Cockatrice, a basilisk's cousin. A creature feared as much as timberwolves, maybe even more. I understand that the idea of being turned into stone and remaining like that for eternity with snails slithering over your face isn't exactly pleasant. Well, that idea has one substantial flaw. If it worked as described above, the Everfree would look like the statue garden in Canterlot by now. Speaking of the garden, you might have heard some hearsay about some of the statues there being ponies intentionally exposed to the curse of cockatrice for ‘preservation’. It’s all mere gossip as you’ll learn below.
Cockatrices
Hierarchy
Given these creatures are half-chicken and half-snake, I find it quite reasonable to refer to the male and female cockatrice as rooster and hen, respectively. I’m also not aware of anyone else introducing a cockatrice-specific terminology yet.
Roosters are highly territorial, fiercely defending the patches of forest where their harem tends to roam. One rooster’s harem consists of three to four hens on average, the amount of hens is defined mainly by the size of the territory and the amount of food and shelters found therein. The hens hardly ever flock together, foraging on their own most of the time.
The hens gather only when another rooster challenges their master to a duel over his harem. The challenger initiates this by crowing in the rival's territory, and all the cockatrices (including nesting hens) rush to watch the duel. Once the whole harem had gathered, the two roosters engage each other in a stare off.
Cockatrices aren't completely immune to their own weapon, thus both opponents are slowly petrifying each other. Turning their gaze away, or, far more rarely, being completely turned to stone, means defeat. The loser is then punished by a slash of talons and chased away, or left behind in his stone prison in case of the latter.
Roosters also have their own specific forest-wide hierarchy. Roosters of higher status have larger territories and are more likely to be tolerated when passing through territories of others.
Diet
Cockatrices mainly feed on insects, earthworms, and slugs they found in leaf litter or under smaller objects. Their beak is not shaped for digging. If invertebrates are scarce, they can survive on berries and seeds for a limited amount of time. They might occasionally spice up their diet with smaller mammals, hatchlings, and eggs.
They never use the stare when hunting as it’d only result in their prey being scared off or turned to stone immediately. It may seem as a good way of trapping the prey since cockatrices have the ability to release their petrified victims on will, however, the whole process costs much more energy than what the consumption of a small bird or rodent would provide.
Range and Associated Ecology
Cockatrice territories are marked by crowing of roosters and pheromone secretions of hens. These have rather pungent odour, so you should be able to tell when you stumble into one. Most territories can be found in areas of central Everfree with dense bushy undergrowth, but it’s not impossible to encounter a cockatrice closer to the forest edge. Most of these are males attracted by crowing of normal roosters from nearby villages.
As was already stated, crowing is mostly reserved for challenging opponents to a stare off. Casual communication happens mainly through infrasound waves, much like in case of elephants and snakes. Given their eyes were largely repurposed for channelling magic, the cockatrices’ sight is rather poor. They may still use it to scan their surroundings, but hearing is definitely their primary sense. This fact is nicely illustrated by how they explore their surroundings.
Upon spotting a large creature, a cockarice slowly crawls nearer through the underbrush. Once close enough, it sticks its head out of the bush, facing away from the creature. It then analyses the situation behind it by hearing and occasionally a few side glances. It seems like a risky strategy, as the cockatrice might be mistaken for an innocent chicken by some predator, but apparently it’s worked so far. If the cockatrice decides that the creature poses a threat or is a larger prey item, it strikes.
The cockatrice jumps at its prey, using the moment of surprise to pin it to the ground with its talons. It then proceeds to eat the creature, or, in case of larger beings, petrify it. However, coackatrice petrification is only temporary and serves as a mere warning, much like the disgusting secretions of poisonous animals. This is the reason why the Everfree isn’t littered with dozens upon dozens of petrified victims.
