And people keep whining about Yukkuri not having a place in an ecosystem. A place can and will be found - and this is just another example of another part of nature finding a place above and with them.
Also, now i can't stop imagining Yuka, Meiling or other smarter types using these things in a symbiotic way somehow. Yuuka/Meiling/whoever guards the 'easy house', other yukkuri desire to get in, Guard leaves for a moment... other yukkuri leap at the chance only to find it's a trap! Dunno quite what the Guard yukkuri would get out of it though - mebbe they eat young shoots or whatever the plant puts out (because i don't know if these types of plant put out fruits or berries of any kind)
They have always been food, that hasn't changed, but the problem is what they eat and how much they eat. I suppose yuka can eat some of the drippings. It might be more parasitic because even without the guards the sweet smell will attract yukkuris as in this case. Though having guards does increase its attractiveness.
Well, we've seen way back around the first appearance of Meiling (Guarding the blocked cave with Remi in it) that yukkuri tend to assume meiling's are guarding something worth taking/invading/whatever. Thinking about it, maybe what the Guards get are protection? They can probably build a nest near/under the plant as long as they avoid the traps (and this is why it'd only be something that smarter or more naturally disciplined yukkuri could take advantage of). obviously other yukkuri likely to, y'know, kill the young and take over, would probably not be smart enough to avoid the traps.
You're right about protection, sweet type yukkuris will just go for the food instead of the nest first since the dripping smells sweet and meilings don't eat sweet. I stand corrected on them not having a place in the ecosystem. Though I still think they're a hazard on how much they eat.
I'm positive animals will find the sweet taste of yukkuris quite delightful. :p
I for one feel like yukkuris are more like groundhogs or rabbits, in which they will form a community and look out for each other. Those too weak to survive will die off, and the rest will be incorporated into the eco-cycle of nature with predators (bobcats, wolves, snakes, etc) at the top of the chain as usual. Since yukkuris are omnivores, they will probably eat the same stuff small animals do... bugs, fruits, nuts, etc.
Mei-lings would make good lookouts for said community. :p
How nutritious are sweet bean pastes? I doubt carnivores would like them very much, they would eat them but how much could they digest of them? Herbivores too. When animals rummage through trash do they eat sweets because it attracts them or because it's there.
That would be the main reason that 'every animal kills and eats yukkuri' is impossible. Hell, given that Chen types are filled with chocolate, most common animals that eat them would then die from chocolate poisoning. (Remember, chocolate is poisonous to almost all birds and mammals, including humans, it's just that the lethal dose is VERy dependant on mass and body chemsitry. Humans, IIRC, would theoretically need to eat something like 24lbs of the stuff before it's lethally poisonous.) This, along with the spicy 'bad taste' (to animals) of meilings, the poison of medicines, and i'm sure there are others, means that yukkuri predation would be significantly based on filling (as animals would, over time, learn which ones to avoid eating.)
The main division in terms of filling, then, is between 'sweet' (Marisa, Reimu), 'Savory/meat' (Remi, Flan) and 'Milk' (Alice, Patchy) filled yukkuri as depending on filling different animals would be attracted to them. 'Sweet' Yukkuri would by far be more susceptable to larger insects, expecially wasps and hornets, which are attracted to sugary substances. There are also a number of herbivores which greatly enjoy sweet foods - horses and pigs being two i can think of offhand. Most of these sort of animals, however, are of the domestic variety. 'Savory/meat' types, being er, Meat... pretty much any carn- or omni-vore would desire them. But the two big yukkuri of this type, Flan and Remi, both fly and nest high up making them difficult if not impossible for most predators to get. Thus i'd assume their main risk would be certain types of bird as well as lizards and other reptiles. Finally, 'Milk' types. There are *hundreds* of animals which go for custard and creams, even if it's bad for them and even when not necessarily hungry, which makes these type by far the most vulnerable to random predation - Alice Rape tribes however work similar to the defense of fish schools, simply meaning the more there are in one place the less chance any given alice is targeted.
