Imagine if there is a barroth that is deemed problematic cause it’s territory includes a nearby village but it is being followed by nomadic people who are very against the idea of kill the beast. Oh who would win in that situation?
What I love about this channel is it isn't just "MH content taken seriously" you teach viewers real science using MH as a medium to explain scientific principles about biology, ecology and even physics.
Preach it brother! More people need to recognize ecosystem services! Everyone focuses on the bad things predators do, but it’s heavily outweighed by all the benefits they provide.
One time I had a protracted argument with somebody who prescribed to the belief that predatory behaviors are unethical, because prey animals feel fear and pain as a result. They then went on to proclaim that all predatory animals should be chipped, sterilized, put in camps, euthanized, and eventually bred out of existence. They had no comment about whether the, frankly, unrealistic and absurd amount of ecological devastation, and undo suffering this would cause was ethical or not.
"Predators bad" is just a shit excuse from humans expanding uncontrollably. MH humans living in harmony with nature, so there is a fine line of safety despite the amount of murderous walking mountain in that world.
I absolutely love how even the monsters that are seen as very dangerous still improve the ecosystem, I never thought about how duramboros could help prevent wildfires
Before watching I just wanted to thank you for indirectly rescuing my biology grades. Our last exam came in the form of a project where we were tasked over 4 weeks to work out a presentation about a topic of biological or ecological nature that we haven't covered as a class yet. As you mentioned it multiple times in your video I went with ontogenetic niche partitioning/ontogenetic niche shift. I even used some of the examples that you brought up in your videos. So yeah, thanks for the high profile information you provide us with, it's really helpful and appreciated ^^
Similar to the Pokémon world, MH always had me wondering how did a world that evolved fire-breathing dragons, electric charged Tyrannosaurs & sword-wielding ice bears somehow evolve regular looking humans?
I think there was a theory going around about humans entering the monster hunter world through a portal, and wyverians being the natives, but it was VERY flowery and no sources were specified. Something to look into, if you have the time.
Probably similar to how we evevolved next to saber toothed cats, mammoths with huge tusks and stealthy big cats that inhabited the savannah. Of course, in MH and Pokémon it's greatly exaggerated.
I imagine even a terrifying dangerous creature like Nerscylla would be useful for preying on smaller bird wyverns like Velicidrome and Great Jaggi, this getting rid of them for humans and their livestock Just like how our domestic housecats predate on rats and mice, thus getting rid of these hazardous pests (especially the former) for humans The same could be said for Nargacuga who would likely also predate on raptorial bird wyverns like Great Jaggi and Velicidrome (as well as their smaller lackeys) too
Nerscylla has a preference for Gypseros. And I imagine the intelligent and venemous Gypseros is a very risky animal for humans in MH. So the Nerscylla, which usually keeps to its webbed nest, it might be an underappreciated contributer to decrease dangerous bird wyverns.
@@DefinitelyNotEmma Sure, it has a preference for Gypceros, but I don't it only exclusively hunts it and nothing else Other than that I do agree with you
Espinas is a rare case where some villages will legit praise and reward the Monster because it deters the strongest monsters and thus, keeping the village safe from more destructive beasts.
I’m not sure if it would count as ecosystem services for monsters but many of the monsters also act as repellents to other monsters, in the flash hunter manga the presence of a khezu was keeping an injured tigrex away from the village and the surrounding area because of tigrex’s thunder weakness, in frontier lore apparently some villages will hire hunters to capture an espinas so that it can be relocated to the surrounding area of said village to keep out other more problematic large monsters (also possibly to control small monster populations like you suggested), and then there was that whole situation involving Malzeno preventing gaismagorm from surfacing and releasing massive swarms of qurio
Excellent video. Seeing that monsters have legitimate ecosystem services, even if extrapolated, really makes me wish for a game which capitalizes on that for the story. Let a game follow the ignorant hunting of great beasts only to have the hunter and assorted npcs come to find that they have actually done damage to their ecosystem, rather than the LOL YOLO hunting style which seems to pervade the franchise' quest descriptions.
Not to mention get the guild knights involved in trying to undo the damage that the village and hunter have inadvertently cause. Being that part of their job is to deter poachers and unsanctioned hunting that would cause these kinds of situations within the ecology of monster hunter, it would make perfect sense that the select few hunters that are chosen for these roles would also intervene to reduce or lessen the impact of accidental or intentional situations like that.
I mean. Could also play as a guild scientist, where the objective is to sneak up on monsters in their natural habitat and observe their behaviors outside of a hunting context
For elders, some like Inagami and Malzeno are said to be very docile towards humans with exceptions like the qurios for the latter. The only one that's specifically hostile on purpose was Fatalis and he's a bit wacky on ecology. Other conflicts seem to stem from accidents or territory disputes like the celestial serpent breeding season.
True the only one I can think of aside from fatalis is nakarkos who shoots basically anything on site to gorge itself but even with it the only reason we fight one is because of freak circumstance causing one to show up on land as stated in there lore they are commonly deep water creatures so one on land is quite weird
Ceadeus is also very timid. However territorial animals like Fatalis are definitely not too unrealistic. The thing with Fatalis is, that they probably have *huge* territories. And due to their sheer size and power, compared to real animals, they don't have any issues at displacing people or entire cities. That results in human hostility towards it, which it meets with defensiveness. So you can see how that leads to centuries of rivalry.
@@DefinitelyNotEmma The thing is Fatalis isn't just territorial, dude is legit is genocidal. When Fatalis arrive and start nesting, the entire ecosystem just fucked off leaving a barren patch the size of a small county. Even Magala contributes more to ecosystem life cycle.
@@victoriazero8869 Well not genocidal in the human interpretation of the word. Fatalis won't actively track populations down that leave a certain amount of space. I assume it just has vast territories and doesn't like anything within it that could take its prey. And Fatalis, as a species, probably have recognized humans as the undisputable apex predator that we are. So it probably displaces anything that isn't a valuable nutritional source. And we certainly are not on the menu. Fatalis probably predates things like Brachydios, Azur Rathalos, Akantor and Gravios. I wouldn't even be surprised if Fatalis was the absolute apex predator among the elder dragons. And if you consider things like Gore and Shagaru, the depopulation of its territory might also suppress the spread of disease etc. having higher value resources at its disposal to sustain itself.
Well yeah even though there is a lot of conflict with elders it's not really on purpose like a teostra wandering in a settlement for gunpowder is accidental that leads to conflict Most elders see humans as we would see a wasp... Not something that we should kill immediately but definitely something you don't wanna keep around your house Despite ibushi and narwa looking evil as you said they aren't really evil they are just in a breeding season and ibushi couldn't find its mate so it was just lashing out... "Worth mentioning that this might have just been a very incompetent ibushi since it lost it's mate twice and went on a rampage twice XD" As for fatalis he is the only "Villain" of the mh universe... Yea he is wacky and I'm not sure how to feel about his existence but to be fair it kinda works... Kinda like a big endgame villain not an animal like the others but like a true monster
The relation between mushrooms and giant monsters is actually canon to the Stories universe, in both games it is explained that certain shrooms grow more common on monster trails. It is not explained how this happens specifically, I guess either the monster trails create a suitable habitat by reducing competition with more dominant species (which get regularly trampled by the monsters before they can completely take over), monsters carry the spores, or their leftovers just leave more nutrients for the mushroom. I would also find very interesting to investigate the non-predatory relationship between monsters and the various small invertebrates that dwell in these ecosystems, tho I think the only thing we have going for it atm are Zinogre and Yama Tsukami being exploited by various insects for reasons that could include dispersal, protection and increased chance of mate encounter.
I think one thing that's very interesting about the series is that the games started off tribal villages. Advanced, obviously, but still tribal. I would imagine hunting something like rathalos to make a sword wouldn't be much different than hunting a bison and making a knife from its bones. However in the Monster Hunter universe, especially at this point, the civilizations are advancing, and rather quickly too, as well as increasing in population sizes. Monster Hunter World tried to set up a plot about saving the environment, but most of the quests you do on the side are for people's convenience. I'd like to think that in Monster Hunter, despite advancing science and technology, there is still that tribal sense of hunting that, due to the advent of mass production, will soon become unsustainable, especially when it becomes more likely that every part of a hunted monster won't be utilized. How long will it take these guys to learn how to produce rubber themselves instead of going out and killing a Gypceros whenever someone needs it?
The thing is that many monster materials are actually more effective at doing the job of being part of armor/weapons than any metal or rock, even the likes of Dragonite, Fucium, or even Meldspar Ore.
The more questionable quests are seemingly to please some rich person, which I would assume the guild accepts only because they are getting a lot of funding for it that they can use to fund their research and also run their other non-hunting activities such as scouting and surveillance of certain dangerous species. The guild probably runs a huge partnership with traders to either provide protection for trade caravans or provide advice on which routes are safe from hostile predators as well. Some quests seems to be out of necessity, a monster is threatening a caravan that is transporting much needed goods or the monster is an active threat that is chasing someone.
