Usually, as I work on a species' description, there's only one copy; even if it was originally completely different, it slowly morphs into the final version, rather than being rewritten. However, there is one exception: the Seashrog.

The Seashrog currently holds the record for longest species description in Sagan 4 history, and it's split into headings and subheadings like a Wikipedia page. What I haven't really shared is that this was not the original goal. I had written a normal semi-organized description more like the ones I do for most species, but then realized it was too long to parse and opened up a new doc to rewrite and reorganize it. Because of that choice, the version of the description that I had written up to that point is still intact in my main Week 26 doc. Here it is in its entirety:

QUOTE

SEE OTHER DOC - Seashrog (Lutrasorex dracops) Creator: Disgustedorite Ancestor: Tamjack Habitat: Size: 2 meters long Diet: Omnivore () Reproduction: Sexual (Male and Female, Live Birth, Pouch and Milk) Seashrog replaced its ancestor and developed omnivory and tool use. Originating as an accidental discovery, the Seashrog learned to craft spears by cutting sticks at an angle. Initially, these were used for self-defense, but before long the Seashrog started using them for something new--spearfishing. It was able to develop the dexterity to accomplish this as an inevitable conclusion of its existing advanced nest-building skills. The majority of the Seashrog’s changes from its ancestor are a direct result of it developing spearfishing. The most immediately obvious of these is the change to the Seashrog’s nests--instead of floating squashed spheres made of one type of wood, they have a half-sphere shape and are made from a mixture of different wood types. Though the Mainland Fuzzpalm is a favorite, they will use any kind of wood. The new shape of the nests serves two major purposes: first, and most importantly, the new shape is bottom-heavy and does not easily flip over during storms or when hit by a large sea creature. Second, and related to the Seashrog’s new hunting method, is that the addition of a flat deck gives the Seashrog more stable footing when hunting. If the nest had a curved roof like its ancestor’s, then it would not have the stability necessary to stab aquatic prey, let alone pull it aboard, without losing its balance and falling into the water. As far as the new construction of the nest goes, the beginning is relatively the same--the Seashrog chops down trees such as the Mainland Fuzzpalm and Obsidibend which have flexible trunks and bends them to form ribs for the nest. However, instead of bending them into half-circles, the Seashrog only bends them part way so that when they are joined on one end they don’t meet on the other. Once the ribs have dried, the Seashrog then lays a few long straight logs or strips of wood on top in one direction to form support, then lays down more perpendicularly to them to create the deck. The deck has a hole in the center, which serves as the entrance to the nest. The entrance is covered by a simple lid constructed of sticks. If at this stage some part of the deck is too weak, additional pieces of wood may be brought inside to serve as vertical support beams. The preferred wood for the deck and support beams are generally that of denser material, such as Cocobarrage wood. All parts of the nest are sealed together using saliva and Mainland Fuzzpalm berries. While its ancestor coated the exterior in various flora, the Seashrog coats the interior as well to serve as padding during rough storms. Inland Fuzzpalm leaves are preferred for their insulating properties. The deck has no flora covering it to reduce exposure to potentially harmful microbes, with the exception of the part surrounding the entrance to help keep the lid in place during storms. Outside of nest changes, another adaptation related to spearfishing is in the Seashrog’s forelimbs. Though its marsupial-like nature somewhat restricted what it could do with its forelimbs, in this case it actually did not run into trouble at all--the changes were actually advantageous to newborns climbing into the pouch. Its forelegs are considerably more flexible and dexterous, though not anywhere near a primate-like level; it just needs to be able to move heavy logs and thrust a spear really hard, so that is what it can do. When presented with finer tools, such as a dagger, the Seashrog would not know what to do with it, and even if it did it would be rather clumsy with it. It’s simply designed to work with spears and nothing else. Although its architectural and tool-using capabilities cause it to take on a highly sophisticated aesthetic, it is very important to note that the Seashrog is not sophont. Though it is indeed intelligent and even self-aware, and it is certainly possible for it to produce a sophont descendant, the Seashrog itself is only as advanced as a chimpanzee in that department. Further, as it does not live in groups, the Seashrog is actually rather lacking in social intelligence; as a result, even if it were to develop sophonce, it could never produce a recognizable civilization. Apart from spearfishing-related adaptations, the Seashrog has a handful of other changes of note. Its pouch can now be sealed shut, allowing females with pouch young to swim without risking drowning them. The pouch is also now present in males, serving to protect their genitalia and streamline their bottoms. It no longer has scales on its underside, as these made mating difficult and weren’t very important for defense anyway. All of its scales, including the tail axe, now have bone cores to increase their strength at only a minute weight cost; its fluffy fur retains air enough to keep it afloat without hollow scales anyway. This does come at somewhat of a cost in swimming ability, as the tail is now very heavy, but a heavy tail is advantageous for chopping down flora and for balancing while spear-fishing, not to mention the core means it remains strong even while soaked. Like many Terran fauna with defensive spikes on their backs, the Seashrog mates belly-to-belly. The Seashrog has advanced its ancestor’s habit of storing Fuzzpalm berries into general food and supply storage. A section of the nest interior is dedicated to stockpiling food, nest maintenance supplies, and spears. Nest maintenance supplies consist of Mainland Fuzzpalm berries, driftwood, leaves, and leftover pieces of wood from the nest’s original construction. Parts of spears can also be used to repair damage to the nest in a pinch, though this is not preferred as the Seashrog won’t be able to construct more spears until the next time its nest washes ashore. Effect on Other Species The Seashrog’s use of other types of wood has caused various flora to spread, either through intentional transport or through spores getting caught in its fur and nest material. In particular, Cocobarrage, Obsidibend, and Mainland Fuzzpalm have spread to all beaches throughout its entire range. Though it initially used both the Fuzzpalm and the Mainland Fuzzpalm for wood and adhesive, when the Mainland Fuzzpalm spread it outcompeted the original Fuzzpalms present in its range. As a result, the original Fuzzpalm is now extinct. The same has occurred with all remaining beach populations of the Obsiditree, as a result of it spreading the Obsidibend. The Seashrog retains a partnership with the Cleaner Borvermid, which keeps its nest clean of harmful vermees and epithetic flora. As such, the Cleaner Borvermid has also spread throughout the Seashrog’s entire range.

