#llekme

[cadere-art]

What does agriculture and typical plants and animals used in food look like in different regions and cultures?

For the sake of brevity, my answer will only cover this part (but don't worry, I'm working on the plants (and invertebrates) as well) :

VERTEBRATE LIVESTOCK OF UANLIKRI

Thanks to a wide range of environments and intercontinental trade, Uanlikri boasts a wide variety of vertebrate livestock, some domesticated locally, others brought along by settlers from the other continental masses. Most livestock on Uanlikri are ceratopsians (some more highly derived than others).

Caviþ

Pronounced chavith. Caviþ are a highly derived species of ceratopsians originating from the Basin region. The wild species still exist, roaming the southern Basin plains in great hordes.

For the most part, caviþ are kept as beasts of burden and for their meat and leather. In most locales, they are unpopular compared to O'ohu, which are more powerful, meatier, more docile, and have more offspring at once. Nevetheless, keeping caviþ has its avantages: caviþ are smaller, hardy, tolerant of crowding, and produce rough but warm pelts.

In general, caviþ are too small to be ridden by adult antioles, but not for the Apinaat and Abimaat, two peoples of pigmies who make their living on caviþback across the southern Basin plains and on the Matar Peninsula. For the Apinaat and Abimaat, caviþ, wild and domestic, are their whole livelihood. Their use of caviþ as mounts gives them an incomparable edge in warfare and has earned them a fearsome reputation.

Wek

Wek are one of the few non-ceratopsian livestock originating from Uanlikri. They were first domesticated in coastal areas of the Pwetitwì range from large gull-like birds, and spread from there to most northern coastal areas of Uanlikri. Wek are meaty and adaptable birds kept for their eggs, plumage, and guano. They require access to open water to thrive, but accept saltwater and freshwater alike. They are primarily kept in coastal areas, as well as along the Koramme river and Basin Great Lakes, where the slow-moving waters suit them fine.

Kabi

Kabi, a guinea pig sized ceratopsian, are the most widely kept livestock on Uanlikri. The kabi in the picture was enlarged for ease of viewing: the vast majority of kabi breeds are much smaller, though giant breeds do exist. Kabi are a multi-purpose livestock: they are bred for their meat, abundant eggs, soft patterned pelts, and companionship. Kabi are extremely adaptable and very tolerant of crowding. Their ease of keeping in urban environments has made them ubiquitous through all the cities of the continent.

There are hundreds of kabi breeds and landraces on the continent. Kabi have a tendency to establish themselves as feral pests as well as livestock, where natural selection by the environment encourages the development of landraces best adapted to the local climate. They also make excellent pets due to their highly social nature, and many lines of kabi are bred purely for good temperament and pleasing (though sometimes extreme) appearance. Kabi are also ubiquitous overseas: it is unclear where they were first domesticated, but most theories point towards dwarf and standard kabi originating from one domestication event on Uanlikri, and red-leg kabi originating from another domestication event overseas, possibly of a different but related species: this would explain some of the difficulties in breeding dwarf and standard kabi to red-leg kabi.

Tsut

Tsut were one of the livestock species brought along by the Senq Ha Empire, conquerors and settlers of the Western Peninsula. These diminutive therizinosaurids were selected through millenia for an extremely downy, frizzy coat which can be sheared and spun like wool. Of all Senq Ha livestock, tsut were the ones to find the fastest and most widespread adoption, only limited by their destructive browsing habits and preference for hilly terrains and cool weathers. Tsut down revolutionized the world of textiles in Uanlikri, where spun-down fibres were previously very rare and very expensive, requiring capture and shearing of wild animals with very little suitable fibre.

Tsut are primarily raised for their fiber but also provide meat and more importantly crop-milk. Consumption of crop-milk is slow to catch in communities not descended from the Senq Ha, but the Senq Ha's people use crop milk abundantly, using it fresh or processed in dozens of different ways.

Llekme

Llekme were domesticated in the Northern peninsulas of Uanlikri from a species related to the caviþ. They share many of the caviþ issues and advantages, being hardy but temperamental. However, contrarily to the caviþ, they are an extremely popular livestock among both sedentary and nomadic populations Uanlikri's north. There, they are used as beasts of burdens and pulling animals of limited power as well as for their meat. For the desert nomads of the Atashir, llekme provide essential help in carrying their tents and tools; in cities, they are often used as pulling animals, working alone or in teams to pull small carts and coaches.

Hêtâ

Hêtâ are family of highly derived ceratopsians, including a dozen species and subspecies on the mainland and a few endemic island species. They are, in truth, not yet a domestic species. All species of hêtâ are game animals highly appreciated for their ornemental feathers and delicious meat, and there have been several attempts to domesticate various species of mainland hêtâ, none of which have been successful. Mainland hêtâ have extremely nervous dispositions, are prone to dying from stress, and mostly fail to reproduce in captivity: they rarely breed, and when they do, they most often do not provide parental care, leading to the death of the chicks.

This said, there is an ongoing project on the Ojame archipelago to restore and domesticate the near-extinct Ojame hêtâ. The Ojame hêtâ is endemic to the archipelago. Due to the absence of large predators on the archipelago, it has evolved to be larger and much less fearful than mainland hêtâ, but was driven to near extinction by hunting and the introduction of larger, bolder breeds of oujabe [dog analogue] from the mainland and of continental hêtâ imported for use as wild game.

The failure of mainland domestication attempts and a joint desire to preserve and profit from the Ojame hêtâ has led to a unique, unusually coordinated project to domesticate and reestablish the Ojame hêtâ. In a rare show of goodwill and collaboration, this project is shared by both Wetki and Ranaite communities on the archipelago. The Ojame hêtâ is thought to be a promising source of meat and ornemental feathers as its population levels rise and stabilized. Successful captive reproduction has been achieved, and semi-domesticated captive population are being reintroduced to Êrar, the archipelago's largest island where the hêtâ had been completely eradicated.

Wagwacguk

The wagwacguk (wag-wash-guk) is a wild animal living as familial herds in the tundras south of the Kantishian, with a domestic subspecies of marginal range in the lands of the Daghwa-Igdø and the Kantishian High Plateau. It is a large, extremely hardy animal with a warm, plush coat and thick leather. For the Daghwa-Igdø, wagwacguk are their main livelihood. One month per year, they feast on the fresh meat of wagwacguk calves, culling their herds as the first dayfrosts touch their lands; the later kills are preserved by smoking and freezing. The rest of the year, wagwacguk blood provides them with most of the protein in their diet. Wagwacguk pelts, leather, guts, horn and hooves are the materials involved in most of their material culture.

Though domestic wagwacguk are most closely associated with the Daghwa-Igdø, they are also kept by the Oubixwø-øi of the Kantishian high plateau as part of the Oubixwø-oi's diverse survival strategies.

O'ohu

O'ohu are domestic hadrosaurs named, in most regions where they are kept, after their loud and haunting cry. They are the largest and second-most widespread livestock on Uanlikri. Where they are kept, they are invaluable for their work as beasts of burden: plowing fields, pulling carts, carrying charges of all kinds. They are essential to the work of peasants and armies alike, and they are surprisingly fast. Historically, they have often been used in active combat, pulling war chariots. They cannot be ridden: their back ridge is too fragile to bear the weight of a rider and their alternatively bipedal and quadrupedal gait makes balancing a saddle impossible. They are also used for meat, blood, leather, and other byproducts. Their finely scaled and patterned leather is considered especially attractive, and their hollow horns are often made into music instruments. In many cultures, O'ohu grastroliths are considered to have medicinal properties as the ultimate digestive aid, and are often sold at a considerable markup by gastrolith merchants.