fd5ea539   
   XPost: rec.arts.books.tolkien   
   From: jcb@inf.ed.ac.uk   
      
   On 2012-04-23, derek  wrote:   
   > On Apr 23, 8:11 am, "pmhil...@myfairpoint.net"   
   > wrote:   
   >> "Sentient" is not required. Porcupine quills will continually work   
   >> their way deeper due to tiny barbs at the tip. Ordinary muscle action   
      
   > I have a lot of experience with porcupine quills - having had 4 dogs   
   > that needed to learn, and one that seemed incapable of it.  The quills   
   > do move quite significant distances - and you know they've gone   
   > _through_ because they extract easily when you are pulling with the   
      
   There are a couple of papers from 50 years ago about this. It seems   
   that American porcupine quills move through human muscle at the rate   
   of about 1mm/hour. (E.g. it took 30 hours for a quill to work from one   
   side of somebody's leg to the other; and a similar speed was found in   
   another incident.) They say it doesn't hurt, but you do notice it.   
      
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    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)