Herbivores Are Friendly

"Observe how the plant eaters share their feeding time with their carnivorous companion with no fear of him turning on them. Truly remarkable!"

Lex: Sh. Sh. Don't let the monsters come over here.
Dr. Alan Grant: They're not monsters, Lex. They're just animals. And these are herbivores.
Tim: That means they only eat vegetables, but for you I think they'd make an exception.

— Jurassic Park

This trope, along with Predators Are Mean, are a fairly common approach to Carnivore Confusion in fiction. Basically, all the villains are carnivores and all the herbivores, particularly if they can talk, are heroes.

Like Predators Are Mean, this trope has been around for such a long time that it may be one of The Oldest Ones in the Book. Herbivores Are Friendly often, but not always goes hand-in-hand with Predators Are Mean.

This trope and Predators Are Mean are so strong culturally that people assume that many Real Life predators (whether omnivorous or carnivorous by nature) are mean, evil, and nasty, and all the herbivores are cute, cuddly, and friendly.

This trope is not Truth in Television for the most part. Herbivores may attack a human to claim or defend their territory, protect their children, drive away a potential predator, or just because they’re in a bad mood. Indeed, the most dangerous large mammals in the world are actually big herbivores; the hippopotamus and the elephant are known to attack and kill humans even without being provoked. In North America, more people are killed by cattle each year than by bears, mountain lions, venomous snakes, sharks, and alligators combined. In other words, just because an animal won't eat you, doesn't mean it won't hurt you. Conversely, domesticated dogs and cats, both of whom are inclined to be friendly with humans, are inherently carnivorous. Many omnivores, such as the whale shark, are never a threat to humans.

Temple Grandin's book, Animals in Translation, explains that domesticated cattle can be a lot harder to handle compared to most felines (wild or domestic, big, small, or medium). A domestic bovine may attack a person in order to exert dominance or protect a calf, but a tiger will not do so unless its prey drive is triggered, as it is a largely solitary animal that, true to nature of all cats, does not care about social hierarchy.

Some herbivores are portrayed as threatening and aggressive on a fairly regular basis. Boars (technically omnivorous), goats, rams, bulls, stallions, rhinoceroses, elephants, hippopotamuses, kangaroos, and gorillas are especially prone to this. When dinosaurs are concerned, you can expect ceratopsians, pachycephalosaurs (technically omnivorous), stegosaurs, and ankylosaurs to also be portrayed this way. On the subject of insects, expect this to be true of bees and moreso termites. Another common exception, when herbivores are depicted as dangerous, is if they get involved in an Animal Stampede.

Goes hand-in-hand with and opposite of Predators Are Mean. Inverted with Xenophobic Herbivore. Often associated with Carnivore Confusion. Subtrope to Good Animals, Evil Animals, Always Lawful Good, and Virtuous Vegetarianism.

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Examples:

Anime & Manga

• Half of the plot points of Beastars is that the populace is convinced of this while also believing Carnivores Are Mean. Though the truth isn't as black and white.
• Oumagadoki Doubutsuen subverts this trope with Rodeo, the humanoid horse in the Circus Arc: he embraces the theory that Predators Are Mean to the point of petty racism, calling carnivores dumb and brutal and going all out on them: when Kisazou, whom he previously respected as a fellow herbivore, tries to protect Uwabami (a snake-woman), Rodeo doesn't hesitate to mark him as an enemy too.
• Zigzagged in Toriko: most of the dangerous beasts they encounter are carnivorous and highly destructive, though the backstory of the Battle Wolf mentions how a colossal, herbivorous kaiju known as the "Death Gore" nearly destroyed all life on earth due to their insatiable appetite for whole forests. Played straight among the incredibly powerful Eight Kings: non carnivorous ones like Horse King Herakles and the Deer King Sky Deer are the least aggressive of the eight (though by no mean less dangerous...)

