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Black Smokers

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PurpleYouko:

--- Quote ---For that matter how did the organisms spread from vent to vent? Maybe its a similar adaptatin that land animals use to adapt to summer / winter.
--- End quote ---


Good question. How did they?

Or more to the point, Did they at all?

If there is one thing that I have studied a lot over the years, it is marine creatures and how to keep them in aquariums. One thing that sticks out beyond all others is that the more these creatures specialize in what they eat and what temperature zones they live in, the less they are able to adapt to even the tiniest change in those conditions.

Try keeping a boxer shrimp alive in an aquarium for a while and you will see what I mean. if the water temperature varies by more than 2 or 3 degrees, it wil start to shed legs and stuff. 5 degrees and it's all over. And to think this is one of the easiest shrimps to keep alive.

One possibility is that larval stages might migrate from one smoker to another. Shrimp larva exist in the plankton for weeks or months before they settle down somewhere. Larva are far more able to tolerate environmental changes than adults. Maybe that is how they do it.
One thing I can be almost certain of though is that within hours of a black smoker turning off, every living thing in its vicinity will be totally, completely and irrevocably dead

In short, nobody migrates anywhere. larval forms probably colonize smokers by the purest fluke of just happening to land on one.
Marine creatures in general simply DON'T have the ability to adapt to anything. They have lost this ability through overspecialization.

Check out the Harlequin Shrimp for a real good example of specialization. It eats the tube feet of starfish and has become adapted to living off this alone. You can't keep these things in an aquarium unless you have a ready supply of live starfish. They just can't and won't eat anything else.

 :D  PY  :D

Numsgil:
And what happens to all the SO4?  It can't just build up forever.

Zelos:
ive read about those creatures, if I dont mistagen they can smell a smocker from greate distance. if I remember right its the youngsters who have the ability to go on a journey. if they are lucky they find a smocker to colonize and can live and give birth to other of their species, if they are unlucky they dont find anything.
py are you really gonna program it to be like they are using chemicals like we do up here(plants) and they do down there (smockers)
 :D Zelos :D

Botsareus:
I agree with Num 100% , PY has a point but if we finally get the mutation to work efficiently enough we can try what Num is talking about

Zelos:
if we want evolution and adeption to work the mutation system is the key for succes

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