Types aside, the biggest real yukkuri killer in terms of predation would be verminous animals such as rats - who will eat damn near *anything* - and the like. Though this would be far, far more of a risk to gutter trash in a city than it would be to those out in the countryside.
for reference, the 'poison' in chocolate is theobromine, and depending on chocolate type between 8oz (240g) and 1lb (500g) is enough to make sick and possibly kill a 44lb (20kg) dog, and almost definately kill anything smaller. Obviously some mammals, like rats (again) either are immune to it or simply don't care about dying from it and will eat the stuff anyway. Not sure how big one would imagine a Chen type to be, but at the very least eating one would make most animals not want to eat one again.
Concerning chens, remember most animals are actually dumber than yukkuri. A family dog I had growing up would eat chocolate at every occasion it was left out. He would get sick every time, and after 10 years never learned his lesson.
Most animals are smarter than yukkuri, because they are well aware of the fact that big bipedal creatures aren't something to be messed with. Besides, a dog that craves chocolate is the same as a human that craves nicotine: both are highly addictive but ultimately poisonous. People who feed their poor mutts with chocolate are fucking retarded.
^Thus why I say "left out", as in accidentally placed within his reach. Also, alot of animals arn't afraid of big bipedal creatures with guns, like Bears and Wolves.
I understood that it was left out and I didn't imply that you fed your dog chocolate, good God. XD Also, most big-ass animals aren't afraid of humans either. Until it's too late. Yukkuri, on the other hand, are small (most of them), slow and without fangs, claws or other goodies. I guess they're in the same league as small rodents. But small rodents have enough sense to steer clear of big, noisy, stompy things like humans - unlike retarded yukkuri.
Rodents are afraid because they don't know what humans is. Yukkuri, in addition to knowledge about "mister", speak the same language as humans. They approach because they are social creatures. While this means they maintain trust in the safety of the unknown to the point of stupidity, it's a tad better than the human response to a mysterious being (which can also be other races of humans), which is always violence. Thus the 18th century fad of slavery. Whites might do the same to yukkuri were they useful for anything.
Human response is survival first, and mysterious creature being dead makes survival much easier to achieve. Yukkuris are more we are invincible, you can't hurt us than trust in unknown.
WTF? How the hell did we cross from chocolate to slavery? XD As Gitami says, human reaction to the unknown is based on self-interest of survival. Yukkuri are too damn thick to even consider that. On the other hand, I don't think they're really to blame - their biology makes learning-by-mistake nigh impossible.
>>Thus the 18th century fad of slavery. The history of slavery is longer and more complicated than just that. This isn't the place for long, involved discussions of history, so I'll just leave it at that.
The thing about yukkuri stupidity, though, as I've said elsewhere, is not that they're not afraid of humans, per se; animals that have never encountered humans are frequently trusting of us. What makes them stupid is that even after encountering humans, and the violence that results, they still aren't afraid. The fact that they haven't adjusted their attitude also points to stupidity, since it causes a lot of the violence.
In a normal animal, a healthy fear of humans and a change in what gets them killed would have developed by now. For instance, rattlesnake roundups have led to there being more rattlesnakes that stay silent and still when humans approach them rather than assume there customary defensive posture and rattle, since that got them captured.
There should have been enough generations of yukkuris by now for something that to have occured. But it hasn't.
^Lack of evolution is really due to the artists not wanting to expand upon their easy prey. That's why I lauded the comic of the marisa eating the rabbit, as a self-preserving yukkuri is really a step in a new direction. Also, when humans bring violence against yukkuri it is usually in the comfort of the human's home, and no survivors are left. How can you expect future generations to learn from mistakes that supposed ancestors would have died from before mating? The wild yukkuri that do live and have surviving children very obvously have never encountered an Onii-san.
