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Description
November 15, 2010
Well, the existence of trolls in modern Norway is no longer a secret; the footage that has been displayed on Youtube thanks to the efforts of three purportedly-vanished film students has spread like wildfire across the internet. I might as well collect my thoughts as to the biology of trolls, and what they truly are.

Trolls are nocturnal, omnivorous, bipedal mammals with some of the most bizarre biology known in the animal kingdom. They live in the most remote mountains and forests of Norway, and there are a wide variety of subspecies, though all can be loosely lumped into either "Forest Trolls", or "Mountain Trolls", depending on their preferred habitat. Trolls have an incredibly wide and varied diet, eating anything from charcoal to tree bark to old tires to animals to the occasional unlucky tourist. They are massive and powerful, ranging from 10 feet to over 200 feet in height, depending on the subspecies. Their eyesight is excellent at night, but easily overwhelmed in bright light. Their sense of smell is truly impressive, and one of their strangest traits is the fact that they are capable of smelling and discerning the blood of Christians (and possibly Muslims and Jews), whom they will attack on sight. They aren't very clever by any standards, and do poorly on all known animal intelligence tests.

Trolls are nocturnal, and often subterranean, as their bizarre physiology makes it impossible for them to process vitamin D like other animals do. As a result, exposure to direct sunlight, or even spotlights that emit UVB radiation, are fatal to trolls. Young trolls will have a catastrophic chemical reaction occur in their bloodstream and muscles, forcing gases into their muscles and blood that will expand so rapidly that they literally explode. Older ones have it occur in their bones, expanding them and literally calcifying the rest of their bodies until they are effectively turned into lifeless stone.

Trolls live for an incredibly long time, and individuals over a thousand years old are not uncommon. Adult trolls have no natural predators due to their size and strength, and their incredibly varied diet means that starvation is a remote possibility at best. Their sheer hardiness also makes freezing in the cold highly unlikely, and their immune systems are among the toughest found in nature. However, their incredibly slow reproduction rates keep their numbers in check; gestation lasts for over a decade and they never give birth to more than one infant troll at a time.

Unfortunately, it has been confirmed that Norway's troll population is swiftly being infected with rabies. Consequently, the trolls are moving out of their normal territories, and acting far more aggressive than usual. What this means for the population, and how they might survive, remains unknown.

The second troll seen in the known footage was a 15-foot Raglefant, a brutal and powerful forest troll. This was a relatively young specimen, and it seemed to live as an ambush predator, lurking under a bridge to attack animals that came to drink. It had only one arm, and seemed to have lost the other to an accident years before. A government-worker "Trolljegeren" (Troll Hunter) named "Hans" acquired a blood sample from it with an immense needle and a suit of specially-made cast-iron armor.

Description
November 15, 2010
Well, the existence of trolls in modern Norway is no longer a secret; the footage that has been displayed on Youtube thanks to the efforts of three purportedly-vanished film students has spread like wildfire across the internet. I might as well collect my thoughts as to the biology of trolls, and what they truly are.

Trolls are nocturnal, omnivorous, bipedal mammals with some of the most bizarre biology known in the animal kingdom. They live in the most remote mountains and forests of Norway, and there are a wide variety of subspecies, though all can be loosely lumped into either "Forest Trolls", or "Mountain Trolls", depending on their preferred habitat. Trolls have an incredibly wide and varied diet, eating anything from charcoal to tree bark to old tires to animals to the occasional unlucky tourist. They are massive and powerful, ranging from 10 feet to over 200 feet in height, depending on the subspecies. Their eyesight is excellent at night, but easily overwhelmed in bright light. Their sense of smell is truly impressive, and one of their strangest traits is the fact that they are capable of smelling and discerning the blood of Christians (and possibly Muslims and Jews), whom they will attack on sight. They aren't very clever by any standards, and do poorly on all known animal intelligence tests.

Trolls are nocturnal, and often subterranean, as their bizarre physiology makes it impossible for them to process vitamin D like other animals do. As a result, exposure to direct sunlight, or even spotlights that emit UVB radiation, are fatal to trolls. Young trolls will have a catastrophic chemical reaction occur in their bloodstream and muscles, forcing gases into their muscles and blood that will expand so rapidly that they literally explode. Older ones have it occur in their bones, expanding them and literally calcifying the rest of their bodies until they are effectively turned into lifeless stone.

Trolls live for an incredibly long time, and individuals over a thousand years old are not uncommon. Adult trolls have no natural predators due to their size and strength, and their incredibly varied diet means that starvation is a remote possibility at best. Their sheer hardiness also makes freezing in the cold highly unlikely, and their immune systems are among the toughest found in nature. However, their incredibly slow reproduction rates keep their numbers in check; gestation lasts for over a decade and they never give birth to more than one infant troll at a time.

Unfortunately, it has been confirmed that Norway's troll population is swiftly being infected with rabies. Consequently, the trolls are moving out of their normal territories, and acting far more aggressive than usual. What this means for the population, and how they might survive, remains unknown.

The second troll seen in the known footage was a 15-foot Raglefant, a brutal and powerful forest troll. This was a relatively young specimen, and it seemed to live as an ambush predator, lurking under a bridge to attack animals that came to drink. It had only one arm, and seemed to have lost the other to an accident years before. A government-worker "Trolljegeren" (Troll Hunter) named "Hans" acquired a blood sample from it with an immense needle and a suit of specially-made cast-iron armor.