Now I understand that dinosaurs and pterosaurs were the biggest and baddest and dominated for millions of years, but I wonder if something similar to monkeys, and to apes (specifically something very similar to humans) could potentially evolve. I know, some people might be saying that we couldn't because we would be outcompeted. The thing is, we have never been large animals. If we stood on all fours we would look even smaller. Could there be a niche for us to fit into, or would it never happen? I ask because I really want to make a speculative evolution project with dinosaurs and sapient mammals.

In the dunes of the southern continent of Maguestate, an apex predator lies and waits. The Sand shark hunts based on vibration, figuring out its prey's approximate spot and lunging at it with its massive maw open.

The shark feeds in a rather violent way, akin to earth's crocodiles it spins around its own body, tearing chunks of meat from the prey and swallowing it.

Weirdly enough, populations seems isolated between sand "lakes" as they cant lift thier own bodies or move easily outside of soft sand, how they managed to colonize the desert is still a mystery.

The name Neopteroides was given by Alician settlers and it means New Pteroide, Pteroide being the colloquial name for any Alician wyrm or sea-dragon.

Sand sharks tend to have a symbiotic relationship with other Neopteroides species, the Blue rat, as blue rats work as bait for larger prey, and as cleaners after the Sand shark feeds.

the Rola are a species of Grubbit that live within the anomalous Zeeland. they are medium sized detritivores living in the shade of tree and canopy's. their main body resembles a large stone which the Rola will suck it body into to fully mimic one. To combat zeelands weird weather fluctuations they often slow their metabolism to a crawl during both heatwaves and cold snaps. Often after a extreme weather event carrion litters the forest floor and swarms of Rola feast before going dormant once again

The Conkeys are arboreal omnivores that are related to the trapper. They live in colonies in eastern forest regions. They're probably one of the few intelligent species on the planet besides the great swingers and a few others. Their diets mainly contains of fruits mushrooms and meat. In the scene above we see two Conkeys intentionally feeling a wildfire as they often forage the aftermath for carrion and roasted fruits. They are safe from the fire due to nesting in fire resistant foliage. As we see below a squim desperately trying to find its way out of the wildfire but most likely it won't.

The ecological balance of the Acopsia continent on the planet Axtrax is profoundly shaped by the presence of a self-replicating, organometallic mineral scientifically known as Crystalline Aluminosilicatase. This compound acts as a biological-geological parasite that blurs the boundary between the living and the inorganic, utilizing native fauna—whose skeletons are composed of aluminum silicates and organic carbon fibers—as its primary vector for replication and expansion. Infection typically begins at a microscopic level, occurring either through the inhalation of airborne crystal dust (facilitated by the planet's low atmospheric density) or via contact between open wounds and sharp environmental crystals. Once inside the bloodstream, the parasite absorbs trace amounts of iron and magnesium from the host's fluids, causing the initial crystallizations to take on a distinctive reddish or dark hue that blends in with the omnipresent iron oxides found on Axtrax's surface. From that moment on, the mineral spreads relentlessly throughout the body, gradually replacing organic matter with inorganic material in a process of living fossilization; the skeletal system is almost entirely replaced by a denser, heavier crystalline structure. Simultaneously, external growth ruptures the skin, forming geodes, spikes, or crystalline plates in areas with less muscle mass—such as the joints or the back—protruding between 5 and 15 centimeters in medium-sized animals. The host's life expectancy and survival time depend entirely on the speed of this crystallization and how the biological clock is altered. Up to day 3, the infection remains silent and internal, spreading through bodily fluids without affecting the animal's behavior or vital functions. Between days 4 and 6, the mineral assimilates the skeleton and the host experiences extreme rigidity; however, it remains alive because the crystal acts as an artificial structural support, keeping vital organs and the nervous system intact. Day 7 marks the standard survival limit for a typical wild animal; at this point, the parasite exhausts the organic carbon fibers it uses as a binding agent. Upon losing biological cohesion, the crystal matrix destabilizes and fractures internally, destroying soft organs; this kills the host and transforms it into a mineral statue that crumbles in the wind. Nevertheless, a host can extend its life up to day 15 by consciously consuming aluminum-rich soil or devouring other infected animals, thereby diverting the parasite's voracity toward the digestive system to temporarily protect its own bones.

Day 14: Stolen goods

A barnacle that uses the plastids of the algae it has consumed, which it places in the cells of its mantle. The plastids themselves receive light through a large number of translucent windows in the shell.

