Rules Of Gor Northern Lodge

Animals of Gor

Anteater:

More than six varieties of anteater are also found here, and more than twenty kinds of small, fleet, single-horned tabuk....
---Explorers of Gor, 32:312

Ants:

Soon, as we approached more closely, quietly, the sound became much louder. It was now clearly distinguishable as a quite audible rustling or stirring. But there was no wind.
"The marchers," said the leader of the small men, pointing.
The hair on the back of my neck rose.
I saw now that the sound was the sound of millions upon millions of tiny feet, treading upon the leaves and fallen debris of the jungle floor. Too, there may have been, mixed in that sound, the almost infinitesimal sound, audible only in its cumulative effect, of the rubbings and clickings of the joints of tiny limbs and the shiftings and adjustments of tiny, black, shiny exoskeletons, those stiff casings of the segments of their tiny bodies.
"Do not go too close," said the leader of the small men.
The column of the marchers was something like a yard wide. I did not know how long it might be. It extended ahead through the jungle and behind through the jungle farther than I could see in either direction. Such columns can be pasangs in length. It is difficult to conjecture the numbers that constitute such a march. Conservatively some dozens of millions might be involved. The column widens only when food is found; then it may spread as widely as five hundred feet in width. Do not try to wade through such a flood. The torrent of hurrying feeders leaves little but bones in its path.
"Let us go toward the head of the column," said the little man.
We trekked through the jungle for several hours, keeping parallel to the long column. Once we crossed a small stream. The marchers, forming living bridges of their own bodies, clinging and scrambling on one another, crossed it also. They, rustling and black, moved over fallen trees and about rocks and palms. They seemed tireless and relentless. Flankers marshaled the column. Through the green rain forest the column moved, like a governed, endless, whispering black snake.
"Do they march at night?" I asked.
"Often," said the small man. "One must be careful where one sleeps."
We had then advanced beyond the head of the column by some four hundred yards.
"It is going to rain," I said. "Will that stop them?"
"For a time," he said. "They will scatter and seek shelter, beneath leaves and twigs, under the debris of the forest, and then, summoned by their leaders, they will reform and again take up the march."
Scarcely had he spoken but the skies opened up and, from the midst of the black, swirling clouds, while lightning cracked and shattered across the sky and branches lashed back and forth wildly in the wind, the driven, darkly silver sheets of a tropical rain storm descended upon us.
"Do they hunt?" I shouted to the small man.
"Not really," he said. "They forage."

... "Look," had said the leader of the small men this morning, "scouts."
He had thrown to the forest floor a portion of the slain tarsk. I watched the black, segmented bodies of some fifteen or twenty ants, some two hundred yards in advance of the column, approach the meat. Their antennae were lifted. They had seemed tense, excited. They were some two inches in length. Their bite, and that of their fellows, is vicious and extremely painful, but it is not poisonous. There is no quick death for those who fail to escape the column. Several of these ants then formed a circle, their heads together, their antennae, quivering, touching one another. Then, almost instantly, the circle broke and they rushed back to the column.
"Watch," had said the small man.
To my horror I had then seen the column turn toward the piece of tarsk flesh.

...There was now a horrified shouting in the camp. I saw torches being thrust to the ground. Men were irrationally thrusting at the ground with spears. Others tore palm leaves from the roofs of huts, striking about them.
I hoped there were no tethered animals in the camp. Between two huts I saw a man rolling on the ground in frenzied pain.
I felt a sharp painful bite at my foot. More ants poured over the palings. Now, near the rear wall and spreading toward the center of the village, it seemed there was a growing, lengthening, rustling, living carpet of insects. I slapped my arm and ran toward the hut in which originally, our party had been housed in this village. With my foot I broke through the sticks at its back.
--- Explorers of Gor, 47:400-402

Bees:

I saw small fruit trees, and hives, where honey bees were raised; and there were small sheds, here and there, with sloping roofs of boards; in some such sheds might craftsmen work; in others fish might be dried or butter made....
---Marauders of Gor, 6:81

Beetles:

"That is a frevet." The frevet is a small, quick, mammalian insectivore. "We have several in the house," he said. "They control insects, the beetles and lice, and such."
---Mercenaries of Gor, 22:276

Bint:

Ayari nodded, shuddering. Such blood might attract the bint, a fanged, carnivorous marsh eel, or the predatory, voracious blue grunt, a small, fresh-water variety of the much larger and familiar salt-water grunt of Thassa....
---Explorers of Gor, 24:267

Bosk:

The bosk, without which the Wagon Peoples could not live, is an oxlike creature. It is a huge shambling animal with a thick, humped neck, and long, shaggy hair. It has a wide head and tiny red eyes, a temper to match that of a sleen, and two long, wicked horns that reach out from its head and suddenly curve forward to terminate in fearful points. Some of these horns, on the larger animals, when measured from tip to tip, exceed the length of two spears.
---Nomads of Gor, 1:4-5

Carp:

Centipede:

Here, too, may be found snakes and monkeys, gliding urts, leaf urts, squirrels, climbing, long-tailed porcupines, lizards, sloths, and the usual varieties of insects, ants, centipedes, scorpions, beetles and flies, and so on....
---Explorers of Gor, 32:311

Clam:

I looked at him steadily. "They are probably false stones," I said, "amber droplets, the pearls of the Vosk sorp, the polished shell of the Tamber clam, glass colored and cut in Ar for trade with ignorant southern peoples."
---Nomads of Gor, 3:20

Cosian Wingfish:

This fish is a tiny, delicate fish, blue, about the size of a tarn disk when curled in one's hand; it has three or four slender spines in its dorsal fin, which are poisonous; it is capable of hurling itself from the water and, for brief distances, on its stiff pectoral fins, gliding through the air, usually to evade the smaller sea-tharlarions, which seem to be immune to the poison of the spines. This fish is also some times referred to as the songfish because, as a portion of its courtship rituals, the males and females thrust their heads from the water and utter a sort of whistling sound.

