why are there virtually zero instances of plant animal composites? imagine being an animal just soaking the sun and letting your plant cells do all the work. you need water? walk to a river. need nitrites? eat some dirts, bugs etc. caterpillar eating your leaves? eat the caterpillar.
venus flytrap
flagella chloron
>why are there virtually zero instances of plant animal composites?
Perfection is achieved not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.
Because energy reasons. Think time and delivery, yield. Goodnight.
>living solar panel
>energy issues
explain
PHOTOSYNTHESIS
PHOTOSYNTHESIS
PHOTOSYNTHESIS
hahah I remember that
>be animal plant hybrid
>suddenly both carnivores and herbivores both wanna eat you
>you are now vulnerable to twice as many parasites, bacteria, viruses
it's a really really bad idea.
herbivores can't catch you and you taste like shit for carnivores
it's a nice idea
Herbivores aren't all super slow and chlorophyll doesn't magically make you taste bad. Plants often taste awful because of bitter compounds the plants themselves produce.
I was thinking on it more and I remembered this is an animal that does have an actual plant growing on it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psammodesmus_bryophorus
doesn't seem like the animal parts are ever going to come close to carrying their own weight in this relationship.
aren't orcs photosynthetic(in some lores)? theoretically how could that be possible?
IS GREEN INNIT?
In 40k they're mushrooms, if that's what you're thinking of.
the cellular organization strategies are totally different.
complex plants went the route of compartmentalization--benefit and harm across the organism is isolated.
complex animals went communitarian--largely the whole organism benefits or the whole organism is harmed.
it's probably too hard for embryos to have such competing strategies and still develop into something complex. sponges are a good example of this, where their cellular organization meant complexity wasn't possible.
this is a view of it I have never seen before, very cool, thanks for the knowledge
I wonder how an animal with compartmentlization would work and what it would look like
mushrooms my dude
mushrooms are consuments as animals
I'd imagine the fact animal and plant cells have totally different methods of cellular respiration and power generation probably plays a part in why it's so rare.
There's a bunch of sea creatures that do that with algae and cyanobacteria.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kleptoplasty
>Some of the only known animals that practice kleptoplasty are sea slugs in the clade Sacoglossa.
>Due to this unusual ability, the sacoglossans are sometimes referred to a "solar-powered sea slugs," though the actual benefit from photosynthesis on the survival of some of the species that have been analyzed seems to be marginal at best.
>In fact, some species may even die in the presence of the carbon dioxide-fixing kleptoplasts as a result of elevated levels of reactive oxygen species.
So it's hard to do, inconsistent, and isn't even that useful?
>So it's hard to do, inconsistent, and isn't even that useful?
Mostly it's hard to do and also the ability for cells to properly photosynthesize isn't universal over the whole of the body. You do see these kind of plant/animal hybrids in things like cnidarians where their bodies are translucent. Here are some examples(beyond corals)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cassiopea
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydra_viridissima
You could likely also see something like flatworms developing a relationship like that, but who knows. Also there's at least one species of salamander that does something similar: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spotted_salamander
>"Its embryos have been found to have symbiotic algae living in and around them,[4] the only known example of vertebrate cells hosting an endosymbiont microbe (unless mitochondria are considered).[5][6]"
It also doesn't provide a ton of energy, which is why plants are pretty sedentary, and why herbivores need to consume a lot of plants or seeds to maintain themselves.
It would be like putting a solar powered fan on the back of your car. Yes it may provide a tiny bit of additional energy, but it isn't going to make a huge difference.
Finally someone said it.
Photosynthesis just doesn't provide enough energy to be a viable thing for animals. Unless they're completely sedentary like coral.
Aphids apparently practice a bizarre form of it though. Not with actual chlorophyll though. Not sure it does much for them though.
Herbivores would not suddenly start eating an animal because it smells like a plant. If they could catch meat and eat it they already would.
>If they could catch meat and eat it they already would.
I mean they already do sometimes. Tortoises will scavenge off of corpses, cows sometimes will just eat chicks who get too close, same with horses, etc. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R9vxHN8_jSE