Pokémon Mountain Biology: from Base to Summit

By Bandkrook. Released: 2021/10/27.

Introduction

Hello, and welcome back to Pokébiology! I, Bandkrook, will be the article host once again! As seen in some past Pokébiology articles like Pokémon Marine Biology and Pokémon Biology: Deserts, Pokémon live all across the sea, from the clear and crystalline seashore to the deep and dark abyss, and they roam the vast deserts of the Pokémon world. Our subject of study for this article will be the mountains! Mountains are giant landmasses, usually formed by the convergence of Earth's tectonic plates. Studies done on Mt. Coronet confirm that's how the huge mountain chain that divides Sinnoh was formed. They can also be formed through volcanism, when lava erupts into the Earth's surface, cools, and solidifies, forming mountains like Stark Mountain and Mt. Chimney.

Mountains are very unique when it comes to their fauna and flora. Their ecosystems are segmented and divided by altitude. A particular set of Pokémon tends to only exist in one of the mountain's segments, as the conditions both above and below are inhospitable for them. This layering of ecosystems is called altitudinal zonation. Over the course of this article, I'll be covering the five main ecosystems present in mountainous regions: Warm Forest, Deciduous Forest, Boreal Forest / Taiga, Tundra, and Cold Desert.

Art by Zephyri.

Warm Forest

As we start our climb up this biome, we are greeted by the warm forest. Here temperatures average at 84°F (29°C), the vegetation is tall and broad-leafed, and the humidity is medium-high.

Emolga

Emolga's popularity may be derived from its chubby face, big ears, and small body attracting young Pokemon trainers, especially the Lass and Lady classes. Emolga is so popular in the Unova region that even "The Shining Beauty" Elesa, the Gym Leader of Nimbasa City, uses two of them! But what makes Emolga popular among scientists is its ability to glide. Emolga is a mammal, and cases of flying mammals are not unheard of: just look at the Zubat and Noibat families. However, unlike those bat Pokemon, Emolga isn't capable of free flying, also known as powered flight, meaning it glides by using unpowered flight. Powered flight uses the Pokemon's muscles to generate aerodynamic force, producing lift and thrust. This allows it to fly without any gust of air present. On the other hand, unpowered flight relies on external factors, like wind currents and jumping from high altitudes to glide. What allows Emolga to glide is a structure called a patagium. This membranous structure stretches from Emolga's wrist to the end of its body, right above the ankle, and along with the Pokemon's tail, it provides a stable form of gliding and landing on tree branches.

Because Emolga's form of flight is unpowered, it can't glide for long. Despite this, we see Emolga glide for as long as it wants to when battling. How comes it can stay up in the air without a single flap of its patagium? Research made on Emolga found that it uses the naturally produced energy stored in its cheeks to glide indefinitely! By receiving Electric-type attacks, either from teammates or enemies, and using its Hidden Ability Motor Drive, Emolga can glide faster and for even longer periods of time!

Many scientists speculate why Emolga have evolved to be gliding squirrels and not just normal tree squirrels like Skwovet. Some say it's related to energy efficiency and foraging. This way, Emolga simply glides from one tree to another as opposed to climbing down each tree to then move onto the next. This makes it so it can cover larger forest areas in less time than other tree squirrels. Pokemon like Skwovet have to risk dangerous leaps in the air, which, if unsuccessful, leave them hurt and vulnerable to natural predators like Thievul and Galarian Linoone. Others say its a mechanism to avoid nearby predators. If Emolga finds itself ambushed by a wild Galarian Linoone that managed to climb a tree, it can simply glide away and hide itself. When it glides, Emolga also scares away bird Pokemon with its electric shocks, stealing their Bug-type prey. The patagium also helps Emolga to adjust its position mid-flight if it does a miscalculated leap, and opening its patagium and decreasing velocity help Emolga escape from predators safely by preventing it from hitting trees with too much force.

