Hi there Bill, I’ve had this Zangoose for a few weeks now and he’s been great in battle but he seems a little too rowdy, especially around Poison-Type Pokemon. I went to visit a friend of mine in the countryside and my Zangoose started growling at his Ekans and Seviper. Do you have any advice on how to calm my Zangoose??

It’s worth it to remember that zangoose are considered to be blood enemies of serpent pokémon—especially seviper—largely because seviper are their natural food sources. So right now, your zangoose is expressing hostility towards your friend’s pokémon simply because it’s acting on the instinct that says he should be killing and eating them.

That having been said, though, it’s intriguing that you’ve mentioned his aggression on the battlefield as well, which may indicate that your zangoose is not only acting on instinct but also attempting release pent-up anger on a target his species deems acceptable. So as with all issues regarding pokémon behavior, it’s important to begin treating the issue off the battlefield and away from triggering situations first. Consider adding meditative exercises to your daily routine to help manage your zangoose’s stress and aggression levels as well as to teach him discipline. Reward him for exercising restraint during battle training. When encountering poison-types other than your friend’s team, give him a treat every time he behaves (by not growling or moving towards the poison-type), and give him a treat whenever he restrains himself on the battlefield against a poison-type.

Then, when you encounter your friend and his team, reinforce all of these lessons by rewarding zangoose whenever he behaves. If he growls, tell him firmly (but not sternly) that your friend’s pokémon are his friends and that you would appreciate it if he would treat them as such.

If all else fails—and only if all else fails—consider pairing him with a sturdy poison-type to help him understand that they are not targets and be prepared to do plenty of patching up during the socialization process.

In short, it may try your patience, but the key is to teach your zangoose restraint, discipline, and a bit of open-mindedness to boot. Once he begins to associate being on his best behavior around poison-types with rewards, it will be easier to keep your zangoose in check.

Best of luck, anonymous.

Hey there Bill, I’ve had both a Nidoran Male and Female since I was little. I grew up with them by my side and they grew fond of each other. Now they’ve evolved into Nidoking,and Nidoqueen and I was hoping to breed them to get a new generation of Nidorans. I’ve hit a snag though, it seems from whatever reason, they can’t breed. I went to a few other experts and they told me that Nidoqueens can’t breed with Nidokings, and i was wondering if you had any idea why?

By and large, nidoqueen and nidorina are incapable of breeding because for whatever reason, evolution sterilizes female nidoran. Male nidoran and their evolutions, meanwhile, retain the ability to breed throughout their lives, and thus, male nidoran often mate with either female nidoran or ditto to perpetuate their species; they don’t actually mate with a female nidoran’s advanced forms.

As for why evolution sterilizes female nidoran, that’s still a subject of debate in the scientific community, but to be fair, considering the fact that male nidoran grow longer, sharper, and more numerous barbs upon each subsequent evolution (including and especially exactly where you would think), one can hardly blame nature for wanting to offer female nidoran a bit of mercy, if you get my meaning.

I’m looking after my friend’s Fennekin for a few weeks while she’s visiting family and she has not trained it properly, if at all. I feel bad saying this, but it thinks it can do anything it wants. It often steals food, pees wherever it wants and scratches the furniture. I agreed to take it while she was gone because she had noone else to look after it. Is it right for me to try and change its behaviour and how should do this? How do I tell her what she’s done (or hasn’t) without sounding mean?

Before anything else, are you certain that this fennekin always acts like this, even when in the company of its proper trainer? Sometimes, stress can cause pokémon to revert to behaviors associated with younger, untrained pokémon, and the kinds of behaviors you’re describing can also (rarely) occur in pokémon that have been traded. This is because they’re under the impression that they’ve been abandoned by their former trainers, so the first step is actually to reassure them that they haven’t been abandoned at all. It’s just that in your case, whereas traded pokémon need to be reassured that their new trainers love them, you have to convince this fennekin that its old (or, well, current) trainer loves it. This is why she hasn’t recalled fennekin and deposited it in the storage system for the few weeks she’s gone, after all.

So although it’s a bit too late to ask if your friend has a routine with fennekin, it’s worth it to establish one now. Give this fennekin the same amount of attention, affection, and training you give your other pokémon. Use this fennekin in battle to help establish a bond and a level of mutual respect. Do everything you can to treat this fennekin as one of your own pokémon, and it will begin to acclimate to your home.