The blue, four-spined wingfish is found only in the waters of Cos. Larger varieties are found farther out to sea. The small blue fish is regarded as a great delicacy, and its liver as the delicacy of delicacies.
---Nomads of Gor, 9:84-85

Cuttlefish:

It contained as well the separated oil of the Thentis needle tree; an extract from the glands of the Cartius river urt; and a preparation formed from a disease calculus scraped from the intestines of the rare Hunjer Long Whale, the result of the inadequate digestion of cuttlefish....
---Marauders of Gor, 8:114

Deer:

"Perhaps," suggested Gorm, "it is diseased or injured, and can no longer hunt the swift deer of the north?"
---Marauders of Gor, 7:108

Eel:

Below me the water was swarming with eels. The blood from my back, I realized, running down the blade and dripping into the water, had attracted them.
---Guardsman of Gor, 16:129

Finch:

...In the second level, that of the canopies, is found an incredible variety of birds, warblers, finches, mindars, the crested lit and the common lit, the fruit tindel, the yellow gim, tanagers, some varieties of parrot, and many more....
---Explorers of Gor, 32:311

Fisher:

...His head was surmounted by an elaborate headdress, formed largely from the long, white, curling feathers of the Ushindi fisher, a long legged, wading bird....
---Explorers of Gor, 18:236

Fleer:

...The fleer is a large, yellow, long-billed, gregarious, voracious bird of the Barrens. It is sometimes also called the Corn Bird or the Maize Bird....
---Savages of Gor, 14:246

Flies:

At certain times in the summer even insects will appear, black, long-winged flies, in great swarms, coating the sides of tents and the faces of men.
---Beasts of Gor, 12:196

Frevet:

"That is not an urt," said the proprietor. "They usually come out after dark. There is too much noise and movement for them during the day." The small animal skittered backward, with a sound of claws on the boards. Its eyes gleamed in the reflected light of the lamp. "Generally, too, they do not come this high," said the proprietor. "That is a frevet." The frevet is a small, quick, mammalian insectivore. "We have several in the house," he said. "They control insects, the beetles and lice, and such."
---Mercenaries of Gor, 22:276

Gant:

I heard a bird some forty or fifty yards to my right; it sounded like a marsh gant, a small, horned, web-footed aquatic fowl, broad-billed and broad-winged. Marsh girls, the daughters of rence growers, sometimes hunt them with throwing sticks.
---Raiders of Gor, 1:4

I stepped aside to let a young girl pass, who carried two baskets of eggs, those of the migratory arctic gant. They nest in the mountain of the Hrimgar and in steep, rocky outcroppings, called bird cliffs, found here and there jutting out of the tundra. The bird cliffs doubtless bear some geological relation to the Hrimgar chains. When such eggs are frozen they are eaten like apples.
---Beasts of Gor, 12:196

Gatch (Armored):

On the floor itself are also found several varieties of animal life, in particular marsupials, such as the armored gatch, and rodents, such as slees and ground urts. Several varieties of tarsk, large and small, also inhabit this zone....
---Explorers of Gor, 32:312

Giani:

Gim:

...and, somewhere, the call of a tiny horned gim, the tiny purplish owllike bird.
---Captive of Gor, 8:97

...In the ground zone, and on the ground itself, are certain birds, some flighted, like the hook-billed gort, which preys largely on rodents, such as ground urts, and the insectivorous whistling finch, and some unflighted, like the grub borer and land gim. Along the river, of course, many other species of birds may be found, such as jungle gants, tufted fishers and ring-necked and yellow-legged waders....."
---Explorers of Gor, 32:311

Gint:

I was interested in the fauna of the river and the rain forest. I recalled, sunning themselves on exposed roots near the river, tiny fish. They were bulbous eyed and about six inches long, with tiny flipperlike lateral fins. They had both lungs and gills. Their capacity to leave the water, in certain small streams, during dry seasons, enables them to seek other streams, still flowing, or pools. This property also, of course, makes it possible for them to elude marine predators and, on the land, to return to the water in case of danger. Normally they remain quite close to the water. Sometimes they even sun themselves on the backs of resting or napping tharlarion. Should the tharlarion submerge the tiny fish often submerges with it, staying close to it, but away from its jaws. Its proximity to the tharlarion affords it, interestingly, an effective protection against most of its natural predators, in particular the black eel, which will not approach the sinuous reptiles. Similarly the tiny fish can thrive on the scraps from the ravaging jaws of the feeding tharlarion. They will even drive one another away from their local tharlarion, fighting in contests of intraspecific aggression, over the plated territory of the monster's back. The remora fish and the shark have what seem to be, in some respects, a similar relationship. These tiny fish, incidentally, are called gints.
---Explorers of Gor, 29:299-300

Gitch:

We watched a large, oblong, flat bodied black object, about half a hort in length, with long feelers, hurry toward a crack at the base of the wall. "That is a roach," he said. "They are harmless, not like the gitches whose bites are rather painful."
---Beasts of Gor, 22:277

Gort:

Grasshopper:

"Oh!" cried the girl, startled. A grasshopper, red, the size of a horned gim, a small, owllike bird, some four ounces in weight, common in the northern latitudes, had leaped near the fire, and disappeared into the brush.
---Explorers of Gor, 29:293

Grub borer:

Grunt:

The blue grunt is particularly dangerous during the daylight hours preceding its mating periods, when it schools. Its mating periods are synchronized with the phases of Gor's major moon, the full moon reflecting on the surface of the water somehow triggering the mating instinct. During the daylight hours preceding such a moon, as the restless grunts school, they will tear anything edible to pieces which crosses their path. During the hours of mating, however, interestingly, one can move and swim among them untouched....
---Explorers of Gor, 24:267

Before each guest there were tiny slices of tospit and larma, small pastries, and in a tiny golden cup, with a small golden spoon, the clustered, black, tiny eggs of the white grunt.
---Fighting Slave of Gor, 22:275-276

Gull:

It was plied with iron, barbed. Its feathers were five inches long, set in the shaft on three sides, feathers of the black-tipped coasting gull, a broad-winged bird, with black tips on its wings and tail feathers, similar to the Vosk gull.
---Marauders of Gor, 16:234-235

Herlit:

It was of peeled Ka-la-na wood and, from its top, there dangled two long, narrow, yellow, black tipped feathers, from the tail of the taloned Herlit, a large, broad-winged, carnivorous bird, sometimes called in Gorean the Sun Striker, or, more literally, though in clumsier English, Out-of-the-sun-it-strikes, presumably from its habit of making its descent and strike on prey, like the tarn, with the sun above and behind it.
---Savages of Gor, 9:143

An adult Herlit is often four feet in height and has a wingspan of some seven to eight feet. The hunter must beware of being blinded or having an artery slashed in the struggle. The fifteen tail feathers are perhaps the most highly prized. They are some fourteen to fifteen inches in height, and yellow with black tips.
---Blood Brothers of Gor, 37:315

Hermit:

...Somewhere, far off, but carrying through the forest, was the rapid, staccato slap of the sharp beak of the yellow-breasted hermit bird, pounding into the reddish bark of the Tur tree, hunting for larvae.
---Hunters of Gor, 7:106

Hinti:

'Hala' is Kaiila for the Gorean hinti, which are small, active insects. They resemble fleas but are not parasitic....
---Blood Brothers of Gor, 22:219-220

Hith:

In another case, somnolent and swollen, I saw a rare golden hith, a Gorean python whose body, even when unfed, it would be difficult for a full-grown man to encircle with his arms.
---Priest-Kings of Gor, 25:191

