Nigel Williamson shows how the lace monitor was found running across a street with a leash around its neck in Cranbourne South last week.
By Sarah Schwager
A GIANT goanna on a leash has been found roaming the streets of Cranbourne South.
Residents were shocked when the 1.7-metre goanna was seen running across the road last week with a dog leash around its neck.
Nigel Williamson, from Devon Meadows-based Nigel’s Animal Rescue, was called to the suburb to rescue the anxious reptile after it shot up a tree in Fiona Drive.
Mr Williamson said the goanna, a lace monitor, had run in front of a car, giving the driver the shock of her life.
“She couldn’t believe what she saw,” he said.
Mr Williamson said in 22 years of rescuing animals, this was only the third large goanna he had been called out to.
“It is a wild animal. This is not something you expect to find in the outer suburbs of Melbourne,” he said.
“Somebody obviously had it tied up somewhere. An animal like that doesn’t need tying up. They’re normally so docile.”
The Department of Sustainability and Environment (DSE) is investigating the find, but after contacting all registered owners of wild animals in the area, believes the goanna must have been illegally obtained.
It took Mr Williamson 20 minutes to remove the goanna’s claws from the tree as he tried to avoid being hit on the head with the goanna’s big tail.
After the escaped goanna was rescued, neighbouring residents were able to put two and two together to solve the mysterious attack of a small Jack Russell.
Devon Meadows resident Leanne Blundy was at a friend’s property on Fiona Drive, Cranbourne South, a couple of days before the rescue when she found her dog Jack slashed and covered in blood near a dam – the only one in the street – where it and two other dogs were playing.
At first she thought Jack had been attacked by another dog, but that did not explain the deep slashes and rip in the dog’s neck.
“None of it made sense, not unless there was a croc in the dam,” she said.
It was only days later Mrs Blundy discovered the lace monitor had been found outside the property next door.
Mrs Blundy said her friend’s other two dogs, a German shepherd and a Jack Russell, had run petrified to the door before she found her poor pet and rushed it to the Hallam Emergency Vet Hospital.
Jack is now recovering at the Cranbourne South Vet Clinic.
“They’re taking good care of him but it’s going to be a long, long process. He’s a very sick dog,” she said.
Mrs Blundy has already forked out hundreds of dollars in vet bills but vets are still not sure if the dog is going to survive.
Mr Williamson said the goanna would attack an animal that was smaller than it was if it felt it was in danger.
“The goanna is a scavenger,” he said.
“It was probably just defending itself and unfortunately the dog has come off second best.
“It just should never have been this close to the suburbs.”
Mr Williamson said lace monitors were quite good with humans and the animal was doing fine at his Devon Meadows property while the DSE worked out whether to release it back into the wild or put it in the zoo.
