Heavy Hitting Horned Archosaurs

From: Erik Sieurin <ERISIE_at_bhs.hb.se>
Date: Thu, 23 Feb 1995 17:56:03 +0100


First, I am finally back on the Glorantha List. I am at a new university now, with better access to e-mail - hurray! I find that everything is the same as it always has been, which is at least some consolation....

First, I happened to literally get some back issues, and found out that my perfectly rhethorical question regarding peoples non-list activities sparked off more response than any other question I ever put to the list, although I was not there to receive it... The world is a strange place.

Second, to really merit this sending, I have a comment on the dinosaur topic: Sorry to spoil the fun, but I think having tank-sized archosaurs trampling all over your lands would make it much _harder_ to plow, since they would pack the earth together. One criticism against modern agriculture (peoples real life drips in on the list sometimes, and I must admit that I once pondered spending my life with alternative farming) is that the heavy machines pack the earth and destroy its porousness, absolutely critical to have fertile earth, since many of the vital microorganisms needs air. In modern day farming you use a lot of artificial fertlizers, which makes this issue less important, but the only culutures using these in Glorantha would be the Vegetarian Dwarves of Slon, perhaps. As I think of ceratopsians as grazers, they would not overturn the earth the way pigs do, either (pigs are very good for this thing, I've heard). If you had a dinosaur that did, however, it would be a better example. Or perhaps you just hitch a Very Large Harrow on to a Triceratops, but since you do not do that with elephants in the real world (elephants having a similar structure and so on, and beingdomestic beasts), I do not know. Perhaps there are better dinosaurs for doing this - I think of Iguanodon-like lizards who perhaps scratch up the earth as chickens do - and the Tricertopses are used in war and to carry heavy loads.

Erik (Sometimes known as Sven) Sieurin


Powered by hypermail