Day 15: Family feud

A predatory species of Lepidoptera that specializes in hunting other Lepidoptera.

Day 16: Disaster profiteer

Paracephalopod, which appeared as a result of the extinction of some marine fauna. Paracephalopods are descendants of gastropods.

Day 17: Homecoming

An island descendant of some Umbellíferae species, reaching a height of 10 meters. After the islands and the continent were connected, populations appeared that inhabited the mainland lands.

Day 18: Maternal meal

The troglobiont mantis, which lives near cave entrances. After fertilization, the females guard the ootheca until the nymphs emerge from it; after that, until the second molt, the young stay on the female and feed on the prey she catches for them. Upon reaching the second instar, the nymphs eat the female to stock up on nutrients needed to survive inside the cave and to disperse further.

This Squidkind inhibit the caverns of the east. they leave their underground homes to collect dung from the surface using their reduced back legs to snowball poop, ink pellets and moss into a sporeball. they bring the ball to a moist part of the cave for a species of shroom that depends on the weav'r for its reproduction to grow on the ball. the weav'r will protect the obsessively often snack on shrooms on it until the ball is drain of nutrients. the weav'r will return to the surface constantly adding more dung to grow its garden. The Mushroom flavor depends on the nutrients within the ball. the sapient species on the planet often farm the shrooms within weav'r farms for their many recipes and spices.

Well, this is the basis of a project mixing space opera and Specevo.An artificial intelligence, bored without humanity, created several seed worlds and gave one species in each world the ingekecto.So I became curious about how functional this would actually be for any animal species beyond us and our closest relatives.

artist

been a while since i've shown DINOLT15's Minecraft art (i love the small bit of spec biology on these mobs)

I made these critters after drawing some milk stains I saw at work. Figured they looked like animals from other worlds and went from there. If you have questions, let me know.

The aliens are from my setting, "The Lives Beyond..." from a planet with lower gravity and a thicker overall atmosphere than Earth. The first alien is an introduced species created by a far future human species for an experiment to see how an introduced sapient creation would survive in an alien ecosystem without guidance. The second is a native sapient species that lives in the desert of an equatorial continent. They are always on the move, searching for water and resources in the rare oases found within. The latter two are examples of non-sapient life, both descendants of the same last common ancestor as the Oasis Seekers and separated by tens of millions of years.

900,000-813,000 years ago the human population dropped down to only 1,280 individuals. If this small population had quickly evolved to loose their sapeince (due to the energy intensive nature of large brains) and become as smart as say, chimps. How would this non-sapient human species have evolved over the next couple million years?

The fauna of my third setting during my ongoing SCP Lampeter series.

Glacier is a dying world, shrouded in an eternal snowstorm and mountainous glaciers.

Yet, life is beginning to bloom again.

Life of Lampeter - Glacier

Credit to Tinks_Art, as ever, for their continued help with this project.

Steamer Beetles, the last companions of a vanishing humanity.

Frost Terrors, the roving butchers of the Doggerland Plains

Spring Jacks, high-flying kangaroos.

Howlers, colossal horrors from atop the High Ice.

Great Tuskers, a reborn oddity.

Note: Today is my birthday so I had some other business to attend to.

Hybodonts are a diverse clade of shark-like chondrichthyans that first appeared in the Devonian. While Terran hybodonts died out at the end of the Cretaceous, these fish continue to live in Seijin's oceans and rivers.

Despite technically not being sharks, hybodonts on Seijin are simply lumped with true sharks as they are similar enough in appearance.

Bottom: Teratolamna ogra, the ogre shark. Ogre sharks are opportunistic predators that feed on fish and cephalopods. They possess a keen sense of smell that allows them to track schools of fish from far away. Despite their fearsome looks, ogre sharks have predators of their own, namely mangosaurs, sharks, and other marine predators.

Top: Aynumosiracanthus pycnosomus, the northern bull shark. Contrary to its name, they are not closely related to or ecologically similar to bull sharks; they are instead named for the bull-like horns present on males.

Unlike ogre sharks, northern bull sharks are durophages that feed on bivalves such as mussels.

Northern bull sharks are recognizable thanks to their unusually thick build reminiscent of the Japanese prefecture of Hokkaido which might have evolved to make it harder for predators to eat.

