3rd Turn
Event
Strength Dice: 59
Temperament Dice: 4
The previously unicelluar algea have evolved to cohesive mats along the coasts, bringing the marine ecosystem more biomass and opening a brand new niche.
Team Pancake
Naturegirl1999: Supports Demonic Spoon
Kilojoule Proton: Supports Demonic Spoon
Demonic Spoon: Jellyfish-like snaring tentacles that wrap around the things it touches and slowly brings them up to the water pump: 2+2+2=capped at 5
Cnidarian Pancake
At first a small, unimportant mutation that granted this lineage of pancakes small bumps along their underside, which granted them with extra surface area for gas exchange. With time, individuals that had more developed bumps were selected and the bumps turned from the mere irregularities, into long white tendrils. These snaring tendrls circle the water pump, and periodicaly retract and lean towards it to give it the whatever debris they caught. Sometimes, they catch a blob, but the blob usually escapes due to the pancake having no way of digestng it. The increased nourishment have also caused a size increase from 5 centimeters to 8 centimeters in diameter, about it is also 30 centimeters long if the tendrils are counted.
But as the pancakes are the only ones to be able to survive in the open sea, which forms the majority of the sea, they seldom encounter a blob, let aone catch one. So the tendrils are practically just water filtering structures.
Status: LC
Description
A small green protoplant shaped like a flat circle. It is 8 centimeters in diameter. A small water siphon is situated at its center, which it uses to get minerals and nutrients more efficently. Surrounding this pump, a ring of long and thin, retractable white tendrils reside, and are used to filter the water. It reproduces by splitting in two when it gets too big. It lives permanently stuck to the sea surface through the dozens of tiny oil-filled pimples across its body. It can be found forming coincidental mats, as well as alone.
Team Pasta Vēlōcis
A_Curious_Cat: Chemotaxis (a more primitive form of chemoreception): 2+2+1=5
King Zultan: Supports Curious Cat.
Voyager Blob
The once vestigial olfactory dots have now been put into a sort of use, by being transformed into a primitive network of not-quit-nerves that reaches from a patch of equally distanced olfactory dots, to the patch of flagellum it uses to move around. It's usual cruising speed is much slower than its close ancestor since it is not needed, but if the dots are activated, the corresponding section of the fuzz acivate, first slowy turning until smell is picked up by the bigger dot in the center, then march foward at the mind-bogging speed of 150 billion lightyears meters an a second hour.
Since this species has the ability to find food by its own means, the most primitive blobs, along with all of its own ancestors have been outcompeted by it due to being left without a niche. It has also grown a bit in size too.
Status: LC
Description
A proto-animal a bit larger than a pea. It moves along the sea floor and above with its tuff of flagella on its bum and digests any organic debris it can find. It has seven black dots on its very front, one of them being large,and the others circling it to form a hexagon shape, connected to the bum fuzz with connections of specialised cells. It uses these dots to sense the strength of certain smells associated wih food and move towards the strongest emission it can sense. It reproduces by splitting in two when it gets too big.
Team Lagus Blob
flazeo25. Thermoreception by specialised proteins: 5
Giant Blob
A small change, one small mutation has lead to this species gaining it's name. A new kind of protein that unfolded a bit when it got heat. Which in turn inspired a system that acted upon this movement by arraging the beatings of the many flagella to the source of heat. The hottest place? The coasts. This blob only lives in the shallow coasts, where extensive algal growths reside. It constantly digests these algea, allowing it to grow to sizes no blob has every did, which is about 10 centimeters, as it is the largest it can be before reaching the size limit it can currently grow into. This organisms are found everywhere along the coasts, and never venture into the deeper waters, where their ancestor still resides, occupying the ancestral niche.
This species has also become very slow, the flagellum system fails at efficently carrying the blob around. The very niche position that it holds is also relatively fragile. But for now, the food is plentiful and the waters are warm.
Status: LC
Description
A proto-animal 10 centimeters in width and length. It slowly moves along the sea shore and digests any organic debris it can find, which is usually algea. It is covered in a very thin coat of tendrils which it uses to move, and it gives it a fuzzy look if you look close enough. Under this thin coat, a specialised layer of tissue keeps the tendril movements in check and prevents any nutrient loss. A specialised protein allows it to sense and change directions towards the light. It reproduces by splitting in two when it gets too big.
Environment
On the southern hemisphere of the planet Aqautico, a saltwater crater lake called The Crater Sea resides.
Surrounding the sea, a barren, lifeless rocky wasteland goes on for hundreds of kilometers, stretching as far as eye can see.
And through the east side, five rivers called The Harbringers follow curved, close-by paths to the sea, coming from far away and who knows where. Where they come from is also close to a volcano.
Multicelluar life is limited the sea, represented only by simple lifeforms. Vast growths of algea can be seen along the shallow coasts.
Author
Topic: Competitive Evolution (Turn 18) (11/15) (Read 36895 times)