Chương 16: Animals

Once Colin had changed into his new boots, we got to work with the barbed wire. I'd also had a pair of leather gloves made in a smaller size, and Colin was definitely grateful for them as we began stringing up the barbed wire. The wire had come with little V-shaped iron nails to fasten it to the posts. We got the four strands of wire placed around the garden plot and then made a simple gate.

We didn't have any hinges, but it was easy enough to make a frame that fit into a space between two posts with a couple of loops of barbed wire making a crude hinge on one side, and another loop in the middle on the other side that hooked over a branch we left on that post. It was a crude gate, but I'd seen plenty of similar gates even at home. A gate didn't need to be fancy as long as it kept animals out and let us in.

While we were stringing up the barbed wire, the two rabbits hopped up to us and sniffed me and Colin for a bit. The rabbits terrified me more than a little. They were each close to four feet long and a couple of feet tall. These weren't cuddly bunnies. They were predators. I was too scared to try to pick one up, but it looked like they each weighed thirty or forty pounds. One was a beautiful tan color that reminded me of a buckskin horse. The other was the same tan with mocha-colored spots all over.

I noticed Colin stopped working for a moment so he could kneel and pet them both.

"What should we name them?" he asked me. I was still wary, but Colin was petting them, so I figured I'd do the same. I knelt next to Colin and began petting the spotted one. It was as soft as it looked. It really leaned into the scratches and began making a cat-like purring noise. As I was petting the spotted one, the buckskin-colored one sneezed. I looked over, and as it sneezed a second time, I saw its teeth. The front two were still large like a rabbit from Earth, but they came to dagger-like points.

It also had four canine teeth that I could see - more like a dog than the sharper cat's teeth. This thing was definitely a carnivore. Once it was done sneezing, it hopped over to me and let me know it wanted pets too by nuzzling up to my free hand.

"Well," I said.

"The one has spots, so it's now Spot. The other is colored like a type of horse I'd call a buckskin, so it's now called Buck." I chuckled at myself. The names were awful, but that just felt right. Colin was looking at me with a look of pure horror.

"Spot is an awful name, but it's your rabbit, you can name it whatever you want. But you can't name the other one Buck! It's a female!" That just made me laugh even harder. When I finally got myself under control, I said, "I know, that's what makes it so funny." Colin didn't look like he found it very amusing at all.

"Whatever, John, it's your rabbit, but I'm telling Ma to name the other animals." The two rabbits hung around for a few more minutes before they hopped off towards Emily. Once we were done with the barbed wire, Emily walked up to us and told us it looked like we'd done a good job. She suggested we go look at all the animals now that the garden was secured. First, we checked on the four goats. They weren't a modern breed that I was used to. They were brownish-black in color with fairly thick fur.

This was probably necessary for survival during winters in a place where they almost certainly spent most of their time outdoors. The billy and does each had four fairly good-sized horns. Two of the horns reminded me of miniature Texas Longhorns. They grew out to each side before coming to a point at the end. They also twisted a bit. The other two horns were just below the bigger ones and pointed straight out. They looked like two-foot-long spears. They were intimidating-looking creatures.

The goats were young, so they probably weren't full-grown yet, but they were already larger than any goat I'd seen before. They'd probably easily end up being several hundred pounds fully grown. I was hoping for a milking goat, but they looked more like meat goats. We were all leaning against the zigzag fence, and I gripped it to check on its sturdiness. So far, so good. I pointed towards our little herd and spoke to Emily.

"Emily, do you milk these goats or eat them? I was hoping for something that looked more like a milk goat."

"They are hybrids," she answered.

"They produce a decent amount of milk. We do not have the classes to make cheese from it, unfortunately, but they do get quite large. A billy can be three hundred pounds." Shoot, we had to have classes to make cheese? All five of the goats were busily eating the grass. When I put my hand into the pen, the billy came up and put his head forward. I scratched his head around his horns, and he let out a pleased bleat. He let me scratch him for a minute or two and then rejoined his does. None of the does came up to me.

After the billy walked away, I asked Emily.

"Do we keep the females and eat the males? I assume if we do, we will need to trade out our Billy for next year?" Emily shooed away a fly. It clearly didn't take them long to find livestock. I'd have to ask about fly issues at some point.

"If we want to grow our herd without bringing in new goats. When we go see the neighbors we can see if they will trade one of their billies to us for next year. They have more than fifty goats. Brendan is a Rancher and he has a billy who is a Herd Leader. If you make a good impression, hopefully he will let us use it. Now as to eating them. We can, but we will probably be better off selling most of them this fall." I nodded.

