seeing dragons
Measuring up to 3 metres and weighing up to 70 kg, the komodo dragon is a super-predator: any creature they can overcome and kill falls within their dietary range, from invertebrates and birds, fellow komodos (when the young hatch they climb straight up a tree, and do not descend until they are strong and fast enough to escape their cannibalistic brethren), the introduced Timor deer, wild boar, water buffalo and goats, and even humans. The dragons can smell blood and the scent of death from nearly 6 miles away. They kill by biting their prey, which dies within a few days from the bacteria carried in the Komodo’s saliva, which can cause paralysis, spasms and shock through haemorrhaging. Animals up to the size of goats are swallowed whole, this process being aided by the komodos' loosely articulated jaws, flexible skull and expandable stomach. The last human death was in 2009, but a Singaporean tourist who wandered off without a guide was bitten in 2017 (onl...