Metazoica back-up

I haven't been working on my Metazoic site much, and I wanted to explain that. For a while there I was on a roll! But I've recently been caught up in doing some more stories for UMG Productions. I'm on a particular book that has 4 stories in a row, and I need to complete those soon. It's taking up all my time. But I will keep doing the family of the week in the meantime, until they are all done. Keep looking for it! I will also get back to regularly scheduled updates on my Metazoica site as soon as I am done with these stories. I don't know how long it will take. I've completed one story and now am almost done with a second story, then I have to complete the next 2 stories which are the longer ones (I always finish the easy stuff first!) and then I will be getting back to Metazoica. For a time that is. Then I have to get going on another group of stories. HA! This is tough work!

According to this article I found, lizards evolved quickly to escape predation by ants. So unusual! I never thought a lizard could be taken by ants. It explains in this article why. Shit! I forgot the link!!! http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2009/01/28/lizard-evolution-ants.html Lizards Evolved Quickly to Avoid Death by Ants Emily Sohn, Discovery News Jan. 28, 2009 -- It takes some effort for fire ants to get under the hard scales of an unsuspecting lizard. When the insects finally penetrate the reptile's fleshy core, the attackers inject a toxin that paralyzes their victim. Then, they tear the lizard to pieces, which they carry back to their nest. Twelve fire ants can kill a 3-inch lizard in a single minute. It's an unpleasant way to die, and one that at least one species of lizard is rapidly evolving to avoid. In just 70 years, according to a new study, eastern fence lizards in parts of the United States have developed longer hind limbs and new behaviors that help them escape th...

I've often been asked about why I made my animals the way I did, well it's all about streamlining. Evolution as we all know is a process of improvement. You look at most modern mammals, and you see big, rather clumsy creatures. Felines lumbering from side-to-side, elephants incapable of jumping, cattle built more like tanks than a creature who should be able to quickly and easily escape predators, mammals with gliding membranes creep slowly up tree trunks. Well, that is what my Metazoic site set out to improve upon. What would make these animals more streamlined for running, jumping, climbing, and still be able to do some of the things that they are likely meant to do? Well, we see some of the answers in modern mammals already. For example, what makes an animal streamlined for running? The fastest animals have developed hooves for running. So I applied this concept to several species, and even to some predators. The deer-like Deinognathids are prime examples of having streamlin...

Animals surely came from little protozoa. Every animal did. From tiny plankton to huge whales, every animal around today came from tiny, microscopic creatures that formed in wet sediment that laid down billions of years ago. According to this article, they were little sperm-like creatures. Probably explains the form of modern sperm whose task it is to fertilize eggs and provide part of the DNA that is essential to build living things. But then we all know that! Anyway, this is an interesting article that I found on Discovery News. http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2009/01/27/animal-ancestor.html Ancestor For All Animals Identified Jennifer Viegas, Discovery News Jan. 27, 2009 -- A sperm-looking creature called monosiga is the closest living surrogate to the ancestor of all animals, according to new research that also determined animal evolution may not always follow a trajectory from simple to complex. Yet another find of the study, published in the latest PLoS Biology, is that Earth may h...

The family Sogariidae are not really hares at all, but relatives of the pangolins. In the face, many of them do resemble modern hares though. The ears are long and mobile, they walk on their hind limbs, they still have scales, but the amount is reduced from those of today's pangolins. The scales only cover certain portions of the body. The rest of the body is covered with thick fur. Walking bipedally allowed these animals to move a little bit faster than their modern day relatives. But the scales on the body still offers some protection. The scales also serve another purpose for these animals in the Metazoic. The scales became colorful mating decorations. The males are brightly colored to attract the females to them during their mating season. The tail is long and used for balancing the animal as it rears up on it's hind legs. Most of these animals are rather large and live in couples. The feet are equipped with rather sharp claws that can slice open an attacking predator. They...

