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Does anyone know the species name of Commander Kruge's "monster dog" shown in Star Trek III: The Search for Spock? Didn't they call it something like "Fido" or "Fluffy" on the set?
Registered: Jun 2003
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Hmmm... I thought a targ was a wild boar-like animal with spikes growing out of its back like the one shown in the TNG episode "Where No One Has Gone Before." If remember correctly Worf had one as a pet.
Although the "Star Trek: Encyclopedia" speculates that Kruge's pet and the "jackal mastiffs" the big white dog-like things guarding Rura Penthe in ST VI are also "targs".
NOOOO! It doesn't work for a porcine-like herbivore and two clearly different meat-eating quadraped predators to all have the same name.
Did Vonda McIntyre mention a name in the novelization of "Star Trek III: The Search for Spock"?
Any fan names that are better?
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Perhaps there are different breeds of targ?
-------------------- "This is why you people think I'm so unknowable. You don't listen!" - God, "God, the Devil and Bob"
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They appear to be different species altogether. I am fairly well versed in the evolution and genetics of Canines and I know of none that bear such a striking resemblence to wild boar as the targ does. I think ST3's jackyl and ST6's sabertoothed thing...are more of the pet-type creatures we would call 'dogs' whereas targs would be more like what we call 'pigs'. Also, I am unsure about this, but do Klingons not also hunt targ, they seem to make them a foodsource as much as a 'pet', much like humans treat pigs....
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Registered: Jan 2003
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Found it's name at KIDC.org. It's named Warrigul. The name was originally an obsolete Aboriginal word for the dingo wild dogs. According to the poster at KIDC.org this name is used in the novelization and appeared on a collector's card when the movie was released in 1984.
I am going to use warrigul as the name of the species in my fan fiction. I going to asume that Kruge was unimaginative in pet names. He strikes me as the type who would own a pet dog named "Dog".
I am going to use the term targ exclusively for the porcine variety as in the delicacy "Heart of Targ".
Although I hate the name jackal mastiff, I am not going to call these creatures targs. The name jackal mastiff does appear in the copy of the ST:VI script that have.
The three species are just too disimilar in appearance, have different diets (two meat eaters, one herbivore). The forked tongue and general reptile-like appearance makes me skeptical that Kruge's pet was even a mammal, while the porcine targ and the jackal mastiff look like mammals.
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well technically none of them are mammals since that's an earth specific family of life forms. Presumably other planets may have similar looking animals and insects it would be very unlikely if their anatomy or evolutionary history bear much resemblance to their terrestrial counterparts.
Case-in-point the Klingons themselves; sure they look similar to humans but their anatomy is dissimilar enough to confuse a 30 year veteran doctor with extensive exobiological experience. They also seam to have evolved from something that looks like a large primate with an exoskeleton and high pressure poison sacs, which is defiantly unlike anything in Earth's history...as far as we know anyway.
If I recall correctly Targs are more analogist to Cats than pigs, in terms of their social standing. We know that both Worf and Martok had a pet Targ when they were children, Martok's apparently being quite long lived since it survived at least until his marriage.
There has been several mentions of Targs living in the wild on Quo'nos, where they apparently move in herds and can be a bother to ground vehicles (I recall Torres mentioning something to this effect.) I would surmise that it's against Klingon nature to domesticate animals and that they instead capture feral Targs, Warriguls and Jackal Mastiff (transliterate to JarkMarsH'Taff maybe?) for food and/or ritual sacrifice (weddings) and keep the more spirited ones as pets for their children and/or as working animals.
Remember that Quo'nos is bound to have just as much ethnic and geological diversity as Earth so it's possible that these different species are from entirely different continents. The Rura Pente creatures are obviously polar and/or mountain dwellers, while the Targs could be indigenous to the Kethar (sp?) lowlands. As for that Warriguls; I get the feeling that they're arboreal, perhaps tree climbers or maybe amphibious swimmers? I'm sure Quo'Nos has it's share of jungles and rainforest/swamp land
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Does anyone have a copy of the "Star Trek III: The Search for Spock" novelization who could give us a verbatim history of Warrigul and where he came from?
Reverend, I assumed that the targ and jackal-mastiff were mammals because mammals were put into makeup to play these animals. You are correct, we don't know if alien lifeforms can be categorized into Terran lifeform classification schemes.
However, the Klingons themselves seem to fit the definition of mammals:
quote:Any of various warm-blooded vertebrate animals of the class Mammalia, including humans, characterized by a covering of hair on the skin and, in the female, milk-producing mammary glands for nourishing the young.
[From Late Latin mammlis, of the breast, from Latin mamma, breast.]
There are differences in anatomy between mammalian species, so this doesn't preclude Klingon from being mammals. Look at bovines with their four-chambered stomachs?
It has also been established that Klingons and humans can inter-breed. Although any biology teacher would probably say that this is so highly unlikely to be impossible. The two are most likely physiologically and genetically incompatible.
It would be like asserting that if a woman mated with a bull we would get minotaurs or lonely sheppards would have human-sheep hybrids in their flocks.
But you're right. It has not been established that categories of life that apply on Earth apply on other worlds. We have only gotten humanoid and as far as I can tell that means bipedal and roughly the same height as human beings.
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quote:Originally posted by Triton: Reverend, I assumed that the targ and jackal-mastiff were mammals because mammals were put into makeup to play these animals. You are correct, we don't know if alien lifeforms can be categorized into Terran lifeform classification schemes.
In all fairness, wasn't the targ was the only mammal put into makeup to play these animals...whereas the rest were otherwise tronic-puppet-creatures?
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![[Eek!]](eek.gif)
It doesn't work for a porcine-like herbivore and two clearly different meat-eating quadraped predators to all have the same name.![[Smile]](smile.gif)
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