Spretting

Spretting is the act of bounding through snow with quick, up and down pouncing motions. Beaglia of all types and varieties spret in order to quickly cover distance, communicate with each other, intimidate prey, or during moments of extreme glree / playfulness.

Origins
Evolutionary biologists and noted Beaglan academics (including Sir Arthur Beagleton himself) have remarked that spretting is likely a behavior that begins during early beagle childhood and persists later in life. It is theorized that in the African Savannah from which all Beaglia descend, packs of tribal beagles moving through tall grasslands would often lose sight of each other directly. Although not directly visible, these beagles could coordinate actions by maintaining white-tipped tail contact at all times, in essence using a basic form of sign language for coordinating hunting, pouncing, and flop-fests.

Adult beagles are able to both view and display their white tail tips quite easily to other adult members of the beagle tribe. Younger members, however, such as Beaglons and Beaglettes, are much shorter in stature, forcing them to periodically hop up in the air to either view or display their tail signals. It is believed that this childhood-phase hopping tactim is the predecessor to spretting of all types, including sprets displayed by older beaglia and beaglia which do not dwell in primarily grassland biomes.

Alternative theories on the origins of spretting are substantially less well-evidenced, though deserve mention. A minority of Beaglologists contend that spretting is functionally equivalent to stotting, a behavior evidenced by Beagzelles indigenous to Africa. When confronted with a predator, occasionally a lone Beagzelle will "stott", or jump directly into the air, to display its clear physical fitness and pre-empt the predators aggression by showing a lengthy and tiring chase would ensue.

Sub-Critical Over-Flop
Due to the vigorous up and down motion of spretting, and the developed size and area of some types of beaglia ear-appendages, spretting can occasionally lead to a sub-critical over-flop, whereby the beagles ears' flop up and down in motion with the resonant frequency  of the ear's swing-length. In such cases tremendous amounts of kinetic energy can build up in the ears of different beaglia, and when such spretting is continued for extended periods of time can set into motion a harmonic oscillation  of ear flops, potentially leading to bruised and swollen cheeks, sore ears, reduced ear softness and hair loss.

Apart from carefully controlled laboratory settings, spretting in the wild does not usually exceed the level of a sub-critical over-flop. In some legends passed down across the ages, exuberant spretting by overweight beagles has lead to catastrophic consequences (see Critical over-flop ).