Animals on a terraformed Mars - what should we populate Mars with?

Byron · 2004-04-24 07:18:53

The posts about kangaroos on Mars in the "Food" thread has gotten me thinking about what kinds of wild animals we would want to establish on Mars as part of a new biosphere, assuming we ever get to "Earth-level" stage of terraformation.

I don't see any reason why parts of Mars couldn't serve as an enormous game reserve, like they have in parts of Africa...there would be gobs of open land, and no national borders or fenced-in ranches and the like which makes it so difficult to perserve large tracts of land in Africa and elsewhere. I'm wondering if it really would be possible to play "Noah's Ark" and bring a representative sample of Earth's wildlife and re-establish them on Mars as part of a balanced ecosystem? Or would things like the .38 gee and lack of a magnetic field make this close to impossible without massive human intervention, such as genetic engineering?

Personally, I think that once you provide the "basics" such as adequate air pressure, comfortable temps and adequate fresh water, along with a full range of flora, the animals would do just fine, at least after an initial period of adjustment, especially if you didn't have things like poachers, people attempting to use gamelands for their own use, etc, etc.

What do you folks think...?

B

Palomar · 2004-04-24 08:49:23

*What I've been wondering this past hour is how to get them there in the first place. [...awaiting reply from someone relative to something in one of KSR's books...] -wry smile-

Anyhow, there are the matters of:
1. Can the animals withstand the long ride to Mars?
2. Feed supply issues?
3. Pooper scoopers (hygiene/biowaste)?

Perhaps only two couples of each sort of animal need be sent, along with fertilized eggs in cryostorage (keep the gene pool well stirred until a thriving herd is accomplished).

Please don't say send only female animals and fertilized eggs...we need males there too (future female animals Mars will thank me). I'm thinking in terms of their social patterns and needs (between the genders), not just mating alone. :laugh:

--Cindy

The Fed Man · 2004-04-24 09:02:37

About withstanding the ride-They could be eggs and sperm

Feed-If Mars is terraformed enough for animals then there should be plants

Waste-Fertilizer

Rxke · 2004-04-24 09:13:55

Beavers!

Seriously... You'd of course need a fairly mature biosphere with trees, fish and whatnot first, but these fantastic animals would be able to do *a lot* of dam building, thus increasing significantly the surface of open water in remote regions, giving a lot of other animals more chances to survive...

Hmmm... but simply getting any animal there alive will be tough, that's a given... Animal friends will recoil in horror when i say this, but we should do some serious experiments in long-term hybernation of animals... Those with winter-sleep patterns should be 'easy' as long as you feed them intravenouesly (sp?) and keep the temp low etc... That way you could transport fairly large animals (bears for instance.)
In the end it will be good for the species, they have a whole new world to proliferate on, so...

I disagree with Cindy, sorry: 2 or more females and a set of genetically varied sperm, no males. The first generations will probably not live 'fee' anyway... and cost/difficulty to get any species alive on Mars will be difficult enough, male species will be purely ballast, survival-wise..

Palomar · 2004-04-24 10:07:11

About withstanding the ride-They could be eggs and sperm

*Okay...now what will the fertilized eggs gestate in?

--Cindy

Byron · 2004-04-24 10:49:32

As for actually getting the animals to Mars, the obvious solution is either using very large or very fast spacecraft...KSR had his first 100 settlers travel to Mars in a large, rotating spacecraft, which contained a large range of plants and some animals (IIRC). The biggest hazard on the initial voyage in "Red Mars" was enduring a solar radiation storm, which would be one of the largest hazards in the real-life transport of both animals and people to Mars.

Hopefully by the time Mars is terraformed (assuming that it ever is), propulsion technology would have progressed to the point that we'd be able to zip from Earth to Mars in a week or less, thus greatly easing the problems of moving large numbers of wild animals to a new world (just keep them tranquilized, etc., for the transit.)

B

Shaun Barrett · 2004-04-24 19:19:47

Yes, I think KSR glossed over the problems of transportation by invoking better technology and larger spacecraft. I don't mean that in a critical way; I'm sure that his scenario is quite attainable in the future if we put our minds to it and invest the green stuff!

