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[neotemplar]

Righto it is year 4 of my fort and we have over 430 living animals (yay awesome new pc, no slowdown), mostly due to massive eggsploitation. (I also only farm booze crops, everyone eats eggs and meat, and cooked meals.)

I have so many that I just plant 30 or so animals outside the walls to exhaust gobbo archers of their bolts and to make the melees spread out chasing them.  This seems to work really well, albeit with horrific animal casualties that get regenerated the next month (I send in the babies as they are more expendable).

Does anyone else do this?

[Eoganachta]

I tried doing this in one fort by having a retractable bridge to drop birds off a wall to distract invaders but it was a lot of micromanagement. I think they did something of the sort in Deathgate by dropping birds into hell.

[neotemplar]

Oh I use a simple system and just leave 30-40 outside the walls inbetween the invasions.  Also I just played 10 minutes and gained 30 animals!

Literal meat shields, best part is if you have enough butchers you get meat after the battle to celebrate.

[DungeonJerk]

This is a brilliant idea. I must employ it.

Also, something with bees.

[ReluctantReaper]

Can I ask the name of your fort fine dwarf?

[neotemplar]

Can I ask the name of your fort fine dwarf?

It's egg-fancies of course

[Blizzlord]

This breaks goobo archers. Good work!

[Aspgren]

Fowl might be good sentries ... but I haven't tried it. I have grown accustomed to hiding away the fowl deep within the bowels of my fortress so that predators can't get to it.

My dwarves eat a lot of egg.

[I am Leo]

I did this in previous versions, but i doubt it's such a good idea any more.
It's all fun and games until a necromancer turns up and suddenly they have 30 bonus zombies.

Still, it's handy for spotting ambushes and delaying gobbos long enough for my militia to put their socks on before going to meet them.

[Naryar]

So isn't it really a lot of bother, FPS drain and large income of meat ?

But if you have the comp for it, a fowl shield around your fortress is cool. And efficient.

Post it on the wiki.

[Sphalerite]

I use male birds (peacocks, mostly) in watchtowers in some of my fortresses, but I surround each one with windows so they can spot intruders without being in any danger of being killed.  The female birds are kept pastured on nest boxes deep underground.

[Loud Whispers]

Does anyone else do this?

Replace birds with bunnies, then yes.

[Psieye]

Chained kittens for me - old fashioned I know.

[peskyninja]

Rattlesnakes.(Genesis)

[Hyndis]

It works with any sort of rapidly breeding population of animals. Dig a shallow pit so that any invaders will overlook the pit on their way to the fort, but not actually go into the pit. Fill the pit with animals and seal it off. In the case of egg laying animals, make sure that there are nest boxes in there so they can breed.

Any invaders with ranged weapons will exhaust their ammo into the pit. Assuming you have enough animals they will replenish their own population between sieges.