Comic Books

• Atomic Robo: Zig-zagged in "The Trial of Atomic Robo". Doctor Dinosaur's latest killing machine is the "omnisaur" — half Triceratops, half Ankylosaurus and half Stegosaurus. Robo points out that those are all herbivores.
  Dr Dinosaur: Herbivores. What was I thinking? Oh, right! The super-beams!
  Robo: The what? [omnisaur starts glowing]

Fan Works

• Averted with a vengeance in the Lost World RPG retelling of The Lost World: Jurassic Park set in the Amalgam'verse. While the carnivores such as the Troodon and Carnotaurus menace the expedition and BioSyn hunters, the only docile dinosaurs the team meets are all carnivores such as a Suchomimus. The most aggressive non-hybrid dinosaur encountered is a Mamenchisaurus the team uses to destroy the hunter camp, during which released Triceratops, Parasaurolophus, Stegosaurus, and Pachycephalosaurus all join in on trampling or attacking anyone they come across in their dash for freedom.

Films — Animation

• The Bad Guys: Professor Marmalade is introduced as this. In contrast to the rough-natured predator species Bad Guys, Marmalade is an adorable, soft-spoken little guinea pig and also a beloved philanthropist. Subverted; he's revealed to be Evil All Along and far worse than the Bad Guys ever were, willing to steal from children's charities and attempt murder.
• Inverted in A Bug's Life. The protagonists are omnivorous ants (though they're only shown eating plants), and their allies include predators such as a mantis, a ladybug, and a spider. The villains, by contrast, are herbivorous grasshoppers.
• Another dinosaur example is the movie Dinosaur. The main characters are all herbivores, and even the mean herbivore rivals are only trying to accomplish the greater good.
• The main dinosaur characters from The Land Before Time. Chomper the friendly Sharptooth is an exception. In the sequels and TV series, an Oviraptor (an omnivorous dinosaur) named Ruby joins the heroes.
• In Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Snow White quickly gains the sympathy of a large group of Woodland Creatures, who do everything they can to help her. Nearly all of them are herbivores, with the sole exception of a couple of raccoons.^note Raccoons are technically omnivores, and don't even belong in Europe.

Films — Live-Action

• Mothra is among the most peaceful of all kaiju and happens to be a nectar-feeding butterfly/moth. So long as you don't kidnap her fairy companions or harm her children in any way, she won't hurt you. And if you do, you'll find that she wrecks cities as well as any Kaiju.
• A subversion occurs with Godzilla Junior. Though he is shown eating leaves in Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla II, his species is actually carnivorous. Though, compared to his more aggressive father, he is quite friendly.
• Jurassic Park:
  • In Jurassic Park (1993), Dr. Grant calms Alex down when she sees nearby Brachiosaurus by reassuring her that they're plant-eaters.
    Tim: Veggie-sauruses!
  • Inverted in The Lost World: Jurassic Park — Sarah upsets a Stegosaurus and barely escapes with her life. In this case it was justified, as she accidentally frightened their baby and the adults moved to protect their young from a potential threat.
  • The Jurassic World website lists almost all of its herbivores as having low aggression, with the exception of the armor-plated Ankylosaurus, whose aggression is listed as "medium". In fact, across the series as a whole, not a single herbivorous dinosaur— not even the stereotypically "aggressive" ones like ceratopsians and ankylosaurs— has ever been shown killing a human onscreen.
  • Jurassic World Dominion averts this trope, though mainly not with the dinosaurs. While the carnivorous dinosaurs are a major threat to the heroes, the danger to civilization as a whole actually comes from genetically engineered locusts created by BioSyn, which are devouring food plants around the world.
    • For the aversion on dinosaur side, we have Therizinosaurus, which, while herbivorous, kills a deer that gets in its way and actively pursues the human protagonists for no clear discernable reason. Notably, it was the first time a herbivore was Played for Horror in the franchise, no differently from the carnivores.
• Tyranno's Claw has several dinosaurs, the only ones which aren't hostile being a pachycephalosaurus who attacks in self-defense (where the sole caveman it killed is an Accidental Murder) and the Gentle Giant triceratops who befriends the main cast. Meanwhile, the pterosaur, giant rodent and ape-people tries killing everything in sight, while the film's main threat is a T-Rex.