Hurlit:

"The first southern migrations of meadow kites," he said, "have already taken place. The migrations of the forest hurlit and the horned gim do not take place until later in the spring. This is the time that the Vosk gulls fly."
---Nomads of Gor, 11:138

Hurt:

Cernus of Ar wore a coarse black robe, woven probably from the wool of the bounding, two legged Hurt, a domesticated marsupial raised in large numbers in the environs of several of Gor's Northern Cities. The Hurt, raised on large, fenced ranches, herded by domesticated sleen and sheered by chained slaves, replaces its wool four times a year....
---Assassin of Gor, 4:39

Jard:

Within the next Ahn we passed more than sixty bodies, dangling at the side of the river. None was that of Shaba. About some of these bodies there circled scavenging birds. On the shoulders of some perched small, yellow-winged jards....
---Explorers of Gor, 49:415

Kaiila:

A kaiila, which normally stands about twenty to twenty-two hands at the shoulder, can cover as much as six hundred pasangs in a single day's riding.

The head of the kaiila bears two large eyes, one on each side, but these eyes are triply lidded, probably an adaptation to the environment which occasionally is wracked by severe storms of wind and dust; the adaptation, actually a transparent third lid, permits the animal to move as it wishes under conditions that force other prairie animals to back into the wind, or like the sleen, to burrow into the ground....
---Nomads of Gor, 2:13-14

I then saw a kaiila pass. It was lofty, stately, fanged and silken. I had heard of such beasts, but this was the first one I had seen. It was yellow, with flowing hair. Its rider was mounted in a high, purple saddle, with knives in saddle sheaths....
---Fighting Slave of Gor, 13:178

The desert native black or tawny pelted sand kaiila, closely related to its cousin of the plains is used by Tahari men as a mount. The desert kaiila differs from the kaiila used by those of the Plains in a few ways, one of which is the fact that it is omnivorous rather than exclusively carnivorous.

The sand kaiila, or desert kaiila, is a kaiila, and handles similarly, but it is not identically the same animal which is indigenous, domestic and wild, in the middle latitudes of Gor's southern hemisphere; that animal, used as a mount by the Wagon Peoples, is not found in the northern hemisphere of Gor; there is obviously a phylogenetic affinity between the two varieties, or species; I conjecture, though I do not know, that the sand kaiila is a desert-adapted mutation of the subequatorial stock; both animals are lofty, proud, silken creatures, long-necked and smooth-gaited; both are triply lidded, the third lid being a transparent membrane, of great utility in the blasts of the dry storms of the southern plains or the Tahari; both creatures are comparable in size, ranging from some twenty to twenty-two hands at the shoulder; both are swift; both have incredible stamina; under ideal conditions both can range six hundred pasangs in a day; in the dune country, of course, in the heavy, sliding sands, a march of fifty pasangs is considered good; both, too, I might mention, are high-strung, vicious-tempered animals; in pelt the southern kaiila ranges from a rich gold to black; the sand kaiila, on the other hand, are almost all tawny, though I have seen black sand kaiila; differences, some of them striking and important, however, exist between the animals; most notably, perhaps, the sand kaiila suckles its young; the southern kaiila are viviparous, but the young, within hours after birth, hunt by instinct; the mother delivers the young in the vicinity of game; whereas there is game in the Tahari, birds, small mammals, an occasional sand sleen, and some species of Tabuk, it is rare; the suckling of the young in the sand kaiila is a valuable trait in the survival of the animal; kaiila milk, like verr milk, is used by the peoples of the Tahari; it is reddish and has a strong salty taste; it contains much ferrous sulfate; a similar difference between the two animals, or two sorts of kaiila, is that the sand kaiila is omnivorous, whereas the southern kaiila is strictly carnivorous; both have storage tissues; if necessary, both can go several days without water; the southern kaiila also, however, has a storage stomach, and can go several days without meat; the sand kaiila, unfortunately, must feed more frequently; some of the pack animals in a caravan are used in carrying fodder; whatever is needed, and is not available enroute, must be carried; sometimes, with a mounted herdsman, caravan kaiila are released to hunt Tabuk; a more trivial difference between the sand kaiila and the southern kaiila is that the paws of the sand kaiila are much broader, the digits even webbed with leathery fibers, and heavily padded, than those of its southern counterpart.
---Tribesmen of Gor, 4:70-71

Kailiauk:

Even past me thundered a lumbering herd of startled, short-trunked kailiauk, a stocky, awkward ruminant of the plains, tawny, wild, heavy, their haunches marked in red and brown bars, their wide heads bristling with a trident of horns; they had not stood and formed their circle, shes and young within the circle of tridents...
---Nomads of Gor, 1:2

I looked beyond Hci to the beasts, some two to three pasangs away. The kailiauk is a large, lumbering, shaggy, trident-horned ruminant. It has four stomachs and an eight-valved heart. It is dangerous, gregarious, small-eyed and short-tempered. Adult males can stand as high as twenty or twenty-five hands at the shoulder and weigh as much as four thousand pounds.
---Blood Brothers of Gor, 1:10

Kite:

Larl:

Some four days into the mountains I heard for the first time in my journey the sound of a thing other than the wind, the sighing of snow and the groaning of ice; it was the sound of a living thing; the sound of a mountain larl.

The larl is a predator, clawed and fanged, quite large, often standing seven feet at the shoulder. I think it would be fair to say that it is substantially feline; at any rate its grace and sinuous power remind me of the smaller but similarly fearsome jungle cats of my old world.

The resemblance is, I suppose, due to the mechanics of convergent evolution, both animals having been shaped by the exigencies of the chase, the stealth of the approach and the sudden charge, and by the requirement of the swift and devastating kill. If there is an optimum configuration for a land predator, I suppose on my old world the palm must go to the Bengal tiger; but on Gor the prize belongs indisputably to the mountain larl; and I cannot but believe that the structural similarities between the two animals, though of different worlds, are more than a matter of accident.

The larl's head is broad, sometimes more than two feet across, and shaped roughly like a triangle, giving its skull something of the cast of a viper's save that of course it is furred and the pupils of the eyes like the cat's and unlike the viper's, can range from knifelike slits in the broad daylight to dark, inquisitive moons in the night.

The pelt of the larl is normally a tawny red or a sable black. The black larl, which is predominantly nocturnal, is maned, both male and female. The red larl, which hunts whenever hungry, regardless of the hour, and is the more common variety, possesses no mane. Females of both varieties tend generally to be slightly smaller than the males, but are quite as aggressive and sometimes even more dangerous, particularly in the late fall and winter of the year when they are likely to be hunting for their cubs. I had once killed a male red larl in the Voltai Range within pasangs of the city of Ar.

