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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Umbran" data-source="post: 7846941" data-attributes="member: 177">Surface area.  If a dragon has bone material strength similar to real animals, and muscle power similar to real world aniimal muscle... that creature cannot fly at all.  You need bone akin to carbon fiber, aluminum, or steel, and muscles akin to machines to get a body that large to fly - which is how you get 747s.So, yes, they defy the laws of physics.  Once you are defying the laws of physics, exactly how big the wings are does not really matter, they may be depicted at whatever size looks good to the artist.  The largest flying animal ever was probably Quetzalcoatlus northopi.  It was as tall as a giraffe, had a wingspan of something like 40 feet, but weighed in at only about 550 lbs.  This is probably as heavy as a flying animal can get, given normal animal physiology and our atmosphere.The major reason to have a skeleton is to gain mechanical advantage by applying muscle power to bones.  As typically depicted, the driving force is applied to the bones at the leading edge of the wing, up at the shoulder.  Assuming something like normal animal anatomy, there's no useful way for muscles at the tail to be applied to the flapping motion.</blockquote>