Lithuanian Riddles with Answers · Page 5

a buckwheat grain

The three-sided hull is the barn; the pale edible kernel is its white calf.

ice

In sustained frost, the ice layer thickens as though it were an animal gaining weight without food.

ice

The old buckets are bodies of water; the lids are the fresh ice covers that form each winter.

an earthworm

The reddish worm fears the rooster that might eat it; the dog is not its usual danger here.

a year

The twelve months are brothers joined by a single belt: the repeating annual cycle.

a year

The birds count 12 months, 52 complete weeks, 365 days of a common year, and 4 seasons; the weeks leave one extra day.

a dog

The playful sound words echo curling up, the posture of a dog resting beneath a bench.

a bee

The small bee is the fellow; its painful sting is the sharp axe.

a bee

A beekeeper knows the hive but usually cannot identify a single foraging bee as belonging to that colony.

hemp

The branching green plant resembles a spruce. The winter cow refers to the milky drink made from crushed hemp seeds.

a cow

The pokers are horns, the four feet are legs, and the final swishing part is the tail.

a cow

The long tongue is the pine tree; the two nostrils it can lick clean are the ovens.

a swallow

The bird shapes mud into a nest with its bill and saliva, without human building tools.

a swallow

The clay hut is the mud nest. The playful word kukoriškai presents the swallow's chatter as an unfamiliar language.

a potato

The armful is the leafy stem growth, while the apple is a rounded underground tuber.

a potato

Flowers appear above ground, edible tubers below. Here fruits means the crop; botanically, tubers are not fruits.

an apple tree

Picking apples feeds the person and reduces the weight of fruit carried by the branches.

a plum

The fruit becomes a small person; the soft-looking bloom on the plum's skin suggests velvet.

night

The black cow is darkness; knocking people down means sending them to lie down and sleep.

water

Liquid water flows together again after a blade passes through, unlike a solid object that stays cut.

water

Open water is naked; a winter layer of ice becomes its clothing.

clouds

Clouds move across the sky on the wind, so their motion is imagined as flying or wading without limbs.

frost

Ice crystals on cold glass form branching patterns like flowers drawn by an invisible artist.

frost

Cold suddenly stinging an exposed nose feels like an unseen visitor grabbing it.

an ox

The pipes are the cow's four teats, overturning mountains is ploughing, and dancing after death means shoes made from its hide.

a pig

A pig's ordinary grunting sounds like human groaning, even when nothing is wrong.

a pig

Rooting for food with its snout turns over soil, making the pig a ploughman with no tools.

a wild strawberry

The red fruit is the cap. People bend to pick the low-growing berry, as if bowing to her.

a wild strawberry

The plant's white blossom is followed by its ripe red berry.

stars

The many stars form a flock, with the single moon imagined as their shepherd.

stars

The many small points of starlight resemble peas scattered along an immense road in the sky.

a raspberry

The ripe red fruit pulls away from its pale receptacle, leaving that white heart attached to the plant.

a river

The long winding river is a divine belt too vast to roll up like an ordinary strip of cloth.

an acorn

A split acorn yields two shell halves and two seed leaves; its cupule is the cap.

a fish

The supposed wings are fins, allowing the legless fish to move swiftly through water.

a fish

The overlapping shiny scales are coins; the opening sound words playfully make them jingle.

a magpie

Its plumage supplies the black-and-white contrasts; flying and landing explain the apparently impossible differences in height.

the earth

The earth becomes a mother's vast store chest, far beyond anyone's power to lift.

a lake

The water's surface is the field. A boat can cross it without leaving lasting ruts like a cart on land.

a dahlia

The tall stem becomes a tree, and its rounded flower becomes a sun rising above it.