[Laeral]

Noble/Elegant/Laughing Cedar all sound good to me.

What does the 'effbush' look like? I'm not sure whether I want to include it or not- the 'tone' seems a little off to me.

I'll note the magnolia, bamboo, and puzzle-pine.

Yes, Laeralian farmers do harvest water chestnuts. Do you know what other crops would make sense to be grown in Laeral? I've been meaning to add more details about the various crops in Laeral's agriculture sector.

The name of the 'Laughing Cedar' actually comes from an incident in mainstream Ursine ['HeartWoods'] mythology which I suspect your nation's culture wouldn't share: This point might need more discussion. Perhaps your people have a name for this tree that simply reflects its shortness relative to the other Cryptomeria species present?

I admit to having invented the name of the Effbush so that I could make that joke about the composer Effbark, some while ago, but would probably have included the plant itself in B-A's flora anyway. I like ginger, and wanted to include something like it in the Bears' traditional cuisine which I'd already said included spicy "hot" stews, but real Ginger wouldn't grow in this nation's climate and the country's backstory already included a high level of isolation from the outside world right up until 2006AD (i.e. to around the date when, OOC, I created the nation...) which would have made obtaining a regular supply by trade difficult... Then I read that some conifers produce specialised chemicals in their bark &/or foliage to repel/deter insects & other herbivores, and remembered that some condiments we use in RL also originated as herbivore-deterrents (e.g. Capsaicin, in "hot" peppers; e.g.ii 'Mustard Oil' in both Mustard and Horseradish...), and this possibility occurred to me. The bush would probably look quite like a Juniper, generally speaking, but with cones rather than "berries" and with slightly thicker/"shaggier" bark.

The question about other crops grown in Laeral raises another interesting question: Did the Chinese cultural (& genetic?) influence here arrive via a piece of territory that was "torn" from a Reality with RL-like geography and re-shaped to fit into our map, or did that culture arise (in parallel to the RL one) on a version of the IDU's continents where East Asian parallels were a lot more widespread than they are in our shared version of the map today, or was Laeral actually colonised by settlers travelling from China [or a similar culture] at some stage during the centuries before the French also arrived there? The answer to this question, obviously, would affect the crops known there today.
Rice could potentially have been introduced into the southern Riverlands, although the climate would probably result in lower yields here than you'd get in southern China, and we already have a close counterpart to RL North America's "Wild Rice" (which can grow at least as far north as 'Asiatic' Rice, but produces smaller amounts of grain per [same area] than that does) in the region as well. I suspect that the main cereal crops in most of the country would be wheat & barley, especially after the French arrived: the northern parts of RL China also have some form of Millet grown, IIRC, but that's mainly in semi-arid areas and Laeral probably lacks wide enough expanses of those to make this crop likely here.
Also, possibly the French colonists introduced the cultivation of potatoes for their subjects -- if not they themselves -- to eat?
Soybeans and other legumes? Some kind of 'greens'? Flax and /or hemp for fibre?

We've already mentioned geese. I'd expect your farmers to also keep ducks (derived from the Mallard; very popular in RL China), chickens, pigs (which might even be turned loose in autumn, as in the traditional West European manner to forage on acorns & other wild foods in areas of woodland that aren't suitable for conversion into grain-fields)*, and possibly sheep or goats (in the hillier areas, useful not only for meat but for their wool as well... especially as I'm not sure how much silk a nation in Laeral's position could produce...). Oh, and in the Riverlands they probably farm at least one species of Carp as well. The traditional plough-drawing animal, in pre-modern times, might have been Water Buffalo in the southern Riverlands but would probably have been Oxen elsewhere. Bearing in mind Laeral's lack of widespread steppe & semi-desert regions [and nomadic peoples living in those] nearby, I suspect that domesticated horses would have been relatively rare, maybe even "unknown", until the French arrived.
The French might also have introduced Oats as an extra crop, for horse-fodder if for nothing else, if that was previously unknown in the country.

(* That reminds me, does Laeral's fauna include the Wild Boar?)

In that case, a name for the 'Laughing Cedar' could be the 'Petite' or 'Dwarf' Cedar.

Regarding ginger, the Effbush certainly sounds interesting, but I don't think it really fits my own conception of Laeral and Laeralian food. So we can jut say that the Effbush never reached as far as Laeral.

So regarding the origins of Laeralian culture- I've never been a fan of the 'parallel worlds develop similarly' theory, and I think that there are too many similarities to the real world (including culture, language, etc.) to make the idea that Laeralian culture spontaneously developed in the IDU feasible. The idea that Laeral was colonized sometime in the nation's prehistory is interesting. The thing is, what is the IDU's relation to real-life Earth? Laeralian history does include plenty of contact with other regions, including RL Earth (French colonization, languages, and even Laeral's status as a present-day member of the UN and various other real-world organizations). And colonization would explain why Laeralian culture and genetics are so different from Legionas' and Malabras'. Of course, I suppose there would be no way in character to tell. I also like the idea of Laeral being 'torn' from RL Earth, as well. So how about this: Laeral was once part of RL Earth, and so developed it's ecology from real-life species. When migrating groups of people from RL Earth moved to Laeral for the first time, they settled it, before being mysteriously transported to the IDU thousands of years ago. An unusually stable inter-regional 'portal' (I hate to use this word here, which is rather overused in my opinion, but I can't think of any good synonyms) remained between Laeral's location on RL Earth and it's new location in the IDU, allowing more humans to arrive occasionally, as well as a smaller number of RL species. However, no one realized the concept of inter-regional portals, instead believing them to still be on RL Earth. This portal remained stable for a long time, allowing the French and other colonial powers to arrive. The portal began to 'flicker' in the 1830s, which deprived the colonial regime of consistent support from home and allowed the Revolution to succeed, as well as allowing the independent government (the first Allied Provinces) to survive without interference from other hostile powers which would normally have seized the moment to invade the weak, fragile revolutionary government. The portal stabilized once again in the 1890s, meaning that Laeral and High Fells were drawn into real-world conflicts such as WWI, before flickering once again starting in the 1950s (after Laeral had joined the UN, but High Fells had not, planning to do so later on). he portal remained fragile until the 1990s, when Laeral began to reopen ties with the real-world. The portal remains somewhat stable to this day, although it is still cheaper and safer for Laeral to trade with other IDU nations rather than risk the vagaries of the erratic portal.

I've already established that rice is grown in the Riverlands region. I hadn't anticipated the possibility of being able to grow grains such as wheat and barley given that I've sated that Laeral has 'bad' soil (I haven't actually established what kinds of soil problems Laeral has, so any guidance on this would be helpful). So in addition to those crops, the French introduced potatoes (only to seem them wiped out in a frost or blight in the 1840s, leading to famine in the ensuing decades) , some legumes and green vegetables, and both flax and some hemp, which still both grow in Laeral and make up some of our textile exports.

Regarding meat, the geese, ducks, chickens, and sheep/goat all sound appropriate. Now, you've said that silk would be difficult to grow in Laeral. I've already established (in multiple places) that silk is one of our major exports, though, so is there any way that large quantities of silk could be grown here?

Carp, water buffalo, and oxen all work. Having horses be rare /nonexistent before the French arrived would also be a reason that the French were able to conquer Laeral so easily- their cavalry were damaging psychologically to the Ren population, and gave the French greater mobility. And it makes sense that the French would have introduced oats as well.

No, Laeral does not have wild boar.