Gilamar Skirata
The most important step is always the next one
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Name: Galek Hound
Designation: Non-Sentient
Homeworld: Mandalore
Language: None
Average height of adults: .308 Meters (~2.8 Feet) at Shoulder
Skin color: Black
Hair color:
- Silvers
- Browns (Most commonly Amber) - Most Common coloration
- Blacks
Strengths:
- Sharp Claws {Flesh and Bone and wood}
- Strong Jaws {Flesh, bone and wood}
- Loyal
- Playful/Friendly towards humans and humanoid sentient beings
- Lithe and powerful body
- Good swimmers
- Allergic to Mandalorian Viper venom
- Can't handle the cold well
- Long, ferret-like bodies
- Males have small fleshy tendrils that come off the back of their head
- Long, flexible tail (Often used as a tool
- Brown or Silver fur coloration
Races: N/A
Estimated Population: 100,000
- EXCLUSIVELY Found on Mandalore
- Also eat the Bark and leaves of the Galek trees to aid in digestion
Culture: The Galek hounds are dearly regarded as guardians of the Galek tree forests that dot Mandalore's landscape. Fierce warriors with a strong sense of family and unity, they mirror many of the values that Mandalorians hold dear. Similarly to how Galek forests are considered something similar to hallowed ground, to kill a Galek hound is seen as disrespectful and generally dishonorable to many of the clans and elders in the Mandalorian community. Because of their tendency to take in lost Mandalorian children some clans have developed the saying "Have you checked the Galek's hollow" for when someone has lost something precious to them. Due to the Galek Hound's tendency to burrow winding tunnels through the thick trunks of some of the largest Galek trees, some Mandalorian scholars have theorized that is where the idea of the Vheh'yaim.
Technology level: N/A
General behavior: Outside of their affect on Mandalorian culture they also seem to have a primitive culture of their own. Galek hounds usually live in large communities with the largest ever recorded being 200 individuals. They share food, hunt together, play together and even sleep together during the winter months when they are most vulnerable. They live in large hollow nests, similar to owls, in the trunks of the ancien silver Galek trees. Usually the pack leader occupies the largest hollow which winds through a great Galek tree, usually the oldest one in their group's territory. During the winter months they will plug the other entrances and huddle in the main hollow for warmth.
During the spring, summer and autumn however the Galek hounds can be heard hunting, roughhousing, and living throughout the Galek forests. Few are ever tamed, but for clans who live near or within Galek tree forests the Galek hounds have proven to be loyal friends to the Mandalorians with stories of them taking lost young into their hollows during winters and keeping them fed with berries and nuts until their parents found them.
History: Believed by Mandalorian biologists and Paleontologists to be one of the oldest species on Mandalore, the Galek Hound has roots to another, larger mammal that called the forests of Mandalore home. It is theorized that a combination of the evolution of the Rekr into one of Mandalore's top predators and the mass extinction of the Mythosaur and the believed extinction of the Beskar Epar (later confirmed to be not a true extinction but a mass hibernation period) led to the Galek Hound's ancestor becoming extinct and would be the catalyst to the biological split that would give birth to the Galek hounds of Mandalore.
By the time the Crusades began the Galek Hounds had solidified their place as a sacred animal of the Mandalorians. Killing one was an offense worthy of death for many clans at the time. As the decades and centuries passed. When the Yuuzhan Vong war began the Galek forests were one of the few places not assaulted by the Vong. Some believe that the Galek Hounds had some special warding power against the Vong and their bio-tech, but that was mere superstition. Today the Galek Hounds live under Mandalorian protection, usually at the discretion of the clans closest to the forests.
Intent: To add to the flourishing lore of the Mandalorian people