Pikipek

When searching for food, Pikipek will first find an opening in the tree trunk where it can position its beak in. It then proceeds to drill into the wood repeatedly and with such brute force that, if it wanted to, it could snap the tree in half! Pikipek's long and thin tongue then enters the crevices and holes in the tree trunk to search for food. Its diet consists mainly of insects, like Caterpie, Wurmple, and Ledyba. It has also been seen hunting other Pokemon, such as Treecko and Seedot, and stealing Pokemon eggs from various Pokemon and berries from Skwovet.

But Pikipek's tongue is long for another reason also. Because it can peck wood with such force, its body evolved in a way to protect its brain from severe damage that would occur due to the repeated and rapid hits. Pikipek's tongue is so long, it goes all the way around its skull when its beak is closed! Not only that, its bill is composed of three layers of protective tissue, its skull is made of a very strong and compressible sponge-like bone, and there is very little fluid inside of said skull, preventing Pikipek's brain from moving back and forth when pecking. Some other adaptations from Pikipek's body are its short and strong legs with four toes, which allow for vertical climb, and a stiff tail, which gives it support when climbing and pecking trees.

Pikipek and its evolutions are capable of drumming, a weaker form of pecking used to establish communication between them. This has been an increasing problem to Alola's big cities in the past years, as populations of Pikipek are being forced to leave their habitat in the mountain base due to deforestation and pollution. Pikipek's habit of drumming can be used not only on trees but also houses with wood structures, lamp posts, and even concrete buildings! This drumming habit greatly disturbs the citizens of Hau'oli City and those across Alola, raising questions about whether or not humans are pushing the boundaries this world has set for them when it comes to occupying nature and its surroundings.

Deciduous Forest

Moving on to the next mountain zone, we find ourselves among tall trees, with broad-leafed vegetation and medium humidity. 59°F (15°C) is the average temperature for this mountain area. Here the trees are deciduous, meaning they bloom in spring, they stay green during summer, and their leaves turn shades of red, orange, and yellow during autumn and start to fall. Finally, they become leafless during winter and the cycle restarts.

Decidueye

Decidueye is this biome's apex predator, meaning it is at the top of the food chain and has no natural predators. Its incredible combination of traits make it the best hunter in this forest. Its eyesight, legs and talons, beak, and coating culminate in this silent yet mortal predator. Decidueye likes eating rodents, hunting and locking them down with its menacing signature move, Spirit Shackle. By pinning its prey down with its feather arrows, Decidueye makes sure they can't escape, even before reaching them. Don't be fooled by its menacing traits, though. When caught by surprise, Decidueye gets really clumsy and can fall from the tree branch it's standing on. It just goes to show how even the most cold-blooded hunters still have their weak points!

Undoubtedly, Decidueye's most powerful adaptation is its eyesight. Its eyes are large and forward facing, and they give Decidueye a wider range of binocular vision (seeing an object with both eyes at a time). This means Decidueye can judge distances in a similar way to humans. Its eyes are so well developed they are in fact not even eye balls, but actually elongated tubes. These tubes are formed by rod-shaped cells appropriately called "rod" cells. These kinds of cells allow for more light to come in, letting Decidueye see further. For this reason, Decidueye can't "roll" or move its eyes; it can only look straight ahead. But it makes up for this by being able to rotate its head up to 270 degrees, left, right, or even almost upside down!

Up next we have Decidueye's beak. It is curved downwards and short, in order to keep its field of vision clear. It is extremely sharp and sturdy, perfect for picking apart its favorite prey: rodents. Pokemon like Alolan Rattata, Bidoof, and Minccino are all meals Decidueye particularly enjoys eating, even if it has to go the extra mile of hunting them down without the use of Spirit Shackle, since they're Normal-types. When locking them down, Decidueye uses its powerful talons and muscular legs to pin them down against the ground instead of using its feather arrows. It then lowers its head and pulls apart the prey's organs as it consumes their flesh.