Literature

• Ring World: Averted in practice — the herbivorous Puppeteers are collectively ruthless, paranoid and deceitful, while Pak protectors are xenophobic killing machines who eat nothing but tree roots — but the Kzinti are under the cultural bias that anything that isn't a carnivore is inherently weak, cowardly, and/or stupid; "you don't need brains to sneak up on a leaf!" They've faced many nasty subversions to this expectation throughout the series; Puppeteers, Pak, the "grass giants" on Ringworld, humanity, and so on.
• Redwall often shows this. Squirrels (technically omnivores, but mostly eat plants), hares, and other herbivores, and a few omnivores such as badgers, mice, and hedgehogs, are the heroes, where wholly carnivorous species such as weasels, stoats, wild cats, snakes, hawks, ferrets, foxes (actually omnivorous, but still predatory), and the like are the villains. This is rather odd considering the fact that the most prominent species, the mice of Redwall, are omnivores but never eat any meat besides fish. One would reason that they never eat any intelligent creatures, but there has been at least one intelligent talking fish in the series.
• Prince Roger: Discussed in March Upcountry: Captain Pahner sees a large herbivore on an unfamiliar planet and tells his troops not to fire. Prince Roger shoots the thing anyway, because he has actually been on safari and knows that herbivores are not harmless (and because he hadn't figured out the com software yet and hadn't heard the order).
• Dinoverse: Played around with. In the first set of books, the Leptoceratopses abduct Candayce and shove Janine around, and Candayce figures out that they were trying to protect her — she's in the body of a Leptoceratops and they don't understand why she's hanging out with a Tyrannosaurus rex. Similarly, when they encounter a Triceratops herd, it is hostile in defense of its nests, but is less so later, realizing that a little Leptoceratops and a wounded Quetzalcoatlus aren't threats. The Ankylosaurus met later on is friendly to the boy in the Ankylosaurus body, but wary at best of all the others.
• Animorphs: The Hork-Bajir are, when free from Yeerk control, naturally docile and unintelligent creatures who use the numerous blades on their bodies to strip bark from trees for food. A community of Hork-Bajir who escape the Yeerks become close allies of the Animorphs.
• Maddrax: The hydrites are an absolutely peace-loving species of Fish People and vegetarians.
• Played with in one Choose Your Own Adventure-style book. Your character is a member of the Space Police hunting an outlaw who's captured rare creatures, and the outlaw turns your android partner against you. You have the choice of opening one of two cages- a carnivorous animal or an herbivorous one. If you open the carnivore's cage, you'll be eaten. If you open the herbivore's cage, the android will preemptively attack it, resulting in it fighting back and enabling you to gain the upper hand.
• Prehistoria: The Raptor's Tail: The Therizinosaurus is portrayed as relatively calm and placid around the protagonist, a comparatively tiny species of raptor, because she is no threat to giant herbivore. The male Deinocheirus on the other hand is a hormone addled brute which attacks any animal he feels is intruding on his territory during mating season, going out of his way to charge the protagonist and later fighting the Therizinosaurus when the two run into one another.
• Quest for Fire plays this straight with the cave bear and giant apes but averts it hard with the aurochs who are just plain nasty. The mammoths are portrayed more complexly: They are easily befriended by the human protagonists because they have no fear of predation but they can be downright lethal if provoked.
• Inverted with a vengeance in The Lost Fleet. The bear-cows are a herbivore race whose fear of predators manifests as omnicidal mania. Meanwhile, the obviously predatory dancers are quite reasonable and more than willing to engage in diplomacy and trade as soon as the translation problems that make both sides come across as oddly patronizing are worked out.
• The Dinosaur Lords: Subverted, the titular dinosaur mounts are most often herbivores (hadrosaurs, parasaurolophus, pachycephalosaurus, etc.), but no less deadly for it. There are some carnivore mounts, and Deinonychus are used in a manner similar to hunting dogs, but they tend to be Awesome, but Impractical.
  • One such subversion helps kick off the plot: to counter Karyl's otherwise-invincible Triceratops line, Rob sends a herd of Ankylosaurs their way. It's specifically stated that they'll eagerly fight due to being natural competitors for territory and pasture, not to mention being very good at killing each other (triceratops by flipping the ankylosaurs over with their horns, ankylosaurs by smashing the triceratops' legs).

