The American crocodile (Crocodylus acutus) has a northernmost range that occasionally stretches into northern Florida, with individuals wandering as far north as Palm Beach County on the east coast and Sarasota County on the west coast.

The American crocodile (Crocodylus acutus) is a widely distributed species, ranging from northern South America to the tip of the Florida peninsula and the Pacific coast of Mexico. In the latter, the mouth of the El Fuerte River (25º 49’ N, 109º 24’ W), in the state of Sinaloa, is considered its northernmost stronghold. However, there are historical accounts of American crocodile populations farther north in Sonora state, such as the report by Jesuit Father Juan Nentuig, who in 1764 wrote about crocodiles in the mouth of the Yaqui River (27º 21’ N, 110º 30’ W). Today, that area is much changed: as one of Mexico’s biggest and most productive agricultural valleys, the river’s freshwater flow has been reduced to such an extent that crocodiles are no longer found there. The same could be said of the mouth of the Mayo River, some 100 km to the southeast and where long-time residents still remember the caimanes.

Occasional individuals may have wandered away from those areas, as suggested by the capture of a crocodile on 19 January 1973 in the El Ciego estuary, near Las Guásimas, approximately 30 km east of Guaymas, Sonora (27º 52’ N, 110º 33’ W). This specimen was netted unintentionally by two fishermen who were night-fishing for seabass. From the photo published in El Diario newspaper the following day, the crocodile was estimated to measure approximately 2.5 m. Because that area does not have freshwater discharges, is located at the southern fringe of the Sonoran Desert, and receives irregular and scarce rainfall, it is unlikely that a breeding population of American crocodiles was ever established there. The surprise and interest that the event caused among local people is evidence that the species was not common then in the area. It may constitute the northernmost-recorded evidence of the species along the Pacific coast. Today, it appears that the species has been extirpated from Sonora. — Carlos J. Navarro, Marine Biologist & Wildlife Photographer, Mexico . CROCODILE SPECIALIST GROUP NEWSLETTER, vol. 22, no. 1, January-March 2003, pp. 19-22

A single one meter long Crocodylus acutus was caught in the Great Dismal Swamp (Suffolk or Chesapeake Counties), Virginia, in December 1976.

The Associated Press) is reporting an interesting new “northern” find:

Officials at the Isle of Palms [South Carolina] ordered everyone out of the water because of a dangerous animal. But it wasn’t a shark this time.

Instead, wildlife officials ended up trapping a 6-foot long American crocodile in the surf Thursday [June 6, 2008].

Steve Bennett of the Department of Natural Resources told The Post and Courier of Charleston that the crocodile likely escaped or was released by someone who illegally brought it from its normal habitat in southern Florida.

But Bennett says it is possible the crocodile could have swum up the coast.

Officials say they shut down the beach and ordered hundreds out of the water as a precaution until the crocodile was trapped.

No injuries were reported. Officials planned to send the creature to an alligator park, or to a wildlife preserve in south Florida.