Notably, I also have a descendant of the Seashrog in the works that this happened to as well--except I had already started out with using headings and subheadings for it. I might post its before-rewrite version here as well after I submit it next gen.

Pelagic Puffgrass (Thalassastipes pelliflos)
Creator: Disgustedorite
Ancestor: Beach Puffgrass
Habitat: Wind Temperate Coast, Dass Temperate Coast, Jindy Tropical Coast, BigL Tropical Coast, Clarke Temperate Coast, King Tropical Coast, Chum Tropical Coast, Elerd Temperate Coast, South LadyM Temperate Ocean, LadyM Tropical Ocean, North LadyM Temperate Ocean, South Jujubee Temperate Ocean, Jujubee Tropical Ocean, North Jujubee Temperate Ocean, Fermi Temperate Coast, Soma Temperate Coast, Fly Tropical Shallows, Hydro Tropical Coast, Oz Temperate Coast, Maineiac Temperate Coast, Yokto Salt Marsh, Always Salt Swamp, Glicker Salt Swamp, Jeluki Salt Swamp, Gec Salt Swamp, Biocat Salt Swamp, Huggs Salt Marsh, Blocks Salt Marsh, Bone Salt Marsh, Irinya Salt Marsh, Blood Salt Swamp, Ichthy Salt Swamp, Terra Salt Swamp, Bardic Salt Swamp, Kenotai Salt Swamp, Wright Salt Swamp, Pipcard Salt Swamp
Size: 80 cm tall
Diet: Photosynthesis
Reproduction: Sexual (Male and Female, Spores, Cone)

The Pelagic Puffgrass split from its ancestor. With the rise of the Seashrog came the appearance of massive amounts of driftwood left over from destroyed nests. The Pelagic Puffgrass grows on the driftwood, more or less using it as though it were a nurse log. This has caused it to spread over a significant portion of the ocean, but being specialized for life on driftwood it has not replaced its ancestor and it is very rare to find it growing on sand.

