"Friendly" Alligators?
 

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I'm still not sure just how on earth I stumbled into this. Here we have a guy working in, or possibly the owner of, a wildlife sanctuary harboring at least some alligators. So he feeds them - I suppose you kind of have to. No problem with that... at least until he starts trying to pass one off as "friendly" to an apparent guest. I guess I'm just not convinced there is enough intellectual horsepower driving this prehistoric lizard apex predator to even understand an anthropomorphization such as "friendly". Yeah, he "pets" it, but only when it is turned away, distracted, with food in its mouth. Isn't this how someone else winds up getting hurt, when they buy into nonsense like this?

Yeah. The guy in the orange shirt is going to get the nickname "Stubby".

It's a trick, a mean trick, and I'm not falling for it.

At some point, the guy's kid or grandkid is going to sneak down to the dock one afternoon to pet it and it's not gonna go well.

Lots of them around here and the number one rule is DO NOT feed them. They begin to associate food with humans. Also bad idea to walk your dog near a lagoon. There's been several deaths in the 8 years I've lived here--dogs and people. Everyone I know gives them a wide berth.

that is some deft showmanship there. i think his actions aren't as casual as they look.

I predict a Darwin moment in his future :rolleyes: . Having lived in FL. for 18 years you learn very quickly NOT to feed these prehistoric eating/killing machines . It never ends well .

My uncle did that sort of stuff, and had teeth marks on his ass to prove it!

Seriously, one Saturday morning, my grandfather (Marine Biologist Prof) received a call from the University of Florida, asking if he would wake his son up, and tell him to get the gator out of the pool, they have a swimming meet today.

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Conditioned response, nothing more. The guy in the video appears either naive or stupid enough to believe otherwise.

_

Boat guide included

This guy must think he's the next Steve Irwin. If he really believes what he's telling them "my friends" etc..., then he's fooling himself.

Yes, an erstwhile Tim Treadwell of the Swamp. His day is coming. Or, worse, someone else's day is coming, someone who buys into his hogwash.

Although a much smaller reptile....I used to feed treats to my turtles by hand.
One day the largest one snapped at the treat too far and got ahold of my finger.
I couldn't get it to release..I had the thing completely out of the water before it realized something was wrong. Tore a half inch piece of my skin off.
Reptiles are not real smart....just always hungry.

I grew up watch B&W TV shows of cajuns wrestling alligators.

Guy would flip them over then rub their belly until they went to sleep.

He'd get up then and walk around it in circles for a while - 10-15 minutes later it would wake up, flip over and trundle off.

Amos Moses was a cajun. Lived by himself in the swamp.....


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Big Lizard in My Backyard — The Dead Milkmen
(1980s punk band)

My great grandfather, who lived in S.C., had a fountain with a pool inhabited by several alligators. He found that by wearing the same coveralls as he fed them every day, the critters would lose their aggressiveness towards him and get "friendly" as feeding-time approached.

But...woe to the hapless person who was not my great grandfather when approaching these creatures! There were apparently a few close calls!

Steve McQueen, from The Magnificent Seven.

alligator-attack-woman-canoeing-fatal-florida-lake-kissimmee

A fatal bear attack Monday followed by a fatal gator attack yesterday here in FL :eek: The bear attack was the first fatality in FL history. The gator attack, not so much. The fatal attack occurred in Lake Kissimmee. Another attack in nearly the same area occurred several weeks ago to a Texas woman in a kayak. She either had her arm bitten off at the elbow or was bit in the elbow depending on the story you read.

Lake Kissimmee is the headwaters of the Everglades and is teeming with gators. I've been there on airboats several times but never in my kayak. I had a very, very close encounter with a 10-footer last month in a lake I kayak in almost daily. Pretty sure he wanted to mate with my yak. Luckily, the sight of me scared him more than he scared me! Mating season ends in June and the kayak is drydocked until then :D

A 50-60 year old in Lake Kissimmee ....

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1746621709.jpg

^^^ yeah, probably not :D I do carry a machete and a handgun in my PFD. Which is great, if you have time to react. But my recent close encounter was a case of being in the middle of the lake (where you would not expect to typically encounter a gator without seeing him first) and he popped his head up next to the yak with no warning. Pretty sure he thought the yak was a gator from afar and swam very fast underwater from shore to investigate.

Details were released on the fatal attack. The couple was in a 14-ft canoe in 2-1/2 feet of water and passed over and/or bumped the back of the gator who was just resting underwater. The 11-1/2 foot gator was startled and reacted defensively, knocking the 61-yr old woman into the water and killing her :(

.... my Dateline instincts cause me to wonder if they've completely ruled out the husband pushing the wife out of the boat? :cool:

While I know exactly where to go to see gators (Lake Alice, Paynes Prairie) I've not seen one while out and about on our local rivers or a few local ponds/lakes. I know they are there though....

In 1982, I bought two foot long caimen. They grew an inch a month and I had them for three years. Went from a 55 gal tank to a 100. When I got custody of my two young boys, I donated them to a licensed reptile raising guy.

They never, ever were friendly. Very protective of each other. I would let them loose in the house to roam around when no body but me there. Having to put them back in the tank was tough. The tail swinging was just about as bad as their teeth. Got a couple scars. Anything I put in the tank would get eaten as long as it was moving.

PSA (I'm pretty sure this applies to FL too)

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Friendly, sure.
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Them folks down in Oz go about it a bit differently
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>>> In 1982, I bought two foot long caimen. They grew an inch a month and I had them for three years. Went from a 55 gal tank to a 100. When I got custody of my two young boys, I donated them to a licensed reptile raising guy.

They never, ever were friendly. Very protective of each other. I would let them loose in the house to roam around when no body but me there. Having to put them back in the tank was tough. The tail swinging was just about as bad as their teeth. Got a couple scars. Anything I put in the tank would get eaten as long as it was moving.<<<

^^^ That's interesting. They do say even the small ones (2-3 footers) can be very dangerous. Although at least they're not going to pull you underwater in a death roll.

"if dat water wet, you got gators!" :D

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1746644914.jpg

Yep, gotta be careful of the death roll!

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2000-2004, I worked with a lot of folks from Louisiana. I love the accent, and something else that I noticed is that being funny seems to be a part of the culture. There were more funny folks in that group than in most groups, and the funny just popped out all of the time, usually very dry humor. I miss working with them.

Yep ... I'd get bigly fat LMAO ... I used to watch Justin Wilson a lot years ago....

How y'all are :)?

Sounds like a case of FA and FO!

At least the husband didn't do something stupid like jump in and try to save her!

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^^^ Amazing how much effort that took to pull the jaws open on that little gator!

I would try to save my dog, for sure!

And then he got his hands stuck in there!

Yeah, that is one of the tricks with gators - all of their mouth muscles are geared towards biting down and they have minimal opening strength.

You can hold the mouth on a big 'un closed really easy, check the u toob vids and you'll see it is common to just hold 'em shut at the nose with one hand. Good luck prying it open if the gator wants it closed ....

Well, I'm happier than a buzzard on a gut truck!

"Friendly gators" and "harmless Pit Bulls" :rolleyes: