Alligator found in the Bristol area
Posted on: 07 Aug 2017A young alligator was found wandering by Chew Valley Lake just outside Bristol over the weekend, with speculation rife as to how or why it got there…
Three summers ago, Bristol was thrown into a furore when images circulated around the city, appearing to provide requisite evidence of a crocodile lurking in the River Avon. The frantically-whirring rumour mill prompted widespread hysteria, national news coverage and even a police search before the story was eventually dismissed as false.
While this news, of course, drew sighs of relief, it also generated a peculiar sense of disappointment among many Bristolians, who had enjoyed their brush with the uncanny and the introduction of the Bristol Crocodile, the 'city's own Loch Ness Monster’.
Over the weekend another story, symmetrical in its content, emerged around the South West – however, this time the evidence was incontrovertible. An alligator was found and filmed basking in the sun by Chew Alley Lake.
A video, above, captured by Bristol Water workers, shows the reptile enjoying a stroll. It was later safely detained and collected by one of the RSPCA’s expert reptile handlers.
Bristol Water fisheries and recreation officer John Harris told the Daily Mirror: “One of our engineers spotted it bathing in the sun.
“We went down there and caught it and put it in a container. We think it’s an alligator.”
“Its mouth was open and it was hissing but I don’t think it was dangerous. We’ve found terrapins in the past, but to see a reptile like this is very surprising.”
Indeed, the means and motives for the appearance of the alligator in the South West remain very mysterious, with authorities yet to hazard guesses as to why or how the reptile ended up where it did.
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An ardent Geordie minus the accent, Sam seemingly strove to get as far away from the Toon as possible, as soon as university beckoned. Three undergraduate years at UoB were more than ample time for Bristol (as it inevitably does) to get under his skin, and so here he remains: reporting, as Assistant Editor, on the cultural happenings which so infatuated him with the city. Catch him at sam@365bristol.com.
