20 seconds before throwing shade at Magnamalo. That's a new record!

Bit late but I’d actually really like a “how to build a herbivore” video. Very few pieces of media actually discuss the strategies that different herbivores use in getting their food. It’s often only as simple as “they eat plants”.

One time I saw a young red-tailed hawk trying to catch mallards in a pond. He kept swooping at them and they would easily fly out of the way every time. He did this for about an hour before leaving. It's really hard to learn how to be a predator. It's not surprising that so many of them die before reaching maturity.

"A term made by me, just now" lmaooo I fucking love it

Sci-fi writers remind me of George MacDonald- Remember a beast does not know that he is a beast. And the nearer a man gets to be one, the less he knows it

Love how we're have 3 kinds of spec evo videos. Ones that focus on the creature(s) from certain media, shorter videos that talk about tropes, and now longer form ones like this. I'm liking how it's going!

Thanks for the shoutout buddy! We'll definitely get you on as a guest again; it was great fun joining forces and you provided some wonderful input! I know we've already been brainstorming some ideas, but we'll definitely follow up once Dominic's back from Zambia.

This channel is just a goldmine. My little brother and I simply cannot get enough of this content. Thank you kindly for doing what you do!!!

While Jurassic World has a lot of problems, I think the Indominus Rex is a good example of an over-the-top carnivore done right. Even in the context of the film's own world, the I-Rex is not a "real" or natural animal. The park's shareholders demanded "more teeth", and the end result was a hyper aggressive animal that was more dangerous than any natural predator would be. Dr. Henry Wu designed I-Rex in pretty much the exact same way a lot of writers design their uber-strong OC monsters. There's definitely an element of satire there. The painful irony of the Jurassic World trilogy is that the filmmakers seemingly forgot about the satire element when they designed Giganotosaurus in Jurassic World Dominion. They made yet another over-the-top carnivore but unironically and without any pretense of scientific accuracy or in-universe logic.

UHC: •Drops Spec Evo video• Me: WRITE THAT DOWN!! WRITE THAT DOWN!!

Time to take notes for my settings

"Educators" cough cough Tierzoo cough cough. No hate tho animal content is always fun. It's just so obvious when seeing a lot of popular YT biology content that it uses sensationalism and hyperbole to hype up animals so they sound like these perfectly evolved machines built for survival, when life in reality is messy, imperfect, and pretty RNG. What makes life so fascinating is how it responds and adapts to the many pressures they face. Predators especially suffer from this hype, which we have seen how dangerous this could be with sharks, wolves, lions, and other animals hailed as super predators being hunted to almost extinction by fearful humans

For being the UNnatural History Channel, you are THE best source of real ecological insights I rely on for world building. Seriously, huge props to you for really explaining top-down and bottom-up concepts from a place of deep understanding, with plenty of cited sources. I'd like to think my fantasy world has much better ecosystems thanks to this channel. Also, I listened to this video as a podcast, but I could feel in my soul when Magnamalo must have been on screen lol

It feels like we just got the Nergigante video yesterday and now this? it’s Christmas in June!

Thank you for the shoutout! I very much plan to make more informational animal content in the future in relation to debunking another commonly cited and seemingly trusted individual, but it's a lot more ambitious than the Forrest Galante one and I have another project before it.

Gonna need to save this for my project. It’s a seed world where the only mammal is the collared peccary

A good idea for spec evo short could be large non avian dinosaurs and large mammals coexisting. It is trope that I see constantly but rarely ever see explored. I think it would be interesting considering the downfall of the former led to the rise of the latter.

This is why I love the Kaimere project because the guy making it knows what he is doing it and his speculative animals can make sense and are unique and cool in their own way. Without making it overkill. For example a theropod made is called the Uktan is a megaraptoran that took the niche of apex predator that uses its claws to make a kill.

Question: Are you going to make a video on kaiju? Specifically on what godzilla is actually closely related to or what would godzilla actually eat aside from radiation.

In all of my science classes ive took in highschool we took maybe one day of studying ecology

I can actually see two reasons why a predator would roar/scream/bellow before an attack. The first--and more fantastic--is that their voice is itself a weapon, loud or powerful enough to actually stun keen-eared prey before they launch an attack. (It's far-fetched, but not implausible: if you've ever been listening really hard for something, a sudden, *really loud* noise will scare the absolute hell out of you and disorient you for a few seconds.) The second would be to panic prey that would otherwise present a dangerously united front, or flush out something that would otherwise remain hidden.

