Hungry alligator wanders onto porch and tries to eat metal plaque showing three turtles

‘I’m glad I did not get up at 5.30am and open my front door’

The large alligator was caught on camera on a doorstep in Florida (ABC 7 Eyewitness News/ Twitter)

A large alligator was caught on camera on top of a bench outside a home Florida trying to grab a metal plaque on their porch wall.

Security footage of the strange occurrence on 21 May shows the large alligator crawling up onto a bench outside a home in Venice, Fox 13 reported.

Crawford B Lewis told the broadcaster that he was alerted by his security system that someone was at the front door, and was shocked to see the large alligator on his doorstep in the footage.

“I’m glad I did not get up at 5.30am and open my front door,” he said.

The video shows the alligator mount the bench before becoming interested in a plaque on the wall that appears to boast a sea turtle pattern.

The alligator then lunges upward and tries to grab hold of the metal plate with its jaws, but fails.

It then can be seen slinking off the bench, knocking over a plant pot while departing.

Its not the first time this month that alligators have been caught on camera acting out in public in the southeastern US.

Last week golfers filmed a fight between two alligators on the 18th hole of a golf course in South Carolina.

The two reptiles were filmed gripping each others by the jaws on the 18th hole at the Hilton Head golf course, and the incident was reported to have lasted two hours.

“We see an alligator pretty much every day. But that is the first time we’ve seen anything like that,” one of the players, Matthew Proffitt, told local news about the incident.