I'm carrying this over from another thread to keep it focused on the appropriate topic.


I guess I should not have used a more recent example since it has been taken out of context. The point was the type of soil on which my grandfather used his team, not that it was horses were better than oxen. As for the plains, the teams that moved the wagons across them to the Oregon Territory and California were predominantly pulled by oxen and when they arrived at those destinations they used them as plough beasts.

If you want an example from my family's historical past that is closer to the medieval period, lets go to Connecticut and Long Island in the late 1600s when the first Dentons came from England, the Yorkshire area. The land they settled was worked by oxen as were most of the lands at that time.

Even in England the oxen remained dominant in the north and west well into the 18th century, these being regions that had the resources to keep them fed but did not have the higher land values to support the use of more expensive horse power.


Actually, when you look at land quality for the manors, you will see that some regions of Harn are settled on some very poor soils (.75 to .90), even as you say, there is plenty of other land around that may even be of better quality. However, most of that land is forested, and as usually happens, man moved onto the lands that were easily accessible first, even if they were poor, and adapted his farming methods for that particular land.


I don't have all of my resources with me here in China, where is this stated?


Again, this was more about soil condition they were used on. In fact, the clay ridge that runs down the center of the sandy soils that used to be under the woods that were cleared for lumber was not even used until the advent of gas-powered farm machinery because the horses just couldn't cope with it, even though the clay ridge is more fertile than the sandy soils.



It's a nice snap shot but needs some context:[/quote]
The material you gave is out of context because it assumes modern breeding and feeding regimes for these animals.

The context of the above is of medieval animals and the research by individuals who studied the excavated bones of such animals and using scientific means developed the average size of these animals and then based on butchering methods and mass of various components of the carcasses the amount of usable meat that could be obtained.

The truth, besides what HarnManor states, is that most animals were not slaughtered every year, only a small percentage, pigs being the exception. Even so, pigs were not usually slaughtered until the year after they had been born because that was when they produced the best bacon and hams (about 1.5 to 2 years of age). Most male calves would be destined to replace the retiring oxen who's working lives were only about 5 years on average meaning they would be slaughtered at about 7 or more years of age. Of course a peasant couldn't afford to replace his oxen as often and may have kept them until much older, even buying the older beast from the lord when he was replacing them.

Personally I think HarnManor generalizes too much and takes some things for granted. Having a hand in its writing, I know a lot of this was to make things less complicated at the time. However, over the years there has been much discussion about these very issues. The fact I used England in the 1250s to about 1300 is because this is where a lot of the research for a mid-medieval period lies. The other reason is this is precisely the place that Robin based a lot of his ideas from, so why not use it to expand on HarnManor for those who want a little more realism and for those who are happy with it as is, then there is still the current version. After all, look at HarnMaster, we have 1, 2, 3, and Gold. Even with HarnManor there was at first just the Manor article in an EH IIRC.

I now step down off of my soapbox.

_________________
Roy Denton - the title says Baron, but Queen for a year. (Cheselyne I)

"Nathamh na hoibre an t-eolas"
(Knowledge comes through practice)

I cited modern information with an example of a canon Harnic cow for context.

Your snapshot is not very useful in a Harnic context when it is missing significant variables like the average before size to achieve those meat and milk values before people start making SWAGs based on that lack of information. IMO more basic information and fewer SWAGs in the process is better especially with production affected by multiplier effects.

Consider the average domestic cow or heifer on Harn from the cattle article:

Cow live 72 - 144 d, Calf live 1/year 50 - 70D, Milk 18 gallons at 3d a gallon, Cream 10 gallons at 12d. Beef 350 - 650 pounds at 1 - 2 d a pound and Veal 90 - 150 pounds at 1 - 3 d a pound.

*Look at the Veal production which reduces the Milk and Cream production you cited significantly at 30% while increasing Veal production by a factor of three to five fold 300% - 500%. Now not only is Harn Manor wrong but also the Cattle article is also wrong since they could get more for that 70 gallons of milk and cream than selling it for Veal at an average of 2 d for those extra 90 pounds [average at 120 #] vice 3 d a gallon for milk without factoring that 23 or so gallons should be cream at 12 d [Extra 200 d or so]. Since your stats do not list Cream I favor that the whole milk (with cream) is being sold not cream-less milk, others will disagree because this is significant amount of coin for the creams for a little bit of labor. Others will argue first they strain the milk of cream (which they can sell or put to other usage) and then feed the decreamed milk to the calves for Veal.

Town prices manorial markets will be up to 50% less. [So those Villeins and Half Villeins right outside of towns do pretty good compared to others. The milk production makes sense because of Harnic default Veal production.]



Amish are not using oxen either which they would if it was the superior plowing method.

They were not 100% efficient in utilization of resources which included labor so plowing a strip a second time in the poorer soils may have been an option particularly with less acreage.

100 Bushels of Rye under livestock springs to mind with a single pair of oxen plowing 180 acres a year and the manor only needing eight of these animals.

I applaud your efforts on this, Ray.



One thing I have to say here (and you seem to have come to that same realization as well Castlemike) Harnic prices for most of the above mentioned items is very off.

A few things about dairy products in general that Harn does not really go into -

Dairy products will be sold largely as butter or cheese. Butter has a bit of a shelf life, cheese even more so. Raw cream and milk have almost no shelf life. Oh, and BTW, the butter and cheese will be tather salty for preservation.

