Raft-riding green iguanas that reached the Caribbean island of Anguilla in the wake of a hurricane have provided ecologists with rare proof of one of the most debated theories of animal colonization of islands. As Ellen J. Censky from the Carnegie Museum of Natural History in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and colleagues report in the 8 October edition of Nature, at least 15 green iguanas (Iguana iguana) rived on the eastern beaches of Anguilla on a large mat of logs and uprooted trees, shortly after autumn hurricanes in 1995.
The iguanas were first spotted by fishermen on Anguilla on 4 October, coming ashore from a raft of uprooted trees, some of which were more than 30 feet long. The best guess for the iguanas? origin is the island of Guadeloupe, a few hundred miles to the southeast, where they occur naturally. Hurricanes Luis and Marilyn swept up through the Caribbean in September 1995, passing Guadeloupe on their way to Anguilla. Given the generally north-west set of the currents in the region, Guadeloupe seems a more likely origin than the nearer but more northerly Virgin Islands.
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