Hoth's ecosystem

[Noble Ire]

If Tatooine was settled early in the current galactic civilization's 25,000 year history, I suppose it's possible an introduced beast of burden might have adapted through natural selection.

Since KOTOR establishes that Tatooine was originally occupied by the Rakatan Empire around 30,00 BBY (even if they did almost destroy it at the end of their reign), it is entirely possible that they brought the Banthas with them. If that is the case, one could justify the term "native species", even if it isn't strictly accurate.

Can someone confirm the areas of heavy vegetation on Tatooine? I would think that if there were such areas, settlements would have formed near those areas, instead of the rocky badlands and deep desert. Unless, of course, the settlements were mining towns at some time.. then I guess they'd be placed around old mineral deposits.

During early portions of ANH, when Luke is hunting for the droids, there are several wide shots that show what appear to be large patches of small, desert shrubs. They may simply be oddly colored rocks, but considering their placement and the relative proximity of sizeable settlements, their is some reason to believe that they are indeed signs of plant habitation.



Note what appears to be a long line of greenish shrubs lining the dry river bed in the distance.



Another shot of what may be vegetation in the background.

The first time I saw ESB I was maybe 10, and the first thing I thought when I saw the tauntauns was "Hmm, they must have brought those with them."

I don't really have any direct evidence for this theory, but the existance of "distant relatives" of tauntauns on Nam Chorios and the obvious problems with the species evolving naturally on Hoth makes it possible that tauntauns may have been introduced to the world at some point in the very distant past, just as the bantha was to numerous other planets.

[Wyrm]

Sorry; but you brought up the fact that the Rebels would have a hard time domesticating/training them. I was just supplying information about that. I wasn't arguing "flightiness" or what have you, just that the Rebels had done obviously it with the indigenous tauntauns.

Given that they are said to be foul-tempered and aggressive, they could be like boars then zebra - more likely to attack an intruder than to flee. i.e. their most common defensive measure is spitting into an opponent's eyes. In Hoth's temperature, the saliva freezes very quickly, blinding their foe.

I guess what I'm trying to get at is that whatever their character traits, they obviously didn't get too much in the way of the Rebels training them as mounts.

That explanation doesn't work either. Whether the response to a wampa attack is fight or flight, the instinct is hard-coded through generations of less aggressive/flighty members of the species being eaten by wampas.

My reason for believing that tauntuans being native to Hoth implies that they are flighty was based on how easily we saw the tauntaun being pwned by the wampa in ESB. See, the wampa knocked Luke off first. It didn't immediately go after the tauntaun's throat, which it would have done if there was any chance that the tauntaun's response to a wampa attack was an agressive counterattack. Wampas are subject to selection pressures, as are tauntuans; if tauntauns are aggressive counterattackers, then the wampa has to take out the tauntaun quickly or it doesn't get dinner, or worse, it gets wounded or killed itself.

Indeed, the ESB footage speaks strongly against tauntauns even having large natural predators. The tauntaun stood there like a fucking dummy as Luke was first knocked off the tauntaun by the wampa, and then the wampa ripped out the tauntaun's throat. There was a good second for the tauntaun to take off or deploy its sticky-spit. If the tauntaun was near feral and not subject through generations of being made docile through human handlers, then the fight/flight instinct of tauntauns would have kicked in instantly as soon as a large predator showed up.

Now, here's the important point. These instincts are robust, and not picky. Humans would fall under "large predator," and would either be aggressively attacked no matter what the sex of the tauntaun, or would run like heck.

As for the training you describe to counter "foul tempered and aggressive" nature of the tauntaun, this attitude is obviously for intraspecies conflicts. Focusing on training females makes them easier to deal with supports this assertion. For the wampa, meat is meat, so shouldn't have any particular preference for the sex of their tauntaun prey.

Now, taking their lack of aggressiveness or fear towards humans or other large predators, together with the fact that tauntauns freeze solid in their supposed native habitat, or would even stand around to freeze solid in this habitat instead of immediately seeking out a thermal cave for shelter, indicates that tauntuans are not indigenous to the parts of Hoth that the Rebels set there base in, and maybe not to Hoth at all.

[Junghalli]

Anyone have any idea how Tatooine's atmosphere maintains its oxygen levels, and what those big banthas eat?

For the first question I'd guess photosynthetic organisms in small seas. We've only seen a small fraction of Tatooine's surface, so I don't see why it couldn't have a few minor large bodies of water. Say, something the size of Earth's Aral or Caspian Sea. Water-borne photosynthetics were responsible for putting all the oxygen in Earth's atmosphere in the first place, so it would probably work.
Such areas would not necessarily be focal points of human settlement, as they might very well look like the Skeleton Coast of Namibia (just as uninhabitable as the deep desert).
At least that's the best thing I can think of aside from limited terraforming, I doubt desert shrubs and the like would be enough to provide a human-breathable atmosphere.

Hoth is a bigger problem. The whole planet is one giant iceball, basically. And while you may be able to get abundant life in caves that doesn't solve the problem, because photosynthesis could not occur in a lightless environment. I would suggest that perhaps Hoth used to be a more Earthlike world and has only recently (<2,000 years) entered a "global freeze" in which all the oceans froze over. It happened on Earth once.
Alternatively, RedImperator's seasonal ocean theory could work.

[Spanky The Dolphin]

Tales from Mos Isley seemed to indicate that Tatooine had once had abundant vegetation, though I don't believe any large-scale areas still exist.

From the ITW books, Tatooine has only one percent surface water, and it totally uninhabitable except for a small relatively "cool" spot in the northern hemisphere.

KotoR Crap, blah blah blah...

Sorry, I think I might have misread you.

Really though, yeah, I already knew all about that.

[Bladed_Crescent]

That explanation doesn't work either. Whether the response to a wampa attack is fight or flight, the instinct is hard-coded through generations of less aggressive/flighty members of the species being eaten by wampas.

Fair enough.

My reason for believing that tauntuans being native to Hoth implies that they are flighty was based on how easily we saw the tauntaun being pwned by the wampa in ESB. See, the wampa knocked Luke off first. It didn't immediately go after the tauntaun's throat, which it would have done if there was any chance that the tauntaun's response to a wampa attack was an agressive counterattack. Wampas are subject to selection pressures, as are tauntuans; if tauntauns are aggressive counterattackers, then the wampa has to take out the tauntaun quickly or it doesn't get dinner, or worse, it gets wounded or killed itself.

I'm going to have to disagree with you here; lone animals are generally less likely to be aggressive when confronted with a larger predator (and of course, make for easier kills which is why predators usually go after isolated animals) a three-meter tall wampa probably wouldn't feel any hesitation in going after a lone tauntaun and rider.

Now, why the wampa went after Luke first? That I can't answer, all I can supply is conjecture; wampas are classified as semisentient - it's possible that it was simply removing the weakest foe first.

Indeed, the ESB footage speaks strongly against tauntauns even having large natural predators. The tauntaun stood there like a fucking dummy as Luke was first knocked off the tauntaun by the wampa, and then the wampa ripped out the tauntaun's throat. There was a good second for the tauntaun to take off or deploy its sticky-spit.