Great video as always! One thing you touched on that could be fascinating would be the behavior and effects of captivity/domestication on animals. My personal headcannon for the original jurassic park, for example, is that the predators were so aggressive and broke out so quickly because they were under-enriched and *bored*.

If I had one nickel for everytime UHC had a brain fart and called an epioth "ludroth", I would have 3 nickels. Which isn't much, but it's crazy it happened 3 times.

Drawing alien animals to these videos are my jam

An hour lecture on predation? SIGN ME UP!

A clear example of sociality not necessarily equating to pack hunting are Ethiopian wolves, which feed primarily on rodents. While each wolf hunts alone, successful wolves will share a portion of their catch with the pups or even unsuccessful group members if it can be spared, meaning the pups are always provided for and often no one in the pack goes to be hungry. Arctic wolves are similar most of the time, primarily feeding on hares because musk ox are too hard to take down and reindeer are too migratory to be a staple food source.

As a current creature creator, this really informed me. I currently try to make my species realistic and have accurate sensible behaviors and ecology but also I have features on them and their behaviors contradict the basic stuff…guess I have a long way to work on them, amazing video as always! So many notes I took…

I love watching this guy's videos, they may be a bit strict about certain fictional creature designs in popular media that some people think are "awesome/badass" but they do explain in detail on what first time spec-evo artists/creators should do if they ever want to make their creatures more realistic

Well you've coined a term, I think you're officially an important contributor to the field

Honestly these last few videos have been the best you've put out so far. It might just be the specific talking points that are more interesting to me personally, but it does feel like you're steadily improving in both an informal way as well as entertainment. Which is pretty impressive, considering that you don't rely on anything fancy in terms of visuals. Really great stuff

Dude, this was AWESOME. I'm gonna re-reference this video so many times, thank you so much! I'm stoked for the herbivore one, and again, thank you for proper sci-comm for people who really care! EDIT: I also think it would be cool to see a spec evo series by you, exploring sci-comm through something you MAKE rather than dissecting the real-world implications of other franchises. I at least would be STOKED to see it.

Maybe it's just me, but the shadow of Magnamalo seems to haunt UHC whenever he makes some form of "how predation actually works" or "how to design creatures or worlds". I still think that Magnamalo may yet be salvaged by making it so the Rampage itself is the only reason Magnamalo is as powerful as it is in Rise. It is a good show of surplus killing too, since Rampage monsters leave the village weakened either by the villagers' defenses, or Ibushi's wind. Magnamalo merely takes advantage of this, and uses its ability to burn energy through heat and fire quickly to get the most out of this precious period better than other monsters. When not in "Rampage hunting behavior", it simply uses its hellfire as lures to isolate prey similar to an anglerfish jaguar hybrid. Is this what I think they were going for? Maybe. Was it shown well enough in the game? Nah. But unlike UHC, I don't think Magnamalo is some complete travesty of a monster design/ecological design.

1:09:14 I had to double-take that Special thanks name! On the video topic, I'm surprised you didn't mention some predators switching prey as they age. I feel like that could have massive effects in world-building if a predator is only dangerous to humans at a younger or older age.

I don't know if this video is my favorite of the channel so far, but it certainly is a candidate for the spot for the spot. Right next to the Skull Island video and the one about the walking with series. Let's just collectively call them the Big 3 (mostly because I like them, but also for actual length)

If you're checking your analytics, know I was gonna click this video off of notification but was busy and saw it in my feed now.

I hope 2025 april fools vid of TUHC is only about praising Magnamalo. Unironically would be hilarious.

anybody else not really into creature design but just has fun learning about cool stuff animals do?

i'm glad you share in my hate of magnamalo. just horrendous. atleast deviljho somewhat looks like a dinosaur on steroids.

Creature design and fantasy writing are my bread and butter, and I can't thank you enough for enhancing the way I think about my work! You've enriched the way I approach art and made biology immensely fun!

Can't wait for Spec evo long: How to build a prey Also can you/able to talk about plant evolution? Producers are the main bases for the majority of ecosystems before animals.

