Feeding Visitors, Residents and Creatures Alike: Sanibel Chef loves to Nurture

Dave Krajnak is the Chef at the Island Café.   He is has been there for 26 years serving up savory breakfast and lunch treats for visitors and residents.

But most do not know that the Chef has some very special friends right in his own backyard that he cares for as well.

The backyard of Dave Krajnak's home, which began as a sanctuary for many animals recovering from an injury, has become a forever Island home for many varieties of birds, turtles and iguanas over the years.

He and his wife, Blanche,  worked with CROW for many years, helping rescue animals and on occasion provided a foster home for them. A number of their African sulcata turtles, the third largest tortoise in the world, came from CROW.

The backyard has been turned into a sanctuary for the tortoises, providing ample opportunities to walk into huts Krajnak built to provide shelter. The yard, which is now sand, also gives the tortoises the opportunity to dig when they are feeling dehydrated.

The tortoises eat eight or nine cases of romaine lettuce a week, an excellent water source for them. They also eat vegetables like zucchini and squash, as well as prickly pear. Toby is the couple's biggest sulcata tortoise, weighing in around 275 pounds. Others that share a smaller portion of the backyard include the red-foot and yellow-foot tortoises.

Cuban, blue rhino (otherwise known as a blue iguana), and regular iguanas can be found in large cages right off the back porch of his home, all ranging in size from small to large, and have many levels to enjoy in their habitat. Krajnak said after you work and spend time with the iguanas, they become tame, which affords him the opportunity to hold them when wearing gloves.

The Island chef said he developed a love for animals as a young boy growing up in Wisconsin due to the proximity of farms surrounding his folks home. Krajnak said his wife, Blanche's, love of animals is partially why many of the animals were adopted, because she fell in love with each one as they took care of them.  Falling in love is , indeed, easy to do on Sanibel.