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Kanaloa; We've got Mud n' Eels...
Topic Started: Oct 7 2008, 11:53 AM (7,542 Views)
agatharights
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Sister Topic to over here. :D

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Approx size; 20-30ft. A slow-moving deep-water predator that sneaks up on prey, grasps it with it's main tentacles, and drags it into it's beak. Nom nom nom.

Kanaloa, roughly the same size as earth orbits a similar star, and is very similar to earth in many ways- except for it's geography and life. The planet's surface is almost entirely covered in shallow, warm oceans (with deeper, cooler patches and small ice caps- it's a little warmer than earth) with very little lands, either consisting of muddy sandbars that can wash away overnight, or reeflike structures that protrude from the water's surface wherever reefs are, as well as 'land' made from large, strong floating plants and some small islands surrounding volcanic activity.

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From a foot to two meters long. The beaked reefeater is a peaceful, if dim-witted creatures that uses it's large, hard beak to defend itself as well was to crunch tough reef into dust when it eats. Cute, no?

But it's not like anything lives on what little land there is, anyways. Virtually all life on Kanaloa exists under the water. Most life in the shallow parts of the oceans is rather safe, consisting of smaller creatures, strange plant-like animals, and the few carnivores and venomous animals don't pose too worrysome of a threat to the adapted posthumans (Mermatees) that live on Kanaloa (They still pose a threat, but attacks and injury are rare or treated well).

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This creature uses it's flattened tentacles to dig up sea-cabbage and sea-lettuce creatures, and then impales them with it's skinny beak before eating. They occasionally bite or nip mermatees or the passing human tourist, but don't pose a great threat. Approx. one meter long.

Granted, in deeper waters, things are a little more dangerous.

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oh god what is it make it go away make it go away oh god

But Kanaloa is a vast place, with much life to be had. Besides rather earthlike reefs, many of the plant forms here are actually somewhere between animal and plant, octopus or eel-like creatures capable of photosynthesis, and the majority of life forms resemble mixes of some creatures from earth. Cepholpods, eels, and crustaceans namely, adapted to fill the niches empty in the ocean.

Skeletons are rare, and anything beyond a cartilaginous skeleton like that of a shark is nigh-impossible to find in the native lifeforms of Kanaloa, although hard, bony beaks and claws are common (teeth less so, but still noticeable) as well as hard shells and spines.

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An example of sea lettuce. The octopod-like body is buried in the mud, the eyes permanently closed in adulthood. As young "spores" the eyes are open as they swim to find a place to root themselves. They taste kinda like broccoli and bacon fat.

Think Lovecraft, for these animals. Horrible horrible H.P.Lovecraft full of tentacles and writhing things.

Enjoy, and do check out the threat above for the Mermatees- my wonderful posthumans. XD
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Everything is Transformers and Dungeons & Dragons and nothing hurts.
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The_Alloxite
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Oooh, it goes down stairs!
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lamna
Oct 13 2008, 05:00 PM
I have no idea. Good work, but that seems a little too earth like.

So long and thanks for all the squid-slug-eel-birds
What's your beef? Why are you just pushing me out the door? I have an explanation- they use hardened cartilage or compact muscle. There, simple.
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*My French Bulldog looks at me*
Me: "Why does my room smell like your diarrhea?"
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Sliver Slave
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I'm going back to basics.

Ah, Lamna's just joking. I hope.
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agatharights
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It does seem a weeeeee bit too earthlike. Give me a few minutes to recover from the day

HEROES WHAT WHAT WHAT FUUUUUUUUU-

and I'll give some idea of more of what I was seeing, considering the rest of the planet's species.
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agatharights
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http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v252/yellowdrakex/kanaloawildlifemisc.jpg

Here, have a meangere of things that I drew today. Today turned out surprisingly busy. D: AUGH SOCIAL LIFE WHAT NOOOO


EDIT: Also, I realized that I don't' really see the mermatees domesticating animals, so much as raising them, training them, or just using them. Like homing pigeons, they just use what they do naturally to their advantage.
Edited by agatharights, Oct 13 2008, 09:38 PM.
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lamna
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Yes I was joking, but that is what I first thought when I saw that dinosaur picture.

I like that picture you have done. Hmm what did you not want use to see?
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Are nipples or genitals necessary, lamna?
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agatharights
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An acheoptryx I got badgered into drawing at Glass Club. >.> It looked pretty bad, and wasn't Kanaloa...hey, you got to see the penisquid, so...
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lamna
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I wonder what is looks like. Probably better than what I could do.

..Penis squid?
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agatharights
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The one in the top left corner. That has Penisquid written by it. >.> I know my handwriting's abominable, but still. ((Alternative misread names include the PenSquid, PentaSquid, and Pinsquid.))
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lamna
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Bad handwriting? You ain't seen nothing yet. "Whats does that say Connam emble?"
I can't write to save my life.

I see the squid now. Not very penisey. Xenobiologists are perverts.
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agatharights
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It looks more penisy when it's colored. Helps that it spits a sticky, white "ink" to deter predators while it escapes.

Xenobiologists just couldn't stop laughing their heads off after it happened to a member of their team. XD

And I had an interesting idea that maybe the flying species of creatures would actually be relatively far in relation from the mollusk-like creatures that otherwise dominate, instead being the few survivors of a mass extinction that would have wiped out almost all other specialized boney-gliding fish. I'm working on a crude timeline of Kanaloa and life on Kanaloa, to help myself figure out where different types of creatures split up...
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lamna
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Perhaps there used to be more land on Kanaloa? A continent that fell into he sea, or more frozen water at the poles. But I think currents would smash up ice caps on such a world.
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agatharights
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Actually, I think Kanaloa used to be almost earthlike, in terms of land, and the ice caps were much larger, the planet cooler in general...and I had a weird idea that maybe all the water that's currently on Kanaloa isn't all originally from Kanaloa. But I'm still trying to figure out if a literal shower of ice comets would do anything. ((That'd be one helluva mass extinction, to completely change the level of liquids available on a planet by a significant amount.))

Or perhaps Kanaloa was a lot cooler, and something literally nudged it just a little closer to the sun. I don't know how that would happen without, like...throwing a continent off the planet or simply ripping the atmosphere off, though. CURSE YOU, SCIENCE.
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lamna
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Vapor canopy? :P

It is pretty hard to flow a world like earth. Perhaps it was mostly ocean except round the poles.

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agatharights
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Yeah...Hrm. I do imagine that land on Kanaloa was mostly shallow land, though. Very few actual areas that were higher than a little bit above sea level, and viruatlly no above-water mountains. What land there is on Kanaloa now is ever-moving sandbars that remain of higher-areas, and small volcanic islands.
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lamna
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Hmm, that makes sense. Yes, noting could go wrong with that..could it? I can't think of anything.

Edited by lamna, Oct 14 2008, 03:00 PM.
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