Other things to keep in mind.. 1. A persistence hunting predator may purposefully target the largest prey animals with the most impressive horns/antlers. Such prey animals have more mass too move and would likely become exhausted more quickly. 2. Predatory animals outside of insects, fish, and small reptiles, never have horns or spikes. Horns are primarily for intraspecies combat over territory or mating rights. Predators already have teeth and claws and have no need to invest further in large, heavy, horns or spikes to engage in combat. 3. Claws do not slice or cut. They can only puncture, grip, and rip. Nature is good at making claws with sharp points, not so much with sharp edges. 4. Predators do not begin a hunt by roaring at their prey. Not unless they specifically want the prey to run in order to exhaust it for an easier kill. 5. Predators don't hunt things that are just as likely to kill them as they are to kill it. 6. There is no such thing as "bleed damage" or a hunting strategy of injuring an animal and then waiting for it to bleed to death. That's not a real hunting strategy and never has been. That isn't too say that every once in a while a prey animal doesn't bleed to death, but that is never the intended hunting strategy of the predator. And the larger the prey animal, the more difficult it becomes for them to bleed to death. By the time you get to something that weighs several tons, it may be almost impossible for them to bleed to death as the wound is likely to close before the animal loses enough blood to die. This is because the bigger an animal gets, the more volume they have compared to surface area, meaning they have more blood for their size than smaller animals, and would need to lose more blood than they can possibly spill in order to die.

A yes, just what i needed today, a 1 hour long video

Really excellent topic, I like how everything from the different ways predators interact to how they impact prey behavior was explored. I'd love to see more videos of this variety exploring broader concepts in ecology as there really isn't much like this online in an easily digestible format.

When you said long I wasn't expecting this long but I'm pleased either way

I really liked your analysis on ambush and chase predators! Next time you make a video, can you please talk about predators that make traps? Ex: Spider webs, Venus fly traps, cetacean bubble net feeding, etc. These hunting techniques are often overlooked because they arent "flashy" but they're still so cool! (Don't get me started on how many fantasy giant spiders chase their prey or hiss or some other wholly unscientific nonsense).

These longer form videos are very well done. I know it can be difficult to cover material sufficiently without going into too much detail or for too long (I don't content create but I do teach/tutor) and your videos always do an admirable job of balancing those two extremes. The reason I originally subscribed is because you cite sources, which is so fucking rare these days that I actually went through most of your catalogue trying to see if it was consistent or a one time video. I love having the sources in the video opposed to in the description, although I can appreciate the pros/cons of each approach. But most of all your videos are always entertaining and educational, which is an incredible balancing act that I don't think I'll ever fully achieve. It is always a hype moment when I find you've posted a new video, and I very much look forward to seeing more in the future.

Awesome video as always, and a lot to love here. I'll definitely be watching this many many times in the future. One thing I'd like to show some love: I really appreciate how in the preamble you have a generous reading of the reasons for people's misconceptions. I find a thing all-too-present in highly specialized fields, or in people with a large amount of professional knowledge, is the "Everyone who doesn't know this is stupid" assumption. A thing that I've always really appreciated about your work is how you've been very mindful to acknowledge the lack of widely available, well-researched and nuanced educative resources on ecological and zoological concepts, rather than some notion of some inborn character deficiency in those who don't have this knowledge. As someone who's both done tutorializing in game design, media analysis, and who has cognitive disabilities to boot, this is a refreshing position I'd like to see more often in creators. Keep up the awesome work!

Happy Birthday to me indeed. Exactly the kind of video I need for building my fantasy setting. I hope to catch a future Q and A section or even just ask questions in comments to better figure these things out for my world. Like how magic could be a *more*, rather than *less* interesting explanation for certain things, because it is there and has tangible effects.

You asked for suggestions so do you know Keenan Taylor’s Tales of Kaimere? I like his KZfaq channel for similar reasons to why I like yours. I know you said you didn’t want to tear apart a small creator’s work but I think it’s quite good and Keenan would appreciate any audience you send his way. Also I think you might appreciate the hunter’s guild in Kaimere because of your criticism of the hunter’s Guild of MH. He also made a video in the style of Walking with Dinosaurs about one of the giant derived Megaraptoran’s of his setting.

It feels like we just got the Nergigante video yesterday, it’s Christmas in June!

I was just rewatching your recent videos at work! I really like this idea of this topic, looking forward to this one.

