Welcome Guest [Log In] [Register]
Speculative biology is simultaneously a science and form of art in which one speculates on the possibilities of life and evolution. What could the world look like if dinosaurs had never gone extinct? What could alien lifeforms look like? What kinds of plants and animals might exist in the far future? These questions and more are tackled by speculative biologists, and the Speculative Evolution welcomes all relevant ideas, inquiries, and world-building projects alike. With a member base comprising users from across the world, our community is the largest and longest-running place of gathering for speculative biologists on the web.

While unregistered users are able to browse the forum on a basic level, registering an account provides additional forum access not visible to guests as well as the ability to join in discussions and contribute yourself! Registration is free and instantaneous.

Join our community today!

Username:   Password:
Add Reply
Stardust: Dragons; It's about.. well, dragons.
Topic Started: Apr 4 2010, 03:06 PM (346 Views)
The Kiat
Member Avatar
Adolescent
 *  *  *  *  *
Green Dragon

Origin: The dragons originated on a world somewhere in the Small Magellanic Cloud some fifty-two million years ago. At that time, they were small, tree-dwelling dinosaurs. As time went by, their third set of limbs evolved into wings, as the proto-dragons spent much of their time jumping around. Once they became truly airborne, they began to grow in size, evolving to their present configuration some forty million years ago. Some time after they evolved, the dragon homeworld under went a heating spell, forcing the dragons to seek water to cool off, and in this water, they discovered a new food source; fish. The green dragons adapted into a semi-aquatic lifeform, yet retained their venomous spray even though they hunt mostly underwater.
Dragons spread across their homeworld, and soon started to look for ways out. Leaving the homeworld was easier a task than was to be expected by a species that lived mostly solitary lives ranging over large territories. Dragons are by far the most intelligent species encountered. Without civilization in the human sense, dragons grouped together, pooled their intelligence and devised a way to reach space.
Once spacefaring, dragons took slow boats (slower-than-light) to the nearest star. With natural lifespans of five thousand years, dragons could afford to take their time. These first Dragoni ships, like those to follow, were built from hollowed out asteroids, then made to rotate. They built their own ecologies inside and stocked it with enough prey to make it self-sufficient. Dragons spread out from their homeworld twenty-six million years ago. Their early tools were bulky and cumbersome, due mostly to their less-than-dexterous hands. When the dragons conquered and ‘domesticated’ the gobli, their machines became more streamline and refined. Gobli hands built the machines that dragons designed. Even with FTL travel, Dragoni Ships would take five hundred years to expand beyond the SMC to the Large Magellanic Cloud and the Main Galaxy. Around thirteen million years ago, their homeworld, along with many core worlds, were devastated by a nearby gamma ray burst. This lead to the collapse of their civilization, though dragon worlds still kept in contact with Spatial Transmitters.
Size: They have a length of ten meters at full size, nearly half of that their tail. Their adult mass is250 kg, with them adding mass until it doubles by the 5,000th year.
Head: A dragon’s head is about the same size as a horses, but can open much wider. The eyes of a dragon are sensitive to vision ranging from infrared to ultraviolet, giving them a far wider scope of the world around them. The appearance of dragon’s eyes are very bird-like. They hear by focusing the sounds around them with a pair of ear flaps, that channels the sound down to ear holes in the side of their head. Their ear flaps help them zero in on the slightest sound. Inside their jaws, dragons have two sets of teeth. The forward teeth are conical, and used for gripping prey. The rear teeth are serrated and used to sheer flesh. Two of the forward fangs have channels running down the front of them. These channels allow a flow of chlorine from the venom glands into the mouth. Chlorine is generated by a high intake in salts. The gland separated the chlorine and stores it, while to sodium is excreted in the dragon’s waste. Dragons have two ways of envenomating; either by biting and injecting the chlorine directly into the target’s bloodstream, or by spraying it through their fangs like a spitting cobra. The mist is then inhaled by the target and killed not nearly as quickly.
Body: Their body is roughly the same size as a war horse, with similar lengths of limbs and neck. The neck is far more slender than that of a horse. The flexible tail acts as a rudder, stabilizing the dragons in flight and adding to their agility.
Limbs: Dragons are sextapods, that is they have six limbs instead of four. Each of the six limbs of a dragon ends with four digits. One the “hands” of the dragon, the inner most digit is slightly opposable, allowing dragons to pick up items and use tools. Each of the digits end in talons capable of penetrating the hides of any prey. Their wingspan is slightly more than ten meters. The wings are a third set of limbs, connecting to the body just above the shoulder joints.
Color: The Green’s skin is a forested green leathery hide. Their chests and undersides of their wings, in the case of males, is a brighter color. This is used for attracting a mate. Their hides consist of several interlaced layers of tough skin. So tough is their hide, that it prevents penetration from any sharp object or projectile short of an armor-piercing round.
Internal Structure: Their bones are hollow and sturdy, but can be broken by a hard enough hit, even if it does not break the skin. The skin membranes of the wings are made of the same structure, but without muscle behind them, are vulnerable to damage. A dragon’s brain is a powerful tool, and makes them the most intelligent animal known. Period. Of the food they eat, at least half the calories go directly to the brain. A dragon can compute square roots faster than one can enter the numbers into a calculator.
