Question for SeaCat - Alligators?

[PMI]

Alligator likely won't be shot if found in Portsmouth
says the local headline

The roving gator in Portsmouth likely won't be shot after all. Portsmouth police said Thursday that they have brought in a private company from Virginia Beach that traps and removes wildlife to capture the alligator.

Lt. Duane Stokes said the entrapment operation has been turned over to ZooPro, Inc.

Several officers spotted an alligator in Baines Creek Thursday, he said.

An alligator was also spotted in the creek earlier this week.


I am reading about this alligator in the news and wondering, aren't there alligators all over in Florida? Wondering why there is such a big deal over this one and why the powers that be in Hampton Roads are spending so much time trying to hunt this one down.

 

[SeaCat]

Well it depends on the size of the Gator. If it's a larger one then they may be worried about the risk to local pets. If it's a big one then they might be worried about the possible risk to swimmers.

Another guess would be the idea that the 'Gator wouldn't be able to survive the winter.

Best guess would be just how people react to the idea of a 'Gator. They tend to over react. It's a completely natural reaction, often seen with Sharks, Snakes and other dangerous critters.

Cat

 

[rgraham666]

There's only one truly dangerous animal.

 

[PMI]

We have sharks, and plenty snakes, what immediately comes to mind are the poisonous water moccasins that inhabit the intercoastal waterway here. Certainly keep an eye on your kids, and your pets. I guess it just seems the whole area has gone kinda gonzo over this alligator. We also get the occasional bear near where I live. They sometimes wander out of the Great Dismal Swamp.

I guess the circus atmosphere over this is just making me wonder. Since alligators are protected, I guess they will catch him or her, but I also think that this is not the last one we will see. Can this area live with alligators?

Thank you for the reply, SeaCat

 

[PMI]

There's only one truly dangerous animal.

absolutely, positively, agreed!

 

[SeaCat]

We have sharks, and plenty snakes, what immediately comes to mind are the poisonous water moccasins that inhabit the intercoastal waterway here. Certainly keep an eye on your kids, and your pets. I guess it just seems the whole area has gone kinda gonzo over this alligator. We also get the occasional bear near where I live. They sometimes wander out of the Great Dismal Swamp.

I guess the circus atmosphere over this is just making me wonder. Since alligators are protected, I guess they will catch him or her, but I also think that this is not the last one we will see. Can this area live with alligators?

Thank you for the reply, SeaCat

LOLOLOL

We raise them down here. Good eating if you stick with the Tail Meat. Water Mocs. on the other hand taste like shit.

I imagine we would freak out down here if we had something like a Grizzly or a Fisher show up down here.

Cat

 

[PMI]

because it made me think of cats....

another version of the war of the species, this time nobody gets hurt!

http://youtube.com/watch?v=mzz-Jn8hvzc

had a good friend when i was a kid. She had two kids younger than i, and a kitten and a dog. The kitten always walked around with wet hair around her neck. The dog chewed on its neck constantly. My friend's husband would say the dog was practicing, so he could get it right, but I knew this dog adored this cat, no matter how much trouble.

 

[3113]

Here's our local and famous 'gator. He lived in a pond in the park evading capture for two years...and then, when they finally got him behind bars...he escaped again! Go Reggie!

Top of the world, Ma -- for a few hours

Reggie, who had won international fame while eluding capture in a Harbor City lake for almost two years, was last seen in stir about 7:30 p.m. Tuesday. About 8:30 a.m. Wednesday, zoo personnel discovered he'd blown the joint.

It was an hour and a half later when a search party of zoo handlers discovered him hiding out near a zoo loading dock. "He'd found a comfortable bush to hang out under," said handler Ian Recchio, who participated in the bust. "He was just sleeping there. Reggie was pretty heated up this morning. As the weather gets warm, alligators get more agile and stronger."

Recchio said the 7 1/2 -foot, 120-pound fugitive "put up a little fight" as authorities laid hands on him. He then went quietly as he was hustled off to quarantine while zoo investigators tried to dope out his escape route and tightened security at his luxury cell. At 2:30 p.m. Wednesday, a yellow truck pulled up to his habitat and five zoo personnel emerged carrying the fugitive, whose face was wrapped in a white towel. Once inside, while Reggie hissed loudly, they removed the towel and a black band that bound his mouth, then scattered, at breakneck speed, to safety.

As 50 visitors watched, Reggie swiveled his head and crawled slowly into the water. As onlookers yelled, "Reggie! Reggie!" he showily swam the perimeter of the pond, then buried himself beneath vegetation in one of its murky corners.

