#eggsacs

[shailion]

A mother making her 3rd eggsac

[kellterntempest]

congratulations to Ivo Robotnik for giving birth to 18 beautiful baby badniks

[aria0fgold]

Just remembered my brain getting stuck in gamer mode yesterday where I was watching one of Sean's videos (Scariest Videos on the Internet #3, I think?) and he said something like, "how are you supposed to leave the catacombs" and without missing a beat, I said: Just dig upwards, like in minecraft. And it took me a solid 2 seconds to realize that... you can't dig upwards... you can't stack dirt and stone on your feet in real life.

[redwolf]

[platycryptus]

Phrynus marginemaculatus babies have molted off their mother’s back and I counted 34 of them! That’s a lot for this species, usually they’re reported to have more like 10-25.

Here’s the eggsac and hatchlings, which only spend a week or so clinging to mom but may continue to cluster near her for several months.

[pangur-and-grim]

just got a blazed post about sonic laying eggsacs from his cloaca, maybe I will turn on that ad-free after all

[sixteenseveredhands]

African Social Spiders: these spiders live in colonies that can contain up to 2,000 spiders, most of which are female; they hunt, forage, maintain their web, and raise their offspring as a group, without any dominance hierarchy or caste system

This communal behavior is extremely rare among spiders, which are normally solitary creatures. The African social spider (Stegodyphus dumicola) is one of the few species that has been identified as a true "social spider," forming colonies and living in communal nests where the spiders work together to hunt, forage, build webs, and care for their offspring.

Above: an African social spider feeding the young spiderlings of her colony by regurgitating food for them, exhibiting a level of maternal/allomaternal care that is relatively uncommon in both spiders and insects

African social spiders can be found in various parts of southwestern Africa, where they will often build a dense silk nest in the branches of a thorn tree and/or shrub. Most of the spiders in the colony are female (more than 85%, according to some studies) and the species itself also has a female-biased primary sex ratio, as researchers have found that female embryos develop in more than 80% of the eggs that the spiders produce.

Above: a group of African social spiders working together to subdue their prey, which will be taken back to the nest so that it can be shared with the rest of the colony

There is no evidence that any dominance hierarchy or caste system exists within S. dumicola colonies. The spiders all cooperate to complete a variety of tasks, such as hunting, repairing the web, foraging, defending the colony, caring for the colony's offspring, etc. While none of them are exclusively assigned to a single task, many have a primary role that they fill, often based on their physical size and condition.

Above: close-up photo of S. dumicola

This species also engages in extreme allomaternal care, meaning that many different spiders (including both mothers and "allomothers") all share the responsibility of caring for the colony's offspring; even the unmated females help out with brood care. The mothers/allomothers tend to the eggsacs, regurgitate food for the baby spiderlings, and even engage in matriphagy, which means that they will eventually be cannibalized by the babies.

From The Encyclopedia of Animal Behavior:

... some proportion of females do not reproduce – sometimes as much as 60% – but remain as helpers, contributing to foraging and brood care (allo-mothering). Both breeding females and virgin allo-mothers regurgitate food for colony offspring and eventually let the young consume their bodies. ...

Young that are raised with both mothers and allo-mothers show higher survival and growth than young raised by their mothers alone, suggesting a clear fitness benefit of cooperative breeding.

Spiders of this species generally measure about 2.5 - 3.5mm long; they can be found in Namibia, Botswana, Zimbabwe, South Africa, Lesotho, and Eswatini.

Sources & More Info:

Science Direct: Social Spiders

Current Biology: Quick Guide to Social Spiders (PDF)

Phys.org: Untangling the Social Lives of Spiders

Proceedings of the Royal Society B: The Age & Evolution of Sociality in Stegodyphus Spiders

Entomology Today: Social Spiders Divide Labor According to Body Size & Condition

Animal Behaviour: Extreme Allomaternal Care by Unmated Females in a Cooperatively Breeding Spider

National Geographic: Baby Spiders Eat their Mothers

University of Portsmouth: Social Spiders Have Different Ways of Hunting in Groups

Behavioral Ecology: Spider Societies Mitigate Risk by Prioritizing Caution

Behavioral Processes: Warring Arthropod Societies

Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology: Does the African Social Spider Stegodyphus dumicola Control the Sex of Individual Offspring?

[mychlapci]

https://www.tumblr.com/mychlapci/761169427078217728/about-the-arachnus-and-blackarachnia-being

Consider the visage of Megatron sitting on his throne, flanked by the bulging see-through eggsacs of his wives perched on the arm rests. Those glowing eggs will be inside him soon enough...

