Alligator causes stir in neighborhood

A 6-foot, 80-pound reptile created a brief stir in a pond in The Preserve subdivision before being removed Monday by personnel from the Alabama Department of Conservation and Natural Resources and City of Auburn Animal Control officers.
The residents had suspected they had an alligator on their hands for the past several weeks, before they actually saw the reptile.
“I’d imagine he’s been eating pretty well,” joked The Preserve managing partner Jerry L. Johnson, who recently had the five-acre pond in the subdivision stocked with Amur carp in an effort to control moss. The pond already has a healthy amount of bass living it as well, according to Johnson.
Preserve resident Soohyun Park, who contacted Animal Control,and her neighbor Christine Gray, prefer the alligator do his eating somewhere else.
“My dogs swim in that pond just about every day,” Gray said of her black and yellow labradors Homers and Samson.
A fishing rod with a special hook that was designed to grip the hide of the alligator (without harming it) was used to remove the animal from the pond.
While some residents of The Preserve were surprised to find an armor-plated interloper living among them, it’s more common than most might think, according to animal control officer Conan DeVine.
“There are alligators in just about every body of freshwater in Alabama,” said DeVine, who says that animal control has already received between six and 10 calls to remove alligators from areas near homes this year.
A point Alabama Department of Conservation and Natural Resources’ Chuck Riddle agrees with.
“We get a lot of calls with people concerned about alligators in Auburn, but the area has a lot of creeks that have been up a lot this year and when the creeks go down, they’ll make their way into ponds,” Riddle said. “As more people build houses around lakes and ponds, you’re going to have interactions with alligators and other animals increase.”
“If you do encounter an alligator on your property, you should call us before you try to do anything about it yourself,” Riddle added.
At maturity, Riddle said the 6-foot alligator could reach as much as 12-feet long and weigh more than 400 pounds.
The speculation is that the alligator made its way into an adjacent lake that is fed by a stream and simply walked over to the pond in the subdivision. The man-made pond’s high seawalls then made it difficult for the alligator to get out once it got in.
The captured alligator will most likely be relocated in the river area of the Eufaula National Wildlife Refuge according to Riddle.
Alligators are a federally protected species in Alabama.