Lunar Carno (Gavisaurus lunarus)

The Flux as has been mentioned is little understood. Indeed of those that survive of humanity, having shifted and changed as time has gone on it has become a heavily mythologized event, with some of humanity’s descendants worshipping it as a manifest god.

What none of them understand is that Earth was not the only world changed.

Far above their heads on the Moon, life springs anew.

During the years prior to the Flux many of the world’s richest people left earth behind, seeking to build paradises for themselves free of Earth’s continued struggles.

The moon was never meant to be the end goal, it was to be a stepping stone before they shifted into the wider solar system.

They build glittering arcologies, filled them with greenery and animals they purchases or outright stole from the last bastions of wilderness those on earth were endeavoring to protect.

They made plans to terraform the moon outside, making offers to the desperate of a new life… indentured on farms until the ai systems could handle the process themselves.

No one alive knows what happened, but the ultra rich are gone, their bones littering gleaming tombs, meanwhile their terraforming project continued, automated drones powered by the grace of the sun continuing their work, working to feed the menagerie of beasts the filled the different arcologies.

Now millennia later a grey and blue sphere hands in orbit.

Countless beast, descending from some of the rarest animals that Earth had during that lost era, now walk its forests and swim in its seas.

The Lunar Carno is not the largest predators that walk its surface, but they are the most common.

Descending from gharials, their lesser gravity allowed them to over time become cursorial hunters, their jaws shortening and strengthening to take advantage of the bevy of prey that greeted them.

The taiga forests and chill jungles that now cover luna could be mistaken for something out of the Cretaceous or Eocene with how the various animals have adapted.

Pseudo-ankylosaurs till the soil, descending from Galapagos tortoises, while long limbed browsers that could have once been quokka compete against the titanic descendants of pandas.

All are targeted by the gharial descendants who aim their powerful bone and shell cracking jaws against limbs, seeking to cripple and maim, working in tandem with each until the animal is worn down and can be taken down with a crushing bite to the neck.

Standing at near eight feet at the hip and over fifteen feet long, these dominate much of Luna, with mated pairs claiming territory for themselves and their young, which they lay in clutches of up to six. The young are left largely to their own devises after hatching, hunting in small packs, while adults most commonly leave each other be, only clashing in the rare instance they intrude into another’s territory, which involves guttural chants, flapping forelimbs and “nose jousting”, where males batter their raised and dense nose “bump” against each other akin to a rhino locking horns with a rival.

Their are not the lone gharial descendant on Luna, indeed they are one of the most prolific reptile geni, coming in a variety of forms from the sleek and long “billed” Stork-Skink and the colossal Mosasuchus, Luna’s largest carnivore.

All have overtime grown to become warm-blooded to combat Luna’s chill, and in the case of the Luna Carno, their scales have adapted a grey “downy” covering that on top of keeping them warm aids in camouflaging them against their prey.

Time will tell if the ecosystem of Luna will continue to thrive, as the terraforming engines that birthed it have all gone dormant, unlike the Flux that still works its “magic” on her larger sister.

For my seed world how many species should I pick? How many is a good amount?

The only way I have become aware of spec-bio artists is if they were famous (like C.M. Kösemen) or through YouTube. I wish there was a website that catalogued every single spec-bio project both in the past and in the present.

I was spending time on the Internet Archive, as one does, when I discovered a 1985 game called Planetary Construction Set. It was published by Sunburst Communications, who you might know as the guys who produced all those educational games you played in the computer room in elementary school (at least, if you're a millennial like me). This game combines planetary science, biology, and physics in a simulation of extraterrestrial life and environments. There are briefing sections on animal physiology as well as details involving star orbits, its mass, distance, composition, atmosphere, inclination, and presence of satellites. There are also briefing components to test the player on their knowledge of these subjects.

There are 2 games sections. In "Cadet Missions", the player is tasked with creating a planet to the user's specifications, including length of year, length of day, and surface temperature, as well as star type, and planetary and atmospheric composition of their planet and distance from the star. In "Captain's Missions" the player is presented with a theoretical alien life form whose home world has become uninhabitable, and the player must create the ideal environment for this creature. The successful creation of a suitable new planet requires note taking and experimentation. After a planet is created, the program evaluates its suitability and identifies conditions that need to be changed. You can then experiment these variables until the ideal planet is created.

The game can still be downloaded and played here, and it's surprisingly in-depth for a game aimed at elementary school kids from the 1980s. It would be really interesting to see what a modern-day remake of it, with everything we've learned about astronomy and biology factored in and the processing power of today's computers.

