Ollivear
| Ollivear | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Fauna | |
| Official Name | Ollivear |
| Common Nicknames | Feathered Ogres, Ollanveras |
| Classification | Bird |
| Habitat | Various |
| Domesticated | No |
| Current Status | Uncommon |
Ollivears are large, hideous birds possessing long feathers, great physical size, and delicious eggs. They are highly ferocious, which makes it a miracle they have been able to survive as long as they have. While populations have been culled periodically over millennia, they remain a problem for rural areas in the west, and a danger dwelling in the deep jungles. They are hunted for their eggs, meat, and feathers, but their population shows few signs of serious damage in the modern age and they are likely to continue attacking egg thieves for many years.
History
The Ollivear has been an element at the margins of history for millennia, dating back to the Allorn Empire. It was a beast the Elves encountered and sought to understand, but once that was accomplished, they largely left it alone. It roamed a significant expanse of territory, but its living in the wilderness rarely brought it into conflict with the growing Allorn Empire, save for when a new city was raised, cutting back the wilds. As the Empire wore on, periodic cullings of the ugly bird’s populace sought to limit their expansion. However, it was the arrival of the Eronidas that dealt the greatest blow to the Ollivear. The Eronidas, fanatically anti-bird, ended up conquering large swathes of territory in which the large bird dwelt. It was rendered almost extinct from these regions, driven into the densest wilds beyond the expansive agriculture of the Pols that emerged across the lands the Eronidas seized. Elsewhere, following the Cataclysm, the Kathar almost rendered the Ollivear of southern Sileria extinct as they poured into that continent, but across the world, the bird took to the deep wilds and remained hidden. In Westwynd, the great jungles hid Ollivear, who gradually began a repopulation of lands now fully claimed by nature, and clear of Elves due to the Wildering. They even crossed coastlines, which is when the Daendroque Ailor encountered a beast from the past of their poor slave ancestors, who were often the first line of defense, and the first to die, when the birds came upon Allorn plantations. The bird remains a threat mostly to rural areas of the west, but also lurks in the deep jungles and wilds, a savage creature ready to strike against perceived foes and future meals.
Physical Appearance
Ollivears are massive birds, standing at anywhere from eight to nine feet in height, five to six feet in width excluding their wings, and weighing anywhere between 250 to 400 pounds. Their heads are small and rounded, with beady black eyes and a large, pointed purple beak. The beak’s base is protected by a draping of loose skin that goes all around the mouth, limiting its ability to open and strike at its customary prey, small animals, and fish. However, this skin can be retracted, permitting the Ollivear to open its beak much wider to consume or bite larger prey. Their head is connected to their body through a short neck with the rest of their body holding a pair of long wings with a wingspan of eight feet that they wrap across their bodies and a set of small taloned feet. Their skin possesses earthen tones, from dark greens to grays to dark browns though their long feathers do not share the same coloration. It begins as black on their wings, feet, first bodies, and head before morphing into a deep purple color along their necks, backs, and the majority of their wings.
Diversity
The population and birth ratio of male and female Ollivear is equal, but males are hunted more so than females because they have more feathers on their bodies. They also range on the upper half of the body heights the species can reach.
Life Span and Development
Ollivear are born in large, fist-sized, pale-yellow eggs with purple and blue speckles along the top. These eggs often come in groups of three to five and once they hatch, reveal small, featherless Ollivear. Helpless despite possessing small talons and already sharp beaks, which they used to peck their way out of their eggs, Ollivear chicks are cared for by their parents. Over the course of a year, their feathers come in though they reach full size and mental maturity by the age of five. At this point, Ollivear usually leave their parents or younger siblings to seek their own mates. The Ollivear mates for life, and makes their nests from rocks and grasses in the area. They can live up to twenty years.
Mental Overview
Ollivear are hostile, dangerous birds with a few notable quirks to them. They are protective of their eggs, chasing down or attacking those who try to take them, and get more erratic and angry the longer their foe is alive. They are also protective of their chicks but after the first year, grow relatively complacent in caring for them and leave them to their own devices. They rarely come to the aid of other Ollivear as the birds put the family unit before the larger species. The animal is also known for enjoying the shade, often creating their nesting ground in the shade of shallow caves, overhangs, or beneath large jungle foliage. In all other matters, they are relatively simple-minded, easily lured into traps, and rudimentary in their hunting techniques which often involves suddenly stabbing at a target with their closed beak to spear it through before going to bite at it.
Territory and Groupings
Ollivears live in small packs made up of one to three family groups. These packs are not directly attached to each other, however, and live within proximity to each other. They share a common territory of several miles when they are nesting. They are known to move around during the spring and summer, though these movements sometimes bring them in a large circle back to the original nesting ground they started at.
Trivia
- Ollivear feathers are popular hair accessories among Daendroque and Kathar society, and some Maquixtl.
- There has been little research done on the Ollivear, namely because their bodies decay quickly and smell awful within a day, making their cooking and consumption a speedy process in Eronidas and frontier Ailor society.
- Ollivear eggs are light blue in their yolks, making up a part of Daendroque children’s tale “I Will Not Eat Blue Eggs and Pork.”
| Accreditation | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
| ||||||