What Old World Crops and Livestock could have done New World Civilization the most good?

Your best bet is to have enough Europeans survive the shipwreck to teach the locals how to ride horses, spin wool and make cheese.

Personally, I'd say that cattle are your number one animal, with any one barley, oats and rye for number one crop.
Number two crop is flax for linen; number two animal is likely sheep.
Horse and a second grain would likely be third.

The Mesoamericans and the Andeans did fine on the crops they had. European crops are useful, but not game changing, really.

It's North America that needs new crops to support large populations sustainbly.

I have seen it argued that the Haudenosanee (Iroquois) were mostly limited by clothing. That if you calculate the number of deer it takes to clothe them, it's a much, much better estimate of the max population possible than food.

So linen from flax and wool from sheep - or even leather from any domestic animal, could lead to a huge population explosion.

Also, the 'three sisters' arrive north quite late. If our introduction of European crops is 1000 or earlier, having a grain would be a huge advantage.

Also, manure for your fields to keep them fertile, so you don't have to move your settlement every generation or two. ANY animal would likely do for that.

I'd really like to see this clothing limiting population argument. Sounds novel.
 
I dunno… the Americas had a fairly good crop package already, it just wasn't concentrated. Get potatoes around the continents and corn acclimated to everywhere it eventually did earlier, add that to the beans, squash, turkeys, etc., and that's a pretty good package. The one thing they might need is something with Vitamin C (not sure if they already had something). So if you could 'shuffle around the native crops' and add some Old World domestic animals, they would have a complete agricultural package...
The Potatoes, ancient potatoes cultivars are really rich in Vitamin C, specially if you eat it with the skin, one of the things the potatoes lost in their travel to Europe, is their Vitamin C content, Source: http://www.fao.org/potato-2008/en/potato/factsheets.html
 
Hmmm. I wonder what they might have done with olives in the Americas, if they suddenly had tens of thousands of olive trees spread around st rsndom.
 
Pigs also aren't extremely important unless you have a lot of crop waste that you'd like turned into edible protein. You don't have domestic pigs if you don't have high-density agricultural civilization.
Like the Civilizations of Mexico and the Mississippian valley? as their are corn farmers, and with high population density Before the plague devastation, they have a big source of crop waste, that could be used to feed pigs, and is a lot of biomass that is loss in America before the pigs and/or cattle introduction
source about corn plant as pig fodder https://www.feedipedia.org/node/358
 
Like the Civilizations of Mexico and the Mississippian valley? as their are corn farmers, and with high population density Before the plague devastation, they have a big source of crop waste, that could be used to feed pigs, and is a lot of biomass that is loss in America before the pigs and/or cattle introduction
source about corn plant as pig fodder https://www.feedipedia.org/node/358

Pigs and chickens in the Mississippi Valley would have been an absolute game changer. Not sure about Mexico. Chickens there would be great.

Hmmm. I wonder what they might have done with olives in the Americas, if they suddenly had tens of thousands of olive trees spread around st rsndom.

No need for an oil crop when you have sunflowers.
 
Pigs and chickens in the Mississippi Valley would have been an absolute game changer. Not sure about Mexico. Chickens there would be great.
Well there is a Theory that indicate that the level of Human sacrifice and Cannibalism in Mexico is caused for the lack of Animal protein in the Area, as all you have are some domesticated turkeys and small game, There is no o big native game animals to eat in Mexico, outside the White tailed deer but this is only in the mountains, not really close to humans settlements, So the introduction of Pig in the year 0 A.C is a big game changer to Mexico

Fun Fact: After the Spanish prohibited the cannibalism to the Aztec nobles, the nobles indicated that they prefer to eat pigs as is the meat that mostly resembles the flavor of human flesh
 
Well there is a Theory that indicate that the level of Human sacrifice and Cannibalism in Mexico is caused for the lack of Animal protein in the Area, as all you have are some domesticated turkeys and small game, There is no o big native game animals to eat in Mexico, outside the White tailed deer but this is only in the mountains, not really close to humans settlements, So the introduction of Pig in the year 0 A.C is a big game changer to Mexico

Fun Fact: After the Spanish prohibited the cannibalism to the Aztec nobles, the nobles indicated that they prefer to eat pigs as is the meat that mostly resembles the flavor of human flesh

A source of protein would be ideal, I'm just not 100% sure how the Valley of Mexico would be for pig raising compared to the Mississippi.

