Snowmelt Srugeing

The snowmelt srugeing split from its ancestor. It moved into Maineiac Tundra, where its niche was unfilled, and developed a very strange annual lifecycle. In order to survive in the tundra, it must take full advantage of the short polar summer. In the winter, it only exists as eggs locked in ice, using antifreeze proteins to stay alive and slowly develop. When the summer snowmelt arrives, the eggs are set free from the ice and hatch in the massive pools of water which form. In only 1 month, after feasting on tundra-adapted miniswarmers and cloudswarmer larvae which also take advantage of the snowmelt, the hatchlings grow into adults which then emerge from the water on the wing. The adults spend the remainder of the short summer spawning into every pool they come across, feasting on tundra-adapted minikruggs and vermees in between to replenish their gametes until the arrival of winter causes them all to freeze to death. About 30% of eggs survive the freeze and hatch the following summer, repeating the cycle.

The snowmelt srugeing loses most of its fins in adulthood for streamlining and heat retention, and it is smaller so that it may mature more quickly. The adult is better-suited to surviving the low humidity of the tundra, as its skin is relatively tough and chitinous, somewhat comparable to a Terran caterpillar. Its wings are leathery and more opaque. Small sclerotised hair-like growths around its wing muscles provide a small amount of insulation so that the heat generated by flight isn’t instantly lost, but if it ever stops flying for more than a few seconds, it must bask to recover. It is capable of keeping its lung-gill moist on its own, but may still dip its gill opening into the water to moisten it quickly. Its gill opening is usually held tight against its neck with only small openings at the corners exposed, so that it remains streamlined and can protect its respiratory system from invasion by disease or parasites. The lung is internalized in adulthood rather than bulging outwards in order to protect it from damage and further streamline its shape.

The juvenile snowmelt srugeing looks far more like a generic gilltail, though with some differences. Even at hatching it has unusually large pectoral fins, so that they may grow into wings as quickly as possible. Its gill anatomy resembles that of the surge gilltail, and the gill internalizes and turns into a lung before adulthood.