Which is Minnesota's most famous animal? Dan Patch? Babe the Blue Ox? The Hamm's bear?

Real animals

• Campus cat: Carleton College was the prowling grounds of a cat named Toff, who became so famous that he got elected to student senate, appeared on postcards sold at the student bookstore and had a statue of him installed at the library. Sadly, Toff died in 2011, but his statue remains.

  Fame-o-meter total: 3

• Bullseye: The Target mascot played by an English bull terrier has been used in national ad campaigns since 1999. He's been profiled by the New York Times, enshrined at Madame Tussauds wax museum, rang the bell at the New York Stock Exchange and put on a 37-foot billboard towering over Target Field in Minneapolis. But how Minnesotan is a dog that lives on a ranch in California with a trainer who specializes in showbiz animals?

  Fame-o-meter total: 6

• MPR raccoon: The racoon that went on a perilous climb up a downtown St. Paul building in June 2018 trended as #MPRraccoon on Twitter, rated mentions on the NBC Nightly News, the BBC, the New York Times and "The Daily Show." Its daring inspired fan art, T-shirts and a tote bag. MPR also did a one-year retrospective on of the creature, which was eventually trapped and released in the wild. But do Minnesotans remember the raccoon like we do, say, the 1991 Halloween blizzard?

  Fame-o-meter total: 6

• Ben Afquack: A pet duck from St. Paul became the star of a viral video in 2020 when it was shown using his webbed feet to play a snare drum. It's gotten 3.3 million views on Facebook, and the duck's Instagram account, @minnesotaduck, has more than 100,000 followers. That won it a Guinness World Record as the most followed duck on Instagram. But does this duck have legs?

  Fame-o-meter total: 6

• Dan Patch: A GOAT of a horse, Dan Patch was a record-setting harness racehorse. In the early 1900s, Dan Patch was "possibly the most famous athlete in America until Babe Ruth," according to Wikipedia. He set records that lasted for decades and his last owner, Marion Savage, became so famous that a Minnesota town was renamed after him. The stallion was used to sell everything from coffee to cars. Minnesota has streets, a rail corridor, a high school stadium and a festival named after him. But would a 20-something know Dan Patch was a horse?

  Fame-o-meter total: 8

• Sparky the sea lion: The Como Zoo has had a lot of famous animals. There are statues commemorating Toby the tortoise and Don the gorilla. Another gorilla, Casey, made front-page news and inspired a children's book after his brief 1994 escape. But the real celebrity is the star of the Sparky Show. A fixture since 1956, the show has had seven different sea lions — all named Sparky. While the marine mammal is mainly known in the Twin Cities, zoo spokesman Matt Reinartz asserts, "It's no exaggeration that millions of Minnesotans old and young know and love Sparky."

  Fame-o-meter total: 9

Imaginary animals

• Pepie the lake monster: Sightings of Pepie, a serpent-like creature said to inhabit Lake Pepin, date back to the 19th century and are part of local Native American lore. There's currently a $50,000 reward for photographic and DNA evidence to prove the existence of the legendary animal. Of course, you could argue Pepie is as much Wisconsin's as Minnesota's because the border runs through the lake, but our state does a better job promoting Pepie's existence, including naming a beer after it.

  Fame-o-meter total: 3

• Rocky and Bullwinkle: The satiric adventures of a squirrel and moose from Frostbite Falls, Minn. (an alias for International Falls) was a network television cartoon from 1959 to 1964 and is fondly remembered by people who were kids back then. Despite reruns and reboots, however, the duo and their enemies, spies Boris Badenov and Natasha Fatale, are mainly for nostalgic baby boomers.

  Fame-o-meter total: 4

• Hamm's bear: The Hamm's bear was created by Minneapolis ad agency Campbell Mithun in 1952 and featured in TV commercials through the 1960s. The cartoon bear was shown being a typical Minnesotan, fishing, camping, canoeing and playing hockey. The lyrics to the jingle — "From the land of sky-blue waters..." — is a loose translation of the Dakota name for the region. A statue of the bear was erected in St. Paul and the Hamm's bear has been included in a list of influential Minnesotans. But the bear hasn't been used in advertising since 2000 because of concerns about cartoon characters peddling adult products.

  Fame-o-meter total: 5

• Snoopy: As the internationally known comic strip character from "Peanuts," created by Minnesota native Charles Schulz, Snoopy has been the star of TV shows and musicals, has lent his name to NASA spacecraft and has floated in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. He's also been used to sell tons of merchandise, and was depicted in scores of "Peanuts on Parade" statues in the Twin Cities. But is Snoopy a Minnesotan? Schulz was never very explicit on where the "Peanuts" universe was.

  Fame-o-meter total: 8

• Babe the Blue Ox: The enduring legends of Paul Bunyan and his bovine sidekick were turned into national icons thanks to an advertising campaign for a Minnesota lumber company. But the origins of the Paul Bunyan legend are claimed by multiple places in North America where there was an active lumber industry. The statues of Paul and Babe in Bemidji may be on the National Register of Historic Places, but there's an even bigger statue of the pair in Klamath, Calif.

  Fame-o-meter total: 8

• Goldy Gopher: Minnesota has plenty of animal mascots, but for longevity, activity and Minnesota-ness, it's hard to beat the University of Minnesota's Goldy Gopher. Minnesota was first dubbed "the Gopher state" in 1857, the U's teams became known as the Gophers in the 1920s and a marching band member first climbed into a fuzzy mascot suit in 1952. Goldy makes 600-plus appearances a year, won a national mascot competition four times and his campus statue has become a good luck charm.

  Fame-o-meter total: 9