88 year old Woman killed in alligator attack in South Carol

[bluemingidiot]

"...alligators are most active at night, so only swim in designated swimming areas during daylight hours; never feed an alligator; and keep your pets on a leash and away from the water's edge."

I'm trying to imagine an 88 years old woman, swimming at night, in an area with alligators and water moccasins, perhaps nude.  It's not working.  Which is a good thing.


There are about five million alligators in the U.S. Two million are in Louisiana, more than one million are in Florida.  
Conservation status: Least Concern
Does Louisiana really need two million alligators?

Mass: 500 lbs (Male, Adult), 200 lbs (Female, Adult
Length: 9.8 – 15 ft. (Male, Adult), 8.5 ft. (Female, Adult)
Bite strength: 2,980 pounds

[mogal]

Bluemingidiot, they have the things in Arkansas and Mississippi too. I grew up in NW MS and remember a man whose veracity was without question tell of seeing one so long that as his nose left one side of a gravel road, his tail was just coming onto the other side. Not long after we moved here, there was a news item about a family whose dog was barking incessantly. When the owner went to check, he got pictures of an alligator about 8' long. This happened near Parkin AR, not far from where my family lived since before AR's original statehood in 1836.

An aside: I dated a boy in college whose roommate decided a baby alligator would make a nice pet. That critter was only about a foot long but he had a mouthful of teeth that he knew how to use. The guy ultimately donated him to a zoo. Stitches and a tetanus shot were required.

[bluemingidiot]

We've got a real problem. Wild hogs eat fawns and other fur bearing young. Alligators eat wild hogs, deer, pythons smaller than them, and other mammals. Burmese pythons eat mammals and smaller alligators. “In some regions of Florida, up to 95% of fur-bearing animal populations have disappeared.”

We are going to wind up with wild hogs, alligators, and Burmese pythons. Animals like deer cannot reproduce as quickly as their predators.  Wild fowl will be threatened.  We are going overboard on predators in this country.  Environmentalists will tell you we need predators like alligators and rattlesnakes to keep other populations in check.  But what keeps the predators from wiping out other populations?

[mogal]

I'd say that I hope it's cold enough in this part of Missouri to keep the alligators and pythons at bay but since we already have armadillos that no one thought could survive our winters, I guess anything is possible. You see the armadillos all the time on the sides of the road and we've had 2 in our yard. Briefly.

[Tim Horton]

I'd say that I hope it's cold enough in this part of Missouri to keep the alligators and pythons at bay
--- ---
I have read some papers saying the Burmese python is crossing with a variety of Indian python.. The python from India accidentally or deliberately released into the wild much like how the Burmese problem started.. Bottom line, the cross has the ability to tolerate colder climates thus the possibility of there range spreading to cover a dozen, twenty or more southern and upper eastern states...

To a point, replace the word alligator with bear and you have many parts of the far north...

[gran29]

Aug 16, 2022 21:42:54 GMT mogal said:

Bluemingidiot, they have the things in Arkansas and Mississippi too. I grew up in NW MS and remember a man whose veracity was without question tell of seeing one so long that as his nose left one side of a gravel road, his tail was just coming onto the other side. Not long after we moved here, there was a news item about a family whose dog was barking incessantly. When the owner went to check, he got pictures of an alligator about 8' long. This happened near Parkin AR, not far from where my family lived since before AR's original statehood in 1836.

An aside: I dated a boy in college whose roommate decided a baby alligator would make a nice pet. That critter was only about a foot long but he had a mouthful of teeth that he knew how to use. The guy ultimately donated him to a zoo. Stitches and a tetanus shot were required.

Actually had one - big one - show up in the Searcy, AR area last year.  Nobody seems to have any idea how it got there.  A little farther north than comfortable for me.

[mogal]

Gran29, yep, Searcy is too close to you and to where we lived about 25 years ago near Beebe! At least we were up in the hills, not near any swampy bayous or such. And I nearly freaked the first time I saw a tarantula in my yard down there!

[bluemingidiot]

Never been an 88 years old lady eaten by a tarantula. Scared to death, maybe, but not eaten.