sczlogover.gif (3787 bytes)

© Sedgwick County Zoo, credit: Brent Ward

Green Iguana

Iguana iguana

*This animal is not on exhibit.

Physical Characteristics

  • These iguanas are pale green in color, with a crest running from behind the head to the middle of the muscular tail and an erectable sac under the throat.
  • Size of average adult
    • length: 6 feet - including tail
  • Approximate life span is 10 years.

Diet

  • Wild: plants including young shoots, fruits, flowers and leaves

Behavior

  • Agile climbers, adults rarely found far from trees
  • Take refuge in water, good underwater swimmers
  • Defend themselves with accurate whiplashes of tail
  • Reproduction
    • clutch size: 20 - 70 eggs
    • incubation: 3 months
    • young are 10 inches at hatching and grow to three feet in one year

Environmental/Global

  • Habitat: tropical forests
  • Distribution: central and northern South America
  • Status: CITES Appendix II
    • exploited for skins
    • sold as pets, for food and as an aphrodisiac
Click here to visit the American Zoo and Aquarium Association (AZA). Click here to visit Sedgwick County, Kansas. COPYRIGHT 2004 Sedgwick County Zoo all rights reserved. No part of this website may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any electrical, mechanical, photocopying, recording means or otherwise without prior written permission of the photographer or author. Unless marked otherwise, materials are from the Sedgwick County Zoo. Sedgwick County Zoo is accredited by the American Zoo and Aquarium Association (AZA).