A massive, 5-foot-long lizard, presumed to be an Asian water monitor, was seen scurrying around a busy road in western Florida recently.
“He’s huge,” Renee Aland can be heard saying in video she posted on social media of the lizard. “He’s just strutting across the road. He’s heading to the other side of the road.”
When her daughter, Zoey Marzonie, asked if she should get closer to the lizard, her mother quickly answered, “Nope, just stay in the car.”
Aland said on Facebook she did a “double take” when she saw the lizard while driving down Hillsboro Road in the city of North Port, on May 20.
She said she called the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission and then waited to capture it on video because the agency wouldn’t make a report “without photographic proof.”
Aland told WBBH-TV that she at first thought the lizard was an alligator.
“When we got closer, I looked, and I saw his tongue, [a] lizard tongue coming out, and I was like, ‘Oh, crap, that’s not a gator!’”
Marzonie said it reminded her of the 7-foot-long pet lizard Mrs. Kipling from the Disney Channel show “Jessie.”
“It was like this big lizard, and I’ve seen something like it before. Have you heard of the show ‘Jessie’ for Disney Channel? It was like that big lizard in ‘Jessie,’” Marzonie said. “It was just strolling. It was huge, at least four, five feet. It was pretty crazy. I wanted to get out and get closer, I was like what is that? I wanted to see it but she said, ‘No, stay in the car.’”
Aland added, “It was really cool, never seen anything like that before, but the concern is what it is doing to our native wildlife. Obviously, they’re pretty voracious eaters, so I can’t imagine they’re good for our ecosystem.”
The Asian water monitor is native to southern and Southeast Asia, but not the U.S. It is common as a pet and not illegal to own, according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
The lizards typically grow to four to six feet and eat anything from snakes and insects, to birds, frogs, rodents, and small birds, according to the Reptarium.
It is considered one of the largest lizards in the world.
A week earlier, another invasive species was spotted moving up the coast of the Sunshine State.
The Peter’s rock agama has made its way north to parts of Central Florida, with residents of West Melbourne taking notice of the red-headed reptiles.
Ken Gioeli, a natural resources extension agent with the University of Florida, told FOX 35 that he refers to the lizards’ move up the coast as “the invasion front.”
They’re causing some impact to the environment, but we still don’t yet have a total handle on what it is that they’re doing,” he said.
The Peter’s rock agama was first documented in Florida in 1976, and has since established its presence in 20 counties, from Monroe to Volusia, according to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC).
The species is native to tropical, sub-Saharan Africa.
