Skinsnipe

Skewers, once the last survivor species of an ancient group of metamorphs, have reclaimed diversity lost by their ancestors during the ice age. But these hothouse butterbirds aren't what they used to be. Skewers are still primarily predators, even now that the climate has warmed and plants have returned to cover the world in green. The ways they hunt and the prey they take has changed as much as it possibly could, though, with species of skewer by 275 million years having greatly diversified their behaviors. If there is a source of protein, there is likely a skewer somewhere that has learned to exploit it. If not, it will probably figure it out soon. 

One of the more novel - and gory - ways that skewers can get food in the hothouse is to not bother hunting or killing at all, but to simply graze. Not on the grass, of course - but on the grass-eaters. Billions of thorngrazers have inherited the warmed world, and they exist in such numbers that they are effectively an unlimited source of meat. Further, for something as small as the skinsnipe skewer, the quantities they need to eat at any one time are so small relative to these large herbivores that they can fill their bellies and leave their prey alive to heal so that tomorrow, they can do it again. One of the littlest skewers, skinsnipes weigh just slightly over half an ounce - the size of a zebra finch that you might find in any pet shop. But seed doesn't sate this flesh-rending parasite, which uses a combination of its long, finely serrated upper bill and a vicious-looking steak knife of a tongue which it slides back and forth in a slicing motion to cut strips of skin from the hides of animals like helmetheads. They climb over the bodies of their prey in flocks, usually only taking quick bites that will heal in a short time and flying off to eat their mouthfuls somewhere else before the victim can retaliate.

Sometimes, though, these birds that can gather upon injured animals in inescapable swarms, being drawn to the sight of blood. Usually only a nuisance, these highly social birds are then a harbinger of death, and the worst nightmare for any animal that has had the misfortune to be attacked by a predator but escape, for they will then target it relentlessly and pick at it until it dies anyway of a much slower fate. Ravenously descending upon an open wound, they tear at its edges and enlarge it until the animal can find itself with its whole backside effectively skinned and open to infection; in such cases, over 100 skinsnipes can cover a weakened animal under a flurry of feathers and beaks and even gouge out muscle tissue several inches down, eventually killing the animal through shock if it is not taken out by another opportunistic scavenger of a larger size before then. Thorngrazers make up almost all of their diet, for these animals rarely defend one another, instead casting out their weak to be easily targeted. Trunkos and many predators such as sawjaws, on the other hand, exhibit altruistic social structures in which healthy individuals keep their wounded under supervision and drive away any of the avian parasites that may attempt to feed on them, so that they can heal up safely. It is a privilege that the thorngrazer, effectively the 24/7 buffet of the soglands, is not afforded.

Skinsnipes reproduce with a larval stage as do all skewers, and their young resemble the adult hardly at all. A featherless, nymph-like burrowing animal, it is initially an herbivore that sucks the sap of plants roots, like earlier butterbirds, but differs in that as it grows it becomes a predator of earthworms and soil-dwelling grubs which it sucks dry of their body fluids with its sharp beak and piercing tongue. With no parental care of any sort, males fertilize their partners large clutch of miniscule shell-less eggs just moments before she descends to a patch of disturbed, damp soil - usually a thorngrazer wallow - to lay them just beneath the earth in a small hole probed by her beak. It takes the larva about eight months to pupate and fledge, with growth hastening significantly once they begin feeding on meat around 4 months of age; the juvenile is independent and feeds alongside the adult as soon as it can fly, being about 2/3 their size.