Southern Ptannu

Despite their unassuming appearance, which recalls wingless fowls, bennus are a quite successful group of organisms that has managed to adapt to all climate zones of Mars. One branch of this family is the cold-adapted ptannu (Bulbornis australis) which inhabits the vast tundra that stretches over much of the red planet’s southern hemisphere.

Though superficially similar to the bennus of the shrublands, the ptannu has a much more bulbous body, denser fur which extends all the way to the toes and extended tail bristles. It is also capable of completely retracting its neck into its shell, including the beak. These are all obvious adaptations towards conserving warmth, which it obviously needs for living in such a bleak landscape. Notably, the auxiliary eyes of the ptannu are much more developed than in other nothornithes, resembling much more the primary eyes atop the cranial bulge.

The life of the ptannu is strongly tied to the seasons. When the first rays of the spring sun begin to thaw the top-layer of the permafrost, the marsfowl migrate south from their winter homes back into the southern marshlands and bogs that start forming. Their characteristically white fur begins to molt and is replaced by brownish to reddish hair which helps them blend into the environment. As the ecosystem, reawakens they start feeding on what they can: Small frondlets, sporians, filulithophore-sprouts, young wanderstalks with unhardened shells, wadjet larvae, as well as tachmut and smaller onychognaths. Once the short summer begins, the ptannus enter breeding season.

Here it is fascinating to mention that ptannus are among the few Martians that can be described as good parents. When two single ptannus meet during breeding season, they usually mate for life and build a nest out in the open tundra which they protect together. How the pair of monogamous hermaphrodites determines who has to be the “mother” in the family, as in the partner that is  impregnated and has to produce the eggs, is not known, though some pairs have been observed changing their roles each season. After a few weeks, the two to seven eggs hatch into precocial young that are immediately able to follow their parents around. The parents care for them greatly, teaching them how to feed and warming them with their bodies during the cold nights.

Unlike some other tundra dwellers, ptannus do not immediately migrate north with the onset of autumn, but choose to remain for a few more months. Their fur turns white to blend in with the growing snow and the family exploits the few remaining resources that have freed up now that everyone else has left. Only during the worst parts of winter, when photosynthesis crawls to a complete halt and makes it difficult to breathe in the tundra, do the ptannus migrate northwards towards oases in the shrublands, which they seem capable of finding by pure memory alone, perhaps using certain landmarks for orientation. Their children follow them and memorize their paths, until at the end of winter they have grown mature and begin living on their own.

It was originally thought that the southern ptannu was closely related to the northern one (Bulbornis borealis, though read on), which inhabits the much smaller tundra surrounding the north pole, and that they formed a single genus. One of the first ever molecular studies done on Martian organisms has however cast serious doubt on this, finding evidence that, surprisingly, the northern ptannu is actually more closely related to the highly aberrant marsalk of the northern ice cap (Leidy 2322). This makes these two an obvious case of convergent evolution. Since the northern ptannu neither belonged to Bulbornis anymore nor was close enough to be shoved into Areoalca, it has since received its own genus, whose name has now been agreed upon to be Paraxenoalca.

References:

• Leidy, Dustin: Molecular evidence disproves ptannu monophyly, in: Nothornithology Bulletin, 14, 2322, p. 76 - 93.

Under the Microscope

As on any planet, the majority of life on Mars is microscopic. Some of these organisms, such as the flechtoids, can form colonies large enough to be clearly observable without help. But most life is invisible to the naked human eye. Taking just a single droplet of Martian groundwater and looking at it through a microscope may therefore yield surprising results.

Most numerous in this unseen world are of course the areonts, the prokaryotic cells of Mars, who manifest themselves to our view as tiny specs slushing between the larger microorganisms. Some form small colonies, banding themselves into hair-like strings. To the north and south of our micromap we may see unusually large areont cells, one swarm propelling itself with single flagellae. The world of the areonts is itself interdependent with that of the Nanobacilli and the Areovira, who are so small that we cannot see them even at this scale.

Most conspicuous are the “elite” of the areonts, who form a kingdom of their own, the Macroareonta. These multicellular prokaryotes shield and compose themselves in all manners of siliceous shells. A quite large shell enters in from the north-west, the whole organism remaining obscure. East of it we see a smaller cousin in the form of a curved tube, from whose ends protrude a number of tendrils. Like their macroscopic cousins, these are likely autotrophic forms, though perhaps feeding on the waste and chemicals left behind by other organisms, for they live in lightless depths.

