Animal Control’s Weird Calls Even In Michigan
Animal Control officers get plenty of calls, but some are just crazy. Case in point, a few years back right here in Lansing, Animal Control got a call about an alligator that had been hit by a car. Yes, right here in Lansing.
The first question you might have, yes, alligators are allowed as pets in Michigan. Most are bought as pets at exotic reptile shows, when they are purchased they are only a few inches long, but those cute little things can grow to 15 feet long and weigh in at 500 pounds. This is a pet that could eat you and your family members.
Wild calls to Animal Control, Chicago Tribune
Local Animal Control Officers got a call back in 1963 about a Circus elephant on the loose. There had been a Circus at a shopping center and the elephant's trainer was trying to get the 12 year old 3 thousand pound pachyderm to dance, well the elephant was having none of that and took off. It didn't end well.
Animal Control officers in Chicago, back in the early 90's, got a call about a huge lizard on the loose. The monitor lizard was about 5 feet long and looked a bit like a dinosaur. Officer Phillip Zavitz responded to that call and another strange one. A homeowner was cleaning his gutters when he spotted a 7 foot python sunning himself on his roof. That startled the owner so much he almost fell off the ladder trying to get down.
Earlier this week a Florida resident had an unexpected encounter with a reptile. Aaron Brown was driving through his family property in central Florida when he spotted a snake. A mammoth snake. (ewwww!) Brown went and got his cousin who is a snake wrangler, and they found the snake in a drain pipe, shot it and killed it. The snake turned out to be a Burmese Python that measured more than 16 feet long and weighed 300 pounds. Animal Control in Florida handles a lot of snake calls, more and more of them are about the Burmese pythons which are breeding like crazy in Florida and wreaking havoc on the eco-system.
Officers have had to wrangle cows who got loose on the highway, tarantulas that have gone missing and even rescued runaway buffalo and horses, not to mention a ram that was found wondering in downtown Chicago.
Thank you to Animal Control Officers around the country who do the jobs that I am way too scared to ever do.