The Swamps

The swamps are teeming with life - Where ever you look there are small birds*, tiny fish@, small animals+, and insects# buzzing around. The water ways have reeds, weeds and other plants-life growing in them, but generally not enough to be truly significant to a party of adventurers.

* Small Birds like King Fishers (flashing blue/green wings diving for minnows and tiddlers), Reed Warblers (rarely seen, small brown bird singing in the reeds), Seagulls, Small Ducks, Moorhens and Coots. Ranging in size from a few inches to about a foot long (note even the ducks are small) The Gulls, and Coots will make a meal for one, the Duck a meal for 2, the Moorhen half a meal.

@ - Small fishes an inch or two long - small fry, minnows, tiddlers, sticklebacks - whatever you choose to call them. A handful thrown into a stew will provide half a meal. A double handful a single meal. Fish of this size don’t actually have to be boned or cleaned before cooking but are eaten whole, bones and all. (See recipes for white bait as an example).

# - The air is filled with dragonflies, damsel flies and fire flies as well as midges and other irritating little flies. (The pretty flies always manage to stay just out of reach; the nasty ones manage to swarm around you) The midges are irritating at first but soon settle into a background buzz and hum, that makes you scratch every so often…

+ - There are small frogs, toads as well as water voles and a breed of rat all over the place. The rat conforms to Normal Rat statistics but can swim as well.

However, there are also some less pleasant or conventional denizens as well, but they change depending on the environment. The possible environments are

Brackish Water - This is the water closest to the coast wherer salt water mingles with the fresh water from the inland rivers.

Fresh Water - Still swampy and marshy here the water contains almost no traces of salt, and is drinkable (probably)

Island - The islands and almost dry places of the swamp. None of these islands are truly dry areas and and range from soggy ground to really sucky mud that seems to pulls characters under. Some dry areas are covered with reeds - other have other types of  life.

Hadon Scarp - The area around Hadon Scarp is different from the rest of the swamps and has its own special encounter tables.