Danielle Craven was almost done cleaning her Palmetto home on Monday night when she stumbled upon an uninvited guest in her bathroom.

Tampa Bay-area woman finds iguana in toilet

Neighbor removed iguana with net, cooler

Iguana turned over to Matthews Wildlife Rescue

According to FWC, spinytail iguanas are nonnative species



To her horror, there was a spinytail iguana, more than a foot long, taking a dip in her toilet.

"The toilet was clogged — on Sunday morning, it was clogged — so my husband unclogged it, and we just thought it was the kids using too much toilet paper. And this thing pops up 12 hours later," Craven said.

Craven panicked, and with her husband at work, she called for help on Facebook, asking anyone who could handle the situation to come by.

Minutes later, her neighbor showed up and went to work, pulling the iguana from the bathroom with a net and a cooler.

"The first thing people ask is, 'Are you on septic?' No, I'm on city water. I think that freaked a lot of people out," Craven said.

The iguana was handed over to Justin Matthews of Matthews Wildlife Rescue. He aptly named the reptile Flushy and said it's doing fine.

Matthews has seen cases in which snakes have ended up inside of toilets, but that's mainly been in apartment-style buildings.

But an iguana in a house toilet? That was a first for him.

"I think it was flushed," Matthews surmised.

But even with family in town for Thanksgiving making for a busy house, Craven said she won't be using that toilet again.

"I will avoid it forever," she said. "I will never go back in that bathroom. I'll gladly wait in line for my other bathroom 100 percent!"