Involving artists in this discussion is breaking the 4th wall. We work with that which is considered canon. Besides, even THAT comic is non-canon. But there are certain stories which show that some of those yukkuris who survived Oniisans managed to learn something out of that ordeal - for example, "Reimu's mute babies". But the species itself hasn't progressed one damn bit - they'll still attack the lairs of big bipedals who could easily crush them or eat them. That shows how hopelessly retarded they are.
Far be it from me to fall upon the 'easy' answer, but i've had it thrown in my face on other issues so... hey, why not try it myself?
'Magic' They can't evolve 'cuz magic keeps them as they are.
Right, that out of the way. I'd take issue with the idea of the species not progressing, as they have in several ways since they first came about. Admittedly not entirely *effective* ways... but when you compare animals to humans there's not a lot of ways, currently, any animal could evolve to take a human on equal footing anymore. The best most manage is striking through surprise, poisons, or through berserk states after which they often die anyway. Yukkuri suck at surprise, and at berserk states (well, though they may go berserk it's largely inneffectual). Through biological methods we have a few (utsuho, medicine, possible eirin) and unique attacks to some (mokou, iku) but by and large yukkuri have no hope against humans. There was some bandying about early on about psychic waves 'n shit but... bullshit to that, if you want to be honest - it never struck me as even vaguely likely at all. Now, how has the species as a whole progressed? simply put, some have learned. Yuka's who farm are generally accepted by most humans. 500-yen Marisa was shown defending her owners property, and the flower-badge Reimu, while gullible, looked after the owners house to a point where she knew how to receive a package on her own. (otherwise how would she know she'd need the stamp to show it had been received?). The problem, however, is that these Yukkuri only really seem to advance intellectually while in captivity because, sadly, a smart yukkuri in the wild is often one to be taken advantage of (or outright killed for 'not taking it easy') by others.
Contrary to belief, Yukkuri must be *ferociously* smart in certain - very limited - aspects. Many Yukkuri have shown a remarkable grasp for what are otherwise complex things that a human child (which most equate to having a similar level of intelligence) have little hope of understanding. Sadly most of this comprehension is focuses on realizing how they've just been made to despair, but hey it's still comprehension. Hell, gutter trash yukkuri beg for money - unless they had some inkling of the value of money they wouldn't bother to do so.
@Theo Good point on the 'not scared of humans'. Take a look at the Dodo for an example, having had no predators *ever* it was made extinct within a year or so of humans and their pets finding it, simply because it didn't know to be afraid of them.
There have been evolutions in Yukkuri, if you know where to look. Hell, the fact that some have adapted to a gutter trash lifestyle is not much short of an incredible change for a species to go through in so short a time. most animals retain their wild instincts in the cities, which gets them in trouble often, wheras gutter trash yukkuri have reached a point where, i expect, if you took a gutter trash to a country 'easy place' it would die in days or less due to not being able to survive out there. We also see more yukkuri using sticks as rudimentry weapons against other yukkuri (and some humans/animals). That's quite a change from being convinced they in and of themselve could take on others with ease, they've learned that pointy stick == easier dead enemy. And they've passed this on as we sometimes see whole families with pointy sticks. Sadly, they have a long, long way to go before they have a hope of seriously worrying a human. And their base mental philosophy is the biggest problem, anything that improves itself is generally seen as 'not taking it easy' and is killed by the rest. If yukkuri seriously evolve as a species, it'll be done almost entirely in captivity.