"Do we need to castrate them?" Emily nodded. Almost every male animal on a farm that wasn't being used for breeding was castrated. It made them less aggressive and ensured that only the animals we wanted could breed. After that, we moved to the other pen. This pen held our pigs. They each weighed around two hundred pounds. We raised pigs a couple of times when I was a kid. Growing up on a farm meant this wasn't all new to me. Hell, my background was part of the reason I first thought this could just be a coma.

I enjoyed being a farm kid, and I loved playing historical and building simulator games. I'd played the old SimFarm game for an entire winter when I was around eleven. Strawberry farming was where it was at, if I remembered correctly. More and more, I was hoping this was real. I'd certainly miss my family, but I also felt a lot of resentment about how everything had gone down. I knew I wasn't exactly being left destitute, but I was being kicked out of a six-generation family farming operation.

Honestly, I didn't know if I would ever get over it if I had to be around them regularly. The pigs were covered in black fur, with their legs and underbellies being reddish-brown fur. I didn't know what they were called here, but back home we would have called them a Berkshire pig. They were an old breed that hobby farmers loved back home. They could survive the winter just fine. Their meat was delicious as well. If I remembered correctly, the boar could grow to be six hundred pounds, and the sows five hundred.

They wouldn't be easy pickings for anything less than a pack of wolves or a bear. We'd need to keep them well fed and make sure that we spent time with them. If this was the same breed of pig I was thinking it was, then it was friendly and docile to anyone they knew well. Of course they were still pigs so you'd always need to be at least a little wary around them. Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

We'd give them a few days in this pen until they were imprinted on this homestead, then we would begin letting them out to forage. Same with the goats. It appeared that Emily was supposed to take care of the animals primarily, but I had always enjoyed feeding animals growing up, so I told her I wanted to be involved in their care. After checking on our mammals, we went to the barnyard area where the ducks and geese were making an unholy racket.

The geese were honking and posturing, and the ducks were nervously quacking. They kind of looked like they were in a standoff at the moment, with the geese as the aggressors. Geese were usually assholes. I should have just added more chickens and ducks instead of the geese. My great uncle had a flock of geese at his place; they were basically guard dogs. They'd honk at anyone they didn't know. When I was a little kid, they had even chased me a couple of times. The rabbits had been hopping along with us.

At the sight of the squabble, the rabbits began making snorting and growling noises and hopped forward and began separating the geese and ducks, surprising me. Emily said, "Those are two good rabbits, you always hope you get ones that have the right instincts to be herding rabbits, but usually they need some more training. What did you name them?" I couldn't help myself, and I just started laughing. I couldn't handle hearing the term "herding rabbit." When I got myself under control, I said, "Buck and Spot."

The look of pure horror and disgust on her face when I told her what I'd named them made me laugh even more. Once she had her emotions in check, she simply said, "We can talk about this later," The geese looked like the same breed that my uncle had. At home, they were called a Toulouse Goose. They were primarily a meat bird. They'd get to around twenty pounds. They were probably pretty close to that already. The males were a bit darker in color than the females.

More of a dark brown, versus the tannish brown of the females. They had small orange beaks, and bright orange feet. I felt like I needed to cut the tension, so I asked Emily about the geese.

"Emily, what are these geese called? What breed?" Offhandedly, she said, "Oh, they're called a London Goose." I chuckled at that. She looked at me curiously.

"What would you have called them?"

"That's not important. Do they originally come from the continent?" I asked without thinking. They both said, "Yes," almost simultaneously.

"How much of the continent is human-controlled right now?" Sometimes I couldn't keep my big mouth shut.

"It is the most mixed of the continents. Very early on Arturos and Merlotus conquered the Albion Islands from the elves who were there. They pushed them off to Eire, or onto the continent." That was certainly an interesting name…

"The empire has managed to conquer the west coast of the continent, but most of the rest of it is still controlled by the elvish tribes who were stronger than the ones on the Isles. There are dwarves in the mountains." Colin looked concerned that I needed this explained to me.

"John, why does this matter for the geese?" I couldn't help laughing. He was right. None of this mattered here.

"Sorry," I said.

"It doesn't matter. I just get sidetracked sometimes." Emily gave me a look that prominently featured pursed lips.

"Colin, what are our beautiful ducks called?" I asked him.

"Territories Ducks. They were bred here actually." I would have called them a Cayuga. They were medium-sized ducks that laid a fair number of eggs. They were iridescent black with some blue on their wingtips. The male had a shiny green neck and head, while the females were all black. Their bills and feet were a dark grey color.

"These should lay a fair number of eggs right?" I asked Emily.

"True," she said, nodding towards them.

"Although they are prone to broodiness if we do not collect their eggs. They like to hide them too." After that, we walked to the only birds that were actually in an enclosure. The chicken coop was big enough for around twenty chickens, but we only had twelve and a rooster right now. The hens had grey feathers, with red wattles. Even their legs were covered in feathers. The rooster was much showier. He had a golden-colored back and head.

