gekkogecko
09-15-2004, 09:34 PM
As you may or may not be aware, I wasvery concerned about what Hurricane Ivan did to Grand Cayman. Not because of the people there, well, not the general populace anyway. Grand Cayman is the home of the Blue Iguana recovery project. Basically run by a very few dedicated people, who are trying to breed and re-intorduce this very endangered animal to the areas where it's disappeared from the Caymans.
Some excerpts from the update this evening (http://www.blueiguana.ky):
Turning down the road leading into the park, the road from that point was littered with debris and just passable, however, as the road turns into the park’s final entryway, they were forced to stop due to fallen trees that completely covered any sign of the road. Leaving the truck, they began to hike in, climbing over fallen trees turning the normal 15-minute walk from the park’s gate into a frantic 45-minute struggle to reach the facility.
The old cages to the right were still standing and in front of them, the new cages were still tightly packed together in the same location they were moved into prior to the hurricane. They split up to check the status of the iguanas in each area. Quickly moving around the bundled new cages, the 2 year olds all appeared to be fine but hungry.
water level in the pens was still high and initially feared that the animals had drowned, but the sinking feeling was quickly relieved with the sight of “Billy’ clinging to the main trunk of a palm with his tail in the water. Looking around the other pens, some of the other adult iguanas could be seen high in the tall shrubs and old “Hal” was perched atop a large rock. As (name) approached “Carley’s" pen, she sighted Fred and immediately dove underwater and made her way to her completely submerged retreat. The status of the animals and hatchlings in the older cages was also good news; all were OK.
The status of the free-ranging iguanas near the facility: “Biter”, “Slugger”, “Red-White”, “Yellow”, “Forest” and others is not known at this time.
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Here's hoping the free-ranging iguanas came through OK, as well.
Some excerpts from the update this evening (http://www.blueiguana.ky):
Turning down the road leading into the park, the road from that point was littered with debris and just passable, however, as the road turns into the park’s final entryway, they were forced to stop due to fallen trees that completely covered any sign of the road. Leaving the truck, they began to hike in, climbing over fallen trees turning the normal 15-minute walk from the park’s gate into a frantic 45-minute struggle to reach the facility.
The old cages to the right were still standing and in front of them, the new cages were still tightly packed together in the same location they were moved into prior to the hurricane. They split up to check the status of the iguanas in each area. Quickly moving around the bundled new cages, the 2 year olds all appeared to be fine but hungry.
water level in the pens was still high and initially feared that the animals had drowned, but the sinking feeling was quickly relieved with the sight of “Billy’ clinging to the main trunk of a palm with his tail in the water. Looking around the other pens, some of the other adult iguanas could be seen high in the tall shrubs and old “Hal” was perched atop a large rock. As (name) approached “Carley’s" pen, she sighted Fred and immediately dove underwater and made her way to her completely submerged retreat. The status of the animals and hatchlings in the older cages was also good news; all were OK.
The status of the free-ranging iguanas near the facility: “Biter”, “Slugger”, “Red-White”, “Yellow”, “Forest” and others is not known at this time.
*******************************************
Here's hoping the free-ranging iguanas came through OK, as well.