Leaping Lizards Leaping Right Into My House

My Son Brought Home A New Friend Tonight. The new friend is not a new girlfriend, not a new pal with whom to drink beers, not someone he met at work, really a friend of a friend. I was a bit surprised when he walked in the door with her, even more surprised when he said she was going to stay for a week. I was also a bit concerned, not so much that a stranger would be staying in the house for a week but at how the dogs would react to her and as to whether or not she had mites or ticks. A quick look leads me to believe she is on the healthy side except for what looks to be a fairly fresh injury or sore on the right side of her head just below her mouth. Hopefully it is not due to illness but is just a scrape that will heal quickly. Also, a quick sniff led to my nostrils being filled with a crappy sour smell that was not good at all. A look in her traveling case/cage showed the reason, the bottom of it was pretty much smeared with lizard shit. I also noted that the cage could be how she got scraped, there are lots of sharp edges on the screening that was added to the cage to make it Iguana escape proof. The cage was probably originally meant for a rabbit or as a travel kennel cage for a cat. So, someone lined it with heavy screening or hardware cloth. The ends are not bent over and could easily stick the lizard if it rubbed against them trying to escape or if frightened by something. and making a quick move. Oh, did I neglect to mention, she is a Green Iguana!

Well, both Brendan and I cleaned out the cage, I gave it a good hosing down with the garden hose and he cleaned the accessories while the lady lizard chilled in a small Coleman cooler with the lid on tight. I knew as soon as she got in there and it was closed and thus dark inside she would calm right down. As soon as the cage was clean, Brendan put a towel on the desk in the basement then put the cage atop the towel. Then he got an extension cord for me and I plugged in the lizard's light. Within minutes it was warming itself under the heat of the very bright bulb and looking content with the improvement we added to the cage by way of a nice sized piece of cork bark for a basking platform.

I can tell you that although not the very last thing I expected to see in my house tonight, a Green Iguana has to be pretty darned close to the last thing I expected to see here. Brendan brought it home to take care of it for a friend who will be away for a week. Well, that is what he told me. It had better not be here for more than a week or I may just surprise Brendan at our next BBQ and tell him he is doing what the song, Mexican Radio, says:  "...eating barbecued iguana"! I am not too worried though, I figure he knows better than to try to sneak a new pet in the house by underhanded skulduggery and subterfuge. My biggest concern, besides it maybe having mites or an illness that could spread to my other animal, is that our dogs may go bonkers over it and somehow get it out of its cage. So, I am going to go work on making sure that even if they knock the cage off of the desk, when no one is home, the cage will remain locked and she will remain inside of it. By the way, I am only assuming it is a she, could be a he for all I know, too small to tell for sure at only about 2 to 2.5 feet long. Oh the joys of being a parent!

Later 4 U,
Glenn B