Those feathers then had a reddish border around them before turning a greenish black for his chest and feathered legs. Here and there, golden feathers were interspersed with the black. His tail feathers were also greenish-black. We had chickens at home, but they were some genetically modified breed that produced a ton of eggs. I had no idea what this one was called. They definitely looked like egg/meat hybrid chickens, they were as large as the ducks.

"Alright Colin, stop me from going on another tangent. What're these birds called?"

"Chickens John…" He pointedly looked towards the ground as he said it, his hands in his trouser pockets. I laughed and shook my head while Emily gave her snort laugh. Colin wasn't always a perfect angel. Good.

"Clearly they're chickens, Colin. Does the breed have a name?" I asked with a smile on my face. He was trying his darnedest to avoid a grin, but he was losing the battle. He composed himself, kicked at the dirt, and spoke.

"Feathered Greys. I'm not kidding either. It's because of the feathers on their feet. I'm not sure what the male is. I don't think they're usually this showy. You can see that they're a meat and egg bird. The ducks will probably lay close to as many eggs as they will."

"Thanks, Colin," I said after he was done.

"I have never lived on a homestead before this. Are we eating eggs every day now?" With a genuine smile on her face, Emily answered.

"You are correct. We should get at least a couple of duck eggs per day, and six to eight chicken eggs. The geese will lay a couple of times a week. Once we have enough extra preserved we will let them hatch some eggs."

"How long will that take," I asked.

"Three weeks for the chickens, four weeks for the ducks, and up to five for the geese."

"Do we let every bird lay on the eggs?" I asked Emily.

"No, once we decide to let them try this first time we will see which hens are the best brooders. Then we will probably let those birds always do it. It will keep the rest laying much more consistently."

"You know," I said.

"I wish we had some cats, or a good dog or two." Colin went pale.

"What?" I said. Emily responded in an almost whispered tone.

"There are no cats in the colonies. They were used as familiars by a wild tribe of human-goblin mixed-breed witches, who were found when the first expedition landed. When they were injured the witches could transfer the wounds to their familiars. Cats have been outlawed ever since."

"Wow," I said.

"I assume they couldn't be reasoned with?"

"The witches?" Colin asked.

"Of course the witches. Everyone knows cats can't be reasoned with. They do whatever they want." I joked. He did not take it lightly, and looked me straight in the eyes, a fairly rare occurrence for him.

"The System priests said they were an abomination that had to be killed. I don't know if they were really bad or not. It didn't matter once the priests said they had to be wiped out." I was getting all kinds of world knowledge without the Almanac today.

"Okay, No cats. Please don't tell me there isn't a ban on dogs." I said, slightly worried. Colin was happier to address this topic. A smile lit up his face.

"No sir. If we do well this year. We should get something bigger to help with guard duty. Maybe a mastiff! The rabbits are great for keeping down the rodent population. Even things like foxes and coyotes are scared of them, but they can't take care of anything bigger." I looked at the rabbits as he spoke, and I could almost swear Buck had a scowl on her face when Colin said we needed a dog. I said, "Colin, I promise we will get a dog or six if we do well this year. Now let's go take care of planting the wheat.

Emily, we have at least three weeks before we plant the corn. Can we put it in the house?"

"Yes, of course," Emily said. She pointed to Colin and said, "Colin you do that, then you can go with John to the tractor to plant." I still wasn't going to see the inside of that house! It was pretty darned clear we needed to get my cabin built, or I was going to have to start sleeping under the stars.

There are many creatures that have abilities that are either magical or skill-based. Some, like the Spark Elk, occur in almost every animal of that species. This is much more common in wild animals. At higher levels, the Rancher class has a skill tree that can lead to semi-intelligent herd leaders who are capable of limited sentience. These animals are of tremendous help in keeping the rest of their herds safe.

Even at lower levels, there is around a 1% chance for any animal born to a Rancher to possess the herd leader trait. The offspring of these herd leaders have a 5% chance of being born with the trait, even if the herd leader has been acquired by someone who does not possess the Rancher subclass. These animals are worth at least ten times the base rate at sale. The dwarves in particular are known to have bred unnatural traits into domesticated animals to better fit their mountain cities.

The Dwarven Rabbit being the most famous, and widespread, of their modified domesticated animals. Of late, the Dwarven Rabbit has become exceedingly popular for rodent control in the Western Territories because of the necessity of wiping out all cats in the territory. Excerpt from Abilities of the Fauna and Megafauna of the Western Territories by Sine Goodfall. This book is available in the Albion Guild Shop.