I thought I would post some videos I found about Evolution. We need some good entertainment on here. I thought this would be the perfect place to post some videos about evolution that I've collected throughout the internet. Besides my own videos I made advertising some of my stories. But that comes later! Anyway, enjoy the videos! And keep your eyes and ears tuned here for further updates about Metazoica. Here's a video about the evolution of the Earth it's self: Interesting about the end of the continental drift, in my timeline on my website, I predicted that very thing! Imagine the continents colliding back together again! LOL! Would the mammals that lived apart for so many eons be able to compete with each other? Here's how modern animals came to be: This video also explains how we evolved from small bacteria and viruses and stuff. Though it does not specifically mention viruses, they were actually the first living animals.

I gave the front page on my website a complete face-lift. Well, sort of! I almost added iframes, but I figured everyone else would hate them. So, I didn't want to scare my loyal viewers away. I was running out of room for my links to different pages on my site so I decided instead of putting them on the top of the page under the official logo, to run them down the left side of the page all in a line. It looks neater and easier to find the links you want. This is the way it's going to be from now on. Now, I have plenty of room for more links should I decide to add more features to the site. I even put a time/date stamp at the top of the page, just because. And I also added a "presence" icon so people will be able to see when I am online with my site. I am thinking of getting back on Y! IM. That way anyone else who gets on my site can send me a page that way. I was also thinking of adding a Skype link but I don't know. I don't want to do chat with my webcam!! Wh...

I have just completed the size-chart for the Megacollidae. Wow! That was a tough one to work on because these mammals are so massive! I think I just dried out my black marker for these! But I got the charts up. They can be accessed on the title page. Click on the family Megacollidae and it will take you to their page(s). It is actually 2 pages long! The animals are so big that they would not all fit on one page, even though there are not that many genera to depict. I also have someone who is going to do a biome map for my website and I will be putting that up once it is completed. I'm not sure about how to predict biomes, but I gave it a shot, and I think I gave him enough info that it can be done somewhat effectively. I don't know if my ideas were detailed enough, I was constantly distracted as I was writing the e-mail. Anyway, enjoy the new size-chart!! You know what's amazing? How much the future evolutionists on the SE forum are so against my mammals being the next rule...

I have just posted a new family (I told you all I am on a roll!) it is the Old World Monkeys. I did the monkeys of the New World some time ago. Today I finally decided to post up the Old World monkey family. I'm still tired, I am surprised I was able to do the old world monkeys and the herps page this morning, even with as tired as I have been. I had a wee bit of a nap, or I was going to, then Scariest Places on Earth came on. That's one of my favorite programs. Some day I want to go to the UK just to experience these happenings. But in between answering e-mails and working on these drawings and scanning them in, I've managed to finish these pages, falling asleep in between scannings! Anyway, to view the page, you can go to the "Meet the Mammals" page, and then click on "Pentadactyls" and then "Old World Monkeys". Or take the short cut: http://www.metazoica.com/OldWorldMonkeys.html

Well, I have done it! I made a page for the Metazoic herps, it includes reptiles and amphibians, well ONE amphibian. Frankly I don't know if amphibians will survive global warming. But I got this one salamander that thinks it's a crocodile. I also have a pack-hunting monitor, a 10-foot tall tortoise, an oar-shaped python, and a herbivorous crocodile. Plus more! I may add more species now and then down the road, but for now these demonstrations are enough. I'm just grateful I finally got a herps page up!!! I know my supporters have been waiting for something like this, and I do apologize for it taking so long. I also need to work on the page for the anacolls. The flash presentation is still the only thing depicting these animals on my site. I will work on that this week too. Possibly this weekend. Well, I don't have many ideas for herps, but these are what I have so far. The page is not going to be like what I got for the mammals, as I want to cover mostly the mammals on...

I've been busy tonight, I completed about 4 different size-charts and put them up on my site. I've been in a frenzy!! The size-charts that have been completed are for the families: Delphinadapidae Pinnepitheciidae Chameliidae Monodactylopteridae That's quite an accomplishment for one night. I think next I shall do some work for my herps page. I've thought of a few species to display, though regrettably not much. This anonymous e-mailer I've been working with gave me an idea for a vegetarian crocodile. I think it would be a great addition! Apparently some crocodilians have learned to eat vegetation in the form of fallen fruits. It would work in like say a remote island where no large, herbivorous mammals are. I am also trying out his idea for a flag-crocodile. I like it. I also have some snakes I will be displaying, like a 50-foot long anaconda of southern South America. I also have an enormous tortoise from the Chilean mountains. I also made the nile crocodile into ...