I'm pretty sure most quests that aren't the main campaign are non-canon Your career as a hunter, canonically, probably just involves killing 20-30 monsters tops, with a few elders here and there
Didn't expect a reference to Legends of the Guild in here, let alone one that would have such an insightful argument in favour of going easy on Teostra! I will never cease to be amazed by your dedication to your subject matter.
I always liked to think actual in world hunting happens way less often than the games make it seem. In reality, hunters probably go weaks without having to actually kill anything, and even then its just to fight lower-teired monsters who are being a nuisance or to collect a resource their settlement needs. I also like to think they make use of the entire creature's body, so a single beast probably keeps them stocked for a month
That would make sense, especially for the larger sized monsters like Rathalos or Nargacuga. It is canon that hunters only need to hunt just a single monster to craft both its weapon and armor, not the farming several dozen monsters that happen in the games for purely gameplay reasons.
For sure. I think a lot of the side quests are also there only to give the player options to farm parts, so in lore they probably don't actually exist as requests necessarily. There are so many quests just to show your mettle or please some royal. While they could happen, I just think it's more of an excuse for the aforementioned reason.
Most hunters also never end up hunting things more dangerous than a Kut-Ku or Rathalos. The player character is very exceptional in every single game, and when you get closer to endgame the optional dialogue from NPCs tends to be quite on the nose about it.
These videos are extremely interesting. What actually got me into playing Monster Hunter were the previews for World. When I saw the environment of the Ancient Forest and how the Anjanath and Rathalos interacted with each other, I was really interested because I didn't know of many games having things like that too much. And when actually playing I found even subtle things like Anjanath drinking water or the herbivores fleeing when it would appear to all be really interesting. As I like ecology and ecosystems in general, these videos are really nice speculative evolution videos. Both informative and entertaining at the same time. I hope you continue to feel inspired to make more, you are doing extremely well!
It feels so good to open your phone after a while and see a new UHC video I recently cleared and deleted all of my social media but UHC will always remain to me its just such good content
The only time overpopulation happens is when humans mess things up, the lack of wolves in my area is why deer numbers are so high. I imagine elder dragons are likely extremely important for the environment as well, to the point of being keystone species that removing would destroy the environment.
This is actually canon. In terms of lore the Hunter’s Guild closely track Elder Dragons, keeping tabs on hunting routes, behavior, and external factors acting on those monsters. In terms of lore, the guild rarely interferes with elder dragons and only sanction hunting them when human life would be at risk, in addition to weighing the cost of killing one while coming up with a solution to the problem killing it would create. Of course this is mostly glossed over in the game, but the guild as a whole is rather aware of it’s actions much more than the game explains.
I dunno, seems very questionable when you look at some of these elder dragons, as some feed on minerals or other form of sustenance. And some that engage in predation, exist in very small numbers and don't hunt all that often. The long life span on many elders suggest a slow metabolism, meaning they don't have to feed as often. Species like Deviljho are probably much more effective in that role. High metabolism and probably a high turnover rate as well make it rather efficient to regulate herbivore and meso-predator numbers
@@DefinitelyNotEmma They explode stuff half the time, an elephant is important to its habitat for the destruction it creates. Elders are like natural disasters, I live near a volcano and the biodiversity on a volcano that had a major eruption 40 years ago is higher than the other mountains. Life thrives with periods of calm and chaos.
@@acgearsandarms1343 Destruction is very important for a healthy ecosystem, in many areas wildfires and floods are necessary for the area to keep high biodiversity. Even a forest needs plants to be damaged by deer or some other animal to keep healthy. If they naturally exist than nature has ways to deal with them and since they have such huge impacts nature would need them. its like volcanos.
One thing I'm interested in is how long humans have been hunting monsters in the series. In areas where it has been common practice for a long time, have humans hunts effectively become an integrated part of the ecosystem? How did the shift to agriculture change things? How might their impact in the new world differ from the old world?
I legit got giddy and squealed when you started talking about mesopredators and mentioned the raptorial bird wyverns, it as it is my favorite niche in nature and the raptors are among my favorite monsters for this reason.
No cap, I have learned a lot about ecosystems and biology in general all thanks to this channel. Universities need to take a page from you on how to teach.
I thank you for this video. I'm currently working on a project for my Kaiju fanfic where I fill the world with several surviving mesozoic marine reptiles and some of which have the role of being food sources for the larger marine & flying kaiju. For example, imagine Godzilla hunting giant Shastasaurs or Rodan carrying a planktivore mosasaur back to his roost. Similarly, several plesiosaur cryptids are now found to be only just 4 genera and the adults spend time at sea, and migrate to freshwater to give birth to a single calf. After calving, the weakened adults are food for any aquatic Kaiju.
We know ecosystem wise Nergigante is made as a balance to the existence of Elder Dragons being way above the evolutionary line Magalas is deffinitly the weirdest one since what kind of benefit does a Virus do to nature other than Mass Death? Espinas funnily enough probably exist as Insectoid population control since it doesnt move a lot for something that big and yet its soo passive enough that villagers would keep them around just soo no larger Monsters can cause the area to become dangerous
I find it interesting how the Hunter's Guild was formed specifically in response to a potential collapse of ecosystems across the globe due to unregulated overhunting. Given how prevalent Monsters are in the modern era of Monster Hunter again, I'd say that they succeeded in their efforts, at least compared to their real-world equivalents. I do wonder just how they managed to enact and put into motion such wide-scale hunting reforms, though. My hypothesis is that they received the backing of multiple high-position Wyverians from multiple nations across the world, all of which pooled their resources to turn the Hunter's Guild into a veritable standing army that was too strong for any individual nation to takedown with ease. Maybe a kingdom could beat the Hunter's Guild through sheer attrition, but the effort needed to destroy the Guild in its entirety would be too costly and deprive these nations of valuable Hunters against Monster threats even their armies can't stand against, such as Fatalis the legendary Black Dragon.
There's still one species in-universe that can be argued to be critically endangered- Monoblos It's one of the only monsters in the series to be exclusively hunted in a Village questline, by a single hunter at that. Modern games feature a lot of Diablos, but Monoblos itself virtually never shows up- save for a cameo as a skull on the back of a Daimyo Hermitaur.
The whole thing about the guild being too tough to easily take down might not even be necessary, since we don't really know if wars between humans exist in monster hunter
i dont doubt that the guild would be too tough to fight, but it could also be that a kingdom might welcome a neutral guild that uses its own resources and manpower to take care of the monster threat. and if it comes down to it, a political scapegoat for not eliminating the monster threat if the guild fails.
I think the guild may work under government boddies. In change for the authority to regulate and enforce laws on hunting activity (and maybe some foundings) the guild may deal with monster threats aswell as share knowledge and technology I think so because there are a lot of quests from nobles in royalty that ask for mosters to be killed for petty reasons that the guild really shouldn't accept
Very timely video as I've been really getting on a botany kick and it's always interesting how plants develop with one another based upon the ecosystems
As someone who watches your video purely to learn more about our own world through the lense of a video game I like, these broader subject videos are some of my favorites. Hopefully you can brainstorm up some in the future, but I won't expect any for a long time because they seem like they take a lot of research.
Could this be the endemic life video that i've secretly always wanted? Haven't watched it yet, but it looks really good! Well, regardless of the content, it was still an incredibly informative video, and a masterfully crafted one at that. Cheers!
Another fantastic video, these kinds of more speculative worldbuilding topics are always fun to discuss about, and you once again hit all the right notes. The topic of elder dragon's effects on ecosystems vs what humans perceive their effects are is itself a really interesting topic, in particular given the huge impact elders have, it's likely their destructive power also brings with them huge advantages to the ecosystems they visit, the most obvious example being the Rotten Vale and Guiding Lands from World, but those are only more obvious take aways, exploring elder impacts in general could be a fun discussion.
I can agree with a lot of the reasoning here, outside of particularly extreme exceptions like deviljho (which can and has been recorded decimating ecosystems due to what amounts to an eating disorder for the species at large) and its even more unstable variants--though a lot of the games' conflict arises when elders or other monsters are displaced from their native environments by something else causing problems, such as the loooooong migratory or predatory cycles of others larger elders (like xenojiva and shara ishvalda, gore and shagaru magala, and the archfiend-whos-name-escapes-me in sunbreak) Fatalis (and the other rare more intelligent elder dragons) pose a wholly separate threat to humans or the environment as they knowingly choose to target things, which isnt a fair comparison with other monsters
With everything that's been discussed of the matter in this video, it's more than a little depressing that wolf eradication campaigns still continue in certain states to this very day.
Always love your stuff. One thing I'm curious about is the actual amount of "cannon" hunting that is done. As a player we may kill hundreds or thousands of monsters, but it seems in the games world most quests could only happen once, and by the end most player characters (often the most prolific hunters of their areas by a historic degree) may have only killed a few dozen monsters. The other hunters around them may have killed far fewer and targeted mostly weak, fast breeding species. It's possible that the arcadey, repetitive nature of the games has given us an overinflated sense of how common hunting actually is.
