Oats in Farmstead World — crop in the game, and what it is on a real farm.
Oats are a cereal grain with a high fat and fibre content, well suited to cool, damp climates.
The same grain that fills the breakfast bowl is a traditional horse feed, prized for keeping animals in steady condition.
Farm facts about oats
Oats began as a weed: their grains mimicked wheat and barley so closely that early farmers failed to weed them out — and eventually grew them on purpose. (en.wikipedia.org)
A granary in the Jordan Valley from around 9,400 BC held some 120,000 wild oat seeds — people were tending oats thousands of years before domesticating them. (en.wikipedia.org)
Wild oat seeds plant themselves: twin awns twist as they dry and re-wet, inching the seed along the ground until it wriggles into a soil crack. (en.wikipedia.org)
Domesticated oats appear in Europe's archaeological record only about 3,000 years ago — far later than wheat or barley. (en.wikipedia.org)
In 1755, Samuel Johnson's dictionary defined oats as 'a grain, which in England is generally given to horses, but in Scotland supports the people.' (en.wikipedia.org)
Oats can be milked: by 2020, oat milk had passed soy milk to become the second most popular plant milk in the US, after almond. (en.wikipedia.org)