Every state has a designated, animal representative. Holding to the old "everything is bigger in Texas" adage, we have way more than 1 state animal.

Every state has a list of official animals, flowers, emblems, nicknames, etc. For example, the Roadrunner is the state bird of New Mexico. New Hampshire's state motto is "Live Free Or Die". The state flower of Arizona is the saguaro cactus. Etc, etc, etc ...

When it comes to Texas, the state motto is "Friendship", our official state flower is the Bluebonnet and our state dish is chili con carne.  We've got an "official" something for just about everything. Except the state animal ... we have 8 of them.

I guess Texas is too big and has too many species of animals to pick a certain 1. So, we subdivided the category and narrowed it down 8.

Their a unique bunch too. They fly, they swim, they stampede, one rolls into a little ball  and another bleeds from its eyes.

I think that's how Gene Simmons came up with his schtick.

The official Texas reptile, the Texas Horned Lizard, (aka horny toad), doesn't actually "bleed" from its eyes, it literally squirts blood from its eyes to scare off enemies.

Works on girls too. Actually, when I was around 9 or so, just about anything involving these guys scared off girls.

Photo, Amazon
Photo, Amazon
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Here are the other 7 official state animals of Texas:

For more "official" Texas stuff, click here.

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