While many Providence residents woke up on Jan. 27 to a pristine sheet of snow outside their windows, Providence resident Frank Hardy was greeted by something different: an injured tegu — a type of large lizard indigenous to South America — lying in his lawn.
After some initial confusion, Hardy brought the lizard, later dubbed Frankie, into his house to warm it up and immediately sought care for the animal.
Hardy did not respond to a request for comment.
ET Reptiles, a pet store and company that specializes in reptiles, picked Frankie up from Hardy’s house and brought her to an emergency veterinary clinic.
The tegu, a common exotic pet, can reach three to five feet in length and live up to 20 years, according to Emily Arpin, co-owner of ET Reptiles. They can raise their body temperatures about 10 degrees higher than their surroundings, making them the only known warm-blooded lizards — but this is not nearly as much as mammals.
Tegus “wouldn't be able to stay warm enough to make it through extreme cold,” Jessica Tingle, assistant professor of ecology, evolution and organismal biology, wrote in an email to The Herald.
Frankie was suffering from multiple injuries when she was found, including bleeding toes and missing nails, according to Arpin. Her treatment included the amputation of the “two tips of her tongue,” which had “gone necrotic after being frostbitten outside of her mouth,” she wrote.
Two weeks after Frankie’s initial rescue, Arpin and ET Reptiles cofounder Taylor Faria are actively monitoring her health. She is “being hand fed daily to build her weight back up,” shows “interest in eating” and is receiving antibiotics for an upper respiratory infection, Arpin wrote.
Tegus are not native to New England, according to Tingle. “I would guess that this tegu is probably a pet that either escaped or was irresponsibly released,” Tingle wrote.
Owning a tegu can be “demanding” for some pet owners — they require a varied diet and “a lot of space,” Arpin wrote. She stressed that “there are multiple options for those looking to rehome their animals.”
“Putting any reptile outside during these temperatures is a death sentence,” Arpin wrote.
Frankie’s case has received national attention. On Instagram, videos about the tegu have garnered thousands of views. The New York Times recently covered the story.
Despite the coverage, no one has come forward as Frankie’s owner. Arpin is “doubtful anyone will come forward at this point” and is considering making Frankie the “ambassador animal” for their shop.
Frankie’s story has even made an impact on campus.
At the end of Graduate Student Instructor Megan Robinson’s ENGL 0202P: Poetics of the Cosmos: Verse, Universe and Existence class on Jan. 30, she connected the course’s thinking “about the universe and existence” with the tegu.
“In a time where things that are blatantly untrue overcompensate by trademarking themselves as true … Frankie is this beautiful opposite,” Robinson wrote. Frankie “embodies a truth about the universe, about its chaos and mystery, its ability to endlessly create and recombine.”
“I told everyone to watch for lizards on their way out,” she added. “I hope that they will.”
Kelly Ding is a senior staff writer for the community and culture beat. She is from College Station, TX and plans to concentrate in IAPA on the policy and governance track. In her free time, she loves to explore new coffee shops, curl up with a good book, and be a gym rat.
