Dahu

The Dahu is a goat-like creature said to roam the French and Swiss Alps, distinguished by legs shorter on one side of its body than the other, an adaptation supposedly allowing it to walk flat around steep mountainsides in only one direction. The legend is best documented as a hunting prank rather than a genuine cryptid: mountain guides in Savoie and the Jura have sent gullible tourists on staged "dahu hunts" since at least the 19th century, equipping them with sacks to "catch" the animal by driving it toward a cliff face at night. A well-known regional saying goes, "Turn the dahu around, and it falls over laughing at you," referencing how the creature supposedly topples if forced to reverse direction on its slope. Some folklorists connect the dahu's asymmetrical-leg motif to older Alpine tales of the "bitch of the mountain" and similar lopsided creatures found across France, Germany, and Scotland, suggesting a shared pan-European joke tradition among shepherd communities isolated by winter snows. No biological specimen exists, and the dahu is openly acknowledged by regional tourist offices as a folkloric prank rather than a claimed real animal.