#1 / Komodo dragons are brilliant swimmers.
When you look at a Komodo dragon, weighing up to 198 lbs (90kg) and 10ft (3 meters) in length, full of muscle and lumbering around the land, you wouldn’t think they’d be natural swimmers.
However, Komodo dragons – much like most other reptiles – are avid swimmers.
Komodo dragons live on a chain of five southeastern Indonesian islands, and they must frequently swim from island to island in quest of food.
They have been observed kilometers offshore and can swim for hours.
#2 / Komodo dragons can smell carrion from up to five miles away.
Komodo dragons, like other reptiles, smell through a different sensory system than humans do.
They literally taste the air by picking up minute flavor particles on the air with their flashing forked tongues.
The prongs of the Komodo dragon's tongue fit into an organ on the roof of its mouth called the Jacobson's Organ when it is drawn back into its mouth.
The fragrance particles on the tongue are processed by this organ, allowing the Komodo dragon to determine exactly what each particle is and where it is.
This method of sniffing carrion is so perfected in a Komodo dragon that it can detect something dead from five kilometres away and pinpoint its location.
As you may expect, this is a really difficult situation.
#3 / Komodo dragons can eat 80% of their body weight in one sitting.
Komodo dragons are indeterminate growers, which means they will continue to grow in size and length for the rest of their lives.
This is one of the main reasons they have no natural predators.
Komodo dragons have been seen in the wild devouring large meals at one sitting, owing to their voracious appetite and constant need to eat.
#4 /Komodo dragons are actually venomous.
Scientists have long assumed that a Komodo dragon's saliva contains a deadly combination of microorganisms potent enough to kill its prey with just one bite, thanks to an observational study conducted in the 1970s.
However, in 2009, University of Queensland scientist Brian Fry put this widely held idea to the test.
He was able to gather swabs from the inside of several different Komodo dragons' mouths in order to figure out exactly which microorganisms were responsible for such a horrible death.
What Brian Fry discovered altered people's perceptions of Komodo dragons.
Although they had a lot of bacteria in their mouths, it was less than most mammalian mouths, and there was nothing that might harm them.
#5 / Young Komodo dragons roll around in poop and climb trees to avoid getting eaten
Adult Komodo dragons are infamous for not being fussy about what they eat, and immature Komodo dragons are frequently eaten by adult Komodo dragons.
To combat this threat, young Komodo dragons climb trees and become nimble branch-climbing predators until they reach a size where they are no longer threatened by other dragons.
However, this does not always work, so as a precaution, they roll around in poop to make themselves as unappealing as possible.
They stink so awful that even the most hungry dragons can't eat them!
They can readily swallow a medium-sized piglet down in one with their extraordinarily flexible jaws that can open very wide.
As a result, it should come as no surprise that a Komodo dragon can devour up to 80% of its body weight in a single meal.
#6 / George H. W. Bush received a Komodo dragon as a gift.
The Indonesian government presented then-President Bush Sr. with a male Komodo dragon named Naga around halfway through his four-year administration.
Despite the temptation to let him loose in the White House, Bush Sr. donated him to the Cincinnati Zoo.
Naga lived to be 24 years old and fathered over 32 young Komodo dragons.
He was one of the main attractions at the Cincinnati Zoo, with over a million visitors per year — and in 1995, he even went on tour as a conservation officer!
#7 / Female Komodo dragons can reproduce sexually and a-sexually
Flora, a female Komodo dragon in London's Chester Zoo, laid 25 eggs in 2006.
After living in captivity alone and never coming into contact with a male Komodo dragon, 11 of them were viable for hatching.
This is due to a process known as "parthenogenesis," which works as follows: in the absence of males, specific egg cells fertilize each other, resulting in the formation of an embryo and allowing Komodo dragons to have "virgin births."
#8 / Komodo dragons are actually quite speedy.
Despite being huge beasts weighing up to 198 lbs and 10ft in length, Komodo dragons can run at speeds up to 13 mph (20 km/h) when sprinting.
This is something they use quite often when hunting in the wild. They will stalk up to their prey slowly, or lie in wait for passing animals, then burst forward at them in a sharp sprint.
All it takes is one bite from the Komodo dragon and it can wait for its prey to succumb to the venom.
Then all that’s left is for the Komodo dragon to use its incredible sens
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#10 Interesting Facts About Komodo Dragons