Live-Action TV

• The herbivore dinosaurs in Terra Nova are shown to be playful in the pilot episode. The main character's youngest daughter even feeds them leaves.
• Spoofed in Dinosaurs as the herbivores are presented as dinosaur versions of hippie pacifists and marijuana users, which becomes a problem when the son Robbie (think Lisa Simpson's version of the series) becomes an herbivore.
• Prehistoric Planet averts this with the Dreadnoughtus: contrary to the typical portrayal of sauropods in pop culture they're shown engaging in violent, and often lethal combat with one another during the mating season, involving thumb-claw stabbing, neck-smashing and even raking their teeth on each other's throats.
• Mix with Our Werebeasts Are Different in Grimm: all the herbivore-based Wesen like the turtle-like Genio Inocuo and the sheep-like Seelengut are essentially harmless.
• Inverted in Dinosapien. The protagonist is an evolved dromaeosaur, while the antagonists are evolved pachycephalosaurs.
• In Primeval, a Scutosaurus is considered harmless in the first season because he is an herbivore. However, a few episodes later, he tramples and kills some men who attacked him.
• On Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Federation President Jaresh-Inyo is a Grazerite, a sentient species descended from herbivores and averse to confrontation. Since The Federation is in the middle of a Space Cold War with the Dominion, Admiral Leyton fears that he won't have what it takes to fight should that cold war heat up.

Myths & Religion

• Some Christian sects in the United States, such as those behind the Creation Museum (Answers in Genesis) believe that this was the literal truth of life on Earth pre-Fall. It's stated that animals before the Fall were friendly herbivores (one diorama depicts a T. rex chomping on pineapples) and that predation and carnivorism, being based in violence and killing, are by-products of the Fall. The Texas-based Creation Evidence Museum believes the pre-Fall atmosphere made creatures live longer, made them more intelligent and thus made them nicer. This has proven contentious, even among creationists.
• Depending on interpretation, Isaiah 65:25 states that currently carnivorous animals will become herbivores in the Kingdom of God. This is sometimes treated as literal, but more often interpreted as an allegory for warriors or aggressive people having their spirits made more gentle.

Tabletop Games

• The Unofficial Hollow Knight RPG has this in-universe: A character with the Herbivore trait gains a small bonus to their Cute score, making them better at social interactions where they need to appear friendly and non-threatening. This doesn't necessarily mean that the character is friendly or non-threatening, just that they're more readily perceived as such by others than they would be if they ate meat.