The Mississippi needs a variety of food sources, since the climate is so variable year to year. If people had potatoes or other garden crops, chickens, pigs, and something to milk, they'd be much healthier than eating just corn, beans, and squash, which would still be the staples.
 
A source of protein would be ideal, I'm just not 100% sure how the Valley of Mexico would be for pig raising compared to the Mississippi.

The Mississippi needs a variety of food sources, since the climate is so variable year to year. If people had potatoes or other garden crops, chickens, pigs, and something to milk, they'd be much healthier than eating just corn, beans, and squash, which would still be the staples.

Well if we used the 2016 source of pig production in Mexico(in spanish) https://www.gob.mx/cms/uploads/atta...orama_Agroalimentario_Carne_de_Cerdo_2016.pdf
Pretty good, as most of the pig production is done in states that are close to Mexico city( as the city is their own state with almost null agricultural production)
 
When it comes to crops I think there is very little missing that is already mentioned. I think Apples and Pears would be a good addition.

I will say this, unless you have people who know how to raise these crops and livestock it will do none of the First Nations peoples any good without the knowledge. One does not just start raising pigs and cattle or horses and sheep and goats just like that.

That being said I nominate donkeys for two reasons, mules which are faster and tougher than oxen when it comes to plowing and hauling and are just as good in mountainous areas as llamas and donkeys. Second Donkeys will survive in places that horses can't. In the Southwest Donkeys are a blessing in that way. Camels cannot actually survive in the Southwest as it is. The cactus is actually to spikey for their feet.
 
I’m on the fence about animal domesticates. I don’t buy the argument that everything that can be domesticated has been domesticated. I don’t think that anything except maybe horses would be a huge game changer overall, for the simple reason most people would eat anything that was just dropped in front of them unless taught husbandry. People had an incentive to learn to ride when they saw people riding, if they saw a horse alone they wouldn’t have any inclination to do so. Maybe something like chickens would be helpful, but a machine that turns garbage into edible protein is most useful for agriculturalists who have lots of garbage around. Crops are more important than livestock to get things going.

The biggest one to me, though it doesn’t really count, is potatoes in the Pacific Northwest. They produced a food surplus without agriculture and were in the very unique situation of having more reliable protein than carbohydrates. The population density of the PNW, at least on the coasts, might approach that of Mexico, and the interior would get a lot more populous too.

California is a bit tricky. They had no shortage of fall/winter food and any summer crop would have to deal with the fact the hundred year flood line in the Central Valley is so high the Valley floor can’t be easily settled. The best thing for them might be...potatoes in the higher elevation tributaries on the western slope of the Sierras.

Sheep, camels, or llamas would be potentially useful in the desert Southwest, where people are already farming. Apaches, who didn’t farm, mostly just ate horses when they caught them (the ones who didn’t rode out of the desert and onto the plains where there were buffalo). Navajos, who did, became shepherds readily.

Horses of course make buffalo hunting a much more viable lifestyle in the Plains. The farmer-hunters of the eastern Plains didn’t have as much chance as the fully nomadic people of the western foothills since their villages could get conquered, but left alone they could do quite well.

I’m not sure what the magic solution is for the Eastern Woodlands. Three sisters agriculture did fine there but wasn’t really reliable compared to Mexico. I don’t think wheat and other cereals would do better, though. Maybe a reliable domestic source of milk or meat would help them the most.
pigs would be wonderful in the woodlands, I disagree with camels, that was tried and failed here in the US and Canada https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Camel_Corps One of the things not mentioned was how the plants here in the SW are way more prickly than where they are from and actually harmed the camels feet.
 