The Pelagic Puffgrass’s reproduction has been altered. Its unfertilized spores are no longer puffy. It now comes in male and female. Females do not release their spores at all, keeping them inside a protective fleshy structure somewhat resembling many individual scales of a pinecone growing along a stem. Male spores are still dispersed by wind, though they may occasionally land in the water and instead be splashed onto the female by seaspray. Either way, after fertilization, the zygote grows the long hairs that give the puffgrass lineage its name, and they are dispersed by wind. They actually do not wait to germinate, growing necessary structures such as small leaves and roots immediately so that they will obtain food and water in the meantime and be ready to go the moment they encounter driftwood. Pieces of driftwood can often be covered in many unrelated individuals.

Like its ancestor, the Pelagic Puffgrass deals with excess salt by transporting it to a few designated leaves which are then shed. However, given the ocean is much saltier than what its ancestor faced on beaches, it has had to make some improvements. It now also secretes much of its salt to make room for additional salt in the same leaf. It is also capable of not absorbing any more water at all if it has had too much salt buildup, such as if its log is too saturated or it grew too far down, instead waiting for freshwater to rain down in a storm for it to absorb; however, this will only occur after an extended period of time without rain.

Though it mainly grows on driftwood, it is also possible for Pelagic Puffgrass to grow on Seashrog and Marine Tamow nests which are currently in use. However, in cases like this it will often be trampled or otherwise crushed by activity.

I've now changed the topic subtitle to something more fitting

I've added it

I didn't see that particular swarmer in the list for its habitats.

no

Shrew Sauceback (Vermisorex muscauda)
Creator: Disgustedorite
Ancestor: Spotted Sauceback
Habitat: Barlowe Temperate Rainforest, Barlowe Temperate Woodland, Barlowe Chaparral
Size: 5 cm long
Diet: Adult: Carnivore (Sapworms, Xenobees, Xenowasps, Dartirs, Minikruggs, Silkruggs, Cloudswarmers, Mistswarmers, Hemoswarmer, Sauceswarmer, Vermees); Larvae: Detritivore, Scavenger, Opportunistic Carnivore (Vermees)
Reproduction: Sexual (Male and Female, Eggs and Larvae)

The Shrew Sauceback is a very small sauceback measuring no more than 5 centimeters in length. This size decrease is due in part to its eyeless nature not being especially competitive in a world of eyed creatures, so it simply got smaller until it hit something it was more competitively viable in. It is named not for any resemblance to [[shrew]]s, but for its dietary habits as an adult, which are like those of a Terran shrew. As such a small endotherm, it must eat constantly to survive, so it is always on the hunt for prey which is often much larger than itself. Tooth-like extensions of its existing tooth jaws assist in grasping and killing large prey. It can starve so quickly that, in order to survive the night, it doesn’t sleep--it hibernates. However, it is a totally different story for its larvae.



Like many other [[sauceback]]s, the Shrew Sauceback has worm-like larvae. Unlike its ancestor, and indeed unlike most other saucebacks, the Shrew Sauceback does not care for its young at all. Shrew Sauceback larvae are completely ectothermic, burrowing, and feed almost exclusively on carcasses and detritus, only occasionally snapping up the [[vermees]] they stumble upon. The larvae hatch at less than a millimeter in length, and they reach their full adult length before they undergo metamorphosis. In fact, a mature larva is bigger than an adult, as it will pack on a lot of weight in fat stores before it begins its metamorphosis. This is necessary because the Shrew Sauceback’s adult metabolism is so high that otherwise it would starve to death before it finishes the transformation. The larva will hide in a burrow while undergoing metamorphosis and emerge as a full-sized adult. Due to their small size, most Shrew Saucebacks will die before they ever mate, so to compensate they will lay thousands of eggs per mating.