Lastly, Decidueye's feathers and leaf hoodie have special adaptations to aid it in its hunting. Its feathers are specially designed to not make noise when gliding. Their edge isn't straight like other feathers, but instead ridged, like a serrated knife. Straight-edged feathers produce a gushing sound when against wind, whereas comb-edged feathers muffle the sound and allow for silent flight. Decidueye uses its leaf hoodie to help it focus on its prey by tightening it around its face, and it is made from leaves it collects from trees. The hoodie stays green all summer and spring long. During autumn, biologists discovered that Decidueye's hoodie turns shades of orange and yellow so it can stay camouflaged. And when winter comes and the trees lose their leaves, it hunts without a hoodie. Fun fact, the "leaf" on top of Decidueye's head isn't a leaf, but a plumicorn, also called a "tuft". It is a display feather, used to indicate Decidueye's moods, such as happiness, anger, and fear.

Boreal Forest or Taiga

As we move onto the next mountain segment, summer, spring, and autumn are significantly colder, and winter becomes a lot harsher. Here, the average temperature is 33°F (-1°C), the vegetation is coniferous (the leaves are long, thin, and needle-like), and the humidity is medium-low.

Ursaring

Ursaring have been documented eating just about anything. You'd expect such a big Pokémon, clocking at 5'11" (1.8 m) tall and 277.3 lbs (125.8 kg) to be a voracious carnivorous predator, but Ursaring's meat consumption makes up only 10% of its diet. The other 90% is composed of Berries, honey, mushrooms (Foongus are its favorite), insect Pokémon like Mothim and Dustox, and flowers! Ursaring's extremely tough claws are specially designed to dig for underground roots, even under frozen soil, and its jaws are capable of smashing tough Pokémon like Seedot and Pineco. Ursaring living near bodies of water have also developed special teeth capable of tearing off the shells of crustaceans like Corphish, Krabby, and Clauncher with a lot more ease. Most of all, Ursaring absolutely love eating Seaking. Despite them only spawning between late summer and early fall, Ursaring feast on them during this period. Seaking are full of fat and proteins, explaining why Ursaring are so big. However, due to their short period of spawn, Ursaring can't rely on Seaking all year long, explaining why its diet is so diverse: it has to compensate all the fat and proteins from a Seaking with other, smaller forms of food.

Ursaring's closest living relatives are Cubchoo and Beartic, with Pancham and Pangoro being a bit less related to Teddiursa and Ursaring. But wait... what about Stufful and Bewear? Well, those two aren't even in the same family! Stufful and Bewear are the only members of the Aluridae family, whereas Ursaring, Beartic, and Pangoro are all part of the Ursidae family. Ursaring is also the only member of the Ursidae family known to hibernate. When hibernating, Ursaring is capable of recycling its body's proteins, allowing it to prevent muscle atrophy. During this period, Ursaring's heart rate drops from the usual 55 to 9 beats per minute, its body temperature declines about 3 to 5 degrees Fahrenheit, and it uses all the fat it stored through summer and fall to keep itself alive.

Lycanroc

Lycanroc's population has evolved in a very interesting way over the course of history. Instead of evolving by itself, it evolved alongside their prey, like Sawsbuck. During winter, Deerling and old or sick Sawsbuck oftentimes have difficulty traversing through snowstorms and end up serving as prey for Lycanroc. As cruel as this seems, this helps the Sawsbuck herd get rid of genetically unfit and diseased individuals, removing genetic failures from their lineage and helping the species survive. This hunting also prevents other species such as Stantler and Bouffalant from becoming overpopulated, as these species can overgraze their habitat and disrupt the ecosystem's balance when their populations become too big.

