There were so many possibilities here. She waited to listen to the other students' answers before giving her own.

Juno raised her hand and waited to be called on. When she was she replied, "Kneazles are in both the Muggle world and the Wizarding. Many Muggles own Kneazles without knowing it because they look so similar to a regular house cat but are in fact magical felines." She knew this for a fact.

Did the Professor just called her Bec?! Not Miss Meadows or even her full name? He had actually chosen to call her by the name she WANTED to be called? Did they just become best friends?! Ok no. But she did smile big time because he was the only adult to have called her Bec which was cool.

If only she could call him Drapes again, siiiiigh.


Waving at Fiyero and making room for him to sit next to her, the Gryffindor noted that her friend looked tired and knowing what she knows now because the Professor himself had told her this, she poked his shoulder. “Dude, don’t fall asleep here, he WILL make you jog in place for the rest of the lesson” as funny as that sounded , she didn’t want Fi to suffer that. Good friend she was eh?


“DRAGONS!” The girl shouted , cleared her throat before she went on with her softer voice cause oops? “They resemble …….uh………” uhm…. What muggle creature did they resemble? “I don’t know which muggle animal they resemble but I KNOW there are a few!”

Ahh creatures that muggles were aware of too! Harriet sat quiet for a few moments, trying to think of a really good answer. She wanted to impress! She was also listening to some of the other answers that her fellow students were saying. She tried to make notes about everything that people were saying. And now she could say something herself because she'd finally thought of an answering!

She smiled, and raised her arm up. "What about the Diricawl Professor?" She murmured, still smiling. "Muggles believe it is the Dodo. But they don't know that the Diricawl can disappear when it wants to, so they believe they have made it extinct" which was kind of sad but not true. So yay!

Dalton raised his hand slightly into the air. "Well, Knarls resemble the Hedgehog, with the noticeable difference being that a Knarl will be suspicious of food offered, and a Hedgehog appreciative." Other than that, he wasn't sure what the differences were, or even if Knarls had any specific magical properties.

"Also, the Diricawl - Muggles thought this was the Dodo bird, and due to it's ability to vanish at will, think they've caused it's extinction through hunting it. Oh, and the bowtruckle is kind of like a stick insect."


Looked like all of his studying was starting to pay off.

Just like with any other CoMC lesson Hady had been up early so wasn't in the least bit sleepy. There had been an early morning run followed by a shower, her class robes being worn and then a quick stop in the kitchen for a banana which she ate along the way. Bananas were simple to eat mostly when one had a leaf still in their mouth. The peel had long been disposed of back in the kitchen before she had even headed outside.

She had greeted Draper and her fellow mates with the usual nod or Slytherin grin before taking up her usual spot on one of the benches. Hady's eye may have wandered over the Huge Maze that stood behind Draper curiously but nothing was being said about it. Soon enough it would be known what was about to happen. Until then she would be taking down notes seeing as she wouldn't be talking today. Any answers she had to give were to be written down. There were a lot of magical creatures in the world however so surely what they were about to go over today wasn't something they had worked on already.

Dropping her bag onto the ground at her feet she pulled out a notepad, a sheet of parchment and a quill. Purple inked. Tucking a lock of brunette hair behind her ear the sixth year went about taking down notes to the question that was asked. Another lesson on creatures that muggles were aware of but didn't know that they were muggle? Hadn't they done something like this last term too. The question seemed familiar and those around her were doing a fine job with answering it.

"I have something to tell you later," Kitty whispered excitedly to Hadley before the lesson began. "Maybe in the Great Hall at breakfast, okay?"

But then the class started and they had to focus their attention on Professor Draper's first question. What magical creatures are similar to animals Muggles knew? "Diricawls" had been what she was going to say, but she decided not to after two others picked that as their answer. Oh well. Guess she would have to go with...

"Snakes," she said, raising her hand. "Muggles know all about snakes. But they don't know that snakes are actually intelligent and that they can talk to some people." Which prompted her to raise her hand and a question of her own. "Professor, isn't it kind of like slavery how Muggles have snakes in zoos? I mean, we know snakes are sentient and everything."

All the obvious answers - like crups and kneazles - were being taken right away, but Scarlett knew that in reality just about EVERY magical creature was called something else or was included in the same lore as muggle magical creatures. Dragons were another obvious one, but she decided to go a slightly different route.

"Well, the Loch Ness Monster is actually a Kelpie, but the muggles don't know that. So it's sort of like the same thing across both worlds," she explained. She knew the professor would know what she was getting at....

