Orange alligator spotted in Florida pond

Alligators may not be an unusual sight in Florida, but not many people can say they've seen an orange gator. One Florida woman says that's exactly what she saw hanging out in her neighbourhood this week and she has a picture to prove it.



"When I was coming back from work this morning, I passed by and I thought I saw what I thought I saw, but I had to back up and come and look again," said Sylvia Mythen, who saw the gator. "I thought, 'This is great. I'm going to snap a picture and send it to my grandkids so they think I'm one of the coolest grandmas in Florida.'"

Some neighbours were a little sceptical. "Some say it was dirt or mud," said Phillip Crosby, who also saw the gator. Mythen was close enough, though, that she's convinced of what she saw. "I was from him to you away from him and he was orange. So, if it was mud he did a good job of covering himself up, every nook and cranny."


YouTube link.

She contacted a biologist with her discovery. "His findings were that it's probably almost an albino, in between. It's an albino, only a little more coloured so he wasn't a full-fledged albino," she said. Florida's Wildlife Commission says it doesn't believe the alligator is albino. Instead, it says the gator was likely painted or stained orange or that something in the environment caused the tint.