WESTON, FLA. (WSVN) - - A Weston family woke up to find a sneaky intruder in their swimming pool. Now they are talking about the scaly surprise.
Speaking with 7News on Thursday, Sebastian Gomez said he and his family found an alligator in their backyard.
Gomez said his father woke him up alerting him about the reptile, Monday morning.
“I thought he was joking, and then, when I came out to see, it was a huge gator there in the pool,” said Gomez
His surprise guest had, indeed, taken a dip in the pool.
Gonzalez took out his phone and began recording video of the alligator, seemingly unbothered, floating in the water.
After finding the stunning sight, Gomez said, he called police, as well as his girlfriend.
“So I went to wake her up and say, ‘Hey, there’s a gator in the pool,'” he said. “She didn’t believe me. She came back out and saw it, and then we called the little one, we call, ‘Hey, Julia, you want to see this.'”
The family has lived in Weston for 15 years. They said they’d heard of these unexpected visits to other homes in the area but never thought they’d be next.
Police responded to the home, and after seeing the 8-foot reptile, they called in a professional trapper.
After some resistance and a few minutes of wrangling with the unwelcome guest, the trapper was able to get the gator under control and out of the water.
Gomez’s daughter, Julia Lencina, said she found the wild experience, well, really wild.
“Really amazing. I loved this experience, except when it started jumping everywhere,” she said. “I would stick it in between scary and fun.”
Lencina then pointed at her mother.
“For her, it’s more scary,” she said.
Lencina got to ask the trapper about how he catches gators. She also learned an important lesson on what to do if she ever comes across another one.
“I would just do the same thing: call 911 and be, like, if the police can’t do anything, an animal catcher,” she said.
Gomez said he thinks the large reptile crawled into the pool area through a hole in the mesh screen enclosure.
The family said the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission took the gator to a farm. Once there, they will work to find a sanctuary for it, ensuring it doesn’t reemerge in another neighborhood.
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