Ankylosaur

The Anklyosaur, when compared to other members of the Saurus family, is short and robust. They only stand about as tall as a man, though are long and massive in size. Their head shape, with the slicing conical beak, hardened, with powerful and large robust grinding teeth in their jaws, helps indicate their role as a low to the ground grazer, stripping branches, ripping up water and nutrient rich root systems and stems of ferns and horsetails, finding their sustenance from the lower to the ground foliage, keeping them out of competition with their preferred companions.

Their eyes are placed on the side of their skull, in sunken spots, where their thick dermic armor and hide have formed an almost protective ridge around them, and thus they rely less on their own eyesight when it comes to detecting predators. However they have a robust nasal structure and in the field do seem to have quite a sensitive and well honed sense of smell. This would further explain this species herd-like behavior with Iguanadonts, as they benefit each other greatly in this sense, covering a sensory weakness for each other.

Their bone like dermic armor, the robust hide and studding seen all along their side and back, continues down their robust and muscular tails, ending in a large ball or bulb like protrusion of a solid nature, which has been documented both as having applications in intraspecies conflict, such as competition between males during mating season, as well as being a defensive weapon used to ward off and fight predators.

Though not a lot is known about the actual mating process, much is known about the courtship rituals, or battles. Males will turn their backs to each other in the presence of the females of a bastion, and wage combat with their tail clubs in a ritualistic display of power. They do not seem to seek to kill or maim, striking not at the legs or hips, but the body and armored back, and though it seems to hurt and cause bellows of pain and anger, these 'fights' have never been witnessed to cause any long term damage. However worth noting is that only three such conflicts have ever been observed, as with all Saurus, Ankylosaurs are not well observed and studied in the field.

Though the process of nesting has not been properly observed, and it isn't fully understood what a bastion seeks when looking for a nursery, a place for pregnant females to lay their clutch, it is known they lay eggs. It is believed that a pregnant female will lay two to five eggs, though data is limited to base such assumptions on. Hatchlings seem to be watched over and cared for by their mothers at first, for perhaps eight to twelve weeks, before the mother and the hatchlings will rejoin the bastion in full, the hatchlings spending another two or three years with the herd as they reach sexual maturity. A mother will not breed the year after she lays eggs, seeming to not go into heat or be fertile that next year.

A typical bastion consists of anywhere from five to twelve adult animals and their young. Of a generation of hatchlings, perhaps ten to fifteen for a healthy bastion with a strong breeding population, it is normal for only two to four to reach adulthood, as predation, illness, and environmental hazards take their toll.

Egg: After a three month pregnancy, and after being laid, it takes about seven to nine weeks for the eggs to hatch.

Hatchling: Hatchlings are born quite small, but will swiftly pack on weight, off a diet of new growth with the beginning of the monsoon season seeing nutrient rich new growth matting the grounds all across Wyriel, and as such they will swiftly grow at first, over the course of that first eight to twelve weeks they will oft triple in size until they are at least the size of a moderate sized hound, and weighing easily double or triple that with their robust structure. This initial growth spurt is very important and necessary for their survival once they join the bastion proper.

Youngling: The next two to three years of an ankylosaur's life will be play and food, learning to interact not just with its own kind in the bastion, but with the Iguanadonts that their bastion herds with as well, learning to navigate those cross species interactions through play, whilst feeding heavily, continuing to gain weight and grow more robust and strong. This time frame is also where they will interact with and come to understand the bastion's hierarchy amongst its female members, as well as learning through play how to utilize their formidable armor and tail clubs in ways that will eventually both help them pass their genetics on to the next generation, as well as defend themselves and the herd from predators.

Adult: At three years of age, an Ankylosaur has reached sexual maturity and is capable of producing offspring, and is more or less done growing, having reached their titanic size, more or less. They might gain and lose weight, but they will not really continue to grow longer or taller by any notable measure, not like the first three or so years of their life. It is estimated these creatures likely can survive well into their forties or fifties, though there is no really concrete data on that matter. It is unknown if they retain reproductive capabilities all throughout that time span.

