Epoch XIV: The Calciferous Epoch
In the aftermath of the devastating gamma-ray burst, known as the great scouring, life was characteristically swift to recover. As the atmosphere returned back to a more stable state, and those organisms which were able to endure the harshest years, whether through hiding in the depths, surviving as spores, or entering some other form of cryptobiosis began to make a comeback. By the epoch's end, life was well on its way to recovery, with many of the survivors of the mass extinction going through dramatic bursts of adaptive radiation, forming many unique new families of life. Fossils of such a diversity of shelled creatures would appear in great abundance in the limestones of this time, giving the 'Calciferous Epoch' its name.
Okianus and Eddoria
The Highleaf is one descendant of the Ground-Grasper which has spread widely across the recently-emptied northern supercontinent of Okianus. Filling the vacated niche of the Horods, these photosynthesizers have grown thicker, strong stems which allow them to stretch very slightly higher than their rivals. However, their intolerance of dessication and lack of ability to bring fluids to the upper sections of the plant puts a strict upper limit on their growth: very few grow more than five centimeters off of the ground.
The Lungatol, evolved from the Placebol, has developed leafy, vascularized infoldings along its belly, greatly improving its capabilities for gas exchange. This adaptation allows them to scavenge washed-up Filtrara on the beaches of Okianus, with very little threat of predation, as they are among only a tiny handful of land-dwelling animals present on the northern continent.
Crania Borers in Okianus have mirrored the explosion of Curata diversity that is happening simultaneously on the southern continent of Sundentia. Derived from Pyracrania stock, they have adapted for a burrowing existence, developing more compact bodies and strengthening their manipulator arms into heavy burrowing claws. They live intertidal existences, occasionally venturing inland, but only when a water-filled tunnel is within close reach.
The Argoped, descended from the Mudiped, has moved into the intertidal niches left empty by the extinction of the terrestiral branches of Phylum Orata. With highly vascularized structures developing in infoldings on the undersides of their limbs, Argopeds are able to exchange gases both in the air, and in the ocean. Argopeds are immediately recognizable for the differentiation of their limb pairs. The first six limbs are well-adapted for crawling and scuttling, while the posterior four are paddle-like and heavily-vascularized, useful for both gas exchange and swimming. This compromise allows the Argoped to behave as an amphibian, equally comfortable beneath the waves and on the shore.
Sundentia
The Venol, descended from the Venusil, had lighter seeds, which could use both water and air as mediums for seed propagation. However, this failed to grant the Venol any significant competitive advantages over the Venusil, thus preventing the lineage from gaining much presence. Currently, the Venusil's main issues are the fact that it has far higher metabolic costs than its competitors, as sticky seeds are not particularly useful when there are no surface animals to spread them, and defense compounds are not very useful in a low-herbivory environment.
Drylanders have developed a deeper and more expansive root system than their Sky-Stealer precursors, granting them increased access to water and soil nutrients, as well as allowing them to rise further above the ground, as they begin to fill the niches emptied by the extinction of the Horods.
The High Needler was a curious organism. It developed its muscular limbs from digging implements into leaping implements, to enable predation against the flying plants of Phylum Ankunia. However, their lack of useful sensory organs rendered such hunting into a chancy affair. Even when they did manage to latch on to a plant successfully, or accidentally bring it down by puncturing its hydrogen sac, they generally faced the fate of being carried away until they dessicated and fell to their deaths, or found their lucrative kill contested by other organisms. Fossilized High Needlers would later be found across a wide area of northern Lambridia, but they would leave no other biological legacy beyond the epoch's end.
Omni Needlers would enjoy more success. Faced with an abundance of grazing Curata and intense competition for food, the Omni Needlers evolved into the predatory niche vacated by the extinction of the Watchers and Trappists of Phylum Orata. Omni Needlers impale their prey on their proboscis, injecting a caustic cocktail of digestive enzymes and acids. Their hard-bodied prey digests inside its own body, and after a few moments can be consumed as a nutritious slurry by the Omni-Needler. Whenever animal prey is hard to come by, Omni Needlers are content to feed on the internal fluids of plants, like their ancestors.