Because the wampa ambushed it; it smelled the wampa first, but didn't see it until it lunged up in front of both of them. If it was caught by surprise at point-blank, shock might have easily delayed its first reaction - especially for a trained animal normally housed around heavy machinery and all sorts of other disturbing phenomena.

If the tauntaun was near feral and not subject through generations of being made docile through human handlers, then the fight/flight instinct of tauntauns would have kicked in instantly as soon as a large predator showed up.

Again, it didn't have a chance - it immediately became nervous and started backing away when it smelled the wampa, but didn't see it until it was too late. It would have to know where to flee before running whole-hog. You see the same behaviour in herd animals today; when they smell a predator, but can't see it, they don't immediately scatter, but become increasingly agitated until its presence is confirmed. In this case, that allowed the wampa to get the drop on its prey.

As for the training you describe to counter "foul tempered and aggressive" nature of the tauntaun, this attitude is obviously for intraspecies conflicts. Focusing on training females makes them easier to deal with supports this assertion.

Quite so; the females use their horns to batter each other over males. This is listed as a sexual behaviour, which is why I didn't mention it as a possible response. Spitting, however, was referred to as "their most effective weapon".

For the wampa, meat is meat, so shouldn't have any particular preference for the sex of their tauntaun prey.

Quite so.

Rather than make a huge slew of a quote and response, I'm just going to break the next bit up and address the individual points:

Now, taking their lack of aggressiveness or fear towards humans....

They've had several months? years? to become acclimated towards humans. For all we know, this could be a herd that moved around the Rebel base, enjoying the warmth that the generators provided and got used to seeing people around.

...or other large predators....

As above, the tauntaun immediately became fearful as it smelled the wampa. Granted, this could be an instinctive response to an unknown scent.

...together with the fact that tauntauns freeze solid in their supposed native habitat, or would even stand around to freeze solid in this habitat instead of immediately seeking out a thermal cave for shelter, indicates that tauntuans are not indigenous to the parts of Hoth that the Rebels set there base in, and maybe not to Hoth at all.

Not many Arctic mammals can survive the deep cold of a nighttime blizzard without some form of shelter. The standing around I'll concede, but it died moments after Han dismounted, so it might not have been able to. It probably would have died underneath him anyways.

I'll concede the 'local' issue in lieu of any other evidence, but all sources confirm that tauntauns are originally from Hoth.

(on an unrelated tangent in regards to the questions of banthas: unless I've missed something, banthas are not originally from Tatooine - their world of origin is unknown because they've been spread so far over so long a period of time)

[LaserRifleofDoom]

How long have the rebels been on Hoth? How long has anybody been on Hoth?

It's entirely possible that the rebels have had a tiny outpost there for years before the main forces arrived. Hell, I wouldn't be surprised if the EU has (or will have) some Old Republic or Clone Wars events take place there.

[Noble Ire]

How long have the rebels been on Hoth? How long has anybody been on Hoth?

It's entirely possible that the rebels have had a tiny outpost there for years before the main forces arrived. Hell, I wouldn't be surprised if the EU has (or will have) some Old Republic or Clone Wars events take place there.

There was apparently a smuggling operation based on the planet for several years before the Rebels arrived, but as far as I know, the Alliance had only been there for a few months, having spent a fairly long period of time after Yavin looking for a new headquarters.

I do recall something occuring there during the Clone Wars as well, but I can't place it at the moment.

[RedImperator]

Lichen is photosynthetic. How precisely is it supposed to grow in caves to being with? It's also slow-growing.

Fair enough, but for all we know these particular lichen are chemosynthetic, living off the gases carried up through the vents. On Earth we have entire ecosystems based around chemosynthetic bacteria, so a similar process on an alien world isn't too far removed from possibility. Nor is the tauntauns themselves being migratory, moving from one cave to another. There are rock caves on Hoth, so my guess is that those are the populated ones.

That's an extremely limited range, and hydrothermal vents have limited lifetimes, too short for a large animal species to evolve. It's worth noting that with the exception of tube worms, the multicellular life living around hydrothermal vents are related to, and likely evolved from, species that live in the photosynthesis food chain. It's also worth noting that there are no chemosynthetic ecosystems on land on Earth. There are chemosynthetic organisms, but no food chain based upon them.

As for the fungus, just what is that living on? Fungi subsist on organic matter, and there's not a whole lot of that available on an ice sheet. Again, the example of Antarctica is worth noting: life has had 30 million years to colonize the ice sheet--indeed, before it froze, Antarctica was full of native life that would have been under extreme selective pressure to find any way possible to survive on the ice sheet once it started forming--and the best its come up with is lichens and mites on the exposed rock.

Add that to the fact that the tauntaun didn't run away immediately when it smelled its "mortal enemy". And that it froze to death in its supposed native habitat, and didn't attempt to take shelter or dig a nest into the snow. And that they even allowed humans to ride them at all. The tauntauns behaved exactly like an imported domesticated animal, not a recently tamed native life form--the idea that the Rebels could have tamed wild animals to that degree of docility and gotten them to ride into mortal danger in a few years, at the absolute outside, is absurd on its face. You can work a horse to death, but even a tamed zebra will quit, and probably bite its rider, long before it gets anywhere near that point.

And on the subject of training that Wyrm brought up:

Because of their foul tempers, the Rebel Alliance had some initial difficulty training them as mounts. General Carlist Rieekan, however, discovered a good way to ge tthrough their obstinance to have them perform well in this regard.

...because these beasts feel that they always need to compete, we needed to eliminate competion. Therefore the wranglers made sure to bring in only females to be trained as mounts....

After this, we kept them warm and fed and gave them pieces of mook fruit every time they performed correctly. They adapted quickly to our needs and proved valuable scouting transportation while our speeders were still being adapted to the cold.

All that demonstrates is that the writer has no idea how difficult it is to tame a wild animal, especially an adult wild animal.

Yes, I'm sure there's some way to turn enough intellectual backflips to make the whole thing fit. You have to if you want to work within Lucasfilm's canon policy. Nevertheless, it's still stupid. It would have been trivial to write "Tauntauns are native to, and were domesticated in, the arctic regions of [Planet], and were imported to Hoth by the Rebels when they realized their vehicles functioned poorly in the extreme cold." The problem is that too many EU writers are scientific ignoramuses who, left to their own devices, make the same kind of moron mistakes with which Star Trek writers have assaulting its fans for years.

[Cykeisme]

No time for a long post atm, but since I'm here reading, thought I'd ask.. if it's unlikely for tauntauns to be native to Hoth (unless there's a large number of unknown terms), then what about the wampas, RedImperator?

I have very little knowledge of biology, especially regarding exotic life forms like chemosynthetic bacteria or life around deep ocean volcanic vents. So it's in fact impossible for "lichens" (remember that the term isn't used accurately, they may not even actually be plants) to grow in hot geothermally heated caves?

I must admit, though it totally blows away parsimony, I'm prefer the idea that tauntauns and wampas are native to Hoth. Probably just had the notion ingrained in me for so long, even if it's the less likely prospect.

