The owner of a Texas alligator sanctuary said rumors that his gators have escaped because of rising floodwaters are not true.
Gator Country owner Gary Saurage spoke out on Tuesday afternoon to squash such claims, , “They’re there.”
“I’m not going to tell you that we may not lose a few little alligators like that,” he said while holding his hands out a couple feet. “It’s very possible. But I can tell you that we’re almost through this thing, and we’re holding tight. So all those folks who are spreading this rumor, I’m telling you now, that we have our eyes on this thing and we’re doing all we can.”
An alligator sanctuary in southeast Texas says it’s on high alert as rising floodwaters risk the escape of roughly 350 gators.
Workers at Gator Country in Beaumont have been busy patrolling the watery grounds of the 15-acre preserve as water from Hurricane Harvey’s rain inches closer to the top of fences that enclose the reptiles. As of Monday evening, none had gotten loose.
“We’re less than a foot from going over the fences. All of these are certified high fences, but look ― when it won’t quit, it won’t quit,” Gary Saurage, who founded the sanctuary in 2005, told local station KFDM during a tour on Monday.
Saurage assured neighbors that not all of the sanctuary’s animals risk escape