Transylvania. Undead, the vampire must drink blood and transforms himself into a wolf or a bat at will. In Stoker’s honor here is an excerpt from my first book, about the 2,000,000 wrinkle-lips bats Uwe and I saw when we visited Thailand. – Jadi
It was dusk when the car came to a stop on a plain with no one in sight, the sun a bright red disk sailing below the horizon. Gabe got out of the car just as the first bats emerged from the cave.
These were followed by more, and more, and more, an impossible number of flying mammals swooping and looping in ribbons across the skies.
“Each bat will cover up to 200 kilometers of hunting grounds tonight before they’re done,” the guide told him.
There was not a single other human being anywhere, no buildings, no roads, no signs of human civilization, only the twisting spirals of the bat colony in the air.
The men stood for over two hours as the bats sailed overhead. Gabe waited until it was too dark to make out the shapes of the bats before he turned away, images of flight burned onto his retinas and his memory.