[RedImperator]

No time for a long post atm, but since I'm here reading, thought I'd ask.. if it's unlikely for tauntauns to be native to Hoth (unless there's a large number of unknown terms), then what about the wampas, RedImperator?

Accidentally imported? A predator from another region that wandered into the area? Someone's pet from the smuggling operation that was there before that got left behind? It's tougher to explain, but there are answers that make more sense than "tauntauns are native to Hoth and eat chemosynthetic lichen that grows in caves".

I like the second explanation, personally. Wampas are clearly analogous to polar bears. On Earth, polar bears hunt out on sea ice. Hoth has to have open seas somewhere at some point in the year, because that's the only way oxygen is getting into the atmosphere. If the rebels set up shop reasonably close to the sea, a wampa might have been attracted by the activity, or maybe got disoriented in a blizzard and wandered nearby.

I have very little knowledge of biology, especially regarding exotic life forms like chemosynthetic bacteria or life around deep ocean volcanic vents. So it's in fact impossible for "lichens" (remember that the term isn't used accurately, they may not even actually be plants) to grow in hot geothermally heated caves?

Chemosynthetic life in the sea is made possible by plumes of hot, chemical rich water creating a warm spot in the deep ocean. Chemosynthetic bacteria and even animals convert the chemicals into organic compounds. Once you get past the initial chemosynthetic stage, the biochemistry is identical to life in the photosynthetic food chain. So fish, crabs, mollosks, and what have you get drawn to the vent and feed on the chemosynthetic bacteria and each other.

On land, you see, in volcanic areas, pools of water rich in hydrocarbons and sulfur, identical in composition to the water coming out of the hydrothermal vents, and you do see chemosynthetic bacteria living in it. But you don't see a whole food chain build up around them. Now, admittedly, there's already a photosynthetic food chain available, so there may be no pressure for anyone to feed on the bacteria in the water, but nevertheless, to my knowledge, no food chain has sprung up anywhere on land around these vents.

I must admit, though it totally blows away parsimony, I'm prefer the idea that tauntauns and wampas are native to Hoth. Probably just had the notion ingrained in me for so long, even if it's the less likely prospect.

You could still pull it off, without all this stupidity, just by saying that in Hoth's tropics, there's tundra, boreal forests, and open seas in the summer, which could support all kinds of life without hurting Hoth's status as an "ice planet" (if the ice sheets extend all the way to, say, the 20th parallel north and south of the equator, that sounds like an ice planet to me). There's still the problem of the tauntauns behaving like domesticated animals, but the wampas would represent no problem in that situation.

[Wyrm]

My reason for believing that tauntuans being native to Hoth implies that they are flighty was based on how easily we saw the tauntaun being pwned by the wampa in ESB. See, the wampa knocked Luke off first. It didn't immediately go after the tauntaun's throat, which it would have done if there was any chance that the tauntaun's response to a wampa attack was an agressive counterattack. Wampas are subject to selection pressures, as are tauntuans; if tauntauns are aggressive counterattackers, then the wampa has to take out the tauntaun quickly or it doesn't get dinner, or worse, it gets wounded or killed itself.

I'm going to have to disagree with you here; lone animals are generally less likely to be aggressive when confronted with a larger predator (and of course, make for easier kills which is why predators usually go after isolated animals) a three-meter tall wampa probably wouldn't feel any hesitation in going after a lone tauntaun and rider.

The wampa is bipedal, and appears to be the same order of weight as the tauntaun. Tauntauns are obviously built for running; take a look at those hind legs. The tauntaun has horns that are good butting weapons. If that tauntaun decides to ram, the wampa is on its butt at the very least, or wounded or dead at worst. Either way, the tauntaun has a chance to run for the hills before the wampa recovers its dignity. Result: The wampa goes without dinner.

If the tauntaun spits and blinds the wampa, then the result is the same: the wampa starves tonight, and will probably suffer permanent damage to its eyes. That's really bad.

Be it learned behavior or instinct, the wampa is best served by attacking the tauntaun first. That it doesn't means that it has no instinct or learning that labels the tauntaun as aggressive prey.

Furthermore, a prey animal is going to be geared toward actions that give it the best chance of survival. If the predator likely hasn't seen it yet, then freezing is a good strategy, especially if you're colored like the background. However, when the predator is right on top of you, it's time to fight or run. Those that continue to freeze get eaten, and have their freezing genes removed from the pool, and therefore will not be found in a population of prey animals regularly predated by this predator.

Now, why the wampa went after Luke first? That I can't answer, all I can supply is conjecture; wampas are classified as semisentient - it's possible that it was simply removing the weakest foe first.

It plain doesn't make sense for the wampa to go after Luke first if the tauntaun is its main prey. Why? Luke is small. There's not as much meat on Luke as there is on the tauntaun. If the tauntaun truly is one of the prey animals of the wampa, then attacking the prey without much meat on it and is unlikely to hurt you makes little sense when there's a larger prey animal availible. If the larger prey runs and escapes, you don't get as much meat as if the smaller prey escapes. If the larger prey attacks, you might get hurt more seriously than if the smaller prey animal attacks you. If the tauntaun is regular prey to wampas, then wampas would be geared to attack them in perference to Luke.

Now, if the wampa thought that the tauntaun is a fellow predator, things change. Predators are adapted to hurt meat, and as a wampa, it is meat. Predators prefer not to attack non-prey predators for this reason, even ones smaller than them. However, they do compete for resources, and there is a hierarchy amongst them. If the wampa thinks that the tauntaun is a predator, then knocking Luke down sends a clear message: "Give up your meat (Luke) or prepare for battle!" If the tauntaun runs, then the wampa is satisfied with Luke, as it doesn't have to engage in battle with a fellow predator. If the tauntaun wants to fight and it is killed, then the wampa gets more meat. (This latter result happened inn ESB.)

Either way, knocking Luke off is behavior more consistent with the wampa thinking the tauntaun as a fellow predator... which we know the tauntaun isn't. Therefore, the tauntaun is not indigenous to this region of Hoth.

Indeed, the ESB footage speaks strongly against tauntauns even having large natural predators. The tauntaun stood there like a fucking dummy as Luke was first knocked off the tauntaun by the wampa, and then the wampa ripped out the tauntaun's throat. There was a good second for the tauntaun to take off or deploy its sticky-spit.

Because the wampa ambushed it; it smelled the wampa first, but didn't see it until it lunged up in front of both of them. If it was caught by surprise at point-blank, shock might have easily delayed its first reaction - especially for a trained animal normally housed around heavy machinery and all sorts of other disturbing phenomena.

If the tauntaun was near feral and not subject through generations of being made docile through human handlers, then the fight/flight instinct of tauntauns would have kicked in instantly as soon as a large predator showed up.

Again, it didn't have a chance - it immediately became nervous and started backing away when it smelled the wampa, but didn't see it until it was too late. It would have to know where to flee before running whole-hog. You see the same behaviour in herd animals today; when they smell a predator, but can't see it, they don't immediately scatter, but become increasingly agitated until its presence is confirmed. In this case, that allowed the wampa to get the drop on its prey.

