According to one story, an old Sunamaki-danuki living in Myosho-ji Temple in Sadoga-shima Island, Niigata Prefecture, was so deeply religious that it smoothed out rough roads and purified them by spreading sand on them when Imperial Princess Tadako visited there to see her father, Emperor Juntoku who had been exiled to Sadoga-shima Island, and people there, seeing the sand-throwing, learned that the imperial princess visited her father that day.
新潟の佐渡島の妙照寺に住む老いた砂撒き狸は信心深く、佐渡に配流された順徳天皇のもとを子の忠子内親王が訪れる際、荒れた道に砂を撒いてならし清めたといわれ、砂撒きを見た人は忠子内親王が父に逢いに来た日だと知ったという。