You've obviously researched this more than me but I recall World pushing the idea that the guild "permits" hunts after confirming it wouldn't harm the ecosystem to hunt them, rather than "we need to hunt this to avoid something", like it seems previous commenters have said. I imagine the people commissioning hunts often hear a "nah, deal with it some way else" from the guild because the monster is too ecologically important at that moment in time.
Any day that you upload a new MH video becomes a great day! Always drop what I'm doing to watch the whole thing when they show up in my sub feed. I've learned so much about animal ecology and biology from these videos through the lens of my favorite video game franchise. What's not to love?
What is really striking to me is the idea that ecosystems truly are systems, with myriad inputs and outputs, numerous cycles working together and complimenting one another to produce a marvel of biological engineering. We humans are so prone to seeing the world as something built around us, for us, that we have failed to see the importance of this series of interconnected networks.
So I have been thinking for a while about all of the current rewilding programs that have been going on, such as reintroducing lynxes to Scotland and the obvious wolves of Yellowstone. I was curious what your opinion would be on introducing the true Cheetahs into North America to act as replacements for the American Cheetah? I don’t believe anyone has seriously considered it, but I am curious since the two convergently fill the same niches and they are probably the only predators that are alive that can reliably still hunt Pronghorns, along with hunting the wild horses.
The two animals likely weren't as similar as people initially think, and the notion of pronghorns evolving to outpace the america cheetah isn't actually as sound as people think. Predators can still occasionally hunt pronghorn and especially the lambs, coyotes were potentially depressing their numbers prior to wolf reintroduction. Also, we've enough on our plate keeping cheetahs going in africa as is. I'm all for reintroduction and rewilding, but some people do have some very extreme flights of fancy that seem to be more about satisfying some spec evo idea rather than actually reconstructing an ecosystem.
Also, feral horses are larger and more aggressive than people think. Larger predators such as wolves and cougars already have trouble hunting them and would much rather target safer deer and elk. Cheetahs wouldn’t really alleviate this issue, but removing feral horse protections to allow culls definitely will.
@@unnaturalhistorychannel What are your opinions on other types of reintroduction? Like say jaguars into the US or hypothetically mammoths into Russia?
I have to say thank you for making this video. I'm a senior in high school and have to write a thesis to finish off the year. I'm doing mine the conservation of big cats, which has lead to issues with finding points to make. The parts about the mesopredators, competition between individuals, and stabilizing populations have pointed me in a good direction.
That tidbit about electricity having a noticeable effect on mushroom yield is really interesting! Already there're a bunch of possible reasons I could think of for why and I'm excited to dig into the article you cited, plus I have a guy friend who shares a common interest in mycology with me so I'm eager to hear what he thinks!
One thing I really love about your channel is that you speak clearly about the complexities of the animal kingdom instead of sensasionalizing it for views. It's so refreshing to see a channel that doesn't treat apex predators like killing machines and rules of the world and who imply hervibores are weak and meek, is like a fine meal restaurant in a street filled with junk food.
I always love how much I learn about the real world through your videos You are an incredibly talented creator, researcher, and analyst I am always super happy and thankful I found your channel for some of the most edifying and entertaining content on the platform 🙇♂️🙏
I had seen examples of killing street dogs with poison, which also kills other native predators and scavengers, and then makes the street dogs multiply more.
the quests we receive in-game are not very well thought-out when considering ecosystems- for instance, if many elder hunts took place in environmenta that they did not normally frequent, suddenly it seems a lot more reasonable to be hunting those elders. but, then again, very few of the in-game quests can be considered fully "canonical", so it may be that the quests hunters receive canonically regard monsters outside of their normal habitat or that linger too close to human settlements and trade routes.
I think the importance of these things is very often underutilized and it makes me kind of sad that some people would gloss over it or find it unimportant. I'm happy Monster Hunter seems to be taking more effort into showing both the cultural and ecological influences that Monsters can have, such as Goss Harag and Espinas, and I look forward to more getting such deep and rich storytelling to them as well.
I always love listening to your content, you always shed theoretical light to understanding these critters Monster Hunter or not. Keep up the good work
on the topic of lagiacrus in tri being a scapegoat for ceadeus, i would like to point out that in actuality, its hunt was still justified as it was threatening fishing boats and sea based exports that the city relied on for food and its economy. right at the start of the game, several fishing boats are brought in that have been shattered to scrap after a lagiacrus attacked them.
Although it may not impact humans directly most of the time at least, Dire Dire Miralis may help provide nutrients for sea floor ecosystems by burrowing through geothermal vents which create more openings which spread out more energy.
I'm sitting here taking notes like I'm prepping for a science test. This is a fascinating subject. EDIT: Definitely a worthwhile video to make for sure. I never thought I'd be interested in ecology, but you've got me thinking about the ecology of my country. Australia lacks a top order predator as far as I know, or at least, theres no obvious one like the bears, wolves, big cats, etc that are found on the other continents. With such a unique ecosystem, what is the ecology of australia like? I'm hoping this newfound interest in ecology is permanent. I've got ADHD and this wouldn't be the first time I became obsessed with a subject and lost all interest in it two weeks later. For what its worth, this interest feels "more real" than they usually do, but I bet I'd say that about all of them at the time. If I'm still obsessed with it in a month I might actually consider seeing if theres any free educational resources I can find to learn IRL ecology.
I’ve only discovered this video now, but… I’m very intrigued by the fact that electricity increases mushroom yield. And it made me realize that one of the major areas of mushroom growth in World is the Ancient Forest, especially on high tree trunks or around the bases of trees… which matches fairly well with the favored territory of the local electric wyvern Tobi-Kadachi. The Ancient Forest even has “Unique Mushroom Colonies”… and Tobi-Kadachi is one of _very_ few electric monsters (and one is Kirin, which is an Elder Dragon but also very low population and _extremely_ highly migratory compared to Tobi-Kadachi’s specializations for arboreality.). Is this connection intentional? Probably not, but it’s interesting to consider.
Hearing about how there are plants that could depend a lot on monsters and the ability to influence topography and soil, I think that can be somewhat easily seen in the Monster Hunter universe with Garangolm, since it's specifically stated to promote plant growth and enrich soil with its bodily fluids, which probably include the mossy rocks it coats its left arm with when enraged.
Dude I hope you don't feel discouraged Because you never fail on delivering good quality content I'm in love with monster hunter and your channel, you do such an amazing job at making a more accurate argument towards a fictional universe, you're amazing man I hope you're channel keeps growing in the monster hunter community and other TV/series and movies videos you make my favorite video it still is the Kong skull island video you made that was just absolutely amazing and that's how I found your channel ❤️ 💙
One of the biggest issues humanity has is trusting government bureaucracies to run ANYTHING. Bureaucracy spreads out responsibility and decision, and does NOT reward knowledge/innovation/understanding/prudence. Government rewards whoever can manipulate the system the best, and whoever can SOUND good, regardless of how awful their ideas actually are.
The benefits of destruction in ecosystems is a really complex topic right now, so as much as speculation goes I wanted to add that these large creatures may force plants and fungi to adapt in the same way, resulting in a flora that can either resists living with fire breathing creatures or have fast regrowth. In this regard I think mh flora is done especially well, the healing and utility property of plants are something that the species need to survive in the ecosystem and the hunters simply borrow these abilities, the same way they use monster parts to hunt monsters better I like to point out that world story, altough it doesn't focus too much on the matter because it keeps betting on the wrong horse, has the undertext that the death of a zhora may mean the death of an ecosystem but the birth of a new one as well, and that all parts involved, shara nerg and the fleet, were trying to rebalance things in their own, narrow, ways
I'm surprised that the energy produced by the Elder Dragons and the nature of the Elder Crossing wasn't discussed here especially since their energies help to stimulate life as discussed in the movie Legends of the Guild.
And this doesn’t even mention how subterranean or even semi-sub species like Agnaktor or Gravios may unearth precious ore and minerals, leaving behind treasure troves for miners. Of course, I’m not familiar with any real world equivalents to this either. Another idea might be how the mere presence of marine monsters may drive fish closer to shore, where fishermen may receive massive boosts in catch. Some may even become seasonal, where migrating Lagiacrus or Plesioth drive schooling fish in droves towards fishing communities.
This is why i like world so much as the main cast are almost entirely ecosystem engineers or culling what were supposedly top order carnivores. The only really destructive one being shara ishvalda, which might have been attracted by the 'jivas in the first place to get culled. xeno/safi'jiva serve as lures to "elderly"/sick elder dragons (and seem to be mostly sedentary waiting for food to come to them), nerg culls the weakest ones first and leaves only the strongest like zorah for the 'jivas, and whatever the 'jivas eat likely is where the coral highlands/veil monsters migrate to whenever the last highlands/veil runs out of nutrients from a 'jiva's last meal. each one serves a purpose to the control of elder dragon populations and even maintain two entire (codependent)ecosystems, and even mostly leave the hunters alone until they start poking them. like depriving the 'jiva of a meal that would have likely satisfied it for a LONG time, and anytime we see nerg in the story we start poking him with sticks despite him leaving us alone as he is trying to do something with zorah? (maybe he was seeing if any weak elders were using zorah as a ferry?)
