For many people, lizards are strange-looking animals. Lizards are apparently seen as threatening because of their appearance with claws and teeth. Most lizards are not comfortable with people. Some wild lizards can be very venomous as well, and some can be very potent. Sometimes even being too close to lizards is harmful to humans. Avoiding contact with these lizards is safe for you due to their nature. Now let’s learn How Lizards Can Be Harmful To Humans:
Types of Lizards Harmful To Humans
Among all the categories of lizard, few are very harmful to humans. So, we are categorizing a few of the lizards that are harmful to humans and must go to the lizard control treatment if you have encountered any lizard around you.
Gila Monster
Gila monster has its scientific name as “Heloderma suspectum”. Its name inspires by Gila River Basin and parts of the U.S. conditions of Arizona, California, Nevada, Utah, and New Mexico. They grow about 50 cm by 20 inches tall and are heavy-bodied with dark pink spots or clusters, and have bead-like scales. They are the largest lizard in the United States.
During the warm climate, Gila monster feeds at night time on small animals like birds and their eggs. It stores the fat in their tail and lowers part of the body to use this in the winter season. The large head and powerful jaw of the Gila monster give a hard bite that contains a poison that causes animal injury.
Many teeth have grooves that lead venom, a neurotoxin, from organs in the lower jaw. Death due to this lizard rarely happens to humans and the last report of a death from Gila happens in 1939. So Gila monster lizards are really harmful to humans as they inject a nerve poison in the body.
Mexican Beaded Lizard
Mexican beaded lizard (H. horridum), is About ’32 inches’ larger and darker than the Gila lizard, otherwise, they are almost the same as they appear. The species inhabit part of the Pacific shore of Mexico. That is from the fringe between the conditions of Sinaloa and Sonora south to Mexico’s border with Guatemala.
The Mexican beaded lizard is the same as the Gila lizard in nature. It depends on the fats to survive in the winter and its bites are deadly for the foes by locking its jaws on its prey while its sharped teeth deliver the nerve poison into the victim. The beaded lizard bite is painful to small animals and causes death to little birds and animals.
The species is a piece of the illicit global exchange pets. Some beaded Mexican lizards are introduced to pet dealers in the United States, Europe, and Japan.
The Iguanas
The iguana is the commonly known species that is found in Mexico southward to Brazil. Males of this species can reach 2 meters and 6 kg in weight. Often it’s seen basking in the sun on the branches of the trees & overhanging to the water. The iguana is green in color with the dark bands that form rings on the tail whereas females are greyish in the color and the half to the weight of males. Other species include the west Indiana iguana and the desert iguana of the southwestern United States and Mexico.
Iguanas possess venomous glands that produce a weak, harmless venom and are common in reptile collectors. But Iguana possesses dozens of sharp serrated teeth which can give the injurious to the faces, finger, and ankles also.
Some of the impending strikes of the iguana are standing on all four legs, sounds of a deep breath to make a body appear larger. However, some iguana is known for the strike without any warning.
Water Monitor, Common, or Malayan – How Lizards Can Be Harmful To Humans
Malaya or common water monitor is native of the Great Sunda islands and coastal bay areas of the Bay of Bengal and the South China Sea. This Malaysian screen lizard features a large head, heavy body, long tail, and well-developed legs. Big legs help him climb trees or the branch area.
This lizard is carnivorous in nature and consumes large insects which include the spider, small fishes, birds, and other lizards. These lizards don’t surprise its prey but they pursue the prey by running, swimming, and climbing after them.
They also eat the flesh of humans corpses, which they know for digging and eating them. People hunt these species for the food or skin which is used to make a medicine and leather product.
This monitor lizard also uses its tail like a whip to hurt the animals or mammals. It can inject the toxin, which produces a mild, but not fatal effect on humans. Moreover, it exposes you to infectious bacteria.