^ I just want to point out, I'm fine with yukkuri evolving socially to start using pointy sticks to try and defend themselves (Like how they also will pick up small rocks in their mouths and spit it at enemies for a projectile attack), but some things I've noticed recently that have been... creepy to me, from a Canon standpoint. - There was a comic where Flans and Yuukas that were living together in a massive horde, which violates the "Flandres and Remiya are loner, predatory-type" yukkuri bit. - A bodied Flandre that had strength beyond that of a human and used a wooden spear (Not a pointy stick), which is completely un-yukkuri (and, to be honest, more like the normal Flan, except she'd use Laevatin) - Yukkuri that have long memories, Due to that, according to canon, the Yukkuri should only have a memory of a few hours, due to the paste inside them cycling about. And Bean Paste in general being a very bad way to store information :-P - Talk of Yukkuri able to break through a solid fence to get at a concealed garden, when a Box is capable of reducing a bodied Remiya to tears and calling out for "Zaguya~!!" - Rapist Alices producing non-Alice children iirc.
Also, the whole Poo & Pee things just never made sense to me, since what they eat is supposed to be added to their filling, increasing their mass.
also, some quick things I just wanted to make a point of before I pass out from exaustion (Sorry if I start getting weird, it's been about 36 or so hours since I've been able to sleep and my focus is lacking.) >>"Also, when humans bring violence against yukkuri it is usually in the comfort of the human's home" Not necessarily true. Akyu goes out of her way, for example, to find and torture Yukkuri, as well as many wandering anon that just pass a yukkuri on the road. Not to say they don't kill Home-Invading yukkuri (Still wondering how the hell Yukkuri get in there with no arms/legs and their skin is about as hard as bread), but I wouldn't really say it'd be "Usually"
>>"and no survivors are left. How can you expect future generations to learn from mistakes that supposed ancestors would have died from before mating? The wild yukkuri that do live and have surviving children very obvously have never encountered an Onii-san." Very true. Just a Quote for Truth. Yukkuri are very slow to develop socially because they're main ideology is to take it easy, not to necessarily protect themselves (If everything/everyone took it easy, there'd be no reason to have to be afraid of getting killed). When people turn dangerous, Yukkuri have no way of telling them apart, nor a way of telling apart where a place is already claimed (keep in mind, they're not bright. Pre-existing Furnishings and food would just be a godsend to a normal person that walked into a cave.) unless someone is already in there, so when people turn violent against them, it completely destroys any possible useful knowledge that they could share with others, like "We can't take it easy in that house." Instead, an entirely new family of yukkuri expand into that area, and will most likely make the same mistake. Yukkuri may be pests to some people, but they have shown a capacity to learn at least somewhat (Like AD's example, Yukkuri learn that sticks can be used for defense. Or 100-yen Reimu [I miss those comics btw. Swirly~eyes @.@] arguably was the first YukkuReimu to learn the value of money), which makes them at least one step above a swarm of Locusts, which I think someone called them a while ago.
It's lauded about that yukkuri become arrogant and selfish, but they don't know any better. It's entirely possible that they have been treated for most of their lives as a cherished possession/pet. If you were to take a normal person, and give them lots of food and care, feeding them only what they like without anything demanded of them, then it's understandable that they'd begin to get an ego. Unfortunately, we only see the points long after this would have occurred. At that point, the comic usually begins, and the yukkuri is often killed in an extremely gruesome way, often to the cheers of many people who call it justice (I, admittedly, often fall into that group. Especially if it's an Alice dying. I don't like Alices, especially Rapist Alices), but without showing if any discipline measures were taken. If a dog knocks over the trash and roots through it, one doesn't normally kill the dog. Nor does one kill the dog if it sits there and begs for food at the dinner table. It's difficult to gauge a Yukkuri's intelligence, especially since it's a massive variable, with Patchy's being smarter and Remiya's being famously dimwitted, but I still think the general public here would Troll about and kill a yukkuri that did either of those, even if it was a first offense.
Sweet Baby Jeebus, this ended up a lot longer than I thought it would. I'm sorry if this doesn't make sense. Like I said, about to crash.
