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That's nice flora. I like the shading.

Does it really make sense it should live in the plains, too? To use the Joshua tree as an example, the Joshua tree only lives in desert areas and a little of the western mountains of the state of California. It doesn't extend to the plains, not even the northern plains of the U.S., which are cold and dry compared to the other plains of the U.S. Even its historic range, which was less patchy, is still limited to those areas. This doesn't even seem to be a highly adaptive, weed-like generalist, like the dandelion or the sunflower (Helianthus annuus). To use something which wasn't spread by humans as an example, the horned dandelionhorned dandelion doesn't spread much into the "plains states" (northern and southern plains next to the "desert states".)

This post has been edited by Coolsteph: Feb 6 2021, 08:12 AM

Plains is the second most arid biome flavor Sagan 4 has. That particular plains biome is also surrounded on all sides by other biomes which would justify these adaptations.

I like it. Are the leaves waxier in order to prevent water loss?

"The berries are no longer waterproof, because they don’t need to be." Does it provide them some advantage to remove that function? Certainly, living things can hold onto useless traits; kiwis still have (very small) wings, and most population of the common dandelion do not reproduce sexually, but they still make pollen. Are the waterproof traits selected against for the sake of making more water-absorbent seeds? That could be an advantage in dry environments.

It's more that it's a waste to keep producing the stuff that makes it waterproof. It's not a major anatomical feature like wings are.