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YellowPanda2001 — Melohyus choerinus

#pig #rainforest #futureevolution #speculativeevolution #30myh
Published: 2021-06-12 07:16:15 +0000 UTC; Views: 2852; Favourites: 32; Downloads: 1
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Description In the southeast asian rainforests, 30 million years in the future, the Melohyus choerinus is encountered. This is a small 70 cm long pig. It has a slong snout, somewhat stilt-like legs, and an omnivorous diet. It is a specialized forager of the forest floor, feeding on a variety of plants, fungi and small animals on the ground. It is part of a very basal lineage of pigs, the most basal native old world lineage, to which it is the sole surviving species, the Melohyinae. Next in the phylogeny we encounter the gregariochoerines (including the Tamiachoerus genus), which are closer to the silvahyines (including Silvahyus and Macroporcus) and the leimontheriines (which includes the Pastiochoerus genus). Being a surviving lineage it retains traits typical of primordial old world pigs, which were dedicated forest-dwelling foragers. The Melohyus has a preferred taste for soil-living invertebrates, with its sensitive snout being able to sense exquisite, as well as obnoxious little critters, that the pig can ultimately evaluate for edibility.
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