Do unicorns really exist?

It’s fairly certain that the mythical unicorns is just a legend, but there are a few animals on the planet that have actually been mistaken for one!

The narwhal is an arctic whale with an amazing tooth – it grows out through the whale’s upper lip and sticks out in front like a 3 metre long horn! The spiralling ivory tooth, or tusk, was often removed when a narwhal was caught by whalers and sold as a unicorn horn. But the tooth isn’t used for hunting, or eating, or even fighting with like a sword. It actually contains so many nerves that scientists think it’s used to detect changes in water temperature, salt content, and even movement from passing fish!

The okapi is another animal that for years was so shy and reclusive that it was dubbed “The African Unicorn”. It’s actually most closely related to the giraffe, and has a similar long purplish tongue. Its tongue is actually so long that the okapi is the only mammal that can lick inside its own ears! The also have hindquarters striped just like a zebra’s that help them disappear into the rainforests of the African Congo.

And in the summer of 2008, scientists discovered a deer in a nature reserve outside of Florence, Italy with a single horn. But that horn wasn’t growing out of one side, it was growing straight out of the middle of the deer’s forehead, just like a unicorn’s!