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Obscure Taxa; For interesting or obscure organisms you'd like to share.
Topic Started: Dec 14 2016, 09:46 PM (48,956 Views)
peashyjah
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Bydo
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Ivan_The_Inedible
Dec 30 2016, 06:47 PM
The Musophagidae are an obscure African family of birds most closely related to bustards. Several groups of species within this family go by different names, with turacos, plantain-eaters and go-away birds being the most common.
Oftentimes literally running through the treetops, these birds will eat fruit, leaves, flowers, and small animals. They have a particular taste for bananas (hence the name), pawpaws, and grapes, and even wild birds can be tame enough to accept hand offers.

Their biggest claim to fame, however, is the fact that only species within this family use the only known truly green pigment among any birds -with other birds using a combination of yellow pigment and blue light refraction-, as well as using a unique red pigment in place of the normal carotenoids. The eponymous pigments turacoverdin and turacin are what contribute to these birds dazzling variety of colors, as shown below.

Posted ImagePosted Image
Left: Great Blue Turaco, Corythaeola cristata
The largest extent species of turaco.
Right: Guinea Turaco, Tauraco persa
Below: Ross's Turaco, Musophaga rossae
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Birds are usually getting so unique and wonderful nowadays.
Discontinued projects:
The New Ostracoderms (i might continue with this project again someday)
The Americas (where in 58 million years from now in the future North and South America has both become isolated island continents)



All Expansions (my attempt at expanding the universe of All Tomorrows by Nemo Ramjet aka C.M. Kosemen, started June 6, 2018)
Anthropozoic (my attempt at expanding the universe of Man After Man and also a re-imagining of it, coming 2019 or 2020)
New Cenozoica (my attempt at expanding the universe of The New Dinosaurs and also a re-imagining of it, also coming 2019 or 2020)
All Alternatives or All Changes (a re-telling of All Tomorrows but with some minor and major "changes", coming June 10, 2018)
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Carlos
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Vorsa
Dec 30 2016, 06:51 PM
I love turacos so much! They always have them in zoos and aviary places, which is probably where I first encountered them. Never knew that they're related to bustards though sonthat's interesting.

I see turacos semi-regularly as I visit Zoo de Lagos very often. They're basically avian flying squirrels.
Lemuria:
http://s1.zetaboards.com/Conceptual_Evolution/topic/5724950/

Terra Alternativa:
http://s1.zetaboards.com/Conceptual_Evolution/forum/460637/

My Patreon:

https://www.patreon.com/Carliro

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Dr Nitwhite
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peashyjah
Dec 30 2016, 08:18 PM
Birds are usually getting so unique and wonderful nowadays.
Indeed! The intertime traveler delights in modern day birds, they really are a treat compared to all those dull things we've been getting these past few million years.
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Jasonguppy
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Turacos are some of my favorite birds! There's one i always sketch at the Central Park Zoo when I'm there who is very personable :)
I do art sometimes.

"if you want green eat a salad"

Projects:
Amammalia: A strange place where mammals didn't make it and the land is, once again, dominated by archosaurs.

Oceanus: An endless sea dotted with islands, reefs, and black holes. Literally endless, literal black holes.

❤️❤️~I'm not a boy~❤️❤️
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HangingThief
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The pitcher plant Nepenthes lowii has been shown to be relatively inefficient at capturing insects. That's because, unlike most members of its genus, it doesn't function primarily as a death trap. Rather, it attracts birds and tree shrews with nectar that oozes from the "hood", which is positioned horizontally or at a right angle to the trap rather than above it (hence why it doesn't capture many insects). As the animals feed perched on the rim of the trap, any excrement they produce falls in. It's a toilet and a vending machine rolled into one.

Spoiler: click to toggle




Hangingflies (Bittacidae) are a family of predatory mecopterans with slender, elongated bodies and legs. Although they have a great deal of superficial resemblance to the much more abundant crane flies (Tipulidae), they can be easily told apart by the number of wings.

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Note that my avatar is not a hangingfly- it's a robber fly, specifically a Hanging Thief (Diogmites). Although it might seem to a case of convergent evolution, it really isn't- the hunting strategies of robber flies and hangingflies are quite different. Robber flies are powerful aerial predators that pluck prey out of the air and carry them back to their perch to devour them. Sometimes, they hang from one leg while feeding so they can easily drop off and fly away if danger threatens.
Hangingflies are not aerial predators. Their behavior is almost reminiscent of a sessile invertebrate or a web- building spider. They hang from a leaf or branch with their legs splayed out as far as possible, hoping to snare anything that flies into them with its tibial spines and flexible, elongated tarsi.
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Their adaptations for hanging and capturing prey makes walking difficult, so they usually just fly from perch to perch.