Those getting cream will be those that have a dairy animal at their immediate disposal - or very close to one. Milk will rarely be drunk. For those without dairy animals and a bit of a distance from them - the spoilage is the issue. For those with dairy animals - milk is their raw product to make procucts that can be sold or kept for longer periods of time, cheese and butter.

But the prices are just wrong. The prices of the animals themselves compared to the prices of grain are about right (probably within 20% of the middle ages prices), but the prices for milk, butter, cheese, meat are all very very high, perhaps 4x the cost they should be.

_________________
Hmm Gurthang. What a nice name for a sword....

i might add when it comes to the slaughtering of animals, with most animals such as sheep, goats, and pigs - the young males are the most often slaughtered before their "productive life" is over.

With most animals it takes maybe a 1/10 ratio or even less of males to females to insure there are enough males to inseminate. Males when it comes to goats and pigs really don't have any production of products while they live - Females produce young, and with goats they produce milk.

Sheep - the males produce wool, but not young or milk.

Cattle (and Horses) are the only animals that the males produce much (other than wool from male sheep).

The onlt time you are going to slaughter a cow that is still productive is if you do not have the resources for the herd to expand anymore, i.e. if it is overcrowded from a grazing standpoint.

I do wich Harnmanor would also have a fief's meadow acreage - I think you could graze more horses/cattle on meadow than what Harnmanor shows, but meadow is not the entire land with is not used for crops or woods.

On the other hand, feeding of the harvested crop stubble provides nutrients for a while as well.

_________________
Hmm Gurthang. What a nice name for a sword....

An Ox would allow a farmer to have a bit more liquidity. You can sell Ox meat, I'm not so sure about a horse. I have no idea what the injury rate for plough animals are, but you might have more piece of mind owning an Ox. And you don't need to grow oats.

Perhaps this could be an intresting adventure hook, a farmer in desperation slaughter their horse and sell the meat, and the church finds out about it.

Oxen on English manors actually were fed oats - though not quite as much as horses received.

I think for any grazing draft animal, the combination of heavy work and not as much time to graze require at least somewhat of a supplement of a higher concentration of calories, such as oats.

I would guess most of the oats oxen received were during periods of hard work.

_________________
Hmm Gurthang. What a nice name for a sword....

Yes, oxen were fed some oats, primarily during the working season, but it was far less than horses required. In fact, the oxen could get by without the oats if the pastures were good grass pastures and not just fallows and stubble. This one of the reasons the Oregonians took oxen as their predominant animal to the northwest in the 1840s-1850s.

_________________
Roy Denton - the title says Baron, but Queen for a year. (Cheselyne I)

"Nathamh na hoibre an t-eolas"
(Knowledge comes through practice)

I forget the exact numbers and do not have time to look it up, but they were fed somewhere around 1/5 to 1/6 the amount plowhorses received.

Funny thing is Warhorses usuually are the one least in need of oats - strenous activity, but for short periods of time. They could probably get by mostly on grazing or hay, with very little in oats unless during intense periods of training.

Give them to much in oats and they become fat. More of a good thing is not always better

_________________
Hmm Gurthang. What a nice name for a sword....

According to John Langdon's The Economics of Horses and Oxen in Medieval England the following national average for oats feed to the following was:

cart-horses: 6.65 quarters or 53.2 bushels
plough-horses: 2.02 quarters or 16.16 bushels
oxen: 0.34 quarters or 2.72 bushels

Thus a plough-horse gets 30% of what a cart-horse is fed and an ox gets 5% of what the cart-horse is fed and 17% of what a plough-horse is fed in oats.

The cart-horse works all year as opposed to the other two so is fed more in oats because of its increased workload. The ox requires less because it processes grass and hay far better than oats.

In regards to hay requirements, Langdon provides this, per animal:

plough-horses: 12.75d
oxen: 15.75d

But straw is also fed as follows:

plough-horses: 0.75d
oxen: 35.5d

And then there are peas/vetches:

plough-horses: 10.75d

Based on the above the horses are oats dependent for sure. However, it appears their hay requirements are very similar, but the oxen makes up the difference in straw (this is the material left over after grain has been threshed). I assume vetches could also replace the straw also.

_________________
Roy Denton - the title says Baron, but Queen for a year. (Cheselyne I)

"Nathamh na hoibre an t-eolas"
(Knowledge comes through practice)

Interesting, I never knew oxen could do so well on straw!

_________________
Hmm Gurthang. What a nice name for a sword....

Horse meat used to be quite common in Europe, and still is in some countries. From what I have read, it was the coming of Christianity and the want/need to wipe out old traditions that did away with it. Used to sacrifice a horse to Woden and have a big feast afterwards, but now do a pig or cow. Wikipedia has some good info on it in the Horse Meat article. If you strongly base Harn on northern Europe, then there should be some eating of horse meat, especially among the Orbaalese and barbarians, but not common elsewhere. You could also say none of the Harnic religions have a taboo against it, but that it is considered a meat for the poor, widely used by everyone, or anything in between.

Horsemeat a flashpoint issue. Followers of Sarajin consume horsemeat causing tension with Larainians who consider it a heretical act.