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Message: <blockquote data-quote="mythusmage" data-source="post: 1307739" data-attributes="member: 571">Dragon Evolution Part OneEarly EvolutionThe end of the Permian Age is marked by the greatest extinction event in the history of the world. Some 90% of all species died off at this time, leaving Dragon Earth with a lot of empty environmental niches.Early dinosaurs were the first to take advantage of the new opportunities. Thanks to them thecodonts and therapsids were forced onto the periphery, with a number of lines going extinct. Others became small, furtive animals. The therapsids finding refuge in the litter of the forest floor, while the thecodonts took to swamps and bracken for the most part.With one exception.Age of DinosaursThe oldest known ancestor of the dragon is a small crocodile like thecodont. It was a terrestrial animal and had a semi-erect stance. Weighing no more than 60 pounds, it is thought to have survived by scavenging and raiding therapsid and thecodont nests. The youngest specimen comes from the Early Triassic, so the species apparently survived the Permian Extinction.By the Middle Triassic its descendents were small, arboreal animals. By this time all four legs were held under the body, giving it a mammalian stance. About a pound in weight at the most, it hunted insects and may have scavenged on larger animals. One species of proto-dragon in known for a unique distinction. It is the oldest known subject of a time-scry. A difficult and potentially hazardous dweomer that sends the caster’s perceptions back in time. There the caster can view events in the past and study the period. In this case the scrying lasted a few seconds before the caster had to cut it short. He described a hexapedal lizard-like beast.There is some controversy regarding this observation. First, no one has been able to duplicate the feat. Some say it’s a fraud. Second, no one can say reliably whether the observation was made in the Middle or Late Triassic since there are no known physical specimens from the Late Triassic. Third, the observer described the animal as ‘lizard-like’. Which leads some to say he saw some type of standard reptile. This ignoring the fact paleontologists commonly refer to proto-dragons as ‘lizard-like’ in the literatureSo the little six-legged proto-dragon is given provisional status as a Middle or Late Triassic specimen, with most scientists considering it Late Triassic.Other than Mr. Anomalous there are no known proto-dragons from the Late Triassic and Early Jurassic. It isn’t until the Middle Jurassic that we find proto-dragon specimens, and some are hexapeds.How dragons came to be six-limbed vertebrates is still a matter of some dispute. Recent genetic studies have indicated a connection with those genes involved in embryological development. But we don’t yet know enough to say exactly what happened. The fact it occurred sometime in the gap between the Middle Triassic and the Middle Jurassic is amply demonstrated by the fact that some proto-dragons were using their mid-limbs as wings.The Middle Jurassic was a time of transition for the proto-dragon. Most known specimens were quadrupeds, but those were soon to die out with only one species surviving to the Cretaceous. The terrestrial hexapeds were only slightly less numerous, but they were largely gone before the start of the Late Jurassic. Possibly because of competion with the newly evolved primates. It is the winged proto-dragons that survived this time of crisis.(And at this point I’ll be cutting this short, since it is turning out to be so long. When next I post I’ll be taking up the thread with the last of the proto-dragons and the first of the true dragons. Then we’ll go on to the Age of Mammals.)</blockquote>

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