Diet: A Green’s diet consists of mostly fish. They have become a somewhat semi-aquatic species, spending much of their time beneath the surface of lakes and rivers in search of prey. All dragons must eat approximately 15 kg of food each day. Both their brains and their wings require quite a bit of energy to function properly.
Lifecycle: A dragon’s life starts when a 2 kg hatchling breaks through the hard-shelled egg. Clutches are between two and four eggs, and usually only one hatchling will survive, due to stiff competition between hatchlings for food. Seldom are they lost to predators, since the parents will kill anything creature they deem a threat to the young on sight. Humans have never seen a dragon nest and lived to tell. Dragons must grow and learn fast, and by the third year, the surviving young are fully grown and driven out of their birth land in search of territories of their own. Dragons will fly off for days on end, searching for lands not already claimed. Since dragon birth-rate is extremely low, there is often enough space for young dragons if they fly far enough.
Dragons grow through their lives, but do so most swiftly as hatchlings. From the time they hatch from an egg the size of a football until they are their adult size, only three years pass. In that time, they grow to their full 250kg mass. So much food is required to grow a dragon, that both parents must work tirelessly to feed the young. This short childhood is also part of the reason dragons are so intelligent; they must master their language, flight and other dragon skills within three years. After three years of age, the growth slows to the point where it is no longer easily detected. Mass will typically increase by a kilogram every couple of decades. The genetic material of any dragon is unknown, but since other sextapods have Trioxyribo Nucleic Acid, it is likely dragons do as well. This structure of genetic material is so durable, that it never decays during the dragon’s life, and is what allows sextapods to live for thousands of years, baring injury or disease.
The death of a dragon is a secret event. Some are killed by injury, and their remains are discovered with scavengers trying to penetrate the tough hide. Most dragons live to be 5,000. By that time, their mass has increased to the point where flight is becoming difficult. Instead of living a life grounded, and perhaps forced to scavenge themselves, dragons choose to die with their dignity in tact. When they reach this age, they will create a burrow deep in the forest, climb into it, and shut their body down. Basically, they will go into hibernation and never awaken. Their brains are powerful enough to shut down their vital systems and offer a quick hibernating death.
Reproduction: Dragonettes (the females) come into season very seldom. Dragons have control over their breeding cycles, and a dragonette will go into season only when conditions are right and population pressures are very low. When she does, Drakes (the males) come from all around in hope of impressing the Dragonette. At first, lack of dimorphism made telling the difference between Drakes (males) and Dragonettes (females) apart rather difficult. Both were roughly the same size. They will dance for her, displaying their bright colors on their chest and wings. Bright colors are a mark of good health. Typically, the oldest, wisest, and strongest male, with the best territory will win. Occasionally, a Dragonette will choose a Drake that she happens to get along with, for they will have to spend the next three years together. The nest is built on the richest of the two parents’ territories. The eggs are laid in a nest that is covered up with rotting vegetation and guarded by one parent at all times. The eggs take some forty days to hatch.
Sociability: As stated before, dragons are very intelligent. This intelligence leads them to seek out mental stimulation, despite being solitaire. Their solitary existence is mostly due to the large territories dragons need to feed themselves. As predators, they are not inclined to share. Every few years, dragons neighboring each other will gather together in neutral territory and exchange ideas and discoveries, and engage in stimulating conversation. Greens will occasionally even engage humans they come across, provided said humans are not seen as a threat to the dragon’s forest.
Aside from their venom and bite, dragons use their talons and tails as weapons as well. Talons cause piercing damage, puncturing internal organs and causing severe trauma. Their tails are used as whips. It strikes an enemy like a thick bull-whip, breaking bones with ease. More than one intruder into their territory has suffered a broken neck from having a tail whip them in the head. Dragon’s are hesitant to bite into other intelligent animals, and will rely on tails, talons and toxic breath.
Occasionally, dragons will venture into human towns and talk with the apes, read their books and watch their television. They will tolerate humans on their worlds only as long as humans are not a threat to the ecosystem. In that case, the dragons will simply exterminate them. This is done by accessing the Dragon Vault and drawing forth ancient and extremely powerful weapon. Though they view technology as a necessary evil, when a dragon builds something, they build it to last forever
Communication: Dragons communicate with one and other through a language that is comprised of a series of chirps, hisses and rumbles. The language is rather complex and has never been translated by humans. Dragons will not teach their language to humans, not even pygmaeus, because their shorter lifespan would just mean the dragon would have to retrain a new human in a matter of decades. Because dragons have so short childhoods to learn, their brains are adapted to learn very fast. A dragon is capable of learning a human language in a matter of days.
Habitat: Greens live within temperate forests. They do not like the cold, nor do they like extreme heat. The hottest forests are home to the Blacks. They prefer forests on worlds with a constant climate and little in the way of seasons. In the even of seasons, they live in the lower temperate zones, where it rarely to never snows.