Commenting on the Flan and spear thing, a spear is a logical progression from a pointy stick, and hands - if you have them - are the natural progression from holding stuff in ones mouth. Now, i don't have a problem with a flan using a spear - since it's basically a pointy stick and it's basic use (put the pointy end in other people) is simple to grasp. Now, if the flan *made* a spear i'd have issues, since i don't think yukkuri - even bodied ones - have pregressed that far. Using a spear a mister made, or it found or, heck, just using a longer pointy stick seems more likely, but i wouldn't expect it to do anything more fancy than 'poke stuff with the end until they die' with it.
Yukkuri memory, low, but you forget all Yukkuri also have a genetic memory - most known by as in the fact that koyukkuri know usable (if slurred) language right from the start without, like other animals and humans, having to learn it. This means it must be pre-programmed, and if that is then other concepts can over time become pre-programmed too. (IIRC some ammo stuff had yukkuri being taught not to shit to embed 'not shitting' in their genes. That's taking it too far, as you can't simply *halt* a biological process like that, but the idea is the same.) It's also shown (with that Reimu that kept getting Youmu in trouble) that artificially slowing filling circulation means a higher memory (an thus intelligence) for a yukkuri. We can extend this to DOS types, generally shown to be far smarter than normal types, by suggesting that their bean paste simply moves much slower, or the effect of it's movement is much less, due to their size.
Weirdly this 'pre-programmed' (and non-forgettable, otherwise yukkuri would keep forgetting how to talk) memory is a MASSIVE evolutionary advantage - when a new skill, trait or whatever makes it into this genetic memory then all koyukkuri born from that point will have this knowledge at birth meaning that, unlike humans, knowledge gained this way is *never lost*. It would be like having every human baby born knowing everything stephen hawking knows - the only direction humanity can go in his field of science then is up because you wouldn't have knowledge going missing over time and you'd be saving the, y'know 50+ years he spent having to learn all that in the first place. The only problem is, the very limited bean-paste memory is a massive evolutionary stepback which, for now, counteracts the advantage of genetic memory and likely will for many, many hundreds or thousands of generations.
>>some ammo stuff had yukkuri being taught not to shit to embed 'not shitting' in their genes. That's taking it too far, as you can't simply *halt* a biological process like that Granted, they never actually succeeded in making progress in that department.
>>It would be like having every human baby born knowing everything stephen hawking knows - the only direction humanity can go in his field of science then is up because you wouldn't have knowledge going missing over time and you'd be saving the, y'know 50+ years he spent having to learn all that in the first place As nice as that sounds, there would be enormous class differences. Dumber people wouldn't be able to get smarter, give birth to dumber people, and we'd end up with 3 billion geniuses and 3 billion expendable labourers.
@ AD Well, true. I agree that I don't think yukkuri are capable of creating weapons. But I still have a problem with the Flan-type using a spear. Specifically, the Remiya and Flandre types, considering they'd have no need for such weapons, since they have a powerful bite attack. I'd imagine it'd be similar to a raptor deciding to use a club over it's claws and fangs. Bodied China? I can imagine holding a large pointy stick. Tewi types? They've been shown to use fireworks, so why not? But not Predator-type yukkuri. Also, I tend to think of Flan and Remiya types as rather stupid for Yukkuri in general, being located on the lower end of the intelligence spectrum easy. There might be freakish examples, like the Orphan Alice Flandre, but that one and it's children were all killed by Komachi summoning Yukkuri-Ghosts on them.