Video Games

• Zig-Zagged in the Monster Hunter series. Most herbivores, like Aptonoths, really are friendly and peaceful. However, the Kestodons and Gastodons from Monster Hunter: World or Bullfangos in the rest of the series will attack if you linger near them for too long. And some of the large monsters are herbivores, like Diablos, which is anything but friendly. It subsists on cacti yet is one of the most aggressive monsters introduced in Low Rank, being in fact one of the postgame bosses in its debuting game (as it's found after Final Boss Monoblos).
• Most of the dinosaurs shown in Paleo Pines's pre-release footage have been herbivores, and they're all easily approachable and willing to help humans. However, the carnivores completely avert Carnivores Are Mean by being just as friendly and approachable to humans.
• Inverted and played straight in Dinosaur King where while the heroes normally use herbivorous dinosaurs, one exception is a Carnotaurus.
• Subverted in Dino System Unless attacked, most herbivores are usually quite placid and ignore the player. Which can make it all the more surprising during survivor mode when a calm male Triceratops enters breeding condition and suddenly starts trying to kill the human survivor.
• Spore has creatures evolving. The first two stages (Cell and Creature) are spent deciding on a creature's diet. Later stages have the creatures evolved more, with their own moralities. Herbivores tend to be nice and social, carnivores tend to be hostile, while omnivores tend to be neutral and economic. Spore plays with this somewhat. When you advance to a new stage, you get bonuses and special abilities depending on how you spent the previous ones. Killing and eating your rivals would tend to give you combat bonuses when you acquired sapience, while socializing with other species and eating plants would give you social abilities instead. So if you began your evolution as a carnivore, you were encouraged to develop into a warlike civilization, while herbivores would be encouraged to play peacefully. However, you could defy this by simply not making use of your bonuses in the Tribal and Civilization stages.
• Subverted in Far Cry 3 and Far Cry 4. 3 has water buffalo that generally keep to themselves, but if you walk through their territory, they'll most likely chase you down and try to ram you. 4 has yaks which are pretty much just reskins of 3's water buffalo, as well as rhinos and elephants. The rhinos basically act the same way as the yaks, only they're faster, tougher, and do a lot more damage. The elephants, on the other hand, will not bother you at all unless you attack them — they'll even let you ride them, provided you have the necessary perk. However, once provoked, these elephants are very dangerous — and you can use this to your advantage, pitting them against your enemies and even riding them into battle. Despite the subversion in Far Cry 3, the binoculars identify animals as herbivore and predator, giving a clear distinction on which animals can attack. The identification is based on whether or not they're aggressive as opposed to their actual diet (e.g. Buffalo are tagged as predators).
• Mammoths in The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim are mostly peaceful, just don't annoy them or their giant owners. Otherwise, it's played very straight: bears will attack you on sight; deer (which are covered on Real Life) flee from you on sight. Unless, of course, you have any active buff preventing animals from reacting to your presence.
• Downplayed with the gurns, druffalo and brontos in Dragon Age: Inquisition. They won't attack if they aren't provoked, but they'll fight tooth and nail if wounded.
• Averted in Subnautica. The Ghost Leviathan is extremely aggressive. Turns out, it's a filter-feeder that eats plankton. It's just that territorial. Played straight, literally, with the Sea Emperor.
• Downplayed in Don't Starve; beefalo are aggressive during mating season (when their hindquarters turn red), but otherwise neutral. If you attack one, all beefalo in the area will fight back.
  • The underground rabbit folk are militantly vegan. If you carry or pick up any meat, fish, or monster meat product or meat-derived foodstuff in their presence, they will attack relentlessly. This includes rabbits you have "befriended" with carrots.
  • The release of playable Merm character Wurt reveals that Merms are vegetarian. They remain hostile to any players that aren't Wurt, unless Wurt allies with a Merm King, in which case they become neutral.
• Downplayed in ARK: Survival Evolved: while most herbivores don't mind you unless you provoke them, many will fight back once provoked, and Therizinosaurus and Kentrosaurus will attack you just for being too close. Played laughably straight with Diplodocus, as its only "attack" is to harmlessly nudge its target, and the Dino Dossier spells out that it's trying to play (even with predators). It doesn't even have an attack stat.
  • The Amargasaurus of the Lost Island DLC map is actively aggressive, and part of its taming requires you to help it battle its enemies (without becoming one of them!).
• Zig-Zagged in the Jurassic Park game produced for the Sega Genesis. The first Triceratops you find is peaceful unless you provoke it by firing a weapon in its presence, but other Triceratopses found throughout the levels will generally attack if you get close (some will even automatically try to knock you into Bottomless Pits). Meanwhile, the Brachiosauruses do nothing but provide obstacles you need to get rid of in order to progress.
• In Parkasaurus, putting a vegetable into an egg's last two item slots will give the dinosaur that hatches the friendly trait.
• In the first Jurassic World: Evolution, herbivores are as much a danger to park guests as the carnivores, which might eat a few humans but don't generally mow down crowds of people like an angry triceratops.