"Excellent answers," he noted raising his voice once again to address the class as a whole. "Some of you even went as far as to mention some of the traits that can be used to tell the mundane creature apart from it's magical counterpart," he appreciated that, actually. Showed they were making deeper connections here. The elevation in answers clearly showed looking at his class now from their place at the beginning of the term. Who knew, these kids were actually learning!? Wonderful. Probably more than what some of the other Professors could say.

"Today our focus will be on a creature that has already been mentioned quite a few times," and with that he bent down and uncovered the box, picking out two hedgehog looking creatures. Carefully holding one in each hand, he brought them forward so the class could see. "In one hand I'm holding a Knarl and in the other, I have a hedgehog." They could see how the two were practically identical, yeah?

"Mr. Fletcher skipped ahead and explained that the only observable difference between the two creatures is that only the knarl will turn down an offering of food," that was important and he was glad to see at least one person had done their reading. "What else do we know about knarls? Doesn't have to be exclusive, feel free to share traits that both creatures share." And yes, despite the fact that Dalton had already mentioned a fact, James was still expecting his participation in this next bit as well.


OOC: Amazing answers, y'all! You have another 18+ hours for this next question.
As always, please try to keep it at one answer per person to be fair to your classmates <3

If you're having trouble finding cannon on knarls, feel free to mention facts about hedgehogs as well, as they overlap pretty much everywhere!

Aww! That knarl was cute. And the hedgehog was. They looked prickly but cute! Could she have one? She already had her crup, and was showing that she was looking after it well. So she could totally get her mom to give her a Knarl right? Hmm. She would have to ask her. But for now she was going to think about what she knew about a knarl. Well she knew that they were prickly for sure.

She tilted her head to the side as she thought about an answer, before she raised a hand, and smiled. "Knarls eat daisies" She murmured, remembering that she had read that once in a book. She couldn't remember if it had been a potions book, telling her about daisies as ingredients, or a magical creatures book. "I read in a book that sometimes potioneers have to remove Knarls from a daisy patch before they can pick the daises" And now she felt really clever.

... Errr, yes. Unicorns are similar to horses. That was what Esme had been getting at. They were horses with horns. Why was Professor Draper looking at her like that? What she was getting at should have been obvious. Moving on.

She raised her hand. "They like to eat wild daisies. Since hedgehogs are omnivorous I guess they might like eating them too." Maybe? At the very least knarls liked them.

Knarls! Genny was plenty experienced about them, what a coincidence today's CoMC lesson was about them after this summer. Although her knowledge was not necessarily academia-friendly. She knew about the food thing, her friend had his garden be messed up by a bunch of knarls (as he claimed, it could be him just marketing the story as knarls-related to be interesting).

Genny spoke immediately, "Knarls are not very nice when they're offered food. They like to work to get their food so they'll be unpleasant to us if we offer them food." Did that count the same as what Fletcher said? She loved his trait the most about them, but she was going to add a little something just in case it was a repetition. "We can't tell if a garden is destroyed by a bunch of knarls who found food laying around as bait or by children. Hedgehogs, on the other side, do not destroy anything and may decide to make baby hedgehogs in your garden if you offer them food and shelter." She came up with that last bit on her own.... what, it made sense!

Azura smiled a bit.. Okay yeah, Fwoopers weren't EXACTLY like Parrots but they were darned closed and had gotten an Excellent from the Professor, that was all that mattered really..

The teen curiously looked at the Box as Professor Draper took out the Knarl and she looked at it and then at the hedgehog..

Aww they were so cute! She tilted her head a little as Professor Draper asked about them, and then noticed that both Hattie and Esme gave pretty much the same answer..

So..

She raised her hand and spoke.. "Knarl Quills have magical uses.." Her mom was a healer and a potioneer.. She knew that sort of thing.

Great they were covering knarls today. Not as bad as flobberworms but almost just as bad for the sixth year. He was a sixth year. Why not more dangerous animals. Probably because Draper is lazy and went the easy way out on lesson animals. Oh well nothing he can do about that.

He would just yawn and let everyone else answer on hedgehogs. Oops, he meant knarls. Really the only difference is offer a knarl milk or a treat and they will be suspicious. A hedgehog will not. Also there is the damage issue. But that was the basic concept.

Can Dante sleep. That was a trait both knarl and hedgehog shared.

They both sleep.