Finally, the Flo'er has developed fine pressure and vibration receptors to accompany its chemoreceptors, granting it an impressive ability to sense its environment. This has granted the Flo'er increased ability to avoid predators, such as the Omni Needler, allowing it to gradually replace its simpler, Needler ancestors.
Navi, descended from the Novite, have become specialists which are adapted to feed on plant roots, to the exclusion of all other food sources. This has earned them a stable niche, and while they suffer from higher predation rates than the Flo'er, their improved digestive systems let them survive in poorer and more marginal environments than any other burrowing Curata. Interestingly, the predatory threat of Omni Needlers has caused some Navi to begin living together for protection, forming simple colonies inside the roots of Iberos, Siccabis and occasionally Venusils.
Sandipeds are an interesting parallel evolution to the Argopeds. Occuring on the coast of Sundentia, rather than the coasts of Okianus and Eddoria, these descendants of the Mudiped have developed a singular, simple internal pouch for gas exchange, branching off of their digestive loop. While this adaptation is largely useless for gas exchange in water, it functions decently in the air, allowing the Sandiped to thrive along the coastlines of the southern continent.
Global Ocean
The Arolu is a curious organism. Derived from the high-flying Venku, the Arolu is much smaller and more compact, but with parasitic tentacles adapted specifically to latch onto the organic masses of Tangle Reefs. While they have done quite well here, they are still somewhat maladapted. As they now live an almost exclusively marine existence, their dessication resistance is rather redundant.
Conversely, the Altiku has diverged in the opposite direction, taking to the skies like never before. Its body has expanded from a simple broad balloon into a huge, kite-like form, capable of high-atmosphere drifting. A crude sensory apparatus allows the Altiku to detect moisture and pheromonal signals, which can cause its body to flex, giving it a small amount of control over its profile in the wind, and thus its movement. By staying in clouds and using highly efficient nitrogen fixation pathways, Altikus are able to spend great periods of time in the sky, descending to he lands and oceans below only when their stores of minerals begin to run low.
The Savage Armor, derived from the highly successful Vector lineage, is much smaller and sociable than its ancestors. Savage Armor attack larger creatures, taking them down by one of two methods. The first is by simply overwhelming their prey in a quick flurry of violence. The second is a much more patient and insidious method. Their ability to inflict retroviral sabotage on other creatures allows them to shadow other creatures, weakening them over time until the prety item is reduced to a more vulnerable state.
The Cracker is a strange, asymmetrical offshoot of the Vector, and a devastating predator. It has developed its mouthparts into heavy, snapping mandibles, allowing them to specialize in the predation of other armoured species. While many smaller, quicker species can evade the unwieldy deathtrap that is the Cracker's mouth, it remains a dire threat to all of the heavier members of Phylum Orata.
The Ventris is, visually, very similar to its Padiped forebears, although it bears an interesting adaptation: sexual reproduction, somewhat like the horizontal gene transfer practiced by Vectors and their kin. By exchanging packets of genetic material with one another, Ventris are able to produce offspring with a combination of traits from both parents. This has greatly improved their genetic diversity and adaptibility, although it is somewhat less simple and quick than the parthenogenesis which is the standard for all of their relatives.
The Chewer is an offshoot of the Shredder, which has developed a highly acidic organ in its digestive tract, improving their ability to extract nutrients from hard-bodied organisms. This simple adaptation has allowed them to significantly broaden their diets. Different members of the Chewer family have developed, each specializing on the predation of different animals, plants, and sessile filter feeders across the global ocean.
The Leuton, descended from the mighty Jargo, is the most competent swimmer of all the Zebedida, with long, muscular tail. Their speed grants them a great ability to both escape predators, and pursue prey. But perhaps more interesting than this physical adaptation is the occasional occurrence of larger, stronger individuals, which lead packs of their smaller bretheren.
