the excitement of white shoes

Komodo Dragons are the largest living species of lizard growing up to ten feet (3 metres) in length.

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“The Komodo’s sense of smell is its primary food detector. Its long yellow forked tongue samples the air, after which the two tongue tips retreat to the roof of the mouth, where they make contact with the Jacobson’s organs. These chemical analyzers “smell” prey such as deer by recognising airborne molecules. If the concentration on the left tip is higher than that sampled from the right, then the Komodo knows that the deer is approaching from the left. 

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The muscles of the Komodo’s jaws and throat allow it to swallow huge chunks of meat with astonishing rapidity. A female who weighed no more than 50 kilograms was seen to consume a 31 kilogram boar in less than 17 minutes.  Komodos eat almost their entire kill including bones, hooves and swathes of hide. They also eat intestines but only after swinging them vigorously to scatter their contents and remove faeces. 

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Although males tend to grow larger than females, no obvious morphological differences mark the sexes. One subtle clue does exist: a slight difference in the arrangement of scales just in front of the cloaca, the cavity housing the genitalia in both sexes. Sexing Komodos remains a challenge to researchers; the dragons themselves appear to have little trouble figuring out who is who. 

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A male initiates courtship by flicking his tongue on a female’s snout and then over her body. Before copulation can occur, the male must evert a pair of hemipenes located within his cloaca. He then crawls on the back of his partner and inserts one of the hemipenes, depending on his position relative to the female’s tail, into her cloaca. 

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A variety of behaviors have been observed from captive specimens. Most become relatively tame within a short period of time, and are capable of recognizing individual humans and discriminating between more familiar keepers. Komodo dragons have also been observed to engage in play with a variety of objects, including shovels, cans, plastic rings, and shoes. 

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Even seemingly docile dragons may become aggressive unpredictably, especially when the animal’s territory is invaded by someone unfamiliar. In June 2001, a Komodo dragon seriously injured a man when he entered its enclosure at the Los Angeles Zoo after being invited in by its keeper. He was bitten on his bare foot, as the keeper had told him to take off his white shoes, in case they caused excitement in the dragon…..

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