Gold Coast croc likely to be illegal pet

A juvenile saltwater crocodile found on the streets of the Gold Coast was most likely being kept illegally.

The 60cm saltwater croc was discovered near Southport Cemetery on Queen Street by a passing motorist.

It's the second time a crocodile has been found on the same Southport street after a 30cm animal was rescued in January 2013.

The man kept the animal in his bathtub for a night before handing it in to staff at the David Fleay Wildlife Park on the Gold Coast.

Expert John Lever, who runs a crocodile farm on Queensland's Capricorn Coast, says there's no chance the animal had found its way to the Gold Coast on its own.

Mr Lever said all signs seemed to indicate the crocodile was being kept illegally, as most registered handlers valued their animals and would have come forward to claim it by now.

"In Victoria and South Australia, you're allowed to keep them as pets, in Queensland you're not," Mr Lever told AAP.

"The only people who would have them legally would be exhibitors or demonstrators and then they're a working animal, they've got to be shown to the public.

"The legal ones, I would have thought if someone was missing a croc they would have come out of the woodwork by now and said `hey, that's mine' and got it back.

"If it's an illegal one, no-one's going to come forward of course because they're going to be prosecuted."

Queensland's Department of Environment and Heritage Protection says the croc is in good health and will eventually be placed in a crocodile farm or zoo.