If this is just typical behavior for your friend’s fennekin or if you need to give her guidance on behavior in yoru home, meanwhile, use positive reinforcement and begin with the simplest thing to correct: housebreaking. Lay down newspaper and whenever you see this fennekin relieving itself anywhere but the newspaper, pick it up and put it on the patch you’ve covered. Any time it relieves itself on the newspaper, reward it with a treat. Eventually, it will begin to associate relieving itself where you tell it to with a reward, which in turn will make the rest of its retraining far, far easier. Use the same tactics for each of the other behaviors. When you see fennekin clawing your furniture, push it off and give it a toy. If it plays with its toys instead, give it a treat for doing so. Place your pokémon’s food bowls far away from this fennekin’s, and any time you see it eating from your pokémon’s dishes, pick it up and carry it to its bowl. If it eats from its bowl (and only its bowl), give it a toy. Reinforce these lessons with words. A simple “no, Fennekin” in response to bad behavior and “good Fennekin” in response to good behavior is enough.

Of course, all of these lessons may be moot if your friend doesn’t actually train her pokémon, but at the very least, this fennekin will understand proper behavior in other people’s homes by the end of this training session.

As for what you should tell your friend, because of the first paragraph in this response (and the uncertainty of whether or not this is normal for her fennekin), it’s extremely unwise to accuse your friend of failing to train her fennekin. However, it’s also vital to be open with your friend, in case this is indeed an issue of either bad training or separation anxiety. Tell your friend that you’ve noticed some strange behavior in her fennekin at first and describe the behaviors you’ve encountered. Also tell her what you’ve done to help her fennekin adjust to your home but never accuse her of being the source of her fennekin’s problems. If you phrase it politely enough, you may be able to convince your friend to look into either her fennekin’s mental health state or reinforcing what you’ve taught it.

In short, yes, it’s perfectly fine (for the sake of both your sanity and your home) to train your friend’s fennekin. It may even be vital to its mental health. It’s just that when it comes time to give it back, be as gentle as possible to both the trainer and the pokémon.

Hey Bill, I’m starting to suspect that my Flygon may be kidnapping people out of jealousy, as she gets quite protective over me when other people/pokemon are around, and my new friends have recently went missing after I introduced her to them. Is there anyway to verify/stop this?

That’s … an unusual situation for a flygon, especially one that’s been well-trained (as I assume yours has). The important thing is that accusing your flygon or being stern with her will not yield any answers. What you’ll need to do is check her usual hiding places. Keep an eye on her if you let her out and try to follow her if she strays from your yard. In addition (not alternatively), ask her nicely and offer her treats if she’s seen your friends. It might even be a good idea to invest in a psychic-type to ensure she’s telling the truth (or to find your friends if she isn’t).

In the meantime, regardless of whether or not your flygon is involved, it may be a good idea to approach the issue that is her overprotective behavior. It may even encourage your flygon to show you where your friends are if she was involved in their disappearances. It’s important to reassure her that you’re not replacing her by maintaining the same level of affection and attention as you usually do. However, it may be prudent to get more pokémon anyway to help her socialize and get used to the idea that you can be “shared,” as it were. As you do this, remember to maintain the amount of love you give your flygon to avoid making her feel like you’ve replaced her with new team members. You may even want to be present as she socializes with her teammates at first. Once she gets used to the idea of sharing you with others and of being around other beings, then you can introduce her to people, but start with public areas with many people, rather than one-on-one interactions with personal friends. If she can get used to seeing you surrounded by other humans, then she’ll find it easier to get used to you forming bonds with some of them. At that point, she may open up and help you find the friends you’ve already made.

Of course, it’s also important to report your friends as missing and to communicate as much as possible either way, as if your flygon is responsible, then it will be some time before she opens up and tells you where they are … and by then, well, law enforcement may be involved. The more you communicate, the more you can make it clear that you didn’t kidnap them.

Best of luck, anonymous!

My friends Zoroark recently gave birth and asked me if I want one of the Zorua. What are the proper methods to taking care of a Zorua? What kind of bed/environment/other Pokémon can it have/be with?

