It hides silently in the tall grasses off the coast of Komodo Island in Indonesia. With its sharp vision, it spies the deer approaching from nearly 1,000 feet away. It is a patient hunter, only capable of fast speeds in short bursts. It is an ambush hunter that hides and waits for its prey to get close enough before striking it with deadly force. The dragon watches as the large deer approaches and finally comes within striking distance.

The grasses rustle abruptly, the deer looks up, but it isn’t quick enough to escape the dragon’s sharp teeth and powerful jaws. It bites the deer, but the deer squirms, bucks, and finally escapes from the dragon’s powerful maw. Injured, the deer bounds off awkwardly into the safety of the nearby woods. It can run, but it cannot hide. This deer will not survive; it will be consumed by the patient and mighty Komodo dragon.

The Komodo dragon trails its condemned prey at a leisurely pace. Venom and bacteria from its mouth quickly begin to work their magic on the wounded deer. The venom keeps the blood from clotting, which ensures that the wound continues bleeding and prevents it from healing. The venom also reduces the animal’s blood pressure, sending the animal into shock and making it too weak to fight. Bacteria in the dragon’s mouth infect the animal’s blood stream, making it even sicker and weaker.

The dragon flicks its forked tongue to taste the air; it detects the smell of blood. It has a strong sense of smell and can detect carrion (a long-dead animal) from six miles away. After slowly following the deer’s blood trail for hours, they meet for the final time in a clearing in the woods. The deer is lying down and can no longer flee or even fight back against the dragon. The dragon makes a quick meal of the deer, consuming nearly all of the deer’s flesh. Then the dragon slinks back to the tall grasses to rest and digest its enormous meal— the dragon has consumed nearly 80 percent of its body weight in this one meal.

Komodo dragons are the largest lizards in the world, growing to be more than 10 feet long and weighing more than 300 pounds. They’re also one of only a handful of venomous lizards in the world and the fact that they’re venomous was only discovered in 2009. Before then, scientists thought that it was the aggressive bacteria living in the dragon’s mouth that sickened and eventually brought down its prey.

Komodo dragons are named for Komodo Island, one of the Indonesian islands upon which they live. However, Komodo dragons can also be found on some other Indonesian islands within Komodo National Park. These include Gili Montang, Gili Dasami, and Rinca— which currently hosts the largest dragon population. Today, there are only about 3,000 dragons left in the wild as a result of poaching and loss of habitat.

Dragons have big appetites and large adults favor large prey like water buffalo, deer, pigs, and sometimes humans. Young dragons tend to live in the trees, which keep them out of reach from fullygrown dragons. Komodo dragons are cannibals, which means that they eat their own kind. Young dragons eat smaller animals, like birds or rodents.

An interesting fact about Komodo dragons is that females can reproduce without a male. This is called asexual reproduction. Females build decoy nests to protect their eggs from predators. Females lay about 20 eggs per clutch and don’t appear to care for the eggs after they lay their eggs. Newborn dragons are about a foot long and scramble from their nest to the safety of the trees as soon as they hatch to avoid being eaten by predators, other dragons, or even by their own mother.

Once they grow to be about four feet long, Komodo dragons come out of the trees and begin to live on the ground. They are about four years old by this time. The dragons have a pretty long life span and can live to be 30 years old.

Humans live side by side with Komodo dragons. As people multiply and build more and more houses, they take away natural areas from the wild dragons. This means that the dragons’ habitat is shrinking. While dragons rarely attack humans, the humans still need to be careful, especially around tall grasses where a dragon could be hiding.