Zakalwe
Inactive Member
These are the first two I came up with, and are designed to live on Yamatai. Their names are tacky because of what the colonists where reminded of.
Megaluirrel:
This creature is in appearance much like a large squirrel, albeit with a few differences. One of these is that its body is as large as a medium sized dog, it has six legs (the additional legs serving an inportant purpose in aiding the scurying and climbing ability of the megaluirrel, and also meaning that it can hold on with for legs while it uses its front paws to grasp fruit, nuts etc.), and each one has a rather strange foot, with gecko-like pads. Much like a squirrel it has a large bushy tail, the same basic shape, and much of the same nervous behaviour patterns. It is a vegetarian, lurking in the forests mainly, and eating the fruit of some of the largest trees, and also eating the trees themselves, usually the smaller or dead ones. It does this by spitting out a stream of specialised enzymes and acid to dissolve and weakening the wood, before using its specialised tongue to partially suck up the resulting mush, and partially shovel.
The Megaluirrel is not a creature to be taken lightly, its spit can burn through flesh as easily as it does through wood, and it has sharp teeth, sharper claws (which are serrated) and senses sharper even than that. A cornered Megaluirrel can main, or even kill, many a would-be-killer, scurrying up the trees using its agility, and climbing ability to usually easily escape into the canopy.
It is not easy to tell between a male or a female Megaluirrel, until the female has given birth, at which point she will be accompanied everywhere by her litter (2-4 cubs), as she goes hunting for food, regurgitating it to the younglings until they are able to gather food themselves. The father is an active, but distant, parent, as it defends its mate from afar, attacking any creature that enters its territory with unusual ferocity. This lasts 5 months, after which the mother runs away very fast and leaves the cubs, now self sufficient, by themselves. The father similarly sneaks off. Through most of their lives Megaluirrel lives alone.
However the rewards for capture are quite high, due to the reclusive nature of the creature. The skin of a Megaluirrel is extremely soft, and keeps the wearer wonderfully warm. It is thus, a popular material for extremely expensive ladies clothes, for those people who wish to show that they can rise above fabricated garments. The fur colour and decorations change greatly from Megaluirrel to Megaluirrel, from a deep red, to grey, to black, to the rather rarer green (it was very popular at one point and almost hunted to extinction).
Other than that, and the other various parts of the body that can be sold simply for being part of a Megaluirrel (the body stuffed for example, or the teeth and claws on a thread) the flesh of the Megaluirrel is a delicacy, and features in some of the more expensive recipes. The taste is meant to be like that of stake, but with a far greater sophistication in flavour, and said by some to be the most exquisite steak meat, above all other animals. The more cynical say that it should be for the prices that are paid for it, and at times can be used as an example of the divide between the lower and higher echelons of society. It is served in a vast array of forms.
Bovinor:
On the planet of Yamatai, the niche filled by cows on earth is filled by the animals that the colonists decided to called ‘Bovinors', stemming from the term Bovine. They where harvested in much the same way, although the resemblance to them is actually not all the much.
The typical Bovinor is three metres tall, and twice that long, heavily built, stocky, and with a long thick coat, which not only protects it from the elements, but effectively deadens blows. Sticking through the fur are long bony spikes, protruding from the back at regular intervals, and at the joints, as well as a series of especially long ones (normally 4-5 foot) horns on the head, which can be used in defence, as well as the mating fights which occur yearly. Rather than the four legs of the cow, the Bovinor has 8, which do not aid it greatly in terms of speed, but do in the amount of force it is capable of conveying and dragging, something that aids it in the seasonal pushing competitions. It is a rather strange custom of the Bovinor that the males not only fight each other for females, but also push large heavy object to show how strong they are, and the extra legs aid them in this. They also serve the purpose of allowing the Bovinor to have a more efficient surface area on the ground without having huge legs, which is especially a boon for those in the north on the ice fields. Bovinor are very strong, and can be used to pull great weights, but despite this are actually relatively gentle grazers, animals that gather in huge herds of many hundreds of individuals, eating grass and low leaves. To eat it uses a long powerful tongue to wrap around the plant, ripping it out of the ground, or of its branch, and devouring it with a set of horrifying looking teeth, which serve to liquidise the food in the mouth. The Bovinor have very sensitive central legs, which allow them to sense vibrations in the ground, a useful ability for sensing predators. And also by stamping with the central legs they can create vibrations in the ground that can communicate over great distances. For shorter range communication they use there extremely loud voices, which sound like that of a grasshopper amplified several hundred times, combined with a blender (the gnashing of teeth). The sound of a herd communicating is a strange, wonderful, and deafening experience.
Bovinors are mainly kept for their meat, for they grow fast, and have a lot of high quality meat on them, which actually tastes like a strange (yet delicious) combination between beef and lamb. They can (and did before the arrival of the colonists), live almost anywhere on land, from the cold North to the temperate fields, and even the forests, each herd (they don't move climate), having its own technique for survival. Bovinors are capable of eating for themselves from their day of birth, and thus need nothing but protection from their mother (the father has very little to do with them). Males are actually smaller than the females, but not by much, and have longer horns, and a more violent temperament. That being said Bovinor's are extremely passive animals unless attacked, or in the mating season.