Scientists used to believe Lycanroc's body was made purely of rock. This confused them for the longest time, as rocks are naturally good heat conductors, meaning Lycanroc's body wouldn't be isolated from the taiga's cold at all during winter. Turns out, Lycanroc's actual body fur and mane are made of a substance known as mineral wool. Man-made mineral wool is made by melting rock and spinning it, making extremely fine strands of molten rock, which then solidify, looking like wool. This man-made version of mineral wool can stand up to temperatures well above 1000°C. Lycanroc's fur and mane obviously cannot stand as much heat, but they works just fine as insulators, preventing it from getting cold in winter and too hot in summer, as the taiga can still have relatively hot summers. Lycanroc have also been documented living in hot deserts, and their manes help them cool off even more, aiding them in standing the desert's blazing hot temperatures.

Alolan scientists were baffled to find Lycanroc's fur was also made from the same material as Alolan Dugtrio's hair. Commonly called "Pele's hair", Alolan Dugtrio's hair is made from elongated droplets of molten rock, which cool and form strands of what we call volcanic glass. Scientists believe this could be a case of convergent evolution. Take for instance Vivillon and Noivern. Both have wings, right? Yet, they have very little connections to each other. Vivillon is an arthropod, while Noivern is a mammal. Convergent evolution states that species, even if unrelated, individually evolve in shared ways to adapt to their environment despite having no close relation to each other. In this vein, despite being very different species, Lycanroc and Alolan Dugtrio evolved in similar ways to withstand the extreme temperatures they face, with Lycanroc facing harsh winters and Alolan Dugtrio living very much near burning hot volcanoes.

Tundra

We are finally reaching parts of the mountain that do not contain trees. The vegetation here is well-adapted to the frost and is characterized by small plants like grasses, bushes with small flowers, and mosses, which escape the high-speed winds due to their closeness to the ground. There are only two seasons: winter and summer. The average temperature is -5°F (-20°C), and the humidity is low.

Frosmoth

While the tundra has only small forms of vegetation, Frosmoth is crucial to the environment. It acts as one of the ecosystem's very rare pollinators along with Pokémon like Delibird. Their roles are extremely important for the tundra, as the harsh winds alone can't take the pollen from the male flowers to every part of the mountain range to fertilize the female ones. Frosmoth and Delibird are attracted by the beautiful colors from the flowers and their nectar. As they consume the flower's nectar, pollen from the flower sticks to their body, and when they fly, this pollen spreads to other parts of the mountain the winds don't reach, like narrow valleys. Without them, the tundra as we know would not be able to exist.

Shifting the focus from Frosmoth's ecological role, let's talk about its biology and morphology. Frosmoth's wings are completely covered in special scales, and when light hits Frosmoth's wings, it reflects in a way that makes them shine, almost blinding the enemy. This happens due to the scales's microstructure and occurs through a process called structural coloration. To simplify it, light usually travels in straight lines and is reflected by surfaces in a single angle. However, when it reaches Frosmoth's scales, their structure messes with the way light reflects, making it reflect in more than one angle.

Cold Desert

We have finally made it to the mountain's peak! Temperatures are below freezing all year long, with an average temperature of -22°F (-30°C). Winds blow at even faster speeds, every form of precipitation is snow, and the climate is very dry.

Cleffa

I know, I know, who would've thought little and seemingly fragile Cleffa could ever inhabit such extreme places like the summits of mountains? Turns out Cleffa are way more resilient than you'd think! Scientists speculate it came from space, as when meteors showers occur, Cleffa sightings increase and they can be seen dancing all night in circles around the summit of Mt. Hokulani. Mountain summits have very scarce sources of food due to their extremely low temperatures, high-speed winds, and intense radiation levels. This means only a few species of moss can survive, commonly known as "cushion moss". Scientists believe this is one of Cleffa's only food sources, and that they have adapted through the years to become herbivores. Since their body mass is very low, they need less energy to survive, and they can spend weeks and even months surviving on nothing but cushion mosses and dew. However, they have been seen covered in colored powder near Minior shower sightings. Scientists wonder what that fine dust could be.

