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[Frogwarrior]

Is it possible to eliminate the animal population completely? My fortress just entered its fifth year, and the last few months have had no animals to hunt whatsoever. (The only wild animals left on the map are a Magma Man who has yet to move an inch the whole game, and one of the four starting Fire Imps (the other three wandered out at various times, one of them even started a forest fire ("Hey, wait a minute, that fire was a lot smaller a month ago. Ohhh, fire SPREADS!"), and one of them was killed by a hunter... thank goodness I caught THAT before he returned it to the butcher's...)

I have killed, I believe it's 287 wild animals over the course of 5 years.

Will more be spawning eventually, or will I have to rely on my massive supply of caged baby animals for bones? I have several marksdwarves that would like to become champions at some point, and a couple would-be hunters that have to scrape by some other way.

[LegoLord]

Yes.  Depends on a tag in the creature's raw file, I think (don't quote me on this).  You will have to rely on invaders, dead merchants, and tame animals for bones now.

[Frogwarrior]

Well then, the goblins had better freaking siege me again already. It's been a while. My 20 champions are getting restless.

[Stargrasper]

Other animals will occasionally come in from the side of the map.  Don't hunt them.  Re-assign your hunters to something useful, like marksdwarf training or fishing.  Try to catch the animals in cage traps, tame them, and hopefully breed them.  It REALLY helps if your livestock industry is self-sustaining.

[Skorpion]

Yes.

And possible to overfish rivers, too.

[Savok]

AFAIK, the animal population will always *eventually* return. Eventually may be a very, very long time, though.

Also, I'm pretty sure that wild animals that are trapped in some enclosure but not tamed will breed.

[XSI]

AFAIK, the animal population will always *eventually* return. Eventually may be a very, very long time, though.

Also, I'm pretty sure that wild animals that are trapped in some enclosure but not tamed will breed.

I'll confirm that, and also, a tamed or untamed animal that's been out for just a short while and then stuffed into a cage may still give birth.

Both tamed and untamed animals will breed, the advantage of the tame ones is that you get a little message when it happens.

[Sphalerite]

Both tamed and untamed animals will breed, the advantage of the tame ones is that you get a little message when it happens.

You get the message for untame animals too.  On my current fortress I captured a pair of untame Mountain Goats and dumped them in a pit.   For the next several years I got messages about Mountain Goat kids being born and animals growing to become Mountain Goats.

There also seems to be some limit to the number of wild animals on the map at once.  Once my pit-of-goats had been breeding for a few years I stopped seeing new animals migrating onto the map.  When I finally decided to kill the dozens of goats in the pit, new waves of migrant goats, gnomes, marmots, and such other things immediately spawned on the map edges.

[LegoLord]

I actually once recieved the message "a nightwing has given birth to twins."

[Hyndis]

AFAIK, the animal population will always *eventually* return. Eventually may be a very, very long time, though.

If it is, I haven't noticed it. And I've played a fortress until year 50.

All wildlife and fish were exhausted by year 5.

The next 45 years had no fish and no wildlife. I had to rely on breeding animals after "trading" with the elves for caged animals.

[Frogwarrior]

How many breeding females do people suggest having? Right now I have a million dogs (actually, I think they're at the pop limit), several cats, a couple donkeys and horses, and two cows. (Female ones, that is. There's also several males and lots of babies.) Whenever a cat, horse, donkey, or cow comes of age I slaughter it, at the moment.

I assume you don't need to have breeding pairs? One male is enough?

[Savok]

AFAIK, the animal population will always *eventually* return. Eventually may be a very, very long time, though.

If it is, I haven't noticed it. And I've played a fortress until year 50.

All wildlife and fish were exhausted by year 5.

The next 45 years had no fish and no wildlife. I had to rely on breeding animals after "trading" with the elves for caged animals.

Morul killed all of his. They were gone for some decades, but eventually returned.

This is why I think that they will return, but it may take several decades.

How many breeding females do people suggest having? Right now I have a million dogs (actually, I think they're at the pop limit), several cats, a couple donkeys and horses, and two cows. (Female ones, that is. There's also several males and lots of babies.) Whenever a cat, horse, donkey, or cow comes of age I slaughter it, at the moment.

I assume you don't need to have breeding pairs? One male is enough?

Answer: Depends on how fast you want more animals.

also, yes, but I like having at least a couple males in case one gets killed.

[Eidalac]

If it is, I haven't noticed it. And I've played a fortress until year 50.

Only fortress I know of where wildlife returned was past 50 years, not sure by how much though.

[Frogwarrior]

Is there any reason not to wait for the babies to grow up before slaughtering? I take it as long as the current animal population isn''t maxed, animals aren't less likely to breed when there are more babies currently alive?
Or is there a max baby number, or something?

Also, do young animals give less bones than grownups?

[Shiv]

You get a bit less bones, but I don't think the time invested in them fully growing up is worth the 2 or so extra bones you get.  Just keep a couple dams and a stud and you're good to go.


I had one fortress where everything was unusually fertile.  Had new babies every season (both tamed and untamed).  That would've been fantastic except the most fertile critter of them all was a giant eagle.  I don't know if there were two on the map originally (I'd never seen more than one before) or if the one that was put there was already pregnant, but I soon had a big giant eagle problem.  I knew I should've killed the original hatchlings but didn't have anyone strong enough .  Anyhow, it was Fun, and maybe fun too.  But it got to the point where dwarves that left were killed in about a minute. 

Shame they didn't attack any goblins/orcs that came though.