Gee, I want to thank all the people who are supporting our site! I really do appreciate it. I never knew I had so many supporters!! I also never realized what lunatics JohnFaa and Proletarian are! But yes I agree, they are losing their minds. I guess that just shows how much ass I kick on my project! LOL! And there is NO WAY I am going to let them dictate what I do and don't on my website. And they sure as Hell are not going to stop me from going on with my site! When they pay for the internet space I am using, then they can tell me what I can and cannot put on my website!! Until then, heck they can enjoy it, or they can curse it, I really do not give a $***!!! Anyway, the cladograms are up! I cannot thank this anonymous person enough for creating them. I e-mailed asking who I should give credit to, because I don't know. I don't want to take credit for them myself. I don't want visitors to my site thinking I did them, when I didn't. Something as awesome as these c...

I realized a few things, I spelt Barofelidae wrong! Well, the changes have been made. I will embed the checklist here, but it can be downloaded on my site. I also made a change to the Articulostiidae, formerly the eopie. I changed it to a Metazoic version of the tapir. I did some tweaking of my own on these species. I even added a few more species to the list and even another genus, Hippotapirus . They are more horse-like than tapir-like. The only thing tapir-like is their heads, they more closely resemble the prehistoric Macrauchenia . Well anyway, here is the list: Metazoic Mammals Publish at Scribd or explore others: Other eBooks future Mammals

Well, life goes on, and my life is NOT the SE forum!! Anyway, this is something I got in an e-mail tonight it's about the benefits mammals could have by developing bipedalism. Most of this stuff I knew all along, which is why I made the mammals of the future becoming bipeds. Basically it is bipedal animals that take over the World. And this is what I wanted in the Metazoic, I wanted a world dominated by mammals. Not man. Anyway, these were the benefits listed in that e-mail. Bipedal animals are more energy efficient than quadrupedal ones. Being bipedal frees up the hands for a myriad of uses, whether it be for catching fish, striking prey, or climbing trees. History has proven that animals, once bipedal, tend to be adaptable...just look at dinosaurs, macropod kangaroos, leptictids, pseudorhynco...whatevers, and hominids Bipedal animals can rear up and browse on vegetation out of reach of their same sized but quadrupedal contemporaries Bipedal animals can look over underbrush or tal...

I didn't want to turn this into a roasting blog, but I must say something to Proletarian and JohnFaa on the Speculative Evolution forum. I heard from the anonymous e-mailer who told me they are talking shit about me on their forum. Well, this person made some pretty good roasts. One of the things that was brought up is how big a hypocrite Proletarian is. I have actually witnessed him talking out both sides of his mouth several times on that forum. I remember when I joined that forum, he said he is a fan of the squids on TFIW, then when he and I got into it with each other on the forum, I said anyone who believes in walking and monkey-like squids can surely believe in bipedal, carnivorous deer. I even wrote about that on this blog because that is what he said! Then he got pissed and totally denied he ever said he believed in those stupid squids from TFIW. Then when I left one of his arguments at me was that he does indeed believe in the monkey-like and mega squids from TFIW. Like I...

I heard from an anonymous source you are bashing me in that forum. Especially JohnFaa and Proletarian. I know what your problem is, you all are angry that I left and now are provoking me into coming back by talking shit behind my back. I haven't looked in, and probably won't, but I will say that is very flattering that you all want me back there so bad you're willing to talk shit about me to get me to come back. Unfortunately it won't work. My mind is made up, I'm not going back. I won't say nothing to JohnFaa, as he is just a kid, and I don't harass children, but I am surprised! I didn't know he liked me THAT much!!!! So much he seems obsessed with me and my project!! WOW!!! You think you know someone's character then this occurs. But Proletarian, I still say you need to grow up. Once you have, I will think about coming back. Seriously! You're 20-something years old, and you still act like a boy! It's time for you to start considering actin...