Considering we live in an era when even getting a few humans to Mars seems like a major feat, the idea of getting hundreds of species of animals there in good condition looks daunting. I still think sending a few cattle in the first few colonising missions would be feasible, though, and cows are used to total domestication, often spending long months indoors in Earth's colder countries. But I think a rotating interplanetary transfer vehicle would be absolutely essential in the case of cattle - for pretty obvious reasons involving floating 'debris' if you try shipping them in zero-g!
I like Rxke's thinking about sending creatures in a state of hibernation. And, if martian winters are going to be generally twice as long as Earth's and twice as cold, genetically engineered species which can hibernate for 6 to 8 months at a time might be a very good idea(?).

We've discussed at another thread somewhere the prospect of populating oceans on a terraformed Mars with fish and cetaceans. I think it may be harder to establish a stable marine environment than a land-based one. I can imagine the new seas being thick with mud for maybe centuries and taking a long time to settle down in a chemical sense - acidity/alkalinity might be a problem, for example.
And even if we can get the water into a suitable state, how would you go about shipping a mating pair of humpback whales to Mars?!! We probably won't have 'transporters' and transparent aluminium, a la Star Trek, any time soon!

No, I think we'll be needing Byron's speedy 'Mars-in-a-week' transportation system if we're going to get serious about establishing terrestrial fauna on our new world. And maybe some of that tranparent aluminium too ... !

atitarev · 2004-04-25 20:11:34

I guess animals should be introduced gradually, as the terraforming itself, which doesn't happen overnight. There won't be any whales, let alone large cattle on a "just" terraformed Mars. At the stage when we have just grass and no trees yet some insects, lizards and small mammals could be brought. They won't thrive at first because of the food scarcity, harsh climate, etc but they will help to create better soils and become food for more advanced animals when they can be brought there. The colonies will probably have some pets, fowls and some small sheep or cattle farms right from the start but there won't be large animals in the wild until there are enough forests, fresh water and both plant and animal food.

It is a good to have all the Earth animals on Mars for species conservation but I can't see it happening soon even if the basic terraformation had happened. The balance could be found even with a small number of species - hardy and small ones - easier to transport, find shelter for or move to a better place.

I would put such a dependency on the stages of terraforming to animal introduction:
1) low atmospheric pressure rich in CO2 (50 to 250 mb)-ice-lichens, moss, algae-bacteria ->
2) medium atmospheric pressure (250 to 500 mb)-some liquid water, clouds-grass - insects, lizards, mice, fish, crabs ->
3) higher atmospheric pressure (more Earthlike) (500+ mb)-open lakes, rivers, seas, (an) ocean(s)- bushes and trees -> birds, small mammals
...

It could also happen that large areas on Mars stay desert - the whole of Tharsis bulge, highlands in the southern hemisphere - about 30% or more of the total surface - areas 6 km or more above average level. Abundance of liquid water is crucial for animal life - it could be clean or dirty, fresh or salty but at least some part of it must be liquid at all times or reachable under the ice crust.

As for the transportation - if people are able to get to Mars, they'll find ways to get some small animals there too.

Trebuchet · 2004-04-26 23:16:17

Perhaps you could breed smaller animals of the species you're going to introduce. They'll eventually end up getting big again if you let them roam wild over a terraformed Mars.

Actually, I prefer a small number of introduced species, and neatness be damned. Just get the plants in the ground and let loose a bunch of critters. God only knows what kind of weird ecosystem will result after a few centuries, but it will be distinctively Martian, I can tell you that. Any unoccupied niches will eventually be radiated into anyways, so setting up anything beyond the bare minimum is wasting money on transport.

dicktice · 2004-04-28 09:59:42

About withstanding the ride-They could be eggs and sperm
*Okay...now what will the fertilized eggs gestate in?

--Cindy

Why, in test-tubes, of course, silly.

kippy · 2004-04-28 10:17:00

I haven't read back all the way in the thread but has anyone considered cloning? just freeze a bucketful of genetic data and you can clone up hundreds of species per ark-trip.

You may have to bring a couple of host animals intact to act as a surrogate mother but that's better than launching a zoo.

Bringing sperm and eggs would probably save a lot of space too. I saw a show on cow breeding and most if it is done that way anyway in the industry. There are only a handful of "daddy cattle" in the industry.

clark · 2004-04-28 10:38:30

Most birds wouldn't be able to fly on Mars- the air pressure is to small, and those that use the planets magnetic field for navigation wouldn't know where to go.

So, nothing but ostrich's and penguins for Mars!

If we're serious about transplanting species to Mars though, and releasing them into the wild, I would imagine that some form of genetic manipulation is going to take place. More than likely, we will need to modify any species to "hibernate" during the long winters, or the cold nights. This goes for the plants too.

