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The anoles are back
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The anoles are back
  This column ran originally in The Weekly Journal of October 2, 2006. It's being re-run because it's time (the geckos and anoles have started their annual trek into the house), and because Susan is too tired to think coherently or string words into sentences or... I just put another gecko out of the house. It was a baby, semi-transparent and stubby-tailed. So delicate I was afraid to try and pick it up. The method I’ve developed over the years is to put one hand on the floor in front of them, and shoo them into it with the other hand. Then you have to close your hand very quickly (but gently) or they leap.  Green anoles are easier. If you can “corner” them with a bent piece of paper or cardboard, they can be induced to bite a small twig. They hang on forever, and twig and anole can be put in some safe place in the garden. Kids around here know anoles will bite and hang on – they catch them, get them to bite their earlobes, and wear them like earrings until the anole gets tired of the game and leaps away.  There weren’t any green anoles where I grew up. We had to wear cicada-skins around on our shirts. So I didn’t know they would bite people. I discovered it by accident while trying to catch one in a corner of the bathroom. It leaped up and latched onto my index finger. Once I assured myself that A) it didn’t hurt and B) the anole wasn’t letting go any time soon, I carried it outside to place it on my ginger plants.  Here’s why you want to use a twig instead of your finger: I stood out there a long, long time waiting for that anole to decide to let go of me. Then I sat down on the grass and waited some more. Their jaws aren’t strong—just about right for catching and munching flies. But what they lack in strength, they make up for in perseverance. I hate putting geckos and green anoles outside at all. They always come into the house when it’s fall, looking for warm places to spend their winters. They eat insects, and although there are insects I like and respect, I’m much less fond of them as a whole than of geckos and anoles.  Our house has been the winter residence of several green anoles. One lived in the closet among the clothes. Every single morning it would startle me when I looked for something to wear. Then I’d smile. Then I’d admonish it to stay off the closet rod, where I might accidentally smash it by shoving hangers to one side. Another one lived in the bathroom. Sometimes it stayed in the wastebasket, which caused me to talk to the trash before I emptied it. Sometimes in the cabinet. Sometimes behind the toilet. But it always came out when I showered, to enjoy the steam.  Over many years, four different friends have expressed fear of green anoles. Every single one of them mentioned the anoles’ cunning, human-like feet. That’s one of the things I think most charming about them. That, and their beautiful green color, when they’re not busy trying to look like a closet rod or a shower curtain. And those gorgeous scarlet dewlaps (I looked it up, that’s what they’re called) the males blow up to attract the females.  Perhaps those friends are less fearful of green anoles now that GEICO has made them an advertising icon. That would be good. But they may also think green anoles are geckos. The GEICO gecko ads, featuring a green anole, have confused a lot of people, including a Houston Chronicle feature reporter who last year wrote a “cute” story making fun of a GEICO radio ad for claiming the gecko was the state amphibian of Texas. Geckos, she pointed out smugly, are reptiles, not amphibians, and the state reptile is, of course, the horned lizard (there is no state amphibian).  The photo that ran with her story was of a green anole, identified as a gecko. She was evidently inundated with e-mails from people who knew the difference. Her second story took a more humble tone. Anyway, I like geckos and green anoles. I enjoy their company. I only put them outside because of the cats. They like them, too.  |
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