Bullcrap. Surprise does NOT globally induce an animal to stand stupified; standing stupid in response to surprise is a quirk of human behavior, and does not apply to the rest of the animal kingdom. How an animal responds to surprise depends on how it's wired, and ultimately on what is adaptive. Standing stupid in response to surprise is maladaptive in prey animals out of human care.

Have you ever had horse-riding lessons? Horse-riding instructors take great pains to explain that having a spooked horse is the last thing you need, because they absolutely do not react by freezing. They bolt, which is hazardous to the rider as he may be thrown off, or they buck and rear back (a response to fend off the attacks of predators, but can throw an unwary rider off his mount) and then run. Riders must take care to anticipate situations that may spook his mount and steer past them. Horses don't respond to surprise by standing stupid, and this is an animal that has been domesticated for thousand of years!

When you have an animal with strong flight instincts, the reaction to being surprised is to run, not "be taken by surprise." Again, the prey animal that stands stupid is dinner. The window of opportunity for taking advantage of a surprised prey animal that you have been preying on for generations is extremely slim, and essenitially needs an immediate response. They prey either runs, or goes berzerk on you, or spits in your face, or does something. The one thing a well adapted prey animal will not do, however, is stand around for any appreciable time and let itself be devoured.

That the tauntaun is struck dumb by the attack speaks against them being native to that region of Hoth, or having ancestors with any kind of large natural predator at all, or even being only recently domesticated; if you really had large predators after you, your freezing ancestors get eaten and removed from the gene pool. That trait can only survive in domesticated animals.

Rather than make a huge slew of a quote and response, I'm just going to break the next bit up and address the individual points:

Now, taking their lack of aggressiveness or fear towards humans....

They've had several months? years? to become acclimated towards humans. For all we know, this could be a herd that moved around the Rebel base, enjoying the warmth that the generators provided and got used to seeing people around.

Bullshit. Domestication takes generations, and for large animals like tauntauns would take decades if not centuries or millennia of selective breeding to get to a usable docility. An animal with a large predator will not let a human mount them, no matter how much exposure to humans they're given. Nobody has ever domesticated the zebra; it's had to deal with lions and tigers for generations, and has the hard-coded instinct "not zebra on your back = PREDATOR!!" has been bred deeply into them. Not just zebra; no animal native to Africa has ever been domesticated. In fact, all of the large animals that have been domesticated by humans are decended from animals from the Fertile Crecent (or in the case of the horse, evolved nearby in central asia), which by some fluke lack large predators like lions or tigers.

As above, the tauntaun immediately became fearful as it smelled the wampa. Granted, this could be an instinctive response to an unknown scent.

The tauntaun complained and tried to rear back. That Luke was able to check it means that the tauntaun has been not merely tamed, but fully domesticated. Humans are able to abort instincts that would normally cause it to flee. No, domestication takes a lot of time, generations of breeding docility, and we only succeeded with the horse because it had lower than normal flight insticts to begin with.

I'll concede the 'local' issue in lieu of any other evidence, but all sources confirm that tauntauns are originally from Hoth.

The tauntaun doesn't respond like a prey animal of the wampa (or indeed any kind of large predator), and the wampa doesn't respond to it like it was a prey animal to it, so it's definitely not local. It definitely responds like a domesticated animal, because a human is able to check its fear instincts... a trait that would be maladaptive in any wild animal, and it's fight or flight instincts have clearly been purposefully dulled... dulling that response is maladaptive outside human care. Therefore, the tauntaun is domesticated and not native to that region of Hoth.

Now, if tauntauns are domesticated, where were they domesticated? Hoth is an uncharted system, "devoid of human forms" by Captain Piett's (?) report, yet tauntauns allow humans to ride them. They must be domesticated by humans, ergo, they are not native to Hoth, no matter what the EU says.

[Straha]

Isn't it possible that Tauntauns are natives of Hoth, but come from another region of Hoth away from Echo base? When the Rebels arrived and set up base they needed a pack animal/riding animal and they looked elsewhere on the planet, found a couple herds of Tauntauns in a milder region of the planet (explaining why Han's froze in the Wilderness, and how they could survive on vegetation) and brough them up so that the Rebels could use them.

As for the domestication in the WEG Cracken's Rebel Field Guide I remember there being an entry about "Animal Restraining Bolts" which were, essentially, pain inducers and narcotic stimulants (if I recall correctly) which you stuck in the back of an animal and triggered to stimulate it. It seems shaky, but this could be a really really quick carrot and stick method to train them in a hurry, as a stop gap to last untill they got the Speeders adapted.

[Quadlok]

Could the Rebels have simply lobotomized the Tauntauns, either chemically or surgically, to make them sufficiently docile? Its not like it would have been hard for them.

[RedImperator]

Isn't it possible that Tauntauns are natives of Hoth, but come from another region of Hoth away from Echo base? When the Rebels arrived and set up base they needed a pack animal/riding animal and they looked elsewhere on the planet, found a couple herds of Tauntauns in a milder region of the planet (explaining why Han's froze in the Wilderness, and how they could survive on vegetation) and brough them up so that the Rebels could use them.

As for the domestication in the WEG Cracken's Rebel Field Guide I remember there being an entry about "Animal Restraining Bolts" which were, essentially, pain inducers and narcotic stimulants (if I recall correctly) which you stuck in the back of an animal and triggered to stimulate it. It seems shaky, but this could be a really really quick carrot and stick method to train them in a hurry, as a stop gap to last untill they got the Speeders adapted.

You can torture a wild animal all you like and that still won't domesticate it. Same goes for lobotomies. The only way to make a truly wild animal (not a domesticated animal that's gone feral) domesticated is with generations of selective breeding. The only exception on Earth I'm aware of are elephants, which have never been domesticated but have been tamed enough to function as war mounts, but 1) those elephants were raised from childhood to be pack animals, and 2) adult elephants have no natural predators, live in social herds, and aren't violently territorial, so the instincts which make zebras, rhinos, and hippos impossible to safely tame don't exist. It's utterly impossible to train a wild animal, especially a wild prey animal, to be a useful mount in a few months, unless the Star Wars universe has mind control devices that can turn animals into biological droids, and to my knowledge we've never seen anything like that.

Besides, if we're getting into conducting brain surgery and installing "animal restraining bolts" (for which, by the way, there's not a lick of onscreen evidence) and what have you, that's turning into a fuckload more effort than it would be to just import a cold-adapted animal that's already been domesticated. Christ, in the months the rebels were supposedly fiddle-fucking around trying to train tauntauns, they could have, oh, I dunno, cold-adapted their vehicles.

[Bladed_Crescent]

That's an extremely limited range, and hydrothermal vents have limited lifetimes, too short for a large animal species to evolve. It's worth noting that with the exception of tube worms, the multicellular life living around hydrothermal vents are related to, and likely evolved from, species that live in the photosynthesis food chain. It's also worth noting that there are no chemosynthetic ecosystems on land on Earth. There are chemosynthetic organisms, but no food chain based upon them.

Fair enough; conceded.

As for the fungus, just what is that living on? Fungi subsist on organic matter, and there's not a whole lot of that available on an ice sheet.