And of course, doing this leads to a new potential "first" for any Martian... "First person to be eaten by an animal on Mars".

A dubious distinction to say the least. :laugh:

X · 2007-04-21 20:22:09

Most birds wouldn't be able to fly on Mars- the air pressure is to small, and those that use the planets magnetic field for navigation wouldn't know where to go.
So, nothing but ostrich's and penguins for Mars!

That's cool though. Mars'll be the biggest island in the history of Earth life. You give birds (or any animal) an environment free from predators and with plenty of food, and some start to become giants anyways since they can get through that intermediate stage where they'd otherwise be big enough to attract predators but not big enough to be intimidatingly large. Birds in particular begin to become flightless given enough time anyways. Oddly enough bats don't as far as I know.

And I would suggest a lack of predators for Mars until we have a planetwide atmosphere capable of supporting life. Humans'll be predators for Mars enough until then. Bring in some vultures to clean up the mess maybe. Of course you'll need to monitor and manage the wildlife to make sure none of the meek decide to go carnivorous and inherit Mars. It'd be tempting to bring some predators, but the problem is you're going to basically need to have massive yearly hunts to keep the population in check unless you like having wild swings in the population sizes of everything.

Arthropods (specifically insects and spiders) would be first in my opinion. Find a niche in any land environment on earth, and you'll probably find a bug that could or is filling it. Insects do a lot of pollination. There are spiders that eat birds, and praying mantises can catch mice. Dung and carrion beetles can clean up the mess bigger animals will make. Plus a lot of insects play with some unusual lifecycles. Locusts would spend the entire trip as eggs and never notice anything had happened. Similarly other bugs play with long egg stages so as not to hatch out in the winter. There are others that will stay as eggs until they sense a warmblooded animal nearby. Course most of those are things we probably wouldn't want to bring such as fleas.

Next bring reptiles. A lot of them can go for a very long time without food so you could take adults with you and not have to feed them for most or all of the trip. Plus they lay their eggs on land os water quality doesn't have to be as perfect as it would for fish or amphibians. At the same time though if we're not bringing predators you're basically limited to turtles, tortoises, and some lizards. If the adults could make it in future Martian oceans/lakes you'd have a great place to establish "safe" populations of sea turtles.

Then birds and mammals. Now here's my thought on this which I haven't seen proposed or mentioned elsewhere. Why not fatten them up to the max here on earth, and then put them on a near starvation diet for a while during the trip? It would save you some weight from not bringing food. Maybe concentrate on insectivores at first since you could raise their feed en route without adding too much weight maybe. Even then though we're probably looking mostly at small animals with current technology. If we bring anything big it's going to cost so much weight it almost has to be domesticated to justify it.

For reptiles, birds, and mammals bring only a few founder females, and then a lot of frozen sperm for artificial insemmination on Mars. These founder females probably never get to go free, but their young are released into the wild once they're old enough to feed themselves.

The biggest problem is that if all this works though you're going to want to bring in predators some day, and then you're going to have a planet full of island species lacking defenses against predators. So your whole ecosystem is going to go through a huge extinction event unless you just let some predators evolve.

nickname · 2007-04-22 16:04:45

Better question is what animals could live on a terra formed Mars.

My thought is that other than bacteria or lichens or a few select virus.
Maybe a few animals that live in aquatic environments like crayfish, leaches etc could survive since they won't be so effected from the 1/3 G mutations.

No other creature will be able to endure a mars with less than 10% oxygen.
With 1/3 gravity the results of long term 1/3 G will be extreme genetic changes to fast for a species to be preserved.

That includes us humans at 1/3 G also, even in fully enclosed habitats at 21% oxygen the genetic rate change will alter humans into sterile Martians very fast.

A surface terra formed Mars with more than 10% O2 will be so far of in the distance as to be forever in our terms.
And 21% O2 if even possible to keep mars warm at 21 % O2, as far again.

StarDreamer · 2007-06-12 05:53:32

I would put such a dependency on the stages of terraforming to animal introduction:
1) low atmospheric pressure rich in CO2 (50 to 250 mb)-ice-lichens, moss, algae-bacteria ->
2) medium atmospheric pressure (250 to 500 mb)-some liquid water, clouds-grass - insects, lizards, mice, fish, crabs ->
3) higher atmospheric pressure (more Earthlike) (500+ mb)-open lakes, rivers, seas, (an) ocean(s)- bushes and trees -> birds, small mammals
...

I vote for "hens and chickens" -- the plants, I mean, not the birds.

