#vulcan planetology

[ichayalovesyou]

do you have any posts on the landscape/wildlife of vulcan?

First off, I am so sorry that it's taken me like, NINE, months to answer this ask. Secondly, I do not know much but I can direct you to a resource that does!

Unfortunately, we only have two named and confirmed animals in main Star Trek canon, the Sehlat, and the Le-matya. There's also that freaky animal that almost kills Michael in If Memory Serves that I thought was a Le-matya but upon rewatching is definitely NOT, we have no name or information on that creature yet though. That being said, Memory Beta has a VERY thorough Vulcan Animals page from an ample supply of Star Trek novels!

Unfortunately we don't know a whole lot about Vulcans flora or fauna. If you want more information on my headcanons about the Vulcan landscape that we do know about check out The Big Vulcan Biology Post, the first half of it is primarily concerned with the hypothetical environments of T'Khasi rather than directly about Vulcans themselves.

Although a couple of new pieces of information that have come to light since I've made that post.

Discovery confirms that Vulcan has seemingly deciduous desert forests considering there were no leaves on the trees, it's dark in the flashback so it's hard to tell. I imagine Vulcan trees have red foliage, trees with red leaves or leaves that turn red in the fall do so to protect themselves from higher intensity UV rays, because our sun is closer to Earth during cold months on the northern hemisphere. Vulcan's foliage is probably red by default due to the context indicating Vulcan's sun is either bigger, or Vulcan is closer to it's sun.

The Strange New Worlds pilot shows us a Vulcan ocean (or possibly a sea)! It is very tame from what I assume is strong gravity and lack of a moon (like I mention in the BVBP). Confirming that Vulcan's oceans appear amber due to the red/orange atmosphere of Vulcan, so it's nice to know my headcanon regarding this was accurate.

I also think it's worth pointing out that Spock and T'Pring having family residences so close to such planetary rarities as forested desert areas and bodies of water is highly indicative of their families' political status.