Biota of Western Cimmeria By TrollMans Watch

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Bordered on the west by the Hellas Sea, to the north by the Utopian Sea, and on the east by the Sirenum Mountains, the southern continent of Cimmeria represents Mars' most geographically even and volcanically inactive region, which isn't saying much. As tectonic movements are nearly stagnant compared to Earth, most major geological changes occur due to the periodic eruptions of supervolcanos, but on Cimmeria, there has seemingly been no major volcanic eruptions since before the extinction of the dinosaurs, and most of its primordial mountain ranges have since eroded into vast canyon systems, which can still rise hundreds of feet above sea level.



The climate is hostile, but alleviated somewhat by the drifting humidity of the Hellas Sea; during the summer, the temperatures during the day are generally within a range of 15-30 degrees Celsius, but can drop to below -15 degrees at night, while in the winter, it'll be lucky to rise above that even during the day. Most life abandons the southern part of the continent in winter, where temperatures can drop below -50 for days. Rain and snow are uncommon, the most prevalent weather condition are the windstorms which can throw up vast dust clouds spanning hundreds of miles, occurring on an almost monthly basis. Despite such challenges, the diversity of flora and fauna is still relatively high, with the native organisms well-adapted to the daily challenges of this environment and numerous different habitats developing from the geological and geographical traits of the region.



As far as it is known, the fauna of Mars are animalistic, unlike the old depictions of incomprehensible tentacled monstrosities or a clear physical mirror of humanity, they fall somewhere in between, organisms which follow the biological laws of natural selection and adaptation. No creatures capable of civilization are known, although some show signs of thinking and intelligence, just as some animals on Earth do. Relationships of predator and prey, illness, natural disaster, and the day-to-day hardships have, just as on Earth, guided the evolution of Martian biota over hundreds of millions of years into a thriving biosphere.



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TOP ROW

(LEFT) Hundreds of millions of years ago, Cimmeria was covered in several vast supervolcanos that each covered hundreds of square kilometres. These have long since become extinct, and even their towering domes nothing but dust, and the walls of their winding lava chambers becoming enormous labyrinth-like canyon systems, the bleached skeletons of the long-dead volcanos. The sheer cliffs and plateaus are effective barriers against the sandstorms that plague the continent, creating refuges for life-forms which choose not to brave such conditions in the open prairies. The aretaur is one such species, a territorial animal which endlessly patrols the miles of valleys, trenches, and slopes. On this occasion, the lonely vigil is lightened by the presence of a whelp which trails its parent, not knowing that perhaps one day, it too will spend its life doing the same. Other animals such as the flageye have found that wandering as a group is much preferable to wandering alone, a preference marked by the difference in display features to the more aggressive aretaur. While its relative has developed long, curved horns for combat, the flageye has developed a large fleshy crest for visual communication.



(MIDDLE) One major find by the expedition team of Nergal I was the discovery of a unique habitat which they termed the dermal forest, a type of growth where the tree flora and epiphytes grow a canopy so entangled and durable that it forms an upper crust that is thick enough for humans to easily walk on and completely hides the forest underneath. The understory may never see more than the dim light of the sun, and is enveloped in an almost endless twilight. Occasionally, some folly may rip holes through the canopy, allowing light to spill into the undergrowth, a curiosity that inevitably attracts the dark inhabitants of this forest. A pair of owlmen, their huge, glassy eyes well attuned to the lowlight conditions, search for fallen prey and edible vegetation that may have been dropped from the upper boughs, while a number of arboreal dustsloths clamber through the tear, trying to find any parasitic organisms that naturally infest the inner dermal layers of the canopy that may have been exposed.



(RIGHT) Satellite imaging of Cimmeria showed a mystery which seemingly defied explanation; long winding rivers and ponds forming in regions that should not sustain them, and completely new rivers forming in a matter of months or weeks rather than years. During the first human expedition to Mars it was revealed that these were created a form of industrious organism similar to beavers, but only on a far greater scale. The semi-aquatic rivermaker digs troughs and trenches leading out from naturally occurring aquifers to farm an aquatic flora that it predominantly feeds on. Other types of flora also thrive along these rivermaker canals, and consequently the rivermakers, in their engineering, become a keystone species of enormous importance, possibly enough to slightly alter the climate of the entire continent. Countless other fauna can be found from these waterholes, such as here, terrestrial relatives, the squat terrapin harvester, and the massive Well's harvester, the largest known animal to walk the continent.