These are large mammals descended from the rodents of today, such as porcupines. These animals however do not have the quills of modern porcupines, instead they have rather soft, flat-lying fur. Their size is what intimidates predators. These animals are unique in that their ancient incisors developed into a protruding, parrot-like beak, used for chomping off tree branches for consumption. The eyes are rather small, the ears are large and highly mobile. The head is rather horse-like in appearance. The beak protrudes out the front of the muzzle and in some cases there are tusks. The largest tusks belong to Siagonodon . They have powerful jaws to break down branches and bark from trees. The body is large and bulky, and the legs are a bit like those of elephants. The tail is thick and relatively short. In some species there is a tasseling effect present. The neck is rather long, but thick. In some species, they even have a tapir-like proboscis, helpful in grasping higher branches and brin...

I added a size chart for the Pteropods. It took all night to work on that and for some reason, I don't feel like I did all of them, but anyway, there they are! You'd be impressed! How does such huge bats get off the ground? The answer is a small, lightweight frame. These bats are built like modern birds. The bones are tiny and hollow, and though the largest of them looks enormous, it actually would weigh less than it looks. To view these pages, go to the Metazoic Mammal Size Chart book on my site and scroll down to the Pteropodidae. There you can click and go to the pages that covers these species. There are 3 pages. Also another update, Phobocebus in the ape family is now known as Castosarchus . I like that name better, and it doesn't take away too much from Dixon's book After Man.

I was busy last night, but managed to find the time to post up a couple new families. Both in the pentadactyl order. One is the eared (or "paddle-finned") sea monkeys, and the other is the apes. I changed the apes from scaly apes to simply Metazoic apes. Having seen some programs about what is possible in evolution, scaly apes just seemed so useless. So I changed them to simply apes. Though traction scales on the feet of Phobocebus was not too bad an idea. But then it'd lose a lot of it's character. Might do more harm than good to the animal. The eared sea monkeys have remained the same as they always were though. I even updated their info. Before I noticed I said the Metazoic apes were descended from modern gibbons. While that would be a good idea, I thought it'd be better to have the apes start from scratch in the Metazoic. The apes of the Metazoic do not have very human-like characteristics, and kept their tails. Because they are attracted sexually to each oth...

Recently, methane gas emissions have been found on Mars. It could just be emissions from deep inside the planet, or it could signal some kind of life forms are there and breathing. Who knows for sure? I think these people are going about everything all wrong. They are comparing that life on other planets would be like life on this one. That wouldn't be true. Life on other planets would have evolved independantly and have their own lifestyles. Send a bulldozer there. Dig up some of the Mars and bring the samples back. Or get a robot up there to bring back some of the water back. Then look at it all under the microscope. BTW, before I get started posting this article up, I wanted to let everyone know there has been some updates to the site, a couple more size-charts have been posted, the browsing squirrels and the armadillos. Enjoy them! http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2009/01/16/mars-methane-nasa.html Mars to NASA: Forget Water, Follow the Methane Irene Klotz, Discovery News Jan. 16, ...

Several animals can sing, but birds are most famous for it. But apparently according to this article, singing actually began with fish! Fish are not really known for singing or making any other sounds. But this article states singing began with lungfish some 300 million years ago. Many groups of animals can sing. Besides birds, whales and many primates can also sing. This probably also accounts in some part to my love-affair with birds, whales and primates. I love music! And of course we know humans can sing. Well, most humans. I sure cannot. http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2009/01/16/bird-song-analysis.html Singing Began in Fish, Perfected by Birds Jennifer Viegas, Discovery News Jan. 16, 2009 -- Fish aren't known for their impressive singing ability, although some can grunt and hum, yet singing originated in lungfish, according to new research that also determined how songbirds consistently produce melodious, sweet tunes. In the future, the findings may lead to better human singin...

