
	Where results make sense

Topic: Sewer alligators

	Sewer - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
		However, completely separating storm sewers from sanitary sewers often means no treatment of stormwater, which is not desirable either, as the first flush from storm runoff can be extremely dirty, although some of the contaminants in the runoff, such as heavy metals, oils and many chemicals, are not removed through waste water treatment systems anyway.
		A well-known urban legend, known as Sewer alligator, is that of giant alligators or crocodiles residing in sewers, especially of major metropolitan areas.
		An 8-foot alligator was trapped in a New York sewer in 1935.
	en.wikipedia.org /wiki/Sewer (1187 words)

	Sewer alligator - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
		Sewer alligator stories are part of an urban legend that date back to the late 1920s and early 1930s.
		The report suggested that the alligator had escaped from a ship traveling from the Everglades and had then swum into the Harlem River and then 150 yards (~137 m) up a storm conduit to where it was found.
		In an episode of The Tick, "The Tick vs. Filth", Tick, Arthur, and Sewer Urchin and are attacked by sewer lobsters.
	en.wikipedia.org /wiki/Sewer_alligators (1463 words)

	Urban Legends Reference Pages: Critter Country (Gatored Community) (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-11-05)
		The alligator hunt was called off after it was decided the boys had seen snakes or lizards in the river, not gators.
		The proper method of catching an alligator alive was the subject of a conference this afternoon between the police chief and his men.
		Some one suggested that one of the police explorers, who sings bass in the police quartet, ought to practice the alligator mating call, which the police chief learned was a cross between the bark of a dog and the grunt of a pig.
	www.snopes.com /critters/lurkers/gator.htm (1838 words)

	The Sewer System (Gotham Gazette. October 20, 2003)
		Sewer mains are typically three to five feet in diameter.
		Sewer workers regularly send remote-controlled video cameras through the pipes to try to spot leaks and cracks and patch or replace damaged pipes before they break.
		The alligator story is an old one, but it got a big boost in 1959, with the publication of Robert Daly's otherwise credible book, The World Beneath the City.
	www.gothamgazette.com /article/issueoftheweek/20031020/200/569 (2165 words)

	USATODAY.com - 'When they eat your dog, they're not so cute' (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-11-05)
		Alligators once were considered endangered, but they made a spectacular recovery in the 1970s and '80s.
		Alligators — and their close crocodilian cousins, the caiman and the crocodile — still represent only a small fraction of the nation's booming reptile trade.
		Alligators' native U.S. habitat stretches from Florida to North Carolina, west to Texas and regions of Arkansas and Oklahoma.
	www.usatoday.com /news/nation/2002/05/29/gators-usat.htm (1169 words)

	CROCLIST: NYC's Sewer Alligators=Truth or Hoax???
		In the early1930's a number of alligators were seen swimming in the Bronx River.
		It was in 1935 that the animals were first reported to Superintendent of Sewers Teddy May. At first, May refused to believe reports from his inspectors that they were being menaced by the sub-terrainian reptiles.
		A few were killed by overzealous sewer inspectors using.22 rifles and pistols in what must have been one of the strangest sub-terrain hunts ever.
	lists.gatorhole.com /pipermail/croclist/2002-November/000102.html (562 words)

	Mystery in History Alligators in the Sewers Part 1 (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-11-05)
		One of the most persistent urban rumors is that alligators live in the sewers of various major American cities.
		Alligators and crocodiles have materialized in cotton bins in Texas, express trains in West Germany, hot water ditches in Illinois, and basements in Kansas, and there is good reason why reports of them slithering and slinking through the New York City sewer system should not be dismissed.
		Many people believe the alligator stories originated in the 1950s when baby alligators became a popular gift item, only to be flushed down the toilet when they grew too big.
	www.trivia-library.com /c/mystery-in-history-alligators-in-the-sewers-part-1.htm (614 words)