Webcomics

• Kevin & Kell likes to subvert this often. Kevin and Kell's daughter is a rabbit that eats meat. Kevin himself is generally friendly, but is not above punching predators trying to eat him. In fact, for a mini-arc it ended up a problem for Kevin as one of predators sued him for "breach of nature, rabbits should run". And was retorted "breach of nature, predators should eat rather than sue". And it should be pointed out that Kevin's ex Angelique, genetically a rabbit (but posing as a rat), is one of the most vicious characters in the comic.
• Subverted in Freefall; Sam's Bizarre Alien Biology is edible and appetizing even to Terran herbivores (he's been attacked by emu and crickets).
• Parodied in this chapter of Manly Guys Doing Manly Things. It depicts a man expecting this to be the case, and getting stomped flat as a result. The page also shows some examples of highly aggressive herbivores in real life, such as the famous park ranger getting chased by a hippopotamus and a bullfighter getting gored.
• Schlock Mercenary: Double-subverted. When Xeno Team is approaching a group of large stick-like alien creatures that appear to be eating moss, Ebbirnoth warns the rest that herbivores can still be dangerous. And then it turns out the big things are actually carnivorous, digging burrowing animals out of the moss.
  Ebby: Let's just stick with "everything's dangerous until we've killed it."
• Parodied in the Housepets! storyline "Let's Imaginate Jurassic Park". In the "these are herbivores" scene, Olive/Dr Grant turns to the camera and says "Remember kids, herbivores are not dangerous under any circumstances! Ask your local zoo to place hippopotamuses in the petting area!"

Web Original

• Jurassic Park Horror: Zig Zag. The herbivores are less prone to attack humans than the carnivores but that doesn't mean they are not dangerous.
  • A group of Hypsilophodon foxii stalks, hunts and devours a park worker.
  • A Triceratops fatally impales another worker.
  • The Stegosaurus is played straight. It not only befriends the farmer and his cattle, it also protects them from a pack of Velociraptors that attacks the farm.