All I can offer is that it's there and may be 'fungus' in the same way a space slug is a slug.

Not much, I know.

Add that to the fact that the tauntaun didn't run away immediately when it smelled its "mortal enemy". And that it froze to death in its supposed native habitat, and didn't attempt to take shelter or dig a nest into the snow.

I addressed the former above (and will do so below), and I already ceded the latter case. For the "froze to death" bit, I'll like to repeat myself: what are the polar animals here that can survive unsheltered in a night-time blizzard in their native habitats? That the tauntaun died of exposure in the worst possible conditions isn't exactly a mark against it living there.

On the flip side, desert animals from reptiles to mammals to birds die out under the heat of the sun - does this necessarily mean that they are in a "supposed" native habitat, or can they simply not handle its environmental extremes without shelter?

Yes, I'm sure there's some way to turn enough intellectual backflips to make the whole thing fit. You have to if you want to work within Lucasfilm's canon policy. Nevertheless, it's still stupid.

Without meaning to sound rude - but to put it bluntly nonetheless - this is not my problem. Even if there was no explanation for how the Rebels trained tauntauns, they did it somehow (it's also something to bear in mind that the EGAS was written from the perspective of an in-universe source and Rieekan is not an animal trainer; if he was asked for a quote on how they managed to train their tauntauns, he's probably only going to cover the basics for the requisite soundbite).

I'm just presenting the canon material and hypothesizing. I do apologize if this appears to be "intellectual backflips", though. Not my intent - I do sometimes let my hypotheses get away from me.

Furthermore, a prey animal is going to be geared toward actions that give it the best chance of survival. If the predator likely hasn't seen it yet, then freezing is a good strategy, especially if you're colored like the background. However, when the predator is right on top of you, it's time to fight or run. Those that continue to freeze get eaten, and have their freezing genes removed from the pool, and therefore will not be found in a population of prey animals regularly predated by this predator.

As I said before - where would it run? What would it fight? It didn't see the wampa until it leapt up right in front of it, so it had no idea which way not to go.

It plain doesn't make sense for the wampa to go after Luke first if the tauntaun is its main prey.

I'll grant you that.

Note that this is just my own mind at work; I'm not presenting it as a rebuttal, given its unlikely nature: the wampa wasn't seeing the tauntaun as as predator, but Luke? In Darksaber (I know, it's a KJA work), a horde of wampas banded together to attack human hunters on the planet, so they obviously recognized them as a threat. It could be that that recognition pre-dated the hunters' arrival, but that was when the Small Pink Things became enough of a threat to force a wampa alliance.

Bullcrap. Surprise does NOT globally induce an animal to stand stupified; standing stupid in response to surprise is a quirk of human behavior, and does not apply to the rest of the animal kingdom. How an animal responds to surprise depends on how it's wired, and ultimately on what is adaptive. Standing stupid in response to surprise is maladaptive in prey animals out of human care.

You'd better tell that to deer - wild animals that freeze when they see large animals nearby, then run. When a predator is nearby, the first insitinct is to freeze and try to locate it, meanwhile hope it doesn't notice you, since anything else tends to draw attention. Of course, some animals wait too long to run, or don't do it at all - as you pointed out, natural selection takes care of them.

Okay... it was six seconds from the tauntaun's first reaction to the wampa's attack - with Luke trying to calm her. It was two seconds from the wampa's attack on Luke to tearing at the tauntaun's throat. That's not exactly "standing stupid" in either case.

They bolt, which is hazardous to the rider as he may be thrown off, or they buck and rear back (a response to fend off the attacks of predators, but can throw an unwary rider off his mount) and then run. Riders must take care to anticipate situations that may spook his mount and steer past them. Horses don't respond to surprise by standing stupid, and this is an animal that has been domesticated for thousand of years!

I agree, but the situations are not entirely analogous. How many horses buck and rear when they just smell or hear - but do not see - something unpleasant? How many of them will suddenly spook over a scent without a clear threat to accompany it?

The tauntaun had, at most, two seconds to react when the wampa jumped right up in front of it. It could have spooked - all we see is Luke being knocked off and the wampa going for its throat. Before then, it didn't know where the wampa was - which way should it run? It couldn't know, because all it knew was Predator! Close!, not Predator! Two degrees east! Run west!

That the tauntaun is struck dumb by the attack speaks against them being native to that region of Hoth....

I'm not arguing that point; I already said so.

Domestication takes generations, and for large animals like tauntauns would take decades if not centuries or millennia of selective breeding to get to a usable docility. An animal with a large predator will not let a human mount them, no matter how much exposure to humans they're given. Nobody has ever domesticated the zebra; it's had to deal with lions and tigers for generations, and has the hard-coded instinct "not zebra on your back = PREDATOR!!" has been bred deeply into them. Not just zebra; no animal native to Africa has ever been domesticated.

It's a good thing that they're not African, then. Somehow the Rebels managed it - maybe due to a fluke, tauntauns, despite being ornery and flighty can be easily trained. Maybe the Rebels drugged the mook fruit to make them more placid. Maybe they sprinkled pixie dust over the pens at night as Chewie chanted soothing passages from the Necrowombicon. I don't know and can't say. What I can say though is that somehow they did with a native population. That's all we have to go on, I'm afraid.

The tauntaun complained and tried to rear back. That Luke was able to check it means that the tauntaun has been not merely tamed, but fully domesticated. Humans are able to abort instincts that would normally cause it to flee. No, domestication takes a lot of time, generations of breeding docility, and we only succeeded with the horse because it had lower than normal flight insticts to begin with.

Don't make me go, "He used the Force." I'll do it, I swear!

Kidding.

No, I agree with you - on most points it seems, which leads me to the question of why we're arguing.

Now, if tauntauns are domesticated, where were they domesticated? Hoth is an uncharted system, "devoid of human forms" by Captain Piett's (?) report, yet tauntauns allow humans to ride them. They must be domesticated by humans, ergo, they are not native to Hoth, no matter what the EU says.

Well, you're free to come up with your own theory for tauntaun origins, of course. Fanfic it, ask Lucasfilm for clarification, debate an intellectual gymnast (ooh! sprained my back! Medic!) on an internet board. But until and unless Lucasfilm alters their stance, tauntauns do come from Hoth (originally - wasn't the possibility of an imported population brought up? Warning: backflip in progress. They could have used those as primary mounts, putting them with wild-caught specimens as an example of behaviour. I have no idea if that would even work.)

...motrin....

At this point, though, I don't think we're going to agree with each other over the central issue and everything else then becomes scrabbling at the edges.

Christ, in the months the rebels were supposedly fiddle-fucking around trying to train tauntauns, they could have, oh, I dunno, cold-adapted their vehicles.

Because they couldn't have done both at the same time. I doubt the Rebel Alliance, on the run as they were, was in dire enough straits to assign their mechanics the task of training animals.

"Bob, we got a new job for you."

"Uh... yeah? I was just about finished with some mods that should get this T-47 working in the co-"

"No no no, that'll never work. Listen, we got some animals here. We want you to train 'em. Get 'em to be our eyes and ears out in the field, since the speeders aren't working."

