Elegant Gryphon

I should be sleeping....instead I'm scribbling....

Elegant Gryphon
The Elegant Gryphon was the second "Designer Hybrid" gryphon to be created. Its development was a cruel process, under the direction of a vain and wealthy animal collector. When he "commissioned" a Paragrypher (gryphon trainer, like a falconer) to create him a unique breed, the Lesser Amazon Gryphon was the result. Being a fan of elegance and "clean beauty," the man found the Lesser Amazon repulsive and filthy. He left the breed to the breeders devices, which ended very well for the Lesser Amazons, as they became popular and loved family pets.

After this failure, the man decided to develop his breed on his own. Using the Standard Gryphons (seen here)and Snow Gryphons from his own collection, he began breeding, cross breeding, and inbreeding to find a creature "worthy" of his ownership. It was a cruel and grueling process, and if the offspring produced didn't meet his standards of beauty, he destroyed them after they hatched. Finally, the first Elegant Gryphon was born, a pure white male, marked only by the black markings around his face and the orange of his beak. The man used this male (once he was of breeding age) to produce more with the female standard gryphons of his pride. So finicky was he about the result of the cubs that any offsprings born with even the lightest of tawny coats, or black tailtips, were destroyed.

Fortunately, the man was also a very boastful man, and couldn't hide his beautiful breed for long. Upon his unveiling of it, people began to look into the breeding. The man was imprisoned for his horrible treatment of the animals, and the members of his collections were either sent to sanctuaries, or re-released into the wild. The Elegant male and his surviving offspring were sent to a sanctuary in Greece. Here, they flourished, and the small pride grew into an established breed. They're calm, tame demeanors made them very popular with visitors to the sanctuary. As the pride grew, members broke off and migrated out. There are now several recorded prides living wildly across the Mediterranean and into Europe.

Elegant Gryphons feed on fish, so they live well in the wild, even after being domesticated. Since the release of the original male and his pride, some have been taken as pets, though rather than being adopted by humans, the cases recorded have all been of one or two Gryphons "adopting" families themselves. They may nest or settle in a person's yard, and quickly become attached to the people in the home. Luckily, with the very public knowledge of their horrible treatment, people who have them as "pets" allow them to come and go as they please, and these beautiful animals are treated very well anywhere they turn up.

A close relative of the Standard Gryphon, Elegant Gryphons get very large. Their strong wings can stretch almost 20 feet from tip to tip. Their manes, rather than being fur like the standard gryphon, is made of of incredibly soft, fine down, which is covered in a natural oil that allows them to swim without becoming waterlogged. The down is more valued that goose or duck down, and any shed down can be gathered and made into any number of soft products.