The evolution of insect swarms from XNUMX million years ago

Chapter 43 Leader Ancient Jaw
  The remains of half of the Iowa jaw were also recovered by nearby workers and stuffed into the holes on the surface of the nest. No matter what, things like genetic sequences cannot be missed. What's more, it's the genetic sequence of a powerful species.

The floating mother nest slowly descended, and the workers began to gather together, focusing on lining up with the solid exoskeleton.

The body of the Fifty-Oar Horseshoe Crab is a bit too large to be directly stuffed into the holes on the surface of the nest for absorption.

Under Lin Yi's control, the workers waved their claws and tore at the joints of the appendages of the fifty-oared horseshoe crab, widening the gaps in the joints as much as possible and trying to tear off the entire appendage.

Bing Hao also stepped forward and used the blades on the sickle limbs to pry up the gaps between the exoskeletons.

The shell of the living body cannot be broken, so the dead one is much easier to handle. Binghao used his sickle limb to gradually expand the gap in the joint, allowing Gonghao to extend his chelicerae into it, tearing at the flesh and blood, and finally tore out a paddling foot. Down.

Immediately, some workers, under the control of Lin Yi, stuffed the half of the stump into the hole on the surface of the mother's nest and began to absorb its genetic sequence.

The inner bay environment formed by the Dikla crater is relatively closed, and is fed by rivers. The salinity is low, and it is not suitable for the survival of typical Ordovician marine life.

But at present, it seems that the horseshoe crabs can adapt to this environment. There is no problem with the workers and soldiers. The mother nest does not care about this environmental problem at all. Lin Yi even suspected that he directly threw the mother nest into fresh water. Nothing will happen, not to mention it is just an inner bay with a river flowing into it.

For Lin Yi, this inner bay with rich species diversity is a good place to station. He plans to multiply some fixed brood nests in this sea area and use it as a stable base.

At this time, the workers and soldiers scattered under his control, looking for a suitable place. At the same time, in the floating mother nest, the nesting workers are also hatching, preparing to pupate into a fixed mother nest.

Since typical Ordovician reef-building organisms such as bryozoans cannot survive here, there are no coral reefs in Dikla Crater, and are replaced by a large number of green hair algae and other algae.

Groups of Iowa jaws shuttle among the green algae waves, preying on star turtles, leaf shrimp and other benthic creatures. The seven pairs of interlaced conodont molecules in the mouth create hideous scars on the prey as the mouth moves.

This area seemed to be a relatively fertile body of water and seemed like a good location. Under the protection of ordinary workers and soldiers, the nesting drones slowly broke away from the floating mother nest and swam towards the seabed.

Controlling the nesting workers, the turtle buries its body half into the seabed and begins to pupate towards the mother's nest. The softer exoskeleton was soon stretched out of the horseshoe crab shape by the proliferated tissue below, and the clusters of sea ringworms began to extend outward, filtering out plankton in the water.

After the general shape of the mother's nest was completed, the mother's nest also slowly left the floating mother's nest under the control of Lin Yi, swung its five pairs of paddling legs to the top of the new fixed mother's nest, and began to lay nutrient eggs.

Subsequently, the surrounding workers picked up these nutrient eggs one after another and stuffed them into the honeycomb-shaped holes on the surface of the new mother nest for them to multiply.

At the same time, compared to coral reefs composed of reef-building organisms such as bryozoans, these algae are also a better source of nutrients, and the workers' chelicerae are also very easy to cut and tear up these algae.

Although the entire species of horseshoe crabs cannot eat vegetarian food even if they pick up garbage, the mother nest is not picky.

Although the nutrients provided are less than those of flesh and blood tissue, the advantage is that they are large and easy to obtain. Lin Yi also controlled the work without any psychological pressure from picking up garbage to fishing for garbage and algae. On the other side, the workers around the floating mother nest also started fishing for algae. Under Lin Yi's control, even Binghao cut the algae with the clusters of thorns on its sickle limbs.

But at the same time, a large conodont appeared again in the compound eyes of the worm.

They are slightly smaller than the giant Iowa jaws, only nearly one meter long, and the staggered conodont molecules in the mouth do not have complex size differentiation like the Iowa jaws, but fine saw blade-like small teeth - the leader. Ancient Jaws.

In later studies, the conodont molecular morphology of the archaeognathus proved that they differed in prey selection from the giant Iowa jaw. However, the size difference between the archaeognathus and the Iowa jaw suggests that they may also be potential prey of the Iowa jaw.

But to Lin Yi's surprise, the predator-prey relationship between the two conodonts was completely opposite to the speculations of later studies.

In Gong Yu's compound eyes, countless leading ancient jaws surrounded a huge Iowa jaw from all directions, but the latter was still chasing the star turtle in the sea, without noticing the other party's approach.

The leader of the group of ancient jaws swarmed forward, biting the body of the giant Iowa jaw with its mouth shaped like a later lamprey, and then the body rotated, and the saw blade-like tooth-shaped molecules immediately cut off a large piece of flesh as the body rotated.

Afterwards, more leader Ancient Jaws swarmed in and tore at the huge Iowa Jaw's body. The red vertebrate blood surged out. When the group of Ancient Jaws dispersed, only one body was left covered with ferocious circles. The broken body with various scars fell down weakly.

For a moment, Lin Yi even wondered whether these leader Ancient Jaws might also be a nest group.

Until he saw two ancient jaws opening their mouths wide and biting each other's body in order to fight for a piece of food residue. Only then was it confirmed that they were just primitive, a cluster that gathered for food, and would still break out into internal fights when the spoils were unevenly distributed.

However, such an attack method still reminded Lin Yi of a small shark called the Cigar Dharma Shark in later generations. They will use this rotating cutting method to make terrifying circular wounds on large prey.

In later generations, from marine creatures not much larger than them, to apex predators such as great white sharks and killer whales, and even the nuclear submarines of the terrifying Ape erectus, they have been eaten by them.

And looking at these ancient jaws, saw-shaped tooth-shaped molecules are arranged in a ring in the mouth,
  But in this primitive era, this tactic was also more terrifying. What's more, although they are not nests, they hunt in groups.

This makes them resemble a cross between a lamprey, a dharma shark and a piranha. For creatures with soft structures, a group of leader ancient jaws may be more terrifying than a fifty-oared horseshoe crab.

Lin Yi even felt that even if it was a single adult Helical Stone, if it was accidentally surrounded and encountered a group of leader Ancient Jaws, it would not be a good thing.

A huge Iowa jaw was quickly eaten clean, but these greedy leaders of the ancient jaw group were still not satisfied. Their eel-shaped bodies twisted, and their bulging eyes stared at another person in this sea area. A huge organism - a floating mother nest, and a filter mother's nest that drives the floating mother nest.

(End of this chapter)