Backwards time travel exists in Beta's timeline as well and transcendence doesn't happen in either.

I've had 2 Sagan 4 Alpha-related dreams that I can remember off the top of my head. Both involved saucebacks.

--

In the first, the dream itself wasn't really what was interesting. I was just having a dream where I was a frosty sauceback, probably frolicking or something. However, I needed to go to the bathroom, so I got up and started to sleepwalk towards the bathroom.

Emphasis on sleepwalk. I was still dreaming, and I still thought I was a sauceback. I remember being able to see, my eyes were open, but saucebacks can't see--they use echolocation--so I ignored my eyesight and tried to navigate via echolocation.

Of course, I walked straight into a wall and immediately woke up.

--

The second that I can remember was last night. I was visiting my grandparents I think, since it seemed to be their house, but it was right next to Niagara Falls for some reason. At some point, a sauceback--some kind of descendant of Brighteyes which was about as long as I am tall--got loose inside the house. At some point we lost track of it and assumed it got out the same way it came in. Then there was some kind of monologue about how Niagara Falls works, which I'm 99% sure was false.

Turns out the sauceback was still in the house, it had just gotten lost and tangled in some clothes inside my sister's messy, messy room. It took 2 people to successfully catch it and put it outside.

Have you ever had a dream about Sagan 4 that you remember? Share it here.

I think the degree of looseness between the two should be restricted mainly to speed and probability of evolution, not necessarily to how something functions.

Seashrogs certainly gained a lot of attention (possibly more than they deserved), and hey, it does mean I now have more explanation for one of my Seashrog descendants for next gen sticking around on Fermi Island!

I don't think so. Within their lineage these are fairly novel in niche and behavior.

It occurred to me that finding an extinction cause may seem like a difficult task. I have a process that I use when determining the generation and cause of extinction:

I picked a species at random, the Mud-Swirl. It is listed as having gone extinct in week 9. It has a single descendant, which was made in week 9 and replaced it. Therefore, I filled in its extinction date and cause as being generation 60 and replaced by a descendant by adding this to the template on its wiki page:

CODE

|exgen       = 60 |excause     = replaced by descendant

For a species not replaced by its descendant, I have picked the Azelak Sprinter, which became extinct in week 15. It has no descendants, so it was not replaced. So, I clicked "what links here" on the wiki's sidebar to see what pages it is linked on. I found it to be linked on the Gammaray page, which preserves week 15 at the moment of the gamma ray burst (between gens 100 and 101) with information on which species died from it. The Azelak Sprinter had no votes to preserve it from extinction, so it died from the gamma ray burst. Gamma ray burst extinctions are being listed as generation 101 on the wiki, so I add this to its wiki page template:

CODE

|exgen       = 101 |excause     = gamma ray burst

The above examples turned out to have correct weeks of extinction, so I only needed to fill in the cause. For a more suspicious extinction date, the process would look more like this:

I picked another species at random, in this case the Feathered Beakworm. It has no descendants the week it went extinct, so I check pages that link to it for anything that might have outcompeted it. In this case, there are none. However, it looks like its prey went extinct the week it died out. However, closer investigation shows that descendants of its prey existed which it would have been capable of eating for much longer. The week it became extinct, its prey was replaced by the Hydroskimmer. However, the Hydroskimmer is still accessible as food for it, and it remained extant until week 11 when it was replaced by something the Feathered Beakworm could not eat. Therefore, the Feathered Beakworm's extinction date is wrong and should be updated to have occurred in week 11 from loss of food. I post this information here or send it to MNIDJM for verification before I edit the wiki accordingly, in case it turns out I'm incorrect.