Of course I added the page for the Trelatebrates, I also made some changes to my checklist. I've been communicating with another Spec Evolutionist for the past few weeks, and he has actually talked me into a few things. I've accepted his group, Barofelidae, which is a descendant of the feline family. OK, so he talked me into that one! I actually made a scenario for when felines are dying out and deinognathids take over. There was another group that he thought up that is closely related, raccoon-cats. I like that idea too, but I haven't got around to putting it on my checklist yet. I will be updating this checklist periodically, so keep up to date with what is going on. Also, I have decided to make this list available through this blog. I hope this works! This is my first time embedding a PDF file onto these blogs! ************File Has Been Removed******************

It has been suggested that I write up a page introducing the trelatebrates, specific to the Metazoic. Well, I am announcing that this page is now up. I speak not only of the trelatebrates, but another branch of the evolutionary tree of elephant shrews. I call them "sinecrus", and they take the place of cetaceans for most of the Metazoic. There are 4 varieties, 3 of which are endemic to the Batavian Islands. All are aquatic. There is a tusked variety that is omnivorous, there is a carnivorous variety that lives like a crocodile or alligator, and there is a vegetarian variety that lives like a fast-moving manatee. There is also a strictly ocean-going variety that lives like dolphins or sharks, and they live strictly in the ocean. I am thinking of putting the upcoming cladogram on this page for the Afrotheres (descendants of elephant shrews). But here is what I have on it so far. Check it out! http://metazoica.com/trelatebrates.html

I was watching this program last night on the NatGeo channel that talked about how viruses may have been what was responsible for making us what we are today! Amazing! I mean, we know that viruses are naturals when it comes to invading cells, taking over the DNA and getting it to do what the virus wants it to do. Basically biological mind-control. It is believed that this is the same method they used billions of years ago to get the first DNA strands in the ground to form a new life form. I've always been fascinated by viruses, and I didn't know why! LORD knows I've suffered through several! I've had streptococci in my throat and ears, bronchitis--which I think I am still suffering the effects of, sinus infections, influenza many times before, rhinovirus better known as the common cold, and many others. But for some reason, I've always been fascinated by viruses. I think it's how they alter our bodies the way they do. I think I've known all along, just by go...

A family that is around even today. The deer we know well, most people regard them as pests. But they are highly successful animals. Like most other artiodactyls, they have 2 fully-formed hooves on the feet. They have antlers that shed annually, and regrow in the warmer, drier months. In most species the tail is short and carried low, except when running. Though in the Metazoic, a few species have long tails, like cattle. The legs are long and slender and launch the animal in a sort-of leaping/running gait, and many species in the Metazoic can cover up to 20 feet in a single bound. The reason these animals use leaping methods when running is they can get away from predators faster. Since the Metazoic has some of the largest catch-and-kill predators ever, this is a valuable tool these animals never lost during the Metazoic. Most deer in the Metazoic are restricted to the New World, though there are some Old World species left, they are generally out-competed in the Old World by antelope...

This is the third great article I found today, all about the earliest feathers on dinosaurs. Many people believed the earliest feathered animals evolved for flight, nothing else. But this article says that is not necessarily so. Though flight is surely the end result, it is not the only reason dinosaurs (who would later become birds) evolved feathers. Apparently a female dinosaur found the best-looking males by judging their feather patterns. http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2009/01/12/dinosaur-feathers.html Earliest Feathers for Show, Not Flight Jennifer Viegas, Discovery News Jan. 12, 2009 -- The world's first feathers probably had nothing to do with flight or staying warm but were instead for showy display purposes, according to a new study that documents the most primitive known version of feathers, which were found on a Chinese dinosaur. The dinosaur, Beipiaosaurus , sported the likely colorful feathers on its limbs, trunk, tail, head and neck, with the neck feathers resembling a...

This is the second great article I found today. Proof that evolution can go in reverse. It has occasionally in the past. This work with fruit flies has proven that. Check this article out! http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2009/01/12/fruit-fly-evolution.html Fruit Flies Put Evolution in Reverse AFP Jan. 12, 2009 -- If you could put an animal in a time machine and send it back to live in the distant past, would its DNA evolve in reverse, returning to the genetic code of its ancestors? The intriguing idea has been tested by scientists in Portugal and the United States, using the fruit fly (Drosophila melanogaster) as the animal, and a laboratory to recreate the conditions of the past. Modern-day fruit flies are the distant descendants of an original group that had been harvested in the wild back in 1975. Over the following decades, 500 generations of flies grew up in different environments. Different groups of insects were starved, exposed to greater humidity and so on in various experimen...