In spite of my hatred of Priest-Kings I could not help but admire them. None of the men below the mountains, the mortals, had ever succeeded in taming a larl. Even larl cubs when found and raised by men would, on reaching their majority, on some night, in a sudden burst of atavistic fury slay their masters and under the three hurtling moons of Gor lope from the dwellings of men, driven by what instincts I know not, to seek the mountains where they were born. A case is known of a larl who traveled more than twenty-five hundred pasangs to seek a certain shallow crevice in the Voltai in which he had been whelped. He was slain at its mouth. Hunters had followed him. One among them, an old man who had originally been one of the party that had captured the animal, identified the place.
---Priest-Kings of Gor, 2:18-19

Lart:

The hunter pulled a pelt from the bundle of furs he carried. It was snowy white, and thick, the winter fur of a two-stomached snow lart. It almost seemed to glisten. The slaver's man appreciated its value. Such a pelt could sell in Ar for half a silver tarsk. He took the pelt and examined it. The snow lart hunts in the sun. The food in the second stomach can be held almost indefinitely. It is filled in the fall and must last the lart through the winter night, which lasts months, the number of months depending on the latitude of his individual territory. It is not a large animal. It is about ten inches high and weighs between eight and twelve pounds. It is mammalian, and has four legs. It eats bird's eggs and preys on the leem, a small arctic rodent, some five to ten ounces in weight, which hibernates during the winter.
---Beasts of Gor, 3:74

Leech:

"Here is another," said a fellow wading near me, holding up its wet, half flattened, twisting body in his hand. It was some four inches long, a half inch thick.
---Vagabonds of Gor, 9:97

Leem:

.. the leem, a small arctic rodent, some five to ten ounces in weight, which hibernates during the winter.

.. The hunter drew forth from the bundle of furs two tiny pelts of the leem. These were brown, the summer coats of the animals.
---Beasts of Gor, 3:74-75

Lelt:

Lelts are often attracted to the salt rafts, largely by the vibrations in the water, picked up by their abnormally developed lateral-line protrusions, and their fernlike craneal vibration receptors, from the cones and poles. Too, though they are blind, I think either the light, or the heat, perhaps, from our lamps, draws them. The tiny eyeless heads will thrust from the water, and the fernlike filaments at the side of the head will open and lift, orienting themselves to one or the other of the lamps. The lelt is commonly five to seven inches in length. It is white and long-finned....
---Tribesmen of Gor, 16:247

Lice:

"We are going to test you for pox," he said. The girl groaned. It was my hope that none on board the Clouds of Telnus had carried the pox. It is transmitted by the bites of lice. The pox had appeared in Bazi some four years ago. The port had been closed for two years by the merchants. It had burned itself out moving south and eastward in some eighteen months. Oddly enough some were immune to the pox, and with others it had only a temporary, debilitating effect. With others it was swift, lethal and horrifying. Those who had survived the pox would presumably live to procreate themselves, on the whole presumably transmitting their immunity or relative immunity to their offspring. Slaves who contracted the pox were often summarily slain. It was thought that the slaughter of slaves had had its role to play in the containment of the pox in the vicinity of Bazi.
---Slave Girl of Gor, 17:325-326

Lit:

...Behind and about him had swirled a gigantic cloak of yellow and red feathers, from the crested lit and the fruit tindel, brightly plumaged birds of the rain forest....
---Explorers of Gor, 18:236

...In the level of the emergents there live primarily birds, in particular parrots, long-billed fleers, and needle-tailed lits....
---Explorers of Gor, 32:311

Mamba:

The word 'Mamba' in most of the river dialects does not refer to a venomous reptile as might be expected, given its meaning in English, but, interestingly, is applied rather generally to most types of predatory river tharlarion. The Mamba people were, so to speak, the Tharlarion people. The Mamba people ate human flesh. So, too, does the tharlarion. It is thus, doubtless, that the people obtained their name.
---Explorers of Gor, 44:393

Mindar:

In the level of the emergents there live primarily birds, in particular parrots, long-billed fleers, and needle-tailed lits. Monkeys and tree urts, and snakes and insects, however, can also be found in this highest level. In the second level, that of the canopies, is found an incredible variety of birds, warblers, finches, mindars, the crested lit and the common lit, the fruit tindel, the yellow gim, tanagers, some varieties of parrot, and many more....
---Explorers of Gor, 32:311

Moccasin:

We saw a narrow, dark shape, about five feet long, like a slowly undulating whip, glide past. A small triangular head was almost level with the water surface. I did not think there had been much danger, but there was some possibility that the movements of her legs in the water might have attracted its attention.
"That is a marsh moccasin," I said.
"Are they poisonous," she asked.
"Yes," I said.
"I never saw one before," she said.
"They are not common," I said, "even in the delta."
---Vagabonds of Gor, 26:267

Monkeys:

Ost:

The ost is a very tiny, orange, extremely venomous serpent, and its bite seems to be invariably fatal. The poison is quick-acting and productive of great agony in the victim.
---John Norman, Letter to The Gorean Group, Sept 20th, 2000

Oyster:

...Other girls had prepared the repast, which, for the war camp, was sumptuous indeed, containing even oysters from the delta of the Vosk, a portion of the plunder of a tarn caravan of Ar, such delicacies having been intended for the very table of Marlenus, the Ubar of that great city itself. I served the food, and poured the wines, and kept their goblets filled, remaining as much in the background as possible.
---Captive of Gor, 15:301

Panther:

... in others there raged the dreadful, tawny, barred panthers of the northern forests.
---Captive of Gor, 12:210

...He had worn at his loins the pelts of the yellow panther....
---Explorers of Gor, 18:236

Parrots:

...The canopy, or zone of the canopies, ranges from about sixty to one hundred and twenty-five feet high, Gorean measure. The first zone extends from the ground to the beginning of the canopies above, some sixty feet in height, Gorean measure. We may perhaps, somewhat loosely, speak of this first zone as the "floor," or, better, "ground zone," of the rain forest. In the level of the emergents there live primarily birds, in particular parrots, long-billed fleers, and needle-tailed lits....
---Explorers of Gor, 32:311

Parsit:

The men with the net drew it up. In it, twisting and flopping, silverish, striped with brown, squirmed more than a stone of parsit fish. They threw the net to the planking and, with knives, began to slice the heads and tails from the fish.
---Marauders of Gor, 4:61

Porcupine:

...Here, too, may be found snakes and monkeys, gliding urts, leaf urts, squirrels, climbing, long-tailed porcupines, lizards, sloths, and the usual varieties of insects, ants, centipedes, scorpions, beetles and flies, and so on....
---Explorers of Gor, 32:311

Quala :