(of these two I actually picked the Feathered Beakworm to check first most extinctions are not suspicious so that was lucky)

Actually, the brush isn't preset--I made it just for this submission.

Hair Nimbuses (Filamentonimbus spp.)
Creator: Disgustedorite
Ancestor: Nimbuses
Habitat: Global (Sagan 4)
Size: 1-10 mm wide cells; up to 20 cm long colonies
Diet: Photosynthesis (UV Light), Diazotrophy (not all species)
Reproduction: Sexual (Cellular Mating), Asexual (Colony: Fragmentation; Cell: Binary Fission)

Hair Nimbuses split from their ancestor. This genus of nimbus forms long colonial chains which are less susceptible to becoming saturated with water and falling. This is due to their high association with real clouds, aided by the appearance of Cloudbubbles which can serve as structural support. Clouds are the wettest part of the atmosphere--basically an oasis in a habitat otherwise more arid than a desert--and to take advantage of this water source, avoiding too much saturation is necessary to their survival. In addition to the sky, they are also present in montane regions, cloud forests, and anywhere else where fog or ground-level cloud cover is common, but in these habitats they are tethered to rocks and rooted flora. They may also occasionally grow on hibernating fauna. They stand out from other nimbuses in that, in three dimensions, they actually resemble the two-dimensional representations, only having fronds growing in a ring around the main body of the cell.

In order to keep their genome fresh, Hair Nimbus cells are capable of mating. Like in many unicellular eukaryotes on Earth, they do so by fusing and then undergoing meiosis. However, their many fronds and status as aeroplankton make this a difficult endeavor, as their chances of meeting outside of colonies and coming close enough to actually mate are very low. They mitigate this by mating when colonies collide: the filamentous shape of the colony causes them to become tangled easily anyway, and they come apart during the process of meiosis, so they both undergo sexual reproduction and avoid becoming vulnerable to saturation with water in a single action.

After undergoing meiosis, the resulting Hair Nimbus cells will proceed to divide a few more times, forming spore-like cells which are very small and do not cling to neighbors. Cells in this stage can survive falling as rain and can reenter the sky through dust storms or sea spray. They are dormant until they bump into larger aeroplankton, such as the Cloudbubble. In the case of Cloudbubbles in particular, they are often captured by the sticky feeding tendrils, but if they land on a different part of the plant, they will proceed to start dividing, growing out from the chosen surface to form their namesake filamentous colonies. This does not harm the host plant, as they use UV light for photosynthesis and are transparent in the spectrums that most plants use. Unlike in typical cell colonies, but as is typical for the Nimbus lineage, the cells are not connected by their main bodies, instead clinging by their fronds. This makes them very light, but it also makes the colony susceptible to fragmentation. Broken lengths of colony can rarely reattach to a new host, but they are more likely to collide with other colony fragments in the sky, allowing them to mate. Fragments that never meet other fragments or hosts will eventually die, either of dehydration, predation, or falling as rain, though they have a chance to survive the latter and return to the sky if they land in the ocean or in dry dirt or sand and their fronds aren’t too severely damaged.

There are many species of Hair Nimbus. They often have different adaptations for different parts of the atmosphere. They cannot rise as high as the stratosphere, but they do exist in the upper troposphere. These high-altitude species, along with those residing in polar high winds, employ antifreeze proteins to protect themselves from the frigid air. In general, the width of a hair nimbus cell will decrease in wetter parts of the sky, as they are more susceptible to becoming rain and having shorter fronds makes them more likely to survive the fall. For species which live closer to the ground, such as in montane environments, the aforementioned dangers of rain and dehydration do not necessarily apply, so these are often the largest and fastest-growing species and they typically mate on the ground. Some species of Hair Nimbus are also capable of diazotrophy, fixing nitrogen in the air and the increasingly “lush” clouds to help themselves grow. Not every species does this, but their existence makes them a vital addition to the third sky ecosystem.

