Goose the water monitor, a large lizard that captivated many in Massachusetts and beyond while he was on the lam from a home in Webster for two weeks, got his closeup at a news conference on Monday before heading to “the Taj Mahal” of reptile rescues.
Evidently a little uncomfortable, the captured fugitive was trotted out before cameras, where officials described how they got their Goose — it had been hiding under a tree root close to where it was spotted several times since its escape in July.
NBC10 Boston
NBC10 Boston
Goose, a water monitor lizard captured Saturday, Aug. 2, 2025, after a two-week escape in Massachusetts, being shown by a Rainforest Reptiles official at a news conference on Monday.
Goose didn’t come out for “hard boiled eggs and things of that nature,” said Capt. Scott Amati of the Massachusetts Environmental Police, but some pieces of chicken lured the lizard out of its burrow and into the loops of two catch poles.
Webster police announced Saturday that “Goose” had been captured safely.
“When he came through, it was pretty surreal,” Amati said, “and we managed to catch him. Very strong animal for its size, fairly well-behaved, all things considered, until we got the catch poles on it, then it’s a wild animal, obviously, and tries to defend itself.”
No one was hurt in the capture, though Amati noted stoically that he “was defacated upon” in the process.
Watch the full press conference here:
Water monitor lizards are illegal to possess in Massachusetts without a permit. This animal was being kept without proper authorization, and Goose’s owner is being cited, though not criminally, for possessing the animal and not having a permit to import it, Amati said.
The lizard is set to stay with Rainforest Reptile Shows and RRS Oasis, a nonprofit animal sanctuary for abused and confiscated animals in Beverly, Massachusetts. Amati described it as “the Taj Majal of places to be,” saying Goose “ended up lucking out and hitting the lottery.”
Describing the lizard as “kind of the unofficial mascot of Webster,” the town’s police chief, Michael Shaw, said “part of me is sad to see him go.”
The president of Rainforest Reptile and RSS Oasis, Joan Gallagher, said that they were building Goose an enclosure at their sanctuary. She said that some people have already sent in donations, and at some point, following a quarantine period, the lizard may make a public appearance.
Animal control officers have been searching for a pet water monitor that escaped from a home.
Webster animal control and police first posted on July 18 about the water monitor going missing in their town from the area of Blueberry Lane off from Upper Gore. The lizard was said to be about 5 feet long and reportedly escaped from an area home, where he was owned illegally.
“They opened the window to get it some air, and it had escaped and got out into the area,” Shaw said at the time.
The animal’s owners declined to speak with NBC10 Boston then.
People were warned not to approach the animal if spotted, asked only to report the sightings to environmental police, Webster police and animal control.
The update Saturday followed a sighting of Goose in Douglas on Wednesday, one of several sightings of Goose in recent weeks, including in nearby Thompson, Connecticut. Three different times, the lizard was spotted within feet of a dot that trackers had spray-painted on a road in Douglas State Forest, where investigators were led thanks to a picture someone took of the animal.
It was under a nearby tree where Goose had been spotted, his tongue sticking out.
The common water monitor is native to southeast Asia, including Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines and parts of India and China, according to the federal Nonindigenous Aquatic Species index.
They can grow to eight feet long and typically forage in and around the water, scavenging or killing and eating fish or other animals they can overpower.
Water monitors have been spotted in the wild in Arizona, California, Texas and, more than anywhere else in the United States, Florida, which the index attributed to pets escaping or being released.
“The potential impact of these huge, aggressive predators on indigenous wildlife almost certainly would be negative should they establish themselves,” the index says, noting that “their size and aggressive behavior” could make them dangerous. But water monitors haven’t established themselves anywhere in the U.S.