Megaluirrel:
This creature is in appearance much like a large squirrel, albeit with a few differences. One of these is that its body is as large as a medium sized dog, it has six legs (the additional legs serving an inportant purpose in aiding the scurying and climbing ability of the megaluirrel, and also meaning that it can hold on with for legs while it uses its front paws to grasp fruit, nuts etc.), and each one has a rather strange foot, with gecko-like pads. Much like a squirrel it has a large bushy tail, the same basic shape, and much of the same nervous behaviour patterns. It is a vegetarian, lurking in the forests mainly, and eating the fruit of some of the largest trees, and also eating the trees themselves, usually the smaller or dead ones. It does this by spitting out a stream of specialised enzymes and acid to dissolve and weakening the wood, before using its specialised tongue to partially suck up the resulting mush, and partially shovel.
The Megaluirrel is not a creature to be taken lightly, its spit can burn through flesh as easily as it does through wood, and it has sharp teeth, sharper claws (which are serrated) and senses sharper even than that. A cornered Megaluirrel can main, or even kill, many a would-be-killer, scurrying up the trees using its agility, and climbing ability to usually easily escape into the canopy.
It is not easy to tell between a male or a female Megaluirrel, until the female has given birth, at which point she will be accompanied everywhere by her litter (2-4 cubs), as she goes hunting for food, regurgitating it to the younglings until they are able to gather food themselves. The father is an active, but distant, parent, as it defends its mate from afar, attacking any creature that enters its territory with unusual ferocity. This lasts 5 months, after which the mother runs away very fast and leaves the cubs, now self sufficient, by themselves. The father similarly sneaks off. Through most of their lives Megaluirrel lives alone.
However the rewards for capture are quite high, due to the reclusive nature of the creature. The skin of a Megaluirrel is extremely soft, and keeps the wearer wonderfully warm. It is thus, a popular material for extremely expensive ladies clothes, for those people who wish to show that they can rise above fabricated garments. The fur colour and decorations change greatly from Megaluirrel to Megaluirrel, from a deep red, to grey, to black, to the rather rarer green (it was very popular at one point and almost hunted to extinction).
Other than that, and the other various parts of the body that can be sold simply for being part of a Megaluirrel (the body stuffed for example, or the teeth and claws on a thread) the flesh of the Megaluirrel is a delicacy, and features in some of the more expensive recipes. The taste is meant to be like that of stake, but with a far greater sophistication in flavour, and said by some to be the most exquisite steak meat, above all other animals. The more cynical say that it should be for the prices that are paid for it, and at times can be used as an example of the divide between the lower and higher echelons of society. It is served in a vast array of forms.
Bovinor:
On the planet of Yamatai, the niche filled by cows on earth is filled by the animals that the colonists decided to called ‘Bovinors', stemming from the term Bovine. They where harvested in much the same way, although the resemblance to them is actually not all the much.
The typical Bovinor is three metres tall, and twice that long, heavily built, stocky, and with a long thick coat, which not only protects it from the elements, but effectively deadens blows. Sticking through the fur are long bony spikes, protruding from the back at regular intervals, and at the joints, as well as a series of especially long ones (normally 4-5 foot) horns on the head, which can be used in defence, as well as the mating fights which occur yearly. Rather than the four legs of the cow, the Bovinor has 8, which do not aid it greatly in terms of speed, but do in the amount of force it is capable of conveying and dragging, something that aids it in the seasonal pushing competitions. It is a rather strange custom of the Bovinor that the males not only fight each other for females, but also push large heavy object to show how strong they are, and the extra legs aid them in this. They also serve the purpose of allowing the Bovinor to have a more efficient surface area on the ground without having huge legs, which is especially a boon for those in the north on the ice fields. Bovinor are very strong, and can be used to pull great weights, but despite this are actually relatively gentle grazers, animals that gather in huge herds of many hundreds of individuals, eating grass and low leaves. To eat it uses a long powerful tongue to wrap around the plant, ripping it out of the ground, or of its branch, and devouring it with a set of horrifying looking teeth, which serve to liquidise the food in the mouth. The Bovinor have very sensitive central legs, which allow them to sense vibrations in the ground, a useful ability for sensing predators. And also by stamping with the central legs they can create vibrations in the ground that can communicate over great distances. For shorter range communication they use there extremely loud voices, which sound like that of a grasshopper amplified several hundred times, combined with a blender (the gnashing of teeth). The sound of a herd communicating is a strange, wonderful, and deafening experience.
Bovinors are mainly kept for their meat, for they grow fast, and have a lot of high quality meat on them, which actually tastes like a strange (yet delicious) combination between beef and lamb. They can (and did before the arrival of the colonists), live almost anywhere on land, from the cold North to the temperate fields, and even the forests, each herd (they don't move climate), having its own technique for survival. Bovinors are capable of eating for themselves from their day of birth, and thus need nothing but protection from their mother (the father has very little to do with them). Males are actually smaller than the females, but not by much, and have longer horns, and a more violent temperament. That being said Bovinor's are extremely passive animals unless attacked, or in the mating season.
