Giving an iguana a proper diet is just as complicated as giving yourself a proper diet. The only difference is that if you spend a couple years not eating properly or eat something you know is bad for you one day, you won’t die or have extremely serious medical problems. Even an ounce of food that is not good for an iguana could result in death or sickness.
What To Feed First of all, remember that iguanas are strictly vegetarian. They can not have animal protein in even the tiniest bit. Feeding your iguana animal protein is no better than feeding her cyanide. This means no crickets, mealworms, pinky mice, eggs, dairy products, or any other anthropods or meat. Plants have plenty of protein and will be discussed later.
Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, iguanas need a greatly varied diet. If a human went on a crash diet and ate nothing but carrots for a long period of time, he would become moody, ill, malnourished, and if he stayed on the diet long enough and didn’t receive medical help, he would die. The same holds true for iguanas. They can not eat romaine lettuce or carrot peals every day of their life, unless you want their life span to shorten from 20+ years to 2 years.
Some vegetables are better than others. Iceberg lettuce should never be fed because it has no nutritional value (actually, people shouldn’t eat it either). Fed in excess broccoli, Brussels sprouts, kale, cabbage, cauliflower, and bok choy can cause a thyroid deficiency. Spinach, rhubarb, beets and chards are high in oxalic acid and may cause gout if fed without other vegetables. These also bind calcium, which is a very important mineral for your iguana. Romaine, green leaf and red leaf lettuce is not much more nutritional than iceberg and should be used very rarely. Bean and vegetable sprouts are not very nutritious but may be used as treats. Frozen foods should only be kept and used for emergencies as these are deficient in some vitamins. Fruits are fine for iguanas but should not make up the iguanas main diet.
Plants and flowers that you grow yourself may be used. Do not get them at a nursery because they may have been treated with pesticides and fertilizer that can kill iguanas. Try hibiscus (flowers and leaves) nasturtium (flowers and leaves), rose petals, violets (flowers and leaves), geraniums, wandering jew, pothos spider plant and ficus.
Preparing The Food
You can prepare a week’s worth of food ahead of time for your iguana. Clean and chop the food finely and store each fruit or vegetable in separate, air tight containers. The basic mixture (or salad) for your iguana should have at least one green and one orange
vegetable, parsnip, a fruit, and protein and calcium supplements. You also need to provide at least two leafy greens each day. At least twice a week, a multivitamin is added in addition to the calcium. Buy a calcium supplement meant specifically from herbivorous reptiles—it will contain phosphorous. You may also supplement the salad with dry iguana foods, mixed in with the salad to make it soggy.
The Greens: Use green beans, snap peas or snow peas, thoroughly washed carrot tops. A tiny amount of broccoli, bok choy or Brussels sprouts may be added a couple times a month.
Orange Vegetables: Orange-fleshed squashes are best. May use shredded carrot, but not too much because it can bind calcium.
Other Vegetables: Don’t forget the parsnip. If parsnip is unavailable, supplement with asparagus, drained, rinsed, and chopped canned cooked lima beans. Other vegetables you can use in small amounts are sweet potato and yams, sprouted vegetable and beans, mushrooms, bell peppers, onions, oregano, basil, cilantro, root vegetables, cactus pad, cactus pad, star fruit, asparagus, okra, and any of the summer yellow and green squashes.
Fruit: Figs are the highest in calcium—with dried figs highest of all—raspberries, strawberries, papayas, pears, plums, mangos, apricots, cantaloupe, dates, grapes, soaked raisins, red apples, prickly pear cactus and kiwi (both skinned) are all good. Do not feed the iguanas the seeds as the seeds of some fruit (such as apples) can be poisonous.
Protein, Calcium, and Supplements: Protein, in the form of rabbit pellets can be ground up or left whole, but mix it thoroughly with the salad to get them soggy. Mix a couple pinches of calcium powder and multivitamins into the salad.
Leafy Greens: Besides the salad, offer two or more leafy greens every day in large chunks or whole. Using them is like providing natural food for the iguanas, since in the wild they tear at leaves. You can either put the chopped leaves on a dish or hang it whole in the aquarium. Good leafy greens are collard, mustard (including flowers), dandelion (including flowers), escarole and water cress. Try to find a market that sells dandelion greens as the ones you find may have pesticides or exhaust fumes.
Misc: You can keep first year baby foods made from sweet potato, carrot, peas or green beans too, and fruits to use in an emergency. Also, freeze some of your salad for emergencies, or keep other frozen foods around. Do not use this as your iguanas main diet, though. Rice, plain chopped cooked noodles, whole wheat or grain breads mixed in with the salad are fine as occasional treats.
Give your iguana enough food to last her all day and even leave food in at night. It would be best to serve her in the morning, then give her more food in the evening. Keep track of how much she eats so you know exactly how much to give her. Use a shallow bowl that is easy for the iguana to use. Remember that an iguana's prime feeding time is about mid-day.
Finally, read up on iguanas. There’s a lot to know about them and you can find all sorts of information in books, magazines, and on the Internet. Take everything you read with a grain of salt, however, as some books still say to feed iguanas animal protein. If you read that somewhere—forget the rest of the book. Find other iguana owners who have successfully kept their iguanas for several years (and still have iguanas) and ask them questions. Also, get a veterinarian for your iguana.
Most of the information for this document was obtained from Melissa Kaplan's Herp Care, page at http://www.sonic.net/~melissk/
