Bitascyphus

## Bitascyphus flavus

Latest Mutations: Invert Lobe

This alien shellfish has a unique feeding method. It has inverted the umbrella-shaped lobe that it's ancestors once used for transportation - which it has no need for now being a bivalve - into a cup-shaped device that can be protruded from the shell. The cup moves in such a way to create a pressure inside it, drawing water and food in, like a jellyfish can do with its bell. When threatened, it can withdraw the soft lobe completely inside the shell.

Status: LC

Habitat: Tropical Ocean

Niche: Sessile Filter-Feeder

Size: 2.3cm (length)

Nutritional Need: 148 x 2.3/100 = 3.4NP. LARVAE: 160

Food / Oxygen Requirement: 3.4 x 0.25 = 0.9NP per round (Needs to intake 0.9/0.7 = 1.3NP per round)/ 34 x 0.9 = 3.1NP

Characteristics: Anti-Freeze. Inflexible. Excretion, Liquid. Excretion, Solid. Only Works Underwater; gills. Osmoregulation (High Salinity). Permeable Skin. Small-Body Circulation. Subzero Metabolism.

Perception: Chemoreception 2 (detects chemicals 5m from mouth). Light Sensing (other side). LARVAE: +Sight 1 (see blurrily on one side, monocular vision).

Stats: Buoyancy -2. Clam Strength 1. Coordination 2. Desiccation Resistance 1. Digestion 2 (100% Meat, Digests 70%). Filtration 3. Immunity 2. Respiration 2 (10% off, Cutaneous Respiration, Stationary Respiration). Stamina 3. Strength 1. Support 1. Swim Agility -1. Swim Speed 1. Swim Stability 2. Toughness 3. UV Resistance 2. Walk Speed -0.5. LARVAE: Buoyancy 0. Swim Agility 1. Swim Speed 1. Toughness 0. Walk Speed 1.

Intelligence / Behaviour: Stimulus Response. Subconscious Functions. Body Movement Control. Hunger hormones = use cirri to filter water with food chemicals in. Pain = close shell. When tired = rest. Adult + Early Spring Full Moon = Release sex cells. LARVAE: Hunger hormones = move around. Pain = move around. Move signal = ciliated paddling. When tired = rest. Food chemicals = use cirri to filter water into mouth.

External Features: The cylindrical body has skin with yellow irridiphore pigmentation. It is enclosed in an aragonite, horizontal, symmetrical bivalve shell. At the front are ciliated cirri inside an inverted jelly-filled lobe, followed by the circular mouth and chemoreceptors. It has six pairs of gill slits. Along the body are four membranes with lines of cilia on them. On the dorsal side of the body is an eyespot. LARVAE: Retains the jelly-filled dome and on the ventral side of the body is a pinhole eye.

Internal Features: Each cell contains lysozymes and piezolytes. The body has a hemacoel and a few small blood vessels from the gills and saccate metanephridium. The blood is violet because it contains hemerythrin. Anti-freeze threitol sugar alcohol flows around the body. It has a sex appropriate gonad. It has muscles across the body. It has a monogastric digestive system. From the ganglia in head is a single, ventral nerve cord with nerves running off. The nerve cord is shielded by the notochord.

Reproduction: Sexual Reproduction. External Fertilisation. 1,000 eggs per spawning.

Castes/Phases: Larval Phase until 10% developed. Hermaphroditism.

Locomotion: Sessile (0NP). LARVAE: Active (20NP). Ciliated Paddling.

External Features: Medium Pigmentation (2NP, +2 UV Resistance). Bivalve Shell (14NP, +3 Toughness, +1 Clam Strength, +1 Desiccation Resistance, +1 Support, -1 Buoyancy, -1 Swim Speed, -1 Swim Agility, -1 Walk Speed, , +Inflexible, -Wriggling). Jelly-filled Lobe (3NP, +1 Swim Speed, +1 Filtration). Membranes (2NP, +2 Swim Stability). Cilia (2NP, +1 Swim Speed, +Ciliated Paddling). Skin (3NP, +1 Immunity, +1 Respiration, +1 Stamina, +Stationary Respiration, +Cutaneous Respiration, +Permeable Skin). Ciliated Cirri (7NP, +2 Filtration). Mouth (0NP, +1 Filtration). Chemoreceptors (2NP, +2 Chemoreception). Eyespot (3NP, +Light Sensing). LARVAE: +Pinhole Eye (2NP, +1 Sight, +Monocular Vision), -Bivalve Shell. +Jelly-Filled Dome (3NP, +1 Buoyancy, +Adjustable Buoyancy, +Suspension).

Internal Features: Piezolytes (5NP, +Low Pressure Tolerance). Lysozymes (1NP, +Subzero Metabolism). Gills (4NP, +1 Respiration, +1 Stamina, +Ram Ventilation, +Only Works Underwater). Open Circulatory System (3NP, +Small-Body Circulation, +1 Stamina). Anti-Freeze Compound (2NP, +Anti-Freeze). Large Nephridium (19NP, +Liquid Excretion, +Osmoregulation). Muscular System (7NP, +1 Strength, +0.5 Walk Speed, +0.5 Swim Speed, +Wriggling). Monogastric Digestive System (18NP, +1 Meat Digestion, +1 Veg Protein Digestion, +1 Immunity, +Solid Excretion). Centralised Nervous System (20NP, +2 Coordination, +Stimulus Response, +Subconscious Functions, +Body Movement Control). Gonads (14NP, +Sexual Reproduction, +Hermaphroditism, +External Fertilzation).

Temporal Range: R. 211 - Present (Agentian Stage of the Oliverian)

Distribution: Cosmopolitan

Lifespan: 1 year

Predecessor: Cilistoma mollusca

Classification:

Discoverer: StealthStyle