A Texas zoo said it had taken back an 8ft alligator which was stolen as an egg more than 20 years ago, then kept as a backyard pet.
In an Instagram post accompanying footage of three agents gingerly lifting the alligator into a truck and releasing it into a zoo enclosure, the state parks and wildlife department said: “Alligators don’t make good pets, y’all.”
A Texas parks & wildlife spokesperson said a game warden found the animal, named Tewa, during an unrelated investigation in Caldwell county last month.
A woman confessed to taking an egg from Animal World & Snake Farm Zoo, near Austin. She did not have a permit to keep the alligator as a pet.