This has been asked over and over. Some marsupials are adaptable, but apparently the thylacine is not. I found this article on my homepage. I actually found several good articles and I will post them up here. But this first one talks about what killed off the thylacines, once common in Australia and Tasmania, now you'd be hard-pressed to find a live one anywhere. http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2009/01/12/tasmanian-tiger-extinct.html Tasmanian Tiger's Mysterious Die-Off Explained Jennifer Viegas, Discovery News Jan. 12, 2009 -- Until recently, little was known about the mysterious Tasmanian tiger , but new DNA sequences of the dog-like marsupial shed light on the striped creature's surprising family tree and its extinction 73 years ago. Researchers now believe the Tasmanian tiger, also called the thylacine, went extinct in 1936 after the death of the last known surviving individual at a Tasmanian zoo, and four decades after genetic diversity within the species dropped to a c...

I think we pretty-much knew this all along that it was our species coming into the scene that caused the demise of the neanderthals. We were just too smart for them. They couldn't compete so we just pushed them out. It seems though that this subject has been hotly debated for years and we originally blamed the weather. But it seems that is not the case according to this article. http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2009/01/08/neanderthal-climate.html Neanderthals: Done in by Competition, Not Climate Emily Sohn, Discovery News Jan. 8, 2009 -- Climate change has become the default scapegoat for nearly every extinction on Earth lately. But a new study lets climate off the hook for at least one dramatic event: The disappearance of the Neanderthals from Europe about 35,000 years ago. Scientists have long debated what caused the demise of this human-like species. One camp argues that the Neanderthals fell victim to a dramatic cooling of the environment. The other view holds that prehistoric hum...

For those doing extra-terrestrial projects, this is an interesting article about how other planets form. It states that planets the size of Jupiter form quickly or don't form at all. By quickly they are talking a few billion years. Earth will obviously never be as big as Jupiter. But talking about other worlds out there, just to be a little more on the scientific side, this helps out. http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2009/01/08/jupiter-planets.html Jupiter-Sized Planets Grow Up Fast Irene Klotz, Discovery News Jan. 8, 2008 -- Compared to small, rocky worlds like Earth, Jupiter-class gas giant planets form quickly or not at all, a new study shows. The realization stems from studies of a five-million-year-old star cluster in the constellation Canis Major made with NASA's Spitzer infrared space telescope. Scientists discovered that all stars in the cluster that were as least as big as the sun had no accompanying disks of gas and dust from which to make gas giants like Jupiter. Only a...

I have posted another family, the highly-advanced earless sea-monkeys. They evolved along the same ways that modern phocids did. There are going to be 2 groups of sea monkeys, there is an earless variety, and an eared variety. The earless are the more advanced species that most of them use sonar to locate prey. Though not all develop this ability. The differences between the eared sea monkeys and the earless are more than obvious. Eared sea monkeys have external ears, a short, diamond-shaped tail and none of their species have the ability to use sonar to detect prey or each other. Earless sea monkeys have no external ears. The closest is with the species Hyphydronexus , which has fleshy flaps that cover the ear openings. The tail is eel-like and sways from side to side, and the rear flippers are greatly reduced and more or less useless. In the eared sea monkeys, the flippers are all the same size and all used for paddling through the water. Unlike dolphins, these sea monkeys occasional...

These are basically much smaller versions of the anacolls. The family Diplonearidae so far contains about 13 species. The neck is still quite noticeably long and flexible. The tail is long and thick, the legs are like those of elephants. I call these animals collectively "double-grazers" because they can browse from trees as well as graze on grass. In their feeding habits, they are quite versatile, whereas the anacolls specialize on feeding on leaves. The head is shorter and more blunt than in anacolls and no species in this family has the long, elephant-like proboscis. The largest species in this family stands no more than 13 feet tall, and the smallest a mere 6 feet tall. Like the anacolls, they often stand on their rear legs to help them reach high branches, and their long tongue gives them a little extra length. The ears are small and rounded, the eyes are relatively large, and the eyesight is very good. Their hearing is their most important asset though. They live in her...