A four-foot alligator spotted and photographed along the Charles River in Dedham, Massachusetts this week has been caught.
Oh, the rambunctiousness of youth — our thoughts as we watched a small alligator buck and wriggle as it was extracted from its temporary home — a small plastic container at Rain forest Reptile Shows in Beverly, Mass.
This roughly two-year-old youngster was pulled from the the cold strange, decidedly nontropical waters of the Charles River by herpetologist Michael Ralbovsky — who showed her off along with Mass Environmental Police officer Matt Nardi.
Someone unknown dumped the roughly four-foot gator in the Charles near the Dedham-Needham line where the river narrows considerably.
That’s where Topher Cox spotted it Thursday as he was serenely paddling around in the canoe he’d just bought from Craig’s List.
Topher: “I was pretty surprised. I think the alligator was pretty surprised to see me and I was pretty surprised to see her.”
Cox called 911 which drew local and Environmental Police — who contacted Ralbovsky, curator of Rain forest Reptile Show.
And he said, “Keep it in sight. Don’t let it out of your sight and when I get there I’ll try to capture it.”
Try he did — and failed once — then tried again early Friday morning, pulling it with is bare hands up into a canoe.
But who on earth put it there — a creature possession of which is illegal in most New England states?
Michael: “We get animals pulled out of all kinds of places. drug deals or a domestic dispute or, you know, being turned loose in the Charles River.
Ralbovsky and his colleagues were calling him Charlie, until determining he is a girl….so now, she’s Charlene.
Michael: “Please, do not release these animals into the wild. Number one, it’s a death sentence for the animal. It’s going to die within a few weeks because of the cold.”
Number two. it’s dangerous, though Ralbovsky says Charlene, being skittish aloof and solitary, probably would have quietly lived and quietly died in the waters of the Charles.
Now she’ll go to a wildlife park in Florida or Texas…after a special one or two year stint with Rain forest Reptiles, educating folks about reptiles like her.