Massive Lizard Keeps Terrorizing Family, Evading Trappers
Davie, Fla. (CBS Local) – Trappers are hunting a giant monitor lizard that showed up at a home in Florida and it won't go away.
Zach Lieberman's wife spotted the creature by the patio door of the family's home in Davie.
"She started screaming and I'm thinking what's going on," Lieberman told CBS Miami. He took a look at the creature by the door and went around the house to shoo the large lizard away. But the reptile turned the tables on him.
"He followed me. He followed me from right here all the way out to the front of my house," Lieberman said of the lizard that wasn't backing down.
Monitor lizards are known to be aggressive, have sharp teeth and claws. They can even knock a small animal like a raccoon, cat, or dog unconscious with its powerful tail and swallow them whole.
"It didn't occur to me how dangerous he really was and how close an encounter I was actually getting into until after the fact," Lieberman said. He estimates the lizard is more than 6 feet long and weighs well over 100 pounds.
Wildlife officers put out a big trap in Lieberman's backyard, with dead mice as lures, but the wily reptile hasn't taken the bait.
"That cage, to be honest, it's probably a little bit too small for him," Lieberman said. Officers have put out smaller cages too in the event the big lizard has little brothers or sisters about. "It's a big animal that you don't see every day, and that shouldn't be here in the first place," the homeowner added.
People buy monitor lizards as pets, but often release them when they get to become too big to handle. The monstrous lizard, which has paid several visits to this one Florida home, has left Lieberman fearful of going outside.
"For my kids, they are scared, my wife's scared, and I am scared because now I know what it's actually capable of," Lieberman explained.
Monitor lizards are capable of inflicting serious harm, not only to animals and people, but also to the local ecology. The giant predators reportedly consider crocodile eggs one of their favorite treats to eat. Crocodiles are a protected species.
[H/T CBS Miami]