The Kuppi, an offshoot of the massively successful Zipper lineage, developed a new structure from its first skeletal tetrahedron: a cranium, a heavy shield of bone around its anterior end. Serrations around its mouth allowed it to scrape edible algae and crusts off of the sea floor, although Kuppis remained diversely omnivorous in their diet. Their armoured heads made swimming more difficult, a challenge which was offset by the appearance of stabilizing fins. Kuppis struggled to avoid predation. Their small size prevented them from developing sufficiently heavy armour to resist the predators of their era, and their armour rendered them unwieldy and slow in the face of increasingly deadly hunters such as Leutons, Chewers and Clickers. The Kuppi was limited to a small geographic range, and was rendered extinct after a relatively short period of existence.
The Turtulis, descended from the armoured Abyssi, has moved deeper into the resource-poor depths of Lambda's oceans. Faced with very little food, they have adopted a somnolent, low-energy lifestyle. Coupling this is an ultra-efficient metabolism, which allows the Turtulis to survive for extended periods with very little food. With little competition in the depths, and few predators who could successfully feed on them even if they could reach them, these organisms enjoy exceedingly long, dull lives, scavenging on the detritus that sinks down from above, as well as snacking on the occasional Svi.
Lambda
Notes:
@bonefang: The Kuppi was great, but I have to make a note that neither Zippers nor Kuppis have gill-arches like fish from Earth. Their gills are external structures, located down the sides of the organisms. I made the cranium develop from the first skeletal tetrahedron, which is the closest thing the Zipper has to what you described. Sorry it went extinct, I thought the idea was very cool, but the adaptation wasn't the best given its context: an armoured head removed speed, which is the Zipper's greatest defense, while not offering very much in return: no new food sources became available, and they didn't gain much resistance against any of their contemporary predators. The Abyssi also already had the 'armoured swimmer' niche filled, which presented an additional challenge for the Kuppi.
@Everyone: Thanks for waiting! Hopefully plenty of us, particularly the new Paradoxians, are still around to take part in the unfolding adventure of NESLife VI!
In the aftermath of the devastating gamma-ray burst, known as the great scouring, life was characteristically swift to recover. As the atmosphere returned back to a more stable state, and those organisms which were able to endure the harshest years, whether through hiding in the depths, surviving as spores, or entering some other form of cryptobiosis began to make a comeback. By the epoch's end, life was well on its way to recovery, with many of the survivors of the mass extinction going through dramatic bursts of adaptive radiation, forming many unique new families of life. Fossils of such a diversity of shelled creatures would appear in great abundance in the limestones of this time, giving the 'Calciferous Epoch' its name.
Okianus and Eddoria
The Highleaf is one descendant of the Ground-Grasper which has spread widely across the recently-emptied northern supercontinent of Okianus. Filling the vacated niche of the Horods, these photosynthesizers have grown thicker, strong stems which allow them to stretch very slightly higher than their rivals. However, their intolerance of dessication and lack of ability to bring fluids to the upper sections of the plant puts a strict upper limit on their growth: very few grow more than five centimeters off of the ground.
The Lungatol, evolved from the Placebol, has developed leafy, vascularized infoldings along its belly, greatly improving its capabilities for gas exchange. This adaptation allows them to scavenge washed-up Filtrara on the beaches of Okianus, with very little threat of predation, as they are among only a tiny handful of land-dwelling animals present on the northern continent.
Crania Borers in Okianus have mirrored the explosion of Curata diversity that is happening simultaneously on the southern continent of Sundentia. Derived from Pyracrania stock, they have adapted for a burrowing existence, developing more compact bodies and strengthening their manipulator arms into heavy burrowing claws. They live intertidal existences, occasionally venturing inland, but only when a water-filled tunnel is within close reach.