	Working Sewergator: March 2, 1915 (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-11-05)
		Alligators may be used to clean out city sewers as the result of an offer received by Thedore [sic] Eichhorn, superintendent of streets, yesterday.
		But he did agree that the idea is a practical one, because an alligator has the strength and determination to push his way through any clog that ever blocked a sewer.
		When the animal becomes too old to work his way through life and sewers alike, it was suggested that he be placed as the first installment in a municipal zoological garden.
	www.sewergator.com /news/eo19150302.htm (238 words)

	The Straight Dope: Are there alligators living in the sewers of New York? (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-11-05)
		It's questionable whether the alligator could actually be said to have "lived" in the Enwye sewers.
		Though nobody knew for sure how the alligators got there, the most plausible theory was that they had been dumped into the sewers by parents who had originally bought them for their children and later grew tired of them.
		Alligators in the sewers have since become part of the lore of New York, and references to them turn up all over the place, including Thomas Pynchon's novel V.
	www.straightdope.com /classics/a2_339.html (565 words)

	New York Times, May 19, 1982
		Flaherty is chief of design in the New York City Bureau of Sewers, but he is also the resident expert on the most durable urban myth in the history of cities, reptiles or waste disposal.
		There are 6,500 miles of sewer lines in New York City, ranging from six-inch pipes to monster sewers big as a small band shell, from brick sewers circa 1840 to concrete structures under construction; these are Mr.
		He adds that one clear proof of the absence of alligators is that not a single union official has ever advanced alligator infestation as a reason for a pay increase for sewer workers.
	www.sewergator.com /news/nyt19820519.htm (907 words)

	The World Beneath the City, Robert Daley, 1959
		Sewer inspectors, searching for leaks, blockages and other trouble spots during the low tide of the midnight-to-8-AM lull, must sidestep floating drums, boxes and Christmas trees.
		Alligators, small boys and at least one horse have accidentally swum in the sewers of New York.
		Within a day or two of admitting that there really were alligators in his sewers, Teddy May was able to face the problem of eliminating them.
	www.sewergator.com /lit/world_beneath_the_city.htm (910 words)

	Classic/alligators in sewers
		A wealth of detail on the "alligators in the sewers of New York City" legend is detailed in _The Vanishing Hitchhiker_ by Jan Harold Brunvand (more abbreviated versions are in _More of the Straight Dope_ and _Rumor!_).
		If the accounts are true, then perhaps the "alligators in the sewers" legend may be similar to the Shergold stories.
		I think there is some debate as to whether one would say that the alligators were indeed living in the sewers or were they dumped and found there or whatever.
	tafkac.org /classic/alligators_in_sewers.html (522 words)

	aligators???
		A barge captain captures a 4-foot alligator in the East River.
		alligators live at temperatures between 78 and 90 degrees.
		The proper method of catching an alligator alive was the subject of a
	members.aol.com /Jrtotskie/aligators.html (1403 words)

	Sewer History: Photos and Graphics
		This alligator was discovered in a sewer in Mississippi during the effort to assess and clean the main following Hurricane Katrina in the Fall of 2005.
		Critters in the sewers: racoon in a sewer, Eastern Europe.
		Everything you ever wanted to know about alligators in the sewers can be found at sewergator.com.
	www.sewerhistory.org /grfx/misc/critters.htm (372 words)

	Alligators in the Sewers (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-11-05)
		Out of every thousand alligators disposed of in this unseemly manner, there's an outside chance that one or two might make it to a hospitable part of the sewer system, where the water is warm enough to prevent freezing.
		Conceivably, the alligator could then survive by feeding on floating carrion--dead fish or birds--much as it does in the wild.
		The sewers offer no safe haven for eggs, and the chances against a male and female alligator finding each other in the first place are astronomical--there are no singles bars for reptiles, not even in New York.
	www.pynchon.pomona.edu /v/allisewer.html (260 words)

