Re: Forests and wildlands in Heortland, Sartar, Tarsh

From: danguillou <dguillou_at_1bPBEhmMfThAoxck095kZ3h_o6nJBpaKMaK24u4MP4l00TP-NT08qJcZINSkZHWsd0x>
Date: Mon, 04 Jun 2007 12:37:35 -0000

> There's really no such thing as a fire-loving tree species and the
> hatred of fire is pretty much engrained in the Aldryami consciousness.
> For example, Pamalt is cited in the HeroQuest Voices as being the
> child of Kitapah the Flame. A fire-loving elf is the equivalent of a
> chaos-loving Uroxi, a demon-loving Yelmite, a horse-loving Praxian
> or a Sea-loving Ramalian. That a fire-loving elf may exist is
> not in doubt but to suggest that a major elf forest is tolerant of fire
> is too much of a stretch. Instead an elf would view a forest fire
> as a natural calamity such as humans would view a plague or
> a drought.

If you say that you know for a fact that in Glorantha, there is no such thing as fire-loving trees, and that aldryami has about the same relationship to fire as uz, then IŽll take your word for it.
But I would have thought that Gloranthan forest ecology had enough in common with our world ecology, for the aldryami to regard fire as a vital part of the cycle of life and death. Without intermittent small and medium forest fires there won't be any glades, and no saplings, and almost no vertebrate animals, in fact nothing but decrepit old spruce, and eventually you get either disasterous bug-infestations or really huge forest-fires (which incinerates everything in the ground for much greater depth, and actually damages biodiversity) or first bugs, and then huge fire. Well, at least in temperate forests. Rainforests are different, but that is where the yellow elves live, right?

It occurs to me that if Pamaltela has functioning forest ecosystems without aldryami, thanks to the harmony and mastery of Pamalt (ie agimori magical/cultural practices) then the sacred groves of Madagascar might be a neat our-world template. I don't have a link off the top of my head, but if anyone is interested I could find one easily enough.

Cheers,
Dan            

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