Despite what you might think concerning zorua’s natural masking abilities, taking care of a zorua is actually rather easy and comparable to taking care of any other dog- or fox-like pokémon. They need the same levels of time and affection and very similar training exercises to their non-morphing cousins. Likewise, they can be kept in very similar environments, with very similar beds. You may need to find a larger bed for zoroark, but luckily, it can even use the same sorts of beds as arcanine or ninetales (if it sleeps curled up, anyway—it may also sleep like humanoid pokémon, which would require a humanoid bed).

When it comes to the other basics, as with other canine pokémon, zorua are largely carnivorous, and when not fed kibble, they should be fed meat but can eat some vegetables and grains (in small amounts). It would also be a good idea to invest in chew toys or rawhide for distractions, and be sure to set aside some time each day for play and walks, especially during the first couple of years. Additionally, as with all canine pokémon, zorua can be paper-trained but should be let out to relieve themselves. Zoroark can be toilet-trained, but zorua prefer taking care of themselves in the outdoors. A fenced yard will do just as well, but definitely keep an eye on your zorua as it does so, especially if it grows into a mischievous pokémon when it comes to its ability to disguise itself. Finally, while zorua and zoroark are capable of self-grooming, you can supplement their routine with regular baths. Either way, zorua claws should be regularly trimmed, and their teeth should be brushed. This may be a difficult task as most zorua are finicky about these, but offering a treat for sitting still through these procedures may make things easier.

The only thing to keep in mind is that your zorua will eventually learn to disguise itself and create illusions. However, this is less of a problem than most people think. If you raise a zorua from a young age and treat it with kindness and love, then it won’t attempt to use its abilities to escape, contrary to popular belief. However, it will very likely attempt to create illusions for its own entertainment, so always keep your head about you when your zorua is growing into these abilities. The aforementioned distractions will be more important than ever at this point. Whenever you encounter something that is clearly an illusion (be it entire rooms that shouldn’t be there, pokémon you definitely do not have, or even an extra toaster in your kitchen), offer a toy. This will distract your zorua enough to break the illusion. In the meantime, try your best not to react negatively to your zorua’s illusions. Certainly, show your support and enthusiasm to its developing abilities, but don’t show fear or anger whenever zorua tricks you. (And, yes, this will happen.) Eventually, your zorua will outgrow its attempts to trick you, at which point you can train your zorua to use its abilities during more appropriate times, such as in battle or to protect you or your home.

As for which pokémon zorua work best with, it really depends on whether or not you intend on using your zorua for battle and what its personality is like. You may find it easiest to have a pokémon with Foresight at hand to dispel zorua’s illusions, but that would be protection for you, rather than accompaniment for your zorua. Some zorua do well when paired with other canine pokémon, especially houndour or growlithe, as they may form a pack together. Otherwise, in battle, trainers tend to pair zorua and zoroark with crobat, as their speed, combined with their typing, make them ideal counters to most of zoroark’s weaknesses.

In short, most people tend to think zorua are a challenge to raise, but for the most part, they’re fairly easy. Just remember that ultimately, zorua are canine pokémon … and also that they have a fantastic mischievous streak that can be countered with squeaky toys.

I have a banette and he is not responding to anything i say in and out of battle,I don’t think it’s friendship problems since i captured him in a luxury ball and also didn’t make him battle until a couple months ago. Is there a solution to my problem?

Disobedience in battle may be caused by two things, anonymous.

First, is your banette completely healthy? As in, can your banette hear you when you shout commands? If you’re not sure, take your banette to your local pokémon center and have his hearing tested. If this is the issue, Nurse Joy should be able to suggest options that will help your banette to hear, even if you’re standing far away.

If your banette is perfectly healthy, it’s possible that he doesn’t actually want to battle. Sit down with your banette and communicate with him. Ask him if he would be interested in battling, and if he isn’t, try to figure out what he would like to do instead (if anything). Some pokémon, no matter how well you treat them, simply don’t want to battle, especially if they feel they’ve reached their “peak” (as some fully evolved pokémon do). Others have interests that lie elsewhere and just don’t have the heart to battle. It’s important to figure out what piques your banette’s interest and support him, regardless of what that is. Never force your banette to battle if he simply doesn’t want to battle.

