It’s one of the oddest results of Florida’s record cold temperatures. People are bundling up, fruits and vegetables are being covered in frost, and, amusingly enough, iguanas are falling out of the trees. These tropical lizards are a common invasive species in Florida, thanks to people releasing their old pets into the wild. However, like most cold-blooded tropical critters, they don’t like freezing weather. It lowers their body temperature enough that they go into a coma-like state, which results in them tumbling from trees by the hundreds.
While prolonged cold will kill the lizards, if you recover the critters (or if the temperature goes up), they’ll usually spring back to life. Just don’t gather them up. As Ron Magill of Miami Metrozoo said, “I knew of a gentleman who was collecting them off the street and throwing them in the back of his station wagon, and all of a sudden these things are coming alive, crawling on his back and almost caused a wreck.”
Looks like that guy will have to find his dinner elsewhere!
Tags: cold weather, unusual weather, iguanas, invasive species, iguanas falling out of trees, Florida, unusual animals, frozen iguanas, Ron Magill, Miami Metrozoo