I would honestly love to see a walking with dinosaurs style documentary but for various monsters from the monster hunter series and show them as animals instead of wild blood thirsty beasts.
I really love your videos, especially like the set real life exemple make me understand so much stuff about the world and as someone who loves creating and building worlds out of realistic blocs your channel makes me so inspired to do shit, thanks
One thing I find interesting to consider is how limited hunting is in the MH world compared to the real world, at least in places the Guild has influence over. According to Legends of the Guild, killing of even a small raptor is prohibited if you are not a licensed hunter, and given each hunt in a game's story by canon only happens once, the number of animals killed is far smaller than it may seem. And most villages only seem to have a few active hunters at any given time. Combine with how relatively small and isolated most societies in MH are from each other, it gives the impression hunting has a different effect compared to the modern world where its often pockets of wilderness instead of pockets of civilization.
I can't find the relevant study, but another ecologist once told me that human hunting pressure can create larger deer herds, because it removes the large, territorial males from the population (who would fight off intruders and maintain smaller group sizes) and you're left with smaller males who just...get along with each other. I think hunting for gold crown sized monsters could mess with their social structure like this, especially in species like great jagras. Maybe we could also see diablos' horns shrinking like has been suggested with elephant tusks, if they're used for materials.
To further your point with ecosystem services with a real world example, Texas has had a fairly constant problem with feral hogs, the problem wouldn’t be an issue if there hadnt been human mismanagement, as well as if human encroachment hadnt pushed top order predators to extinction in the area. Both problems were the cause of humans, there are over 2.6 million hogs in Texas, and at one point it was believe to be 5 million, causing over 400 million USD in damages annually. These monsters are also growing to abnormal disproportionate sizes, we have records of 488lbs (221.35kg) and 460lbs (208.65kg), reaching 7ft (2.13m) in length around 4ft (1.219m) to the shoulder. This problem was created by humans and exasperated by humans.
@@unnaturalhistorychannel I 100% recommend it to anyone who enjoys Monster Hunter. Just not on PC though, apparently the port sucks. Thanks for the videos, king.
Disclaimer: I don't remember exactly from what game and the exact quest description.. But I can vaguely remember in one of the past gen games, a quest description alluding to Teostra having increased activity either through mating or attracting a mate which resulted in the volcano region becoming more unstable. Teostra generally mind their own business but I can understand how the research team would see a problem with monster doing this because the nearby village would be in danger if the volcano erupted. End result: gotta hunt him.
I think a movie you'd like as a biologist is Watership down. I don't know how well it would translate to the channel, as it's just rabbits and no spec evo or anything like that. Still though, it's a good movie, just be prepared for shit to hit the fan
a question I've always had, which will likely never have a true answer and go more into headcanon, is how many of these quests actually happen. A lot of them I could imagine being non-canon and existing purely for the players benefit, especially a lot of the challenge quests that show up as free dlc. With a lot of monster hunter games I see most stuff after the credits as entirely non-canon, with a non-game version of these stories probably being much smaller in scope and more about exceptionally skilled individuals helping their community and the environment alike. Although that is purely a personal interpretation, I also imagine not every hunt would result in an actual kill and I'd expect more capture or scare goals for quests just relocating a monster in an area that harms both it and the player. Monster hunter also seems to have some degree of magic-like elements, especially in terms of how extreme biology can get, so perhaps rapid mutation and evolution creating new invasives on a non-geologic timescale is more of a feasible occurrence. All that said, I enjoy how you apply this kind of lens to such a creative and silly franchise
Hunting is like PR or HR. It only exists to facilitate the interaction between the wider population and themselves. While the villagers may not have been affected by Rathalos, Tigrex or Lagiacrus previously, difficulties arise when humans encroach upon the natural habitats and/or limit them. We have observed that a lot in human history. Ultimately, it cannot be understated how important living alongside the natural world in all its facets is. That is a lesson Wyverians have learnt the hard way, if the dubious lore is to believed. Further, much of the role of Elder Wyverians in the games is to guide us towards invaders that could upset the "natural balance". Monster Hunter 4 is actually pretty explicit about the role we play in that game: We smash the Wheel that represents the (life) cycle of the Magalas. A motive that is reflected whenever Shagaru makes an appearance. Worldborne initially makes us believe that it was us that stopped both Xeno and Shara, only to humble us at the end by making it expressly clear that the natural world has its own counterbalances when Ruiner "steals" the kill. Again stressing that the only reason we actually interfered is how the Great Everwyrm's awakening would have affected the settlements in the New World. Not keeping the natural ecological balance. If anything, Hunting in the New World is exemplary of my entire point: We arrived in this untouched land, are disrupting it and have to turn to Hunting in order to carve out our niche while maintaining a semblance of balance in our presence.
Have a visual audio presentation on any bio topic of my choosing due next week, and i really have to ask how the hell do you go from writing papers to talking about them in a way that people can understand? I sound like a scared robot trying to explain things. I really didnt appreciate what you do until now making entertaining but accurate and educational videos is so hard
I didn't realise I'd stopped sounding like a robot! Being in person should help, and make sure any notes you can bring are as detailed as you can get to try and cut back and um'ing and ah'ing.
I kinda always thought that hunting animals as a service is bull shit a healthy environment will not need any species be culled. Would love to play a dnd game set around this concept maybe showing that the guild is a corrupt organization which is pumping out propaganda as to maximize profit maybe ??
One thing i think people commenting about the "need" for hunts miss is that the culture of monster hunter is one that is significantly less developed re: biology, zoology, ecology and other fields that explain and understand the natural world. Taking the Guild, an org that exists to facilitate hunts, at its word when it says such hunts are necessary is dubious. Maybe from the perspective of experts in universe there is a reason to deal with so called "problem monsters" or to cull a population but that doesnt make those experts right. Certainly scientists and naturalists in the real world have had reason to believe certain courses of action were correct and then been proven wrong either by the results of their actions or by new research. While the MH games arent exactly textual about the potential unreliability of Guild sources i think there are a lot obvious hints at it. We also have to consider political, cultural, and economic pressures that might lead to people inventing reasons for hunts that sound good but arent, not unlike the coyote culling measures you mentioned in this video. in general i think a good chunk of players are too quick to take in game sources at their word when theres really no reason to. The Lagiacrus in tri is a perfect example of how wrong they can be.
The idea of a nomadic desert tribe following a wandering barroth in search of a water source sounds so cool to me
Imagine if there is a barroth that is deemed problematic cause it’s territory includes a nearby village but it is being followed by nomadic people who are very against the idea of kill the beast. Oh who would win in that situation?
@@victory8928 be good showcase natives who depend on local rescources vs people denying them it.
Sounds like a very cute conecpt
@@victory8928Would you mind if I use that for a Monster Hunter dnd
@@ematic0054 go ahead may the campaign be splendid
What I love about this channel is it isn't just "MH content taken seriously" you teach viewers real science using MH as a medium to explain scientific principles about biology, ecology and even physics.
Exactly 😫
I didn't know mushrooms like lightning bruh
It’s like TierZoo in a way
I never played MH I’m here for the science stuff
Preach it brother! More people need to recognize ecosystem services! Everyone focuses on the bad things predators do, but it’s heavily outweighed by all the benefits they provide.
Hopefully someday it'll be common knowledge!
people for get that humans are the most dangerous liveing thing on earth.
One time I had a protracted argument with somebody who prescribed to the belief that predatory behaviors are unethical, because prey animals feel fear and pain as a result.
They then went on to proclaim that all predatory animals should be chipped, sterilized, put in camps, euthanized, and eventually bred out of existence.
They had no comment about whether the, frankly, unrealistic and absurd amount of ecological devastation, and undo suffering this would cause was ethical or not.
"Predators bad" is just a shit excuse from humans expanding uncontrollably. MH humans living in harmony with nature, so there is a fine line of safety despite the amount of murderous walking mountain in that world.
Exactly! I wish more people understood this!
I absolutely love how even the monsters that are seen as very dangerous still improve the ecosystem, I never thought about how duramboros could help prevent wildfires
Smokey the durambaros
Before watching I just wanted to thank you for indirectly rescuing my biology grades.
Our last exam came in the form of a project where we were tasked over 4 weeks to work out a presentation about a topic of biological or ecological nature that we haven't covered as a class yet.
As you mentioned it multiple times in your video I went with ontogenetic niche partitioning/ontogenetic niche shift. I even used some of the examples that you brought up in your videos. So yeah, thanks for the high profile information you provide us with, it's really helpful and appreciated ^^
Very glad to be of help! Hope everything goes well!
