Jungle Color for the ERC Age?

[ametist]

Here's a sketch of the 'Medusa tree' - an animal which can move, though slowly, to find a partner or better hunting grounds. It feeds on smaller animals, bugs, worms and such, which it cathes with the help of it's 'arms'. It's body is musculuos and can contract or stretch for various behaviors:

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ametist (a.k.a 'rebus' in DZS)

[Monkeyboy]

That's very intriguing! I wonder if there are some other type of plants that like to live around it. The soil there may be very rich.

[Jennifer_P]

Ooooh! That is one cool hunting tree! We have got to add this.
I have a couple of questions:
1. What sort of bark does the tree have? Rough, smooth, peely...?
2. How tall is the tree?
3. What's the largest thing that it could capture?
VERY cool.

[ametist]

@ Monkeyboy - Oh yes,the soil is fertilized, so to speak, so most often you can see smaller plants growing round its base, like the 'Sphere'plant and the 'Arrow'plant and flowers of course!

@Jennifer- Oh, that would be fun This is my thoughts, but everyone feel free to discuss them:

The Medusa have a smooth 'bark' much like the skin of an elephant I guess. It must be rather thick but on the other hand elastic so the tree can contract and stretch, even if it doesn't do that very fast. When it bends down, it let the 'branches-arms' hang down quite still, so smaller animals just walk through, not aware of the danger, and then comes to close to the drops of 'glue'. Types of ants, termites and such, crawling worms, snakes and smaller mouse-like animals it can catch by 'clapping' the arms together and then hold them so pretty tight while the 'body' strectches up and the 'arms' sucks inside the body. It has a mouth with teeth in there, which can chew prey that have kind of shell, like bugs. An old, large tree can probably cath an animal in the size of a rabbit.
And large exemplars can be 1 meter tall, mostly around 60-70 cm though,that meisured in it's digestive phase.

One can come across this tree while it's sliding, then it's body is contracted. Like this:

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[Jennifer_P]

The Medusa have a smooth 'bark' much like the skin of an elephant I guess. It must be rather thick but on the other hand elastic so the tree can contract and stretch, even if it doesn't do that very fast. When it bends down, it let the 'branches-arms' hang down quite still, so smaller animals just walk through, not aware of the danger, and then comes to close to the drops of 'glue'. Types of ants, termites and such, crawling worms, snakes and smaller mouse-like animals it can catch by 'clapping' the arms together and then hold them so pretty tight while the 'body' strectches up and the 'arms' sucks inside the body. It has a mouth with teeth in there, which can chew prey that have kind of shell, like bugs. An old, large tree can probably cath an animal in the size of a rabbit.
And large exemplars can be 1 meter tall, mostly around 60-70 cm though,that meisured in it's digestive phase.

This is good stuff; I particularly like your explanation of how the tree moves around. By shrinking down and going short like that, the medusa avoids tipping over. So, is this glue maybe sweet like honey? It would be interesting if it could be harvested and spread on a slice of bread... Also, it looks like the tree was digging a hole for its eggs with a shovel-like attachment--that is pretty neat; it would also seem to show that that branches is fairly muscular, maybe having about the same strength as an octopus tentacle. Perhaps the tree has another special arm that it can inject poisons which are used to subdue its prey? That would be a handy ability for some of the larger critters like rats, snakes, mice, birds, and rabbits.

[Jennifer_P]

Ametist, would it be okay if I drew some more detailed close ups of the medusa tree?

[ametist]

Ametist, would it be okay if I drew some more detailed close ups of the medusa tree?

Of course!!

[Jennifer_P]

Great; I'll see what I can come up with then.

[Jennifer_P]

I'm adding a medusa tree to the panorama, ametist... It's only a juvenile though, about a foot high.

[ametist]

Can't wait to see it, Jennifer! And yes, I'm with you about the colourscheme. There can't be colours that are unpleasant, in that case no visitors will come there if they don't have sunglasses on ...
Yes, I don't think the Medusa Tree is very common and it grows slowly too.