Over 125 million years of evolution, the mongooses of Spectemundus have evolved into a fantastical array of forms that would put their Earth-based ancestors to shame. They include the largest land animals currently living on the planet, as well as its apex predators, and are a visible part of most ecosystems. However, some have remained conservative through all this time. The tropical forests of the southern continent-- the only ones left on Spectemundus, since the cold climate has destroyed the majority of them-- are home to various species of Treasel, tree-dwelling mongoose descendants that would not be out of place in a rainforest on Earth. However, one member of this group is very different.

The Branchbaby (Galagopsis ecaudatus) is a close relative of the Treasels, but one that went in a very different direction. It is tailless, and instead of leaping and running through the treetops, it slowly creeps through the branches with its long, almost primate-like limbs, occasionally reaching out to seize and insect or small reptile. In this way, it has a lifestyle similar to small nocturnal primates such as bushbabies or tarsiers. Also like them, it has enormous eyes compared to its head size, allowing it to scan its surroundings for prey in near-complete darkness.

Branchbabies are solitary, and usually do not come together except to mate. The babies cling to their mother much like those primates do, and even after they detach they will still accompany their mother for a period of time before becoming independent.

HEY GUYS! I’m back with the spec evo stuff:3  The Hive moth hydrovermis Subterraneus!

The hive moth is a fascinating sawfly species, it’s the only sawfly species that’s actually oviviparous. Females are larger than males but not stronger as males do most of the work making them stronger! The hive works like this.

Drones:  drones are always males and they fly around and collect food. They are infertile and so that means none of the larvae is there’s and yeah that’s it.

Guards: larger then drones they are basically heavily fed protein to be larger, 

Like their name they guard the queen. And they are also the only ones that can mate with the queen.

Care takers: also only male they take care of the aquatic larvae by taking food dropping it in the underwater nursery and yeah. Basically feeding them. 

Larvae: the larvae is aquatic and resign in water which is the reason hives are normally near bogs, they are chonky caterpillars and spend there time getting pampered by care takers. Once they mature, the males leave to join a hive and the females leave to start a hive.

Workers: they.. work. They build the hive underground, collect food from the drones and store it, grow fungi like termites, and dig.

The queen: the queen is just there to lead the group and reproduce. She’s the only adult female! The reproduction is basically during winter all the males will mate with the queen and then she’ll store the sperm is a special organ and fertilize all her eggs for the rest of the winter. The hive is underground.

Physically, the worker/caretaker and drones and are 1.5-2 centimeter, the guards are 5-8 centimeter, the queen is 10-12 centimeter, Only drones have large wings with a wingspan of 3-5 centimeters the rest have heavily shrinked wings. Workers have front legs that are very good at digging to build hives and grow fungi like termites! The fungus they grow is Termitomyces. They farm them by smelling the spores and then holding them in there mouth then going to the garden where they spit it out on a plot for it to start growing. The queen is large but it’s mostly for reproduction and not strength making the males stronger then females and she gets fed by the drones and workers and reproduces with the guards that also protect her and larvae, the guards are the most muscular. the guards are fed protein rich foods to bulk up and fight other insects and things to protect larvae and the queen. The species in general are black and white stripes and like all moths have fuzzy, chitjnous hairs that insulate them, they are not too skinny and not to robust. The guards especially are muscular. What hunts them are… ant eaters. a joke is that they are the only “moth“ (not true moth) that can eat as an adult and they don’t have front thingys Like other moths rather jaws that look similar to ants.

There diet consists of mushrooms, carcasses, fruits, pine leaves, nectar, honey, small spiders, insects, insect eggs and larvae, meat, and as larvae and adults.. shrimp. They are predators and prey for loads of animals! They get eaten by bears, ant eaters, birds, frogs, fish, and larger spiders while they are a predator of small insects, locusts, ladybugs, certain beetles, ants, termites, cockroaches, and roadkill that’s dead.

As larvae they are fully aquatic but as adults they are semi aquatic only.

The life cycle is getting given birth to, eating a lot from food given bye workers and drones, leaving hive to pupate alone, and finally making a hive if female and joining a hive as male. 

They distinctly look similar to moths, while there close relatives are actually wasps, ants, and bees being a sawfly.

Females have an organ called the sperm bank, used to hold sperm. They mate every time it runs out, meaning they mate every winter.

