Published: January 7, 2018
An oldie from 2012, but still entertaining. Original video here, reposted below.
Over the course of thirty years, the Island of Boca Grande in Florida went from having zero iguanas to over 10,000. This invasive species was making it impossible for native plants and animals to survive. The island finally decided to do something about it; they called George Cera. We went on trip around the island with this hired gun… and of course, we ate some iguana.
It was the silly season, and iguanas fell from the trees in south Florida. The press were on top of it. As the NYTimes wrote,
When temperatures dip into the 30s and 40s, people from West Palm Beach to Miami know to be on the lookout for reptiles stunned — but not necessarily killed — by the cold. They can come back to life again when it warms up.
As seen in the NYTimes.
CBS coverage positioned the “frozen iguana” crisis as an animal-welfare issue. Curiously, no one so far is suggesting that the answer is for people to adopt some iguanas as pets, and then exterminate the rest. Since they are an invasive species anyway, and arrived through the pet trade.
It’s all very sad, a matter of pressing concern. Video here.
Published: January 5, 2018
Please don’t pick up that iguana. It may be rabid. Or have cooties. Ehhww.
The Washington Post‘s Herman Wong (that’s right) took a refreshingly snarky view of the whole thing.
The situation was much worse for iguanas in 2010, when temperatures in South Florida fell to the low 30s, the Sun Sentinel reported.
“Neighborhoods resounded with the thud of iguanas dropping from trees onto patios and pool decks,” Sun Sentinel reporter David Fleshler wrote.
Many iguanas died that year, as did other animals.
“Many pythons were reported dead, floating in the Everglades,” the Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission said in a statement to the Palm Beach Post.
The deaths resulted from both the low temperatures and the length of time of the frigid weather.
The iguana population has since recovered, to the consternation of residents.
The WaPo story closes off by insinuating there’s no real story here, it’s just a lot of social-media buzz, according to one Kristen Sommers of the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission:
“Bats sometimes will fall out of the roost of trees when we have a pretty cold snap,” Sommers said.
Sommers said that while she’s heard of falling iguanas on social media, the agency hasn’t gotten any reports.
“There have not been an influx of calls to FWC about people worried about iguanas falling out of trees,” she said. “It’s not like something you see every year.”
Read the whole darn thing here.
Published: January 5, 2018
TIME, speaking in its usual latter-day idiom, doesn’t quite know what to think about Frozen Iguanas. But is decidedly of the opinion they are not a Good Thing.
Read it here, or don’t bother.
Published: January 5, 2018
As the storyline runs down, the Fox News blog picks up newspaper stories third-hand. Pathetic.
Best line:
The cold-blooded creatures native to Central and South America start to get sluggish when temperatures fall below 50 degrees, said Kristen Sommers, who oversees the nonnative fish and wildlife program for the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.