Anyone who has browsed the wiki recently may have noticed that extinct species now automatically show what week they went extinct, and there are likewise categories for what week a species died in. The vast majority of these species are listed as also having an unknown extinction generation and cause.

I've been working on a project to track down every single extinction date and cause. Originally, this was just for the sake of being able to add Sagan Bot, but then I started discovering species that were made extinct by mistake--such as Crystal Sapper, which was never added to the ecosystem page when it was first created, and more notably Uksip Marfinnus, now the oldest extant species, which seems to have been killed off retroactively by accident during a reorganization of the ecosystem pages in 2008. (it's known to be a mistake because there were other species killed off by mistake that appeared or left descendants after the affected pages)

These discoveries sparked deeper investigation into extinctions, such as those of extinct kingdoms, and suddenly mistakes are being uncovered left and right. However, investigating them is proving difficult, as there are literally thousands of extinct species from throughout Sagan 4's 14-year history. Therefore, I have made this dynamic list of every single species with an unknown extinction cause, sorted by week: https://sagan4alpha.miraheze.org/wiki/User:...auseMaintenence

If possible, I would like assistance in pinpointing the exact extinction date and cause of every species listed. If an accidental, mistaken, or otherwise suspicous extinction is found, it should be reported here so it can be investigated further and potentially fixed.

I was pretty amazed too. On the canonical timescale, week 3 is practically the late cambrian. You'd think it would have eventually gotten taken out by habitat loss, but the map only started undergoing major changes regularly in like Week 19, so plenty of old habitats are actually intact.

Note that it's only alive now because it was very, very lucky. It was mistakenly marked as extinct in week 7, so it completely missed Alpha's highest peak in popularity where it would have been replaced. Other species were also accidentally marked extinct that same week, but Uksip Marfinnus was the only one that, once corrected, would be found to survive everything. I'd say that makes it officially Sagan 4's luckiest organism.

When Uksip Marfinnus was found to still be alive, I was asked to make a descendant to replace it, and when we still thought it only had one surviving population MNIDJM and I had a disagreement about whether it should be a genus group (I wanted to do an externally identical bookend species, Uksip Lazarus). Then there were two populations, so I did both. I didn't find a genus especially likely either, but it was requested, so I tried my best to explain it.

A bit of context for those not on the discord server: I've been doing a little project where I track down the exact cause of extinction for various species, and there were a few that seemed to have been made extinct by mistake. Some were from accidentally deleted lines on the ecosystem page, others from never being added in the first place, etc. MNIDJM went through and found out when their actual extinction dates should be. The majority eventually died from one of the mass extinction events or from habitat loss, and the ones that didn't were predominantly microbes and other simple organisms, or if they weren't, they were fairly recent extinctions anyway.

Then there's Uksip Marfinnus.

Squidwhals (Lolligouksip spp)
Creator: Disgustedorite
Ancestor: Uksip Marfinnus
Habitat: Global (Sagan 4)
Size: 10-20 cm long
Diet: Planktivore (0.05-20 millimeters), Carnivore (swarmers half their size and smaller, other similar-sized fauna), Scavenger
Reproduction: Sexual (Male and Female, Spawning, Eggs)

Squidwhals are the descendants of the other surviving population of Uksip Marfinnus, replacing the Justin Polar Shallows population. These smaller marine uksips are similar to their cousin the Uksip Lazarus, the two diverging when the glaciers melted at the end of the Bloodian period. Thus, like the Uksip Lazarus, they have a U-shaped gut (meaning their anus is inside their mouth), a continuously-growing tooth that wears in such a manner that it automatically sharpens through use, a larger brain, a chamber derived from the ancestral sucking function of the mouth which can expand to suck in food, and they are very r-selected. Their suction chamber lacks protective setae inside and is less vascularized than their cousin's, and they depend more on obtaining oxygen through their skin. Far more developed, however, is their filter-feeding ability.

