-Caveat Lector- YEAR 2000...YEAR OF THE DRAGON... <A HREF="http://www.draconian.com/misc/body/">Physiology of a Dragon</A> http://www.draconian.com/misc/body/ COLOR Scale color is determand by the genes of the parent dragons. Usually only red dragons will mate with other red dragons, etc. But if a mating took place between a gold and a green dragon, the result might be a bronze colored offspring. Scales on a dragon are never simply one shade of color. If a dragon is blue, there will be many, many shades of blue. Light, medium, dark, blue-black, etc. Scales are bright and shiny in a healthy dragon, but dull and muted if a dragon is ill. A DRAGON'S ARMOR The main function of scales is protection of the soft skin tissue of the dragon. An adult dragon can easily take a direct blow from a knight's sword and hardly flinch. Adult dragons have 4-6 inch wide, and 7-9 inch long teardrop shaped scales covering its body. The pattern of the body scales is a flat, rotating design that overlap each other. Easy movement is due to the unique depression on the top side of each scale that allows them to lay evenly flat on the body. The scales on the chest area are the largest; easily being over a foot wide. The chest scales are one to three flat "scale flaps". These are shaped differently than a regular scale as they are more squarish. The pattern of the chest scales is overlapping and flat running from the throat, under body to the end of the tail. All of the scales lightly slide over each other, so when a dragon walks it will make a soft scraping sound. The overlapping scales make it difficult for anything to successfully injure a dragon. An interesting fact is that the dragon can make the scales stand on end for washing. Also, when angered, the dragon can puff up, spread its scales, and look a lot larger than the dragon actually is. Lifting the scales is also an effective heat reducing element. Making the scales stand on end allows the skin underneath to release heat, thus cooling the large animal down quickly. A favorite past-time of dragons is to stand the scales up and go into a cool pool of water to allow it to run in between the scales and onto the sensitive skin. THE WING The wing. The part of the dragon that distinguishes itself from all other creatures. The dragon wing is a huge, leathery appendage that is found on several different species of dragon. The wing is usually larger than the dragon's body to accommodate the incredible force needed to lift and maintain flight. BONES The wing is essentially another arm and hand. If you look at the skeleton of a dragon front arm and claws, you will notice that the wing is just a very stretched out version. The two thick "arm bones" (humerus and wing radius) runs from the body of the dragon attaching itself with cartilage and muscle to an "elbow" of the wing. There are usually 4 or 5 elongated "fingers" on a wing each ending in a claw. One short "thumb" claw is at the "wrist". The "fingers" then attach themselves to the "wrist joints" to form the complete SENSES Dragons have the same senses as humans; site, hearing, smelling, touch, and taste. But some have a six sense which is being able to "read" the emotion of another being. Their regular five senses are incredibly sensitive. For example, the sense of smell is about 100 times more sensitive than a bloodhound dog. They can smell and hear a person or animal from a couple miles away! Their six sense is very accurate at close range. If a person or animal is feeling a strong emotion, such as fear or hate, it will register very strongly to the dragon, even if it is not in visual range of it. This is where dragonfear comes from. Dragonfear is an all encompassing, frozen-in-place fear that the dragon causes upon the animal or person seeing a dragon. The dragons sometimes use this advantage to beat its foes, such as thieves or knights. Only the very bravest (or very dim-witted) are not affected by this terrible fear. This is usually an aura around evil-minded dragons, but in a friendly dragon, such as the Faerie Dragon, this aura is non-existant. THE FIRE BREATHERS! Fire: the thing that makes the dragon most feared. It's a hellish belch of flame that can turn flesh and bone into ash. Though, not all dragons breath fire. Some have freezing cold breath, others have acid, and some don't use their breath as a weapon at all! The two that have fire breathing power are the Red Dragon and Fire Drake. HOW DO THEY BREATH FIRE? It all starts when the dragon catch their prey. When dragons eat, they digest the food in a regular stomach. The digestion then continues in a second stomach that breaks down the food even further. After the dragon's body has used all it can from the second digestion, the body then turns the leftover food and acid into a byproduct of hydrogen. The dragon can hold the hydrogen in various large glands in it's body for later use, and can call upon it at any time it needs to. When the dragon needs to belch it's flame, the glands release the hydrogen into the lungs where it mixes with other various chemicals the body creates. Once this mixture finds oxygen, it burns extremely hot, and very quick. The dragon usually has enough hydrogen in its body for about three spits of flame, but that should be plenty for anything coming up against a large red dragon. This explanation is about the same for dragons that breath other types of breath. Their bodies just break down food into different compounds. (Maybe that is what happened to Mars....burned the place up....the planet of w ar) We are about to go on a Journey. 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