Reproduction
Hens can lay up to four leathery eggs, nesting might occur from Spring to early Autumn. Hatchlings are nidicolous, meaning they stay in the nest and depend on their mother for sustenance. Whenever the hen returns with more food, the hatchlings switch from quiet peeping to intensely fixing their mother with their stares and pecking at the red tips of her wings--much like many seagull hatchlings do with the red spot on their parents' beaks. Young cockatrices wander away after reaching maturity to join harems or fight for other territories. Only rarely do they stay in the territory where they hatched.
Appropriate Behaviour, Handling Potential Petrification
If you are (un)lucky enough to encounter a cockatrice the best course of action is to fly/teleport/run away or stay completely still--not sure which is better, especially for earth-bound ponies. You can close your eyes, wait and just hope that the cockatrice'll think you aren't a living creature. If you want to take a closer look for some reason, you'll need special goggles with a polarising filter. Looking into their eyes "bare-eyed" isn't the best idea as you already know. That is, unless you want a shiny new coat or a nice deep scratch from their talons.
Cockatrices fear foxes, my guess is that it’s a side effect of them being part chicken. However, a normal pony doesn’t usually have a fox at hoof, and a truly angry cockatrice will ignore the presence of a fox anyway, so this piece of advice is not really applicable. But hey, somepony might find it useful anyway. What might be a bit more practical is the fact that if you are fast enough and manage to put a mirror in a cockatrice's line of sight, you’ll effectively freeze it in place as it's blind and deaf to the world when staring.
If you find yourself in a spot where you need to deal with a petrified creature, then just know that a small hammer should be enough. The stone is just a crust on the surface of the petrified one. Let's say that testing this theory was quite... peculiar. If the brute force approach is not for you, waiting also works--the stone starts falling apart on its own after a day or two. The trapped one is in a state of torpor during their entrapment, and they should wake up once you pull them out, just provide them with fresh water and something to eat. There are a few reports of stiff joints and slight muscle atrophy after a longer period of petrification, but to be fair, the credibility of these documents is not exactly high.
Also, some old sources claim that the higher the cockatrice’s hierarchy rank, the longer will its petrification last. The alfa rooster's stare might even result in permanent petrification. However, I haven't collected any data on that yet.
Another interesting fact is that the stone the “prison” is made of is the same as the nearest parent rock. I suspect they derive it partially from there.
Since we are already discussing creatures able to somewhat alter one's appearance, let's mention a plant with a similar ability. However, this one is not likely to turn you to stone. It’s going to do something much worse.
Lilium noxia cupiunt
as called by the botanists of the Classical era, now commonly known as poison joke, is one of the rarest plants of the Everfree. A small, innocent-looking blue flower with the ability to alter the physical form of any creature, from vocal cord tightness to bone density.
These plants can grow only on a few sites in the Everfree, though they might become very abundant in these localities. They create patches of dense, linked underbrush, most of the “individual” plants being asexually produced clones of just a few parent plants. Poison jokes require medium humidity and don't react well to being completely overshadowed; you'll most likely find them around remains of old paths to the Castle of the Two Sisters or former clearings as both provide enough light for these plants. This makes poison joke one of the most excellent paleobotany indicators.
Their magic is contained in the powder produced by their anthers and also the outer membrane of their pollen grains. The powder's primary purpose is protection from herbivores and pollen eaters. In other words, touching the plant carefully and in the right places won't cause any harm--just like a tender grip on a nettle will help prevent you from getting stung.
You are probably wondering how is it possible that you have encountered the blue flowers almost every time you had ventured into the Everfree if the joke is supposed to be so scarce. If you were lucky enough, these really were the rare jokes, but much more likely it was the common Lilium hyacinthum, commonly called "blue archer” in old Zebrican. These plants can survive being overshadowed by the treetops or growing in wetter soil, so that's why they are very common not just in the Everfree Forest.
You can tell blue archer apart from poison joke by the presence of white or light blue spots at the bases and ends of petals. Though the most accurate--and also the easiest--method is determining the number of stamens the plant has. Poison joke has four, you can remember it by four letters of the common name, J-O-K-E, while archer has six of them, so you can use the mnemonic device: A-R-C-H-E-R.