Topic: horns vs. antlers

Posted under General

I suggest the de-implication of horn from antlers (it is currently not, nor should it be, implied the other way, either).

Horns are from the bovine family, whereas antlers are contained within the cervine; they do not appear similar, and are constructed differently enough to do away with this implication.

Quoting the US National Park Service:

'Antlers, on members of the deer family, are grown as an extension of the animal's skull. They are true bone and are a single structure They are generally found only on males. Antlers are shed and regrown each year.

Horns, found on pronghorn, bighorn sheep, bison, and many other bovine, are two-part structures. An interior of bone (also an extension of the skull) is covered by an exterior sheath grown by specialized hair follicles, as are your fingernails. In fact, your fingernails and the exterior sheath of horns are made of very similar materials.'

Updated

Antlers aren't true horns, but based on how they are used in day-to-day English they are still called horns, regardless of the interior structure. The implication wasn't made to be anatomically accurate, it was made to simplify tagging and searching. Tagging-wise antlers is used to mean "forked horns which often resemble the ones found on cervines", but it's handled pretty loosely because furry characters come in all kinds of configurations, many of which aren't going to be anatomically accurate (or are entirely fictional) anyways.

Updated by anonymous

Not sure, wouldn't that make a big mess?

Even if there are things that aren't technically correct they are best left alone for the sake of usefulness.

I would think that someone searching for horns would actually want to include antlers, but if the person wants to be more specific they can search for antlers.

Updated by anonymous

parasprite said:
Antlers aren't true horns, but based on how they are used in day-to-day English they are still called horns ...

Respectfully, if somebody were to refer to antlers as horns, they have never seen a real cervine in their life (deer, reindeer, moose, elk, et.al.) I am an old wuff, and not once have I heard reference to a buck with a '6-point horn' ...

Just_Another_Dragon said:
I would think that someone searching for horns would actually want to include antlers, but if the person wants to be more specific they can search for antlers.

If you search horn right now, you get 94,802 results, 50,668 of which are either unicorn or winged_unicorn. That is 53-54% heavily attributed to my_little_pony, which has absolutely no context to antlers.

A search of antlers only yields 3,844 results. So yes, I guess it would make a bit of a mess, only because the tags have been misused, or because of the implication.

Ultimately, this means Parasprite is correct, and many users here cannot differentiate between Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer, twilight_sparkle_(mlp), and a cape_buffalo.

I understand both of your points, and that makes me just a bit sad.

Updated by anonymous

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