Tusked Manatee

The Tusked Manatee is a creature with large bulk, and a miniature forest growing on its back. As a consequence of these plants coating the manatees, numerous small creatures live out their entire life cycles on this species' backside. This also helps the manatees themselves camouflage amongst dense foliage, which serves as a defense mechanism on top of fighting with their large tusks.

Basic Information

Anatomy

Tusked Manatees have large round bodies with leathery skin, their backs having deep grooves for plants to grow. Their heads are large and bulbous, with round snouts, small eyes, and thick tusks jutting out from their bottom jaws. They have small and round forelimbs for propulsion, as well as a round, but serrated tail fluke.

Biological Traits

Males are generally much larger, with much longer tusks, and bits of hardened spikes on their heads as a form of armor.

Genetics and Reproduction

This species often competes for the right to mate, especially if they meet alone. Oftentimes, males will begin a brawl with each other when they plant to mate with a female, sparring with their large tusks. Their brawls mainly consist of them backing away, before ramming into each other's heads, trying to hit their opponent in the right spot. They will also take to interlocking their tusks and pushing the other away. The duels normally end when one gets an injury and flees the scene, but sometimes can result in one's death. After these creatures mate, they give birth to only a few live young one after the other.

Growth Rate & Stages

Newborn Tusked Manatees are a lot smaller and pudgier than the adults, lacking tusks all together. Despite having the same grooves on their backsides, they are slightly too active for plants to grow sufficiently. Newborns spend their time interacting with their few siblings, often racing each other around their parents and other adults while their herd travels. They grow slowly, and their tusks grow slowly as a consequence, leaving them to require the adults' protection for a long time. Eventually, they'll become slow enough that plants will begin growing on their backs, and begin hosting their own micro-ecosystem. As adults, most young will leave their herd to join another.

Ecology and Habitats

Tusked Manatees can only be found in the Pits, and mostly live in a semi-large herd with other members of their species. Oftentimes, they can be found resting on the seabed, playing dead among various structures and plants shaping the terrain. With the plants and small animals on their backsides, they will be disguised as a patch of sea grass, and largely be hidden from predators when resting. Some have been found traveling alone, who travel much faster, and hide much more often among the seabed.

Dietary Needs and Habits

Tusked Manatees mostly feed on Black Tubers, using brute force to dig them out of the ground. These creatures forcefully push their tusks through the ground, piercing the tuber's outer skin, and ripping them from the sea floor. Some manatees often have to help their offspring with this endeavor, which slows down the herd altogether. While not engaging in conflicts themselves, their large size often scares off smaller creatures from their meal.

Biological Cycle

Because plants and animals are constantly dying on their backs, these manatees have to manually clean them off, doing so by brushing against large plants in their environment. Sometimes, this method kills already living creatures amongst the small plants.

Additional Information

Social Structure

Tusked Manatees live in semi-large herds that form from enough smaller manatees grouping together to help each other survive. Only rarely do the herds get extremely large, and is only caused by enough of the members mating and their offspring surviving long enough. The herds are only put in place to give each other an extra line of defense against predators, and the dense collection of adults prompts them to target the young, which are largely defenseless on their own. Otherwise, members of different families barely interact with each other unless in an act of courtship, in which the rest of the herd clear away. 

Uses, Products & Exploitation

This species is a prized food source among Cave Stalkers. Using their intelligence, the Cave Stalkers can isolate a fully grown member of a herd, and effectively kill it with their tools. Tusked Manatee meat is highly valued in trade between different nomadic bands.

Perception and Sensory Capabilities

Their sense of sight is mediocre compared to their smell. They often use their smell to locate food sources, as well as detect incoming creatures to feed off the plant on their backside.

Symbiotic and Parasitic organisms

The various plants found on Tusked Manatees are too numerous to count, and consist of plants that grow nowhere else in the Nightlight Zone. The animal species that live in them consist of small arthropod-like creatures, small fish and barnacles, and in rare cases, the Vilmacanthids.

Scientific Name

Trichechus herba

Lifespan

Unknown

Conservation Status

Endangered

Average Weight

1,950 lbs.

Average Length

34 ft.

Average Physique

Tubby

Body Tint, Colouring and Marking

Green-grey skin, ivory-colored tusks

Geographic Distribution

• The Halocline Pits

Average Intelligence
Fairly high