Labor Six - Destroy The Stymphalian BirdsEurystheus gave Hercules his next task, to destroy all thirty Stymphalian birds. Any other person would have trouble killing one of them. Hercules went to the middle of Greece to the Stymphalian valley where the birds lived.
When Hercules entered the valley, all was quiet. There was not a sound or sight for miles except for a single stone mountain. He walked to the base of the mountain and curiously started to climb. Before he got very far he met the first bird. It dove at him and bounced right off the skin that Hercules had received from the skin of the Nemean lion. Hercules caught it and slashed its soft body with his knife. On the way up to the top of the mountain, Hercules had 9 more encounters very much like this one. He cut up the birds with ease. When he reached the top looking for the other twenty birds he saw them flying in the sky overhead.
Hercules sat and waited for 24 hours until finally he heard a squawk behind him. There it was, the last bird. It was just like the other birds except it was at least ten times the others' size. Hercules faced the bird bravely. After what seemed like an eternity, Hercules lunged at the bird. He took his knife out and started to stab. Somehow he could never hit the bird. The bird flew up in the air and knocked Hercules down. It then began to pull off the Nemean lion's skin. Hercules turned around and in one moment, slashed it across the stomach. Moments later, the bird was motionless on the top of the mountain. Hercules gathered the birds up in a net and brought them to
Eurystheus.
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Everybody in Greece had heard about the birds. They were said to have bronze beaks and bronze claws. They ate humans and easily killed them by diving into them.
He took arrows and started shooting at the birds. One by one the birds started to fall. Hercules had killed all but three and he only had two arrows left. He shot down one and then the other. The last bird was nowhere in sight. Hercules knew that he had counted right and decided he would wait until he saw the last bird.