Initial indications were that Reggie had climbed a chain-link fence at the back of his enclosure, then clambered over a series of brick ridges above it to freedom. Once on the ground, he followed another chain-link fence about 500 yards to the loading dock area. "It's been so warm lately, and alligators are all nocturnal, so Reggie was just moving around, checking things out, just exploring when he escaped," said Zoo Director John Lewis. "It just goes to show that he's an extremely healthy, agile animal. We've certainly learned our lesson."

The inmate had been on display at the zoo since only last Thursday.

He'd been kept in solitary confinement, isolated from the facility's eight other alligators, in what officials termed a "luxury suite" with shade, vegetation and a pond and waterfall of filtered water. Authorities had expanded it to accommodate their celebrity prisoner, and they speculated Wednesday that some of the improvements might have contributed to his escape.

"It's just speculation," Recchio said, "but I definitely found areas where he used his tail for leverage." Alligators' short legs, he said, ordinarily discourage climbing. Wednesday, workers added chain-link overhangs to low spots in Reggie's habitat. Zoo authorities said the escapee would be placed under 24-hour watch to ensure he didn't repeat his caper.

Reggie's jailbreak generated media attention worthy of Dillinger's legendary escape from the county jail in Crown Point, Ind., in 1934.

Television reporters climbed into his enclosure to deliver their reports. Zoo officials begged that TV helicopters give the facility a wider berth because they were spooking other animals.

It was a continuation of the circus-like atmosphere that has attended Reggie since he was discovered in the water of Lake Machado in August 2005, having allegedly been dumped there by owners who thought him too large to keep as a pet. For the ensuing two years, a parade of would-be captors -- official and unofficial -- tried unsuccessfully to seize him. Finally, on May 24, Recchio wrangled him with a dog-catcher's pole. Officials ran up a bill of $200,000 pursuing him.

His fame spawned children's books, T-shirts and other merchandise.

"He may have a brain the size of a walnut, but he's outsmarted every man I know," said Councilwoman Janice Hahn after hearing about Reggie's escape.

All the hoopla attending Reggie's return Wednesday attracted the attention of passing children, several of whom were heard to ask, "Where's Reggie?" Anthony Montes, 14, of Studio City said he had come to see Reggie for the first time and brought along his 12-year-old brother, Zachary. "Reggie is getting more publicity than Paris Hilton's arrest," he said. "I've been following the story from the start, especially because Reggie's around my little brother's age."

Zoo visitor Celia Ramirez, 28, of Sylmar said Reggie's escape showed "it's obvious he's not meant to be in captivity. He went from a home to a huge lake, to a very small enclosure. He should be released back to the wild or a refuge where he has more space. He's used to being free."

After 10 minutes buried in the pond vegetation where he'd taken refuge upon his return, Reggie emerged and swam the pond again. Wearing a hat of leaves that had stuck to his head. Probably pondering his next move.

http://www.latimes.com/media/photo/2007-08/31762030.jpg​

Reggie plots his next move.....

 

[jayce1066]

We have some major reptiles in this area also.

"HOUSTON -- A Missouri City family found a 400-pound alligator in their back yard Monday, KPRC Local 2 reported.

The alligator crawled under a fence the homeowners put up to keep wildlife out of their back yard on Cicada Drive near Peninsulas Drive.

The family's dog found the alligator around 7 a.m. The alligator then lunged at the dog...."

http://www.click2houston.com/news/9256098/detail.html

 

[shereads]

Small pets, and occasionally small children, are easy prey for alligators - which tend to look sleepy and lazy, but are faster than a horse over short distances.

Left to their own devices, and with enough habitat, alligators avoid people. (Who wouldn't?) But as soon as they get human neighbors, some idiot can't resist feeding them. And alligators make no distinction between the snack and the hand that offers it.

"You're out of chicken wings? No problem. I'll have a leg. Or a poodle."



Edited to add: Two years ago, Florida had 3 fatalities, a single-year record. These weren't pets or even small children, but adults. Including a woman who was last seen jogging on a path several yards from the water.

Since I moved to Florida about 15 years ago, there have been a number of grisly attacks, including one on a boy who was portaging a canoe with his family. You'd think the publiciity would frighten people. If not the publicity, the signs that read DANGER: ALLIGATORS. There's one beside a lake at Fairchild Tropical Garden in Miami, near the spot where I once saw a couple of tourists taking a picture of their toddler, who was standing beside an alligator three times her size.

"it's not that people are getting stupider. it's that fewer stupid people are getting eaten by bears."

~ Bill Maher