Blue Dragons: One of the four dragon species to be engineered by the Green Dragons are the Blues. Where the Greens evolved in a more temperate, forested world, the Blues were engineered to survive in a semi-arid grass and scrubland. Blue Dragons were made blue to blend into the sky, for they ambush their prey from above. To kill their prey, Blues simply use the impact from above to break the necks of their prey. If that fails, instead of Chlorine, they use electricity to kill prey and ward off threats. Their breath attack works because when engineered, genes from electric fish were incerted into the Blues’ genome. Electrical cells line their tongues, and by clicking it against their fangs, sparks of electricity jump from their mouth.
Off all the dragons, Blues are the least friendly. This has to do with their habitat. On the savanna, there is plenty of prey, and plenty of competition. This drive to compete with other predators forced the Blues to evolve a nasty disposition. Of all the dragons, they are the most likely to kill intruders on sight.

Red Dragons: Another of the four dragon engineered by the Greens were the Reds. Red Dragons were designed to inhabit ecosystems even harsher than the savannas the Blue were engineered with in mind. Many of the arid worlds Dragons first visited showed an abundance of red rock, which is why the Reds have a slightly rusty sheen to their hides. They were engineered to blend into the desert background, and to sneak up on prey if possible. Red tend to kill with a bite, injecting an oily venom into their prey, which can kill in minutes. Like the Greens, they are also capable of “spitting” their venom. Unlike Greens, the Reds can click their teeth together to cause a spark and ignite the oil. Of all the dragons, the Reds are the friendliest. Being of such marginal environment, one might expect Reds to be more territorial than Blues. However, Reds have little in the way of competition, and live in the largest territories any dragons occupy. The sparsity of other dragons makes them eager to talk to any intelligent species they stumble upon, provided they do not threaten a dragon’s territory.

Black Dragons: The fourth dragon species to be engineered were the Black Dragons. They were designed to live in environments similar to Greens (forested) only hotter. Blacks thrive in swamps and jungles, and spend half of their time under water. They hunt almost solely by ambush, lurking beneath the water in a way reminiscent of crocodiles. Instead of drowning their prey, Blacks inject them with a highly acidic venom, which breaks downs blood vessels and causes massive internal bleeding. The prey dies from shock quickly, unless the force of the bite crushes vertebrae. Blacks live in the highest population density of any dragon species. However, with wide sources of prey, little conflict arises between Blacks, and between them and other species. Blacks are almost as sociable as Reds. Their hides are a dark black, similar to the scales of a black mamba.
The Web Log that connects all my works into one, easy to use, website: http://kiatspace.blogspot.com/
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Holben
Member Avatar
Rumbo a la Victoria

I like the concept, but no fire? :(

Nice to have them evolving from dinos, maniraptoran anaolgues i presume. Were these hexapedal?

What kind of skin and skeleton do they have?

If they're so clever, they must have big brians. These must be even bigger for flight co-ordination. Their heads must be massive.
Time flows like a river. Which is to say, downhill. We can tell this because everything is going downhill rapidly. It would seem prudent to be somewhere else when we reach the sea.

"It is the old wound my king. It has never healed."
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
The Kiat
Member Avatar
Adolescent
 *  *  *  *  *
Holbenilord
Apr 5 2010, 04:57 AM
I like the concept, but no fire? :(

Nice to have them evolving from dinos, maniraptoran anaolgues i presume. Were these hexapedal?

What kind of skin and skeleton do they have?

If they're so clever, they must have big brians. These must be even bigger for flight co-ordination. Their heads must be massive.
You mean fire as a tool? They know how and would use it if they had the reason, and Reds' venom is highly flammable. One click of the teeth and <poof> goes whatever is on the receiving end. All animals, or vertebrae anyway, on their homeworld are sextapods. Their bones are made from bone, and hollow. As for their skin. It is several interlacing layers of really, really tough stuff (that's going to be my technical term for it).
The Web Log that connects all my works into one, easy to use, website: http://kiatspace.blogspot.com/
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Holben
Member Avatar
Rumbo a la Victoria

One click of the teeth lol.

For your tuff stuff, how about a carb like chitin? It does very well for arthropods. A few centimetres entwined with bony scutes and scaly shock absorbers, perhaps?
Time flows like a river. Which is to say, downhill. We can tell this because everything is going downhill rapidly. It would seem prudent to be somewhere else when we reach the sea.

"It is the old wound my king. It has never healed."
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
1 user reading this topic (1 Guest and 0 Anonymous)
« Previous Topic · The Habitable Zone · Next Topic »
Add Reply