(urth) Urth Digest, Vol 111, Issue 17‏

[David Stockhoff]

On 12/2/2013 3:24 PM, Lee wrote:
> Undines say they will continue to grow until they are able to mate with Abaia. This is almost but
> not quite in keeping with the most classic example of parthenogenetic reproduction, that being
> the phylum of Rotifers.
>
> Rotifer females happily clone themselves over and over in good conditions. But when their
> environment becomes stressful they start producing both male and female offspring who mate
> and produce diverse offspring, some of which will survive the stress.
>
> Perhaps this is the model Wolfe was drawing upon. Our Megatherian types bud off offspring as
> needed. But perhaps something stressful happened causing Typhon and Echidna to actually have
> sexual congress and diverse offspring. They certainly don't seem to have a relationship based
> on love.
Possibly. Plenty of species do that, including some fish. Many species 
migrate in response to stress, too, though most don't hollow out an 
asteroid.

Also, here's a tidbit about rotifers: The animals appear to offset a 
loss of genetic diversity by eating any DNA floating in their 
environment and incorporating it into their genome.

Hmm ... so on a diet of dead sailors ... hmm ...