Subject:
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Re: Enter the Dragon... or a fun teaser part deux
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.castle
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Date:
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Sun, 15 Apr 2001 15:47:39 GMT
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Viewed:
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583 times
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> > One question for you - what does this monster eat? No population of people
> > or domesticated cattle could support the daily appetite it would require.
> > Got a herd of buffalo with a head count in the millions somewhere nearby?
> >
> > John
> > #388
>
> HAH! You think you can stump me on this one, well let's just see who's
> stumped.
Wasn't trying to stump you - I just wanted to know ;) I think Dave got most
of my additional thoughts already...
> TO answer your question, we must first look at the biological requirements of
> the dragon. Now, most people see dragons lying on their horde of gold,
> guarding it. Also, the dragon can seem to have bursts of energy, chasing down
> its prey. This would make it seem that dragons have the ability to change
> their metebolic rates to suit their needs, much like most preditory mammals.
> Also, a dragon would seem to be an ambush preditor, like a lion or a crocodile.
> Lieing in wait till the moment is right and then charging. A dragon with
> wings would most likely swoop down, grab its prey and fly off again.
>
> Most raptors do not falp their wings much, except to take off. The usually
> glide. A dragon of this size would most likely have to do the same, and given
> that my dragon is roughly the size of a 747, flight IS theoretically possible,
> granted the creature would have to obtain considerable speed.
>
> So, we know now that the dragon doesn't spend much energy except to hunt and
> defend its horde of gold, and with a variable metabolic rate, it doesn't
> needlessly waste energy while it lies in wait. But because of the scaley
> nature of the beast, and its superstructure, it would only be fair to say that
> the dragon lies somewhere inbetween reptiles and mammals on the evolutionary
> ladder, much like dinosaurs.
It would also require a whole lot of energy to grow to that size.
> Ok, so the dragon is like a dionsaur. Well, we know that a 30 foot dinosaur,
> like the Allosaurus, would need about 200 lbs of meet a week to survive.
> Given that a lego man is roughly 5 studs high, we can get a rough guesstamet
> from that. Now the picture I took with my knight in the picture, my knight's
> character is a little less than six feet tall. With his helm, he is, and is
> also just about 5 studs tall (with a lego brick on end sitting next to him.
> So, knowing this, we can say that for ever 5 studs long, my dragon gains 6 feet
> in length.
>
> So, my dragon is 154 studs long. Apply basic algebra and you come up with my
> dragon being 184.8 feet long.
>
> 185 feet for the sake of argument, even thought that is counting the spikes on
> the end of its tail, I'll STILL give that to you.
>
> OK, so the dragon is 185 feet long. Since it is like a dinosaur, we can then
> expand the 30 foot carnisaur to the 185 feet length. Porpotionally, the
> carnisaur at 185 feet would need rougly 1234 lbs of meat a week to survive.
>
> Unfortunately, we cannot use that number, because we cannot use porportions
> like that, the dragon gains different metabolic needs as it gets bigger.
You also can't use that number because it's not volumetric. A creature 6
times as long is also that much bigger around, probably with longer limbs,
bigger heart, etc.
> So, for the sake of arguement, lets TRIPLE the amount. Granted, she probably
> wouldnt need THAT much, but lets say the dragon is gluttonous. Ok, so triple
> 1234 lbs of meat is 3702 lbs of meat. We'll continue with 3700 just to make
> it easy.
>
> Ok, so thats 3700 lbs of meat a week, thats 192,400 lbs of meat a year.
>
> Thats a lot of meat.
>
> However, the average cow in the US weighs 900 lbs.
>
> Let us assume that the dragon lives in an unpopulated area, where wild heards
> roam. For the sake of argument, let us use the example of the Amercian Bison,
> otherwise misnamed as the Buffalo. (Its not called the buffalo, its the
> American Bison, the Buffalo is a European creature, but the settlers saw a
> resemblance and the name stuck).
>
> In Amercia, the american bison roamed in great heards of over 2 million heads.
> Let us say, again for the sake of arguement, that only one sixth of the
> population was of breading age, and only produced one calf every year.
Those biggest herds covered a mid-west state or two. That's a pretty big
unpopulated area and quite a trek for any knight to confront the beast.
> That's a positive population birth rate of 300,000 possible babies born every
> year. The population's death rate is unkown, but for the sake of argument let
> us say that it is 3/4s that of the birth rate, since the amercian landscape
> more than supported these large heards. So thats a net population growth of
> 75,000 head a year. OK, let us also assume that the dragon has no effect on
> this first, theoretical death rate.
>
> The american bison is larger than the average cow, and thus could reach weights
> of up to 1200 lbs.
>
> The dragon needs 192,400 lbs of meat a year to survive.
>
> That is roughly 160 american bison every year, WELL below the net population
> growth of the heard. In fact the dragon could double her already high amount
> of food intake and not even barely dent the heard's growth rate.
>
> IN FACT.... 46 dragons of my dragons size could live off of the heard and the
> heard would STILL have a positive population growth.
>
> So there you go, not only is it possible for my dragon to surive, but it could
> thrive, and have parties and invite friends over.
>
> --Anthony
>
> http://www.geocities.com/savatheaggie/legohome.html
Well, I just love the fact that you thought it through! Thanks for sharing.
My question was based on the thought that a 90' blue whale eats 2 tons of
krill a day. Your dragon looked to be about twice that length, albeit
thinner, so I was thinking probably the same two tons. I wouldn't imagine a
swimming sea creature would expend more energy than a walking or flying land
creature - anyone know?
John
#388
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Message has 1 Reply:
 | | Re: Enter the Dragon... or a fun teaser part deux
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| (...) Well, while a blue whale doesn't expend much energy to swim, it also doesn't have the ability to change its metabolic rate. Also, the blue whale expends an ENORMOUS amount of energy maintaining its body temperature. A mammal needs to eat a lot (...) (24 years ago, 15-Apr-01, to lugnet.castle)
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Message is in Reply To:
| | Re: Enter the Dragon... or a fun teaser part deux
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| (...) HAH! You think you can stump me on this one, well let's just see who's stumped. TO answer your question, we must first look at the biological requirements of the dragon. Now, most people see dragons lying on their horde of gold, guarding it. (...) (24 years ago, 14-Apr-01, to lugnet.castle)
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