INVERTIBRATES ON A PLANET WITH ONLY CATTLE? - Project Apollo(Cattle seedworld) Ep. 4
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- Опубліковано 29 чер 2024
- My Patreon: / alienevolution
Planet Apollo is an abandoned planet-wide cattle farm. The only vertebrates are cattle, but they're not all that's been evolving. In their shadow, invertebrates have been thriving. So what forms could insects take in such a unique ecosystem?
This is part of my seedworld series, Project Apollo. Seed worlds are planets that were 'seeded' with earth animals, that are then left to evolve independent of Earth in this new context. This can result in extreme diversification, reminiscent of Darwin's Finches or mammals post K-T Extinction Impact. Serina, a natural history of the world of birds by Sheather888/Dylan Bajda and Tales of Kaimere by Keenan Taylor are two examples of popular seedworlds.
Most insect groups could have representatives on Apollo, except for ants, wasps, termites and most parasitic groups.
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I definitely didn't cover all the insect species on Apollo in this video. Countless unique forms have probably evolved, thrived, and went extinct, which I might cover in future episodes. Let me know if that's something you're interested in seeing.
Sorry about how long it took for me to get this video out. I've been procrastinating A LOT, but hopefully the next video will be done a lot sooner lol
If you've got fanart you'd like shown in the series, post it in the / new r/speculativeevolution subreddit and I'll probably see it. But don't flood the sub of course, and I can't guaranty it'll be in the vid.
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Original concept by reddit user Bteatesthighlander1
Art by:
Dylan Roca
www.dylanroca.com/
adeerinasuit
Fanart by CrabdominalPain.
Credit to those who drew their respective images in the video, such as Keenan Taylor and Dylan Bajda. Most other images belong to me, can be found on Wikipedia, or are protected by fair use. Some have been modified/edited.
♫Music is from UA-cam's Creator Music and does not belong to me.
I watched a documentary recently that focused on sleuthing the reasons for the giant arthropods demise, and the oxygen rule is apparently not as strong as people think. Apparently meganeura (giant dragonfly) species existed all the way into the Jurassic.
I've heard that arthropleura grew big before the oxygen spike, which also implies oxygen to be less important for big bugs
There are biologists that put the limit of size for an open circulatory system closer to the size of a dog. Past that a closed circulatory system would be necessary...but there are examples of arthropods independently developing closed systems
The Dragon fly body plan being long and thin helps as well
As a ark survival OG player, I am both unsurprised and horrified by this
@@Alien_Evolution it also survived into the early permian
While oxygen levels do influence the size of arthropods, even our current atmosphere can support a cat sized arthropod. Coconut crabs are a good example of their potential.
They use wetted gills to respirate, right?
They use lungs evolved from gills to breathe.
In fact, it was the destruction of jungle habitat and competition with vertebrates that did the giant insects of the Carboniferous. They actually survived a bit into the early Permian.
I must admit.. I was prepared to come and correct you on the basis that insect have a different respiratory system from crustaceans....
Then I realized how stupid I was....
Because their circulatory systems are the same... And the only true problem with the insect respiratory system...is that it's not directly connected to the circulatory system.
But that still allows the possibility of growing to something around dog/cat size... And possibly even slightly larger.
Don't get me started on how wrong the exoskeleton argument against giant insects is....
So thanks I guess 😁
Crabs not only have lungs, but an specialized oxygen transport protein that insects never developed (on Earth).
Plot twist, the bugs became cows.
Everything eventually evolves into cow.
Without crabs to take inspiration from, cow has become the pinnacle of survival
Cow becomes new crab
cowcinization
Bug milk.
@@adorablecockroach5131 Honey Bees basically make bug milk already,
It might be interesting to cover cattle specializing in insectivory. You’ve only really covered the ones that hunt other cattle, and it doesn’t feel realistic to me to let such an enormous amount of protein go to waste. Loving this series, though! I can’t wait for more.
I definitely agree. Especially as cattle get smaller and faster, insect-specialists are almost unavoidable
Cattle already eat a lot of insects. When grazing, that's usually where they get most of their protein. But specializing in it is a good idea once they grow smaller
They could be like blue whales be really big but eat small food
anteater, arvark and sloth bear versions can be sick too look at
@@battledome3226that doesn’t work as well as whales are filter feeders which is only possible in water. consuming large amounts of small food on land is way more difficult.
