Leapin’ lizards — they’re back!
A baby alligator was captured on Long Island after chomping a man’s finger on Friday — a possible sign that another Gatornado was poised to strike the area, wildlife officials said.
Robert Lheureux, 55, of Yaphank, spotted the 15-inch critter — after nearly two dozen sightings last year — near a canoe at Mott Lake while he was out for a stroll with a friend, he said.
“At first I was like, wow, that’s a big lizard. Then I looked closer and saw it was an alligator! I picked it up and it was hissing and growling at me,” he said.
“I tried to feed it a piece of chicken but it didn’t want it. It jumped up and grabbed my little finger!” Lheureux said. He suffered only a minor scratch.
“I told my sister and she said, ‘Yeah right. I bet you caught a mermaid, too,’ ” he said.
After stuffing the coldblooded creature in a cooler, he called wildlife officials — who last year encountered a shocking total of 20 alligators dumped in Suffolk County. And residents reported spotting more but weren’t able to bag them.
“I hope it’s not a here-we-go-again situation — but I got a bad feeling,” said Suffolk County SPCA chief Roy Gross.
“The water is getting warm right now and they could survive until December,” he said.
The agency is offering a $1,000 reward for tips about the abandoned alligator, which was likely ditched by a lame-brain owner, Gross said.
The grumpy gator may have ended up on the lam after it grew “too big,” Gross said.
“It gets to the point where the owner doesn’t have a container to put it in. Or maybe the owner realizes they’re getting large and aggressive,” he said.
“There’s a reason why they’re illegal,” he said.