The Argoped, descended from the Mudiped, has moved into the intertidal niches left empty by the extinction of the terrestiral branches of Phylum Orata. With highly vascularized structures developing in infoldings on the undersides of their limbs, Argopeds are able to exchange gases both in the air, and in the ocean. Argopeds are immediately recognizable for the differentiation of their limb pairs. The first six limbs are well-adapted for crawling and scuttling, while the posterior four are paddle-like and heavily-vascularized, useful for both gas exchange and swimming. This compromise allows the Argoped to behave as an amphibian, equally comfortable beneath the waves and on the shore.
Sundentia
The Venol, descended from the Venusil, had lighter seeds, which could use both water and air as mediums for seed propagation. However, this failed to grant the Venol any significant competitive advantages over the Venusil, thus preventing the lineage from gaining much presence. Currently, the Venusil's main issues are the fact that it has far higher metabolic costs than its competitors, as sticky seeds are not particularly useful when there are no surface animals to spread them, and defense compounds are not very useful in a low-herbivory environment.
Drylanders have developed a deeper and more expansive root system than their Sky-Stealer precursors, granting them increased access to water and soil nutrients, as well as allowing them to rise further above the ground, as they begin to fill the niches emptied by the extinction of the Horods.
The High Needler was a curious organism. It developed its muscular limbs from digging implements into leaping implements, to enable predation against the flying plants of Phylum Ankunia. However, their lack of useful sensory organs rendered such hunting into a chancy affair. Even when they did manage to latch on to a plant successfully, or accidentally bring it down by puncturing its hydrogen sac, they generally faced the fate of being carried away until they dessicated and fell to their deaths, or found their lucrative kill contested by other organisms. Fossilized High Needlers would later be found across a wide area of northern Lambridia, but they would leave no other biological legacy beyond the epoch's end.
Omni Needlers would enjoy more success. Faced with an abundance of grazing Curata and intense competition for food, the Omni Needlers evolved into the predatory niche vacated by the extinction of the Watchers and Trappists of Phylum Orata. Omni Needlers impale their prey on their proboscis, injecting a caustic cocktail of digestive enzymes and acids. Their hard-bodied prey digests inside its own body, and after a few moments can be consumed as a nutritious slurry by the Omni-Needler. Whenever animal prey is hard to come by, Omni Needlers are content to feed on the internal fluids of plants, like their ancestors.
Finally, the Flo'er has developed fine pressure and vibration receptors to accompany its chemoreceptors, granting it an impressive ability to sense its environment. This has granted the Flo'er increased ability to avoid predators, such as the Omni Needler, allowing it to gradually replace its simpler, Needler ancestors.
Navi, descended from the Novite, have become specialists which are adapted to feed on plant roots, to the exclusion of all other food sources. This has earned them a stable niche, and while they suffer from higher predation rates than the Flo'er, their improved digestive systems let them survive in poorer and more marginal environments than any other burrowing Curata. Interestingly, the predatory threat of Omni Needlers has caused some Navi to begin living together for protection, forming simple colonies inside the roots of Iberos, Siccabis and occasionally Venusils.
Sandipeds are an interesting parallel evolution to the Argopeds. Occuring on the coast of Sundentia, rather than the coasts of Okianus and Eddoria, these descendants of the Mudiped have developed a singular, simple internal pouch for gas exchange, branching off of their digestive loop. While this adaptation is largely useless for gas exchange in water, it functions decently in the air, allowing the Sandiped to thrive along the coastlines of the southern continent.
Global Ocean
The Arolu is a curious organism. Derived from the high-flying Venku, the Arolu is much smaller and more compact, but with parasitic tentacles adapted specifically to latch onto the organic masses of Tangle Reefs. While they have done quite well here, they are still somewhat maladapted. As they now live an almost exclusively marine existence, their dessication resistance is rather redundant.
Conversely, the Altiku has diverged in the opposite direction, taking to the skies like never before. Its body has expanded from a simple broad balloon into a huge, kite-like form, capable of high-atmosphere drifting. A crude sensory apparatus allows the Altiku to detect moisture and pheromonal signals, which can cause its body to flex, giving it a small amount of control over its profile in the wind, and thus its movement. By staying in clouds and using highly efficient nitrogen fixation pathways, Altikus are able to spend great periods of time in the sky, descending to he lands and oceans below only when their stores of minerals begin to run low.
