Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Ok so a little help and advice please. We are experienced Herpers but new to Iguanas. We keep many snakes, some lizards and a chameleon (which as we all know are aliens from another planet) We have had great success with all which is exactly why the store gave us the iguana. The store knows we will research the iguanas needs to death and stand on our heads to make it happy. I have recently acquired a “dropped off” Iguana. We were told very little about its past situation except that it was allowed to roam the house freely. We took it to our herp vet. Aside from flagellates they said “she” was very healthy. (After looking on line at pics of males and females, I and the store personel disagree with the vet, a bit more time and I think we’ll be able to better tell.) The Iguana is clearly stressed, which could be expected, since it was dropped at the store, lived there for 4 days was picked up by us lived with us 4 days went to the vet, came home to get 5 days of meds, and isn’t allowed to free roam. Yup she’s not a happy girl.
This is what we did do. Read up on the Kaplan diet. I have no idea what they were feeding her at her old home. I have literally tried every single thing that Kaplan listed except for dandelion greens and the various flowers (those items seem to be out of season here in New England) and she says “no way”. She has a red heat bulb for night, day basking spot of 95 degrees, and UVA/UVB strip. I am dusting her food with the calcium D3 dust and a vitamin dust. The vet said she was in great shape other than the flagellates and didn’t feel the blood test was necessary at this time, in fact thought it would simply be a waste of money since it was 100$ and she was obviously in good shape.
My questions are…How long can she safely go without eating? Do I stick to my guns and wait it out for her to eat. The vet gave me syringes and so forth for a force feed if necessary. He said a sort of yogurt smoothie, room temp, with collards and fruit blended in. She was super easy to medicate. Do they ever starve themselves to death barring a diseased animal? How long can she reasonably last with out eating is a big question. I was worried about her last night. She was basking but I hadn’t seen much movement all day. So I had my husband go in after her and she was the definition of feisty, and believe me had enough energy to take on the world. We are handling her very, very little. Before last night it had been days since we picked her up. Usually we only open the enclosure to give her food and water and spray her down.
I’m thinking I did a really bad thing stressing her with the whole vet visit and meds too soon after her moving in with us. I know such a thing is really responsible and all, but now I’m afraid she’ll never eat, cause it was too soon. I honestly don’t think I would ever do things that way again.
Also we are building a proper enclosure for her (right now she is in a 40 breeder which I know is way, way too small). I am confident that on the outside I can have her in her proper home with in 10 days. The thing is this…stupid windows….lol, a window is in my way. I can build this to be 7 feet long, 7 feet tall, but only 3 feet wide, or my other option would be 7 long, 7 tall and 3 feet at the left side wall but I could extend the right side wall out to 4, but it will be really strange and funky and difficult, since wood comes in square-ish shapes. Can I get away with it being 3 ft on the sides? What would all of you do? Please remember to answer the feeding issue. I am currently holding off on a force feed knowing that will only stress her more and I’ll be back at square one. So please respond quickly as I just moved my Tessellate Morey Eel to a different wall in preparation for the Iguana’s enclosure and I want to start cutting wood and plexi. Thanks for the comments

By the way she just pooped...hmmm now I feel that is truely a mystery as she hasn't been eating. I have been counting the pieces of food going into and coming out of her cage. What are iguana poops supposed to look like. Hers are medium brown in color, look like slimy lumps(definitely a good bit of wetness there (I was worried about dehydration too), and definitely a patch of white urates like my snakes have. If she was a mammal I would describe the consistancy as "almost like diarrheabut definitly has some form to it" Does that sound healthy and normal. I read that bowel movements happen usually in the morning every day or every other day. I have cleaned out only two poops since she came, of course I might have missed that my husband cleaned out one or two and the Flagyl might also affect the frequency, not sure about that. But things are apparently moving through, which I also wondered about since she was formerly a free roamer. Sorry for this gross comment but please let me know what you think.

How long can she safely go without eating? Do I stick to my guns and wait it out for her to eat. The vet gave me syringes and so forth for a force feed if necessary. He said a sort of yogurt smoothie, room temp, with collards and fruit blended in. She was super easy to medicate. Do they ever starve themselves to death barring a diseased animal?

