Seadragon Reproduction (because I wanted to know)
A post in the Research Rabbit Hole series
[warning: if you are freaked out by snakes, you might want to skip the video.]
I mentioned in an earlier post that The Môrdreigiau Chronicles would keep the bedroom door firmly closed, because you didn’t want to read about how seadragons procreate. Here’s why.
The ABC (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) shared this video recently on Instagram …
… and it was almost exactly how I imagined the sea dragons doing it — except in water. In the book, I call them “dragon dances”. (And yes, my sea dragons are more sea serpenty— no wings, only vestiges of limbs.)
I first went down this rabbit hole while reading about a release of sea horses into the water at Port Stephens.
Baby ickle seahorses! So cute!!
Australia is also home to various kinds of seadragons and I wondered how baby sea horses and sea dragons were made. Because it could become very pertinent to the story.
Both male and female are required, but it is the male seadragon who carries the eggs. The female deposits the eggs on his tail, they are fertilized and moved to a “brood patch”.
How is this relevant? Well, small spoiler, our heroine’s mother is a seadragon (of the magical kind, not Australasian). Her father is human. One of our male leads is 100% seadragon, while the other is 50%. If magical sea dragons reproduce the same way as the adorable Australasian ones, who carries the baby (or eggs?) when someone who has human genetic material is involved?
Of course I needed to figure this out.
See, high school biology did come in handy.
I’m not sure it makes any sense, but I know this. A female seadragon bore a child that’s also human. Did she return to the ocean and have a seadragon carry it for her? Or does being in human form mean she’s human on the inside too?
In addition, a female human bore the child of a male seadragon (which I’m willing to bet came as quite a shock to him, heh heh.)
It helps, I think, that the sea dragons were human initially, before a goddess got involved.
Anywho, there is only so many times one can use the word “writhe” to describe the act, so it’s best that this door is closed. Although it’s going to have some story ramifications later, I can already tell.
If a magical sea dragon was interested in you, would you carry the baby? I am assuming you are all human.
Oooooo it's so interesting to see all the research and the creative process behind constructing such a fantastical range of characters! Thank you for sharing!