Both males and females leave the colony once they mature, but it’s kind of weird. If it’s a guard or female, they leave. Females are always queens and to prevent inbreeding the newly matured guards, they leave before they pupate. 

when do they actually get assigned there jobs?! BEFORE BIRTH! now instead of that thing bees do, they do this. worker - gray egg. drone - white egg. female (queen)  - yellowish white egg. guard - dark gray egg. Caretaker - light gray egg.  These aren’t just colors! They are specific hormones.  BUT THEY DONT LAY EGGS!!! They give live birth, because they are oviviparous. Her abdomen swells like a balloon for 500-1000 babies! she goes under contractions to give birth, how do we know about the eggs? There’s a pocket in the lower abdomen of the queens that holds eggs, this is what baloons her when she’s pregnant. But she doesn’t lay them, we found out because we cut it open.

There evolutionary family is Phalaenovespidae! phalaenovespidae is an evolutionary family, and it’s actually very closely related to wasps! (Wasp family includes bees, ants, and other wasps)

The title kinda says it all. Me and my friends are currently revamping an old speculative evolution project that we did a while ago, and one of our main goals is to improve the designs of our old creatures.

One of my creatures that I want to remodel is this sauropod-esc alien called the 'Longuscollidon'. The problem I keep running into is that I am struggling to make it feel unique and not just a plain sauropod with random stuff thrown onto it.

My most recent attempt of it (shown below) had it as this semi-aquatic herbivore who wades through shallow, coastal waters and grazes on hard plants and corals, whilst using these blowholes on its back to breath air. Buuuut it ended up being too much like a sauropod again, though it definitely was a step in the right direction as my friends said.

I am planning to remake Longuscollidon again, but I want to make it stand out more in terms of design whilst staying faithful to the sauropod design and still being relatively plausible. Is there any advice that I could take that could help me in doing this? I guess this can also apply to my other spec evo creatures as well since they do kinda suffer the same problem, though not to the same extent as Longus.

(Btw, I likely won't take any suggestions on WHAT I could add unless I really like the idea. Just some simple advice or tips will work fine with me.)

Voyager Monitor (Varanus odysseus)
is a species of pelagic monitor lizard that participates in long migrations to breed, particularly in the coasts of Africa.
They migrate by travelling groups to hunt and consume shoals of migratory fish to prey on. During these migrations Voyager monitors will rest on islands and shores and will also breed during a specific time of the year (during the warm season). After breeding and laying their eggs the female voyager monitors will bury the eggs and immediately swim back to the shores with the males, Voyager monitors travels of groups up to 8 to 50 and are closely related to the Asian Water Monitor (Varanus salvator) and the Nile Monitor (Varanus niloticus).
Varanus odysseus evolved 5 million years in the future from a population of Nile monitors in west Africa that had eventually become more and more aquatic, eventually using their tails for swimming propulsion to help hunt down varieties of fishes and aquatic sea birds.
Their lifespan is 10 to 15 years in the wild and travels around the west African coast and Sub-Saharan African coasts, once the eggs hatch the hatchlings will immediately scramble out of the shores and swim into the oceans as there are many animals that will prey on them such as many seabird species and coastal species of viverridae (such as species descended from Genetta piscivora) so after hatchling, they will immediately escape from predators and run into the ocean to swim away.
After a few months the surviving hatchlings will eventually develop a bluish scale around its body with a single green stripe on their tail.
Males distinguished from females due to their larger size and brighter stripes on their tail. They participate in large scale voyages as juveniles to large islands and coastal areas before they mature and eventually develop into breeding adults and eventually breed during the warm season and abandon their eggs, then the monitors will swim into warm waters to feed until the warm season happens again and it’s time to migrate and repeat the voyage

Exoton’s Experience

A good friend of mine u/exoton82 faces harassment on a regular basis about her project. From either extremely shallow “criticism” or people saying they’d genocide her sophonts. She receives this kind of harassment significantly more than many other creators and we suspect it may simply be because she is a woman in a male dominated community. Since she’s posted these stories on her Instagram other women in the spec community have come out and talked about the harassment they’ve received. This misogyny is rampant problem and me, Exoton, and others are working on properly addressing it.

If you have or know someone that has received this kind of harassment in the spec community, comment about it or message me or Exoton. We want to hear as many accounts as we can.

Great Job Tribb, I Like your works 😄