Re: (TFT) Orcs on Easter Island (30,000 Orcs in 63.1 square miles with 16 million giant palms)

["Jay Carlisle" <Jay_Carlisle@charter.net>]

So I crunched some numbers yesterday but frustratingly for myself, (although 
likely thankfully for yball), my failure to put an IQ point in a word 
processor Talent lost the rant for me so Ibll try this again.

Just homogeneously dumping 30,000 souls onto 63.1 square miles gives a 
population density of about 475 individuals per square mile.
By doubling that figure I can say roughly that for every 1000ish people I 
can pack into a square mile of inhabited area I can leave a square mile open 
elsewhere.
This is an urban-like density but still gives me plenty of room for 
self-sufficient farming with just under one and a half individuals per acre 
(1 acre is a bit less than a square 50 Melee-hexes per side or close to 5 by 
6 Battle-Maps).

To get a real-world picture of what this might be like I looked for similar 
densitybs and came across New Jersey.
As the recent spat of programs claiming to feature the region focus on 
groups of Orcs, (from my personal viewpoint), I took a closer look at the 
states demographics.
About 95% of the population live in urban areas with populations of at least 
1000 people per square mile, but about a third of the states overall land 
area remains undeveloped.
When applied to Easter Island this would suggest about 29,000 souls live in 
an area of about 40 miles, with a population density of 725 per sq mile.
I can reduce that area by more than 25% and be right at 1000 people per 
square mile meaning I can pack almost everybody on the island onto about 
half the land area without being so densely packed that the inhabited area 
canbt be used for production.
So far fitting 30,000 Orcs onto Easter Island isnbt proving to be as tight a 
fit as I thought.

The quality of the land is going to be important as well.
Modern agriculture under ideal conditions requires roughly a quarter of an 
acre per person in the most generous estimates Ibve seen so far.
This kind of production allows about 2500 people to be supported per square 
mile, but of course that assumes the entire area is used for agriculture.

Before I address production I want to get a basic Idea of what kind of space 
is being used on these bfarmsb by paths, yards, homes, and support 
structures (and just dead space) so I have an idea of how much additional 
area will be required in additional fields.

In densely populated eastern countries average home size runs in the 
neighborhood of 300ish square feet.
In u.s. terms this is about the area of a typical one room efficiency.
This is roughly 16 Melee-hexes in floor space allowing an average family of 
5 about 60 sq ft each or a little more than 3 hexes of enclosed area per 
Figure.
Thatbs pretty tight quarters and bodes ill for the populations half-life 
(mainly due to illness) but itbs certainly not unrealistic and boathouses 
actually averaged somewhat larger than these dimensions.
bSizes ranged from 10 to 40 meters long, 1.5 to 4 meters at the widest axis, 
and were between 1.5 to 3 meters high at the central high pointb.
The rule of thumb I use for a homes byardb is an area about 10 times the 
floor space of the home.
This would suggest about 160 hexes for a house and yard (2 Battle-maps) 
which is about 6% of an acre.
Allowing another 4% of area for transportation is a little more than 100 
hexes per acre for pathways and similar usage, sufficient to run a path over 
four feet wide along 2 sides of a square acre (or a cross through the 
middle).

Lacking cereal crops or livestock excepting chickens (lack natural 
predators?), and having a temperature range of between 60 to 85 F means that 
Ibm reluctant to make any calls about support structures required for food 
processing and storage.
I know poi can be stored in a vessel under a layer of water, and in some 
areas the sourness imparted by this process is preferred, but in general  I 
need to learn more about the bshelf livesb of the produce base.
Were we in Europe or other latitudes with winter temperatures consistently 
between 30 to 40 F I could at least say that the sweet potato crop could be 
banked and left in the fields for storage but I have my doubts about the 
method in such milder temperatures and Ibm curious about bananas and 
ethyleneb&
So before I get mired in all that, I need to have something to build with in 
the first place.

A Nat Geo programe gave a figure for the virgin growth forest first 
encountered as a dense forest numbering some 16 million giant palms.
These seemed to be somewhat similar to Chilean Wine Palms with heights 
exceeding 80 feet and trunks up to 4.3 feet (1.3m) in diameter at the base.
63.1 square miles works out to over 1,750,000,000 square feet or just over 
95,000,000 Melee-hexes.
Now if I give each one of these giants a mega-hex of space per tree at 
ground level then the average separation of 2 hexes per trunk works out to 
about 13.5 million trees and of course, not the entire area of the island 
would be available for such a forest.
A ring of half-hexes around a center hex equals 4 hexes in area.
At 4 hexes of space the average separation is about 1 hex between trunks and 
works out to almost 24,000,000 trees.
If I leave about a third of the island free of this forest then the total 
tree population on the other two thirds come out to about 16,000,000 palms.
So when they mention the original forest on the island we could be talking 
60 to 80+ foot tall palms with trunks filling most of a Melee-hex and 
separated by about a hex from the half dozen other trees around it on 
average.
I think Ibm certainly going to transfer the sap properties of the wine palm 
to the giant palm of Easter Island.

In the under-canopy so far Ibve got -

Portia trees; height 6 to 10m w/trunk diameter of 20 to 30cm

Toromiro trees; height up to 5m w/main stem diameter of 10 to 20cm

Carolina Wolfberry; 1 to 3 feet in height and width
http://repository.tamu.edu/bitstream/handle/1969.1/3758/etd-tamu-2006A-WFSC-Butzler.pdf?sequence=1
(gotta love them gradual students!)

I need to know a little bit more about the properties of these materials to 
be able to set factors like ST and half-life but living on the Pacific tells 
me that wood doesnbt last as well on the coast as it might elsewhere.
Also worth noting, the size of these palms leads me to question the often 
made assumption that slash and burn techniques were used in clearing.
Itbd take one helluva fire to burn off an acre of those big boys (well over 
500 trees distributed as suggested above).

Still, the numbers seem to indicate that the population figure Ibm working 
with is quite doable from a realistic standpoint while still leaving some 
wilderness-like areas as well to separate the tribes somewhat.

Even a remote little island is pretty complex, but most of this 
infrastructure is valid throughout Polynesia with a tweak here or there.
In other words, once youbve figured out the basics of infrastructure for 
something like European agriculture you can apply it to any region 
applicable to the practice with tweaks for locality and the like, and there 
really arenbt many styles of agriculture.

Anyway, Ibm trying to figure out how much bfree timeb I can allow my farmers 
for things like blongbow practice after churchb but Ibll break this off here 
as itbs getting a bit longb&
Ibm gonna find out roughly how many villages and hamlets per tribe next and 
maybe get down to a basic farm description.
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