Undergroundi
| Undergroundi | ||
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| (Megadelphimyermex tunnelicusdigus) | ||
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| Information | ||
| Creator | Colddigger Other | |
| Week/Generation | 24/150 | |
| Habitat | Darwin High Grassland, Darwin Desert | |
| Size | Worker (2 cm Long), Soldier (6 cm Long), Queen (24 cm Wide), King (2 cm Long) | |
| Primary Mobility | Unknown | |
| Support | Endoskeleton (Jointed Wood) | |
| Diet | Omnivore (Yuccagave, Gold-Belly Cadovermi, Snow Windbulb), Scavenger | |
| Respiration | Active (Lungs) | |
| Thermoregulation | Ectotherm | |
| Reproduction | Sexual, 2 Sexes, Live birth, Hive (1 Queen) | |
| Taxonomy | ||
| Domain Kingdom Phylum Class Subclass Superorder Order Family Genus Species | Eukaryota Mancerxa Chloropodia Phyllauria Xylodonta Formicomures Megadelphiformes Megadelphimyermecidae Megadelphimyermex Megadelphimyermex tunnelicusdigus | |
| Ancestor: | Descendants: |
|---|---|
The undergroundi replaced its ancestor, the yellowdundi. They have further specialized the hive system with a bloated blind queen, tiny fast growing workers numbering in the thousands, and powerful bulky soldiers for defending the entrances to their burrows. The king has the appearance of a worker.
The life cycle of a workers starts by being coughed up by the queen and quickly carried away to the nursery chamber where hundreds more developing young are cared for by the nurse caste, once grown to adult size the new worker takes on the role of nurse caste, queen carer, or burrower, whatever is required in the hive. After a few weeks of internal work the worker moves into the forager cast, venturing out to find and bring back food, mostly carrion.
Hives have lifespans as well, depending on genetics and health of the queen. Near the end of the Hive's life the queen will begin to produce young queens and kings. The young queens are accompanied and protected by young workers who find a suitable place to start a new hive, the kings go off on their own to find young queens from other hives.
The way in which a hive begins its existence is with the formation of an entrance tunnel, the handful of workers and their virgin queen find a rock or the rigid remains of a floral structure to seek shelter beneath. From there the workers begin hastily digging into the earth until a tunnel that can safely house the queen is formed, from there they move the queen (who is yet to be the bloated beauty in the picture) into the tunnel and seek a wandering virgin king to pull into the new hive.
Once the king has been found and the queen has been fertilized the hive must be prepared for raising the first generation of workers, the tunnel is lengthened further and the end where the queen is opened into a chamber to house her enlarging body, multiple smaller chambers are branched off from this to act as nurseries. The first generation of workers birthed from the queen are stored in the nurseries and cared for to the extreme by their surrogate mothers (the workers). They are fed the bodies of the older dead workers until they themselves are at the age to care for their sisters and brothers at which point the original workers leave the tunnel to find food.
After fertilization the reproductive organs of the queen quickly enlarge to produce the massive numbers of young, she props up onto her hind limbs to support her girth and hunch backward to give room for her increasing mass. Her mouth is wide and constantly open for workers to force food into her gut, cleanse out waste, and remove the many offspring she gives birth to.
As the worker population rapidly increases the nurseries are widened to accommodate the great number of young and extra nurseries are branched off of them. The construction of storage chambers for dry foods is begun at this point as well. The entrance tunnel is widened for the increase in traffic and secondary entrances are branched roughly from where the entrance tunnel and queen chamber merge, and "back doors" may be branched off of an empty nursery. The production of soldiers begins being triggered as well to defend the population from raiders and predators that may try to get to the nurseries. They gather at the mouths of the entrances and use their massive specialized front limbs to pinch and stab into the flesh of predators, workers will help as well by clambering onto the threat and chewing and digging at the cuts that the soldiers already created to further irritate the attacker.
Gallery
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Worker. Artwork by OviraptorFan
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Soldier.
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King.
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Queen.