When the two Uksip Marfinnus populations diverged at the end of the Bloodian period, the ancestors of the Squidwhals had taken greater advantage of the booming populations of swarmers. Initially they remained restricted in range, but their new burst in speciation is correlated with the also-recent rise in meiofaunal swarmers. Similar to their cousin, water pushed out of the suction chamber passes through a filter of setae. The setae of the Squidwhals are stiffer and bear feather-like branches, able to capture wriggling zooplankton such as smaller Miniswarmers, as well as the arguably-phytoplankton Microswarmers and kin.

Most Squidwhals are social and live in bands of up to 10 individuals. This is because, making use of their increased intelligence which occurred over the half-eon since their ancestor first evolved, they maximize the number of small swarmers they can eat at one time by coordinating to round them up into dense clouds. The swarmers have little room to turn without colliding, so when the Squidwhals start sucking them in, they will have difficulty escaping. Most Squidwhals will also hunt larger prey, either ramming them with their tooth or otherwise grabbing them and pulling them against it. However, some species have abandoned this practice and likewise have shorter tentacles and a smaller tooth.

Unlike their cousin, Squidwhals do not broadcast spawn. When the breeding season comes along within a given species’ range, they gather in brackish estuaries and the males intentionally spawn over the females’ eggs. Hatchlings resemble miniature adults, and they live in the estuaries until they have reached about half their adult size. They join social bands early in life, usually with others from the same estuary, but if their band is split or massacred by predation, they can form or join new bands. Similar to their cousin, their reproductive opening is inside the mouth and next to the anus.

There are over 200 species of Squidwhal. They can be found all over the ocean, especially around reefs and upwellings where swarmers are abundant. Most species are associated with specific estuaries due to their breeding habits. They come in many colors. Many with an affinity for the open ocean are red or silver, the former making them less visible at greater depths. Those in the shallows are more varied depending on their environment, such as having stripes to disrupt their shape among oceanic flora or bright colors to help them blend in with reefs. Some species change color as they mature, having patterns that keep them hidden in the estuaries but switching to something more plain once they leave.

Like their ancestor and cousin, Squidwhals are soft-bodied. The only hard parts are their tooth, sucker teeth, and compound eye lenses. The only internal skeleton they have is a hydrostatic one formed from their abdominal cavity. They swim using six ribbon-like cuttlefishesque fins and a horizontal tail fin. Similar to their cousin, they can taste and smell with chemoreceptors on their tentacles.

Uksip Lazarus (Uksip lazarus)
Creator: Disgustedorite
Ancestor: Uksip Marfinnus
Habitat: Krakow Polar Shallows, South LadyM Polar Ocean, Fermi Polar Coast, South Jujubee Polar Ocean, Nemo Polar Shallows, Colddigger Polar Coast, South LadyM Ocean (Twilight Zone), Jujubee Ocean (Twilight Zone), Krakow Twilight Seamount, Fermi Twilight Seamount, Dixon-Darwin Twilight Floor, Dixon-Darwin Twilight Slope, South Sagan 4 Ice Sheet
Size: 40 cm long
Diet: Carnivore (Miniswarmers, Larvaback, Scuttlers, Miniwhorls, Squidwhals, Red Echofin, Common Oceanscooter, Finback, Imprisoned Wolley, Gillarill, Southern Gillfin, Gillaysheaia, Hallucigillia, Floating Pumpgill, South Polar Shardgill, Squire Finworm, Marine Gilltail, Marine Filtersquid, Sticky Urphish, Gilgan Waterworm, Ebony Pump Gilltail, Speckled Spinderorm, Crallsnaper, Metamorph Spinderorm, Shoalrorm, Deep Ribbon Gilltail, Mucurorm, Stegosnaper, Gulperpump), Planktivore (5-20 mm), Scavenger
Reproduction: Sexual (Male and Female, Broadcast Spawning, Eggs)

Though sometimes regarded as god-like, such as by the sophont Tripodician, the Nauceans who study Sagan 4 are ultimately people. Even with time travel and other technology well beyond what we can ever hope to comprehend, potentially including the ability to detect and scan every species on the planet, people can still make mistakes. One of these was regarding the Uksip Marfinnus, which was regarded as having gone extinct by the Irinyan period. Obviously, this was completely false.

