The Harry Potter Compendium
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The Bowtruckle is immensely difficult to spot, being a hand-sized, insect eating, tree dweller with long sharp fingers (two on each hand), brown eyes, and a general appearance of a flat-faced little stickman made of bark and twigs, which serves well as camouflage in its natural habitat.

The Bowtruckle can be found in western England, southern Germany, and certain Scandinavian forests. A Bowtruckle serves as a tree guardian for its home tree, which is usually a tree whose wood makes wands (such as Wiggentree). The twig-like fingers are well adapted for digging out wood lice in trees, and can also be used as a weapon against a foe when aimed at the eyes. It is generally a peaceful creature, but will become violent if anything threatens its tree, or even to itself. To take leaves or wood from a Bowtruckle's tree, one would have to offer it wood lice or fairy eggs as a distraction.

Etymology[]

The word "bow" was an old Scottish dialect means "dwelling," and "limb of tree" or "truckle" in old English dialect. This means "to take a subordinate position."

Behind the scenes[]

Appearances[]


Care of Magical Creatures
The Monster Book
Professors: Silvanus Kettleburn · Rubeus Hagrid · Wilhelmina Grubbly-Plank (substitute teacher)
Textbooks: The Monster Book of Monsters · Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them
Care of Magical Creatures at Hogwarts: Hagrid's Hut · Forbidden Forest · Care of Magical Creatures classroom
Creatures studied: Hippogriffs · Flobberworms · Salamanders · Blast-Ended Skrewts · Nifflers · Unicorns · Thestrals · Bowtruckles · Crups · Fire crabs · Knarls · Kneazles · Porlocks



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