The augerino is a

legendary creature A legendary creature (also mythical or mythological creature) is a type of fictional entity, typically a hybrid, that has not been proven and that is described in folklore (including myths and legends), but may be featured in historical accou ...

present in the folk tales of

lumberjack Lumberjacks are mostly North American workers in the logging industry who perform the initial harvesting and transport of trees for ultimate processing into forest products. The term usually refers to loggers in the era (before 1945 in the Unite ...

and

ranching A ranch (from es, rancho/Mexican Spanish) is an area of landscape, land, including various structures, given primarily to ranching, the practice of raising grazing livestock such as cattle and sheep. It is a subtype of a farm. These terms are ...

communities in the western

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., federal district, five ma ...

.Carol Rose, ''Giants, Monsters, and Dragons: An Encyclopedia of Folklore, Legend and Myth''. Norton, 2001, pp. 30-31.
Google Books link
Tales of the augerino described it as a

subterranean Subterranean(s) or The Subterranean(s) may refer to: * Subterranea (geography), underground structures, both natural and man-made Literature * ''Subterranean'' (novel), a 1998 novel by James Rollins * '' Subterranean Magazine'', an American f ...

creature which inhabited the drier regions of

Colorado Colorado (, other variants) is a state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It encompasses most of the Southern Rocky Mountains, as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the wes ...

. The augerino required a dry environment to survive and would bore holes in dams and

irrigation Irrigation (also referred to as watering) is the practice of applying controlled amounts of water to land to help grow crops, landscape plants, and lawns. Irrigation has been a key aspect of agriculture for over 5,000 years and has been dev ...

ditches to let the water drain out. Some accounts described the augerino as a type of worm, though tales differ on the exact physical description of the creature. The name appears to derive from the diminutive of the common hand tool, the auger. A 1941 investigation of the folk tales of Middle Park, Colorado uncovered stories of the augerino describing it as a gigantic, corkscrew-shaped, indestructible wormlike creature which lined its burrows with a

silica Silicon dioxide, also known as silica, is an oxide of silicon with the chemical formula , most commonly found in nature as quartz and in various living organisms. In many parts of the world, silica is the major constituent of sand. Silica is o ...

substance to keep them from collapsing.Ronald L. Ives, "Folklore of Eastern Middle Park, Colorado". ''Journal of American Folklore'' 54 (1941), pp. 24-43, at pp. 29-30. Some residents apparently believed the creature was authentic, remarking, "Hell, the ditches still leak, don't they?" Folklorist Ronald L. Ives suggested that genuine belief in the creature may have come from misinterpretations of

paleontological Paleontology (), also spelled palaeontology or palæontology, is the scientific study of life that existed prior to, and sometimes including, the start of the Holocene epoch (roughly 11,700 years before present). It includes the study of fossi ...

finds; excavated '' laxispira'' specimens were sometimes known as "Devil's corkscrews" or "fossil augerinos". Ives had also published a fictional short story based on tales of the augerino in 1938. In 2008, a new helical fossil found in

New Mexico ) , population_demonym = New Mexican ( es, Neomexicano, Neomejicano, Nuevo Mexicano) , seat = Santa Fe, New Mexico, Santa Fe , LargestCity = Albuquerque, New Mexico, Albuquerque , LargestMetro = Albuquerque metropolitan area, Tiguex , Offi ...

was named '' Augerinoichnus helicoidalis'' in honor of the augerino.Nicholas J. Minter ''et al''. "Augerinoichnus Helicoidalis, a New Helical Trace Fossil from the Nonmarine Permian of New Mexico". ''Journal of Paleontology'' 82:6 (2008), pp. 1201-1206.

References

{{reflist American legendary creatures Colorado culture Colorado folklore