Search Results

Bullet points one through three in the question bring to mind an existing animal, the wallaby. (Note: this was originally written before the question was edited to add cat nose as a feature. The com …

I'm going to go add a fourth possibility to your crocodilian, amphibian, mammalian choice list: dinosaurid. First, the hair could be explained as pycnofibers, " hair-like filaments ... similar to, bu …

Let's start with something in the Real World (TM), then try to see whether we can manipulate its future evolution into your creature. The thing I have in mind is the humble gannet, birds of the Morus …

Why can a vampire change from a man-form to a bat-form? Let's draw inspiration from the mimic octopus. It is not a lion fish, a flounder, a sea snake, nor a jelly fish. But it can imitate those thi …

My answer is going to go well beyond what we can ever expect from reality, so I hope your definition of "rational SF" is fairly liberal. This is going to be a major undertaking in genetic engineering …

Go backwards just a few small steps in our evolutionary tree, and you will encounter the primate sub-order strepsirrhini, consisting of lemurs, galagos, and lorises. These are perhaps not our fierces …

The fantasy creature I am imagining (planning a short story or two around) satisfies the following analogy: Human is to Chimpanzee as "This Thing" is to Badger. That is, the creature has a clear …

The largest so-far known flying animal on this here earth was the quetzalcoatlus. At 10 meters, its wingspan falls far short of 1000 feet you mention. (image from wikimedia) However, the mechanic …

There are some real-world examples we can point to that indicate the possibility of a realistic small humanoid. Since we don't need anything exotic like antlers, carapaces, or magic, this should be s …

The meteor missed. The end-cretaceous mass extinction event didn't happen. Velociraptors and their friends lived on. They continued to evolve, to be large, and to eat whatever they wanted. We now …

Your quadrabirds don't have to loose flight to have a walking fore-limb. Another answer already mentions that some groups of pterosaurs folded their wings when on the ground and used them for walking …

As far as we are currently aware, the most intelligent things in the oceans are the cetaceans (dolphins and whales) and the pinnipeds (seals, walrus, sea lions). Further, it is more tempting to want …

Let's take inspiration from the claws of mantis shrimp. Their club- or spear-like claws are deployed by flexing and releasing bands of chitin. In the same way, your creature's tail would need such a …

On the Life Ball of my fantasy stories, a particular species of delphinidae- I call them black dolphins- have evolved and advanced at least as much as humans and other intelligent races. A prior quest …

Based on an answer of mine from a few months ago, I've been inspired to adapt the concept to my own Life Ball. Fair warning- this question and some of its links are not for the squeamish. May contai …