...I saw what I first thought was a shadow, but as the tarn passed, it scattered into a scampering flock of tiny creatures, probably the small, three-toed mammals called qualae, dun-colored and with a stiff, brushy mane of black hair....
---Tarnsman of Gor, 12:140-141

Small straight bows, of course, not the powerful long bow, are, on the other hand, reasonably common on Gor, and these are often used for hunting light game, such as the brush-maned, three-toed Qualae, the yellow-pelted, single-horned Tabuk, and runaway slaves.
---Raiders of Gor, 1:4

Rennel:

I was told by Kamchak that once an army of a thousand wagons turned aside because a swarm of rennels, poisonous, crablike desert insects, did not defend its broken nest, crushed by the wheel of the lead wagon....
---Nomads of Gor, 5:27

Roach:

Salamanders:

...Among the lelts, too, were, here and there, tiny salamanders, they, too, white and blind. Like the lelts, they were, for their size, long-bodied, were capable of long periods of dormancy and possessed a slow metabolism, useful in an environment in which food is not plentiful. Unlike the lelts, they had long stemlike legs....
---Tribesmen of Gor, 16:247

Saurian:

...Sharks, and sometimes marine saurians, sometimes trail the ships, to secure discarded garbage and rob the lines of the fishermen. The convoy, by its size, had doubtless attracted many such monsters. I had seen, yesterday, the long neck of a marine saurian lift from the waters of gleaming Thassa, It had a small head, and rows of small teeth. Its appendages were like broad paddles. Then it had lowered its head and disappeared. Such beasts, in spite of their frightening appearance, are apparently harmless to men. They can take only bits of garbage and small fish. Certain related species thrive on crustaceans found among aquatic flora. Further, such beasts are rare. Some sailors, reportedly, have never seen one. Far more common, and dangerous, are certain fishlike marine saurians, with long, toothed snouts; they are silent and aggressive, and sailors fear them as they do the long-bodied sharks....
---Slave Girl of Gor, 22:360

Sea Sleen:

And behind them, in a rich swirling cloak of the fur of the white, spotted sea sleen, sword in hand, looking wildly about, was another man, one I did not know.
---Raiders of Gor, 18:300

...The sea sleen, vicious, fanged aquatic mammals, apparently related to the land forms of sleen, are the swiftest predators to be found in Thassa; further, they are generally conceded to be the most dangerous; they tend, however, to frequent northern waters. Occasionally they have been found as far south, however, as the shores of Cos and the deep inlets of Tyros.
---Slave Girl of Gor, 22:360

Shark:

...Beyond them would be the almost eel-like, long-bodied, nine-gilled Gorean marsh sharks.
---Raiders of Gor, 6:58

Slee:

In the lower branches of the "ground zone" may be found, also, small animals, such as tarsiers, nocturnal jit monkeys, black squirrels, four-toed leaf urts, jungle varts and the prowling, solitary giani, tiny, cat-sized panthers, not dangerous to man... On the floor itself are also found several varieties of animal life, in particular marsupials, such as the armored gatch, and rodents, such as slees and ground urts.
---Explorers of Gor, 32:313

Sleen:

The vicious, six-legged sleen, large-eyed, sinuous, mammalian but resembling a furred, serpentine lizard, was a reliable, indefatigable hunter. He could follow a scent days old with ease, and then, perhaps hundreds of pasangs, and days, later, be unleashed for the sport of the hunters, to tear his victim to pieces.
---Raiders of Gor, 9:105

There are many varieties of sleen, and most varieties can be, to one extent or another, domesticated. The two most common sorts of trained sleen are the smaller, tawny prairie sleen, and the large, brown or black forest sleen, sometimes attaining a length of twenty feet. In the north, I am told the snow sleen has been domesticated. The sleen is a dangerous and fairly common animal on Gor, which has adapted itself to a variety of environments. There is even an aquatic variety, called the sea sleen, which is one of the swiftest and most dreaded beasts in the sea....

Sleen are used for a multitude of purposes on Gor, but most commonly they are used for herding, tracking, guarding and patrolling. The verr and the bosk are the most common animals herded; tabuk and slave girls are the most common animals tracked; the uses to which the sleen is put to guarding and patrolling are innumerable; it is used to secure borders, to prowl walls and protect camps; it may run loose in the streets after curfews....
---Slave Girl of Gor, 8:185-186

I crouched down. The animal had been released. Its head was now fully through the door. Its head was wide and triangular. Suddenly the eyes took the light of the lamp and blazed. And then, the head moving, its eyes no longer reflected The light. It no longer faced the light. Rather it was watching me.
The animal was some twenty feet in length, some eleven hundred pounds in weight, a forest sleen, domesticated. It was double fanged and six-legged. It crouched down and inched forward. Its belly fur must have touched the tiles. It wore a leather sleen collar but there was no leash on the leash loop.
I had thought it was trained to hunt tabuk with archers, but it clearly was not tabuk it hunted now.
I knew the look of a hunting sleen. It was a hunter of men....

... The beast watched me closely. For the first time it snarled, menacingly.
Then the tail stopped lashing, and became almost rigid. Then the ears lay back against its head.
It charged, scratching and scrambling, slipping suddenly, on the tiles. The girl screamed. The cast fur, capelike, shielding me, enveloped the leaping animal. I leaped to the couch, and rolled over it, and bounded to my feet. I heard the beast snarling and squealing, casting aside the fur with an angry shaking of its body and head. Then it stood, enraged, the fur torn beneath its paws, snarling and hissing. It looked up at me. I stood now upon the couch, the ax of Torvaldsland in my hand.
I laughed, the laugh of a warrior.
"Come my friend," I called to it. "let us engage."
It was a truly brave and noble beast. Those who scorn the sleen I think do not know him. Kurii respect the sleen, and that says much for the sleen, for its courage, its ferocity and its indomitable tenacity.
---Beasts of Gor, 1:12-13

"Keep your legs apart," he said. "It is a gray sleen. I raised it from a whelp. Ah, greetings, Borko! How are you, old fellow!"
I would have screamed and reared up, but I was thrust back, helpless, half strangled, scarcely able to utter a sound, to the step. So our masters can control us by our collars. To my terror, then, pushing over my body, to thrust its great jaws and head, so large I could scarcely have put my arms around them, into the hands and arms of my master, was an incredible beast. It had an extremely agile, active, sinuous body, as thick as a drum, and perhaps fourteen or fifteen feet long. It might have weighed a thousand pounds. Its broad head was triangular, almost viperlike, but it was furred. This thing was a mammal, or mammalian. Its eyes now had pupils like slits, like those of a cat in sunlight. So quickly then might its adaptive mechanisms have functioned. About its muzzle were gray hairs, grayer than the silvered gray of its fur. It had six legs.
"Good lad!" said my master, roughly fondling that great, fierce head.
"We have been through much together, Borko and I," said my master. "He has even, twice, saved my life. Once when I was struck, unexpectedly, by one foolishly thought to be a friend, the origin of this scar," he said, indicating good-humoredly the hideous, jagged tissue at the left side of his face, "I told Borko to hunt. The fellow did not escape. Borko brought part of him back to me, in his jaws."