If he does want to battle but still shies away from the battlefield, consider adding more time to his routine training regimen. It’s also possible that he’s simply afraid to battle, so it will take a bit of extra work to build his confidence.

Best of luck, anonymous!

Half way through my pregnancy I noticed a hypno in the yard. I put up cleanse tags only to see it stand at the edge of the yard… just waiting. I’ve since let my houndoom stay in the yard at night to keep it away, but every time he chases the hypno off, it returns. Is it after my child? How can I keep my baby safe?

There are two reasons why a hypno is lurking about your property: one good and one bad. The bad possibility involves the fact that hypno feed on sweet dreams, particularly those of small children (as they have particularly potent imaginations). It’s possible that this hypno has sensed the fact that you’re expecting and is thus waiting for a possible meal—or feeding on your hopeful dreams.

The good possibility involves the fact that hypno are psychics. They can sense negative energy, even if humans can’t sense it themselves. These hypno, then, are not there to feed off you or your child but rather to feed off whatever threat it perceives around you in order to protect your dreams. (Why it would do that tends to vary from hypno to hypno. Some do it to preserve a possible food source. Others do it simply because they revere small children due to their powerful imaginations.)

In order to determine the cause of your hypno’s presence, start off by having your houndoom use Odor Sleuth to ensure there are no negative energies in the house. If there aren’t, approach the hypno as cautiously as possible. If the hypno attacks you, drive it back with houndoom. It may then be a good idea to invest in a guard ghost, such as a mismagius or banette, to drive away the hypno with negative energy to counter your positive. Partnering your baby with a munna or musharna (which can “claim” your baby and thus discourage the hypno) might also help drive hypno away.

If, however, the hypno doesn’t attack you but instead continues to watch your house or something around you, ask it to join you or try to catch it. Even if it’s malevolent, catching it (when it isn’t trying to attack you) gives you an advantage: you have the ability to train the hypno to leave your child alone or store it in the PC system to keep it away from your child. If it’s benevolent, then asking it to join you will bring its protection into your home. It’d still be a good idea to train it to leave your child alone, however, as it’s still a pokémon that feeds primarily on dreams and thus needs to be taught to go against its instincts around a potent source of them.

As always, best of luck, anonymous!

I cannot eat certain ingredients due to allergies so I have my slurpuff take a sniff of them so I know I won’t get sick. When they do have ingredients inside that I can’t eat she eats them! This has become an expensive habit, how do I get her to stop?

Well, to be fair, your slurpuff is attempting to remove the dish so you don’t eat it at all. As you likely know, certain food allergies carry a risk of cross-contamination, meaning you may get sick from attempting to salvage the meal and eating around the ingredients. (This is especially true for nut allergies, due to the fact that many nuts have oils that may contaminate otherwise safe food.) So you will likely encounter some expense with handling food you’re allergic to either way, and if your slurpuff eats only the foods you can’t eat, it’s likely it’s operating under that assumption. Of course, it’s true that you’re likely referring to situations in which you’re eating out and can therefore ask a waiter to take back a dish and remake it free of charge; it’s just that it’s worth it to understand the reasoning behind your slurpuff’s habit.

That having been said, you may wish to switch to a growlithe, which, due to their extreme loyalty, will not eat anything unless it has express permission to eat it. Alternatively, considering the fact that you have a medical condition, you could possibly apply for a pokémon trained specifically to sniff for allergens.

If, however, you wish to continue using your slurpuff, it’s important to teach her to heel. When at home, set out a dish of her own food and train her to wait before eating it. Show her a treat as an incentive to wait. If she waits (that is, if she sits perfectly still, not if she goes for your hand instead), give her a treat. If she moves towards your hand or the dish, put the treat away. Eventually, she’ll associate waiting with rewards, so she’ll be easier to train to sniff out allergens. In order to do this, have her heel beside you and let her sniff the dish. If she tries to eat your food, have her stop and heel. If she listens to you, give her a treat and send back the dish that would have made you sick. Teach her to place a paw on your arm or give you some other signal that will let you know that the dish is dangerous without taking it for herself, and make it clear to her that she doesn’t have to get rid of the dish herself.

