Blue iguanas

Well we had walked around a bit and all of a sudden a man was standing in the path ahead and waved us over. Our trip was a success. There were 2 blue iguanas or otherwise called blue dragons. They were huge. And so mellow. They were just sitting in the sun trying to warm up from the cool night before. So luck was with us. We had a tour group come through while we were there taking photos and she said there was another one ahead by the pond. He was bigger still. So we took lot's of shots and moved on to the next one. She told us we could get close but not to touch them as they can bite. Well I wouldn't touch them anyways as they are wild. Out of 30-40 iguanas to see 3 within 15 min of each other was amazing. It was the time of day and they were out to get a meal and warm their bodies. What magnificent creatures. We could see were the other name blue dragon came from. They are really quite prehistoric looking. And a beautiful color. These are all radio tagged and color coded. The color coded tell them who is who when they are tracking them. So they don't have to go to close say if a female is doing her nest or laying. They know who it is and wait to collect the eggs when she is done. You can just see the color tags on the neck. If the iguanas breed the eggs are collected to guarantee they hatch. At one point this species was down to only 12 individuals. They are working hard to bring them back. Of coarse the tropical storms are hazardus as well to the habitat and species. The grand caymen racer snake's are a threat,when the young hatch out they usually go immediatly to the trees. The snakes can climb but the iguanas jump to another tree and by doing this can survive. Once they reach about 3 months of age they are big enough to come down and survive on their own. To big for the snakes to eat them. Once in a while however a baby does not leave the den right away and a snake enters and eats it. Survival is also threatened by ferrel cats and dogs. The more they can raise in the wild the better chance of survival for the species. It is a wonderful program that I would love to be a part of it.