... "Borko," he said, "is a seasoned hunting sleen. Even to strangers he would bring a hundred times what you would bring in the market."

... "Learn slave," he said. "Learn slave."
I then began to whimper. "Hold still," said my master.
The beast then began to push its nose and muzzle about me, thrusting it here and there, about me. I now understood why I had been spread as I had, on the steps.
"The sleen," he said, "and especially the gray sleen, is Gor's finest tracker. It is a relentless, tenacious tracker. It can follow a scent that is weeks old, for a thousand pasangs."
I whimpered, the beast's snout thrust between my thighs, sniffing.
"Please, Master," I whimpered.
I felt it nuzzling then at my waist and breasts. It was learning me.
"Do you know what the sleen hunts?" he asked.
"No, Master," I whimpered.
"In the wild it commonly hunts tabuk and wild tarsk," he said, "but it is an intelligent beast, and it can be trained to hunt anything."
"Yes, Master," I whimpered.
He held back my right arm, further, exposing more the armpit.
"Do you know what Borko is trained to hunt?" he asked.
"No, Master," I said.
I felt the snout of the beast then poking about my throat and under my chin, to the side, and then at the side of my neck. My maser then held my left arm further, exposing the armpit to the beast.
"It is trained to hunt men, and slaves," he said.
---Dancer of Gor, 10:160-161

...To be sure, at that time, I did not know about the miniature, silken sleen that are sometimes kept as sinuous pets....
---Dancer of Gor, 11:167

... farther to one side I saw a pair of prairie sleen, smaller than the forest sleen but quite as unpredictable and vicious, each about seven feet in length, furred, six-legged, mammalian, moving in their undulating gait with their viper's heads moving from side to side, continually testing the wind ...
---Nomads of Gor, 1:2

Sloth:

Snail:

Once the Forkbeard went to her and taught her to check the scoop, with her left hand, for snails, that they not be thrown overboard. Returning to me he held one of the snails, whose shell he crushed between his fingers, and sucked out the animal, chewing and swallowing it. He then threw the shell fragments overboard. 'They are edible,' he said. "And we use them for fish bait.'
---Marauders of Gor, 4:62

Sorp:

He sat upon a giant shell of the Vosk sorp, as on a sort of throne, which, for these people, I gather it was.
---Raiders of Gor, 3:14

Spiders:

I detected the odor of kort rinds, matted, drying, on the stones, where they had been scattered from my supper the evening before. Vints, insects, tiny, sand-colored, covered them. On the same rinds, taking and eating vints, were two small cell spiders....
---Tribesmen of Gor, 7:115-116

They are called rock spiders because of their habit of holding their legs folded beneath them. This habit, and their size and coloration, usually brown and black, suggests a rock, and hence the name. It is a very nice piece of natural camouflage. A thin line runs from the web to the spider. When something strikes the web the tremor is transmitted by means of this line to the spider. Interestingly the movement of the web in the air, as it is stirred by wind, does not activate the spider; similarly if the prey which strikes the web is too small, and thus not worth showing itself for, or too large, and thus beyond its prey range, and perhaps dangerous, it does not reveal itself. On the other hand, should a bird, such as a mindar or parrot, or a small animal, such as a leaf urt or tiny tarsk, become entangled in the net the spider swiftly emerges. It is fully capable of taking such prey. ... It, immobile on the ground, was about a foot in diameter.
---Explorers of Gor, 29:294

Squirrels:

Swamp Spider:

...Approaching me, stepping daintily for all its bulk, prancing over the strands, came one of the Swamp Spiders of Gor....
...and I caught sight of the mandibles, like curved knives....
...I saw then for the first time that strapped to his abdomen was a translation device...
..."They hunt us and leave only enough of us alive to spin the Cur-lon Fiber used in the mills of Ar"....
---Tarnsman of Gor, 6:81-83

Tabuk:

The tabuk is the most common Gorean antelope, a small graceful animal, one-horned and yellow, that haunts the Ka-la-na thickets of the planet and occasionally ventures daintily into its meadows in search of berries and salt. It is also one of the favorite kills of a tarn.
---Outlaw of Gor, 14:126

...On the floor itself are also found several varieties of animal life, in particular marsupials, such as the armored gatch, and rodents, such as slees and ground urts. Several varieties of tarsk, large and small, also inhabit this zone. More than six varieties of anteater are also found here, and more than twenty kinds of small, fleet, single-horned tabuk....
---Explorers of Gor, 32:312

Tanagers:

Tarn:

...The Goreans believe, incredibly enough, that the capacity to master a tarn is innate and that some men possess this characteristic and that some do not. One does not learn to master a tarn. It is a matter of blood and spirit, of beast and man, of a relation between two beings which must be immediate, intuitive, spontaneous. It is said that a tarn knows who is a tarnsman and who is not, and that those who are not die in this first meeting.

My first impression vas that of a rush of wind and a great snapping sound, as if a giant might be snapping an enormous towel or scarf; then I was cowering, awestricken, in a great winged shadow, and an immense tarn, his talons extended like gigantic steel hooks, his wings sputtering fiercely in the air, hung above me, motionless except for the beating of his wings.

'Stand clear of the wings,' shouted the Older Tarl.

I needed no urging. I darted from under the bird. One stroke of those wings would hurl me yards from the top of the cylinder.

The tarn dropped to the roof of the cylinder and regarded us with his bright black eyes.

Though the tarn, like most birds, is surprisingly light for its size, this primarily having to do with the comparative hollowness of the bones, it is an extremely powerful bird, powerful even beyond what one would expect from such a monster. Whereas large Earth birds, such as the eagle, must, when taking flight from the ground, begin with a running start, the tarn, with its incredible musculature, aided undoubtedly by the somewhat lighter gravity of Gor, can with a spring and a sudden flurry of its giant wings lift both himself and his rider into the air. In Gorean, these .birds are sometimes spoken of as Brothers of the Wind.

The plumage of tarns is various, and they are bred for their colors as well as their strength and intelligence. Black tarns are used for night raids, white tarns in winter campaigns, and multicolored, resplendent tarns are bred for warriars who wish to ride proudly, regardless of the lack of camouflage. The most common tarn, however, is greenish brown. Disregarding the disproportion in size, the Earth bird which the tarn most closely resembles is the hawk, with the exception that it bas a crest somewhat of the nature of a jay's.

