Poker Lore

Glossary

  • Albumen: Egg whites, protects and provides nutrients to a growing embryo in an egg.

  • Barometer: Scientific instrument that measures the change in air pressure in a space. May be used for weather prediction.

  • Batrachotoxin: A toxic compound found mainly in poison dart frogs. Paralyzes the muscles and heart of those afflicted by the poison.

  • Endotherm: An organism whose body temperature is regulated internally, rather than externally, warm blooded.

  • Gular Sac: A sac that lies above the sternum of a poker, used for mating display in males and producing milk in females.

  • Monotreme: A prototherian mammal group, known for laying eggs and secreting milk through pores, among many other rudimentary features.

  • Morph: A poker's toxicity level and hue of their patches.

  • Pleicher's Organ: Organ in the poker's digestive system, stores bacteria capable of producing proteins that surround and neutralize batrachotoxin.

  • Sodium Channel: Proteins on the membrane of neurons that selectively releases and captures sodium cations. The movement of sodium ions in and out of neurons, and the polarity of the neurons external environment and internal environment, allows for action potential.

Taxonomy

Pokers are monotremes, a group of mammals known for laying eggs, among other features seen in the early mammals and their ancestors. Modern day monotremes in our world are the platypus and echidna, both of whom have beaked faces, poor eyesight, and a sprawled gait. It's believed that much of the mammals in the Late Cretaceous Epoch were monotremes. Monotremes would begin to dwindle with the advent of their more "complex" relatives, the marsupials and placentals.

Looking further into the phylogentic tree, there are two broad categories that can describe the monotremes of the Poker universe: the orinithorhyncoids and the anuramimids.The earliest known ancestor of all monotremes, Teinolophos trusleri, had teeth throughout all stages of its lifecycle. However, the ornithorhyncoids (platypuses and echidnas) lost their teeth as a result of their diet, only growing teeth for a short window of time in embryonic development.The anuramimids kept their teeth, as their diet of fruits and meats require them. As such, anuramimids also lack a beak, instead having a fleshy mouth with a cleft lip lined with sensitive whiskers. Their faces are squat and similar to amphibians, hence the name "anuramimids" (frog like).

For the sake of brevity (and because there's a lack of info yet on Proanuramimids), we will focus on the stars of the show: Toxocherians.

Biology

Toxocherians, colloquially referred to as "pokers", are slender bodied creatures that live most of their lives in the trees. As such, their body is well adapted for climbing, sporting a prehensile tail and opposable thumbs on both the front and back feet. Pokers can stand upright but also take on a quadrupedal stance if need be, thanks to their slacked knees. The species also lacks pinnae, the membrane surrounding the ear, and rely on the specialized hairs around their ear to funnel sound into it.The most common, as well as the most successful, species of poker are the Pinstriped pokers (Toxocherius lineatus). Despite their name, pinstriped pokers are not limited to having stripes on their body. In fact, the species is extremely variable, thanks to selection pressure and near-speciation.

Dermal Mucus Patches

Pokers have a suite of unique physical characteristics, some of which are independently evolved. The most striking feature of the species are their colorful dermal mucus patches, areas of the skin that lack hair and are lined with epithelial cells that secrete a mucosal covering.This covering is thick and contain batrachotoxin, a toxin they derive from their diet. Batrachotoxin is a real toxin, found in animals like the poison dart frogs of South America and a few species of birds endemic to New Guinea, where pokers are mostly found. When batrachotoxin enters the bloodstream, it irreparably forces open the sodium channels of nerves, causing muscular paralysis and heart failure. Even in doses as small as one hundreth of a milligram, batrachotoxin is lethal, and there is no known antidote for it.

Pleicher's Organ

If pokers derive the toxin from their diet, then how are they not poisoned? Pokers have an entirely new organ, one of which may have been derived from tissue of the spleen. This organ, the Pleicher's Organ, is connected to the digestive system and lymphocirculatory systems. When a poker eats an insect containing batrachotoxin and digests it, the bacteria in the organ secrete molecules that wrap around the toxin, making it unable to bond with the poker's sodium channels. Then, the wrapped molecules enter the bloodstream and are stored in Pleicher's glands on the dermal mucus patches. When the poker feels threated, these glands open, releasing the packaged batrachotoxin which becomes unpackaged once in contact with the slightly basic dermal mucus.

Why would pokers put them at risk of being poisoned, let alone grow an entirely new organ? Because humans don't exist in the world of pokers, much of the predatory megafauna of the past such as megalania, thylacoleo, thylacines, and quinkana aren't extinct, still roaming the earth and terrorizing the poker species. What pokers lack in muscle, claws and teeth, they make up for in their poison, and their brightly colored bodies tell their predators to be wary of them.The poison is also a nifty insect repellant, especially during wet seasons where disease vectors run rampant.

Gular Sacs

On the chest of pokers are large hollow organs called gular sacs. These sacs lie above the sternum of the ribcage and are connected to the stomach via a network of valves. All pokers, monties, mollies and moseys otherwise, have a gular sac, but how this sac appears and it's functions differ based on the biological sex of a poker.

In monties, the gular sac is much like the golus seen in frogs and howler monkeys. The gular sac inflates with gases produced by chemical digestion of plant matter. When inflated, the dermal patch on the gular sac changes color, indicating to onlooking mates (and competitors) the male's health and testosterone.Monties also sport a pair of long canines. These canines are weaponry, weapons of which allow them to puncture and pop the other male's gular sac during fights for mates. When a male's gular sac is popped, it runs the risk of exposing their gastrointestinal system to the bacteria of the outside world.

In mollies, the gular sac is split down the middle by a border lined with specialized mammary glands. In the previous segment, it was mentioned that the Pleicher's organ's bacteria are responsible for creating the valuable packaging molecules. This bacteria isn't something pokers are born with, and they can't acquire it through means of their diet in the wild.So, a mother poker becomes a donor, and will regurgitate some of her digesta, along with her own Pleicher's bacteria. The digesta is broken down by extretions of the glands, and transformed to a fluid similar to milk. The mother feeds her young by regurgitating the gular milk in her young's mouth.

Dorsal Sail

An extraordinary feature of pokers is their sail. Sails are ridges, extensions of the bony spine of vertebrates, and can be seen mostly in aquatic animals yet rarely in terrestrial ones. One example of a terrestrial species with a sail is the iconic, but extinct, dimetrodon. Little is understood what the purpose of the dimetrodon's sail was, but it's theorized it may have been a way for the synapsid to regulate it's body temperature, or may have even been a Fisherian runaway.The same assumptions could be made in pokers, however the sail is found in roughly the same size in both in males and females. Like all mammals, pokers are also endotherms, but like monotremes, might struggle with maintaining internal body temperature due to their metabolism. The sail could be a way for pokers to radiate excess heat away from the vitals, as their ecosystem tends to be very hot year round.

One fascinating observation about the sail of pokers are their internal structure, which is comprised of several grooves and a saline fluid. The presence of the fluid suggests the sail may serve a far more unexpected purpose: a built in liquid barometer.The rainforests of New Guinea are prone to cyclones, floods and other storms. For a creature who spends most of their life in trees, finding shelter quickly is paramount, and having an internal barometer could give pokers an edge in sensing storms before it's too late.

What is "Intersex"?