Koorikoka

The koorikoka split from their ancestor to take advantage of the abundant diversity of lumenocula. With the rise of the lumenocula lineage of saucebacks, montemsnappers found themselves under increased pressure, not just for competing directly with lumenocula for resources but with themselves becoming prey to several species. Some populations of montemsnappers began to respond by developing an acute aggression with regards to lumenocula, and over time became more active in their competition. In search of newer prey and safer hunting grounds, this lineage split off from the montemsnappers and began living in the drier shrubland and herbaceous environments of Wallace. At first this increased aggression manifested as hyperaggression when protecting their young. They seasonally congregate on nesting ground to mate and hatch their clutch, and will guard the colony collectively; if one nesting adult or young are attacked the surrounding colony members will target the aggressor in a frenzy, usually resulting in their evisceration and occasionally other members of the colony caught collaterally. However once the young are large enough to fly the colony will instinctively disperse so as to not strain the resources of the nesting ground. Males and females will stay together for a few seasons, forming packs with their young to help them hunt and providing their young with the skills needed to survive when they leave and form a new pack. These packs will disperse all over the continent, giving each pack wide swaths of hunting grounds of up to 5000^2 km per family unit.

When no longer in the protection of the colony, the other byproduct of the hyperaggression becomes apparent; they have shifted their diets to primarily hunting all saucebacks lineages in their environment. It began as therm harassing the species such as sausophrey or wallyhawk s to steal their prey, but this quickly began to shift into active predation. One of the parents will scout out potential prey, soaring until they find their main desire, a sauceback with a fresh kill, and the pack will then descend to attempt to both kill the sauceback and steal its meal. If they spot saucebacks without a kill they believe they can take down, they will chase them using a pursuit pack hunting strategy, hunting their prey for hours until the prey collapses from exhaustion. They will even collectively attempt to chase their prey into the upper troposphere, with the aim of inducing hypoxia. This method has proven successful enough to take out most flying saucebacks, however the ascendophrey requires a modification to this strategy. They cannot fly as high as ascendophrey for the same length of time, however they just need to prevent them from descending long enough for hypoxia to set in. Individuals of the pack will harass the ascendophrey Attempts to dive onto the pack will usually prove fatal, as while a blow would prove fatal to the koorikoka caught by it, the descent is generally uncontrolled, and the koorikoka will attempt to roll and dive out of the way, baiting it low enough for the other members of the pack to swoop down from above and attack with teeth and talons. Like most skysnappers they have no sense of hearing, and relying on complex visual, olfactory, and behaviors cues to corrodinate and find meals. Supplementing this diet are other sources of protein and energy, such as during sauceback breeding seasons they will seek out nests that can be raided for eggs and unprotected juveniles. in addition, they have evolved the capability to digest sauceback feathers, breaking the keratin proteins down into useful amino acids. If saucebacks aren't available they will scavenge for relatively fresh carcasses when available or even hunt other prey such as other species of skysnappers or ground prey like gnarbolonk, however they generally will not touch anything below approximately 30 cm as they are not usually worth the energy expense to hunt.