Pokemon Symbiosis ?

[Vaporeonn]

Spoiler: in case you don't know what symbiosis means

Just in case, symbiosis is a type of interraction / relationship between animals / plants / bacterias, that is usually mutually beneficial, although sometimes one party tends to get more of the benefit, and other times it turns parasitic. For example, the clown fish hides in sea anemones, and in return, the clown fish cleans the anemone. No idea how well I managed to explain this in English, but if this is wrong or if you don't understand, don't be scared to correct me / google it yourself

Alright, I had this sort of headcanon for quite some time, and I thought it was interesting enough to share – the creatures in our world form symbiotic relationships, so how would they work in the Pokémon world? The one that made me think of this was as follows.

The Viridian forest is inhabited by mostly Bug-type Pokémon, such as Caterpies and Weedles, and, although rare and not present in all games, Flying-types (Pidgeys and Pidgeottos), and the occasional Pikachu. Presuming that Pidgey and Pidgeotto would, well, feed on bugs (and since Bug is also weak to Flying), what could the poor Caterpies possibly do to protect themselves? Team up with a Pikachu to help them out, since their Thundershock could scare off the birds. Because Pikachus are rare, I'm guessing there would be multiple Caterpies and Weedles helped by one Pikachu.

I still haven't figured out what the little bugs could do in return, and their Pokèdex entries didn't help out that much, but some mention Weedle having a good sense of smell, so it could find the tasiest fruit/berries to give to Pikachu. And if we count in Butterfree as well, since it produces honey, Butterfrees could give honey to the Pikachus as a thank-you for protecting the younglings.

So, that's that. I hope this was even a remotely interesting topic to read about, and if someone comes up with amother symbiosis headcanon, feel free to share it!

 

[Fishykarp]

It does appear that Pokemon Symbosis would exist. Mantine are most often depicted alongside Remoraid, probably like a cleaner fish. I'd imagine these would exist.

Really though, this is also the relationship between humans and Pokemon, as many humans do catch Pokemon and help them thrive, and I'd imagine this relationship had been going on a long time before Pokeballs, shown in some of the spinoff games and in the Anime

 

[StellarWind Elsydeon]

To be fair, Remoraids are unholy hybrids of archerfish and remora - the latter of which actually do attach themselves to larger sea creatures (including manta rays, yes) - which was thought to be a purely commensal relationship in the past, but recent research shows that this is actually a mutualistic arrangement. So yeah, that relationship is rooted in reality.

If we leave symbiotic relationships between Pokemon and non-Pokémon life-forms (of which there are many) aside, true symbiotic shenanigans between Pokémon species appears to be fairly rare in canon. There is the symbiotic relationship between Slowpokes and Shellders (which is definitely a bit more symbiotic-mutualistic in the case of Slowking rather than in the case of Slowbro in which the relationship can be described as closer to parasitic), and the incredibly weird situation between Karrablast and Shelmet in which both species require each other's presence to evolve (amusing considering Karrablast is based on a carabid beetle, voracious predators of snails like Shelmet). Another implied symbiosis appears to involve smaller Pokémon taking shelter in the water bubbles of Araquanid (and yes, the dex entries contradict each other regarding whether Araquanid protects things by bringing them into its bubble or is trying to eat them, but I suspect the truth is somewhere in the middle). Looking away from mutualistic symbiosis and look at more one-sided relationships we can find Joltik commensally attaching themselves to larger Pokemon and feeding on static electricity (something which likely wouldn't adversely affect the carrier), for example. There's probably more examples, but really, where there are living creatures you can almost certainly expect odd interactions - and when some of these animals are borderline sentient you could probably find situations that are specific for individuals but don't define a species. So there you have it, really. XD