"Yeah, that's what I was about to-"

"Look, just get into the pens and start training. Here. You'll need some raingear."

"...I'm afraid to ask."

"Good man - by the way, I want half a dozen ready for riders by the end of the day."

"You hate me, don't you, sir?"

[Wyrm]

Furthermore, a prey animal is going to be geared toward actions that give it the best chance of survival. If the predator likely hasn't seen it yet, then freezing is a good strategy, especially if you're colored like the background. However, when the predator is right on top of you, it's time to fight or run. Those that continue to freeze get eaten, and have their freezing genes removed from the pool, and therefore will not be found in a population of prey animals regularly predated by this predator.

As I said before - where would it run?

Fuckssake. Anywhere but where this wampa is! Sure, it might run into a crevasse, or it might get lost and freeze to death before getting to shelter, or it might run into another wampa, but it just might escape with its life. If it stays, it's definitely doomed. The choice is clear.

What would it fight?

Fuckssake. The wampa! What did you think I meant? Pat Boone?!

If the tauntaun fights, sure it could be fatally wounded and die anyway, or it could exhaust itself and freeze to death while recovering, but it might convince the wampa that this pray is too much trouble to kill and retreat, and the tauntaun might survive the wounds it gets and might not be too exausted to get to shelter or to its food. If it just stands there, it's definitely done for. The choice is clear.

It didn't see the wampa until it leapt up right in front of it, so it had no idea which way not to go.

Fuckssake. Anywhere is better than being where your main predator is right on top of you! Idiot!

It plain doesn't make sense for the wampa to go after Luke first if the tauntaun is its main prey.

I'll grant you that.

Note that this is just my own mind at work; I'm not presenting it as a rebuttal, given its unlikely nature: the wampa wasn't seeing the tauntaun as as predator, but Luke? In Darksaber (I know, it's a KJA work), a horde of wampas banded together to attack human hunters on the planet, so they obviously recognized them as a threat. It could be that that recognition pre-dated the hunters' arrival, but that was when the Small Pink Things became enough of a threat to force a wampa alliance.

If these things are semisentient, then they learn. Luke was probably among the first humans that wampas have ever encountered, and at first enounter, wampas wouldn't know what to do with them, really. They'd therefore treat them like whatever humans are most similar to in Hoth's ecosystem.

The only reason creatures in the wild recognize other creatures as threats on sight is because they've been evolving together. New animals have to be guessed at, but predators tend to treat novel animals as prey (unless they're too large) and prey tend to treat novel animals as predators. Obviously, the wampas had enough further contact with humans to recognize them as a specific threat. (Re-erecting my EU barrier.)

Bullcrap. Surprise does NOT globally induce an animal to stand stupified; standing stupid in response to surprise is a quirk of human behavior, and does not apply to the rest of the animal kingdom. How an animal responds to surprise depends on how it's wired, and ultimately on what is adaptive. Standing stupid in response to surprise is maladaptive in prey animals out of human care.

You'd better tell that to deer - wild animals that freeze when they see large animals nearby, then run. When a predator is nearby, the first insitinct is to freeze and try to locate it, meanwhile hope it doesn't notice you, since anything else tends to draw attention. Of course, some animals wait too long to run, or don't do it at all - as you pointed out, natural selection takes care of them.

Deer freeze when there might be predator "nearby", when there's still a chance that the predator hasn't noticed them, but not when the "popping out right on top of them" (like the wampa), and therefore probably has already caught on that it's there. That's a different situation, requiring a different response. Notice that a deer, when it spots a predator, immediately locks both eyes on it, which is the only part of the visual field that many prey animals have binocular (distance) vision, so it's definitely checking distance, and therefore distance is important.

Crissakes, why do you think many predators have stalking behaviours? Predators stalk the way they do because it avoids catching the prey's notice until they're within pouncing distance. Stalking takes advantage of the peculiarities of prey vision, moving slowly to avoid catching they prey's notice, freezing when it looks like the prey is alert and looking out particularly keenly for predators. (It must be noted that vision in many prey animals is poor in detail, but sensitive to movement.) If the predator pounces too early, the prey has time to react to the sudden movement and gets away. If it risks getting closer for a better shot, they prey might notice it and run away.

Of course, prey adapt to stalking behavior by reacting to anything that looks like a pounce by running the other way. Animals can react very quickly to this general kind of stimulus, and it's better than doing nothing and getting eaten.

Okay... it was six seconds from the tauntaun's first reaction to the wampa's attack - with Luke trying to calm her. It was two seconds from the wampa's attack on Luke to tearing at the tauntaun's throat. That's not exactly "standing stupid" in either case.

In this case, yes, that is standing stupid. In the animal world, and with a predator that close, two seconds is far too long to respond to a predator. Distance matters in these instinctual responses. Standing around for two seconds with your main predator within grabbing distance is standing stupid.

They bolt, which is hazardous to the rider as he may be thrown off, or they buck and rear back (a response to fend off the attacks of predators, but can throw an unwary rider off his mount) and then run. Riders must take care to anticipate situations that may spook his mount and steer past them. Horses don't respond to surprise by standing stupid, and this is an animal that has been domesticated for thousand of years!

I agree, but the situations are not entirely analogous. How many horses buck and rear when they just smell or hear - but do not see - something unpleasant? How many of them will suddenly spook over a scent without a clear threat to accompany it?

When the smell or sound is immediately followed by something big jumping out in front of them? Just about all of them.

The tauntaun had, at most, two seconds to react when the wampa jumped right up in front of it.

Idiot. Two seconds is PLENTY of time to react to a potentially threatening stimulus like a large shape suddenly looming in front of you. Prey animals are not humans, you know. It doesn't take much time to react to a rapidly changing situation that might indicate you're in immediate danger, if you accept the possiblity that most of the time you may run from a situation that is actually harmless.

It could have spooked - all we see is Luke being knocked off and the wampa going for its throat. Before then, it didn't know where the wampa was - which way should it run? It couldn't know, because all it knew was Predator! Close!, not Predator! Two degrees east! Run west!

When the wampa appeared, roaring, the tauntaun then had two seconds to estimate that the predator was somewhere on its right side and very much too close for comfort, and therefore it should bolt left. Believe it or not, for a wild animal, two seconds is plenty of time to react to a general threat, if you're not picky about making sure that the threat is really a threat.

Prey animals will run away with the slightest provocation, even if the situation is harmless to them. It makes a lot of small inexpensive mistakes (running from non-threats) to avoid making that one large, very expensive mistake (not running from a real threat).

It's a good thing that they're not African, then. Somehow the Rebels managed it - maybe due to a fluke, tauntauns, despite being ornery and flighty can be easily trained.

Don't be an idiot! The point about Africa is that zebra, hippos, ect. have large predators after them. What is the wampa? A large predator! How do prey creatures evolve in response to large predators? By becomming skittish, or mean. If the tauntaun is really the prey creature of the wampa, then it will evolve to become skittish like the zebra, or mean like the rhino. What they will not be is easily trained. Why do you think I singled out the Fertile Crecent as just about our only source of large domesticated animals? That region is unique in that large herbivores were relatively unmolested by large predators.

