Tribbles are parthenogenic & born pregnant *. Their high rate of reproduction deals with the predators on their home world. (nuked by the angry Klingons in retaliation for McCoy's beaming them into their ship). They hate Klingons. (the only comedy written in the Star Trek series, and I have a book on the writing of this episode.)
* Some flukes are not only born pregnant,but the unborn larva is also pregnant. Degenerate parasites are often quite bizarre in the life-cycle.
Tribbles are parthenogenic & born pregnant *. Their high rate of reproduction deals with the predato
They've also been taken off their planet for a centuries. During his time on the NX-01, Doctor Phlox kept a few tribbles on hand to feed to his menagerie of medically useful critters. They've also been sighted on Earth during the Genesis Crisis (STIII), and the ones that time traveled to 24th century Deep Space Nine must have been located somewhere. It's likely there's still tribbles out in the galaxy despite the Klingons' efforts. (The Klingons were also right. Tribbles were ecological menaces.)
The Klingons originally attempted to control tribbles by breeding tribble predators like the glommer, but even the glommer got intimidated when confronted by giant tribbles (actually colonies of regular tribbles stuck together – see "More Tribbles, More Troubles"). Presumably, the Klingons were using tribble predators because most infestations couldn't be as simply resolved as bombing the tribble homeworld to ash was.
(A minor correction, it was Scotty who did the beaming rather than McCoy. McCoy hated the device while Scotty, as an engineer, was well-versed in its operation.)
They've also been taken off their planet for a centuries. During his time on the NX-01, Doctor Phlo
The animated Star Trek shows (1/2 hr) I do not consider canon. They drop in characters & concepts that are not mentioned in the STTNG series. Animated versions of prime-time live TV take liberties. Brewster in the animated shows had a magical pet ,but you will NOT find this imp in the live prime-time show.
I think the tribbles on DS9 were brought by accident from the hold in the original Star Trek episode.(Two crewmen were searching the bin for the tribble with the bomb inside.)
McCoy's antipathy towards the transporter is justified: mistakes have produced alarming results: duplications, fusions, even a freak transfer to a parallel reality. A very subtle error resulted in "transporter psychosis" where the person beamed soon develops mental symptoms .
McCoy likely also wonders if the person who got transported is the same person that stepped into the transporter, or whether it's a perfect duplicate,the original erased.
My Traveler,a hero-villain who has figured in my stuff -when I was doing it- doesn't bother with transporters. He just DISLOCATES to wherever or whenever he wishes. You'll meet him eventually.
(a joke in Svengoolie's show had a transporter mistake turn Capt.Kirk into T.J.Hooker, police officer. It was an ad for the T.J.Hooker show on channel 33 in my area).
The animated Star Trek shows (1/2 hr) I do not consider canon. They drop in characters & concepts th
Once, I would have agreed whole-heartedly with the Animated Series' non-canonicity. After all, Paramount considered it so when they produced The Next Generation, with the sole exception of "Yesteryear", the episode dealing with Spock's childhood which was alluded to in the two-part episode "Reunification". However, other bits of the Animated Series snuck into official canon over time, from live action Caitians (in STIV) to Kang's ship the Klothos (mentioned in DS9) to the Vulcan city of Shir'Kahr (also mentioned in DS9 and actually seen in TOS Remastered).
Overall, the animated format allowed writers to pursue storylines and special effects that would have been impossible on the small screen until the past decade or two. The writing was also better than most animated fare. Unlike animated Brewster's imp, M'ress and Arex have a logical reason to be inserted and are treated not as cute animal sidekicks but equal members of the crew. After all, how many cartoons even nowadays would dare tackle the subject of euthanasia for a suffering pet? Yet, I agree there's bits that contradict the live action canon. So, how to add in TAS without damaging continuity?
I consider TAS to be semi-canon, in that, yes, these events happened at the end of the five year mission, but not exactly as depicted on the screen. Live action continuity takes precedence, of course, and also exactly which pieces should be discarded to avoid a big mess is a good question, though. I just write it off as potential story fodder for the future as I do with other bits of Star Trek discontinuity and try to avoid mentioning it for the most part.
(As can be expected, I have Star Trek fan story ideas, some of which can be considered "fix fiction". My idea for TAS is that it's an actual part of the Star Trek universe. The protagonists recovered a bunch of notes from a log in a dead alien observer's ship, which they would MST3K throughout the episode. However, this can only be considered my own head canon which overall, wouldn't be worth much.) _______________
Most likely, some tribbles were beamed onto the Defiant during the comings and goings, like what was seen in the original episode. _______________
By all appearances, travel by transporter appears to be safer overall than travel by automobile is nowadays. Already uncommon in its time, transporter psychosis was eliminated sometime before TOS. Background material such as the TNG and DS9 technical manuals explain the process as a conversion of an individual's matter to energy and then back on a quantum level. That we don't understand how the process works shouldn't be a deal breaker or mean that anybody dies in the process. Trying to explain how the latest modern sports car works to an early 18th century British colonial would be similarly difficult as there are some concepts that no matter how well-educated and open-minded the colonial was, he'd still have to take them on faith because the concepts hadn't been discovered or developed yet.
But your point that McCoy's dislike for transports has some justification is sound. Weird is part of the job, and McCoy's had to deal with his share of transporter weirdness – transporter doubles and interdimensional transfers, primarily.
Once, I would have agreed whole-heartedly with the Animated Series' non-canonicity. After all, Para