Borrowing grasshoppers? The Seeders could have seeded the planet with many generations of locusts like those that swarmed the USA last year. If enough groups are seeded, there could be an annual invasion of locusts, which would compete with cattle for grass, but would also be a source of protein (& other stuff) for the cattle. The ones that aren't eaten will fertilise the fields.
One very important thing that is missing are trees. It's important to have places where cattle can protect themselves from the sun, & cows do eat fruits to add more vitamines (& other stuff) to their diet.
Since trees and are an evolutionary strategy for plants, it wouldn’t take a long time to one kind of grass adopt this strategy.
@@jmg10v49 I mean grass already did that here on earth!
I think there should be soy and other calorie dense plants that humans can also eat. They are often included in feed.
So the next episode is about mega fauna? What about "mega flora"? I'm intrigued what plant may take up the niche analogous to trees.
In the last video I hypothesized that, given that there is a thick layer of mycelium in the soil, some plants could evolve a mutualistic symbiosis in which the fungi would become the "trunk" while the grass above could grow and specialize in order to create the "Leaves ". Imagine a forest of palm-like plants that are actually two different organisms. Furthermore, to be habitable, the planet needs geological activity, which would form mountains, rifts and greatly change the morphology of the planet, creating new biomes and new adaptations.
Grass
Bamboo is a grass
During the time of the dinosaurs, ferns were the major plant. Fern trees existed at this period. So grass trees could possibly evolve.
Now, imagine some grasses and/or other plants (such as clover) becoming carniferns. Helping to limit the bug explosions that could occur.
@@vincenzopiras9765 fungi don't have lignin though so would struggle to transport water any significant distance upwards, they dessicate very easily
Armored cattle would be interesting. Possible in smaller species that need defense against predators. Something like a cow pangolin or armadillo. Could eventually lead to cow glyptodonts!
I can definitely see Asterionoides turning into a megafauna, they could hibernate like bears eating a lot then going into a great sleep.
The Asterionoide megafauna could be like an alpha to smaller Asterionoides,nor they can just be a mixed herd with some regular and some megafauna
I'll call the spider "Megarachne", meaning "big spider".
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Megarachne are you sure?
A sea scorpion with this name already existed in the Carboniferous period
Since that name already exists, paramegarachne meaning “near big spider” would fit well
YEAH
I think it should be named something to do with King David. (To ironically mirror the Goliath bird eating spider)
Excellent video! If you want more ideas for invertebrate evolutionary pathways:
. Krill evolving into a clade resembling Eurypterids
. Earthworm, Millipede and Spider clades returning to the ocean
. Pill bugs evolving into trilobite-like creatures
. Deep-sea gigantism among all of the above
. Dragonflies evolving bee-like hive societies
Hmmm yes I like this idea
Hoo boy, what wacky bovine monstrosities await us today?
Long necked cattles
Next Episodes*
I liked that comment because the video wasn’t about cows
It’s about bugs
I'd love to see the big spider called "Arctosatitan" Arctosa is the genus for the burrowing wolf spiders and you know what titan means so I think it fits pretty well^^
I was planning the giant spiders as wolf spider descendants(I don't think I mentioned that?) so that'd fit
@@Alien_Evolution i second arctosatitan, or maybe even titanocosa. will you be focusing much more on the invertebrates in the future? there is so much potential for them, like for example corpse feeding insects that set up some sort of pitfall traps for cows by burrowing or specialized spiders that attack like how big cats do, grabbing onto the back of the cow where it cant reach and biting.
also a side note, i feel like flying blood sucking insects like horse flys could end up being really successful evolutionarily, as their only real threat was arial predators like wasps and birds, which don't exist on the planet. dragonflies may be able to prey on them but they also need to stay near water sources to reproduce, meaning that they are untouchable when more inland.
@@hivehelepolis6591 I agree on the blood-sucking fly thing. I was actually considering a blood-sucking parasite for this vid
@@Alien_Evolution oh nice! good to know that im onto something with the fly thing. other than that, do you have any ideas/future plans for the inverts?
@@hivehelepolis6591 No major plans yet
For the grasshopper I propose "Neotitanoptera cicadaformi" Neo: new in Greek, titanoptera: a group of grasshopper-like priedator insects equipped with raptorial legs, cicadaformi: from Latin "cicada-shaped" for the wings and growth behavior.
For the spider genus:
Buculovenator: 'Calf hunter'
For the Grasshopper genus:
Legiogryllus: 'Legion Grasshopper/cricket', a reference to it's mass emergence behaviour.