I don't know how long they can exactly last, but a healthy animal, despite the stress, should not starve itself to death.
There is a girl here who rescued a juvenile:

new here, new iguana, temp question - rapunzel, Feb 5, 2007

She was facing similar issues to yours. A few threads up there's her "Success!" thread: the little guy began eating.
It would be best if you are not present in the room as much as possible. Try mix in a tiny bit of fruit to make it appetizing (the salad mix that is).

I’m thinking I did a really bad thing stressing her with the whole vet visit and meds too soon after her moving in with us.

Yup, you did mess up there, sorry. But it's not the end of the world, just leave it alone as much as possible free of stress (this includes loud noises, people coming and going, and any visual stress, such as other animals).

3 feet is kinda tight. As I've said to many people, you wouldn't want to live in a walk-in closet, so why make a wild arboreal animal do so? If all goes well and the iguana will be able to free-roam, you can get away with the 3 feet, especially since the length and height will be at an exceptional 7 feet!
If it is indeed a female, it should not grow to be more than 4ft. I'll let others add their 2-cents.

As for the poop... should have more 'substance', but then again the thing is not eating, so it's no surprise if the feces are somewhat runny/diarreah-like. If it does come down to force-feeding, processed veggies and even baby-food (vegetables) mixed in can help.

Good luck,

-IJ

Thanks for your response Iguana Joe, because your responses are kind and encouraging to all and you seem to have a lot of experience. I would love it if you could post some pictures of your enclosures, for it helps me to get ideas about how to go about this. Our iguana is in a room that has little foot traffic mostly just my husband and myself. I’m trying hard to balance this whole situation, until the enclosure is done. I felt really bad that she is in substandard housing quarters temporarily, so we discussed it and thought it would be good to let her stretch her legs. I had all the members of the family stay relatively quiet and in the kitchen, which is attached to the living room where she currently resides. There was quiet talk going on. I told my son to bring her out and just put her on the floor of the living room and give her several feet of space, just following from a distance to supervise. We had just vacuumed, and I had just “baby proofed” the room for the iguana making sure there was no trouble that she could get into. He set her on the floor faced away from the kitchen. She walked a few steps forward, and then my nephew talked. I swear as soon as she heard his voice she turned around and came into the kitchen with us. There was no tail whipping, only a few head bobs the whole time she was out, a couple of times she opened her mouth at us if we got close. Once she was satisfied with the kitchen, (and she stayed with us for quite a while) she went back into the living room and then just like if you bring a cat into a new house, she looked around and started exploring the whole house! She had not done this before. She definitely had an inquisitive attitude. She was exploring with her tongue. Someone had said in another post that like snakes they smell with their tongues. Is this true, that they in fact do smell with their tongues? Anyway I am taking all yesterday’s exploration in a positive way. I feel she has likely de-stressed enough that she is now exploring a bit. She was also much less aggressive than she had previously been with us. She sought out my nephew several times during her explorations, I guess he must remind her in some way of her previous owner.
I need to draw a line some where about the feeding though. She actually did look thinner to me yesterday. I think if she doesn’t eat by Friday I will make her. Let me know what you think of my plan. I’m still open to suggestions. We tried some figs last night that was a no go too. By the way she always has collard greens, but I try other different items one at a time at this point to try and get a line on what might be iguana candy to her to get her at least eating, then we’ll get her eating the good stuff.
And yes I agree, about the enclosure size. It is planned that she will only be able to free roam when there is someone there to follow her and constantly supervise, and then it will only be for short periods of time. Let me know if you disagree. I saw this really great video on Youtube of a guy’s office being completely trashed by his iguana! I just feel that there is way too much trouble she could get into, and then there’s the whole issue of her not necessarily being in her basking spot getting the light that is so necessary for her health. Realistically though, I think if its easy access they will want to stay and bask rather than wander. I think I will keep the cage at three feet near the window and also keep it at three for a couple of feet into the room, just so I can access the window, and then angle it out (instead of making an L shape). That may at least help the air flow in the room. I think I will tape off the foot print on the floor and submit the picture and see what you think. It will still create an area that is the 3 ft width but perhaps I’ll kick the other side out to 5’. She will at least have choices in that way. I’ll but her basking on the wider side. I’m not going to stress over this, I’ll just work hard at giving her a great home, because good is not good enough.