	The UnMuseum - Gators in NYC Sewers
		A popular urban legend claims that the sewers of the Big Apple are populated by alligators large enough to eat unfortunate city sanitation workers who unknowingly venture into the underground tunnels.
		More recently, it spawned at least two movies: Alligator (1980), the story about a 36 foot long reptile emerging from the sewers of underground Chicago to dine on unsuspecting citizens of the windy city and Alligator II: The Mutation (1991), which changed the locale of the underground menace to a small town.
		According to the 60's version of the legend, the gators found their way to the sewers of New York City after they had been purchased at pet shops, grew too large for the owners to keep in their apartments, and were flushed down the toilet.
	www.unmuseum.org /sgator.htm (798 words)

	storm, siphon, Category, through, alligators, Paris, surface, should, sewage, objects, natural, metro, large - Sewer (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-11-05)
		However, completely separating storm sewers from sanitary sewers often means no treatment of stormwater which is not desirable either, as the first flush from storm runoff can be extremely dirty.
		Some titles that include this clichÃ© are the Mario series, Deus Ex, Dark Cloud 2, Duke Nukem 3D, The Matrix, Resident Evil 2, Silent Hill 3, The Shawshank Redemption, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and many materials related to the influential Dungeons and Dragons game.
		The sewers under Vienna serve as the setting for the climactic scene in the film The Third Man. (These sequences are echoed in the American film noir, He Walks by Night, starring Richard Basehart).
	www.alphasearch.org /directory/Sewer.html (1186 words)

	Urband Legends and Hoaxes (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-11-05)
		The New York Sewer system is full of unwanted alligators that were flushed down the toilet.
		It is true that alligators have been found in many unlikely places, such as swimming pools as well as some sewers.
		However, while rats, insects and some stray fish do call New York's sewers home, over the long term an alligator would have difficulty surviving the cold, the close quarters, the lack of sufficient prey and the bacteria commonly found there.
	www.urbanlegendsandhoaxes.com /legends.php?id=30 (77 words)

	NYT 2/10/35 (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-11-05)
		Slowly, with its curving tail twisting weakly, the animal was dragged from the snow, ten feet through the dank cavern, and to the street, where it lay, non-committal; it was not in Florida, that was clear.
		And therefore, when one of the boys sought to loosen the rope, the creature opened its jaws and snapped, not with the robust vigor of a healthy, well-sunned alligator, but with the fury of a sick, very badly treated one.
		So the shovels that had been used to pile snow on the alligator's head were now to rain blows upon it.
	home.att.net /~Storytellers/gatnews4.html (762 words)

	Alligators in the Sewer
		It used to be a trend for parents returning home from Florida vacations to bring back small, baby alligators for their children to raise as pets, particularly in New York.
		It's been said that the animals are blind and albino, having lost their eyesight and the pigment in their hides because they live in constant darkness.
		The alligators grew to monsterous sizes and are "mutants."
	urbanlegendsonline.com /pets/alligators.html (121 words)

	Gators in the City - Sewers (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-11-05)
		The legend in short: After a vacation in Florida, people brought baby alligators back with them to New York City to breed as pets in their apartment.
		Once the alligators get to the sewer system, they feed on rats and other small animals.
		They grow huge, becoming a colony of fearless alligators that terrify the employees of the city’s sewers system or people who dare to go down to the sewers.
	nyc24.jrn.columbia.edu /2001/issue04/story01/page2.html (300 words)

	New York Gators \| Alligators in Sewer (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-11-05)
		The sewers of New York are swarming with alligators.
		On August 12, 1982 a 26-inch alligator was found swimming in Kenisco Reservoir in Westchester New York (part of the water supply for the city).
		Last but not least, there are the numerous horror stories about people in New York City apartments going to use the bathroom and finding a gator trying to make it's way into their house from their toilet bowls.
	www.kidzworld.com /site/p517.htm (245 words)

