Creating your own flora

[uknowitbeb]

I know most people when creating their fantasy worlds, tend to come up with different types of cultures and species; but I'd like to know if anyone on here has ever attempted creating their own flora too. I've been thinking about doing this for a while, but I haven't really seen anyone create unique flora for their world besides Brandon Sanderson. Also, if this topic has been discussed before, feel free to let me know so I can search for the thread. Thanks

 

[Ireth]

I've done a VERY limited amount of that for my works involving Faerie. About the only thing I've made that has a distinct name and purpose is a type of berry called fuilsocair, or stillblood. The berries contain a powerful sedative which can kill in even moderate doses ("stilling the blood", hence the name). The bark of the fuilsocair bush contains considerably less of the sedative, and is safer to use in medicines and such. The plants come into play in a couple of ways. One of my characters is a healer who at one point harvests the bark for medicines, and the berries are used as a tactic for thinning out an approaching enemy army -- mainly by transplanting bushes in strategic places after the army's food stores have been deliberately depleted by the good guys, resulting in a lot of enemies scarfing down berries by the handful and effectively poisoning themselves. And even after they figure out what's up, they still have no (or at least less) food. XD

 

[buyjupiter]

Yes. Not that I've described it all that well yet, but I've created a couple of herbs from scratch. I have two for healing and a couple for magic use.

It might be an interesting world building exercise to come up with an herbal and try sketching out the plants.

 

[Saigonnus]

I have made flora for a concept story, actually. I have 2 types of woody vines: The first is creeper vines, which grows very fast and leaves a salty residue in their wake, making it so infected fields cannot be planted if the salt content gets too high. It grows very fast, up to several feet in one day; luckily it's more or less harmless and will burn for fuel. The second type are the slow-growing strangler vine; which are highly reactive to touch. Like a constrictor, it will coil around anything in range and squeeze it to death. As is decays, the nutrients leach into the roots for nourishment. It often keep tendrils just beneath the surface, disguised so prey more easily fall into its traps. This makes it an extremely stinky plant, making it easily recognizable.

Another one I have is the "mile" tree... which grows a delicious and fragrant fruit. It is genuinely delicious and filling, but acts like a powerful sedative, knocking out a human before they are a mile from the tree, leaving them exposed to the predators that roam the forest.

 

[MVV]

So far, I stick with the real flora while exploring the folk legends and lore to see what it was (is?) believed to do. There's a lot of fun with mandrake, for example. But of course it highly depends on the overall character of the fictional world, i. e. how "far" is it supposed to be from ours.

 

[Motley]

The plants in my stories don't affect the story too much, so I let the reader imagine them as earth-like if they choose. I do use oaks, pines, roses etc. I do also have stories that have fantasy flora that I give names to and different characteristics. Most of these have particular functions: building, medicinal, magic.

 

[Nagash]

While most of the plants, trees, flowers, what have you, you can possibly find in my WIP can be retrieved in the real world, I had to imagine a few vegetal organism of my own, for the sake of plot and specific world-building. For example, since an entire chunk of an empire is located in a great jungle, I imagined a few carnivorous plant setting traps on the jungle-floor... Alchemy and chemistry also demanded I invent a few plants of my one, for some specific remedy/compound etc...

Specific flora is proper to very detailed world-building, and although i admire such devotion to the craft, I do not believe it is necessary to re-imagine an entire ecosystem; reinserting real-world flora will spare you fastidious descriptions about the environment every single time your character walks by a random tree.

 

[Saigonnus]

The plants in my stories don't affect the story too much, so I let the reader imagine them as earth-like if they choose. I do use oaks, pines, roses etc. I do also have stories that have fantasy flora that I give names to and different characteristics. Most of these have particular functions: building, medicinal, magic.

Mine on the other hand directly affect this concept story. They serve to act as a series of obstacles to overcome and are part of a magically created "system" to keep the denizens of a city from leaving (it was designed to be a concentration camp of sorts). The citizens were placed there after a war 500 years before as "prisoners" by the winners of the conflict; who ended up dying in a later war themselves.

 

[MVV]

Maybe a little offtopic here but I think it's still relevant:

What are your thoughts on plants that are also creatures or even sapient races? Treefolk are perhaps the most popular... do you use them? Or other concepts?

 

[Saigonnus]

Maybe a little offtopic here but I think it's still relevant:

What are your thoughts on plants that are also creatures or even sapient races? Treefolk are perhaps the most popular... do you use them? Or other concepts?

I don't use them, but I would consider putting something in a future story. Treefolk are a bit too cliché for me, what with the Ents and the Elcrys (Terry Brooks). I would probably use something else for an intelligent and sentient creature, maybe my strangler vines could be semi-intelligent. Creeping bushes that kill things with it's thorns could work or even shuffling saw grass that feeds on blood as it spreads.

 

[Zero Angel]

This is a pretty common practice for most serious world-builders, any sci-fi that goes to other planets, and it's also rather common in fantasy video games and the like.

 

[James G Pearson]

I've created a couple of my own fish with certain, poisonous qualities. But I like a type of tree I have created, the Ashen Ostwail. Naturally near black in colour and amour piercing, except for the finest made armour. But it's rare and not common to the land I've based my series in. It's favoured among assassins.

 

[CupofJoe]

David and Leigh Eddings created their own flora [and fauna] more than once.
There was Garion's Rose that was magically made from dried twigs and leaves by Belgarion for his cousin [as proof of magic]. It was forgotten about for a while and thrived and turned out to have healing, restorative and aphrodisiac properties.
Also there was The Tree [of the world] in the Vale, a huge living thing so old that it measure the life of the planet [or at least that is what I got from it].
They also used the link/relationship between Dryads and Trees fairly well. One faired or failed as the other did.

As for my work... I've tweaked the names and properties of a few plants to make then fit with what I need but I wouldn't say they were creations or all that central to the plot. In one instance I needed the antagonist to have a bow that had a better range than could be got from a long bow that my protagonist used. So I used a "Witchwood" bow. Cut from a rare and slow growing tree it maked bows of incredible power if cut and handled properly.