( - SOE) - Arbor Day: A Gnollish*Perspective - Sat, 01 May 2010 04:34:51 +0000

Translated from the original Gnollish by Linda “Brasse” Carlson, Senior Community Relations Manager

Our inspiration, Fippy Darkpaw, tireless advocate of
conservation and responsible ecology management.

You humans will pay for ruining our homeland!! GRRRRRRRR!!!! Family Darkpaw of the Sabertooth Clan will slay you all!!!
~Fippy Darkpaw,
Spoken during the Age of Turmoil
What set Fippy Darkpaw off on these tirades? Gnoll scholars have studied this issue for years. We recognize that Fippy, ancestor of many modern gnolls, was somewhat of an extremist, but we have to agree with his basic sentiment – protecting our natural world.
Today, April 30th, is Arbor Day in the United States. You humans seem to have a need to set aside a day to remember trees. “Oh yeah… trees. They are cool.”
Gnolls find it particularly odd that Arbor Day follows so closely on the hindpaws… err… heels of Earth Day, held the previous week. Are your memories really that short? Unless of course we have mistaken the meaning of Earth Day, and you actually just worship dirt, as opposed to celebrating the entire planet as we assumed, and therefore need to be reminded that there are trees on the planet. Human thought is so twisty and unfathomable. I will have to Google this later.
We gnolls, on the other hand, do not need special days to remember the gifts the world has given us. Ever have we stayed close to nature and never take trees, or any plants, for granted. We see these celebrations of yours and think that it’s about time that you lot started caring about the natural world – what took you so long?
Grrrrrrr, bark, bark grrrrrr!

Trees enhance the village of Willow Wood in EQII.

To start with, trees are incredible, natural works of art, ever-changing from day to day. No two are ever identical, although they may seem so at a glance, particularly when planted in groves. Each bark crenellation, each miraculous leaf is a unique creation, never seen before and never to be recreated in precisely the same way. They combine to form the glory of a mixed forest, the majesty of a stand of ancient conifers, the bravery of small stands of trees struggling up a mountainside… images that exemplify the glory of nature. How can anyone NOT notice this and be awed?

Where would Wood Elves be without trees? Here an elf* takes refuge
in a slumbering oak found in the Plane of Knowledge, in EverQuest.

Of course, trees are useful as well. You humans are certainly inventive, we’ll grant you that. Trees provide shelter, valuable building materials, fruit and nuts. Paper created from trees is used for a thousand and one purposes: decorating walls, creating books, origami, post-it notes or even that stuff on rolls in the bathroom that you all argue endlessly about (whether it should unroll from the top or the bottom).

A splendid old oak just outside of Qeynos in EQII.

Millions upon millions of trees are cut down, sliced, shredded and pulverized to feed your endless needs, but, miraculously, they come back. It takes time of course, decades in fact, for a tree to grow to maturity. Some species take hundreds of years to reach full height and once they’re gone, you humans may never see the like again.

A line of majestic alien palms decorate the evening
horizon on the moon of Luclin, in EQ.

For millennia, foolish humans have clearcut forests without any thought to the future. While trees can regrow, taking an entire forest down at once can often devastate the ecology of an area can make it almost impossible to recreate what once was.
You really have ruined your own lands, haven’t you?
These are the reasons we gnolls decided to stand up and prevent you from ruining our lands as well. We’ve seen what you have done to your own! Fippy Darkpaw and his less famous cousins Nixx and Grarrax have been martyred for the cause several hundreds of thousands of times, but they’ll never give up until all humans are made to take notice!

Fippy in ancient Norrath, before the Shattering, and his ancestor, still
carrying the torch of conservation some five hundred years later.

Fortunately, our voices of protest seem to have been heard, at least in some areas. Forest management, harvesting regulations and replanting plans have rapidly burgeoned throughout North America (and have been standard practice in some overseas lands for much longer). We gnolls like to think that we had something to do with your change of heart, and we are somewhat more hopeful for the future.

A few lively trees take matters into their own hands in EQII.

On a side note, we gnolls hypothesize that trees are merely gaining subtle revenge when they besiege you with allergenic pollens in the spring. Many jokes exist in gnollish culture about this phenomenon, but they do not translate well to your languages. Trust me, they are funny… especially the one about how you use disposable soft paper made from trees to wipe the runny nose caused by trees, hahahah hooooooooowwwwl!
Let us work together to make this planet a better place, so that by next Arbor Day, you can be proud instead of ducking your head, and we can stop yelling at your species. Stop wasting paper. Recycle. Don’t buy disposable whatever-it-is-human-thingies when you can reuse an item instead. Finally… take ownership of a tree!

Even in the depths of winter, trees add elegance and beauty
to the landscape, as in this scene from Everfrost, in EQII.

If you have a yard, consider planting a tree today. Spend some time looking at the hundreds of varieties available, and choose one for its beauty, or perhaps one that will gift you with food in future. If you don’t have a yard, help a friend plant a tree in theirs, or support a reforestation program with a small donation.
All gnoll tribes heartily support any efforts that place lovely, life-giving trees upon our planet. Please plant one. You may call it “Fippy,” if you wish!
We are glad of the prospect of having humans as friends once more. You may even be allowed to visit our tribes without being bitten, if diplomatic relations improve further. No, you still cannot convert Splitpaw into luxury condos… you’ve ruined your own subdivisions, we’ll not let you ruin ours!
Skrum Darkpaw,
Gnollish Scholar and Arborist

The edge of the jungle in Feerrot in EQII, where sometimes
you can’t see the forest for the trees!

Learn a little more about trees now at Arborday.org
Study some of your recent human history regarding Arbor Day at Arbor-Day.net
Wikipedia includes Arbor Day observances around the world!



Author:
Visit This Blog Page...
Visit StationBlog