Of all the other creatures in the world that might have been mounts or beasts of beasts of burden, the only animal outside the Fertile Crecent (or nearby) we've ever successfully domesticated is the llama, and only because it, too, has no large predators. This says something very important about how the predator/prey relationship affects a prey animal's temperment.

As RedImperator says, adult wild animals are very difficult to tame. Tauntauns show clear signs of being quite thorougly domesticated (specifically, they show traits that are maladaptive in wild animals and only make sense in domesticated animals, like accepting human mounts at all when they are prey animals).

Maybe the Rebels drugged the mook fruit to make them more placid.

And how would the Rebels know what kind of drugs to use to produce these specific effects in a few short months if Hoth has never seen human habitation before, idiot?

Now, if tauntauns are domesticated, where were they domesticated? Hoth is an uncharted system, "devoid of human forms" by Captain Piett's (?) report, yet tauntauns allow humans to ride them. They must be domesticated by humans, ergo, they are not native to Hoth, no matter what the EU says.

Well, you're free to come up with your own theory for tauntaun origins, of course. Fanfic it, ask Lucasfilm for clarification, debate an intellectual gymnast (ooh! sprained my back! Medic!) on an internet board. But until and unless Lucasfilm alters their stance, tauntauns do come from Hoth

You do understand the hierarchy of the Star Wars canon, do you not? The movies trump everything, even the EU (especially the EU)! All the movie evidence points to an animal that has been long domesticated by humans. Tauntauns plain don't behave like wild animals. Again, this brings up the question, if they've been domesticated, where were they domesticated? Again, Hoth is supposed to be devoid of human forms, so there's no way they could've been domesticated on Hoth. Ergo, they must be domesticated elsewhere. QED.

This conclusion was derived from the movie evidence. Therefore, if the EU contradicts it, the EU is wrong. Period. Because that's how the Star Wars canon works.

[Bladed_Crescent]

Fuckssake. Anywhere but where this wampa is! Sure, it might run into a crevasse, or it might get lost and freeze to death before getting to shelter, or it might run into another wampa, but it just might escape with its life. If it stays, it's definitely doomed. The choice is clear.

Yes, that's great.

It doesn't know where the wampa is. If it just runs, there's a chance it'll run right towards the predator because it can't see it. Staying put is a risk, I'll concede - but so is running if the wampa is unaware of the tauntaun's presence and just happens to be passing by, or is trying to spook it into fleeing.

Predators do that, especially smart ones like wampas are supposed to be. Hell, it could be a mama wampa taking a young 'un out for a hunting lesson. As you said, it could fall into a crevice or otherwise injure itself reacting to a threat that may not present itself - and there we have a good reason for not jumping everytime there's an indication of a predator nearby.

As it turned out, of course, it did.

Fuckssake. The wampa! What did you think I meant? Pat Boone?!

Yes, Pat Boone. Of course. I couldn't have been referring to the tauntaun's inability to attack an animal it can't even see, not at all.

Fuckssake. Anywhere is better than being where your main predator is right on top of you! Idiot!

It didn't know the wampa was right on top of it. It smelled it nearby. So, it runs. As above - it could have just drawn a passing predator's attention to it, could be running right towards the very thing it doesn't want to encounter. The tauntaun was looking around and snarling/coughing/whatever, trying to determine the situation. Again, coming back to deer - they will examine a perturbance and likely run. But unless already panicked, wild animals will not suddenly run blindly at the first whiff of a predator.

Deer freeze when there might be predator "nearby", when there's still a chance that the predator hasn't noticed them, but not when the "popping out right on top of them" (like the wampa), and therefore probably has already caught on that it's there.

Right - the tauntaun didn't immediately flee when there was something "nearby", but was upset. That was my point.

Crissakes, why do you think many predators have stalking behaviours? Predators stalk the way they do because it avoids catching the prey's notice until they're within pouncing distance. Stalking takes advantage of the peculiarities of prey vision, moving slowly to avoid catching they prey's notice, freezing when it looks like the prey is alert and looking out particularly keenly for predators. (It must be noted that vision in many prey animals is poor in detail, but sensitive to movement.) If the predator pounces too early, the prey has time to react to the sudden movement and gets away. If it risks getting closer for a better shot, they prey might notice it and run away.

That's, uh... pretty much what the wampa did.

In this case, yes, that is standing stupid. In the animal world, and with a predator that close, two seconds is far too long to respond to a predator. Distance matters in these instinctual responses. Standing around for two seconds with your main predator within grabbing distance is standing stupid.

All right, fair enough. This could have just been a stupid tauntaun, or it could have been put off-balance, by the wampa knocking Luke off its back.

When the smell or sound is immediately followed by something big jumping out in front of them? Just about all of them.

All right then; at this point, I should come clean - I misinterpreted your bit about the horses to mean a minor disturbance like a scent. Thanks for the clarification.

If all prey species were unable to be startled from an immediate flight response, ambush predators would enjoy very little success as a hunting strategy. Luck - and as you noted above, honed stalking behaviours - and the fact that some prey can be panicked into a brief indecision make the difference. Wild animals can be shocked into inaction.

Prey animals are not humans, you know.

I don't know why you keep saying this; I have never said or intimated they are and have referred to other prey animals' behaviours rather than humans'. The only thing I can think of is that I maintain that it is possible for a wild animal to be shocked into a temporary inaction. This is not a trait endemic solely to humanity, nor domestic animals.

When the wampa appeared, roaring, the tauntaun then had two seconds to estimate that the predator was somewhere on its right side and very much too close for comfort, and therefore it should bolt left. Believe it or not, for a wild animal, two seconds is plenty of time to react to a general threat, if you're not picky about making sure that the threat is really a threat.

And it's not like an roaring animal twice its size right on top of it, batting its mount off it might cause a brief What do I do! or similar effect (i.e. the force of the blow knocking Luke might have unbalanced it). If the wampa were further away when it appeared, believe or not, I would be in full agreement with you, because the threat, while imminent, is less abrupt.

The point about Africa is that zebra, hippos, ect. have large predators after them. What is the wampa? A large predator! How do prey creatures evolve in response to large predators? By becomming skittish, or mean. If the tauntaun is really the prey creature of the wampa, then it will evolve to become skittish like the zebra, or mean like the rhino. What they will not be is easily trained.

I'm sorry - I was joking. Next time I'll remember to put an insipid smiley face in.

It's still a large leap from "Luke's tauntaun didn't act right" to "therefore every single Lucasfilm-approved source is wrong". It's not like scaling the Executor, where there can be an objective, definitive word on its size - we're both discussing the behaviours of an individual animal's behaviour that doesn't even exist and applying it as a generality, then using that same generality as proof.

And how would the Rebels know what kind of drugs to use to produce these specific effects in a few short months if Hoth has never seen human habitation before, idiot?

I don't know and can't say.

That part right there just flew right on by, didn't it?