Also please do take it easy my liege, don't push yourself if you're tired!

ohhh yes that's so hot. They're both so full, brimming with little spider eggs, just waiting until they can push them all into Megatron's waiting forge... I bet they'll be mean about it and shove their ovipositors in at the same time.

[mynameisjessejk]

Stories of the Past

Maedhros regarded the blanket-lump on the sofa for a moment.

Maglor, at his harp in the corner, shrugged one shoulder, but didn’t stop the slow, sweet tune he was coaxing from the instrument.

Maedhros supposed, by the slightly wavy dark hair ruffling up from the edge of the blanket, that one of the twins was having a bad day. He’d had plenty of those in his life, and he understood the urge to bury oneself in blankets and ignore the world a bit.

The buried twin made a soft acknowledging noise when Maedhros rubbed his back, and he turned into his arms when Maedhros wedged himself onto the sofa behind him.

Maedhros pressed his grandson into the back of the sofa and tucked the dark head beneath his chin. “When your father was a child,” he murmured.

Maglor plucked a cheerful chord, abruptly swinging the mood of the tune he was playing around the something more playful.

Their grandson made an approving noise and nuzzled deeper into Maedhros’ embrace.

“The watch captain at Amon Ereb at the time was an edain woman named Beldis,” Maedhros continued. “And she came into my service because her brother had been killed and someone needed to protect her law-sister and her nephew. As far as she was concerned, the funniest thing in the world was watching Elros sass me.”

“He did, too,” Maglor agreed, playing an emphatic chord.

“Powers, he sassed me,” Maedhros said. “First thing he ever said to me was to call me rude.” Maedhros hummed in harmony with Maglor’s tune for a moment, and then said reflectively. “One day, Beldis decided to teach your father and your uncle to shoot the reflex bow favored by her people.”

“Oh I remember this,” Maglor said, and the tune changed again, something lighter, lilting, an echoing memory of childhood laughter in a dark time.

Maedhros closed his eyes and picked up the tune, Singing softly.

It was hard not to think of the grandson in his arms as young, though he was older than Maedhros had been when he’d followed his father across the sea. Still, there was an innocence about him, a sweetness and warmth, that made it difficult for Maedhros not think of him as boy.  

The boy cradled to his chest turned his head so he could watch Maedhros’ memory of Elrond and Elros play out across the rug.

Maedhros closed his eyes as he Sang, better to feel the memory his Song was bringing to life, of Elros, snapping himself with the bowstring, of Elrond trying to care for his squirming brother’s welt, of Beldis, chiding them to keep trying, and the swear words Elros spewed when he snapped himself again.

Elros had utterly refused to say where he’d learned some of the words, a few of which were so vulgar no one had dared say them in Maedhros’ hearing in centuries, and Beldis had been laughing too hard to back Maedhros up when he tried to discipline Elros.

Maglor had offered to wash the young peredhel’s mouth out with soap, as their mother had done the first time she’d heard Celegorm say a swear word, and Elros had replied, “Try.”

This had only made Beldis laugh harder.

Maglor had taken the twins to their room, grounded and about to get a stern talking to.

Maedhros had turned to look at Beldis. “Just like my nephew at the same age,” she replied to his arch look.  

Maedhros let the memory and the Song fade. “Truth is,” he murmured into the dark hair against his shoulder, “I was only annoyed at Beldis because her laughing made it so hard for me to keep a straight face.”

Maglor, fingers stilling on the harp briefly, said indignantly, “You! I had to actually be the one to yell at them!” He scoffed. “I had to be the one to explain to Elros that he wasn’t allowed to call his bowstring a  void spider’s eggsac.”

Maedhros snorted. “Never did take,” he said reflectively.

There was a soft sigh against Maedhros’ neck.

Maedhros stroked his back tenderly. He let his voice turn lilting and low. “Elrond had a look that could pin you in place and make you feel like even your ancestors should be embarrassed. Elros just swore. That was always the easiest way to tell them apart. Even when they were trying to be confusing Elrond never remembered to swear enough.”

Maglor picked back up the soothing background music.

Maedhros hummed along for a while, feeling his grandson start to drift to sleep.

[5mind]

@teknah || cont. from here

"Yeah, yeah. I know." Antares unfolds a ziplock bag from his backpocket. He's not going to carry a horrendously moist piece of meat in hands the whole time. "They should let me keep it though."

"I mean, haven't you ever thought about like starting a family or anything?" The question was punctuated by a nauseating squelch as he squeezes the meat (and the eggsac) into the bag. He doesn't seal it all the way so the little ones (?) can breathe.

[monstersdownthepath]

Additional details I couldn't find a good place to fit into the article:

Beetle Knights lay clutches of 4 to 7 eggs only once a year at the end of summer, and their eggsacs look almost exactly like backpacks filled with folded clothes and paper-wrapped trail rations, though anyone familiar with such items will note the 'backpacks' are much heavier than they should be. Knight eggs are highly sought after by anyone hoping to employ these creatures, though their instincts swiftly override most attempts to train them.

Beetle Knights carry their eggs with them until they find a monster large enough to make a good first meal for them. They will slay the monster, construct a simple resinous nest around it (which looks like a large camping tent, but the 'cloth' is rigid and hard as stone), place the eggsac on the remains, and spend the next few days gathering additional morsels for them, typically in the form of small game or whatever magical creatures they catch. Small iron items are also placed on this hoard. Knight grubs look look like enormous beetle grubs; they gorge on the offered items, then burrow into the ground to feed on roots, vegetables, and subterranean creatures before undergoing their metamorphosis into a full Beetle Knight just one month later.

A Knight that has nested near a settlement for an extended period of time may offer its eggs to the population for them to safely care for the next generation, especially if the population knows the truth of what they are but didn't chase them off. Some settlements have extended symbiotic relationships with entire lineages of beetles this way, though the insect's wanderlust (and eventual prey shortages) means most of them move on, and these relationships rarely last more than a handful of generations as their swift reproduction depopulates the surrounds of monsters. It's for the best; bereft of any other prey and driven to starvation, Beetle Knights have been known to prey on the humanoids they otherwise live alongside, though never more than they have to.

[kellterntempest]

Uh oh Im gonna have to make that cursed arachnid eggman aren't i

[bulkyphrase]

Hey! I know you have a post containing Winter!Steve works, do you have any more to share with us?

I sure do! Below are few more stories that feature Steve as the Winter Soldier instead of (or in addition to) Bucky.

And if you haven't already, check out one of my earlier lists, Villain(ish) Steve, which features stories with brainwashed/reluctant villain Steve Rogers.

Thanks so much for the ask!

Sleeping With Ghosts by @rohkeutta, art by @cobaltmoony, @esaael (Stucky | Mature | 33,918 words)

Summary: The first two years after Bucky gets out of the ice are-- surprisingly easy. Serve his country, learn to use his charmed robot hand, make friends, don’t think about the spark of magic in him that’s gone out, see the world, try to live with the grief (try to live with the grief, try to--) Maybe they’re not that easy, in the end, but he’s settling - until he gets reluctantly pulled out of the Army and has Steve’s shield (Steve’s shield, its magic wary and curious and half-dormant) thrust onto him again, even though he’s already turned it down once before. The world has changed and so has he, but as he tries to immerse himself into a new life, he meets a ghost he could never leave behind.

Ghosts by Shaish (@shaishwrites) (Stucky | Explicit | 70,380 words | Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence)

Summary: What if Steve and Bucky both fell in 1944?

More below the cut!

who he might be by Mici (noharlembeat) (@eggsac) (Stucky | Mature | 39,938 words | Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death)

Summary: There are ways worlds overlap, and this is one of them, the tiny divergences that make us who we are, that run events the way they are. Bucky Barnes looks out at the world and he knows that he had always prepared for a world without Steve, but really, he didn't think it would look like this, like toxic lights and shining streets, like how every pulp book he ever read had shown the future. It's so brilliant. Bucky wants to just say, hey, Stevie, look. But Steve isn't there. Until he is.

The One Where Steve is Tony's Weakness by @jinxquickfoot (Gen | Teen And Up Audiences | 7,156 words)

Summary: Tony had come straight back the moment he’d received Natasha’s call. Three words—“HYDRA has Steve”. -------------------------------------- After surrendering himself to HYDRA, Steve Rogers reappears in Tony's life, forcing Tony to choose between his teammate's life and his own.

Folie a Deux by cloud_wolfbane (@cloudwolfbane) (Stucky | Explicit | 55,156 words | Graphic Depictions Of Violence)

Summary: When Bucky falls off the train in the Alps, Steve follows, and Russia gains two of the greatest assassins that ever lived.

every love story is a ghost story by lazyfish (@bobbiamorse) (Romanogers | Teen And Up Audiences | 10,451 words)

Summary: When Natasha is a child, she falls in love with the ghost story that is the Winter Soldier. When Natasha is an adult, she falls in love with the man that is Steve Rogers.

These last two are WIPs that haven't been updated in years, but I think they're well worth reading even in their incomplete state

Will the Real Captain America Please Stand Up? by @theoestofocs (Stucky | Teen And Up Audiences | 45,304 words | Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings)

Summary: On that fateful train raid in 1945, the angle of the HYDRA agent's gun knocked Steve back towards the ruptured wall of the train car. Bucky couldn't reach him in time. Steve fell. Bucky copes by crashing a plane. Seventy years later, Bucky wakes up, and finds himself in a world that's happy to let him take over as the new Captain America. He kind of hates it, but what's he gonna do? The real Cap, Steve Rogers, is long dead. (Right?)

Switched by @danveresque (Stucky, Bucky/Loki | Explicit | 40,649 words)

Summary: Bucky Barnes wakes up seventy years in the future, and everything is a few degrees off from where it should be.

[grapejuicedragoon]

Quick drawing of deicide AU Titanosaurus and Kamacuras A

Titanosaurus is an ascended spinosaur, he is a relatively peaceful kaiju feeding on smaller aquatic animals and sunbathing on beaches titano never willingly attacked other kaiju he preferred to lay low living a very quiet and peaceful life. Titano only began to attack after having a control chip planted into his brain by the scientist Mafune and given a sensory boosting drug causing him to constantly feel distress and anger. the monster became a weapon for the scientist and his alien allies. deep inside Through all the pain titano simply wishes to be free again.

Kamacuras Alpha a mutated praying mantis, the chemicals that mutated her and her brethren also gave them high intelligence. Kamacuras A at first minded her own business along side the other two hunting smaller kaiju and the local humans to eat. Really having no reason to leave her home island. After awhile of being an apex predator on her small island ecosystem she laid an eggsac that she carefully tended to daily. However a fight between godzilla and first stage mechagodzilla got dragged to the island and during the attack much of the island was ravaged and the eggsac was destroyed. This caused Kamacuras A to form a deep grudge against the mutant reptile which lead to her attempts at killing minilla and Jr though she never succeeded in her revenge.

mantis are my second favorite insects after beetles so i have a bias i promise i'll draw mothra and battra soon

[typhlonectes]

Celebrating Cephalopods

Dumbo octopus (Grimpoteuthis)

Pacific bigeye octopus (Octopus californicus)

Japetella octopus (Japetella)

Humboldt squid (Dosidicus gigas)

Black-eyed squid carrying an eggsac (Gonatus)

North Pacific giant octopus (Enteroctopus dolfeini)

Cirrate octopus (Cirrata) P

acific red octopus (Octopus rubescens)

via: MBARI (Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute)

[sparkmender]

Whats something about the Hive AU that you've really wanted to talk about but haven't gotten a chance to

Faeries are sort of a grab bag of weird stuff but generally speaking all moths share the same kind of moth body plan, all beetles have the same kind of beetle body plan, etc though there are of course size/weight/strength/color differences and other traits and things that lead to some wild variations. Basically if someone’s a specific kind of insect or arachnid, generally speaking they have the same number of limbs in the same place.

Except spiders.

There are two kinds of forms: Hearthkeepers and Hunters.

Ratchet is a Hearthkeeper, so he has a more drider like body layout— which is to say, he has eight legs coming from the junction between his upper and lower body, with his upper body being an upright torso with two additional arms at the shoulders, and his lower body being a thorax. Hearthkeepers are commonly associated with earth or fire magic, but they’re not limited to just the two. Lunar mage Hearthkeepers are nearly unheard of, however.

Tarantulas is a Hunter form, meaning she is primarily upright with two legs for bipedal motion and three sets of arms coming off of her torso (so two primary arms, and four secondaries). Hunter spiders are more active and athletic than their Hearthkeeper cousins, known for clambering around overhead and generally getting into things they shouldn’t. Most Hunter spiders find themselves beheld to moon or water magic, with the occasional wind affiliate popping up, but a Solar Hunter would be a very rare sight.

Hunter spiders are less common but there’s not a huge margin of difference between populations and they’re mutually compatible, so you can have mixed eggsac groups of both types. And sometimes you get even WEIRDER mixes with crossbreeding and you get a Hearthkeeper with four arms up top and four legs below, or a Hunter with a notable thorax (such as BlackArachnia).