A Tampa-area woman found an unwelcome weekend guest in her bathroom — a 7-foot alligator.
Alexis Dunbar told WFLA-TV that she screamed and the alligator hissed when she found it inside the bathroom of her home Saturday afternoon.
Her boyfriend propped a small table by the bathroom to keep the gator inside until an officer from the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission showed up to take him away.
Dunbar believes the alligator used a doggie door on the back porch to get inside the house. Dunbar, who lives in Palmetto, which is south of St. Petersburg, told WFLA that she believes the gator hung out at her house for several hours.
"My neighbor said she heard my porch things being knocked over at 3:00 a.m.," she said. "So he must've been here all night until I got home at 12:00 p.m. the next day. My furniture was all moved around; my blinds were all discombobulated."
The doggie door was used by Dunbar's two cats, who survived the night unscathed. But they now will face new restrictions on their movement. "I don't like doggie doors anymore," she said.
Spring is mating season for alligators and wildlife officials urge people to be extremely cautious, especially around water.
The officials who trapped the alligator in the Dunbar house said they planned to kill the creature, as they consider them a nuisance when they are more than 4 feet long.