The Uksip Lazarus has replaced the Uksip Marfinnus in Krakow Polar Shallows. Like the Terran coelacanth, it can be regarded as a living fossil, implying a ghost lineage (now busted) which has been residing in Sagan 4’s oceans for a whopping 357.5 million years. It survived the gamma ray burst through representatives in deeper waters, which later repopulated the sunlight zone. It survived the ice comet impact event thanks to its small size and generalized diet. When its population was once again pushed deeper by the ice age, it resurfaced once food returned. It survived the snowball event thanks to its tolerance to cold water, though as the ice receded it was eventually left restricted to only a few locations.

The most remarkable aspect of this creature is that externally, it looks almost exactly like its ancestor. Even its lifestyle seems similar, at a glance. However, it has made quite a number of less visible changes over time, such as in behavior and anatomy. The most visibly notable of these is that its tooth grows continuously and has more enamel on the inner side relative to the spiral, which causes it to wear unevenly and stay sharp. Further, though it can still kill by ramming its prey, if it misses it will grab it with its tentacles and pull it against the tooth. Like a Terran cephalopod, its tentacles have suckers which bear toothy sucker rings to help it grip. It has also taken up scavenging, detecting carcasses over a great distance with chemoreceptors on its tentacles.

There have also been significant internal changes. The most immediately obvious one is to the Uksip Lazarus’ gut. Rather than a simple blind gut, its gut is U-shaped--meaning it has an anus inside its mouth--and it has many chambers for different stages of digestion. The first of these chambers was originally used to aid in suction-feeding, and as such it can expand to suck in water and food particles. When water is pushed out, it passes through setae which are homologous with the insulating coat of the extinct Snowky. This allows it to filter feed to some extent. This chamber is also vascularized and has many bumps tipped with protective setae, allowing it to also function somewhat as a gill. It also became much smarter over time, as it had to compete with both other predators and increasingly smart prey. At present, its intelligence is comparable to that of a Terran shark.

The Uksip Lazarus has a relatively small population density, due in part to its eggs being consumed by the cosmopolitan planktivorous swarmers. Its reproductive method is full-throttle r-selection, broadcast spawning mass numbers of gametes with the hope that just a few will be fertilized and grow into surviving offspring. Hatchlings somewhat resemble the Uksip Luliformes, but as they grow they rapidly change to better resemble the adult form. The reproductive opening is located inside its mouth, next to its anus.

Like its ancestor, the Uksip Lazarus swims using six ribbon-like cuttlefishesque fins and a horizontal fish-like tail fin. It lacks any internal skeleton at all apart from a hydrostatic skeleton formed from its abdominal cavity, the only hard parts of its body being its tooth, its sucker teeth, and the lenses of its compound eyes.

One particular member of interest is Bonosaber. To most he seems more infamous than anything, but he is literally the creator of iron fauna and the ancestors of whorls, among other things. Mason fauna can also trace their ancestry to a species made by him. I can't help but wonder how he is today, and if he's aware of the legacy some of his species have left.

Islands on Earth usually also get the really small base niches filled in, while this one does not because of Alpha's mechanics. This is well in line with how I've seen island scaling used in Alpha. I'd be willing to make it a little bigger though, since it still works at a larger size.

Similar to what happened with Seashrog, I excluded scales from the underside because they would be converted to quills and make mating more difficult. Even if it mounts like a hedgehog, though I doubt it would because the scales are immobile.