LA PORTE, Ind. — An alligator apparently is on the loose in one inland lake popular among fishermen and recreational boaters from Indiana and Illinois.

The Indiana Department of Natural Resources is investigating a reported siting of a three- to four-foot-long alligator at Pine Lake in La Porte, in the northwest part of the state.

The risk an alligator might pose to humans appears low because alligators turned loose in a strange environment tend to avoid people, and the air and water temperatures might be a bit chilly for the cold-blooded creature to survive until summer when conditions become more life sustaining for such reptiles, said Shawn Brown, a conservation officer with the DNR office 15 miles to the north in Michigan City. “They’re going to stay away from people as much as possible,” he said.

John Williams, 41, said he’s 100 percent sure what he saw on May 1 was an alligator because he often called animal control to retrieve the reptiles that found their way into his built-in swimming pool while living for nine years in Florida. “It’s kind of hard to forget what they look like,” Williams said.

He was standing on a dock when his attention was drawn to a set of eyes lurking above the water’s surface on the lake that draws boaters from as far away as Chicago, which is about 60 miles away. His suspicions were confirmed as he watched the animal make its way onto shore.

Williams said he ventured over to a small foot bridge to get a better view. Once the alligator returned to the water, he was standing directly above the reptile, which he estimated to be 4 to 5 years old. Three police officers responded to the water’s edge, but the alligator had already headed back into deeper water, and they were unable to spot it.

Brown said the alligator was likely put there by an owner tired of the novelty of having it as a pet or looking to dump the expense of feeding the animal. 

It’s also possible the owner didn’t want the responsibility of having to obtain a permit for the animal.

Alligators are legal to have in Indiana but require a permit once they reach five feet in length, Brown said. Occasionally, Brown said there are reported sitings of alligators in area lakes, but to his knowledge none have been found alive. 

There have been some recoveries, though, of dead alligators that surfaced weeks or months after a siting, he said. 

Alligators have occasionally turned up in other states, including the siting last month of a seven-footer in the Monongahela River in Pennsylvania and one in 2010 in the Ohio River in Portsmouth, Ohio, just north of the Kentucky border.