A five-month-old baby was rushed to hospital after contracting Salmonella pomona from an exotic family pet.

Your Local Guardian reports a warning has now been issued to all reptile owners and further investigations by Sutton Council environmental health officers revealed the family’s Bearded Dragon lizard and tortoises to be the likely culprits that passed on the bacteria.

The five-month-old has since recovered and the council is using the incident to urge parents of young children to keep them away from reptiles.

It follows a similar incident in 2009 when a baby girl from Sutton was admitted to intensive care with a fever and high heart rate after contracting Salmonella Arizona from her family’s pet snake.