{"id":276359,"date":"2025-10-04T05:17:12","date_gmt":"2025-10-04T05:17:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/276359\/"},"modified":"2025-10-04T05:17:12","modified_gmt":"2025-10-04T05:17:12","slug":"community-works-together-to-wrangle-12-foot-gator-outside-mcdonalds","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/276359\/","title":{"rendered":"Community works together to wrangle 12-foot gator outside McDonald\u2019s"},"content":{"rendered":"

MACON, Ga. (WPGA<\/a>\/Gray News) – An alligator sighting outside of a McDonald\u2019s in Georgia gained a lot of attention over the weekend after residents took it upon themselves to help capture it.<\/p>\n

The 12-foot alligator was found outside of a McDonald\u2019s on Rocky Creek Road in Macon on Sunday. <\/p>\n

After videos and pictures of the animal began to gain popularity on social media, more and more people went to see it for themselves.<\/p>\n

Alexus Sparks, her friend, Acacia Rene, and Lord D\u2019Andre were among those who went to the McDonald\u2019s to see the gator.<\/p>\n

Rene even started a Facebook Live to share what they were seeing that afternoon.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople came up and they were like, \u2018We just left your live video. Everyone just came out to see the gator to make sure it got caught,\u201d Rene said.<\/p>\n

The group worked together to help wrangle the gator, as they said law enforcement hadn\u2019t yet assisted.<\/p>\n

\u201cI threw my jacket over it, he put the slipknot over his neck and then I grabbed the back of the string and walked him like a pit bull,\u201d D\u2019Andre said.<\/p>\n

The Bibb County Sheriff\u2019s Office said it was called Sunday at about 4:40 p.m., responding with the Department of Natural Resources. <\/p>\n

Authorities were assisted by a gator trapper who was able to remove the animal from the area.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe community really did come together,\u201d Rene said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was outside for like an hour-and-a-half today, and at least seven people came up to me and said, \u2018The alligator man!\u2019\u201d D\u2019Andre added.<\/p>\n

Bibb County Sheriff\u2019s Office Capt. Linda Howard said animal control discourages such actions by residents when it comes to handling gators due to the potential dangers. <\/p>\n

\u201cCitizens put themselves at risk of being attacked or injured by the alligator,\u201d she said. \u201cThe alligator became a threat when they decided to capture it with no plan for where and how they were going to relocate it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Howard said the sheriff\u2019s office hadn\u2019t experienced a situation like this before.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have answered several calls for alligator removal, but never one like this. We would like to ask people to please stay away from wildlife, no matter what it is, and notify the sheriff\u2019s office so that we can get the appropriate people there for removal,\u201d Howard said. <\/p>\n

Copyright 2025 WPGA via Gray Local Media, Inc. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MACON, Ga. (WPGA\/Gray News) – An alligator sighting outside of a McDonald\u2019s in Georgia gained a lot of…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":276360,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[142873,142871,142870,142869,142867,142866,142856,142857,142868,142875,142874,142862,142863,142864,142861,142865,142859,142872,142858,159,67,132,68,837,142860],"class_list":{"0":"post-276359","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wildlife","8":"tag-acacia-rene-alligator","9":"tag-alexus-sparks-alligator","10":"tag-alligator-caught-mcdonalds","11":"tag-alligator-caught-mcdonalds-macon","12":"tag-alligator-mcdonalds-macon","13":"tag-alligator-mcdonalds-macon-georgia","14":"tag-alligator-removal","15":"tag-alligator-removal-on-your-own","16":"tag-alligator-spotted-mcdonalds-macon","17":"tag-bibb-county-sheriffs-office","18":"tag-bibb-county-sheriffs-office-capt-linda-howar","19":"tag-capturing-alligator","20":"tag-capturing-gator","21":"tag-capturing-gator-mcdonalds-macon-georgia","22":"tag-catching-an-alligator","23":"tag-gator-mcdonalds-macon-georgia","24":"tag-how-to-wrangle-an-alligator","25":"tag-lord-dandre-alligator","26":"tag-removing-alligator-on-your-own","27":"tag-science","28":"tag-united-states","29":"tag-unitedstates","30":"tag-us","31":"tag-wildlife","32":"tag-wrangling-an-alligator"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":"Validation failed: Text character limit of 500 exceeded"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/276359","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=276359"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/276359\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/276360"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=276359"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=276359"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=276359"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}