Nature & Animals
Discover 204 folk tales about nature and animals — the largest theme in our collection. These stories feature talking animals, enchanted forests, magical rivers, and the deep connection between humans and the natural world. From Panchatantra’s jungle fables to Aesop’s barnyard tales, these animal stories for kids use the wonders of nature to teach timeless moral lessons.
African Folk Tales
Ages 6-8
The Tiger, The Ram, And The Jackal
A Panchatantra tale where a clever jackal's lies to tiger and ram destroy his own plans.
African Folk Tales
Ages 6-8
The White Man And Snake
The Khoikhoi fable of a man who frees a snake pinned under a stone, only for the snake to turn on him - until the clever Jackal restores her to the trap by asking her to prove her story. A Cape retelling of tale type ATU 155.
African Folk Tales
Ages 9-12
The Story Of Hare
The Story of Hare is a Xhosa folktale from South Africa. Five careless watchmen die guarding the animals' fat from the monstrous inkalimeva, until the clever hare alone outwits the beast by its own trick - then nearly undoes himself through greed.
African Folk Tales
Ages 9-12
The Monkey’s Fiddle
A scholarly retelling of the southern African folk tale "The Monkey's Fiddle", in which a poor monkey, falsely condemned for theft by a corrupt animal court, escapes the gallows by playing a charmed fiddle that forces the whole court to dance.
African Folk Tales
Ages 6-8
The Lioness And The Ostrich
The Lioness and the Ostrich is a Khoikhoi folk tale of southern Africa from Bleek's Reynard the Fox in South Africa (1864) and Honey's South-African Folk-Tales (1910). A lioness accepts an ostrich as her equal, then lets her cubs' flattering scorn break that bond - and dies of it.
African Folk Tales
Ages 6-8
The Lion, The Jackal, And The Man
The Khoikhoi folk tale of a boastful lion whom a clever jackal humbles by leading him to meet a man — and the man, armed with dogs, fire and steel, proves the strongest creature of all.
African Folk Tales
All Ages
The Lion And Jackal
A Khoikhoi trickster tale of the Cape: Lion and Jackal hunt on shares, but Jackal cheats Lion's family of the winter meat and, cornered at last on a krantz, destroys the great beast with a red-hot stone disguised as a ball of fat.
African Folk Tales
Ages 6-8
The Hunt Of Lion And Jackal
A Khoikhoi trickster tale from the Cape of Good Hope: the jackal cheats his hunting partner the lion out of an eland's fat with a false blood-trail, talks his way out of being caught, and escapes scot-free with his family.
African Folk Tales
Ages 9-12
Story Of Lion And Little Jackal
A string of clever escapes from southern African oral tradition: the small black-backed jackal outwits the mighty lion again and again, proving that wit, not muscle, rules the veld.
African Folk Tales
Ages 9-12
Lion’s Share
Lion's Share is a Khoikhoi (Khoekhoe/Nama) folk tale of the South African Cape, from the jackal trickster cycle first printed in W.H.I. Bleek's Reynard the Fox in South Africa (1864). Lion and Jackal hunt as partners, and the cunning jackal outwits the powerful lion meal by meal.
African Folk Tales
Ages 9-12
Lion And Jackal
Lion and Jackal is a southern African folk tale from James A. Honey's South-African Folk-Tales (1910): a lion and a jackal agree to hunt on shares, the jackal hoards the meat, and the cheated, prideful lion is destroyed by his own greed.
African Folk Tales
Ages 6-8
Elephant and Tortoise
A southern African Bushman tale: proud Elephant quarrels with Rain, claims the last water of a drought-stricken plain, and is undone by the patient wit of Tortoise.