Monday 20 July 2015

Billy-Bob, the green Iguana


Mike and I just got our first pet - a baby Green Iguana named Billy-Bob. So now I'm a reptile person. I guess it's better than being a cat person. (No offense to cat-lovers. It's just... I really, really, really don't like 'em. Maybe it's a personality clash)

We've been reading up on iguanas a lot over the past few days. We now know that they're purely vegetarian. They love everything from mustard greens to mango and dandelions. They like climbing up and down things. Mostly up. And up. And up. Little Billy-Bob even tried to climb up the wall with the brick wallpaper. It's weird how his instinct told him he could probably do it. I don't think he's ever even seen a rough brick wall. He's only two months old. He explores his environment by flicking his tongue. He's been doing that a lot.

Something else we discovered, is that iguanas are not at all like chameleons, even though right now, they kind of look alike. They don't have long tongues, because they don't hunt for flies and other gross insects. Iguanas are much faster than chameleons.  They run. They jump, or leap. Obviously, they don't change colour. Chameleons will probably never hurt you. Iguanas can bite or even slap you. Also, chameleons stay small and cute forever. Iguanas grow to over a meter long (sometimes two), and they become, well... "less cute". I'm hoping that, because I will see him every day, I won't notice when he gets all scary-looking. Kind of like how you only notice how much someone has aged when you haven't seen them for a few years. 

Back to our baby. I never thought I'd say this, but Billy-Bob is pretty darn cute. Right now, he's just sitting in his cage - obviously as high up as possible - looking at me. Well, I'm never sure what he's looking at, because their eyes don't quite work like ours. But let's say he's looking at me. I wonder what he's wondering about. I wonder what the world looks like through his eyes. I'm not saying I wanna trade places, because I can't imagine a life of just lying around and "wondering about things". But I'm curious about what goes on in his mind. Is it all hormones and instinct? Or does he actually think about things? 

I think I need to go rescue him, because I don't know if he knows how to get down from his... O wait, there he goes - upside down, all the way to the ground. You did it, Billy-Bob!