Landasticker

Split off from the Thikasticker, the Landasticker developed as a result of individuals occasionally washing up on beaches. Beaches had plenty of tasty dead fauna washed up with little able to eat them due to the desiccating sun, so the Landasticker developed adaptations to live on the beach specifically to feed on them. The Landasticker’s locomotory baits are thickened and more leg-like, allowing it to haul itself over land more easily. Its cell walls have thickened to prevent desiccation, and it has stomata-like pores on its upper surface for absorbing carbon dioxide and other necessary gases from the air. It is restricted to the beach, however, as it cannot reproduce on land—it must return to water to mate.

Like its ancestor, it uses its leg-like baits to pull bits of dead fauna and flora towards a stomach-like organ in its center, seeking them out with chemoreceptive patches on the end of each arm. It returns to the water to mate, releasing a plume of gametes from its underside when it finds a suitable partner, and it has a brief free-swimming Leafstar-like larval stage in the sea. Much like its ancestor, it is literally fat—its body is full of stored lipids, giving it a thick, puffy shape.