Moorlands

The Moorlands are a fifty square mile expanse of heath and peat bog to the west of Rooks Fall, across the Cauldmoon River. It is a place of great natural beauty that can appear desolate and haunting or bright and vibrant, depending on the time of year.

Jerotus Rosethorn, explorer and travel writer

A Changing Landscape

Late summer / early autumn is the best time to visit the Moorlands, this is when the heather is in full bloom and the landscape becomes a vast, patchwork carpet of purples, pinks and greens. Bees buzz happily amongst the patches of heather, gathering as much pollen as they can before winter. Young adult Peat Dragons dive and swoop in magnificent aerial displays as they try to attract a mate, and the youngsters clumsily try to copy them as they learn to fly.
The Moorlands are covered in snow for most of the winter, and wintry showers are common in late autumn and early spring. Most creatures hibernate or emigrate to warmer climes during this time, and the plant life is all buried under the snow. The rolling white landscape is broken only by the few bare trees that have decided, perhaps in rebellion, that this is a good place to live, and the occaisional low rooftop of one of the Gnomish settlements.
For the rest of the year the Moorlands are a rather dreary patchwork of green and brown, dotted with the white pink and yellow flowers of the other flowering plants which thrive on the moors. There is an abundance of wildlife however which brings additional colour to the place: Deer, birds, insects, waterfowl, fish and amphibeans all make their home in the Moorlands, for at least part of the year.

Natural Resources

Some folk say there's naught on the moors but heather and peat. And while that is a bold faced lie, even if that is all there was, we'd still do alright. There's a lot can be done with heather and peat.

— An indignant Gnome

Heather is one of the most abundant resources in the Moorlands and it is used by the Moorland Gnomes for many purposes: building materials, thatch, insulation, bedding, rope, weaving and whole host of tools and implements. They also collect heather honey from the bees and use it to make honey and mead.

Peat is another resource in plentiful supply in the Moorlands, and is used by both the Gnomes and the Peat Dragons as a fuel source, though in different fashions. The Gnomes have long known of the healing properties of peat, and have recently turned it into a bit of a business with Willowbark's Moorland Spas.

Included Organizations

• Willowbark's Moorland Spas

Inhabiting Species

• Peat Dragons

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Peat Dragons

One of the forms the mighty Dragons of the past took, during the Great Evolution, Peat Dragons are much smaller than their forebears, but have retained the ability to breath fire. Feeding off the peat of the boglands, they use their unique ability to help the Gnomes manage the Moorlands.