Komodo Dragon

Fewer than 3,500 Komodo dragons remain. They once lived across a huge range, spanning Indonesia’s islands and Australia, but since the 1970s, Komodo National Park has been the only place in the world where they can be found. Often weighing more than 300 pounds, these giant lizards can grow up to 10 feet long, run as fast as 12 miles (19 km) per hour, smell blood from almost 6 miles away, and deliver a powerful bite with venom strong enough to kill a human.

Common Name:

Komodo Dragon

Scientific Name:

Varanus komodoensis

IUCN Red List Status:

Endangered

Threats:

Rising sea levels; pet trade; habitat destruction; poaching of Komodo Dragons and their prey

Weight: 

Typically about 70kg (154 pounds), but the largest verified specimen reached 166kg (366 pounds)

Size:

Up to 3.13m (10.13 feet) long from head to tail

Habitats:

Prefer tropical forests but can be found across the Komodo islands.

Continent:

Asia

GC Sites:

Komodo World Heritage Park, Indonesia

Partners:

Komodo Survival Program

Komodo Dragon Global Population Size Over Time by Year and Estimated Population:

1981 — 5,000

2013 — 3,222

2015 — 3,014

2021 — 3,458

Current range (green) and historical range (red) of the Komodo dragon. Their habitat has been decimated on the island of Flores, which is not part of KNP.

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There is evidence that the evolutionary development of the Komodo dragon originated in Australia roughly 3.8 million years ago. They once lived across a huge range, spanning Indonesia’s islands and Australia, but since the 1970s, Komodo National Park (KNP) has been the only place in the world where they can be found.

It is unsurprising that these lizards are called “dragons”: Often weighing more than 300 pounds, these giant lizards can grow up to 10 feet long, run as fast as 12 miles (19 km) per hour, smell blood from almost 6 miles away, and deliver a powerful bite with venom strong enough to kill a human. As the largest, most aggressive animal in the park, they are at the top of the food chain. Dragons can eat an impressive 80% of their body weight in a single feeding.

While they eat a wide variety of animals, ranging from rats to adult buffalo, their numbers have significantly declined. There are now fewer than 3,500 dragons left in the park due to human-caused habitat loss, illegal hunting, and climate change. Consequently, they are classified as Endangered on IUCN’s Red list.

KNP was initially established to protect the Komodo dragon and its remaining habitat in 1980. In 1991, due to the park’s dedication to protecting its land and marine life, it was officially designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Threats

Despite efforts to protect the park and all life that relies on it, KNP and its Komodo dragons have been and still are under threat of further human impact. 

Historically, people on Flores Island have burned Komodo dragon habitat to clear the land for other uses, and poachers have targeted the dragons and their prey. Furthermore, tourists feed the dragons and disrupt their mating behavior, causing KNP to consider closing Komodo Island (just one of the islands in KNP) to tourism. Nonetheless, tourism remains an important part of sustainable conservation financing for KNP.

Interestingly, female komodo dragons can reproduce even without the help of a male. Through a process called "parthogenesis", they can reproduce asexually, producing only male offspring. As their numbers dwindle, females more frequently rely on parthogenesis, creating another problem -- a shortage of females, which has led to inbreeding.

One of the greatest current threats to Komodo dragons is climate change. Rising sea levels, combined with habitat destrtuction for urbanization and agriculture, will likely lead to at least a 30% shrinkage of the dragons' habitat in the next 45 years.

Conservation Action

Given the sheer size of the park, one of the main issues preventing effective protection is a lack of monitoring and reporting. Without access to the technology necessary to thoroughly survey the land, there is no way to ensure that conservation guidelines are being upheld and that there are no illegal actions taking place in the park. It also means that, even when human-caused impacts are discovered, there is often a lack of accountability for actions that intentionally or unintentionally impact the environment in illegal or negative ways.

Given the beauty and impressive biodiversity above and beneath its oceans' surface, it is no surprise that the tourism industry thrives there. While prosperous for the local community's economy, tourism can be detrimental to the environment. Visitors bring in the funds that over 3,200 people living in the park and over 16,800 others living in the surrounding areas need to survive. However, because the only way to travel within the park is by foot or by boat, the more people exploring the islands, the more pollution from boats and the more foreign substances from visitors' shoes. 

In partnership with Komodo Survival Program (KSP), Global Conservation has funded and supported efforts to provide the technology and resources needed to more effectively protect KNP. This year, KSP has accomplished the following:

1. Park staff has been trained in SMART implementation, which is now being used during patrolling.

2. Fourteen dedicated young KNP rangers have been trained in ecological monitoring methodology.

3. 624km of marine patrols and 175km of terrestrial patrols were conducted during June, July, and August 2021.

4. A terrestrial wildlife survey was conducted, focused especially on monitoring the presence of Komodo dragons and their prey.

5. After several coordination meetings with the director of KNP, KSP has been given a permit to renovate an unused building and use it as a command and education center, as well as the base camp for the KNP and KSP monitoring and patrolling team.

6. Conducted a preliminary survey on the west coast of Komodo Island to identify the areas of KNP that need to be monitored more frequently for threats such as deer poaching and burning of the savannah by poachers.

7. Purchased and installed a Portable Marine Radar and a large anchor to support and improve the floating ranger stations.

While many of Indonesia’s national parks have been using SMART technology to protect their lands, KNP has not, so implementing relatively user-friendly technology has been Global Conservation’s leading priority in the current 6-month 2021 pilot project. Providing technology and rolling out Global Park Defense during this pilot has already proven to be extremely useful for increasing security capacity within this World Heritage Site.

The 2022-2025 plan that Global Conservation developed in collaboration with KSP involves increasing the frequency of monitoring and patrolling, as well as implementing all of the methodologies being set up during this year's pilot project.

Next, with KSP, we plan to further implement the SMART monitoring and patrolling program not only for boat patrolling of coastal areas, but for all 13 ranger stations across KNP that also help to protect terrestrial areas.

Additionally, preparations have been made to increase the frequency of surveillance patrols and monitoring of wildlife. In particular, KSP will help the park continue to conduct intensive surveillance and Komodo dragon monitoring programs on the west coast of Komodo Island and the two remote small islands of Nusa Kode and Gili Motang.

The success of the current pilot project will become a strong negotiation point for the park to request necessary funding from the central government for operational costs of monitoring and patrolling programs.

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