What size would a dragon be?

[Sivert3]

Mainstream dragons are mostly depicted as large fearsome beasts. Given the limits of physics how large could a dragon be? Surely an organic life form the size of a small factory can't possibly fly on Earth. What is a reasonable size for a dragon?

[Forgotten Dragon's Ire]

Realistically I think the largest a dragon could be and still fly would range between the size of a small horse and a house cat.

[BeneathTheStarlight36]

realistically, a dragon could be any size i suppose, but it would have to live in an area with a lot of food, and its wings would be gigantic depending on how big you make it.

[Forgotten Dragon's Ire]

At a certain size the weight to wing ratio would be too enormous for a creature to realistically exist and still be able to fly... this is an issue with all flying things like planes and birds.

In general the larger the creature the heavier it is meaning it needs a larger wingspan to accommodate. Unfortunately this does not mean if you double the size of a creature that you only need to double the size of the wings it is actually closer to exponential growth. Not only that but the wings themselves have weight as well so you have to increase the wingspan to accommodate for the extra weight which means more weight and etc... Even if the creature has a suitably sized wingspan it would also need muscles strong enough to move them which equates to more weight = more wingspan = more muscle =...

As much as I would like to believe dragons could be as large as most books and movies portray them I know they are much too big to realistically exist. And if anyone can prove a dragon could realistically be that big and still fly I would gladly accept it.

As it is dragons can be whatever size you want them to be but they couldn't fly unless they were properly proportioned and sadly I don't believe the realistic proportions are anywhere near as big as I would like them.

[Sivert3]

I've done some searches to figure out realistic proportions, but so far what I've found has mostly been a few levels above my knowledge (mostly technical papers with more jargon than English). What little I did understand was that wing size and flight speed increases exponentially with weight, and subsequently there would be an upper bound to size.

However complicated it may be to find the upper bound it is trivial to find a lower bound on the maximum size of a dragon from nature. The Quetzalcoatlus and the Argentavis are two truly massive beasts with estimated wing spans of 10 and 7 metres respectively. Proving that dragon can be at least as large and still fly. However, there is evidence to support than neither one of those can sustain flapped flight over long periods of time and that they are more likely to be soaring.

If you were to engineer a dragon on the other hand (this is not possible with current technology and understanding of biology), the rules of nature does no longer apply and something much greater can be achieved. Albeit it might have some issues regarding heath since the immune system was dropped in favour more power to the wings. And the entire gastronomical system.

[Forgotten Dragon's Ire]

Still even if they were to be genetically engineered, the laws of physics would still determine what was indeed possible.

I could see something like the Quetzalcoatlus would be a good indicator of possible size. Just modify the bone structure a bit, add a couple front legs, make the head smaller, and change a few other details while making sure the wings still have enough muscle to sustain themselves. You could conceivably make a dragon that size or at least smaller than one of those.

[Drakel]

Yes. I actually did necro this thread. But then again, most threads here need to be necromanced or the site would have been dead... So I guess I didn't necro this thread lol.

I'm also using a phone to get on, so I'm sorry for the bad grammar.

Quetzalcoatlus is a good example for size but personally I've taken quiet a liking for the Imperial Chinese Dragons. I believe I had a thread in here asking how we could make one fly without magic or the need of wings. I think, looking back on it we could add similar properties to make a large flying dragon lighter. I still find a large dragon possible, just harder to explain since we, as humans still have quite a lot to learn.

Now FDI, for your last post, I'd like to point out that you should read your argument then read it again. My reason for saying such is that you stated that all you needed to do was add some small modifications and we are set, the biggest being, "We add (front) legs" and " Modify the bone structure". You must remember that doing both of these will also have a great impact on the weight factor.

[Sivert3]

Yes. I actually did necro this thread

Necro? What are you talking about. This thread is barely a month old. On this board, grave digging is loosely defined at about 6-12 months.

Now doing a "few" modifications will not only impact the weight factor. Evolution brings some couple of millions of factors to near optimum values in relation to each other. If you were to simply add a few limbs here and there it will cause the fine tuned balance of the animal to be lost.

Not to mention the fact we don't have the understanding or capability to make said changes in the first place. Getting back to the point, about 200 Kg is a weak lower bound to the maximum size. Given that nature does not necessarily favor large size this tells us pretty much nothing.

[Forgotten Dragon's Ire]

Drakel as Sivert has so aptly pointed out it is more of a fine tuning of features and it what I was referring too during my post. Sure its definitely possible to make something "look" like a dragon but for it to "be" a dragon it requires a lot more finesse and knowledge of gene manipulation than we currently have at our disposal. Besides even with modifications a creature can only get so big to be a viable size and still be able to fly you can't defy the laws of physics.

[Corva]

What sort of Oxygen levels are we talking about? They've been up to 35% before, I think, which is more than a doubling of the oxygen partial pressure. Conveniently, it also means the air density is about 1.2x the current values... I don't know when Quetzlecoatlus was around.

I do think that they could probably reach 50kg at least.

[Drakel]

RD: Oxygen levels have been around 20% or about 20.000001% given this chart.
Chart: http://www.globalchange.umich.edu/globa ... oootwo.gif

Over all we'll assume that the air is hell of a lot less polluted during our discussion, since in all technicality, they were. So, over all I doubt the density of the air would be a lot more thicker then what we have today. If it was thicker it wouldn't be by much.

In all technicality though, the Quetzlecoatlus were originally deemed as a god so he was there since the beginning of time. However, in this discussion I would suggest that we use Medieval Times to 800 BC as our base since that be the generic area of where most of the "myths" came.

FDI: I know this. However at the time I believed that weight was the commonly discussed factor in mind at the time. In which I stated that limbs and additional things a true dragon would have would also either add or subtract from the weight factor.

In all honesty though, I do agree with you that there are far more factors in use that would determine what the maximum size a dragon could possibly be to fly.

[Basil D'Oliveira]

I think there is no specifications about the size of the dragons. as if we see in the video games, there are different sizes depicted in different games. also in animation movies the sizes varies. it all depend on the developers of the game or the animation. bt i like watching big...bigger and bigger dragons.

[Corva]

Oh hello. Have a cookie and please introduce yourself (we have a forum for that!). It's been a long time since anyone took a cookie, and these are a bit stale. I'll have to bake a fresh batch.