Aloowog

Though Mars has its fair share of beautiful and elegant creatures, a great lot is downright hideous and somewhat malevolent in appearance. The aloowog is no exception, resembling an unholy combination of a malignant toad and a ravenous locust.

The aloowog is the largest member of the gryllopodidae, a family of cricket-like archaeocephalian onychognaths whose third leg pair has adapted towards jumping high and far with the help of Mars’ gravity. Though, there is some recent discussion around this group actually being polyphyletic. The decoupling of the cranium and jaws in the aloowog is stronger than in its relatives and it has an unusual, inflated, almost squishy appearance. This masks a quite slender skeleton underneath, which, as in anurans on Earth, completely lacks rib bones, but offers a lot of space for six large lung-sacs. These the aloowog uses to broadcast its calls far and wide across the shrublands. The sound is often described by astronauts as a faint “aloo-aloo”, giving the Martian its name. Unlike a frog, its skin is dry and keratinous and, though wrinkly, the smooth texture and pinkish colour gives it an unnervingly human quality.

Living in various temperate areas around the planet, fully grown aloowogs are capable predators of various microfauna. The mandibles, derived from ancient hands, have a large, jointed, but hidden arm skeleton behind them that allows the mouth to open with an impressively large gape. Thanks to this they can swallow much of their prey whole. Sometimes though, aloowogs seem to prefer eating their food slowly and methodically, often by starting with the head, as this poor Yrp had to find out.

Aloowogs differ in another aspect from other gryllopods. The majority of the family gives birth to fully developed young which resemble the adults, but the aloowog reproduces in a seemingly more primitive manner. During the inundation season, two aloowogs mate and externally fertilize aquatic eggs, which they lay into the temporary streams and ponds that form. These hatch into larvae which have to metamorphose into the adult form.

Aloowog larvae are nicknamed aloopoles and differ drastically from the adults. They hatch with strongly developed hindlimbs with extended webbing, with which they propel themselves like backswimmer bugs. The other limb pairs are still missing. Out of the later breathing holes sprout gills, the tail has a fluke and the skin is much tighter, making the body more streamlined. Especially apparent through this is the chelicerous mouth detached from the cranium, used to feed on various small semi-aquatic animals the aloopoles share their habitat with. Fascinatingly, the anatomy of the aloopoles has some superifical resemblance to that of the fossil Tyralloidea, a successful group of marine archaeocephalians that went extinct at the end of the Thermozoic Era. Some of these fossil organisms could reach plesiosaurian dimensions, which is reflected in the names of famous taxa like Elasmorallus, whose magnificent 12-metre long skeleton graces the main hall of the American Museum of Natural History. Some have proposed that this resemblance might hint at a deeper connection between tyralloids and modern gryllopods, but convergent evolution seems a more likely explanation. The rail-like swimming method with long paddle-limbs, instead of a fish-like undulation, has evolved a curious number of times independently among various Martians, including many groups that were not even secondarily aquatic. The exact reasons for this phenomenon are still speculated upon, though a leading hypothesis is that the lower gravity affects water physics in such a way that this method of swimming becomes more viable than on Earth.

Aloopoles do not remain long in this antediluvian form, as they develop front legs quite quickly. As soon as they are then able to walk and breathe on dry ground, the body inflates to its adult, rounded state. The webbing on the hindlimbs becomes reduced, as they transform from paddles into jumping legs. Due to relying on open bodies of water for their reproduction, aloowogs are much more vulnerable to climatic changes than other shrubland organisms, especially on such a dried-out planet. The prospect of future urban stations on Mars redirecting much of the glacial meltwater for their own needs could seriously threaten their populations. I therefore implore the readers, especially those positively inclined towards colonialism and terraforming, to perhaps show some sympathy towards this and other Martians, for, as unfriendly as they may look, they are but innocent animals and alive just like us. After already devastating our own world, what right do we have to invade another and rape its natural treasures? If Man truly is wise, he would do best to come to Mars only as a visitor, not as a violator. We may be alone in this solar system with our power and intelligence, but if higher powers do exist in the greater beyond, they might not judge us favourably, should we succumb to our selfish and unnecessary excesses.