okay so, this post is going to be going over the basic reproductive timeline for my setting's dragon-people, the paradisians, and some interesting details therein. timescales will be given in Earth measurements for the convenience of the audience.
i'm not going to go into detail about conception. you can probably figure it out.
for approximately 3 months, the one carrying the young will be growing anywhere from 1 to 6 eggs on average. at the end of this period, the eggs are laid.
the eggs continue growing outside of the parent's body throughout their rather lengthy incubation period. when laid they're approximately the size of a human fist, in another 7-8 months they'll be nearly the size of a human head. they must be kept warm during this period - traditionally this is done via keeping the eggs close to one's body, but in modern times they're kept in incubation chambers.
after hatching from their eggs, young paradisians are rather small and relatively defenseless - their scales start underdeveloped, their horns are short and just sharp enough to puncture out of their eggshell, and they've got surprisingly little muscle mass.
culturally, the young are often cared for by their entire community, but are lodged with their parent or parents.
unlike much of the rest of their body, they do come out of the egg with rather well-developed sets of teeth in their snouts, and they can start eating the same food as adults immediately.
their wings come out rather underdeveloped, and though not useful for flight even as adults, the young cannot even use them for gliding.
adult paradisians develop a particularly sturdy set of plate-like scales covering the back of the neck and shoulders, and young paradisians are often seen riding around on the backs of the heads of their parents, caretakers, older siblings, neighbors, or other trusted adults with these plates as their footholds. the fully-developed, swept back horns of adults, beyond just serving as a defensive adaptation that's been co-opted into a display of maturity and a place to decorate, also serve as excellent handholds for these little riders.
it takes nearly 20 earth years for a paradisian to grow from a fresh hatchling to an adult.
the first 10 years actually develop much faster than human offspring - hatchlings come out of the egg with developed enough proprioception to walk, and language development is relatively quick. they're known to be incredibly fast and adept learners during this time. physical development is relatively slower, however - as their scales grow in more fully, it takes far more energy and resources than human growth, and a young paradisian may appear physically stunted compared to a human offspring of the same age due to this. their wings also develop to a size appropriate for gliding during this time.
the following 10 years of adolescence bring more rapid physical growth - height increases far more rapidly, a secondary set of scales begins to grow in to fill in the gaps (this is known to be a bit painful at first), the first set of teeth are shed as a new, larger set grows in. most notably, the rather short horns they've had up to this point begin to grow out, eventually reaching similar sizes to their fellow adults by the time they reach full physical maturity. notably, their neuroplasticity does not decline during this period in the slightest in most cases, and only does so well into their 30s or 40s in human years. their wings also maintain their usability for gliding.
and then, at the end of all that, you're left with a young adult paradisian, ready to go out and face the universe.