SECOND ROW

(LEFT) The extent of Mars' primordial volcanism is truly staggering, even hundreds of millions of years later, even with only the inner workings of these flaming mountains left, these cliffs still often tower over two hundred metres high and stretch for untold miles. In ancient times, the eruptions of such peaks would have been monumental, but ironically, they now offer the greatest protection from the elements. Although cooler on average than Earth, summers can still be swelteringly hot, climbing to above thirty degrees Celsius in regions of Cimmeria. The massive walls provide welcome shade for animals such as the Cimmerian ogre; these are predominantly tropical animals much more common near the equator and are not well-adapted to the extreme seasonal conditions of more temperate arid regions such as this, and this species' range is restricted to the stone corpses of these supervolcanos, where they can shelter away from the more severe weather.



(MIDDLE) The fact that Cimmeria's biotic diversity and population density is relatively high despite its desert-like conditions was a peculiar aspect that was uncovered by the discovery that vast aquifers wind beneath much of the continent, possibly containing a volume of water equal if not exceeding that of the Hellas Sea. Geothermal activity is believed to keep the aquifers above freezing even during winter, and in areas where it intersects with accessible caverns, or breaks through the bedrock in cenotes, it supplies water to the surface. In most cases, it is still too far down for animals to directly drink from, so flora must draw the water up through roots where it is then consumed by grazers, who are also able to quench their thirst while feeding as a result. Areas where the aquifers are exposed are often marked by the unusual quantity of vegetation around them, like oases in the wasteland, and where animal life of all varieties inevitably congregates as well, from massive grazers like the kooshbeests to more humble visitors like the nimble jacoon. Within the aquifers as well are aquatic organisms that live entirely within them, only briefly glimpsing sun through these cenotes, untold shoals of troglobite jellysquids just beneath the surface.



(RIGHT) For all its fearsome predators, there is no greater killer on Mars than the elements, and a lesson which is bred into all Martian organisms is readiness for such conditions. For any organism on Cimmeria that does not migrate each year, this means to be both a desert and polar adapted life-form. The apex predator of the continent, the brute vampire is one such animal, with a large, compact body and thick layers of fur-like filaments and sub-dermal fat to remain warm in the freezing temperatures, but shedding most of the inner layers of hair during the summer to prevent overheating and naturally losing some of its fat during the long, harsh winter. On the coldest nights, even this predator may choose to stay inside, such as this animal sheltering from the snow within a sea cave along the Hellas Sea. This cave is kept slightly warmer than the surrounding area because it is connected to an aquifer and the flow of warmer water prevents this region from icing over. The Hellas serpent is a species of grub-seal that shelters within the aquifers for this reason, emerging again to hunt in the sea as spring arrives.



THIRD ROW

(LEFT) Separating the continent of Cimmeria from the neighbouring continent of Noachis is the Hellas Sea, covering hundreds of thousands of square kilometres and reaching up to a kilometre in depth, the deepest point on Mars. Its cool, sunlit waters are ideal for the growth of planktonic organisms and aquatic flora which flourish in the summer months, providing the basis of a blue oasis in the middle of the arid red landscape. Vast hydrothermal vent systems line the seabed which shelter the aquatic life-forms during the winter months, when much of the surface freezes over. The immense goliath grub-seal spends much of the winter in a state of torpor, usually only rising every few weeks for air, to sink back beneath the depths. As the ice begins to break up in spring, it once again springs to life, its armoured head easily breaking apart the smaller icebergs that may lay in its path. Its much smaller relative, the speckled grub-seal on the other hand remains active year-round, working in groups to keep breathing holes in the ice from freezing over and with the onset of spring, they'll no longer be able to enjoy basking on the ice floes out at sea.



