Hi I'm Sharon Collins. I want to share an interview I did with DDaniel Sollenberger,
he's a herpetologist with the Department of Natural Resources. So he studies
things like reptiles and amphibians and I kept hearing about these huge lizards.
Well after talking with Daniel I learned they really are big and they can really be mean.
They get to be between four and four and a half feet long.
Woah!
Yea and it's the Argentine or black and white tegu from South America.
Tegu?
Yup, tegu. I sometimes mispronounce it as tigu
and people give me a hard time.
Well you're doing better than I am.
I'm not South American- do what?
You do better thanI am, I was saying tegus.
[laughs]
So, they-
that's a big lizard and I mean are they mean?
They will defend themselves,
you know they're they're not gonna attack people unprovoked or anything
like that they're not big enough to do that but if you were to grab one with
your hands or something like that they will defend themselves and they have
very strong jaws and sharp teeth. And they can even whip you with their tails
and scratch you with their claws so it's not something you want to just grab on
to if you aren't prepared and trying to do that.
No I don't think I would be
doing that, would they attack like a cat or a dog?
I've been telling people that basically a medium-sized dog at least is
of no danger you know something really small, a small cat or a really small dog
possibly they would go after that but most of the things they eat are actually
a good bit smaller. Other lizards, rats and mice, insects and then fruit and
vegetables too. And then we know they really like eggs.
And that's your big concern?
Yeah, probably that that would be their major impact would be their
predation on native wildlife and in particular the eggs of other reptiles
and ground nesting birds like turkey and quail. Our state protected reptile, the
gopher tortoise lays eggs in a shallow nest and they could easily find those
and eat them. So yeah there are a lot of things that could have a detrimental impact on.
And of course the gopher tortoise is already in danger, am I right?
Right, they are state threatened, they're a candidate for federal listing under the
Endangered Species Act and we've done a lot of work to try and conserve them and
preclude the need for them to be listed federally here in Georgia. And something
like this could do a lot to undermine that.
And the last thing we need is some
giant lizard coming up and sucking up their eggs.
Exactly, exactly.
Wow, you know in the midst of a pandemic and warnings that
we're gonna have a larger hurricane season now we have big lizards.
Yea. [laughs]
Unlike murder hornets, these are actually found in the United States right now.
So are they
isolated in just two counties right now?
As far as we know, the only verified
sightings or captures you know, we actually have those pictures or a specimen are
from Toombs and Tattnall County down in the onion Belt of Georgia. There are some
credible sightings where we think it's possible there actually was a tegu in
some adjacent counties around that but as far as we know it's limited to Toombs
and Tattnall County- possibly starting to spread into some surrounding counties.
Any idea how that got into the country?
They're really common in the pet trade, I
don't know how long tegus have been in the pet trade but for decades at least
and they're sometimes bred in captivity and they're available in pet stores and
online and and people do keep them as pets. And so we think that probably that
one got too big and or a few got too big and somebody released them and that's
how we got them.
Doesn't that happen with a lot of things that you know people get
these- these creatures as pets and then all of a sudden it gets out of control?
Yeah, that's the source of a lot of problems with invasive species,
especially in Florida, you know they have a lot more wider variety of this
kind of stuff going on than we do and a lot of that is related to the pet trade
in some ways escaped or released animals.
Well, you just saw my pet.
Yea, I've got two
walking around here behind me too but they're probably, they're probably too short to see.
Well, I'm sure that it's a concern to you
especially when we're trying to protect all these you know animals and
amphibians that nest and have eggs because if this population of lizards
grows anymore they're in, they're really in
trouble. Am I overstating?
No, that's potentially so yeah.
So what can we do?
Anything at this point as a citizen of the state?
Alright, we have asked
that the public keep their eye open for these animals especially if you live or
work in that two or three, four county area in southeast Georgia. Basically we
ask that people- if they can capture or dispatch the animal humanely themselves
do so as long as it's legal to do so where you're at and you know if you see
one and can't capture it then try to get a picture and send us a picture and a
report but basically we're asking the public to report sightings and if they
can take animals out of the wild for us and that if is as soon as they do.
And it sounds like they're pretty easy to identify, big black and white lizard.
Right, yeah well you you would expect so a lot of people have been confused I
think by that they don't realize just how big they are and so we've had most
of the reports that have come in have actually been our native lizards
especially something called the Eastern Fence Lizard which is a dwarfed by a
tegu even when it's an adult. Tegus hatch out of the egg you know
eight to ten inches long which is already larger than almost any of our
native lizards that have legs are as an adult. And so essentially if it's not a
around a footlong or larger it's probably not a
tegu but if it is then it's either a juvenile alligator which does get mixed
up sometimes or a tegu.
But you don't want to pick either one of those up?
Nope!
Sounds like a tegu is just
mean which makes me wonder why anybody would want it as a pet.
Well the animals
that you see people have oftentimes have grown up in captivity, they are
habituated to human contact and so- they tend to be much
more docile and you know better houseguests maybe then a- then a wild
tegu but these wild caught animals aren't like that they will defend
themselves if you try and pick them up, they don't want to be petted and they
don't want to be pets.
And you sure don't want to get bitten by one of these or scratched.
No, you can do a Google search for tegu bite and you can see pictures
of- it's pretty, it can be pretty gruesome.
Woah, ok you convinced me. I like to pick
up critters but I don't think I'd be picking that one up.
Yeah, [laughs] yeah.
Well Daniel Sollenberger, thank you so much for joining us today and telling us about
the lizard that everybody seems to be talking about these days.
Yea, no problem you're welcome.
Good luck eradicating.
Alright thank you, thank you.
Alright, thanks.