Despite this, wingless species exist. These two two engaged in one of the elaborate mating rituals found in many scorpionflies, in which females judge the quality of prey brought to them as nuptial gifts.

Spoiler: click to toggle
Edited by HangingThief, Dec 30 2016, 10:23 PM.
Hey.


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Carlos
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Probably the ultimate obscure taxon, I just learned of the existence of Hypselornis sivalensis, a possible cassowary/emu relative form the Pliocene of India.

Literally only one publication on it exists. From 1929
Edited by Carlos, Dec 31 2016, 09:47 AM.
Lemuria:
http://s1.zetaboards.com/Conceptual_Evolution/topic/5724950/

Terra Alternativa:
http://s1.zetaboards.com/Conceptual_Evolution/forum/460637/

My Patreon:

https://www.patreon.com/Carliro

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IIGSY
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HangingThief
Dec 30 2016, 09:25 PM
The pitcher plant Nepenthes lowii has been shown to be relatively inefficient at capturing insects. That's because, unlike most members of its genus, it doesn't function primarily as a death trap. Rather, it attracts birds and tree shrews with nectar that oozes from the "hood", which is positioned horizontally or at a right angle to the trap rather than above it (hence why it doesn't capture many insects). As the animals feed perched on the rim of the trap, any excrement they produce falls in. It's a toilet and a vending machine rolled into one.

Spoiler: click to toggle




Hangingflies (Bittacidae) are a family of predatory mecopterans with slender, elongated bodies and legs. Although they have a great deal of superficial resemblance to the much more abundant crane flies (Tipulidae), they can be easily told apart by the number of wings.

Posted Image
Posted Image

Note that my avatar is not a hangingfly- it's a robber fly, specifically a Hanging Thief (Diogmites). Although it might seem to a case of convergent evolution, it really isn't- the hunting strategies of robber flies and hangingflies are quite different. Robber flies are powerful aerial predators that pluck prey out of the air and carry them back to their perch to devour them. Sometimes, they hang from one leg while feeding so they can easily drop off and fly away if danger threatens.
Hangingflies are not aerial predators. Their behavior is almost reminiscent of a sessile invertebrate or a web- building spider. They hang from a leaf or branch with their legs splayed out as far as possible, hoping to snare anything that flies into them with its tibial spines and flexible, elongated tarsi.
Posted Image
Their adaptations for hanging and capturing prey makes walking difficult, so they usually just fly from perch to perch.

Despite this, wingless species exist. These two two engaged in one of the elaborate mating rituals found in many scorpionflies, in which females judge the quality of prey brought to them as nuptial gifts.

Spoiler: click to toggle
I love it
Projects
Punga: A terraformed world with no vertebrates
Last one crawling: The last arthropod

ARTH-6810: A world without vertebrates (It's ded, but you can still read I guess)

Potential ideas-
Swamp world: A world covered in lakes, with the largest being caspian sized.
Nematozoic: After a mass extinction of ultimate proportions, a single species of nematode is the only surviving animal.
Tri-devonian: A devonian like ecosystem with holocene species on three different continents.

Quotes


Phylogeny of the arthropods and some related groups


In honor of the greatest clade of all time


More pictures


Other cool things


All African countries can fit into Brazil
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Archeoraptor
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JohnFaa
Dec 31 2016, 09:47 AM
Probably the ultimate obscure taxon, I just learned of the existence of Hypselornis sivalensis, a possible cassowary/emu relative form the Pliocene of India.

Literally only one publication on it exists. From 1929
how did it get there?what are the consequences of this in the apleognathe evolution?
Astarte an alt eocene world,now on long hiatus but you never know
Fanauraa; The rebirth of Aotearoa future evo set in new zealand after a mass extinction
coming soon......a world that was seeded with earth´s weridest
and who knows what is coming next...........

" I have to know what the world will be looking throw a future beyond us
I have to know what could have been if fate acted in another way
I have to know what lies on the unknown universe
I have to know that the laws of thee universe can be broken
throw The Spec I gain strength to the inner peace
the is not good of evil only nature and change,the evolution of all livings beings"
"
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LittleLazyLass
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It flew there, clearly. It's a route that birds are known to have traveled several other times in the Cenozoic. Most paleognaths evolved flight independently, although cassowaries and emus probably had a common flightless ancestor.