Similar to the Pokémon world, MH always had me wondering how did a world that evolved fire-breathing dragons, electric charged Tyrannosaurs & sword-wielding ice bears somehow evolve regular looking humans?
I think there was a theory going around about humans entering the monster hunter world through a portal, and wyverians being the natives, but it was VERY flowery and no sources were specified. Something to look into, if you have the time.
Probably similar to how we evevolved next to saber toothed cats, mammoths with huge tusks and stealthy big cats that inhabited the savannah. Of course, in MH and Pokémon it's greatly exaggerated.
Never say never in this world or the next.
They look human, but they are basically cartoonishly strong and tough, and heal extremely quickly. Mh humans are adapted for their environment.
@@JoseJose-sh7fr Yeah, but they still just look like regular humans. Five digits & all, & with the said evolutionary context that's very unlikely.
yay new UHC video time to drop everything and watch the king explain biology and ecology
I imagine even a terrifying dangerous creature like Nerscylla would be useful for preying on smaller bird wyverns like Velicidrome and Great Jaggi, this getting rid of them for humans and their livestock
Just like how our domestic housecats predate on rats and mice, thus getting rid of these hazardous pests (especially the former) for humans
The same could be said for Nargacuga who would likely also predate on raptorial bird wyverns like Great Jaggi and Velicidrome (as well as their smaller lackeys) too
Nerscylla has a preference for Gypseros. And I imagine the intelligent and venemous Gypseros is a very risky animal for humans in MH. So the Nerscylla, which usually keeps to its webbed nest, it might be an underappreciated contributer to decrease dangerous bird wyverns.
@@DefinitelyNotEmma Sure, it has a preference for Gypceros, but I don't it only exclusively hunts it and nothing else
Other than that I do agree with you
Espinas is a rare case where some villages will legit praise and reward the Monster because it deters the strongest monsters and thus, keeping the village safe from more destructive beasts.
I wouldn't use house cats as a good example ^^'
Their impact on local ecologies can only be described as: catastrophic.
@@TheSuperRatt I didn't know my ageing senior age pet cat is massacring creatures left and right
I’m not sure if it would count as ecosystem services for monsters but many of the monsters also act as repellents to other monsters, in the flash hunter manga the presence of a khezu was keeping an injured tigrex away from the village and the surrounding area because of tigrex’s thunder weakness, in frontier lore apparently some villages will hire hunters to capture an espinas so that it can be relocated to the surrounding area of said village to keep out other more problematic large monsters (also possibly to control small monster populations like you suggested), and then there was that whole situation involving Malzeno preventing gaismagorm from surfacing and releasing massive swarms of qurio
Excellent video. Seeing that monsters have legitimate ecosystem services, even if extrapolated, really makes me wish for a game which capitalizes on that for the story. Let a game follow the ignorant hunting of great beasts only to have the hunter and assorted npcs come to find that they have actually done damage to their ecosystem, rather than the LOL YOLO hunting style which seems to pervade the franchise' quest descriptions.
Not to mention get the guild knights involved in trying to undo the damage that the village and hunter have inadvertently cause. Being that part of their job is to deter poachers and unsanctioned hunting that would cause these kinds of situations within the ecology of monster hunter, it would make perfect sense that the select few hunters that are chosen for these roles would also intervene to reduce or lessen the impact of accidental or intentional situations like that.
I mean. Could also play as a guild scientist, where the objective is to sneak up on monsters in their natural habitat and observe their behaviors outside of a hunting context
For elders, some like Inagami and Malzeno are said to be very docile towards humans with exceptions like the qurios for the latter. The only one that's specifically hostile on purpose was Fatalis and he's a bit wacky on ecology. Other conflicts seem to stem from accidents or territory disputes like the celestial serpent breeding season.
True the only one I can think of aside from fatalis is nakarkos who shoots basically anything on site to gorge itself but even with it the only reason we fight one is because of freak circumstance causing one to show up on land as stated in there lore they are commonly deep water creatures so one on land is quite weird
Ceadeus is also very timid.
However territorial animals like Fatalis are definitely not too unrealistic. The thing with Fatalis is, that they probably have *huge* territories. And due to their sheer size and power, compared to real animals, they don't have any issues at displacing people or entire cities. That results in human hostility towards it, which it meets with defensiveness. So you can see how that leads to centuries of rivalry.
@@DefinitelyNotEmma The thing is Fatalis isn't just territorial, dude is legit is genocidal. When Fatalis arrive and start nesting, the entire ecosystem just fucked off leaving a barren patch the size of a small county. Even Magala contributes more to ecosystem life cycle.
@@victoriazero8869 Well not genocidal in the human interpretation of the word. Fatalis won't actively track populations down that leave a certain amount of space. I assume it just has vast territories and doesn't like anything within it that could take its prey. And Fatalis, as a species, probably have recognized humans as the undisputable apex predator that we are. So it probably displaces anything that isn't a valuable nutritional source. And we certainly are not on the menu. Fatalis probably predates things like Brachydios, Azur Rathalos, Akantor and Gravios. I wouldn't even be surprised if Fatalis was the absolute apex predator among the elder dragons.
And if you consider things like Gore and Shagaru, the depopulation of its territory might also suppress the spread of disease etc. having higher value resources at its disposal to sustain itself.
Well yeah even though there is a lot of conflict with elders it's not really on purpose like a teostra wandering in a settlement for gunpowder is accidental that leads to conflict
Most elders see humans as we would see a wasp... Not something that we should kill immediately but definitely something you don't wanna keep around your house
Despite ibushi and narwa looking evil as you said they aren't really evil they are just in a breeding season and ibushi couldn't find its mate so it was just lashing out... "Worth mentioning that this might have just been a very incompetent ibushi since it lost it's mate twice and went on a rampage twice XD"
As for fatalis he is the only "Villain" of the mh universe... Yea he is wacky and I'm not sure how to feel about his existence but to be fair it kinda works... Kinda like a big endgame villain not an animal like the others but like a true monster
The relation between mushrooms and giant monsters is actually canon to the Stories universe, in both games it is explained that certain shrooms grow more common on monster trails. It is not explained how this happens specifically, I guess either the monster trails create a suitable habitat by reducing competition with more dominant species (which get regularly trampled by the monsters before they can completely take over), monsters carry the spores, or their leftovers just leave more nutrients for the mushroom.
I would also find very interesting to investigate the non-predatory relationship between monsters and the various small invertebrates that dwell in these ecosystems, tho I think the only thing we have going for it atm are Zinogre and Yama Tsukami being exploited by various insects for reasons that could include dispersal, protection and increased chance of mate encounter.
I think one thing that's very interesting about the series is that the games started off tribal villages. Advanced, obviously, but still tribal. I would imagine hunting something like rathalos to make a sword wouldn't be much different than hunting a bison and making a knife from its bones. However in the Monster Hunter universe, especially at this point, the civilizations are advancing, and rather quickly too, as well as increasing in population sizes. Monster Hunter World tried to set up a plot about saving the environment, but most of the quests you do on the side are for people's convenience. I'd like to think that in Monster Hunter, despite advancing science and technology, there is still that tribal sense of hunting that, due to the advent of mass production, will soon become unsustainable, especially when it becomes more likely that every part of a hunted monster won't be utilized. How long will it take these guys to learn how to produce rubber themselves instead of going out and killing a Gypceros whenever someone needs it?
The thing is that many monster materials are actually more effective at doing the job of being part of armor/weapons than any metal or rock, even the likes of Dragonite, Fucium, or even Meldspar Ore.
The more questionable quests are seemingly to please some rich person, which I would assume the guild accepts only because they are getting a lot of funding for it that they can use to fund their research and also run their other non-hunting activities such as scouting and surveillance of certain dangerous species. The guild probably runs a huge partnership with traders to either provide protection for trade caravans or provide advice on which routes are safe from hostile predators as well.
Some quests seems to be out of necessity, a monster is threatening a caravan that is transporting much needed goods or the monster is an active threat that is chasing someone.
I'm pretty sure most quests that aren't the main campaign are non-canon
Your career as a hunter, canonically, probably just involves killing 20-30 monsters tops, with a few elders here and there
Didn't expect a reference to Legends of the Guild in here, let alone one that would have such an insightful argument in favour of going easy on Teostra! I will never cease to be amazed by your dedication to your subject matter.
I always liked to think actual in world hunting happens way less often than the games make it seem. In reality, hunters probably go weaks without having to actually kill anything, and even then its just to fight lower-teired monsters who are being a nuisance or to collect a resource their settlement needs. I also like to think they make use of the entire creature's body, so a single beast probably keeps them stocked for a month
That would make sense, especially for the larger sized monsters like Rathalos or Nargacuga. It is canon that hunters only need to hunt just a single monster to craft both its weapon and armor, not the farming several dozen monsters that happen in the games for purely gameplay reasons.
