Alligator going door to door found with a lawn chair on its head, FL video shows

One of Florida’s alligators drew attention to itself in the worst way when it began “knocking on doors” and peeping in windows at the crack of dawn.

It happened Friday, May 9, in the Tortuga neighborhood in Fort Myers and Lee County Sheriff’s Office deputies arrived to find it sitting on someone’s porch — with a red lawn chair awkwardly stuck on its head.

When the alligator moved, the chair moved with it, even as the gator tried getting in someone’s front door.

“The call came in ... around (7 a.m. Friday) and it was seen to have crawled up to a couple different residences within the community,” the sheriff’s office told McClatchy News in an email. “It was said that the gator was seemingly 7+ feet.”

Body cam video incriminates the alligator of multiple transgressions, including being a Peeping Tom, resisting arrest and causing a disturbance.

A professional trapper was called to help remove it, and the alligator was so intent on staying that it took three men to pull it off the porch, video shows.

“I think I’m just going to let him settle down,” the trapper is heard saying. “He was wrestling way too much.”

The alligator was so heavy that four men were needed to lift it into the back of a pickup truck. It’s fate was not revealed.

May is the start of alligator mating season in Florida, and the reptiles “become sexually mature by the time they reach approximately 7 feet,” the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission reports.

It’s a period when males are known to wander in search of females, which often results in them rambling through neighborhoods.

The Tortuga community in southwest Florida is about a 145-mile drive southeast from downtown Tampa.

This story was originally published May 9, 2025 at 3:26 PM with the headline "Alligator going door to door found with a lawn chair on its head, FL video shows."