Reports of a Lower Keys crocodile, a species not long ago virtually unseen outside of North Key Largo, did not surprise Nancy Finley, manager of the Florida Keys National Wildlife Refuges Complex.

"We have crocs documented in various places. The lowest location in the Lower Keys right now probably is in the Boca Chica area," she said Friday. "But we have documented sightings from the Cudjoe and Saddlebuch areas, as well."

State and federal wildlife experts estimate the American crocodile population has grown from a near-extinction level in the mid-1970s of around 300 adults (most then in North Key Largo) to more than 2,000 adults today.