Both are great names!
@@____________838
Thank you.
I was gonna say something to that effect. Something like Aranea bosinterfectorem (Cow-killing spider. I'm not very good at latin).
@@MrNickPresley I totally admit I got some help from Google Translate and some online dictionaries for both of those.
Seconding this
What about evolution of trees? Different plants on earth becomed trees, I think it's good idea
Who drew these arts? It's look very cool, before arts looked... not so cool
@@-SA-Dushes thanks man that totally doesn't hurt...
(jk lol. The artists are mentioned in the video description)
@@Alien_Evolutionoh, okey, I didn't saw it 😅
In the last video I hypothesized that, given that there is a thick layer of mycelium in the soil, some plants could evolve a mutualistic symbiosis in which the fungi would become the "trunk" while the grass above could grow and specialize in order to create the "Leaves ". Imagine a forest of palm-like plants that are actually two different organisms. Furthermore, to be habitable, the planet needs geological activity, which would form mountains, rifts and greatly change the morphology of the planet, creating new biomes and new adaptations.
@@vincenzopiras9765 it's really good idea
Here are my picks for the names: Deinoscelis (terrible legs) for the giant spiders, and Trypanogryllus (burrowing grasshopper) for the huge locusts
Also, I could see coleoid cephalopods like squid or cuttlefish moving into the niche left by fish (assuming they were among the plankton or aquatic life seeded)
Omg is the guy from planet of shark hello
I suspect several of those plants would evolve into tree, megaherb, and bamboo forms. And now I imagine arboreal cows. And flying squirrel cows. And flying cows. And burrowing mole cows.
To get such diversity, you would first need the cows 🐄 to evolve into smaller forms that are more flexible.
@@UniDocs_Mahapushpa_Cyavana Alternatively have one of their stomach chambers grow extra large and fill with hydrogen produced by symbiotic bacteria giving us balloon cows that fart-jet through the sky.
The foot long spiders could be called cowlions (like ant lions, which dig burrows and hunt ants, but these hunt cows so you know)
Their scientific name could be neopalpares, meaning new ant lions
I think their family would be short-lived. They'd have an early advantage to grow and specialize, but while they get large to hunt larger, some cattle would become small to hunt smaller. Much more efficient cat-sized predatorial cattle would out-compete them eventually on most scenarios, with competition normalized, all the same weeknesses that prevent massive invertebrates to take up that niche on Earth would eventually apply to Apollo.
Lame name
YES! new cattle video!
I found this series recently when I was craving some seed world content and it's really been able to scratch that itch. Great work so far with this project! Can't wait to see where you take it :)
The drawings of this episode are soooo good
Yeah! I commissioned the art, and the artists did an awesome job
Something like brontorachne, maybe. Meaning thunder spider.
I think the manatee cow should evolve into a gigantic whale like creature
This really makes me want and root for humanity to conquer the stars and become interstellar...only because I want a planet to become like this and see what happens lol
This is such a cool series! I really like the idea of the grasshoppers being the major population of insects in a cow world. A lot of species of grasshoppers have the tendency to transform into locusts during rapid changes in the enviroment and when there are a lot of grasshoppers around at the same time. The planet is probably reigned quite a bit by the locust presence, since swarms of locusts can easily devour entire forests. Also, depending on the size of the grasshoppers, their predators (mainly the spiders) must be huge in comparison. Maybe some species of spiders later specialize in a carrion heavy diet, it would probably be easier to eat carrion than to hunt grasshoppers. Maybe some species of spiders evolve into a symbiotic relationship with some species of cows, helping manage pests (like gadflies, mosquitos, etc) and the cows provide places to live and help distribute their species across the regions.
There's so many possibilities, I just find this project very interesting! Especially if you start bringing bugs into this world, bugs are just so endlessly fascinating and there are just so many niches they can easily fill (to help or compete against the cows) Can't wait to see more!
Id call the giant spider "megalokumonga"
Fantastic Art and Amazing Video as always!! :) 👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏 ❤️💖❤️💖
Thanks!
@@Alien_Evolution You’re Welcome 🤗
Didnt know people did it like this. I always had the idea of only leaving the weirdest mammals reptiles and birds(other groups remain unchanged) on earth. Sloths, echidnas,anteaters,kiwi,koala,American opossum,platypus, lake Baikal seal,tuatara,giant tortoise, alligator snapping turtle, colugo, kakapo, all penguins, all bats, hummingbirds and pandas I think that would be a sick scenario. Imagine penguins moving inland into an Africa devoid of predators while another group moves into the seas permanently
That'd be really cool. I'd love to see a project like that, with lifeforms specifically picked to create an alien enviroment
Well, if we presume that pillbugs are brought to the planet, it could be likely that species of pillbugs along the coastline could fill in coastal niches and grow to much larger sizes (akin to terrestrial crabs or the close cousins; deep sea isopods).
Please discuss how the plant life of this 'Cattle World' will evolve.
I'm guessing...*GRASSES* will evolve some sort of defense to deter cattle from munching on them too much, maybe some 'Serrated grasses' will become common? or grasses that can grow back very fast? Or what about some Grasses that will slowly evolve into 'Aquatic Grasses'.
the noticable jump in quality of the artwork is great, keep it up!
next video should dive on seeing how plants start evolving in this world, like some evolving defenses around their leaves, or some of them starting to evolve to fill the niche of trees
For the spider: Gigarachne ushioni, after the Japanese spider demon with an ox head
For megafauna: a shout-out to Dougal Dixon's gigantelope with massive horns used for digging up roots, and an indricothere-like cow with moose lips for eating giant tree-like grasses
Felix aranea, for that first spider. Literally just 'lucky spider'
Amazing video!
I can't wait to see what aquatic invertebrates are doing with the lack of fish!
The giant grasshopper i don't have a name for but the giant clawed spider could be"dienoaracnae" with a certain species of it being "megacarnoaracnae ferox"
i suggest the mega spider genus to be Caroficedula "latin for flesh eater" or possibly gigantarachne "from gigantic and the greek mythological figure arachne"
I imagine if dung beetles weren’t introduced, other beetles or perhaps crickets or isopods would quickly fill that niche.
since there are no tall trees or shrubs, i'd imagine that the horns of larger cattle would be some of the best spots for a spider to build a web. maybe this could become a symbiotic relationship similar to oxpecker birds and buffalo, wherein the cow keeps the spider and it's eggs safe (while attracting bugs with it's dung and wounds) while the spider keeps pests off the cow.
the lack of trees would also be important in the development of megafauna, as the only things to be gained by growing that tall (like a giraffe or sauropod) are insect swarms and a vantage point to spot predators. i'd imagine that non-predatory megafauna would be more like whales, in that they passively eat a huge amount of tiny food (grass or insect swarms).
i love this series btw, can't wait to see where you take it.
I'd love to see giant crab shrimp! Also, what would happen to these grasslands over millions of years? Would any develop into forests? It would be cool to see an arboreal cow species evolved for climbing trees! I think accounting for massive environmental shifts over the eons means that you might even see deserts, tundras, and other biomes form. A cow living in the desert might even begin to tunnel under the sand to escape the heat and find roots and water, eventually becoming subterranean! But yeah, very cool series thank you!
Wonderful video! Thank you for the opportunity to make some illustrations for this one (the spider and the color of the grasshopper). I cant wait to see what’s in store for the future!
This series is so cool! Keep up the good work!!!
About insects i would like to see what praying mantis have evolved into (since they were introduced). They look soo cool like little aliens! On a planet with almost no competition they could take trully alien shapes! Also about insectivore cow i think that something in between anteater and pangolin could work (long tongue, elongated face, somewhat armoured head so insects cant fight back, large hoofs made for digging in the ground and smaller size than a typical cow). I trully love the concept of seeded worlds and this one is really unique!
Regarding megafaunal cattle, you're going to want include a lot of elephantine traits - thick, column-like legs with a reduced number of toes and nails and, depending on the climate at the time, a means of regulating body temperature. For hot climates, this means heat sinks like dewlaps, wrinkled skin, large ears, or anything to increase surface area; behaviorally, this means wallowing in mud or staying in the water. For cold climates, you're looking at thicker and multiple fur coats of different types, reduced extremities, layers of body fat, and a means of potentially clearing away snow; behaviorally, this means huddling together for warmth or using the reflecting nature of snow to retain body heat.
Holy shit, the art style took a massive jump in quality! Those insects looks really nice, congrats
please keep going, I love this series and I'm working on a weasel world
I myself am an artist as well as a hobbyist reseatcher who love Zenobiology and world building and studies all the sciences for fun, I would be glad to discuss me helping with the series
With massive cow heards, I can well imagine their first "predator" would be a insect parasite.
I find it kinda funny how all of the plants you named are clover or closely related, being in the same subfamily as clovers. If you’re interested, since you’re covering megafauna next, some bean family plants are trees like the redbud. Maybe the bean/clover family of plants will be the first to develop into trees on a world of grasslands? Maybe the vegetation being out of reach results in larger animals? Maybe the beans get larger and we see an avocado/giant ground sloth relationship?
Maybe the spider could be named something like "megaphobia", since arachnophobia is the most common fear and that were some big ass spoders
I could definitely imagine some of the Invertebrates evolve to a size of small tortoises or coconut crabs.
Imagine a full swarm of tortoise sized beetles following the cattle wiles migrating
I think that invertebrates in water could grow to be truly giagantic. We already have fairly large aquatic invertebrates right now with no competition they could be larger and they have gills as well.
I'm liking the sound of "Giganlupus" for the giant spider, translating to "Giant Wolf". I noticed how you intended the spiders to possibly be descendents of Wolf Spiders, so I thought the name would be fitting
I am loving this series, do you think you'll do a video on how the plant life would diversify? The plants would also be attempting to develop ways to avoid being eaten by the cattle and insects.
Forgot about this series, gotta put on all notifications. I'm sure this will be as interesting as real life insects.
To get most of the diversity, you would probably need the cattle 🐄 to first evolve into small niches, as they tend to be a lot more flexible than the large ones.
I think for most of the big changes, you need to decide on one or a few cow lineages that evolve into a small generalist. Which is then the ancestor to a wide variety of stuff down the line.
Also, plants constantly evolve into trees 🌲, so adding multiple trees in would be a good idea.
Amazing series! Love it every time you upload.
I'd love to see some spec evo on the plants of this world, eventually. Without any major covering plants (aka trees) and with multiple examples on Earth of grasses evolving tall, tree-like structures (palm trees an example of this I believe) it's a completely open niche they could probably very easily exploit.
With how relatively-uniform the planet's climate is across differences of latitude, I can imagine that, without bark-consuming animals (which would not have been imported since there were no trees for them to eat, with any sneaking their way on losing the trait or dying of starvation), you'd get a similar situation to the carboniferous period, with gigantic forests and nothing to digest them. I wouldn't be easy, since there's no way that would all happen without some interference from the post-bovine (and some of the larger post-arachnid) species, but it would still be possible.
For the large spider (this is more of a meme than anything serious) they could reference the sea scorpion genus thought to be a giant spider (Megarachne). Maybe Eumegarachne (true great spider), Pseudomycterops (false-Mycterops, type genus of the family that included megarachne) or Eurypterimimus (sea scorpion-mimic)
Also Grasshoppers could diversify further, adopting niches of its relatives like crickets and katydids as detritivores or even predators
these bug drawings are really good
A thought occurs to me... With enough time would there be a possibility of tree analogues forming? And would there be a possible elephant, giraffe or even sauropod like cow that could feed on them?
More on invertebrates would be lovely!
One thing I recoment for when you go back into the carnivorous cows is to look into mesonichids. They were a group of ungulates sister group to cows, pigs and whales that had a lot of omnivorous to carnivorous members, and their carnivorous members would range from pig presenting, to super nimble pig presenting (think indohyus), to canine and even civet presenting carnivores or insectivores with sometimes not even just claw like hooves but their hooves reevolved back into claws.
And they didn't go extinct because of modern carnivoran competition but climate change killing their prey and/or themselves.
So have fun with that!
And yeah, thinking about what pressured would make cows make their hooves smaller and redevelop fuctionality on their back toes, it's the water. Since hooves add drag to swimming and more fingers make better paddles.
Perhaps perhaps branches of either or both aquatic cows had relatives that when straddling the line where land movement isn't too cumbersome radiate back into land as more hippo esque hoove using all four fingers cows that can not only be quieter and more steathy on land if such traits forced them down to digitigrade if not even plantigrade walking, but also with smaller modification like they taking more claw like forms allow them to exploit the niches of grass trees that rise up.
I think hoofed would still likely have the advatage of being better endurance runners than these though, and if anything they could force them to be small and insectivorous. If the pressure to just move well on a inland radiotion isn't enough somehow, catching fast nimble insects could be the ultimate presure for them to slowly morph into almost carnivoran presenting animals for the job.
5:11
Four great options to name the spider:
1- Theraphosaltis (jumping Tarantula)
2- Oryctaranodinos (terrible spider rabbit)
3- Aracnolepus (spider hare)
4- Theraphovulpes (tarantula fox)
AHH this was so good!! Loved it so much man❤❤❤ look forward to more!!
Do you think the predators would evolve leaner forms if rabbits or deers were introduced maybe even moose?
i could imagine that the crickets have a mice like niche as nymphs and the name could reflect that: Caelimures, this means like "heaven mice" in latin and comes from the scientific name of the crickets.
I love watching this series. The designs are amazing. Keep it up!
It's always exciting to see this update
I love your videos!! I really look forward to part 5 :) Please dont stop making content
For the non scientific of the spider 5:19 what about the clawed spider
Maybe give dragonflies somewhat of a filter feeding adaptability? Would make an interesting challenge to have that and deal with air drag too
I'm glad UA-cam took the time to educate me on the Apollo Space Program before this speculative evolution video.
Bro I can't believe I missed this by 7 days but I'm pumped this subject always interested me and these vids make my day
An important factor to note is that as the cattle and invertebrates such as grasshoppers specialize more, some grasses and other plant species are bound to give rise to the planet's first trees due to there being less grazer overall. We'd see the first forests on Apollo in the first million years.
FINALLY!!!! I was waiting for so long
Imagion Large Cattles swapping from grass to evolving large and long sticky tounges for swipping at large swarms of prey! Maybe they even evolve to squat on their hind legs and stand on them. focusing more sturdiness in their hind legs and evoling long scuer like horns for fighting off certain preditors. They could be able to easily crush large spiders with their giant feet which might evolve extra toes for stronger grip on the ground. and their front hooves evolve into knuckle walking claws~
I really do love this series. And it's what got me into speculative biology in the first place
5:06 DinoAracne.
5:27 Phoenix grasshopper
For the giant spiders I might suggest “Magnaranea”. It literally just means “Great Spider”.
This is right up my spec evo ally. Thank you and amzing job!
I've been waiting for this for weeks
Massive congratulations on the 15k! I really enjoy your videos!
Thanks!
Omnivorous cattle would be a neat concept focusing on cattle that eat plants, meat and well basically anything they would be opportunistic eating smaller cattle and invertebrates beside plants
We all are eagerly waiting for the next episode 🔥Can’t wait to see some giant Elephant-like Cows
5:20 uhh greater arachnophage?
5:31 forfexus can be the family name and mmm
Bladed locust?
Also AMAZING WORK!! I still dont understand how people draw bugs 😅
Btw when you talked about big insects and showed a grasshopper i immediately had flashbacks to jurassic world dominion
_So that was fun._
Keep up the groovy speculative stuff!
I think another interesting concept for dragonflies would be them undergoing neoteny similar to the grasshoppers but to a further extent, staying as nymphs their whole lives and thus growing much bigger than their original adult forms.
I love this series a lot
Amasing work,keep going your gona get big on youtube
I like that UA-cam just put the wikipedia page for Apollo, they sure want to help you.
I think I even turned off automatic context for this video so I have no idea why that's still happening lol
@@Alien_Evolution Well now you need to make space cows man, at least cow people that want to go to space.
Thanks community note, really helpful
Like you, I also enjoy speculating about biology. I've been thinking about what the world of wolves and rabbits looks like lately
I'd watch a series about that!
Right, the arthropods are also here, interesting ideas
this is one of my favorite spec evo series! i love cow!
5:11 Butcher Spider sounds like a good name, since it eats baby cows on the occasion
And subscribed! This such a unique and fun idea to explore, im looking to where you will be taking this series
i would like to point out bamboo, Sonchus palmensis, and scalesia these are ALL very close to the plants listed above YET all looks like tree or act like trees, I would suggest that the plants diversify and evolve into these large tree like structures, this forces the cattle to evolve into megatherium/Paraceratherium. Also i would imagine a lot of the plants could evolve tuber/shoots/roots that become dense with nutrients that support a species of subterranean wombat like cattle
YESSS COW WORLD!!!!! seriously loving this
Given that burrowing is a natural way to escape predation it would be awesome if we could get an insectivore cow that digs around in the dirt with its horns. Sorta like the Gigantelope's antlers in After Man. Maybe they even shove their long straight downward facing horns into holes and then lick them clean with an elongated tongue. Sort of an anteater niece but they specialize in grubs instead of ants.
Great video!