You do understand the hierarchy of the Star Wars canon, do you not? The movies trump everything, even the EU (especially the EU)! All the movie evidence points to an animal that has been long domesticated by humans. Tauntauns plain don't behave like wild animals. Again, this brings up the question, if they've been domesticated, where were they domesticated? Again, Hoth is supposed to be devoid of human forms, so there's no way they could've been domesticated on Hoth. Ergo, they must be domesticated elsewhere. QED.

This conclusion was derived from the movie evidence. Therefore, if the EU contradicts it, the EU is wrong. Period. Because that's how the Star Wars canon works.

Yes I do. However, here's the inevitable but:

Based on two animals, which, given that they were assigned to the officers held in high regard were likely to be the most well-trained of the bunch. Yes, that's a whiz-bang way to make an assessment for an entire species that we never see again. But, whatever. I do apologize if I've gotten your goat - again, it's obvious that neither one of us will convince the other, so if you'd care to call a ceasefire, I'm game.

Otherwise, I'll just have to get a catapult and some dead woodchucks.

Rocks cost more.

[Tychu]

Well if its anything to go by. The Super Empire Strikes Back game has you traveling to diffrrent caves for some reason where an abundance of life persits, as well as warm water. The cave thing is probally where the TaunTauns get their fill

and i know i know but games are a low cannon level

[Elfdart]

If tauntauns are part of the Hoth ecosystem and are preyed upon by wampas, then they have a large natural predator after them and --as part of their adaptation-- would be quite flighty and and therefore just about undomesticatable. It's the same reason no one has domesticated the zebra.

And yet the reindeer was in fact domesticated.

There's no way that the Rebels could tame such flighty creatures even after a few short years; it would take generations of selective breeding to remove the flightiness from them and make them acceptible mounts. That Rebels are able to use them as mounts even when they're on the run from the Empire indicates that feral tauntauns are very naturally docile and calm (an assertion not supported by the fact that wampas prey on them as a matter of course), or tauntauns have been imported by the Rebels, and the wampa we see is being opportunistic.

Horses, llamas, camels, donkeys and cattle were all domesticated as well, yet all have (or had) large predators that eat them in the wild.

[Elfdart]

I don't see what's so unusual about Hoth's animal life. Berengia had two types of large horse, two smaller types, the saiga, musk ox, reindeer, mammoth and two types of bison. There were also the short-faced bear (about the size of the wampa), dirk-toothed cats, lions, brown bears and dire wolves. There could easily be a lot of plant life under the ice and snow for starters. The animals could also migrate when food gets scarce in one area.

[RedImperator]

I don't see what's so unusual about Hoth's animal life. Berengia had two types of large horse, two smaller types, the saiga, musk ox, reindeer, mammoth and two types of bison. There were also the short-faced bear (about the size of the wampa), dirk-toothed cats, lions, brown bears and dire wolves. There could easily be a lot of plant life under the ice and snow for starters. The animals could also migrate when food gets scarce in one area.

If the EU said that the area in which Echo Base was located was tundra like Berengia that we just happened to see in winter, and there was an ordinary arctic ecosystem in place, there'd be no problem. In fact, that's pretty much where I think the wampa came from. But the imbeciles took "ice planet" completely literally and made the tauntauns cave dwellers who eat magical lichen that grows without sunlight and roam across the ice sheet eating fungus that grows without organic matter, leaving the fans to try to rationalize it or (my solution and I suspect yours as well) throw the EU out for being nonsensical bullshit on this matter.

[Tychu]

Sorry; but you brought up the fact that the Rebels would have a hard time domesticating/training them. I was just supplying information about that. I wasn't arguing "flightiness" or what have you, just that the Rebels had done obviously it with the indigenous tauntauns.

Given that they are said to be foul-tempered and aggressive, they could be like boars then zebra - more likely to attack an intruder than to flee. i.e. their most common defensive measure is spitting into an opponent's eyes. In Hoth's temperature, the saliva freezes very quickly, blinding their foe.

I guess what I'm trying to get at is that whatever their character traits, they obviously didn't get too much in the way of the Rebels training them as mounts.

That explanation doesn't work either. Whether the response to a wampa attack is fight or flight, the instinct is hard-coded through generations of less aggressive/flighty members of the species being eaten by wampas.

My reason for believing that tauntuans being native to Hoth implies that they are flighty was based on how easily we saw the tauntaun being pwned by the wampa in ESB. See, the wampa knocked Luke off first. It didn't immediately go after the tauntaun's throat, which it would have done if there was any chance that the tauntaun's response to a wampa attack was an agressive counterattack. Wampas are subject to selection pressures, as are tauntuans; if tauntauns are aggressive counterattackers, then the wampa has to take out the tauntaun quickly or it doesn't get dinner, or worse, it gets wounded or killed itself.

Indeed, the ESB footage speaks strongly against tauntauns even having large natural predators. The tauntaun stood there like a fucking dummy as Luke was first knocked off the tauntaun by the wampa, and then the wampa ripped out the tauntaun's throat. There was a good second for the tauntaun to take off or deploy its sticky-spit. If the tauntaun was near feral and not subject through generations of being made docile through human handlers, then the fight/flight instinct of tauntauns would have kicked in instantly as soon as a large predator showed up.

Now, here's the important point. These instincts are robust, and not picky. Humans would fall under "large predator," and would either be aggressively attacked no matter what the sex of the tauntaun, or would run like heck.

As for the training you describe to counter "foul tempered and aggressive" nature of the tauntaun, this attitude is obviously for intraspecies conflicts. Focusing on training females makes them easier to deal with supports this assertion. For the wampa, meat is meat, so shouldn't have any particular preference for the sex of their tauntaun prey.

Now, taking their lack of aggressiveness or fear towards humans or other large predators, together with the fact that tauntauns freeze solid in their supposed native habitat, or would even stand around to freeze solid in this habitat instead of immediately seeking out a thermal cave for shelter, indicates that tauntuans are not indigenous to the parts of Hoth that the Rebels set there base in, and maybe not to Hoth at all.

could it be that when the Rebels came to Hoth they took young TaunTauns first and trained them. This would result in the TaunTauns being easily trained and not knowing what the hell to do when the Wampas attacked

[Tychu]

this is why us imbeciles think Ice



hmmm seems to me its alot of ice

damn ILM loosers, it kinda looks like a frozen Venus, they just changed the damn reds and oranges to blues and whites

[RedImperator]

That looks like a band of ocean around the equator (assuming we're seeing the planet tilted on its axis and the ocean doesn't extend into the temperate latitudes). Which would be, you know, pretty much necessary for the planet to retain an oxygenated atmosphere for any length of time anyway. Plenty of room for tundra and even boreal forest in the tropics, with large enough ice sheets in the polar regions and temperate zones to qualify as an "ice planet".

[Tychu]

It could be that it is just a frozen body of water with no snow on it when the picture of the planet was taken. just so you know im taking Hans line in ESB very strongly here "There isnt enough life here to fit in a space cruiser".

im not disproving you because as you know if its snow and ice that we know of snow and ice that means that Oxygen is very abundent so there has to be a some kinda greenery.

for me thermal heating is the only thing that is oxygen-up Hoth, something tells me Han sees life as TaunTauns and Wampas and not green fungus