Echo didnt really know the main difference but she knew something ish "if muggles spot a knarl they just assume that its a hedgehog or an animal close to it?" Muggles and not spotting anything magical was so typical. she wasnt sure if her fact was correct or not but why not give it a shot.. everything else was pretty easy to spot, needles, eats veges.

but the main thing was could she please please please please.... hold on to the hedgehog! it was just so cute and all she wanted to do was to feed it berries and get it all fat!

So many answers. Janelle listened to her classmates and wrote down the related animals that they mentioned. As the professor made his comments, she made note of those too. Finally the creature of the day was revealed. They would be learning about knarls. Janelle couldn't help it, but she thought they were very cute........in a weird sort of way. She didn't have time to dwell on that thought because another question was posed and it was time to come up with an answer.

Janelle raised her hand and began to speak. "Knarls use their quills for protection." That was pretty obvious. "They can roll into a ball so just their quills stick out. I would think that the smart animals would be reluctant to approach them because of that." At least Janelle would stay away, if she was an animal.

See Cool Creatures Man totally understands what he's trying to say yeah? Salander on Salamanders: Level: Expert.

What else did he know about Knarls? Well other than it’s a home wrecker of literal proportions, which many of his classmates have already mentioned, Tenacius blue-green gaze flitted between the two creatures on the Professor's hand, one a hedgehog, the other the knarl. Hedgehogs......oh wait theres something he know really well. Up goes the hand "Well Hedgehogs can move at SONIC speeds and collect gold coins!" mmhm totally true "....Also sometimes they're blue. Knarls cant do that can they? I mean sure you can try to collect their quills and sell them for gold coins but thats waaaaay too much trouble and not much fun. They're basically just paranoid and jumps to the wrong conclusions." bam truth.

Hadley gave Kitty a quizzical look. "Um, okay. Yeah sure, breakfast." She hadn't had the chance to eat before class so it was kinda perfect. Still she couldn't help but wonder what it was about.

She'd find out soon enough.

Hads grinned over at Salamander and his answer. Was it a coincidence or did he just totally give her a nod with that answer? Maybe both? Didn't matter. It totally made her morning.

As for the question at hand, ummmmm.... to be honest, Hadley didn't really know much about either, even if she was more familiar with the hedgehog, growing up muggle and all.

Again, Salamander's answer got a reaction from her. This time a laugh. She had no idea what he was referring to, as her brother was the gamer in the family, not her. It was the absurdity of the answer that got her.

"They're both mammals?" she ventured. "I think. Are magical creatures still classified the same?"

Hady knew she was being quiet. She knew it wasn't like her but really she had thought Draper would've guessed by now that it was due to the Mandrake leaf. Maybe the professors didn't keep things communicated as well as she thought they did. Not that it was a huge deal really but she was going to mention it so he understood her silence.

Shifting to be able to see both the Knarl and the Hedgehog that was being held up she grinned. Hedgehogs were adorable! It was actually the animal she had made out of clay last term and identified with as her familiar. In fact she still had it, only it was at home in her bedroom on her dresser. Anyhow similarities and characteristics between them. That wasn't to hard a question to answer if everyone hadn't already said everything she was thinking over.

Taking her small white board from the bag at her feet she grabbed a erasable marker and pulled the cap off. Quickly she wrote down what she was thinking before holding it up for Draper to see as she raised her other hand.

Sorry for the simple answer but there really wasn't all that much to say right now.

Fiyero nodded in reply to Bec's warning. It was nice of her to think.of him, but he didn't want to talk over Professor Draper and get in trouble. Speaking of whom, did he really just say Fiyero's answer was good? Wow, he definitely wasn't expecting that!

Fiyero stared intently at the two little creatures in Professor Draper's hands. They were so funny-looking with those pointy noses and spines sticking out all over their bodies! It made him smile... but he'd have more time to ogle them later. Right now he had to think of a fact about knarls and/or hedgehogs.

He listened to the others' answers. Most of the characteristics of the knarl had already been mentioned, and some of his classmates' answers were really off the wall.All he could do was blink in response to the one about blue hedgehogs catching coins. He couldn't wait to see Draper"s reaction yo that one! Somehow he didn't think he'd get the reference...

Fiyero thought for a minute. He finally remembered reading something about a hegdehog's spines, and his hand shot up."The hedgehog and the knarl both have spines," he said, "spines that are made of stiff, hollow hairs."