How complete is the holotype? Do we know if it could fly?
totally not British, b-baka!
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I don't even really like this song that much but the title is pretty relatable sometimes, I guess.
Me
What, you want me to tell you what these mean?
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Carlos
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From what I can tell it seems to be known from a tarsometatarsus.
Lemuria:
http://s1.zetaboards.com/Conceptual_Evolution/topic/5724950/

Terra Alternativa:
http://s1.zetaboards.com/Conceptual_Evolution/forum/460637/

My Patreon:

https://www.patreon.com/Carliro

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the boy
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Some Remarks on Hypselornis sivalensis: http://sci-hub.cc/10.1111/j.1474-919x.1929.tb08775.x
nice plates.
nice.
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Sphenodon
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Calcareous

Now here's a favorite of mine: the basket stars, a group of ophiuroidean echinoderms.

Basket stars are grouped together under the suborder Euryalina, though a study exists that apparently suggests that the group be upgraded to a full order. Their fossil record is rather poor compared to other echinoderm groups; the earliest fossils are known from the Carboniferous, but Euryalina likely extends significantly further into the Paleozoic. A subgroup of brittle stars, they are quite similar to other clades in terms of general physical structure, but outwardly are far different. Most notably, they have adapted to a diet of small free-swimming prey, and have radically adapted their arms to accommodate this feeding style.

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A plate illustration of a gorgonocephalid basket star by famed German naturalist Ernst Haeckel.


The most profound difference between basket stars and their nearest relatives is the structure of their arms. While still possessing the same overall number of them as other ophiuroideans, basket star arms are intensely branched in a fractal manner along the entirety of their length, from their bases to their terminal tips. These individual arm branches themselves branch in the same manner, and so forth, leading to the intense bush of arms possessed by members of the group. When feeding, basket stars hold some of their arms up to the current in a vaguely basket-like fashion (hence their name); as prey items brush by, they are snared on the multitude of tiny hooks borne by each arm and sub-branch, and are slowly passed down the structure to the central disk. When not feeding (during phases of rest, movement, or incline conditions such as an exceedingly strong current or complete lack of one), their arms are held in a compact, indecipherable tangle.

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An intensely magnified view of the tip of one arm of an Astroboa nuda specimen photographed in the Red Sea. Some small crustaceans lay ensnared within various sub-tendrils.


Aside from the obvious, basket stars still host some other differences from other brittle stars; their bodies are encased within a smooth fleshy layer, which covers their calcareous skeleton. While not a true feature, another notable fact is that the largest ophiuroideans of all are cold-water basket stars of the genus Gorgonocephalus, which in some cases may weigh up to 11 pounds. While the specimens of the polar waters may be the largest, and basket stars in general most commonly found in deepwater environments, basket stars are not solely confined to such areas, and bear a global distribution.

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Another specimen of Astroboa nuda photographed in the Red Sea (likely the same specimen as above), shown here in a feeding position.


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Basket stars are not exclusive to deep or polar waters; shown here is a rather colorful specimen photographed at a depth of approximately 28 meters (92 ft.) near Maori Bay, South Africa.
Edited by Sphenodon, Jan 3 2017, 03:52 PM.

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Some of my ideas (nothing real yet, but soon):
Refugium: A last chance for collapsing ecosystems and their inhabitants.
Pansauria: A terraforming project featuring the evolution of exactly one animal - the marine iguana.
Mars Renewed: An insight into the life of Mars thirty million years after its terraforming by humankind.
Microcosm: An exceedingly small environment.
Alcyon: A planet colonized by species remodeled into new niches by genetic engineering.
Oddballs: Aberrant representatives of various biological groups compete and coexist.

..and probably some other stuff at some point (perhaps a no K-T project). Stay tuned!
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LittleLazyLass
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Proud quilt in a bag

Nobody tell BAND supporters about those things, clearly those are feathers - just like Longisquama!
totally not British, b-baka!
Posted Image You like me (Unlike)
I don't even really like this song that much but the title is pretty relatable sometimes, I guess.
Me
What, you want me to tell you what these mean?
Read First
Words Maybe
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Sayornis
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Little
Jan 3 2017, 12:24 PM
Nobody tell BAND supporters about those things, clearly those are feathers - just like Longisquama!
And definitely don't tell them about feather stars!

Speaking of which, these giant Jurassic crinoids are pretty cool.

Now for a more obscure echinoderm-- Helicoplacus is an odd echinoderm from the Cambrian, lacking fivefold symmetry and bearing an spiral groove used for feeding.

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The Library is open. (Now under new management!)
Dr Nitwhite
Aug 19 2016, 07:42 PM
As I said before, the Library is like spec crack.
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trex841
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Elysia chlorotica, A species of Sea slug that steals Chloroplasts from Algae and uses them to Photosynthesize.

...OK, not as long as some of the other entries here, but apparently there are some people that didn't know this exists.
F.I.N.D.R Field Incident Logs
A comprehensive list of all organisms, artifacts, and alternative worlds encountered by the foundation team.

At the present time, concepts within are inconsistent and ever shifting.

(And this is just the spec related stuff)
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