Secondly, we don't know if Cleffa actually came from space or if it's just a weird case of a Pokémon being a lot more tough than it looks, but one thing is certain. Cleffa could be the key to solve one of the longest mysteries in the history of science: where does life come from? Over the course of many years, scientists have tried to find where life came from. Was it generated through a series of chemical reactions between oxygen, nitrogen, carbon, and hydrogen? Or maybe, life came from space! For an organism to survive the extreme conditions of space, it would need to be extremely resilient: it needs to be able to endure extremely low temperatures, take high intensity radiation, and spend a long amount of time without any food. Doesn't that sound familiar?

Problem is, the conditions of a mountain summit, while very harsh, cannot compare to those of outer space. Temperatures in mountain summits average around -22°F (-30°C), whereas temperatures in outer space average around −454°F (−270°C). Yup. Very improbable for Cleffa to survive that. Not to mention, Cleffa's body would be too exposed to survive for more than a couple seconds in space. It would need a way to protect itself from the low pressure and radiation, like some bacteria do when they are in disadvantageous environments. Said bacteria are capable of creating an endospore, a tough structure that can protect them. Sadly, no studies show Cleffa being capable of creating such endospores, and even if they did, they most likely wouldn't be able to withstand outer space's conditions. Cleffa's case is quite frustrating, since it has the necessary traits to theoretically survive outer space conditions, and yet it falls short of meeting said conditions. Some rumors have been going around of a secret experiment where scientists aim to send Cleffa to space and see how it reacts. But for now, its origins remain a mystery.

Aurorus

Aurorus were originally found deep inside frozen caves in mountain summits long, long ago. Their bodies were perfectly conserved, encased in ice crystals for about 10 million years, their faces serene as if they knew their time hadn't come yet. As scientists melted their coverings and Aurorus slowly regained their consciousness, they let out roars that made caves tremble and ice stalactites fall and crash. As the scientists fled the cave, they reported seeing the most beautiful aurora ever, with glimmering sparkles and shades that ranged from deep purples, to turquoise, to blue, signaling Aurorus's return. Despite their newfound discovery, questions still remained: why did Aurorus encase itself in ice for so long and what is their connection to those hypnotizing lights?

Studies show the Aurorus living close to mountain summits were indeed encased in ice for millenia, since their bodies show signs of atrophy and they have less muscle mass than revived fossils collected from Kalos, which didn't stay frozen and were instead brought back by using DNA extraction techniques. One of the reasons for Aurorus to encase itself in ice before going extinct is, of course, a last resort to keep itself alive. The whole point of existing is passing your genes onto the next generation; that's what we do and that's what Aurorus did to survive. And it worked.

Now, you may ask yourself: what is up with those pretty lights in the sky? Where do they come from and how does Aurorus mess with them? First, let me explain their origin. Auroras are caused when hydrogen atoms around the Sun's surface get extremely excited and their protons and electrons are projected at blistering speeds right into Earth. Normally, that would damage our atmosphere, but Earth's magnetic fields distorts said particles and makes them follow the Earth's own magnetic field, which is strongest in the poles. The pretty colors come from those particles hitting nitrogen and oxygen atoms in our atmosphere and making them excited; however, they don't like being in that state for very long, and they quickly release that energy in the form of light in different frequencies, which produce different colors.

Aurorus can mimic that by using Hyper Voice at lower or higher frequencies, making it so protons and electrons from hydrogen atoms around them go flying into the atmosphere and form auroras. They most likely use this as means for communicating at longer distances, with their sails changing colors to match the sky.

Conclusion

Mountains from top to bottom are extraordinary, and they show us that even the places we thought we knew the most about are full of secrets and exciting discoveries! Be it how we are connected to those ecosystems or how their inhabitants survive, mountains for sure have no shortage of new Pokémon to find and study. I hope you have enjoyed this article, and I'll see you next time, bye!

HTML by oizys | Script by HoeenHero.

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