Magical Creatures!!! Sky loved creatures of all types and the Professor didn't seem so bad either; least not in Sky's mind he seemed alright so far and hadn't done anything to prove otherwise. And they were talking about in particular, knarls versus hedgehogs.

She knew a couple differences, most of which were already said. And though she doubted that hedgehogs had a classification according the ministry of magic, the one for knarls was still relevant. "Knarls have a Ministry Classification of Beast and Triple X, which means they'll be of no trouble to competent wizards and witches to handle." Yes, she knew her classifications; prime examination topic so it was definitely one of the first things that Sky made sure she learned.

They were talking about knaaaaaaarls. Yes, good. It was probably a good thing Sniffler was up in the castle today... not that Sniffler could get confused for either creature Draper was holding. Sniffler had loooong ears. Jaemin held up his hand, wiggling a bit. More awake now, Draper. More awake.

"I think one of the things I read was that they're physically indistinguishable from each other... like even inside too. They're the same all the way except for their attitude problem." He tilted his head thoughtfully. "Professor, are there different kinds of knarls, like there are hedgehogs? Sniffler's a long-eared hedgehog but I didn't read anywhere that there are long-eared knarls..."

Considering the book had said they were native to America and the UK, he figured the answer to his question might be no, because hedgehogs like Sniffler were from Central Asia... but things moved and evolved and were discovered all the time. So really... who knew. DRAPER WOULD, RIGHT?

Kitty blinked. Was Draper inviting her to talk with him him later about snakes in zoos? She was going to ask when the class was over.

AWWW how cute! Kitty literally could not tell the difference between the hedgehog and the knarl, but she was going to gibe it her best shot. She raised her hand."Hedgehogs and knarls both have quills but I think knarls are stronger and more feisty. Not sure how knarl's got their name but I know hedgehogs were named got their name because they travel around in hedges a lot."

"We sometimes have hedgehogs in our yard, going through the hedges. My mom has hedges growing all around our mansion. Even the entrance is enchanted to look like a hedge. So we see them quite a lot."

Who knew, maybe she had even seen a knarl and hadn't realized it?

Well the most obvious similarity that the two had was that the kneazles and hedgehogs were both SUPER ADORABLE! But Scarlett knew a thing or two about hedgehogs, having done research on them herself - before they had been allowed to get a dog, she'd been trying to convince her dad that they should get a guinea pig or a hedgehog. She raised her hand.

"Well, hedgehogs can be kept as pets, whereas kneazles might not be the best pets. Because of their attitude and everything," she explained. "They want to get their own food, so they'd probably always be running away or constantly refusing the food given to them, which would likely lead them to eat less than they should."

"Correct," he nodded in response to both girls, deciding to wait to address their answers seeing as they bounced right off each other. "Knarls have quite the affinity for wild daisies, where as hedgehogs don't show the same strength in desire for the flowers." They'd probably eat them as well, but wasn't a preference. But if you dropped a knarl in a daisy field... They'd really have a field day. "However, seeing as hedgehogs aren't very picky, they'll eat daisies as well." Not a preference though.


He nodded along to Genny's answer, actually he was quite impressed with the depth of thought the girl had managed to show. "Excellent," he half-grinned, "Take two points for that answer!" Which, by the way, he didn't do often. Turning to address the class, as this was a very important point the young Gryffindor brought up, he started once again "As Ms. Tate just explained, knarls become very suspicious of intention when offered food and can become very unpleasant if they feel threatened." And.... Eh, the rest she covered perfectly. Not too much to tack on there. Very good. He liked this one.


"Good," he nodded. "Various potions will call for the use of knarl quills," he nodded. Did everyone see how well Creatures overlapped with the other subjects? Why this one was the most important. Mhm.


"Keep awake, Barrington," James was watching him.

Very

Closely.


James nodded, this one went without saying... And normally he'd expect more from his students, but they hadn't ever covered Knarls before... So he'd let her have this one. Yes, technically she was right.


James gave the polite girl a nod, "Very good." They were relatively harmless creatures, but they did have their own means of defense. "A trait they share with hedgehogs as well," now that they had brought those creatures up... Might as well cover them both, yeah? Extra knowledge never hurt anyone.


.......

..............

................ Was he serious? James couldn't tell.

"No," he deadpanned. No one took any notes on what this kid said, right? Because that was around 60000% wrong.

Just no.


AND MOVING ON from that ridiculous answer.

