December 1998.............

Many people have written to me lately to ask why their perfectly sweet iguana is suddenly not so tame anymore. It seems that there are many of you suffering the effects of male iguana breeding aggression. Iguana breeding season can start any time of the year, but seems mostly to start in late summer to early fall. It varies greatly and can last all the way into February.

Male iguanas can become very aggressive during breeding season. Some seem to handle it very well and have only aminor mood swings. Others have turned into a sort of Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde type of deal. Their personalities do not seem to be their own and they hurl themselves at humans, other iguanas, other lizards, cats, stuffed animals, etc. Female ig owners tend to have a harder time with breeding aggression as male iguanas tend to turn to them to practice their romance on.

Pugsley started to really become aggressive in November but I had seen the signs as early as October. As of December 13 he is flaming orange and has been paying a lot of attention to a stuffed iguana in his room. One day in November he climbed up my leg onto my back at least 15  times while I was trying to clean cages. He doesn't usually do that so that was my first tip-off that something was happening. Now he spends much of his day moving around the room bobbing out this window, bobbing out that window, bobbing at all the lizards, bobbing at the cat if he happens along. It looks like there is no end in sight. He is seven years old and this is the first year that he has been really "bad". I believe that this El Nino year really spurred him on.

Hopefully these two sites may be of help to you in controlling and dealing with this behavior that is, shall we say, less than fun. If it is any consolation it will come to an end eventually and rather abruptly too.