For sure. I think a lot of the side quests are also there only to give the player options to farm parts, so in lore they probably don't actually exist as requests necessarily. There are so many quests just to show your mettle or please some royal. While they could happen, I just think it's more of an excuse for the aforementioned reason.
Most hunters also never end up hunting things more dangerous than a Kut-Ku or Rathalos. The player character is very exceptional in every single game, and when you get closer to endgame the optional dialogue from NPCs tends to be quite on the nose about it.
@@Underground_Owl So our protagonist is essentially a Mary Sue character
I like you because explain the mechanics in a realistic way and dont take the lore at face value like so many others
These videos are extremely interesting. What actually got me into playing Monster Hunter were the previews for World. When I saw the environment of the Ancient Forest and how the Anjanath and Rathalos interacted with each other, I was really interested because I didn't know of many games having things like that too much. And when actually playing I found even subtle things like Anjanath drinking water or the herbivores fleeing when it would appear to all be really interesting. As I like ecology and ecosystems in general, these videos are really nice speculative evolution videos. Both informative and entertaining at the same time. I hope you continue to feel inspired to make more, you are doing extremely well!
It feels so good to open your phone after a while and see a new UHC video I recently cleared and deleted all of my social media but UHC will always remain to me its just such good content
The only time overpopulation happens is when humans mess things up, the lack of wolves in my area is why deer numbers are so high. I imagine elder dragons are likely extremely important for the environment as well, to the point of being keystone species that removing would destroy the environment.
This is actually canon. In terms of lore the Hunter’s Guild closely track Elder Dragons, keeping tabs on hunting routes, behavior, and external factors acting on those monsters. In terms of lore, the guild rarely interferes with elder dragons and only sanction hunting them when human life would be at risk, in addition to weighing the cost of killing one while coming up with a solution to the problem killing it would create. Of course this is mostly glossed over in the game, but the guild as a whole is rather aware of it’s actions much more than the game explains.
I dunno, seems very questionable when you look at some of these elder dragons, as some feed on minerals or other form of sustenance. And some that engage in predation, exist in very small numbers and don't hunt all that often. The long life span on many elders suggest a slow metabolism, meaning they don't have to feed as often. Species like Deviljho are probably much more effective in that role. High metabolism and probably a high turnover rate as well make it rather efficient to regulate herbivore and meso-predator numbers
A bit ironic since some Elders would destroy the environment on a large scale upon being fully powered or awakened. Some even on a continental scale.
@@DefinitelyNotEmma They explode stuff half the time, an elephant is important to its habitat for the destruction it creates. Elders are like natural disasters, I live near a volcano and the biodiversity on a volcano that had a major eruption 40 years ago is higher than the other mountains. Life thrives with periods of calm and chaos.
@@acgearsandarms1343 Destruction is very important for a healthy ecosystem, in many areas wildfires and floods are necessary for the area to keep high biodiversity. Even a forest needs plants to be damaged by deer or some other animal to keep healthy.
If they naturally exist than nature has ways to deal with them and since they have such huge impacts nature would need them. its like volcanos.
One thing I'm interested in is how long humans have been hunting monsters in the series.
In areas where it has been common practice for a long time, have humans hunts effectively become an integrated part of the ecosystem? How did the shift to agriculture change things? How might their impact in the new world differ from the old world?
I legit got giddy and squealed when you started talking about mesopredators and mentioned the raptorial bird wyverns, it as it is my favorite niche in nature and the raptors are among my favorite monsters for this reason.
No cap, I have learned a lot about ecosystems and biology in general all thanks to this channel. Universities need to take a page from you on how to teach.
I thank you for this video. I'm currently working on a project for my Kaiju fanfic where I fill the world with several surviving mesozoic marine reptiles and some of which have the role of being food sources for the larger marine & flying kaiju. For example, imagine Godzilla hunting giant Shastasaurs or Rodan carrying a planktivore mosasaur back to his roost.
Similarly, several plesiosaur cryptids are now found to be only just 4 genera and the adults spend time at sea, and migrate to freshwater to give birth to a single calf. After calving, the weakened adults are food for any aquatic Kaiju.
We know ecosystem wise Nergigante is made as a balance to the existence of Elder Dragons being way above the evolutionary line
Magalas is deffinitly the weirdest one since what kind of benefit does a Virus do to nature other than Mass Death?
Espinas funnily enough probably exist as Insectoid population control since it doesnt move a lot for something that big and yet its soo passive enough that villagers would keep them around just soo no larger Monsters can cause the area to become dangerous
Very nicely done. This video is a fantastic piece to go along with the hunting video from last year.
I find it interesting how the Hunter's Guild was formed specifically in response to a potential collapse of ecosystems across the globe due to unregulated overhunting. Given how prevalent Monsters are in the modern era of Monster Hunter again, I'd say that they succeeded in their efforts, at least compared to their real-world equivalents. I do wonder just how they managed to enact and put into motion such wide-scale hunting reforms, though.
My hypothesis is that they received the backing of multiple high-position Wyverians from multiple nations across the world, all of which pooled their resources to turn the Hunter's Guild into a veritable standing army that was too strong for any individual nation to takedown with ease. Maybe a kingdom could beat the Hunter's Guild through sheer attrition, but the effort needed to destroy the Guild in its entirety would be too costly and deprive these nations of valuable Hunters against Monster threats even their armies can't stand against, such as Fatalis the legendary Black Dragon.
There's still one species in-universe that can be argued to be critically endangered- Monoblos
It's one of the only monsters in the series to be exclusively hunted in a Village questline, by a single hunter at that.
Modern games feature a lot of Diablos, but Monoblos itself virtually never shows up- save for a cameo as a skull on the back of a Daimyo Hermitaur.
The whole thing about the guild being too tough to easily take down might not even be necessary, since we don't really know if wars between humans exist in monster hunter
@@cleo42 Wars between humans must exist. Armies exist with weapons made to kill humans.
i dont doubt that the guild would be too tough to fight, but it could also be that a kingdom might welcome a neutral guild that uses its own resources and manpower to take care of the monster threat. and if it comes down to it, a political scapegoat for not eliminating the monster threat if the guild fails.
I think the guild may work under government boddies. In change for the authority to regulate and enforce laws on hunting activity (and maybe some foundings) the guild may deal with monster threats aswell as share knowledge and technology
I think so because there are a lot of quests from nobles in royalty that ask for mosters to be killed for petty reasons that the guild really shouldn't accept
The information presented in this type of video could help to add more quest variety to future games other than gather, slay or capture.
Very timely video as I've been really getting on a botany kick and it's always interesting how plants develop with one another based upon the ecosystems
As someone who watches your video purely to learn more about our own world through the lense of a video game I like, these broader subject videos are some of my favorites. Hopefully you can brainstorm up some in the future, but I won't expect any for a long time because they seem like they take a lot of research.
Could this be the endemic life video that i've secretly always wanted? Haven't watched it yet, but it looks really good!
Well, regardless of the content, it was still an incredibly informative video, and a masterfully crafted one at that. Cheers!
Alas not just yet...
My right ear enjoyed this
Another fantastic video, these kinds of more speculative worldbuilding topics are always fun to discuss about, and you once again hit all the right notes. The topic of elder dragon's effects on ecosystems vs what humans perceive their effects are is itself a really interesting topic, in particular given the huge impact elders have, it's likely their destructive power also brings with them huge advantages to the ecosystems they visit, the most obvious example being the Rotten Vale and Guiding Lands from World, but those are only more obvious take aways, exploring elder impacts in general could be a fun discussion.
I can agree with a lot of the reasoning here, outside of particularly extreme exceptions like deviljho (which can and has been recorded decimating ecosystems due to what amounts to an eating disorder for the species at large) and its even more unstable variants--though a lot of the games' conflict arises when elders or other monsters are displaced from their native environments by something else causing problems, such as the loooooong migratory or predatory cycles of others larger elders (like xenojiva and shara ishvalda, gore and shagaru magala, and the archfiend-whos-name-escapes-me in sunbreak)
Fatalis (and the other rare more intelligent elder dragons) pose a wholly separate threat to humans or the environment as they knowingly choose to target things, which isnt a fair comparison with other monsters
With everything that's been discussed of the matter in this video, it's more than a little depressing that wolf eradication campaigns still continue in certain states to this very day.
Shout out to this video for helping me get a 5 on the AP environmental science test
Always love your stuff. One thing I'm curious about is the actual amount of "cannon" hunting that is done.
As a player we may kill hundreds or thousands of monsters, but it seems in the games world most quests could only happen once, and by the end most player characters (often the most prolific hunters of their areas by a historic degree) may have only killed a few dozen monsters. The other hunters around them may have killed far fewer and targeted mostly weak, fast breeding species.
It's possible that the arcadey, repetitive nature of the games has given us an overinflated sense of how common hunting actually is.
You've obviously researched this more than me but I recall World pushing the idea that the guild "permits" hunts after confirming it wouldn't harm the ecosystem to hunt them, rather than "we need to hunt this to avoid something", like it seems previous commenters have said. I imagine the people commissioning hunts often hear a "nah, deal with it some way else" from the guild because the monster is too ecologically important at that moment in time.