Hopefully Ms. Denaker had a useful response and not one of her usual snarky comments. They were doing so well. "Good connection," he nodded. "Though in our case, we don't normally classify our creatures using general muggle classifications as we delve a bit deeper into sentience and danger levels. But as a generalization, both can said to be mammals as they fit the definition."



Professors probably did communicate with each other. But not James.

He always chose to avoid Poncho Paul when he had the choice and when speaking to Nana... They didn't generally speak about the students at all, actually. They're conversations were always more tense. So James had no idea what Hadleigh's uncharacteristic silence was due to.

But writing down the answer was a very strange way to go. "Good," he nodded. "As we mentioned before, the only way to identify between a hedgehog and a knarl is by offering them food." Just so that the class was aware of the written answer.


"Excellent," he nodded. "More specifically, their spines are made of keratin, which is a common fibrous protein." There was more to it, but that'd be delving very deeply in the biology of things and... They wouldn't have to know that for exams. Besides, he didn't need Barrington dozing off for real. So if any of them were interested, James wouldn't mind going more into it with them after class. Well, he wouldn't mind much.


"Thank you for bringing this up," he said, turning his head to Haddie who had just asked about classifications, before returning his gaze back to the Slytherin. "As well as calling them mammals, we will more commonly see the knarls under their Ministry Classification of a beast with a XXX rating." He nodded at this one.


"Good," he nodded. "Take a point for your answer," everyone got that right? "Knarls and hedgehogs are almost identical not only in physical appearance, but also with their inner chemical pathways and general biology." THIS was GREAT stuff right here. Something that truly made him excited, though.... It probably wasn't all that easy to tell because tbh he looked exactly the same on the outside as always. Hard to read, he liked that best about himself.

As for the boys question, "Considering that experts have only been able to trace knarls back to one particular breed of hedgehogs in particular, there is only one known type. However, that is bound to change in the future if the breeds are forced to migrate or new niches become available." The real question here was, how come they didn't offer biology at this school?


...... She talked a lot.

James only listened a little.

So eh, he was going to assume that everything she said was correct because he didn't care about half of it. Yes, yes. He nodded. Very good. Great stuff. Didn't need to know about your mother. MOVING ON.


"Knarls don't trust easily, you're correct," he nodded. "Therefore, they don't particularly enjoy being domesticated." So yeah, moral of the story is her guess was right. Yeah. Okay, that was everyone yeah? Merlin. How many kids were enrolled in this school? Not that he'd complain out loud. This was merely reserved for his internal monologues.

Moving forward.

--------------

.... And with that he walked in front of the class to address everyone as a whole once again. They were moving along pretty well, yeah? No one had started crying. That was always a success. Always. "Another common attribute of both the hedgehog and the knarl, is that they are both nocturnal animals, meaning they prefer to come out at night," among other things. But they knew what nocturnal meant, yeah? Hopefully... Though, seeing as Tenacious thought hedgehogs come in blue.... Doubtful. It was a wonder how some of these kids could survive in the real world.

"With that in mind, they have very poor eyesight even in the dark," made sense, yes? Eyesight bad because dark out. Eyesight terrible even in light. Get it? Got it? Good. "How do you think their bad eyesight plays a role in their lives? How do they get by without having to rely on their vision? Why isn't it a huge problem?" He folded his arms as he waited for everyone to think about the question. This one wasn't as straight forward, which was good. Meant hopefully they'd do some critical thinking here. Time to see who knew more than just facts out of a book, y'know that sort of deal. But honestly, he was just looking forward to the activity that'd be coming up real soon. Meant he could take a break from all of this Q&A.



OOC: Another 18+ hours to answer this question!
As always please only give one answer and feel free to get creative! Incorrect answers won't count against you.

No? What does Cool Creatures Man mean? The Curly Top followed the man around with his gaze, trying to get some two words in that there is a blue hedgehog collecting gold and going at supersonic speed. He could show him, oh yes he could.

...... Well ok maybe he has to ask his mom if the battery in that Muggle gadget thing is still working-- and if she would even let it out of the vault because collector's item-- but oh yes he could show the Prof yeah.

But right hedgehogs and knarls have poor eyesight and…… how can they possibly deal with life?? "With a little help from their friends Professor." nod nod yes true. Because that blue hedgehog has LOTS of friends he knows mmhm. "….. Well at least the hedgehogs will have lotsa friends because its nice and friendly. The knarls uh….. well they pretend to be hedgehogs and freeloads."

Makes sense to him.