Anyone not know what these are? A small garden succulent plant which grows in a circular "nest" form. Wikipedia calls them Sempevivum or Jovibarba.

Jarek Duda · 2007-06-15 07:06:54

My thought is that other than bacteria or lichens or a few select virus.

Virus have to have something to live at...:)
We have to start with the bottom of chin food - propably unicellural, organisms, which are able to photosythesis...

StarDreamer · 2007-06-15 09:26:11

There actually is a thread here on plants, while this is for animals, officially. But I saw this one first and so here we are....

Maybe let's focus on your new thread Jarek?

m1omg · 2007-07-03 12:42:35

I have a wild idea....
What about recieting Pleistocene ice-age glory on Mars?I mean mamooths and so...

m1omg · 2007-07-03 12:44:53

Most birds wouldn't be able to fly on Mars- the air pressure is to small, and those that use the planets magnetic field for navigation wouldn't know where to go.
So, nothing but ostrich's and penguins for Mars!
If we're serious about transplanting species to Mars though, and releasing them into the wild, I would imagine that some form of genetic manipulation is going to take place. More than likely, we will need to modify any species to "hibernate" during the long winters, or the cold nights. This goes for the plants too.
And of course, doing this leads to a new potential "first" for any Martian... "First person to be eaten by an animal on Mars".
A dubious distinction to say the least. :laugh:

If we will terraform Mars, we will create breathable atmosphere sufficiently dense for flying birds.
And what about non flying birds like Ostrich or Kiwi ?

Spatula · 2007-07-03 22:04:00

With the low gravity birds will have much greater advantages than they would on Earth. Birds and fish would be the way to go.

X · 2007-07-24 18:19:15

How about musk oxen? Related to goats so one would think they could live on a wide variety of plants, and that they and their milk would be palatable. They produce a winter coat of quivit which according to some sources I've seen is the warmest natural fiber, and it just falls off in the spring so you just need to gather it up and not bother with shearing them.

However, I don't know much about them for certain so maybe they aren't that good. One would think if they really were that beneficial native peoples would have used them in the same ways reindeer were used in other arctic and subarctic cultures.

Tom Kalbfus · 2007-09-02 11:59:59

About withstanding the ride-They could be eggs and sperm
Feed-If Mars is terraformed enough for animals then there should be plants
Waste-Fertilizer

That would preclude sending any mammals as we do not have artificial womb technology.

Tom Kalbfus · 2007-09-02 12:02:17

How about musk oxen? Related to goats so one would think they could live on a wide variety of plants, and that they and their milk would be palatable. They produce a winter coat of quivit which according to some sources I've seen is the warmest natural fiber, and it just falls off in the spring so you just need to gather it up and not bother with shearing them.
However, I don't know much about them for certain so maybe they aren't that good. One would think if they really were that beneficial native peoples would have used them in the same ways reindeer were used in other arctic and subarctic cultures.

How about a Polar Bear of Steroids? Under the low gravity a Polar Bear could be much larger than on Earth. Just the thing for all those future "John Carters" to face.

farmountain · 2007-09-29 15:02:52

Given it is unlikely we would ever terraform to completely match an earth atmosphere and habitabt, The best way would be that we would build an ecosystem piece by piece by specifically breeding and genetic engineering species to build up that ecosystem.

e.g. animals whose bones and circulation systems dont expect high gravity, bigger lungs for thinner air etc.

We would start with bacteria , lichens with radiation resistance and work up from there.

Finally we would genetically engineer ourselves to subsist on the ecosystem we have build so we dont have to build and drage around all that expensive life support talked about in the other thread

Tom Kalbfus · 2007-09-29 16:14:11

Given it is unlikely we would ever terraform to completely match an earth atmosphere and habitabt, The best way would be that we would build an ecosystem piece by piece by specifically breeding and genetic engineering species to build up that ecosystem.
e.g. animals whose bones and circulation systems dont expect high gravity, bigger lungs for thinner air etc.
We would start with bacteria , lichens with radiation resistance and work up from there.
Finally we would genetically engineer ourselves to subsist on the ecosystem we have build so we dont have to build and drage around all that expensive life support talked about in the other thread

Well if you go that route, we could turn ourselves into full-bodied cyborgs that can subsist in space. Just place our brains into robot bodies that recycle the nutrients from our wastes produced by our brains using some hefty power source and we can survive in space.

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Re: Animals on a terraformed Mars - what should we populate Mars with?

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