Unicorn Action
There are many fanciful theories about how unicorns mate but in fact, they mate in the same manner as horses and gazelles. However, unicorns have a rather long gestation period compared to those other creatures. A unicorn doe will carry a foal for about 1230 days or over three years. The mother always gives birth at daybreak concealed in a heavily wooded area. The father stands by to guard the doe during this extremely vulnerable time. Unicorns typically have one off spring at a time.
At the time of birth ( always at daybreak) the mother conceals herself in heavy growth, while the father waits some distance away. When the sun rises and hits the stag's horn, he calls out in joy, celebrating the arrival of the fawn lying white and wet at its mother's side in a thicket.
Unicorn fawns are some of the loveliest of baby animals.Born without horns, they have a hard waxy substance about the size of a bottle cap in the spot from which the horn will sprout, directly in the center of the forehead. Once the fawn has been born and the doe has finished cleaning it, she turns her attention to his forehead.
Most fawns seem actually to push their foreheads toward their mother in order for her to lick the waxy spot, as though it itches. Once the wax has been removed, the horn is able to sprout and can literally be seen to grow before one's eyes. Baby unicorns nurse off and on throughout the day, but especially at dawn and dusk, and often follow these nursing periods with bouts of playful running and jumping, when they resemble lambs gamboling about in the fields.
Young unicorns spend nearly fifty years with their parents, normally remaining until the next fawn is born. Several months before the next baby is due, the mother gently but repeatedly nudges her offspring away. By this time the now fully grown unicorn will have learned to get along on its own. The horns of the young animals are well developed, and as mentioned earlier, will continue to grow throughout the animal's life, although the total length of the horn varies greatly even among animals of the same age.