As for Yukkuri Memory, the Filling circulation was what I was referring to. Also, it's worth pointing out that the original Yukkuri weren't able to poo, pee, had Peni-Peni, Mamu-Mamu or Anyu (Or whatever the hell their ass is called). Those were illogical modifications to the Yukkuri, since Yukkuri are supposed to consume food to create paste to grow quickly, the ability to convert food into liquids (for pee) or solids that are to be expelled would be self-defeating, because it'd remove their mass, and should, in theory, make them shrink. It'd be like pooing out Muscles (Since they require bean paste for memory, attacking and to a small extent, movement [more filling should allow it to grow larger, which should let it bounce further]) Also, @This, Part of the reason they never made progress is because they killed off yukkuri that had nothing to do with the problem, remember? There was a yukkuri that had tried so hard to hold it in that it died from the pressure and it's poo shot out. Then the Mister had gotten the other two Koyukkuri killed by Mother Reimu (when it tried to remove the butt plugs)
back to @AD That thought of Evolutionary advantage would only come about if the skill in question became part of the Genetic Memory, which I don't think has happened yet. So individual yukkuri, while able to know how to say "Chake id eajy!", hop around, and able to do basic functions like Cry or eat on their own, I don't think they can learn how to write (outside of Reimu's Reimu) or do other things like math. And yes, the fact they have Paste for Brains makes it likely they won't be able to add new information to their skills easily.
Oh, and before I forget, someone was mentioning how Chen and Medicine (and such) types would be dangerous to animals, but I think the Yukkuri Ecosystem (w/e) Makes that threat low by just not making a lot of them. Like Ran, Chen, Mokou, Keine, Tewi, Reisen, (and so on) are all exceedingly rare outside of the Basic 6 mentioned (Marisa, Reimu, Patchy, Alice, Flan & Remiya) + Meiling-types. And Technically, Flan types should be rare as well, with Remiya being the overwhelming Majority, due to Flan types keeping Remiya types in check (Remiyas are afraid of and bullied by Flan types), and Remiya types keeping the Majority of Yukkuri Types (Also including Chen and Medicine and the like) in check by eating them and converting toxic substances into meat filling.
So the ideal Yukkuri Ecosystem would be Yuuka types grow plants -> Reimu, Marisa & co. Eat plants and multiply -> Remiya keep landbound Yukkuri population in check -> Remiya checked by Flandre I'd imagine that, if there were too many Flan-types, Remiya (with the Sakuya types, mostly because I like Sakuya types) would keep them down.
In regards to genetic memory, i think it would be safe to assume that any yukkuri action which has become repeatable by the species as a whole made it in. Such as Marisa using their hats for boats. Once a few started it, suddenly every Marisa thereafter seemed to know how to do it. You could probably mix this with a bastardized form of morphic knowledge (seen in reality, with sheeps escaping cattle grids - within a day or two of one discovering how to do it *every* sheep knew how to do it, despite everyone swearing blind there was no possible way they could have communicated this information in any perceivable way). Once an action enters genetic memory, every applicable yukkuri born thereafter knows it. Otherwise we hit major problems with the super-short-term filling memory, because if they were just relying on filling to remember some of this they would be forgetting about sticks / hat-boats repeatedly and having to relearn from scratch each time - which we've never seen them have to do in any stories/pictures. HOW or WHY information somehow makes it into this memory though... hell if i have any idea. Maybe if enough Yukkuri know the same thing at the same time or something it just sorta... happens. (okay yeah, my ideas fall apart around here. heh.) Obviously specific types have certain preledictions to certain skills. (marisa and her hat-boat, youmu's are often shown being better with pointy sticks, flying types know how to fly, meilings are born with guard discipline, etc)
@This Class differences? Although i admit my example was a bad one, i think you misunderstood. When i said every baby i meant *every* baby - regardless of the parents intelligence.
Artist: "This is a fun idea. I think I'll draw it."
You people: "Genetic memory! Evolution! Class differences! Pre-programmed! Biological processes!"
Hot damn, your science is killing yukkuris. Artists just want to show them doing cute things or torturing them. There is no grand scheme of evolution for yukkuris, just artists coming up with new things to draw.
^ Lol, and to think it all came from someone commenting how Nature would adapt to taking in Yukkuri. Yukkuri: Heavy thinking Easy. I think the main idea was taken off track when the talk of slavery was being floated around.
We just like to keep our Yukkuri-based minds sane (And I like to keep it in line with what's established in the original works). That, and it's a great time killer.