2007 Komodo dragon

Photo: Archiv Prague Zoo

The first in continental Europe

In 2004, Prague Zoo received a pair of Komodo dragons as a gift from Indonesia. At the time, it was rare for this species to breed in captivity. To get the dragons into form, our keepers decided not to stick to the recommended procedures. Instead, they heated the exhibition in the Indonesian Jungle Pavilion to a higher temperature and fed the dragons whole goat quarters rather than rats and quails. The lizards tore off whole bites from the carcases, just as they would in the wild. In the summer of 2006, when the dragons had reached sexual maturity, they began mating.

The first clutch escaped the keepers’ attention for half a year! The female, Aranka, ignored the place that had been intended for laying and laid her eggs in a deep hole she had dug under the exhibition’s concrete floor. Surprisingly, the eggs survived in the soggy mixture of sand, spoil and concrete rubble.

The keepers transferred the eggs to the hatchery and incubated them at the same temperature they had measured at the nesting site, which was slightly higher than that recommended in the literature. After about a month, three healthy young hatched and were named Blueberry, Commodore and Monster. After a few years, they were relocated to other zoos.