THE BOGWING
Dagobah. The name conjures up images of dark, mist-covered jungles, mysterious caves, and humid swamps full of exotic and dangerous creatures - of whom we know very little about. Only several have actually been documented, including a flying carnivore called the bogwing.
The bogwing are territorial creatures with natural camouflage, sharp eyesight, and superior night-vision. Their two membranous wings can span from 1 to 3 metres, with a body length of 1 to 5 metres. In addition to the two wings, bogwings also posses four thin limbs tipped with sharp claws for climbing and hunting, and a long, thin tail. Their mouths lined with many small, sharp teeth the bogwings prey on small reptiles and rodents, massive insects and other small creatures.
Usually flying through the jungles in small groups of three or four, they communicate with a shrill distinctive cry, but otherwise fly in complete silence.
A much larger subspecies of bogwing live above the tree tops, feeding almost exclusively on the rodents that reside in the highest branches. They grow to about twice the wingspan of the normal bogwings, and fly on thermal air currents.
When the bogwings appeared in TESB, only one small puppet was actually used. The illusion of a large bogwing population was created by combining a variety of shots of the puppet. During the blue screen filming, the puppet’s wings were manipulated to create a flapping effect. We only actually see bogwings in TESB twice. The first being about 40 mins into the film just after Luke has crash landed, we see two fly across the screen, and about 60 mins into the film when Luke is training with Yoda, one flies across and a few seconds later, another.
