You’ve heard of raining cats and dogs… what about iguanas?
Believe it or not, the phenomenon can occur in parts of Florida during winter time. Iguanas live in many parts of the Sunshine State – especially the southern portion – and when temperatures dip closer to freezing, the cold-blooded reptiles simply (and literally) can’t hang.
When a cold snap hits Florida, the green creatures enter into a torpor state. In order to conserve energy, and because iguanas depend on external heat sources to regulate their body temperature, they’ll enter into the torpor state. Doing so helps them maintain their bodily functions… but it also can render their body useless until it’s able to warm back up.
Temperatures dropped well below 50 degrees in much of Florida this past weekend, and that was plenty cold for iguanas to start falling out of trees and other forms of vegetation they typically call home. The bigger the iguana, the better they can handle the cold weather (and less time it takes to recover). It’s hard to tell how big the reptile is in this video, but judging by how big of a thud it fell with, it might be safe to assume it was on the larger side.
And just a quick side note, Tom Petty’s “Free Fallin'” overlaid on top of the video is a nice touch:
Ouch.
For some, this video was how they found out that it’s actually possible for it to rain iguanas in Florida. And should we really be surprised by anything that happens in Florida anymore? The answer to that question is a firm, resounding, “No.” I simply can’t get over how loud of a sound the falling iguana made, and that certainly stood out to social media users as well:
“Damn that THUD.”
“You just know he knocked the wind out of himself.”
“Buddy hit HARD.”
“That’s gonna hurt in the morning.”
“That one might be dead… now.”
It actually looks like the iguana stands up right after it falls, so it’s not dead. However, it might wish that it was after taking that hard of a fall. And while we’re on the topic of thinking an iguana is dead, I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention a story that went viral a couple of years back.
Ron Magill, the communications director at Zoo Miami, told a story to NPR explaining that a cold spell in South Florida caused iguanas to start falling out of trees like in the video above. A Florida man started gathering them up to eat them, tossing them in his car anytime he saw one laying “lifeless” on the ground.
As Magill explained, that didn’t end well:
“So this gentleman just thought, wow, I just have a bunch of protein here. He’s on Key Biscayne. He’s sort of picking up all these iguanas that appear to be dead on the road that had fallen out of trees. They turned gray and were not moving at all and very cold to the touch.
And he put them into his vehicle. He’s loading them up like he was stocking up for a big barbecue. When they went back into the vehicle, the vehicle warmed up, and those iguanas started coming back to life. And all of a sudden, they started getting up and running around in the car, and it caused an accident.”
Moral of the story? If you are down in Florida during a cold spell and you see an iguana that looks dead, leave it be…
