Not one, but two alligators have been found just a few miles apart in the Los Angeles area this week.
On Thursday, Los Angeles Animal Services responded to a home with an eviction notice only to find an abandoned alligator in the backyard — about six miles from where another alligator was found Monday.
The 2½-foot-long American alligator found Thursday was in a large aquarium, a news release from the agency said.
American alligators are primarily found in the Southeastern United States, around Florida and Louisiana, according to National Geographic. That’s a long way from Southern California.
“It is illegal to keep wildlife without a permit in the City of Los Angeles,” according to LA Animal Services.
The owners were not home at the time, and authorities are looking to talk to them.
The alligator is being held at the West Valley Animal Shelter in conjunction with the Los Angeles Zoo, which is looking after the alligator’s health.
The case is unrelated to Jaxson, a 8-foot-long, 37-year-old alligator that was found Monday at a house where the residents said Jaxson had been their pet for nearly four decades.
“You cannot own a reptile, or wildlife for that matter, like this, in the city of Los Angeles without having a proper permit,” Mark Sanchez of Los Angeles Animal Services said of the Jaxson case.
Criminal investigations are being performed in both cases, but authorities have not said what charges the alligators’ owners might face.