Can't wait to watch this video!
Any day that you upload a new MH video becomes a great day! Always drop what I'm doing to watch the whole thing when they show up in my sub feed. I've learned so much about animal ecology and biology from these videos through the lens of my favorite video game franchise. What's not to love?
Loved the video! I plan on working on the field of environmental science and your videos always insert the idea of taking my degree on ecology.
Best of luck with it all!
@@unnaturalhistorychannel I'll do my best!
What is really striking to me is the idea that ecosystems truly are systems, with myriad inputs and outputs, numerous cycles working together and complimenting one another to produce a marvel of biological engineering. We humans are so prone to seeing the world as something built around us, for us, that we have failed to see the importance of this series of interconnected networks.
SUPER NICE, I've never really thought in dept about the benefits of large predators in human populations!
So I have been thinking for a while about all of the current rewilding programs that have been going on, such as reintroducing lynxes to Scotland and the obvious wolves of Yellowstone. I was curious what your opinion would be on introducing the true Cheetahs into North America to act as replacements for the American Cheetah?
I don’t believe anyone has seriously considered it, but I am curious since the two convergently fill the same niches and they are probably the only predators that are alive that can reliably still hunt Pronghorns, along with hunting the wild horses.
The two animals likely weren't as similar as people initially think, and the notion of pronghorns evolving to outpace the america cheetah isn't actually as sound as people think. Predators can still occasionally hunt pronghorn and especially the lambs, coyotes were potentially depressing their numbers prior to wolf reintroduction.
Also, we've enough on our plate keeping cheetahs going in africa as is.
I'm all for reintroduction and rewilding, but some people do have some very extreme flights of fancy that seem to be more about satisfying some spec evo idea rather than actually reconstructing an ecosystem.
Also, feral horses are larger and more aggressive than people think. Larger predators such as wolves and cougars already have trouble hunting them and would much rather target safer deer and elk. Cheetahs wouldn’t really alleviate this issue, but removing feral horse protections to allow culls definitely will.
cheetas are so delicate, we need tigers/pumas
We have pumas. It’s not enough.
@@unnaturalhistorychannel What are your opinions on other types of reintroduction? Like say jaguars into the US or hypothetically mammoths into Russia?
I have to say thank you for making this video. I'm a senior in high school and have to write a thesis to finish off the year. I'm doing mine the conservation of big cats, which has lead to issues with finding points to make. The parts about the mesopredators, competition between individuals, and stabilizing populations have pointed me in a good direction.
Nothing more exciting to see than Fantasy World Animal Planet program, great job mate. //
That tidbit about electricity having a noticeable effect on mushroom yield is really interesting! Already there're a bunch of possible reasons I could think of for why and I'm excited to dig into the article you cited, plus I have a guy friend who shares a common interest in mycology with me so I'm eager to hear what he thinks!
One thing I really love about your channel is that you speak clearly about the complexities of the animal kingdom instead of sensasionalizing it for views.
It's so refreshing to see a channel that doesn't treat apex predators like killing machines and rules of the world and who imply hervibores are weak and meek, is like a fine meal restaurant in a street filled with junk food.
Jesus I studied Natural Resources as my undergrad, and good sir you deserve much more subs
Thank you! Already staggered by 50K
Thank you for your hard work, we all appreciate it. You are a incredible, amazing, and wonderful person.
I always love how much I learn about the real world through your videos
You are an incredibly talented creator, researcher, and analyst
I am always super happy and thankful I found your channel for some of the most edifying and entertaining content on the platform 🙇♂️🙏
I had seen examples of killing street dogs with poison, which also kills other native predators and scavengers, and then makes the street dogs multiply more.
Great video, thanks for making such complex topics so accessible.
I would love more sauropod based monster or a spinosaurus based brute wyvern
the quests we receive in-game are not very well thought-out when considering ecosystems- for instance, if many elder hunts took place in environmenta that they did not normally frequent, suddenly it seems a lot more reasonable to be hunting those elders. but, then again, very few of the in-game quests can be considered fully "canonical", so it may be that the quests hunters receive canonically regard monsters outside of their normal habitat or that linger too close to human settlements and trade routes.
I have a theory that only the key quests in the games are fully canon
This was a great vid on eco-services! I'm a college student studying ecology and I love your vids!
Thank you! Hopefully these can help in someway!
Awwww yes my favorite youtuber uploading just in time for me to work on my homework! I'm gonna grab a coffee and a blanket this is gonna be good!!
I think the importance of these things is very often underutilized and it makes me kind of sad that some people would gloss over it or find it unimportant. I'm happy Monster Hunter seems to be taking more effort into showing both the cultural and ecological influences that Monsters can have, such as Goss Harag and Espinas, and I look forward to more getting such deep and rich storytelling to them as well.
I always love listening to your content, you always shed theoretical light to understanding these critters Monster Hunter or not. Keep up the good work
on the topic of lagiacrus in tri being a scapegoat for ceadeus, i would like to point out that in actuality, its hunt was still justified as it was threatening fishing boats and sea based exports that the city relied on for food and its economy. right at the start of the game, several fishing boats are brought in that have been shattered to scrap after a lagiacrus attacked them.
Although it may not impact humans directly most of the time at least, Dire Dire Miralis may help provide nutrients for sea floor ecosystems by burrowing through geothermal vents which create more openings which spread out more energy.
I'm sitting here taking notes like I'm prepping for a science test. This is a fascinating subject.
EDIT: Definitely a worthwhile video to make for sure. I never thought I'd be interested in ecology, but you've got me thinking about the ecology of my country. Australia lacks a top order predator as far as I know, or at least, theres no obvious one like the bears, wolves, big cats, etc that are found on the other continents. With such a unique ecosystem, what is the ecology of australia like?
I'm hoping this newfound interest in ecology is permanent. I've got ADHD and this wouldn't be the first time I became obsessed with a subject and lost all interest in it two weeks later. For what its worth, this interest feels "more real" than they usually do, but I bet I'd say that about all of them at the time. If I'm still obsessed with it in a month I might actually consider seeing if theres any free educational resources I can find to learn IRL ecology.
The cinematic event of the month
I’ve only discovered this video now, but… I’m very intrigued by the fact that electricity increases mushroom yield. And it made me realize that one of the major areas of mushroom growth in World is the Ancient Forest, especially on high tree trunks or around the bases of trees… which matches fairly well with the favored territory of the local electric wyvern Tobi-Kadachi. The Ancient Forest even has “Unique Mushroom Colonies”… and Tobi-Kadachi is one of _very_ few electric monsters (and one is Kirin, which is an Elder Dragon but also very low population and _extremely_ highly migratory compared to Tobi-Kadachi’s specializations for arboreality.). Is this connection intentional? Probably not, but it’s interesting to consider.
This will have drastic effects on the trout population!
Hearing about how there are plants that could depend a lot on monsters and the ability to influence topography and soil, I think that can be somewhat easily seen in the Monster Hunter universe with Garangolm, since it's specifically stated to promote plant growth and enrich soil with its bodily fluids, which probably include the mossy rocks it coats its left arm with when enraged.
Dude I hope you don't feel discouraged Because you never fail on delivering good quality content I'm in love with monster hunter and your channel, you do such an amazing job at making a more accurate argument towards a fictional universe, you're amazing man I hope you're channel keeps growing in the monster hunter community and other TV/series and movies videos you make my favorite video it still is the Kong skull island video you made that was just absolutely amazing and that's how I found your channel ❤️ 💙
Aaah, this brings me back to my second year in forestry studies.
One of the biggest issues humanity has is trusting government bureaucracies to run ANYTHING. Bureaucracy spreads out responsibility and decision, and does NOT reward knowledge/innovation/understanding/prudence. Government rewards whoever can manipulate the system the best, and whoever can SOUND good, regardless of how awful their ideas actually are.
The benefits of destruction in ecosystems is a really complex topic right now, so as much as speculation goes I wanted to add that these large creatures may force plants and fungi to adapt in the same way, resulting in a flora that can either resists living with fire breathing creatures or have fast regrowth. In this regard I think mh flora is done especially well, the healing and utility property of plants are something that the species need to survive in the ecosystem and the hunters simply borrow these abilities, the same way they use monster parts to hunt monsters better
I like to point out that world story, altough it doesn't focus too much on the matter because it keeps betting on the wrong horse, has the undertext that the death of a zhora may mean the death of an ecosystem but the birth of a new one as well, and that all parts involved, shara nerg and the fleet, were trying to rebalance things in their own, narrow, ways
I have been studying animals and nature since I was 3 and yet at least a 1/3 of my knowledge has been contributed from you.
Please keep it up with these MH ecology videos! Some of the best content on all of RUclips
I'm surprised that the energy produced by the Elder Dragons and the nature of the Elder Crossing wasn't discussed here especially since their energies help to stimulate life as discussed in the movie Legends of the Guild.