Western Animation

• Something was said about this in the Magic School Bus episode where they went back in time and saw dinosaurs.
• The Wild Thornberrys Zig Zags it. Eliza easily makes friends with plenty of herbivorous animals, but she also encounters some realistically aggressive, such as hippos and water buffalo.
• The Simpsons often subvert this trope quite realistically.
  • In "Little Big Mom", Lisa tried to approach a herd of deer because they look harmless, but when she gets close enough they turn ferocious and try to attack her.
  • Lampshaded in "Four Women and a Manicure" when the Wicked Witch of Snow White mocks a group of cute woodlands critters, most of which are herbivores. The critters proceed to gang up and tear the witch apart as she screams in agony.
  • Doubly subverted in a school video starring Troy McClure in "Lisa the Vegetarian",^note you might remember from such videos as "2-3=Negative Fun" and "Firecrackers: The Silent Killer" where he convinces Bobby^note Jimmy that it's okay to eat meat. McClure warns Jimmy that "if a cow had the chance he'd eat you and everyone you care about," as ominous music plays and the camera zooms in on a cow's face. However, the cow's face is so placid, that the idea of a threatening cow seems ludicrous.
  • In "The Seemingly Never-Ending Story", Lisa's story-within-the-story has her encountering a goat in the forest, hoping it'll be friendly to a fellow herbivore, until it chases her into Mr. Burns' mansion. It turns out it was trying to bring back her necklace which she'd lost in the woods.
  • In "Simpson Safari", Lisa expresses disbelief at a hippo eating someone, subverting the trope.
• Marina's best friend in Saban's Adventures of the Little Mermaid is a seahorse (in a setting where all marine predator animals are evil). It should be noted that in reality, seahorses are predators, albeit of microscopic crustaceans and plankton.
• Both inverted and played straight in The Lion Guard where Beshte the hippopotamus is the sole herbivore of the titular group as the rest are carnivores (Kion the lion, Fuli the cheetah, and Ono the egret) and an omnivore (Bunga the honey badger). Nonetheless, most of the show's villains are carnivores and it's guaranteed there will be villainous omnivores as well, but herbivores are invariably non-malicious and even ones that are not friendly can be reasoned with. Season 3 finally brings in some herbivore villains: the porcupine henchmen of Mama Binturong.
• DuckTales:
  • The 1987 series has the Triceratops Tootsie. She is the pet of Bubba the Caveduck who is very sweet to most characters she interacts with.
  • Tootsie is also in the reboot of the previously mentioned show. However, much like Bubba subverting the stereotype that Neanderthals were stupid, this version of Tootsie is a stark aversion to this trope, being very territorial and aggressive. Bubba does ride on her temporarily as a reference to their original relationship, but it's treated more like a cowboy trying to stay on a bucking bull.
• Molly of Denali: Averted in "Culture Clash." Molly and Tooey warn Trini about the danger of a nearby moose before she can assume it's safe to approach just because it's not a carnivore.

Real Life

• Species living in an environment without predators are indeed often very docile. The Dodo of Mauritius evolved on an island without predators and was noted for having no fear or aggression toward humans, who promptly ate them into extinction. Herbivorous species that are accustomed to the presence of predators, however, often avert this: while some herbivores will flee danger as a first resort, others can be very aggressive, and will often be the ones to attack first if threatened or surprised. Herbivores such as hippos, rhinos, bison and even cattle have well-deserved reputations for being dangerous to approach, and even deer can turn on you if you startle them.
• Ironically one of the few sizable herbivores to largely be this trope to some degree (other than manatees and capybaras) are gorillas, despite being one of the chief exceptions to it in fiction. If not startled, attacked, threatened, or having their children harassed, they largely are docile and ambivalent towards humans and will go about their business. They can still be dangerous if agitated, especially a Silverback with his children or grandchildren in danger, but a majority of the time they much prefer to bluff-charge and scare a threat away than actually fight. Coincidentally, gorillas are also the most herbivorous of the apes and the meat they do eat mostly amounts to a few insects here and there.
• Capybaras, which are large herbivorous rodents native to South America, are rather friendly and harmless in general. Capybaras are known to allow many different species of animals (except natural predators like jaguars) to rest by or perch on them.
• Manatees and dugongs are the only marine mammals to be herbivorous. They are also very docile and harmless, to the point of approaching kayakers and scratching their backs on the canoes. Unfortunately, this also led to them getting injured by boats and people.
• Some species of herbivore play this straight with each other, roaming in multi-species herds. Usually this is a sign that their dietary preferences are slightly different (e.g. grass vs. shrubs), and that each species in the group has a different well-developed sense (scent, hearing, sight) with which to detect herd members' mutual predators. Less competition, more chance to pick up on danger that way.
• This trope is behind the Japanese "Carnivore/Herbivore" slang. "Herbivore" in this case refers to a docile person who plays the passive role in a relationship, though sometimes it's used as a pejorative in the "Extreme Doormat" sense.
• The wild deer in Nara, Japan are extremely docile around humans and freely roam the streets. There is debate on how far this goes — they could simply be tame around humans, though the generations of interaction may also have bred out their instinct to be skittish around humans. Either way, they will walk right up to people to beg for petting and treats, and some will even bow.

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