Hide the Kids! You Won’t Believe Where this Alligator Was Found in New York

On Tuesday, the Department of Environmental Conservation got a call regarding an alligator on the property at Van Wyck Junior High School in East Fishkill, New York! Imagine getting that call? Not a lost dog or a curious black bear, an alligator approximately 5-feet in length on school grounds!

When my son was still in school the big excitement each year was getting his new "school clothes" and notebooks, pencils or a new backpack. This year much of the buzz has been to debate whether the kids should be mandated to wear masks or not. With all of these distractions it is understandable that nobody planned for an alligator showing up.

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According to News 10 ABC, a next door neighbor to the school happened to be looking out the window and spotted a 50-pound junior alligator crawling through the parking lot of the nearby school. She immediately called the police. Once DEC officer Eyler arrived on the scene he was able to safely subdue the animal and transport it to an area animal rehabilitation specialist for evaluation.

You may have heard the legend of alligators living in the sewers of Manhattan but what is the reality of encountering an alligator upstate? Alligators are not native to New York and most likely these reptiles were someone's pet, released into the area. It is illegal to keep an alligator as a pet on New York. A few years ago New York Upstate confirmed the capture of 2 gators in the Tioughnioga River near Whitney Point.