Im so glad you made a channel. You make my day everytime. More than watching rajang body in world.
Sometimes I wonder how villages deal with an occasional hungry Rathalos swooping down to pick up your neighbor or something
And this doesn’t even mention how subterranean or even semi-sub species like Agnaktor or Gravios may unearth precious ore and minerals, leaving behind treasure troves for miners. Of course, I’m not familiar with any real world equivalents to this either. Another idea might be how the mere presence of marine monsters may drive fish closer to shore, where fishermen may receive massive boosts in catch. Some may even become seasonal, where migrating Lagiacrus or Plesioth drive schooling fish in droves towards fishing communities.
This is actually one reason the guild are *comparatively* tolerant of Glavenus, as it does just that. But I'm saving that for his video
I recently watched a good video form Ze Frank on the hippopotamus he talked about the role their waste and gut bacteria have on the environment.
Man,we hunters are the real villians.
This is why i like world so much as the main cast are almost entirely ecosystem engineers or culling what were supposedly top order carnivores. The only really destructive one being shara ishvalda, which might have been attracted by the 'jivas in the first place to get culled.
xeno/safi'jiva serve as lures to "elderly"/sick elder dragons (and seem to be mostly sedentary waiting for food to come to them), nerg culls the weakest ones first and leaves only the strongest like zorah for the 'jivas, and whatever the 'jivas eat likely is where the coral highlands/veil monsters migrate to whenever the last highlands/veil runs out of nutrients from a 'jiva's last meal.
each one serves a purpose to the control of elder dragon populations and even maintain two entire (codependent)ecosystems, and even mostly leave the hunters alone until they start poking them. like depriving the 'jiva of a meal that would have likely satisfied it for a LONG time, and anytime we see nerg in the story we start poking him with sticks despite him leaving us alone as he is trying to do something with zorah? (maybe he was seeing if any weak elders were using zorah as a ferry?)
Gonna keep asking for a crab video til I get a crab video.
......
CRAB VIDEO
Someday...
I would honestly love to see a walking with dinosaurs style documentary but for various monsters from the monster hunter series and show them as animals instead of wild blood thirsty beasts.
It's pretty much the ecological version of what I always say " If it ain't broken, DONT FUCKING BREAK IT!!".
lot of fertilizer
I really love your videos, especially like the set real life exemple make me understand so much stuff about the world and as someone who loves creating and building worlds out of realistic blocs your channel makes me so inspired to do shit, thanks
One thing I find interesting to consider is how limited hunting is in the MH world compared to the real world, at least in places the Guild has influence over. According to Legends of the Guild, killing of even a small raptor is prohibited if you are not a licensed hunter, and given each hunt in a game's story by canon only happens once, the number of animals killed is far smaller than it may seem. And most villages only seem to have a few active hunters at any given time. Combine with how relatively small and isolated most societies in MH are from each other, it gives the impression hunting has a different effect compared to the modern world where its often pockets of wilderness instead of pockets of civilization.
I love the idea the most destructive monsters can have beneficial effects to the ecosystem.
I learned a lot from this. Thank you.
I can't find the relevant study, but another ecologist once told me that human hunting pressure can create larger deer herds, because it removes the large, territorial males from the population (who would fight off intruders and maintain smaller group sizes) and you're left with smaller males who just...get along with each other. I think hunting for gold crown sized monsters could mess with their social structure like this, especially in species like great jagras. Maybe we could also see diablos' horns shrinking like has been suggested with elephant tusks, if they're used for materials.
To further your point with ecosystem services with a real world example, Texas has had a fairly constant problem with feral hogs, the problem wouldn’t be an issue if there hadnt been human mismanagement, as well as if human encroachment hadnt pushed top order predators to extinction in the area. Both problems were the cause of humans, there are over 2.6 million hogs in Texas, and at one point it was believe to be 5 million, causing over 400 million USD in damages annually. These monsters are also growing to abnormal disproportionate sizes, we have records of 488lbs (221.35kg) and 460lbs (208.65kg), reaching 7ft (2.13m) in length around 4ft (1.219m) to the shoulder. This problem was created by humans and exasperated by humans.
UHC, would you ever consider covering Wild Hearts' Kemono? The Fumebeak in particular is a favourite.
Possibly in the future, but I've had little to do with it so far
@@unnaturalhistorychannel I 100% recommend it to anyone who enjoys Monster Hunter. Just not on PC though, apparently the port sucks. Thanks for the videos, king.
Disclaimer: I don't remember exactly from what game and the exact quest description..
But I can vaguely remember in one of the past gen games, a quest description alluding to Teostra having increased activity either through mating or attracting a mate which resulted in the volcano region becoming more unstable. Teostra generally mind their own business but I can understand how the research team would see a problem with monster doing this because the nearby village would be in danger if the volcano erupted.
End result: gotta hunt him.
Man I wish we had a durambaros or benbaro in California really could've been useful
I think a movie you'd like as a biologist is Watership down. I don't know how well it would translate to the channel, as it's just rabbits and no spec evo or anything like that. Still though, it's a good movie, just be prepared for shit to hit the fan
a question I've always had, which will likely never have a true answer and go more into headcanon, is how many of these quests actually happen. A lot of them I could imagine being non-canon and existing purely for the players benefit, especially a lot of the challenge quests that show up as free dlc. With a lot of monster hunter games I see most stuff after the credits as entirely non-canon, with a non-game version of these stories probably being much smaller in scope and more about exceptionally skilled individuals helping their community and the environment alike. Although that is purely a personal interpretation, I also imagine not every hunt would result in an actual kill and I'd expect more capture or scare goals for quests just relocating a monster in an area that harms both it and the player. Monster hunter also seems to have some degree of magic-like elements, especially in terms of how extreme biology can get, so perhaps rapid mutation and evolution creating new invasives on a non-geologic timescale is more of a feasible occurrence. All that said, I enjoy how you apply this kind of lens to such a creative and silly franchise
19:48 Sunbreak (endgame, specifically) in a nutshell
Hunting is like PR or HR. It only exists to facilitate the interaction between the wider population and themselves. While the villagers may not have been affected by Rathalos, Tigrex or Lagiacrus previously, difficulties arise when humans encroach upon the natural habitats and/or limit them. We have observed that a lot in human history. Ultimately, it cannot be understated how important living alongside the natural world in all its facets is. That is a lesson Wyverians have learnt the hard way, if the dubious lore is to believed.
Further, much of the role of Elder Wyverians in the games is to guide us towards invaders that could upset the "natural balance". Monster Hunter 4 is actually pretty explicit about the role we play in that game: We smash the Wheel that represents the (life) cycle of the Magalas. A motive that is reflected whenever Shagaru makes an appearance. Worldborne initially makes us believe that it was us that stopped both Xeno and Shara, only to humble us at the end by making it expressly clear that the natural world has its own counterbalances when Ruiner "steals" the kill. Again stressing that the only reason we actually interfered is how the Great Everwyrm's awakening would have affected the settlements in the New World. Not keeping the natural ecological balance.
If anything, Hunting in the New World is exemplary of my entire point: We arrived in this untouched land, are disrupting it and have to turn to Hunting in order to carve out our niche while maintaining a semblance of balance in our presence.
Keep up the incredible and amazing work.
Have a visual audio presentation on any bio topic of my choosing due next week, and i really have to ask how the hell do you go from writing papers to talking about them in a way that people can understand? I sound like a scared robot trying to explain things. I really didnt appreciate what you do until now making entertaining but accurate and educational videos is so hard
I didn't realise I'd stopped sounding like a robot!
Being in person should help, and make sure any notes you can bring are as detailed as you can get to try and cut back and um'ing and ah'ing.
I kinda always thought that hunting animals as a service is bull shit a healthy environment will not need any species be culled. Would love to play a dnd game set around this concept maybe showing that the guild is a corrupt organization which is pumping out propaganda as to maximize profit maybe ??
One would think dromes would be quite open to domestication, or at least taming. Like birds of prey, canids and cats.
One thing i think people commenting about the "need" for hunts miss is that the culture of monster hunter is one that is significantly less developed re: biology, zoology, ecology and other fields that explain and understand the natural world. Taking the Guild, an org that exists to facilitate hunts, at its word when it says such hunts are necessary is dubious. Maybe from the perspective of experts in universe there is a reason to deal with so called "problem monsters" or to cull a population but that doesnt make those experts right. Certainly scientists and naturalists in the real world have had reason to believe certain courses of action were correct and then been proven wrong either by the results of their actions or by new research. While the MH games arent exactly textual about the potential unreliability of Guild sources i think there are a lot obvious hints at it. We also have to consider political, cultural, and economic pressures that might lead to people inventing reasons for hunts that sound good but arent, not unlike the coyote culling measures you mentioned in this video.
in general i think a good chunk of players are too quick to take in game sources at their word when theres really no reason to. The Lagiacrus in tri is a perfect example of how wrong they can be.