Napoleon The Green Iguana's Rescue

     Napoleon came to us on September 7th, 1996. He is a rescued iguana. The store that was keeping him had received him from the Toronto Humane Society. His former owner had not taken care of him very well and Napoleon was in very very bad shape when he arrived in our home.

      It did take us a while to decide to rescue Napoleon. The pet store. that the Humane Society had given him to, had offered Napoleon to me shortly after his arrival there, but I had to convince my husband that we HAD to help this poor creature out. All in all it took me two weeks to convince my husband how badly "Curve", as the store had called him, needed our help. My husband, while he loves reptiles was reluctant to rescue this poor animal because we had decided quite a while back that we were not going to keep iguanas. They just get too big, and we knew they could become quite aggressive. He was afraid that we would end up keeping Napoleon! I agreed that we would do the best we could to make him healthy again and then try very hard to find him a good home where he would only get the best of care. At the time I really thought we might only have him for 6 months at the most. Little did I know huh? :)

     Napoleon only weighed 300 gm (that is about 2/3 of a pound!), was 8" snout to vent, and 30" long when we rescued him. He had plugged femoral pores, a definite sign that he was male and that he was sexually mature, meaning he was no less than three years old, yet the size of a one year old iguana! :( Many of his toes were, and still are, bent in all directions- obvious damage from past breaks and severe MBD. His upper spine was, and still is, hunched and bent off to the right, again an obvious sign of severe MBD due to calcium deficiency where the bones become soft, brittle, and deformed. :( His ear drums were cracked! He had red mites. His skin was thick and it appeared that he had not seen water to bathe in for at least a year! His skin was covered in scabs and abscesses. I'm not sure if some of the scabs and abscess were due to mite damage, lack of proper hydration, or even if previous fights with the male iguanas he was housed with in the pet store might have caused them. I suspect a combination of all of the above. :( He didn't urinate or defecate for the first two weeks that we had him either!

     He was in sorry shape. Poor thing. I'm sure he would have died within a week of our rescue if we hadn't taken him in and immediately started specialized care.

     We had only planned to keep Napoleon for a few months, until we were sure he was healthy again and on the road to good health ... provided we could find him a good home that is ... But over the first few months he grew on us, and we soon realized that there was no way that we could ever give him up. :)

      Napoleon has been with us for over 3 years now and I certainly hope to share many more years with this wonderful being! :) Please continue on to learn just how we rehabilitated Napoleon.

      Back to Napoleon the Iguana's Home page

Iguana Books

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