Banthas

All right, I have a question about banthas and wookiepedia isn't being real helpful.

I always thought of bantha's as beasts of burden, comparable to oxen in RL. I have been reading Traitor lately, however, and there is a reference to bantha butter. Also, there are several sources which reference bantha meat. Correct me if I am wrong, but I always had the impression that the meat of a beast of burden would be tough and not so tasty, since they would have to be so heavily muscled to carry large loads. Also, such animals don't really produce good milk. So, how does it work that banthas fulfill both roles at once? One solution would be that there are two or more subspecies of bantha that are used for different purposes.

Also, nerfs. Are nerfs merely a subspecies of bantha, or something different altogether?

 

Banthas are found on many worlds. I know it's used for a multitude of reasons. They're even holy animals on I forgot which planet. Someone will pipe in with it.

As for Nerf? No idea. I kind of think of it as a cow and chicken combined but that makes no sense.

 

well I didn't take the time to look up the article on wookiepedia recently, but the last time I read it I do believe that they did infact say there were several subspecies of bantha (one was the size of a large dog I believe). One bantha that evolved on Kashyyk was even arboreal (and a jedi is seen riding an entirely different horned bantha like creature into battle on kashyyk in that article). So, yes it is possible that one subspecies or breed is used for labor and another breed is used for milk and yet another is used for meat (much like breads of cows are used in RL).
However, the alternative explaination would be that a bantha much like the ones used by tusken raiders could be used for all the above. Given their size, there is not much labor that humanoids might make banthas do that would be particularly strenuous. This may allow their meat to still be edible (I don't believe that they were ever referred to as delacacies). Also, in order to live in such extreme and varied climates (especially tatooine) an animals milk would probably be very rich (given the opprotunity) so, it would make since that the milk could be turned into a nice butter.

Nerfs are suppose to be bulbous creatures with a high fat content to their meat. it is suppose to be quite good, but the farms they are raised on are suppose to aquire a horrible smell (thus why being called a nerf hearder is an insult). If you had to make an analogy to the real world, I would say banthas are bovine and nerfs are porcine.

Finally, remember that the writers in the EU love to make unimportant references to things in the films, so when their writings call for the mentioning of milk, they are going to try to relate it to an animal in the films (banthas, taun tauns, wamp rats, and nerfs were the few mentioned by name in the OT). So if something doesn't make since, it was probably just the writers fault. if your he first one to retcon it in Wookiepedia in a logical way, it will probably stick (unless someone notices the lack of references).

 

Thanks, I actually don't really care enough to think up a logical retcon; I just thought it would be cool to make a thread discussing banthas. U r smrt anyway though!

 

I have spent way too much time putting off studying by reading wookiepedia and wikipedia. if that makes a person smart, god help society in the coming age.

 

Nerfs are not related to the holy and serene Bantha.



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