Also, be consistent with your training. If you allow her to sniff your food as you go grocery shopping or whenever you cook at home, don’t let her “dispose” of the food herself. Train her that it’s okay to send back the food or discard it some other way. If you’re consistent with what you teach her, she’ll be more likely to recall the lessons she’s learned when you take her with you to restaurants.

How do we know what the shiny variations of legendary pokemon look like if there is supposed to only be one of each species? And how do we know their typings if it’s so hard to get close to one? Is the “one of each” thing simply a myth telling us how rare these pokemon are?

Legendary pokémon are rather unique in that there are actually an abundance of depictions of them via ancient art. Remember, legendaries are essentially gods or powerful spirits to many cultures, and as such, many humans have created paintings, idols, statues, and so forth depicting what legendaries are normally like. We can gather that the images we see are of “normal” variations if that legendary is of a particular color in many of its depictions. For example, we assume that Ho-oh’s normal coloring includes blue, green, and violet because most of the paintings in Johto depict it as such. Thus, if we ever see Ho-oh without those colors, we can safely assume that this is a variant color, not its normal coloration. (Either that, or our ancestors were wrong.)

As for typings, we don’t always know for certain, although we can collect data from exceptionally strong trainers who have managed to encounter or capture one themselves. For those legendaries we still have yet to catch (Arceus and Ho-oh, for example), the officially listed typing is more or less a hypothesis based on what we know from their respective legendaries. Ho-oh, for one, is listed as a fire- and flying-type because it’s a bird known for its sacred flames. Lugia, by contrast, is a flying- and psychic-type (as opposed to water or dragon) because the legends about it describe abilities that are more in line with psychic-types than water- or dragon-types … and also because we have data from trainers who have managed to get close enough to Lugia to observe it.

Finally, as for your question concerning uniqueness … that’s a difficult one to answer. For some legendaries, it’s very true that there are more than one, and the uniqueness the pokédex emphasizes is really just a label, as you say. This is the case with Latios, Latias, and Lugia (although the lugia Johtonians worship is a very specific one, not just any lugia—and lugia are extremely rare either way). Meanwhile, for other, more powerful legendaries (such as Arceus, Dialga, Palkia, and so forth), it’s very likely there’s only one. Then there are legendaries who are somewhere in between—that is, we don’t have enough data to determine whether or not they’re unique. This is the case with legendaries such as Mew or even Ho-oh.

In short, much of what we know about legendaries is tied to conjecture based on legends and folklore. In reality, we don’t have a lot of data to know for certain if many of our assumptions—of populations, of powers, and even of color—are completely true.

I suppose a follow up question would then be why not just make Dusk/Dive/etc. balls perform better under all circumstances? Is it to preserve their battery life or something? (also what happens when a poke ball runs out of power?)

Actually, it’s because those balls were specifically designed for certain types of trainers. As uncomfortable as it is to admit this, it’s largely due to business. Putting it another way, ultra balls are the best type of universal poké ball (meaning its capture rate is consistent in all situations, and it’s the best type of ball available to the public wherein that’s true), but it still has a reasonable chance of failing. Meanwhile, you have balls that work better than the ultra in certain situations, but in other situations, they’re comparable to poké balls. Additionally, these other balls can be marketed towards certain demographics. Dusk, for example, can be marketed towards those who specialize in cave or nocturnal pokémon, dive can be marketed towards fishermen and swimmers, timer can be marketed as a last-resort poké ball for trainers after specific pokémon, nest can be marketed towards those with exceptionally strong teams, and so forth.

By contrast, there is a poké ball that works better than ultra balls (the master ball, specifically), but this is not available to the public. The reason why is because if everyone has access to a ball that has a 100% capture rate all of the time, they’ll be less likely to buy balls because they’ll need far, far fewer of them.

In short, it’s not so much because of a technological restriction as it is because of capitalism, anonymous.

As for what would happen if a poké ball’s battery runs out, that’s extremely unlikely because of how long the lifespan of a ball’s power source actually is (and because various transfer systems also recharge said power source every time a ball is converted to electricity and data), but should it happen, there’s a failsafe within the ball that will automatically release your pokémon just before the battery dies. It’s the same failsafe that’s triggered whenever your poké ball becomes too damaged to safely contain a pokémon.