(Terra Antarcticus) The Coast and Ocean: The Whelkpryers
These wolf-sized theropods are a common sight along the rougher, stone-littered portions of the coastline. Descended from unenlagiine dromaeosaurs, Whelkpryers have developed an array of features allowing them to thrive in this environment, including an excellent sense of balance and feet bearing ridged soles and tough claws that allow them to grip onto the slipperiest of rocks as they prowl around the tidepools. The specialized snouts of these creatures have formed into curved beaks that they use to pull whelks and other shellfish from the rocks and extract the meat from the shells. In the case of completely protected prey such as clams, Whelkpryers have been known to use their surprisingly powerful and dexterous arms to smash the shell with a heavy stone until the meat is exposed, showing a surprising degree of intelligence.
After about 2 years of looking at this subreddit and not posting any of my work, I finally got over my insanity antisocial behavior to get myself a new account and begin doing so. The creatures displayed here are from a personal project I’ve been working on for a few years called Terra Antarcticus, based on an Antarctica that inexplicably stayed warm and is home to a myriad of derived dinosaurs, strange ungulates, and other bizarre life forms, as a sort of love letter to all of the ‘Lost World’ type stories that have come and gone through the ages. I hope to eventually compile it all into a field-guide book (or several, depending on how long it gets), but until then I will semi-regularly make posts here to share some of the flora, fauna and fungi that call this alternate Antarctica home. I am open to feedback and will try to answer any questions when I have the time. I hope you all enjoy!
(Note- I apologize for any bad image quality. I made the drawings shown here using tools on Google Slides and I only mean for them to be placeholders until I can either hire an artist or find an art app that doesn’t seem to go out of it’s way to inconvenience me. Thanks for understanding.)
These wolf-sized theropods are a common sight along the rougher, stone-littered portions of the coastline. Descended from unenlagiine dromaeosaurs, Whelkpryers have developed an array of features allowing them to thrive in this environment, including an excellent sense of balance and feet bearing ridged soles and tough claws that allow them to grip onto the slipperiest of rocks as they prowl around the tidepools. The specialized snouts of these creatures have formed into curved beaks that they use to pull whelks and other shellfish from the rocks and extract the meat from the shells. In the case of completely protected prey such as clams, Whelkpryers have been known to use their surprisingly powerful and dexterous arms to smash the shell with a heavy stone until the meat is exposed, showing a surprising degree of intelligence.
After about 2 years of looking at this subreddit and not posting any of my work, I finally got over my insanity antisocial behavior to get myself a new account and begin doing so. The creatures displayed here are from a personal project I’ve been working on for a few years called Terra Antarcticus, based on an Antarctica that inexplicably stayed warm and is home to a myriad of derived dinosaurs, strange ungulates, and other bizarre life forms, as a sort of love letter to all of the ‘Lost World’ type stories that have come and gone through the ages. I hope to eventually compile it all into a field-guide book (or several, depending on how long it gets), but until then I will semi-regularly make posts here to share some of the flora, fauna and fungi that call this alternate Antarctica home. I am open to feedback and will try to answer any questions when I have the time. I hope you all enjoy!
(Note- I apologize for any bad image quality. I made the drawings shown here using tools on Google Slides and I only mean for them to be placeholders until I can either hire an artist or find an art app that doesn’t seem to go out of it’s way to inconvenience me. Thanks for understanding.)