Why Cryptozoology Is Interested In Alligator Sightings

Okay, I started hearing about this a couple days ago, and it now seems to be taking on cryptic or even cryptid status. Folks in Tennessee are having “Alligator Sightings Outside Memphis,” according to the Chicago Tribune:

Alligators aren’t suppose to be this far north. Nevertheless, the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency has gotten reports of alligator sightings on McKellar Lake, a backwater of the Mississippi just south of Memphis, and at T.O. Fuller State Park, north of the city. Up to five alligators may have been seen, including one said to be close to 7 feet long that was reportedly spotted on a bank beside McKellar Lake. Alligators’ natural range is believed to end south of Tennessee.

Meanwhile, in Austria, a “mystery caiman” was sighted and caused an official search on May 11, 2006. The Silbersee – a lake near Austria’s westernmost city of Villach – was the site of recent sightings of large, five-feet long “crocodile-like creature,” which local official believe is a caiman.

Tensions are going to run high in the media when the subject of alligators comes up this spring again. Florida has suffered its first gator fatality already, the 18th confirmed fatal alligator attack in Florida since 1948. An alligator apparently attacked 28-year-old jogger Yovy Suarez Jimenez on land. Her dismembered body was found floating in the Sunrise canal on Wednesday afternoon, May 11th, west of Miami. CNN reported on May 14th that the ‘gator has been killed and had two arms in its stomach,

Crocodilian sightings (such as those from Tennessee and Austria) and findings (e.g., one of the “Maine Gators” found on April 22nd) are of interest to cryptozoologists.

Why, you ask? Well, there are several reasons, including (please add your own, in comments):

1) some Lake Monsters are initially reported to look like alligators;
2) some water cryptids may turn out to be alligators or other pet croc escapees;
3) keeping track of the expanding or pet escapee enhanced alligator range is a good idea;
4) field-aware cryptozoologists like to know if there are any dangerous animals in the path of their pursuits;
5) out-of-place ‘gators are cool and very Fortean.

Of course, getting killed and eaten by a gator is not cool, but it would might be Fortean.

UPDATE: Two more have been killed by alligators in Florida, please click here.

Loren Coleman About Loren Coleman
Loren Coleman is one of the world’s leading cryptozoologists, some say “the” leading living cryptozoologist. Certainly, he is acknowledged as the current living American researcher and writer who has most popularized cryptozoology in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Starting his fieldwork and investigations in 1960, after traveling and trekking extensively in pursuit of cryptozoological mysteries, Coleman began writing to share his experiences in 1969. An honorary member of Ivan T. Sanderson’s Society for the Investigation of the Unexplained in the 1970s, Coleman has been bestowed with similar honorary memberships of the North Idaho College Cryptozoology Club in 1983, and in subsequent years, that of the British Columbia Scientific Cryptozoology Club, CryptoSafari International, and other international organizations. He was also a Life Member and Benefactor of the International Society of Cryptozoology (now-defunct). Loren Coleman’s daily blog, as a member of the Cryptomundo Team, served as an ongoing avenue of communication for the ever-growing body of cryptozoo news from 2005 through 2013. He returned as an infrequent contributor beginning Halloween week of 2015. Coleman is the founder in 2003, and current director of the International Cryptozoology Museum in Portland, Maine.

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