Winter Olympics live updates: Eileen Gu defends halfpipe title to win first gold of these Games on Day 16
Tina and Milo — the sibling mascots representing the 2026 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games, respectively — have bounced aroundMilan and Cortina, chopping it up with Snoop Dogg and cheering onathletes from the stands.
Grinning, plushie versions are coveted pieces of Olympics merch, and the organizers have assigned the slender, sharp-eyed creatures distinct personalities and interests: Tina, with her cream-colored fur, has developed an affinity for curling; the brown-coated Milo, whose official biography says he was born missing one paw, is prone to playing practical jokes.
Why a pierogi and the mascot stoats are selling out at the Winter Olympics
Why a pierogi and the mascot stoats are selling out at the Winter Olympics
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In Italian, Tina and Milo are called “ermellini.” For English-speaking Olympic fans, though, the word being used is “stoats.”
“Stoat” — a word first recorded in the 1400s and which stems from the Middle English “stote” — is one of the English names for a small predatory mammal, Mustela erminea, with a short, black-tipped tail, found not only in the Italian Alps but across a broad stretch of Europe, Asia and North America. Stoats are six to 12 inches long, with brown coats that, in some subspecies, turn white in the winter except for the black tail tip.
Small though they are, stoats belong to the famously fierce mustelid family, a carnivorous classification that also includes otters, ferrets and wolverines. They are highly intelligent, voracious predators who can take down prey six times their size, says Andrew Veale, a wildlife geneticist and ecologist who has mapped the stoat genome.
As for their Olympic credentials, Veale calls them “the greatest athletes of the animal world.”
Read more about stoats here.
