7-foot, 150-lb. lizard terrifies family
Davie dad says kids can’t play outside
A lizard in the backyard? No big deal, right?
Er, wrong. This monitor lizard is about 7 feet long and weighs about 150 pounds — and it’s eluded capture for four straight days.
“It’s scary,” said homeowner Zachary Lieberman of Davie. “It’s big.”
Monitor lizards are not known to attack people, but Lieberman takes no comfort in that because he has a 2-year-old son and 4-year-old daughter.
“I’m more afraid of it than I would be an alligator because of my small children,” he said. “On Sunday it was right at my back [patio door] window kind of scratching to get inside the house.”
The terrified family has enlisted the help of trappers, hunting dogs and state wildlife officers to try to catch the monster, which has shown up in the Liebermans’ backyard — in the 9000 block of West Tree Tops Court near the Pine Island Ridge Natural Area — at least three times in the past two weeks.
So far, efforts to lure the lizard have included bait in the form of dead rodents and chicken thighs hanging from a tree. The fourth straight day of actively trying to trap the reptile ended fruitlessly, Lieberman said. The closest the lizard came to capture was on Sunday, when it came right up to the edge of the garage — but then it bolted.
“I had a baseball bat with me that I was tapping on the ground,” Lieberman said. “He seemed to be following the tapping sound, but then
all of a sudden he turned and made for the woods.”
A couple of dogs were brought in to track it and they found a burrow the lizard may call home.
“The dogs know what they’re doing,” Lieberman said. “They’re hunting dogs.”
Two officers with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission were using a video camera scope to check inside the burrow Wednesday but found nothing.
Lieberman has been told the lizard probably makes return visits because it can smell prey.
“The FWC [officers] said it’s because of the scent of mammals,” he said. “There’s a lot of raccoons in the area and they like to terrorize my garbage can so that could be one of the reasons why.”
Monitor lizards are not native to Florida, according to wildlife officials. The reptiles eat small animals, birds, fish, rodents, and eggs and have no natural predators in the state.
State wildlife officials ask the public to report sightings by calling 888-483-4681 or at IveGot1.org. These lizards can be dangerous when cornered.