New green iguana

little bit different than a little over 2ft huh

lol yeah - I am useless at guessing sizes
I think tonight we will leave him alone - I will squirt him with a water bottle and change his water again as well as add some food.
Tomorrow night I will get him out again and try to be the alpha male. One thing; when my wife was bitten, she had 3 tiny pin-prick tooth marks on her thumb which started to bleed again this morning. Do iguana bites contain some kinda blood thinner?
She thoroughly washed it with antibacterial wash.

Also, if anyone is interested I set up a site about Pixel; www.pixeltheiguana.com

James

Sounds like a good plan, Seems like you have alot of spare time.

Last night I decided to be the Alpha Male.

Pixel was being aggressive again but this time I was having none of it. I went straight in and grabbed him then held him against me. He was struggling a lot, but I was firm (not so it hurts him) and he calmed.

I took him downstairs and put him on the sofa. He became cocky again so I picked him up and held him firmly until he stopped struggling and accepted that he was not going to get away with being naughty.

I would put him down and let him walk over the sofa. Every time he wanted to go on the floor to go under the sofa, I would stop him and hold him again.
Soon he would let me hold him without struggling at all and I could stroke him all over without him looking aggressive.

I took him up to his vivarium and held him on my forearm (hand under his armpits and supporting his body on my forearm). He walked into the vivarium without running off and didnt scratch me once. I then put my hand in and stroked him - again, no aggression.

This morning when I went to feed/water Pixel, I tried to stroke him. He jerked at me indicating agression but I ignored him and firmly stroked him without flinching. He leaned against my hand with his eyes closed and when I moved my hand, he stumbled - almost as though he trusted me.

I went back downstairs for a bit then came up and thought I would stroke him again ie still show my dominence and he did the same.

I think the key is not to go to stroke/hold him with caution - just go in there with intent so he cannot sense your hesitation and use it to his advantage.

I don't have loads of spare time - away from home from 07:30 - 19:30 but when we are home, we like to have him out with us.
Got lots of patience with him too

Another photo of him from today

You may want to start a little slower. You may want to get him comfortable with reaching in the cage and petting him first before grabbing him. He may feel that you are a predator coming in to get him if you do it real fast. It's good you keep working with him even though he's being aggressive. Keep it up. You have to make them think that their aggressive behavior won't get them the results they want (you leaving them alone). I've also read that hand feeding will help to tame them down a bit. Beware, at least mine did this, that after I got her over her aggression she felt that maybe pooping on me would maybe get me to leave her alone. That isn't a very fun experience.

As for caging, if you build a cage, it needs to be large. The ideal is about 1.5 times the total length of the animal. Some people also convert closets into cages for their iguanas. My own iguana actually free roams when we are home and stays in a room when we are not.