Wildlife update

Several of you have asked about Lucy, the monitor lizard. Here's what we know so far about living with a monitor on our back porch.

No, she isn't dangerous. In fact, she is more afraid of us than we are of her. I guess if she was cornered, she'd be dangerous then but so far, she scampers away when we come near.

Yes, we want her to stay because she chases away rodents like rats.

No, she is not nocturnal. She is active in the daytime, thus the reason she was at our backdoor in the middle of the day. She goes out into the field behind our house and looks for food, I presume. We've tried to get pictures of her out there but she's quite fast and takes off when she sees us coming with the camera. Occasionally, so we've heard, a monitor will accidentally find itself on the campus field when classes are let out and some kids will try to catch it. It's a sight to be seen, watching a group of kids chasing after a very frightened monitor.

Lucy is about two and a half feet long, quite skinny so she can fit in the six inch drain pipe. She might like to come in our house but we keep the door at the back latched so it doesn't give her any opportunity. If she ended up inside, then we'd have a BIG problem. We have heard tales (not sure how true) about baby monitors coming up through toilets and other drains. Could just be folklore.

As I said in a previous post, the best thing for us is to always bang the door to give Lucy notice that we are coming out. She hides quickly and we often don't even see her. The door banging also alerts any tree shrews and geckos to our presence. They usually take off like lightning, too.