The Savage Armor, derived from the highly successful Vector lineage, is much smaller and sociable than its ancestors. Savage Armor attack larger creatures, taking them down by one of two methods. The first is by simply overwhelming their prey in a quick flurry of violence. The second is a much more patient and insidious method. Their ability to inflict retroviral sabotage on other creatures allows them to shadow other creatures, weakening them over time until the prety item is reduced to a more vulnerable state.
The Cracker is a strange, asymmetrical offshoot of the Vector, and a devastating predator. It has developed its mouthparts into heavy, snapping mandibles, allowing them to specialize in the predation of other armoured species. While many smaller, quicker species can evade the unwieldy deathtrap that is the Cracker's mouth, it remains a dire threat to all of the heavier members of Phylum Orata.
The Ventris is, visually, very similar to its Padiped forebears, although it bears an interesting adaptation: sexual reproduction, somewhat like the horizontal gene transfer practiced by Vectors and their kin. By exchanging packets of genetic material with one another, Ventris are able to produce offspring with a combination of traits from both parents. This has greatly improved their genetic diversity and adaptibility, although it is somewhat less simple and quick than the parthenogenesis which is the standard for all of their relatives.
The Chewer is an offshoot of the Shredder, which has developed a highly acidic organ in its digestive tract, improving their ability to extract nutrients from hard-bodied organisms. This simple adaptation has allowed them to significantly broaden their diets. Different members of the Chewer family have developed, each specializing on the predation of different animals, plants, and sessile filter feeders across the global ocean.
The Leuton, descended from the mighty Jargo, is the most competent swimmer of all the Zebedida, with long, muscular tail. Their speed grants them a great ability to both escape predators, and pursue prey. But perhaps more interesting than this physical adaptation is the occasional occurrence of larger, stronger individuals, which lead packs of their smaller bretheren.
The Kuppi, an offshoot of the massively successful Zipper lineage, developed a new structure from its first skeletal tetrahedron: a cranium, a heavy shield of bone around its anterior end. Serrations around its mouth allowed it to scrape edible algae and crusts off of the sea floor, although Kuppis remained diversely omnivorous in their diet. Their armoured heads made swimming more difficult, a challenge which was offset by the appearance of stabilizing fins. Kuppis struggled to avoid predation. Their small size prevented them from developing sufficiently heavy armour to resist the predators of their era, and their armour rendered them unwieldy and slow in the face of increasingly deadly hunters such as Leutons, Chewers and Clickers. The Kuppi was limited to a small geographic range, and was rendered extinct after a relatively short period of existence.
The Turtulis, descended from the armoured Abyssi, has moved deeper into the resource-poor depths of Lambda's oceans. Faced with very little food, they have adopted a somnolent, low-energy lifestyle. Coupling this is an ultra-efficient metabolism, which allows the Turtulis to survive for extended periods with very little food. With little competition in the depths, and few predators who could successfully feed on them even if they could reach them, these organisms enjoy exceedingly long, dull lives, scavenging on the detritus that sinks down from above, as well as snacking on the occasional Svi.
Spoiler :
Lambda
Notes:
@bonefang: The Kuppi was great, but I have to make a note that neither Zippers nor Kuppis have gill-arches like fish from Earth. Their gills are external structures, located down the sides of the organisms. I made the cranium develop from the first skeletal tetrahedron, which is the closest thing the Zipper has to what you described. Sorry it went extinct, I thought the idea was very cool, but the adaptation wasn't the best given its context: an armoured head removed speed, which is the Zipper's greatest defense, while not offering very much in return: no new food sources became available, and they didn't gain much resistance against any of their contemporary predators. The Abyssi also already had the 'armoured swimmer' niche filled, which presented an additional challenge for the Kuppi.
@Everyone: Thanks for waiting! Hopefully plenty of us, particularly the new Paradoxians, are still around to take part in the unfolding adventure of NESLife VI!