Tarns, who are vicious things, are seldom more than half tamed and, like their diminutive earthly counterparts, the hawks, are carnivorous. It is not unknown for a tarn to attack and devour his own rider. They fear nothing but the tarn-goad. They are trained by men of the Caste of Tarn Keepers to respond to it while still young, when they can be fastened by wires to the training perches. Whenever a young bird soars away or refuses obedience in some fashion, he is dragged back to the perch and beaten with the tarn-goad. Rings, comparable to those which are fastened on the legs of the young birds, are worn by the adult birds to reinforce the memory of the hobbling wire and the tarn-goad. Later, of course, the adult birds are not fastened, but the conditioning given them in their youth usually holds, except when they become abnormally disturbed or have not been able to obtain food. The tarn is one of the two most common mounts of a Gorean warrior; the other is the high tharlarion, a species of saddle lizard, used mostly by clans who have never mastered tarns. No one in the City of Cylinders, as far as I knew, maintained tharlarions, though they were supposedly quite common on Gor, particularly in the lower areas--in swampland and on the deserts.

The Older Tarl had mounted his tarn, climbing up the five-rung leather mounting ladder which hangs on the left side of the saddle and is pulled up in flight. He fastened himself in the saddle with a broad purple strap. He tossed me a small object which. nearly fell from my fumbling hands. It was a tarn whistle, with its own note, which would summon one tarn, and one tarn only, the mount which was intended for me. Never since the panic of the disoriented compass back in the mountains of New Hampshire had I been so frightened, but this time I refused to allow my fear the fatal inch it required. If I was to die, it would be; if I was not to die, I would not.

I smiled to myself in spite of my fear, amused at the remark I had addressed to myself. It sounded like something out of the code of the Warrior, something which, if taken literally, would seem to encourage its believer to take not the slightest or most sane precautions for his safety. I blew a note on the whistle, and it was shrill and different, of a new pitch from that of the Old Tarl.

Almost immediately from somewhere, perhaps from a ledge out of sight; rose a fantastic object, another giant tarn, even larger than the first, a glossy sable tarn which circled the cylinder once and then wheeled toward me, landing a few feet away, his talons striking on the roof with a sound like hurled gauntlets. His talons were shod with steel--a war tarn. He raised his curved beek to the sky and screamed, lifting and shaking his wings enormous head turned toward me, and his round, wicked eyes blazed in my direction. The next thing I knew his beak was open; I caught a brief sight of his thin,sharp tongue, as long as a man's arm; darting out and back, and then, snapping at me, he lunged forward, striking at me with that monstrous beak, and I heard the Older Tarl cry out in horror, 'The goad! The goad!'
---Tarnsman of Gor, 3:51-53

Tarsier:

...In the lower branches of the "ground zone" may be found, also, small animals, such as tarsiers, nocturnal jit monkeys, black squirrels, four-toed leaf urts, jungle varts and the prowling, solitary giani, tiny, cat-sized panthers, not dangerous to man....
---Explorers of Gor, 32:312

Tarsk:

I looked up. The slave boy, Fish, had emerged from the kitchen, holding over his head on a large silver platter a whole roasted tarsk, steaming and crisped, basted, shining under the torchlight, a larma in its mouth, garnished with suls and Tur-pah.
--- Raiders of Gor, 15:219

Termite:

...Also in the ground zone are varieties of snake, such as the ost and hith, and numerous species of insects. The rock spider has been mentioned, and termites, also. Termites, incidentally, are extremely important to the ecology of the forest. In their feeding they break down and destroy the branches and trunks of fallen trees. The termite "dust," thereafter, by the action of bacteria, is reduced to humus, and the humus to nitrogen and mineral materials....
---Explorers of Gor, 32:311-312

Tharlarion:

Scarcely had she broken into the clearing, splashing through the shallow greenish waters near us, than the fearsome head of a wild tharlarion poked through the reeds, its round, shining eyes gleaming with excitement, its vast arc of a mouth swung open....
---Tarnsman of Gor, 6:84

Broad Tharlarion:

Their more dormant relatives, the broad tharlarions, barely lifted their snouts from the feed troughs. Shielded by the placid, heavy bodies, some as large as a bus, I worked my way toward the interior side of the corral.
---Tarnsman of Gor, 15:166

High Tharlarion:

...The tarn is one of the two most common mounts of a Gorean warrior; the other is the high tharlarion, a species of saddle-lizard, used mostly by clans who have never mastered tarns....
---Tarnsman of Gor, 3:52

Land Tharlarion:

There were other barges on the river, some moving across the river, others coming toward Laura, others departing. Those departing used only the current. Those approaching were drawn by land tharlarion, plodding on log roads along the edges of the river. The land tharlarion can swim barges across the river, but he is not as efficient as the vast river tharlarion....
---Captive of Gor, 8:81

Marsh Tharlarion:

...I screamed. In the pool, clambering over one another, lifting their jaws upward were crocodiles, beasts like river tharlarion but differently hided and plated.
I nodded. The marsh tharlarion, and river tharlarion, of Gor are, I suspect, genetically different from the alligators, caymens and crocodiles of Earth. I suspect this to be the case because these Earth reptiles are so well adapted to their environments that they have changed very little in tens of millions of years. The marsh and river tharlarion, accordingly, if descended from such beasts, brought long ago to Gor on Voyages of Acquisition by Priest-Kings, would presumably resemble them more closely. On the other hand, of course, I may be mistaken in this matter. It remains my speculation, however, that the resemblance between these forms of beasts, which are considerable, particularly in bodily configuration and disposition, may be accounted for by convergent evolution; this process, alert to the exigencies of survival, has, I suspect, in the context of similar environments, similarly shaped these oviparous predators of two worlds....
---Explorers of Gor, 32:326

River Tharlarion:

A broad, low-sided barge began to back toward the pier. It had two large steering oars, manned by bargemen. It was drawn by two gigantic, web-footed river tharlarion. These were the first tharlarion that I had ever seen. They frightened me. They were scaled, vast and long-necked. Yet in the water it seemed, for all their bulk, they moved delicately. One dipped its head under the surface and, moments later, the head emerged, dripping, the eyes blinking, a silverish fish struggling in the small, triangular-toothed jaws. It engorged the fish, and turned its small head, eyes now unblinking, to regard us. They were harnessed to the broad barge. They were controlled by a bargeman, with a long whipping stick, who was ensconced in a leather basket, part of the harness, slung between the two animals....
---Captive of Gor, 8:81

Rock Tharlarion:

... the tiny, six-toed rock tharlarion of southern Torvaldsland, favored for their legs and tails, which are speared by children....
---Marauders of Gor, 10:152

Sea Tharlarion:

...It would probably be a sea-tharlarion, or perhaps several such; sometimes the smaller sea-tharlarion, seemingly not much more than teeth and tail, fluttering in packs beneath the waves, are even more to be feared than their larger brethren, some of whom in whose jaws an entire galley can be raised from the surface of the sea and snapped in two like a handful of dried reeds of the rence plant....
---Nomads of Gor, 17:204

Water Tharlarion:

To my right, some two or three feet under the water, I saw the sudden, rolling yellowish flash of the slatted belly of a water tharlarion, turning as it made its swift strike, probably a Vosk carp or marsh turtle. Immediately following I saw the water seem to glitter for a moment, a rain of yellowish streaks beneath the surface, in the wake of the water tharlarion, doubtless its swarm of scavengers, tiny water tharlarion, about six inches long, little more than teeth and tail.
---Raiders of Gor, 1:1

Tibit:

There were no signs of sails on the breadth of gleaming Thassa. The great circle of the horizon was empty. There were swift, white clouds in the sky. I heard the cry of sea birds, broad-winged gulls and the small, stick-legged tibits, pecking in the sand for tiny mollusks. There was a salt smell in the air, swift and bright in the wind. Thassa was beautiful.
---Hunters of Gor, 18:247

Tindel:

...Behind and about him had swirled a gigantic cloak of yellow and red feathers, from the crested lit and the fruit tindel, brightly plumaged birds of the rain forest....
---Explorers of Gor, 18:236

Tumit:

...beyond them I saw one of the tumits, a large, flightless bird whose hooked beak, as long as my forearm, attested only too clearly to its gustatory habits; I lifted my shield and grasped the long spear, but it did not turn in my direction; it passed, unaware...
---Nomads of Gor, 1:2

Turtle:

...turning as it made a swift strike, probably a Vosk carp or marsh turtle....
---Raiders of Gor, 1:1

Umbrella bird:

...In the lower portion of the canopies, too, can be found heavier birds, such as the ivory-billed woodpecker and the umbrella bird....
---Explorers of Gor, 32:311

Urt:

The urt is a loathsome, horned Gorean rodent; some are quite large, the size of wolves or ponies, but most are very small, tiny enough to be held in the palm of one hand.
---Nomads of Gor, 10:125

It was a giant urt, fat, sleek and white; it bared it three rows of needlelike white teeth at me and squealed in anger; two horns, tusks like flat crescents curved from its jaw; another two horns, similar to the first, modifications of the bony tissue forming the upper ridge of the eye socket, protruded over those gleaming eyes that seemed to feast themselves upon me, as it waiting the permission of the keeper to hurl itself on its feeding trough. Its fat body trembled with anticipation.
---Outlaw of Gor, 10:86

Vart:

Perhaps most I dreaded those nights filled with the shrieks of the vart pack, a blind, batlike swarm of flying rodents, each the size of a small dog. They could strip a carcass in a matter of minutes...
---Outlaw of Gor, 3:26

Veminium bird:

Perhaps in one of these times, due to no fault of Mistress he was charmed by her voice, as by the songs of the veminium bird, or again, by her grace and manner ...
---Magicians of Gor, 21:363

Verr:

The verr was a mountain goat indigenous to the Voltai. It was a wild, agile, ill-tempered beast, long-haired and spiral-horned. Among the Voltai crags it would be worth one's life to come within twenty yards of one.
---Priest-Kings of Gor, 8:63

Vint:

Vulo:

She was a peasant, barefoot, her garment little more than coarse sacking. She had been carrying a wicker basket containing vulos, domesticated pigeons raised for eggs and meat.
---Nomads of Gor, 1:1

Wader:

Warbler:

...Monkeys and tree urts, and snakes and insects, however, can also be found in this highest level. In the second level, that of the canopies, is found an incredible variety of birds, warblers, finches, mindars, the crested lit and the common lit, the fruit tindel, the yellow gim, tanagers, some varieties of parrot, and many more....
---Explorers of Gor, 32:311

Whales:

Two weeks ago, some ten to fifteen sleeps ago, by rare fortune, we had managed to harpoon a baleen whale, a bluish, white-spotted blunt fin. That two whales had been taken in one season was rare hunting, indeed. Sometimes two or three years pass without a whale being taken.
---Beasts of Gor, 20:265

...That scent, I knew, a distillation of a hundred flowers, nurtured like a priceless wine, was a secret guarded by the perfumers of Ar. It contained as well the separated oil of the Thentis needle tree; an extract from the glands of the Cartius river urt; and a preparation formed from a disease calculus scraped from the intestines of the rare Hunjer Long Whale, the result of the inadequate digestion of cuttlefish. Fortunately, too, this calculus is sometimes found free in the sea, expelled with feces....
---Marauders of Gor, 8:114

...Sometimes they managed to secure the northern shark, sometimes even the toothed Hunjer whale or the less common Karl whale, which was a four-fluked, baleen whale....
---Beasts of Gor, 2:36

Woodpecker:

...In the lower portion of the canopies, too, can be found heavier birds, such as the ivory-billed woodpecker and the umbrella bird....
---Explorers of Gor, 32:311

Zad:

...About some of these bodies there circled scavenging birds. On the shoulders of some perched small, yellow-winged jards. One was attacked even by zads, clinging to it and tearing at it with their long, yellowish, slightly curved beaks. These were jungle zads. They are less to be feared than desert zads, I believe, being less aggressive. They do, however, share one ugly habit with the desert zad, that of tearing out the eyes of weakened victims. That serves as a practical guarantee that the victim, usually an animal, will die. Portions of flesh the zad will swallow and carry back to its nest, where it will disgorge the flesh into the beaks of its fledglings. The zad is, in its way, a dutiful parent.
---Explorers of Gor, 49:415

Zadit:

...The zadit is a small, tawny-feathered, sharp-billed bird. It feeds on insects. When sand flies and other insects, emergent after rains, infest kaiila, they frequently light on the animals, and remain for some hours, hunting insects. This relieves the kaiila of the insects but leaves it with numerous small wounds, which are unpleasant and irritating, where the bird had dug insects out of its hide....
---Tribesmen of Gor, 10:152

Zarlit Fly:

...I did see a large, harmless zarlit fly, purple, about two feet long with four translucent wings, spanning about a yard, humming over the surface of the water, then alighting and, on its padlike feet, daintily picking its way across the surface....
---Raiders of Gor, 1:5

Zeder:

...There is, however, a sleenlike animal, though much smaller, about two feet in length and some eight to ten pounds in weight, the zeder, which frequents the Ua and her tributaries. It knifes through the water by day and, at night, returns to its nest, built from sticks and mud in the branches of a tree overlooking the water.
---Explorers of Gor, 32:312