Toraach

Banned
More potatoes in North America + plus metalworking + destilation = vodka. It would make people happy.

I wonder why you want to introduce cows to Americas. Introducing cows does not change much. The most important uses of this cute and nice animal in the past were:
1. Milk production, so an excelent source of proteins.
2. Drafting animal.
Beef was less important, people ate this less than now. Of course other uses and meat-cows were also in the past, but they were less important for ordinary farmers. But with dairy products is one big problem. To fully enjoy milk you need to tolerate lactose. Even now in Europe after thousands of years of raising cows many people still are lactose intolerant. A chance that a mutation of lactose tolerance among adults would spread and happen quite easily in Americas between years 1000-1500 is quite small.
 
I said earlier that potatoes in the PNW would give you at least Mexican-level civilization. More protein (salmon mostly) and more vitamin C (berries and fruit) than Mexico. Possibly domestic ducks to fill the trash to protein role like in Mexico.

What about some chance introduction of a crop farmed in East Asia, like millet or buckwheat?

pigs would be wonderful in the woodlands, I disagree with camels, that was tried and failed here in the US and Canada https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Camel_Corps One of the things not mentioned was how the plants here in the SW are way more prickly than where they are from and actually harmed the camels feet.

I'm not convinced that camels wouldn't work. It seems they never imported enough camels to begin with, since Australia imported far more camels and their population is huge to this day. There's plenty of non-prickly plants in the Southwest for camels to eat.

More potatoes in North America + plus metalworking + destilation = vodka. It would make people happy.

Potatoes aren't needed since you can distill anything. Corn vodka exists after all, and there also is a distilled alcohol from the sunchoke too. And your distillation doesn't need to result in vodka either. You could likely make some interesting distilled drinks from some Eastern Agricultural Complex crops like lamb's quarters (relative of quinoa), in addition to alcoholic drinks in general (although chicha made from corn seemed to be the most popular even in the Andes).

I wonder why you want to introduce cows to Americas. Introducing cows does not change much. The most important uses of this cute and nice animal in the past were:
1. Milk production, so an excelent source of proteins.
2. Drafting animal.
Beef was less important, people ate this less than now. Of course other uses and meat-cows were also in the past, but they were less important for ordinary farmers. But with dairy products is one big problem. To fully enjoy milk you need to tolerate lactose. Even now in Europe after thousands of years of raising cows many people still are lactose intolerant. A chance that a mutation of lactose tolerance among adults would spread and happen quite easily in Americas between years 1000-1500 is quite small.

Cattle were pretty big for various African pastoralists, so there's no reason they can't be so big for hypothetical American Indian populations. Lactose tolerance would spread through natural selection, and perhaps evolve up to a level comparable in parts of Africa (lower than Europe, but higher than many lactose-intolerant populations).

Ideally you'd have cattle which can best tolerate cold weather, given the continental climate of much of the Americas.
 
Cattle for draft animals, leather and manure.
Agree that milk, per se, would be far less important. Cheese production might be possible, especially hard cheeses. But that would, of course, require a longer, deeper contact between the natives and shipwrecked Europeans. Riding horses and the fact that cattle can be penned and slaughtered at will, is something that can be picked up by spying on the foreigners. Black smithing and cheese making would require specific instruction.
 

Driftless

Donor
Some of the Icelandic varieties of sheep would be a good option. They are adapted to the cool damp winters of the North American Eastern seaboard. They could provide wool, either for pelts, felt mats, or spinning. They're not very sociable, so milking is going to be a one-ewe-at-a-time operation probably, though sheep milk is generally easier to digest for many people than cow's milk.

Barley could have been another North American winner. Wide range of growing temperature tolerance and multiple uses, from animal fodder, to beer, to storable grain for human consumption
 
I should add that the novel I am writing, the heroes, after they assassinate a few historical figures and nothing really changes, do then apply Jarod Diamond's ideas by introducing assorted crops.
 
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