Ice sprites—as cute as the yeti is fierce
January 3, 2083
One more post this week before I get back to work and my life is turned upside down again. This one is along the same theme as the last post about Yetis—ice-sprites, the yeti’s smaller, cuter cousins.
A few years ago, I found a little, wilted creature in the middle of the hot city. He was winged and covered in downy white fur. And he seemed to be struggling in the heat. Really struggling.
I have no idea how he got there. Probably some collector who decided he was too much work to care for. I took him home and tried to keep him cool while I figured out what he ate (anything sweet). It was a close thing. I didn’t think he’d survive those first days. I nursed him through an especially hot July.
Those were the early days of my pest control business, and I barely had enough money to keep me and my few rescues fed. I spent every cent I had on bags of ice to keep the poor little guy cool. I wasn’t even sure what he was at that time.
Eventually, he blossomed into a beautiful creature with wings, about the size of a snowy owl. I dubbed him as an ice-sprite and named him Kur because he makes a little chirping-purring noise that sound like he’s saying “kurrrr.”
I hand fed him all that summer and fall, until he was strong enough to fly. That winter, I brought him to Dorion Park to set him free, but he’d followed me back to my truck, sat on my windshield wipers and chirped until I let him in. That was eight years ago. He was one of my first rescues and my first foster fail. He’s been with me ever since.
But lately, he’s been looking a little wilted again. Not sick exactly, just sad. I took him on my last Inbetween adventure hoping the cold and abundance of fresh air would perk him up, and it did. But going forward, I wonder if Kur’s diet could use some revamping. Does anyone out there in the blogosphere have experience with ice-sprites? What do you feed them?
Comments (4)
You’re asking the wrong question. Not what you feed it, but what you feed it to.
Biggameguy21 (January 3, 2083)
Ice chips?
Soupie (January 3, 2083)
We had a similar creature here. My dad called it a monkey-owl. He hung around for one winter and we never saw him again. I used to feed him bread, but he didn’t seem too excited about it.
BetweenSteader (January 4, 2083)
First, I love your blog. Thanks for trying to care for all those creatures. As a biologist, zoologist and former vet tech, I have been studying what we used to call cryptids for the last 50 years. Now, of course, they have gone from myth to commonplace. That doesn’t make them any easier to understand. I would say that if your ice-sprite craves sugar, that’s probably what his body needs to survive. Good luck with all your foster fails!
YukonZookeeper (January 4, 2083)