How have the Ocampan not gone extinct? Kes says that Ocampa only have 1 chance to have a child; if they don't take advantage of that window, they will never have another chance to conceive. That means each generation could only be half of the previous (assuming male Ocampa cannot themselves conceive- but again, if there's just 1 shot)... this seems to be made more challenging given the comparatively short Ocampan lifespan. Is this a plot hole, or am I missing an important fact??
She says a child. She doesn't want Nelix to know her species delivers litters. Might freak him out.
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Presumably they always produce more than one child.
I kinda like the notion that the Ocampa weren't originally so short lived either, and that previously they'd have multiple fertile periods where they can have kids, but after someone (caretaker maybe) meddled with them, they live much faster and are dying out because of it.
Ooohhh, like the damage the Caretaker did to their world, that drove them underground also majorly effed up their fertility! And maybe, with such finite space, resources, and the caretaker essentially meeting all their needs (making them dependent on him), with his mortality (despite an impossibly long life by all accounts) keeping the birth rate down was a choice made for practical purposes!
In that other timeline where Kes and Paris got together, they only had 1 child... though, cross-species reproduction will always have unexpected outcomes...
About this alternate timeline, I also wondered how long the life expectancy of the mixed children would be. Both the half-Ocampa and the quarter-Ocampa obviously grew up faster than average humans. But will they also age and die earlier? And I cannot imagine how one might only live nine years. That's practically nothing!
Right!!! Fully agree!
I try not think too hard about the implications of the Ocampa's biology.
Someone else mentioned litters/multiple babies at once.
That would just about be the only way they could keep going.
The others are probably tucked away in another dimension. Too many of them in the same one may cause shenanigan's [shrug]
Weâve seen that the two versions of Ocampa had very different traits; the ones in the initial episodes nurtured by the caretaker are literally kept as a child race, almost like pets. They are basically already a dying race, due to the damage done to their planet by the caretaker in their distant past, which is never fully described. The caretaker is literally taking biological samples from other races, but we donât know exactly why. This could presumably be tied in to why they are able to sustain a certain number in their population. The ones who leave that main society to live outside the boundary are already starting to evolve beyond that capacity. So itâs reasonable to assume that eventually they would be able to grow and live long enough to have multiple breeding cycles, almost like vulcans and the seven year cycle of the Pon Far.
The second set of Ocampa, shown much later in the series and nurtured by the mate of the caretaker live well into their 20 years, and have been given the chance to enhance their telepathy abilities to a much stronger capacity. It is reasonable to assume that this society is able to have several reproductive cycles within their lifetime.
Every time someone brings this up-- an Ocampa gets its wings.
lol my B
They're basically space pandas. They should have been extinct long ago.
Cloning. Dark science. Secrets only the Sith knew.
Did you ever hear the tragedy ofâŠ
To ever have a child, the process must happen then. That does not preclude them post Ocampan puberty having multiple pregnancies.
The important fact youâre missing is they have a literal, omnipotent caretaker
I mean, not literally omnipotent or he would have restored their planet rather than driving them all underground for 500 generations... đ«Ł
Which is basically the explanation for why they are a slowly dying race. The caretaker was trying to take compatible biological material from alien races, but we donât know exactly why. This could reasonably explain how and why they are able to sustain a population despite their short lifespan.
Wasn't it because the caretaker searched for someone compatible to mate with?
Honestly an interesting idea, to take and invert the elf/vampire/vulcan trope, and making the life expectancy the length of the show made sense. Itâs a pity absolutely nothing else to do with Kes was any good. So yeah, she got ascended and replaced with a new blonde woman with a longer life expectancy.
True; a new love interest for the doctor.
Ever noticed that all three classical 24th series had major events and changes around the start of season 4?
Les was kinda lame. The Ocampans made no sense. Letâs replace all this with a hot chick in a cat suit.
My fan theory is that her parents were unhappy about her seeing Neelix, so when they told her the Ocampan birds and the bees, they told her lies about Ocampan reproduction.
Ooohh, he is much (MUCH) older than Kes!
Blanche helped. She was promiscuous on Golden Girls.
A wizard did it
As Captain-Griffen pointed out, the situation was indicated to be that a female Ocampan has only one (true) elogium (presumably one at most) in her lifetime and it lasts for only a limited amount of time, and that in order to ever conceive, she must mate during it. That doesn't mean that even if she does mate during it, she can't ever get pregnant again.
While for Kes it might have been that she would have only 1 child, there's no indication that that's the case for all female Ocampa. And maybe it only seemed that Kes would have only 1 child because of the false elogium.
I always wondered the same!
Either twins/triplets/quadruplets are extremely common, or more likely, the longer lived Ocampa not subject to the caretaker's meddling have multiple pregnancies throughout their life.
It's a plot hole. The writers all failed biology.
And math
Exactly. But it isn't the only one. The language of the Tamarians (TNG Darmok) was also quite illogical.
LaZebnik and Menosky at Paramount
Shakra when the walls fell
They totally screwed up with the Ocampas. Plus in the original publicity images Kes looked about 12
Ocampans are the larva form of a largest energy being species is just that the Caretaker screw that up.
Triplets
And the Kazon Oogla! Who are the Kazon Oogla?!
Kes mentioned that she had an uncle, so it sounds like they can have multiple kids per pregnancy or multiple pregnancies once the elogium happens.
Thatâs a good question. I have also wondered about how believable the Ocampa are. How could they develop language and civilisation if they only live about 9-10 years and a fair amount of this would be as an infant or elderly? I donât think it could happen.
Was Kes's condition not more analogous to the menopause? Given it wasn't a natural occurrence, it was forcing her fertility and the end of said fertility to end early? I'd take it much more that naturally, Ocampas have like a 2-3 year window to have kids.
I saw someone theorise that if an Ocampa misses the first fertile window, they can't get pregnant again but if they have a child they will then be able to go on to have more children over the course of their life.
(Obviously the real reason is that the writers didn't think it through, but that's boring.)
I also prefer the theory you noted, as opposed to failure to think things through đ Thank you!
Voyager.