THE GOODS : You’re Gonna Wanna Healthy Iguana

Bubba’s green scaly skin is not very shiny these days.

First, the green iguana broke a foreleg. The veterinarian put it in a sling, but she ripped that apart.

Then, Mike, or maybe it was Ike, got her pregnant. All of her 28 jawbreaker-size eggs were infertile.

Now she has a mean case of mites and mouth rot. She’s being treated with antibiotics and calcium supplements, but refuses to eat.

While Mike and Ike perform incessant acrobatics on a tree branch in their $200 custom-made cage, poor 4-year-old Bubba is too sick to budge. But her keeper, Justin Enos of Torrance, is determined to make her well.

Green iguanas have captured the hearts of American pet owners. Reptiles in general are the hottest-selling pets these days, according to the Pet Industry Joint Advisory Council, and green iguanas lead in the lizard category.

“People really like the iguanas because they’re easy to care for,” says Frances Araki, owner of the Fish Tale in Hollywood, which opened an annex called Hollywood Reptiles in response to the demand. “Sales have really been up.”

But some store owners and veterinarians say many iguana fans are unprepared for the amount of care these pets require. Herpetological societies and pet stores report that iguanas are being offered up for adoption in record numbers, usually by owners whose six-inch, tree-dwelling babies quickly grew into five-foot adults. Others make the mistake of thinking that low maintenance means no maintenance.

“An iguana needs just as much care as a dog or a cat,” says Dr. Jeff Jenkins, owner of the Avian and Exotic Animal Hospital in San Diego. “People don’t seem to realize this.”

Owners are also sometimes surprised when their green iguanas lay eggs, even without mating, during the November to April breeding season. In their natural habitat--Central and South America--the iguana deposits the eggs in a burrow under the soil and wait up to 90 days for them to hatch. In captivity, eggs placed in an incubator may survive. But many iguanas retain eggs and die.

A hysterectomy is available for about $250, Jenkins says, adding that most people don’t want to spend that much on a lizard.

Jenkins, who has worked with reptiles exclusively for 12 years, says most lizard ailments could be prevented. Proper handling of the pets not only ensures their health but also helps protect owners from bites and salmonella poisoning, which can be avoided by washing the hands after each contact with the iguana, its feces and its habitat.

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Many iguana owners have never taken their pets to veterinarians. Instead, at Reptile Kingdom in Hermosa Beach, customers perch on wood stools for hours discussing the care and feeding of the creatures.

Store general manager Erik Miseroy has diagnosed mite infestations and has prescribed calcium to treat weak bones. A herpetology student at California State University, Dominguez Hills, who plans to go into reptile medicine, Miseroy says he sees a lot of sick iguanas, mostly victims of poor husbandry.

With a healthful habitat, green iguanas can live 10 to 15 years in captivity. Serious iguana lovers have been known to turn closets or entire bedrooms into tropical jungles. Enos had a six-foot-tall cage with one glass wall custom-made for Bubba and company.

But owners more often purchase 30- to 60-gallon aquarium tanks, priced from about $25 to $45, and outfit them with ultraviolet ray-emitting reflector lamps (to maintain a heat level of 80 to 105 degrees). The cage should contain bark or a comparable ground cover, and tree branches for climbing.

A diet consisting of lots of leafy greens--such as romaine lettuce, kale, collard greens and spinach--is also essential to good health.

Most of the chartreuse and forest-green lizards sold in pet stores are bred in Central and South America. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service reports that nearly 700,000 are imported each year; the agency does not track the number of U.S.-bred iguanas.

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At Exclusively Reptiles in Westchester, owners Brian and Erin Terry have bred a number of reptiles. Erin’s 5-year-old iguana, Pig, laid 52 eggs last year but only 14 hatched. They sold seven of those iguanas, and the rest remain in a store display dedicated to Pig. She died within a week of giving birth because of a retained egg.

Determining the sex of a young iguana isn’t easy. Enos thought Bubba was a male until she laid eggs. And 16-year-old John McLaughlin of Westchester had to change Megan’s name to Mango.

He is among the iguana owners who would argue with those who describe the lizards as low maintenance. He has spent far more time with 19-month-old Mango than he ever expected.

Mango spends most of his day in a tank roaming tree branches and plants. When John lets him roam the house, the iguana gravitates toward a bass violin, where he sits on it as if on a treetop. In the morning, Mango goes for a swim in the shower, which he also uses as a potty when uncaged.

“Mango is great, but I wouldn’t get another iguana,” John says. “He’s a lot of work.”