Really Big Lizards!

[Barklessdog]

We went to see the Komodo dragon that was touring here in Chicago at the Shedd Aquarium.

First off the lizard is just a juvenile about 12 feet long with a body the size of a large lab dog.

They had him in the really large glass enclosed room. You could go right up to the glass to see him.

What was funny and scary at the same time there was a lady with a toddler and the toddler took off running in front of the glass. The Dragon seeing this turned his head and went running after the toddler!

It was shocking on how fast the giant could move and he did not drag his tail or stomach on the ground, he just went into chase mode. Good thing for the glass!

The Staff is always present at the exhibit and commented on how dangerous it is to be around the lizard. They don't look forward to dealing with it directly.

I believe this is the same Dragon that when younger bit a celebrities foot?

There has been endless speculation over the years regarding the world's largest lizard, the Komodo Dragon. Most of it surrounds the fact that it is found in only one part of the world. Queries were raised questioning the very existence of these creatures. Until recently there was precious little that was known about the lizard. A couple of years ago it got into the news for the wrong reasons, a Komodo Dragon managed to bite popular Hollywood actress Sharon Stone's husband, Phil Bronstein. He was immediately provided with medical aid to prevent any further damage.

[SKATE RAT]

no pics,no lizard.hahaha.seriously i thought this thread was gonna be about the Dead Milkmen.

[uwe]

Great beasts they are - beautiful in how archaic they've remained. Being bitten by one is dangerous not so much for the sheer force, but for the highly infectuous saliva they have, their mouths are breeding pens for all kinds of bacteria. Bitten by one of them, you need antibiotics fast or you'll slowly die of blood poisoning while the dragon leisurely follows your trail for days until the final blissful moment when its jaws pierce your gangrenous flesh to mercyfully crush your bones ...

I like'm!

"Huddled in the cellar
Fear caught in their eyes
Daring not to move or breathe
As the creature cries
Fingernails start scratching
On the outside wall
Clawing at the windows
Come to me it calls
Atmospheres electric
As it now descend the stairs

Hiding in the darkness
Is so futile from its glare
Death comes in an instant
As they hoped it would
Souls ascend to heaven
While it feasts on flesh and blood"

[Barklessdog]

The one at the Shedd they said was only half size and I have to tell you seeing him run after that toddler was really scary and amazing at the same time. It moved so fast!

I saw a TV special about them and your right, they kill by bacterial infection and mainly feed on Water buffalo & deer. They also said it's a painful a gruesome death to die from a bacterial infection. All it takes is one small bite and they just follow them around till the worst happens.

[TBird1958]

"
What was funny and scary at the same time there was a lady with a toddler and the toddler took off running in front of the glass. The Dragon seeing this turned his head and went running after the toddler!"

If I may quote loosely from Austin Powers............"Baby! The other, other white meat!"

[Dave W]

no pics,no lizard.hahaha.seriously i thought this thread was gonna be about the Dead Milkmen.

Great minds think alike.  First thing I though of was "And you should see the way it shits". 

[felig]

Down here in Fort Myers, Florida we have a growing population of Nile Monitor lizards--the Komodo's smaller, but equally nasty tempered cousin.  The Nile Monitor's saliva is pretty much as horrendous as the Komodo's.  We are only just beginning to see the monitors on our side of the river & on Sanibel Island, but they have really exploded on Cape Coral (just across the river from me).  The monitors have been munching on burrowing owls (which used to be all over Cape Coral), small pets, etc.  I guess once the food supply dwindles on the Cape, they'll come over here after my Shih tzus.

[Dave W]

The monitors have been munching on burrowing owls (which used to be all over Cape Coral), small pets, etc.

Big lizards and burrow owls in the same thread? Okay, now I know this is a Dead Milkmen thread.

("Everybody knows the burrow owl lives. In a hole. In the ground. Why the hell do you think they call it a burrow owl, anyway?")

But seriously, better watch out for your dogs.

[bdgotoh]

Komodos love to eat, I think I read somewhere that the babies hatch out and spend their early life in trees so adults won't eat them! 

[uwe]

Most reptiles eat their offspring if they have a chance to. Species with nursing habits such as alligators and crocodiles are relatively rare, monitor lizards to which the Komodo dragons belong never nurse.

Which gives me ample opportunity to bemoan the only recent passing of an adult tokeh gekko in my terrarium when the black iguana who had been living with it side by side peacefully for years decided to adhoc change its dietary requirements. I think I'm gonna sue the pet shop that sold it to me with the comment: "Once adult, they are strictly vegetarian." I could build a great personal injury case on that devoured little gekko I think ...

[felig]

My daughter had a few anoles (often inappropriately referred to as "chameleons" because they change colors.  I ran across a really cute little frog--a Cuban Tree Frog--in a pet store & thought that it would make a nice companion for the lizards.  It wasn't too long afterward that the anoles started vanishing.  I didn't realize that frogs would eat anything that they could fit into their mouths.

Now that I've moved down to SW Florida, I've found that the Cuban Tree Frogs & (especially) Anoles are all over the place here.  There don't appear to be anything like sufficient frogs to make a dent in the anole population, though.

[Dave W]

In 1900 my grandfather (age 7) took his pet anole on an ocean trip from Houston to Germany and let him loose in the Zoologischer Garten Berlin.

Germany has never been the same.

[uwe]

That was new to me. 

But you guys infected us with racoons! Göring, an avid hunter, let about 30 pairs of them loose in 1934 for trophies. That alone wasn't perhaps a sufficient gene pool for all the racoons we now have, but in 1945 a couple of pairs more escaped from a bombed out Berlin Zoo. And then US GIs had the unfortunate habit of keeping them as mascots/pets, but racoons love freedom! So a third strain was created after the war. Ever since then they have been populating merrily and tens of thousands are shot today of a species of which we didn't have a single one up to 1934!  Never mind, I like racoons.

Other yankee imperialist insurgents are all kinds of North American turtles (from the cute little red cheeked ones that just grow and grow to outsize Mississippi snappers). People bought them as pets, they refused to die after the kids had gotten bored with them and off they went to the next little pond. Where needless to say diese Amerikaner - oversexed, overfed and over here! - have been breeding happily ever since, becoming fully adjusted to our winters.

And now anoles, courtesy of Dave's grandpa ...  ... it just won't end.

Uwe

[SKATE RAT]

turtles are amazing.they kinda shut down for the winter.almost like hibernation,they don't eat much and don't move much and somehow survive the cold.

[Barklessdog]

Ever see The movie based on the book "The Orchid Thief" with Nicholas Cage?

Anyway there is an obsessive compulsive (not pointing any Gibson Fingers) that collects orchids, when going back about his past he talks about how he collected turtles, he collected every type of turtle and finally came to "the end of turtles"

When I was a kid I collected turtles. I had a soft shell turtle (vicious turtle), painted turtles, snapping turtles and even a diamond backed terrapin-which they make turtle soup from down south. They make stinking dirty pets.

Then I had an iguana when in college, I kept him in a metal upright cloths locker in my bed room. He grew to 5' long and was never really tame as I did not handle him enough. I ended up donating him to the Cleveland zoo.

Then I owned a red legged Tarantula, that was cool, but more like owning an inanimate object-they are not big on personality!

Then once I got married and had kids the spider escaped, while at work and found him on the back of our bed head board!
I donated him to a local animal nature center, duevto my wife's prodding. You can't even get red legged Tarantulas anymore, due to them becoming endangered because of the pet trade.

Then there was cats, hermit crabs, Hamsters, African Chiclids, then last is Leopard Geckos. After that it's just dogs. No more pets, too much work.

Although I still would love to this as a pet!