(MIDDLE) The two primary predator guilds of Cimmeria are the spider-hounds and the vampires, and the two avoid competition by niche partitioning, with the spider-hounds hunting during the day, and the vampires at night. The vampires' favoured prey are the sleeping herds of grazers which huddle together for protection in the cold Martian night. However, some herds do not offer themselves up as such an easy target, especially those with infants to protect. A pair of winged vampires, having failed their initial attack, continue to harass this herd of shieldfaces in an attempt to unsettle them, exposing their vulnerable young. Their nocturnal senses are far better attuned to the night than their quarry, but their lightly-built frames wouldn't withstand a direct attack on an adult. An adult shieldface rushes at the vampires to scare them off, but chances are they'll need more than that to be chased away for good.



(RIGHT) The antithesis to the vampires are the spider-hounds, which, as their name suggests, strongly resemble huge spiders. The most commonly seen variety, the crimson spider-hounds, are more conventional hunters, chasing down prey to kill it with claws and teeth. But Mars is also home to many more unusual hunters. As this pair of spider-hounds runs a herd of yowlers down the naturally carved valleys, they are interrupted by a specialized ambush predator hiding beneath the sand like a gigantic owlfly larvae, its raptorial mandible ready to spear any prey that strays within reach, the dustray. Both hunters utilize the topography of the environment to their advantage, as the steep slopes make it more difficult for the prey to break away or change direction during a chase in the case of the spider-hounds, and within the cramped valley it increases the chance that prey wandering down the path will be within reach of the dustray's claw.



BOTTOM ROW

(LEFT) Between the vast canyon systems scattered throughout Cimmeria are the windswept open prairies where only the hardiest vegetation can gain a foothold. Temperatures at night can fall to below -15 Celsius (without windchill), even in summer. However, what vegetation that can survive here finds an environment with little competition and unrestricted area to grow, and with them, follows the inevitable herds of grazing animals seeking to exploit this bountiful resource, and the predators that hunt them. For it is not the red earth of Mars that really marks its surface crimson, but the vast blanket of scarlet vegetation and red weeds stretching across the planet. Here, one of the most common grazers of this region, the lashheads, are seen in their continuous migration for the best feeding grounds; herds of such size can consume literal tons of vegetation every day, but the flora easily grows fast enough to keep up.Alongside them, one of the rarest of Cimmeria's major predators, the bone-eater demigod, a species well-adapted to scavenging the carcasses that are inevitably scattered widely across the plains, seen burying itself into the body of a waddler.



(MIDDLE) Martian sandstorms far exceed any that occur on Earth, vast billowing clouds spanning continents reaching speeds exceeding a hundred kilometres an hour, easily visible from outer space. And unfortunately for every Martian life-form, these are also one of the most common weather conditions; chances are, if clouds are on the horizon, they aren't bringing rain. Plant life must either be hardy enough to stand against these winds, or grow quickly enough to effectively recover after each sandstorm. The domed harvester is a grazer well-adapted to these storms, its rounded carapace hiding its vulnerable extremities and baring the brunt of the pummelling sands, it can continue to forage even as the sun is blotted out for hours, if not days in severe cases. The smaller inker is not quite as well-adapted to these weather extremes, and this individual caught out in the open shelters behind the body of a harvester as protection.



(RIGHT) The Dor Caldera is the youngest and only semi-active supervolcano on Cimmeria, although its last major eruption occurred roughly eighty million years ago. Whether it will ever erupt again is unknown, but beneath it is still geothermally active. The collapsed lava cones form a series of smaller calderas together over thirty kilometres in width surrounded by walls up to three kilometres high. Drawn up from tunnels by this unique environment are subterranean organisms common on more volcanically active continents closer to the equator, but almost non-existent elsewhere. Most evidently is the blue fungus, chemosynthetic flora which feed on the volcanic elements and grow in great abundance, filling the caldera. The blue vampire's existence is heavily intertwined with this fungus; it builds nests within its outgrowths, its fur is encrusted with its para-mould form, and it hunts among its boughs. Here a female vampire defends its nest from another vampire, its own mate returning from a hunt, who now inflates his display sacs to remind her of this fact lest she attack him on the spot.



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This... this got away from me. It was originally just going to be six quick sketches just to show I was still working on the Mars spec... then it turned into eight... then ten... and then twelve... I had to stop myself.... There'll be more detailed profiles on the specific species of flora and fauna depicted here (and some others that weren't)... eventually... I promise... Hopefully I didn't forget anything...

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Published : Feb 13, 2019