Quite different from these forms is the fellow which dominates the south-west, this hydraic pentagon. Using the tendrils which slither from beneath its shell, it drags itself forward and even entangles and strangles smaller organisms, the arms slowly devouring them with acids. This macroareont is what is called a “zoomorph”, in simplistic terms an “animal composed of bacterial cells”. It is not as organized as that may sound. Although moving as a single organism and encased in a single shell, prolonged observation has shown that the five compartments house separate cell-families that feed and nourish themselves independently of each other, making it more of a strung-together mass of rafts rather than a disciplined battleship.

This is in contrast to its relative we see in the south-east, encased in its mushroom-shaped shell. The cells-compartments of this “zoomorph” indeed appear to act in unison, with parts much more specialized for shell-building, feeding and reproduction and unable to exist without the others. Sagittabacillus, as it is called, has on occasion been described as a bacterial jellyfish.

Fierce competitors of these baroque organisms are the rhodokaryotes, chiefly the proteroareozoans. Their internal compartmentalization into distinctive cammaculae allows them more complexity and size even in a single-celled state. We see various of them floating around. In the very south is a malignant parasite that brings to mind a naval mine, seeking to attach itself to a larger areozoan or perhaps to be ingested. To its right is a three-flagelled “bottleship”, on collision course with its prokaryote counterpart. In the north-west, between the macroareonts, we catch a cell in the process of mitosis.

The contrast between the proteroareozoans and the macroareonts represents two different “philosophies” towards the attainment of complexity. One seeks it through external compartmentalization, the process of multiple simple individuals banding together to form one complex construct. The other seeks it through internal compartmentalization, dividing oneself into smaller sections to form one complex individual. This contrast forms, I believe, a universal pattern in nature. We see it repeated again at a larger scale when we compare the Polyfractaria with their relatives, the Pseudarticulata. On Earth too, when we contrast the great colonies of the ants and termites with the hulking bodies of the ungulates and pachyderms that both roam the remaining savannahs.

The highest complexity is however attained by those that can combine both internal and external compartmentalization. For evidence of this, look no further than Man himself, who in him carries the most complex organ the universe knows, which in turn allows him to form, beyond his own body, the most complex construct the universe knows: A society which puts to shame any organisation ever attained by the simple-minded colonial insects and produces intellectual and cultural achievements beyond those of even the smartest solitary animal. The terrifying side-effect, or perhaps result, of this compartmentalization is that Man’s potential for destruction is ironically only outdone by the most mindless and simplest of things, the nuclear forces which govern the very fabric of the universe and make even the mighty stars burst.

What we observe at the planetary scale of Man’s expanding civilization, we see, of course, repeated again at the microscopic one. Arezoans, the “animal” life of Mars, clearly outgun the destructive potential of both their single-celled forebearers and their macroareont prey. Three of them we see enter the picture in the north-east. On the very edge we see some sort of ciliated “brachiostoman” with a tail-fluke, using its tendrils to capture itself a unicell. To which new phylum of this broken up waste-basket-taxon it might belong is unknown. In some ways it resembles a miniature mollizoan without the distinctive jet-mantles. The fellow in the centre of the image, who is about to feed on some areont strings, defies classification even further. With its tendrils, mantle, cilias, vertical jaw and glide symmetry it combines traits from various known phyla and even kingdoms, making it hard to categorize for now. Perhaps this is a new phylum that has yet to be recognized.

More firm is the identity of the multi-legged organism, Noxochaetus, just entering into the lens’ frame. Its four-part jaws, four antennae and segmented body all indicate that this creature is a highly derived onychognath, likely a member of the insectoid Dodecapoda, who have reduced their six legs to such a degree that their expanded fingers now serve as twelve new limbs. Combined with the complete lack of eyes and extreme reduction in internal complexity (completely lacking lungs) to reach such a miniscule size, it is admittedly hard to see that this organism has more in common with an ushabti than any of the other worm-like organisms that inhabit the Martian soil. Noxochaetus represents the utmost degree of derivation, which ironically makes its playing field again that of the most archaic of Mars’ organisms.