As many Floridians know, falling iguanas are a hazard in times of low temperatures. Tonight will be one of those times, due to nobody nailing them to the trees. So be sure to leave home with a REALLY strong umbrella.
I saw a clip of this on the news this AM. The silly things literally freeze in place, so when they fall out of the trees they are found belly-up, looking like they were playing the kids’ game of Statues. People grab them by the tail and drag them out to a patch of sunshine so they can thaw.
~VOW
Give natural selection long enough, and eventually we’ll see a breed of Woolly Iguana.
I thought their tails pulled off, like skinks.
A friend’s daughter grabbed her pet by the tail, and it came off.
Just before Christmas, a big one (4+ feet) appeared on my back lawn. This was after three days of cool rain, so it must have needed to warm up. I was not happy to see it. It’s the second time I’ve seen one in Ft Myers and the first time near my place. I circled around it trying to think of how to catch it when it freaked a made a beeline to the corner of the lawn and after flailing at the fence for a minute, into the canal.
Woolly iguanaaaaaa!
Woolly iguana.
Woolly iIguana woolly iguana woolly iguana.
Check YouTube for field dressing methods and recipes. Never had iguana but apparently they are not too bad.
taste like chicken
I’ve had them stewed in tomato sauce. They are quite tasty, though there’s not a lot of meat on them.
In my experience, iguana tails are not that fragile. You can generally pick them up by the tail without breaking it.
So…I’ve read a little about this, but the stories leave out my biggest question - are they dead? I guess not necessarily, I think frogs freeze in ponds overwinter, but it’s weird that the stories haven’t said if the poor things survive this or not.
… there goes the Australian monopoly on drop bears.
They’re more or less hibernating. Don’t know what’s a fatal low tempfor them, but in the 30-40 range, they temporarily shut down and lose their grip on the trees they’re in. As long as they don’t fall so far that they actually break something, they’ll thaw out and scurry off.
They should be quite well protected. If they survive the freezing process, that is.
I think their survival rates go up if they’re revived with nice meals of hot stewed road-starlings.
Chicken of the Trees, they call them.
(For real!)
https://www.usatoday.com/amp/4543262002
They’re no good to us dead.
All over FB the fight is raging between those who want to eliminate the invasive species and those who want the sweet lovable lizards to roam free because, hey, humans are a way worse invasive species.
Sure they are. You can eat them!
As somebody who used to live in the Fort Lauderdale area, I can tell you that they are incredibly common, but don’t really do anything except lay out in the sun (they are usually seen on people’s backyard docks - Fort Lauderdale has a lot of waterfront property, due to all of the canals). In fact, they are kind of cool looking. The problem is that they leave gross poop everywhere.