	SignOn San Diego Strange But True -- Gators in the sewers: Truth, or urban legend?
		Sewer water is warmer than groundwater, this would help.
		However, reproduction would be a virtual impossibility as alligators nest in mounds of decaying vegetation exposed to the sun, and the female would need both to regulate nest temperatures.
		Adding to a sewer's inhospitality are the sewer gas, hydrogen sulfide and volatile chemicals from industrial effluents, says University of Florida Prof.
	www.signonsandiego.com /news/diversions/strange/20000524-1210strange17.html (488 words)

	Flora & Fauna of the New York Sewers (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-11-05)
		But alligators, even babies, are pretty contrary and do not make warm cozy pets.
		They're cute but mean, and when people realized that 1)their pet did not love them, and had no qualms about biting the bejeezus out of their owners on a regular basis; and 2)would be vicious and dangerous as adults; they decided to get rid of them.
		But you can't exactly release an alligator into the wild, and they didn't know how to get rid of their pets, so they finally just flushed them down the toilets.
	members.tripod.com /~SaraAnnette/lore/sewers.html (282 words)

	Alligators in the Sewers (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-11-05)
		Though it is assumed by many people to be nothing more than an urban legend, the alligators in the sewers story actually does have some basis in fact—though how much basis in fact is a harder question to answer.
		A Cornell University zoologist I spoke to had his doubts, although, noting that the average "alligator" seen by May and his inspectors was only two feet long, he allowed that they might have been caimans, a related member of the crocodile family with a higher tolerance for low temperatures.
		As for how they got into the sewers, Daley's explanation is as plausible as any: they could have been abandoned pets that vacationing New Yorkers had brought home from Florida and then discarded once they got too big.
	home.att.net /~Storytellers/sewrgatr.html (257 words)

	CROCLIST: juvenile alligators
		Steve ----- Original Message ----- From: Bill Moss To: croclist@lists.gatorhole.com Sent: Friday, November 29, 2002 8:35 AM Subject: RE: CROCLIST: juvenile alligators Steve, The thing about this that makes me go "hmmmm" is that the wild alligator sizes are achieved with a natural seasonal cool-down (versus a constant growing season).
		She goes off feed because her water temp is in the high 60's, although her basking spot is in the 80's.
		I wouldn't do it with a croc from a purely tropical environment, but with American alligators I've found it non-detrimental and it allows me to keep her much smaller than a constant growing season would.
	lists.gatorhole.com /pipermail/croclist/2002-November/000104.html (422 words)

	Gothamist: Alligators in the Sewers
		As much as we might want to see an update of 1980's Alligator or a sequel to 1999's Lake Placid (Lake Placid 2: Alligator Boogaloo, anyone?) we're glad that those movies aren't documentaries.
		According to Snopes.com the idea that alligators could live in the putrid New York City sewer system is just an urban legend.
		Alligators may have occasionally made their way to the New York area - read this old New York Times story which seems to have been written by the Jayson Blair of 1935 - but none actually thrived in the raw sewage and drain water coursing underneath city streets.
	www.gothamist.com /archives/2004/06/14/alligators_in_the_sewers.php (294 words)

	MSN Encarta
		An elderly woman, in an attempt to dry her just-bathed miniature poodle faster, put him in the microwave and pressed the defrost button.
		Baby alligators from Florida were flushed down a toilet, and they grew into a thriving colony of enormous alligators living in the New York City sewer system.
		That little bit of crunch in Fig Newtons could be due to the bugs that inadvertently get into the fig paste.
	encarta.msn.com /quiz_228/urban_legends_quiz.html (479 words)

	Vampires and Liches Review -- October 3, 2003 \| d20 Magazine Rack
		There is a one page introduction describing the overall theme and most basic elements of the plots that follow and the rough order of difficulty for the three (3) adventures.
		Sewers of the Underguild is the first adventure included and is actually an adventure I dropped my group into.
		A sewer is filled with levels of methane gas, a fairly flammable substance, and so fire can do some nasty things like an explosion or damaging the caster in the case of Burning Hands.
	www.d20zines.com /html/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=645&mode=thread&order=0&thold=0 (1174 words)

Try your search on: Qwika (all wikis)