Ankylosaurs have a habitat preference that seems to have evolved adjacent to Iguanadonts, the two animals seeming to share a sort of symbiotic shared herd relationship. Preferring relatively open woodlands, that is regions of forest not to dense with plentiful growth matting the forest floor, though with notably plentiful trees for their iguanadont companions. Regions of thick low and moderate height brush, ferns and horsetails between the trees, are the preferred and favored grazing grounds.

Ankylosaurs are documented as non-picky grazers, seeming to be straight herbivores. They eat water and nutrient rich root systems, stems, shoots and leaves of horsetails, ferns and other low to the ground vegetation, as well as being capable of digesting and gaining nutrition from rotting plant matter such as over ripe and fallen cycad fruit and gyeko seed pods. In fact it is this harvest that likely aids in the rapid growth of hatchlings, as it has been documented that such bounties as these nutrient rich fruits and seed pods are oft saved and favored to the hatchlings. Ankylosaurs, due to their massive bulk, and much like many herbivorious Saurus, spend a massive amount of their time grazing, basically seeming to feed for nearly the entirety of their waking hours.

Ankylosaurs and Iguanadonts seem to show a rare and unique cross-species herding trait, only really seen in animals like zebra, gazelle, and wildebeests on the savannahs of northern and western Susma. Unlike those mammals though, for whom this seems more an accidental gathering of convienence to graze the savannahs, Iguanadonts and Ankylosaurs actually live, bed down, and travel together, their individual groups indecipherable form one another. They even lay their eggs together, seeming a bonded group. There are of course many benefits that have been noted above about this behavior, not the least of which is predatory defense.

Ankylosaurs also play a defensive role in this sort of cross-species herding behavior. Though the thumb spike of Iguanadonts can be a formidable striking weapon in a pinch, Iguanadonts are much more likely to attempt to use their robust back legs and excellent cardio to simply flee predators whenever possible. Ankylosaurs however, will oft form a sort of defensive permiter around the area the herd is feeding and should they smell or otherwise detect a predator, will begin bellowing aggressively, grouping up and insuring their tails are facing the direction of any threats they have detected, swinging back and forth menacingly, thumping the ground or tree trunks with tremendous force, a show of power, as they will stomp and snort. Should a predator be unfortunate enough to be struck by the tail club of a fully grown Ankylosaur, such a bone snapping injury is oft a death sentence.

A group of Ankylosaurs is known as a Bastion, which is also referenced in their taxonomical classification name. Bastions seem to be run by a matriarch whom commands great respect, the oldest and most powerful and respected female of the group/family unit. Bastions oft have no more than two or three males, with males being run off, forming their own herds, known as Forts, that seem to lack the instinct and connection to groups of Iguanadonts. These roaming bands are generally where competition for mating comes from, as during mating season they will be drawn to engage with bastions, trying to vie and compete to force a male out of their enviable position within a bastion and take their place.

Rearing the hatchlings after those first few vulnerable weeks, does seem to be a Bastion wide chore, lead by the matriarch herself. There does not seem to be any percieved favoritism towards hatchlings by their birth mother, instead the whole herd treats them as if their own, watching out for, protecting and watching over the hatchlings as a group.

Non-existent

Their unique hides are known to be used for making crude, but effective, armors by various Scaled Folk that live all amongst the central regions of the continent of Wyriel, an unsurprising usage. It is presumed such creatures likely eat the meat of the animals as well, though not much is known for sure in this regard.

Found only in Wyriel in the regions beyond the Sauri Mountain Range on the mainland.

Though their skulls are thick and robust, allowing less room for a brain, they do exhibit a greater intelligence through their unique and complex herding behavior than first theorized possible when fossilized remains, skulls in particular, have been discovered elsewhere.

Ankylosaurs do not possess great vision. It isn't that their eye-sight is poor, so much as the natural evolution of this creature has prioritized protective armor for the vulnerable eyes, and this has led to a distinct lack of periphrial vision. This is likely an pressing factor of why their sense of smell has developed to be so reliable and sensitive.