Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I'm up here for the weekend in Connecticut, hundreds of miles away from Bud, who is being watched by my petsitter. This morning I got a frantic call from her, saying that Bud's tail had broken off- an entire foot of it is gone. She said he was acting strange, tail whipping her which I've NEVER seen him do to anyone, and when she picked him up to give him a bath, he darted forward, and all she was left with was- a tail. She was pretty freaked out, I don't think it was her fault, it could have happened at anytime, to me or anyone who handles Bud. I'll be back home by tomorrow night, and after a day of phoning my regular vet and several emergency places down there, they said they don't usually do anything for tail drops.

I'm so sad for Bud. He just finished regrowing the end of his beautiful tail, which had to be amputated after I adopted him (gangrene). My poor baby. I don't know what I'm going home to. My petsitter is pretty traumatized, too. We didn't know what to do with the tail, so I told her to put it in the freezer. It seemed like a good idea at the time, since I didn't want my roommate to go throw something away and find an iguana tail in the trash. But now I can't reach him, to warn him that the tail is in the freezer. It's so gory.

I'm just really anxious to get back to my apartment and assess the damage. This is going to take so long to heal. He's just going into breeding season, and it's getting to be winter... not a good time to try to regrow an entire tail. Just when you think you've done a good job, and you're patting yourself on the back for rehabbing your rescued ig, something has to happen, right?

If anyone has pictures of a regrown tail, or can share with me how long it took to grow back, maybe I will feel a little better. I keep thinking about what we could have done differently to prevent this, but I just don't think it was preventable, or anyone's fault, really. Just a horrible accident. I am so scared about what this is going to look like, and how I will handle him without hurting him, and even just do everyday things, like give him a bath. Poor, poor Bud. My poor baby. Although he's apparently pretty nonchalant about the whole thing. According to my petsitter, who stayed with him almost the whole day today, he didn't even seem to notice that he'd lost anything, and was back to acting normal. I just don't get that, although I guess it makes me feel a little better.

What am I going home to?

Hi there,
When an iguana loses his tail it can be very traumatizing for the owner; when it happened to my Joey I totally panicked because I didn't even know that this was something that could happen with iguanas. It was 8 pm at night and I took him to the emergency 24 hour vet clinic. They gave him an antibiotic and taped the end of his tail to stop the bleeding. We were told to make sure that it stayed clean, so as to prevent infection. We bathed him regularily and soaked the end of his tail in a betadine solution.
When Joey's tail started growing back, it grew back very thin and although it was not infected, the vet removed the tip since it was very fragile. It has been over a year now, and his tail has not regrown at all, but the tip is very healthy. The vet said that tail regrowth in iguanas can be very 'tricky', and that sometimes it won't regrow, but as long as it does not become infected or get gangrene, it will be okay.
So now Joey is a foot shorter, but he still has plenty of tail to store fat and he seems no worse for wear.
I do have photos, however I am at work right now and they are at home.
Let us know how Bud is doing and make sure to keep his tail tip clean and watch for signs of infection.
Cheers,
Kayla

Hi,

Our male ig, Cujo, has a regrown tail. It happened before we adopted him (we rescued him from a previous owner) and it grew back with a slight kink, plus I don't think it grew back to its full length. We also used to have another male with a regenerated tail that seemingly grew all the way back. You could hardly tell it was regenerated.

I think that when it happens when they're really young, that it can grow back well, but as they get older, the tail doesn't grow back as much or possibly won't grow back at all.

Here is a pic of Cujo and a closeup of his tail:

The small bump in the middle is from another injury and has nothing to do with the regrowth.

Hope this helps! Good luck with your ig.

Julie