Created by Captain Michael Turlogh Kane on Aug 16, 2016 @ 1:37pm

TELLARITES

TELLARITES are the dominant species of 61 Cygni V, known as Tellar Prime. They are one of the founding worlds of the United Federation of Planets and one of the permanent members of the Federation Council.

Tellarites are short, stout humanoids with distinctive facial snouts and deep eye sockets. The skin colour tends to be dark brown, but can run to deep ebony black. Albinism, while not common, is known in this species. Male Tellarites are generally covered with a coat of coarse hair, and style their facial hair into beards. Female Tellarites are less hairy, and do not grow beards, but tend to be slightly taller than the males. Their blood is purple, and their limbs end in segmented hooves. They generally have high body temperatures, and have advanced hearing and smell, but their eyesight is generally poor.

As a result of having to mine their own world for its mineral rich water, Tellarites are natural and inquisitive engineers, and they united their world and achieved warp capability during Earth's 20th century. They made contact with the Vulcans and Andorians, quickly becoming trading rivals with the latter. However, during the Babel Crisis of late 2154, the Tellarites realised that unity with the Vulcans, Andorians, and the newcomer species of Humans would safeguard their future, and joined with the others to create the United Federation of Planets.

With their strong engineering traditions, Tellarites are efficient and strong believers in order, structure, and due process. This lack of spontaneity can make them seem argumentative and standoffish to outsiders, but Tellarites love debating the merits of their own processes, so much so that debating is their most common form of recreation. Tellarite politicians have enhanced debating to an almost legendary art, and they are often used as treaty negotiators by the Federation.

Today, there are over twenty billion Tellarites living around the Federation, with many hundreds of thousands of them serving in Starfleet.