I’m Flabbergasted, did you upload this with me in mind? This is exactly the thing I needed for a Worldbuilding project. Please UHC the people need more Spec Evo Longs!

I would love to see large herbivores or even small carnivores next!! Or maybe something more niche..literally, just creating a creature that has evolved to fulfill a specialized niche. Or even how to write symbiotic/parasitic relationships between creatures! Domestication would also be a huge help for spec evo stuff. There are just a whole lot of things to talk about it’s insane.

It's interesting how much this goes out the window when talking about aquatic ecosystems. There are lakes where I live that contain only pike. The pups eat tiny shrimp and the adults eat smaller pike. By filling all the higher tiers of the food chain they prevent any other fish species from developing.

It would also do good to keep in mine that predators hunting predators can be surprisingly common in snakes as well. For example the Eastern and Gulf coast Indigo Snakes are very well known to eat other snakes like cotten mouths, copper heads, and Rattlesnakes. They hunt other snakes so often that they have built up a resistance to venom. They dont exclusively hunt snakes, but its up to the point they have adapted physically for it. Its also worth noting that they do not have any fancy/flashy way to take down fellow snakes but rather that they are considerably bigger and there for overpower them. It they same reason why I like Nergigante: same MO with just overpowering fellow apex species like Elder Dragons.

This might be one of your best/most informative videos. As soomone who spec-evos as a hobby, i found this very helpful

28:55 This has similar energy to that one meme of the girl sitting on a couch with a bunch of doods standing over her.

52:37 I was kinda disappointed you didn’t mention my favorite predator cooperation example, Groupers and Morays!

Perhaps for Kaiju content is due in the future? A question with Kaiju ecosystems I have is how do we handle them being animalistic despite many having not only sentience but personalities and such? Is it possible to give animalistic behaviors to a character like Godzilla without diminishing that he is a character?

The Magnamalo hate is pretty good. I've always felt the same way about that goofball.

Yep. Had an RP with mythical creatures. Human was chilling in the woods when the sky suddenly went dark, a dragon swooped, claws ripped out a forest death worm, and flew away. No roar, no fire, no circling, no fanfare. Didn’t even glance at the human.

1:06:18 This is exactly why Betta Fish were bred to have extravagant fins. In the wild, would they be this flashy? Of course not, but in captivity, where they’re bred to be elegant fighters originally, the flashier the better, even if they were worse off.

Something to possibly note about surplus killing, is that it can also happen when hunting periods are limited. Salmon runs are the obvious example of this, but other fish migrations qualify too. And I imagine that other large-scaled migrations (as much as they have been depleted or forcibly redirected) could possibly have a similar effect. Perhaps not full-on surplus killing, but more active hunting periods, where predators are more proactive in catching more prey.

Wow, UHC messed up and called epioth ludroth, TWICE, guess he's wrong about everything ever actually, magnamalo best monster design ever confirmed?

Something to extend upon the point of Maneating would be what is happening in the story to the people the predators are hunting, such a political instability/volatility. A specific example highlighting this is Gustave the Man-eater; a giant male Nile crocodile that grew over double the size of the average, and is notorious for numerous disappearances and attacks in Burundi. It's well worth remembering how much and in what ways civilizations and people influence ecosystems.

I love the idea of a bunch of wolves in India sitting around a turned-over turtle or something and thinking, "Man, it'd be nice to have a hyena on hand right now."

When I think exagerated fantasy/scifi apex predator I think of a very relaxed ambush predator. This creature is the peak so it's not going to have that desperate need to chase and kill every single day. It doesn't need to be picky either because the whole ecosystem is on the menu.

What do you think of the moørkutlot from kaimere?

I do think it's very funny that, only a couple of minutes after mentioning that size is almost always the determining factor in who wins intraguild competition, you immediately use fishers hunting lynx as an example. Fishers are roughly half the size of lynx (8-10 lbs vs 17-20 lbs). This is obviously an extreme exception, but it is a very funny one.

I wanna see a predator in fiction be very small but also very deadly

"Sharing some females is better than having none" Sad truth 😞

also the predator display thing it is also worth mentioning how tigers have a elaborate and striking appearance, even though it actually helps hide them from their chosen prey

Personally, I love predators because it shows how different they kill their prey like for example sabertooth cats, the way how they kill their prey is that they bite through the throat, which is a quicker death, unlike lions and tigers, which that which they can buy the throat, but they can also go through your nostrils of a prey animal to suffocate smilodon did not do that it’s design was a throat slasher

Personally, educational videos like this are much more entertaining, or ones that have a lot of parallel to irl animals.

