Fringed Quagdragon

Quagdragons are a small genus of widely spread but rarely seen freshwater sea dragons which are native to Serinarcta's waterways 280 million years PE. Growing to a maximum of seven feet long, they are stocky, heavy and slightly dorso-ventrally compressed animals that broadly resemble a cross of a stingray, a catfish, and a salamander.

Named after their preferred habitat of quags, or boggy areas, these eelsnakes are ambush predators and spend most of their lives partially buried under sandy or muddy substrates in warm muddy waters as shallow as just eighteen inches deep. There they lie quietly, with only their eyes and two longest feelers above the sediment. Fringes along the sides of their bodies obscure their outline, and they can adjust the pigment of their skin from nearly white to almost black to better mach different backgrounds. Their eyesight isn't very strong, but the murky waters they prefer have little visibility anyway; quagdragons' strongest sense is touch, and they navigate mainly with the long sensitive barbels along their faces and around their jaws, which are sensitive to weak electricity produced by the muscle movements of prey. The two top-most barbels above either of the lower nostrils are extremely long and have become specialized lures, with a four-pronged shape that closely mimics the basic shape and motion of a small, injured fish as the dragon flicks them back and forth in jerky movements. When anything comes by to investigate the dragon draws it close to the sand with its lures, and when it is within range erupts out of its hiding place and catches it in its powerful alligator-like jaws. Prey ranges from fish - which make up the bulk of its diet - to land animals such as water birds, that it may catch by flicking its lures up out of the water near the shore.

These eelsnakes are highly sedentary as adults, and generally establish a territory of just a few tens of meters in which they will spend most of their time. Yet newborns leaving the territory of their mother and adult males in search of mates will migrate many miles, even crossing dry land to do so, though waiting for the cover of rain to keep them from drying out en-route. They walk across the ground similarly to tribbet ancestors, alternating by pulling with each pectoral fin and flicking their tail at the same time to lurch forward. Males, after mating, will often return home to familiar waters, guided by their sense of smell. Females however may spend their entire adult lives in a territory as small as fifty square feet, and may stay in one place for several months at a time. With such slow metabolisms, they need only occasional meals to sustain themselves, and utilize any excess to produce more offspring, which are independent from birth.