Yucatan Mexico Farm and Ranch Predator 1 - The iguana

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I speak to my co-workers often about the need to rid the ranch of any iguanas we can find.  3 of my 5 guys eat them and love them BBQ'd, so to kill them is just giving them some meat and not just killing the iguanas for the sake of killing.

Click here for video about these 3 and 1 more we got afterward.

Today I had to run into the pueblo to pick up a few things at the store and when I came back it was time for the guys to get off work.  They were all walking up to me, and I could see that one of them, Santos, was carrying something in one hand.  As he got closer, I could see it was 3 iguanas that he'd killed.  Actually, he'd "almost" killed them.  

I wish I could have snapped a picture of the look on his face.  He was so proud of his accomplishment and doing something he knew would make me happy.  I give the guys a bounty of 10 pesos (about 50 cents) for each one they kill.   That's not a fortune, but it is a welcome extra for them.  Plus they get to take the critter home for dinner.  For perspective, when he goes home tonight and takes them in to his wife, you might imagine it being, more or less, the equivalent of a guy coming home from work in the USA holding 3 Standing Rib Roasts.  These people in the pueblo do not eat meat often, and certainly not as a normal part of their diet.  It's just too expensive.   These 3 will be BBQ'd tonight and his family, (and maybe another) will have a feast tonight.

By the way:  The reason for ridding the ranch of them, is they are herbivores and will destroy a garden.  They eat a variety of plants and prefer vegetables.  I had a lot of pinto beans planted and when they finally popped up out of the ground, the iguanas ate every single plant in one night.   Geckos and lizards on the other hand devour insects and I pay the children in the pueblo a reward of 1 peso for 5 lizards they bring me, and I spread them everywhere near the garden.



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