Made my day that my long drive is eased by a long video from you.

This video came out when i had a long car ride and made it a bit more bearable. I really like how you talked about the predators roaring before trying to get their prey, as it has always been one thing i find somewhat annoying in media. I get that its for entertainment purposes, but I really wish it wasnt such a big part of media.

Evrey day UHC uploads, no matter what harships I may have faced, I go "WHAT A WONDERFUL DAY" and it is indeed, a wonderful day.

That's a well researched content, my friend. You cared to look into genuine publication without bombarding with random claims. Keep it up! I will make sure to watch your future videos

I read spec evo long but the video length wasnt showing yet but when it did a came a little from seeing over an hour of peak content

I'm running a TTRPG campaign where some of the monsters are... Well, monsters, in a mythological sense. They're spawned by divine will and aren't part of the ecosystem. That doesn't excuse me from ignoring the fact they should logically wreck said ecosystem (or at the very least interfere with it). I'll need to include that. Fortunately the party hasn't run into one yet so I'm still good! I wonder what would happen of something like a manticore was thrown into a regular savanna biome. It's not like the thing could reproduce, so its impact would be limited, but it could still displace populations of both predators and prey trying to get as far away from it as possible. I guess the closest real-life thing would be human activity, uh... Except without the "limited" part.

When it comes to species profiles, this normally stems from the writer excelling at creature profiles and less so when it comes to creating an actual story. But there are of course several exceptions to this.

You have no idea how helpful this is to an animal character artist and writer. Please do one on prey species if you haven't already

I'd love to see a video from you that takes a more "how to" angle rather than a "why you shouldn't" angle. To elaborate, you often criticize excessive monster designs that are excessive and ineffecient, but I would love to see a different approach in which you explain the conditions, world building, and evolutions that would be necessary to end up with a giant, edgy, spike-covered, fire-breathing creature. So, less of a "why this creature couldn't evolve in the natural world" and more of a "what kind of world would be needed to make this creature evolve naturally."

God I love a good break from reactionary hot takes and brain rot. Wonderful video

What a great video, i was watching while drawing the details of my creature anatomy and took me to think more about of how it would act, really good.

What's up with so many people hating on Joe Rogan? Yeah it isn't as informative as a documentary but he is pretty entertaining. He isn't really high intellectually but he is charismatic, entertaining and ask's interesting questions also he isn't afraid to talk about stuff like congo dinosaurs.

Holy smokes 1 hour? Get me in!

You list some educational resources on youtube to check out (which is highly appreciate, thank you) but do you recommend any non-youtube resources to look into for further education, such as certain documentary series or books?

just love when you make these spec evo videos

Your videos helped me become a better writer. I think Understanding predator and prey dynamics is very important for writing conflict, rivalries, and behavior in general. Animals arent dumb, they're just smart and capable in different ways. I love comparing humans and animals in writing and in real life.

The slander of Magnamalo never stop till the end. Fantastic. Also what slander do you have on Laviente?

I enjoy the visual representations so you don't just imagine what you're saying.Tbh I zoned out half the time but I got some of important things. Environment, Efficiency,food preferences and there pro's and con's when hunting them, Adaptations, Mating grounds and seasons(😏), Interaction with different types of prey and predators(They may hunt something different then this),and what's there position on the food chain/food Web

As someone who DMs DnD games sometimes this is a helpful guide on what monsters can be the product of spec evo and what monsters make more sense as artificial killing machines.

Thank you for helping me to write better animals for my fantasy world. All your videos are invaluable. Thank you

I love that the video is called a “Spec Evo Long” instead of a short. Haha!

Best backing track to draw to, 10/10

Man the dinosaurs of Peter Jackson's Skull Island are superb!

These days i’m struggling with the design of an imaginary apex predator i want to draw. This morning i open KZfaq and BAM you dropped this. Thanks

Would a raptor with combs over their ears & maybe tusks or saber teeth & shaggy feathers & maybe also hornbill like keratin displays on their heads?

If one day there a fan project for a monster hunter natural history book like skull island, you really should be a part of the project. You will give so much value in the project