How to Train Your Very Own Dragon

OFFICIAL SYLVAN SERPENTINE SANCTUARY STATIONERY

Since that dratted movie came out, people have been given a very wrong impression about how to hatch, raise, and train your very own dragon. We are here to put a stop to this nonsense, by once again issuing our official How To Train Your Dragon manual. And this time, pay attention, please? Your life, and the life you’ve chosen to bond with, may depend on it.

Firstly, congratulations! You have been chosen to receive a Dragon Egg Surprise! Much like cats, and for the same reasons, the universe has decided that YOU, and only you, are the recipient of this unique gift. Brace yourself, there will be challenges!

Reminder: this is not a thing you can foist off on others. You have touched the egg, it has imprinted on YOU. So YOU are now responsible for raising it properly.

Now, examine your egg. Is it hard, and, well, egg-shaped? Prepare for a feathery dragon, and buy the correct raising setup: a rag-lined box, a feed station, a water station, and a heat lamp. Generic fowl feed will do for a food supply; it’s close enough. Eventually they transition to grass outside, and are mostly self-contained. On second thought, buy lots of towels. LOTS of them. Your dragon will poop everywhere it can, and you will be shocked where you find fewmets. Wait till they get wings! On third thought, just buy stock in towels companies. You’ll need it.

Instead, is your egg round, and rather leathery? Prepare for a scaly dragon. These are easier to maintain. A glass box, with a miniature environment, is ideal. They will use that heat lamp, as opposed to the feathery type (who think it’s their mother for the first two weeks, then act as if it’s Chixulub Meteor come back for a second try.) Food is tiny insects, grubs and crickets, easily available at any pet store. The will never voluntarily leave their environment, just graduate to bigger and better food. If you find you need to buy the Arm Sized Jumbo Grubs (species Grubbo holey-crapola), you might have the third type, see below.

If your egg is extremely large, about the size of your head, then that is a dinosaur egg, and you must immediately re-boot the planet. Space laser or another meteor is the preferred method. DO NOT RETURN IT TO POINT OF DISCOVERY, guaranteed there is a velociraptor lying in wait, ready to eat you. It may have tracked you instead, and be outside your door RIGHT NOW, so never leave your house again. Chuck your egg out the front door as a decoy, then run out the back and start a new life on another continent.

Scaly dragons just grow into larger versions of themselves, so no further investment of equipment is needed, unless you need a bigger glass box. Talk to fellow enthusiasts, swap boxes, and trade tips and pointers. Enjoy your low-key, relatively low-maintenance pet.

Feathered dragons – when their hunger cries go from peep-peep to cluck-cluck, you know they are now adults. You must build a bigger wire enclosure for them outside, follow the directions on our Feather Dragon Hutch or Baba Yaga Special for construction tutorial. Food stays much the same, just more of it, and some calcium. Be aware, one usually begets more, and soon you will acquire a flock, whether you want it or not. DO NOT KEEP THEM IN THE HOUSE WITHOUT HEAVY INVESTMENTS IN TOWEL STOCKS, because you will need the dividends to carpet every surface in towels. They will turn on each other if you do not feed them in time. They will also turn on each other if you do feed them on time. They will turn on you if you do not feed them. Remember, if you die, your feathered dragons will eat you. Saves on funeral costs while your heirs fight over the towel stocks.

When they learn to fly, let them go. They will terrorize the neighborhood until they meet with a fox, dog, or slow-moving car. If you are lucky, you will learn that slightly flattened feather dinosaur in broth is delicious, and good for colds.

DO NOT feed them fish. Ever. Salmon and tuna are gateway drugs to caviar, and there is no coming back from that.

DO NOT attempt to eat a scaly dragon. They are edible, but some are poisonous; it is not worth the effort to distinguish one from another. When in doubt, chuck the carcass over the fence into the yard of a neighbor you don’t like.

DO NOT show fear. But it’s no use, they can smell it, and will eat you anyway.

Training? Useless. They will do whatever they want, and you are powerless to stop it. Unless you have built a towel fortress to survive the attack, which can come at any moment.

If you survive till they reach adulthood, it’s a miracle, so it’s likely you haven’t been able to read this far, because you’re already gone.

Get a cat. They’re safer.

Good luck!