Sunny Side Up

“Animals have these advantages over man: they never hear the clock strike,

they die without any idea of death, they have no theologians to instruct them,

their last moments are not disturbed by unwelcome and unpleasant ceremonies,

their funerals cost them nothing, and no one starts lawsuits over their wills.”

- Voltaire, letter to Count Schomberg, 31 August 1769 -

Another unusual animal friendship and the endearing story behind it for this week’s sunny side up.

Rina Deych is a registered nurse and often does volunteer work on animal welfare issues. Her apartment already a zoo, she took in a foot-long iguana from a friend who found it wandering the streets of New York City without question and quickly researched what he needed. The reptile thrived under her care, soon stretching to four and a half feet, nose to tail tip. Meanwhile, another needy critter found his way to Rina’s door. “The kitten was near death when I found him,” she says. Johann the cat soon improved markedly, and Rina decided to see how the two castoffs would get along.


“When I put Jo into the iguana’s enclosure, Sobe puffed up like Godzilla and hissed. He can look very big and threatening. But Jo didn’t know to be afraid, so he just rubbed up against Sobe’s rough skin and purred. Sobe probably wondered, “What the heck? Why isn’t he scared?” But the iguana calmed down quickly. He closed his eyes and let the kitten rub against his face and play with his tail. He did nothing to discourage the contact, and even seemed to relish it.


Nowadays, Sobe is a free-range iguana in Rina’s home. He’ll get up on the bed with Jo and Rina’s other cats and lets them curl up around him, and he doesn’t mind when they attempt to groom him or join him on his warm perch in his reptile enclosure. In fact, if the perch is empty, he’ll wander around looking for the felines.

Story and photo found here.