Okie-dokie, I want to tidy up Yih's biosphere.

For starters, Yih life is not DNA-based, but it is based on a similar nucleic acid that encodes the same proteins. This creates a genetic firewall between Earth life and Yih life. This hopefully doesn't mean that Yih organisms can't metabolize Earth biomass.

Off the top of my head, here are the critters I've mentioned so far, whether alluded to indirectly or meticulously detailed, arranged into rough clades. I may refer to these biota by a close Terran equivalent, and you can go ahead and append “analog” or prepend “xeno-” or “pseudo-” to these names, since they aren't at all related to Terran lifeforms. My goal is to strike a balance between alienness and familiarity, erring on the side of the familiar both to make my job easier and to make the yinrih and their environment more relatable.

Code: Select all

* animals

  * exovoviviparans (give birth via womb nests, sweat milk from the forepaws, bear fur, six or fewer digits)

    - Zap Rats (small, use electric shock as weapon)

    - Forest Flyers (flight)

    * Vulpithecoids (tool use)

      - Bobtail Hob (cursorial, pursuit predator, iteroparous, bipedal)

      * Vulpithicids

        * Vulpithicins (arboreal, long-lived, semelparous, social)

          - yinrih (sapient)

          - tree dwellers

  - Wormcows (give live birth, iteroparous, trophic limbs)

  - The critter that Firefly is named after (bioluminescence, flight, insectoid)

* plants (photosynthetic)

  -  grasses eaten by wormcows and other grazers

    * woody plants

      - Steadtree

      - Wind fruit bush

      - poisonous redfruit tree

      - nonpoisonous redfruit tree

    - Whatever the minty yellow fruit comes from

    - Whatever is used to make cream/butter (whence the phrase "cloaca butter")

  

* Fungus (heterotrophic)

  - whatever is used to make leasemeat



* Pathogenic microbes

  - Whatever caused the plague that killed Stormlight's parents and litter mates.