Year of the Dragon

Today marks the beginning of the Chinese Year of the Dragon. "Congratulations and be prosperous; now give me a red envelope!" say cheeky Chinese children. New Year's gifts of red envelopes containing even-numbered amounts of money are supposed to bring good luck and suppress demons. (I wonder if they would suppress extraneous presidential candidates? Envelopes full of money have been known to work on politicians before... .)

The critters in this photo are not demons but Komodo dragons— actually giant monitor lizards. We shot them in Indonesia, where they live on their namesake island and a few others in the Lesser Sunda chain. Relics from the age of megafauna, Komodo dragons are the largest living species of lizard: these were easily eight feet long and probably weighed 150 pounds. Though not literally fire-breathing, they do have yellow tongues and red saliva. Let your imagination run wild.

The food chain is relatively limited on the hot, dry island of Komodo. Native deer eat the scrubby foliage, and the Komodo dragons eat the deer. When the island was designated a national park, administrators got the bright idea of creating feeding stations for the dragons with viewing platforms for the increasing number of tourists who came ashore from island-hopping cruise ships. Park rangers would carve up a few deer and sure enough, dragons (who have a very keen sense of smell) started showing up for matinee feeding performances.

The administrators didn't foresee that the dragons would grow accustomed to having food delivered and would stop hunting for themselves. The deer population exploded. The administrators then decided to stop feeding the dragons, hoping instead to lure them to the viewing platforms merely by providing fresh water on the otherwise arid island. The tactic worked, kind of, but we saw several dragons near the viewing platforms who were stubbornly starving to death, waiting for dinner to be served.

In the Chinese animal hierarchy, the dragon is the highest-ranking beast and was associated at one time with the emperor. It is the only mythological animal of the twelve animals on the Chinese calendar. 2012 is the Chinese year of the Water Dragon.

So, have a good year!
Go get your own deer;
It's every dragon for himself, out here.