In fact, those pastures were not grass at all; they were the tall stalks of a semi-terrestrial plant, more closely akin to so-called blue-green algae (cyanobacteria), that survives its march up out of sea water by forming dense, root-like, rhizomous subsoil mats that wicked water and dissolved nutrients upwards from the (saline) water table. In a unique adaptation, excess salt is excreted in small beads that form at the tip of each stalk. Almost no stands now exist, because under True Church direction, all of the Saint George plain and most of the Oquirr delta were quickly put to the plow, followed by pivot irrigation and drainage systems to combat soil salinization. Once the rhizome mats are destroyed by plowing, stands do not regenerate.
It was the plowing of these algae fields that led to the first contact (and conflict) with Swenson’s Ape colonies. Early on, construction and agricultural activities in close proximity to colonies themselves did not seem to result in anything but excitation among the Lesser apes. However, the first team to run gang plows through adjacent “grass” stands met with a quick and bloody end. Swenson was fairly certain that this algal grass was a primary colony food source, and that the attacks on humans had been made in defense of “colony-owned” fields. Thereafter, colony clearances were conducted as part of plowing operations. Colonists were quick to identify and pick off the “watchdog” species; thereafter, the other Greater Apes generally fled. The commensals were more problematic: colony clearance was generally followed by a local population explosion. Considerable effort went into their subsequent extermination, generally by gassing and poisoning.
This provided Swenson with hundreds of specimens of Lesser Apes for dissection and analysis, and he came to a startling conclusion. In brief: primitive blue-green algaes require and utilize selenium and iodine as powerful, highly-soluble antioxidants, readily available in sea water, to excrete excess oxygen during photosynthesis. However, this becomes problematic on land: because it is highly soluble, selenium quickly leaches from soils, especially under conditions of high rainfall—or artificial irrigation.
In general, terrestrial plants cope with the absence of these antioxidants by manufacturing their own, such as ascorbic acid, polyphenols, flavonoids, and tocopherols. However, some terrestrial plants, like aquatic seaweeds, actually accumulate and store selenium and iodine, and the New Utah algal grasses are among these. In these “grasses,” selenium uptake is regulated in the rhizome mats. Hence, when the mats are destroyed, so is the uptake mechanism—and thereafter selenium is quickly leached from the soils.
Also in general, terrestrial animals can and do utilize many antioxident forms, as well as sequestering trace amounts of selenium and iodine in the thyroid gland, or its equivalent. However, in the case of Swenson’s Apes, or, at least, in the case of the Lesser Swenson’s Apes, selenium deficiency resulting from collapse of access to the algae fields was especially dramatic in its effects on reproductive hormonal regulation. Absent selenium, “love dart” manufacture all but stopped. Initially, this resulted in increased oogenic (“female”) hormonal levels and “feminization” of the population (since no female hormones were being withdrawn from the body for dart manufacture). At the same time, reproductive drive increased, as did copulation rates. Given the total number of live births, Swenson postulated that hermaphrogenic reproduction also took place, but he was unable to prove this. In any case, the immediate effect was a local population explosion. However, the second consequence of selenium deficiency became manifest in isolated individuals: spontaneous, habitual abortion and miscarriage. Outwardly, apparently “female” Swenson’s Apes gradually sickened and died, as internal egg and sperm stocks were repeatedly fertilized, aborted, and reabsorbed.
Conclusion
So again, why this bizarre reproductive physiology? Our research resources here on New Utah are, to say the least, limited, and I am more historian than xenobiologist, but I will draw some tentative conclusions from what I know of old Earth specimens.
Chimerism and hermaphroditism are most common in (especially) aquatic species characterized by low population densities and high potential birth rates. These include angler fishes, marine and terrestrial mollusks, and other animals that live in isolated populations that rarely encounter one another, including some of the lower primates. In these animals, chimerism and hermaphroditism ensure that multiple germ lines are carried within each individual, maximizing the potential for genetic diversity with each “chance” encounter—or, in the absence of an encounter, via hermaphroditic reproduction within the “individual” itself. A Swenson’s Ape colony is, in effect, a “gene bank,” representing germ line biodiversity far beyond that of the number of its members.
The prevalence of these modes of reproduction in Swenson’s Apes, plus their apparent dependence on selenium for efficient reproductive regulation, suggests two things. First, that we might well search for maritime origins for this bizarre set of creatures. Their physiology is certainly more akin to that of widely-dispersed benthic mollusks than that of terrestrial mammals. Second, that these animals are reproductively adapted to extreme and variable conditions.
The paucity of indigenous flora and fauna on New Utah has been the subject of much conjecture, but little science. We suspect that we may now be experiencing a climatic optimum, but we have no way of testing that assumption. Basic geology has not even proceeded to the point of developing local radiometric curves. We have insufficient samples to establish normative carbon isotope uptake and decay, so we cannot validate radio-carbon curves for carbon dating. Similarly, we have not yet established local thermo-luminescence norms. Even if we could, we have virtually no paleontological record to draw from—let alone any archaeological record or deep-time historical sources. Thus, we can only construct a circular argument: we presume that climate in the past has been subject to extremes, in part because Swenson’s Apes’ reproductive physiology is so well suited to surviving them.
More importantly, we might well take a lesson from what we do know: the observed practices of Ape colonies. We should investigate methods for re-establishing selenium-concentrating algal fields for livestock forage and local nutritional supplementation. Doing so would eliminate New Utah’s dependency on imported fertilizers and vitamins.
And lastly, we might well ponder: Swenson insisted that these were not mere animals, but sentient creatures like ourselves. When faced with destruction, some Swenson’s Apes fled. Where did they go? So much of New Utah remains unexplored by science that perhaps, one day, we will be able to ask them ourselves.
Acknowledgements
I owe debts of knowledge and gratitude to many people who informed the science behind this story. Special thanks are due Aleta Jackson of XCOR Aerospace, for providing personal tours of the world of privately-financed space tourism, rocket planes, Mohave Spaceport, and the XCOR Lynx production line. McArthur fellow Prof. Guillermo Algaze of the University of California, San Diego introduced me to the early complexities of Mesopotamian accounting, trade, industry, and labor systems. Professor Lisa Levin of the Scripps Institute of Oceanography illuminated the improbable world and reproductive habits of benthic mollusks. Finally, the owners, operators, staff, and impeccable security teams of Neareast Resources kept me alive and safe amidst the chaos that was postwar Iraq. My debt to them is unlikely to ever be repaid.