Whee! The alligator slide, photo from the State Library and Archives of Florida.
I don’t know what it is about alligators, but they seem to wind up in comical, bizarre situations. For a few years I’ve been collecting stories about their run-ins with humans, and let me tell you, reading all these different articles is like looking through a window into a world of weird.
Over the past week, I’ve been reading through hundreds of news reports about alligators from 2011, trying to whittle it down to ten of the wildest. It wasn’t easy, but I did it and the list follows. Some are just plain odd; some are pretty cool. I didn’t include many poaching, hunting, or alligator-in-strange-states stories (over the past year, alligators turned up in Rhode Island, Pittsburgh, Tennessee, among other states where it gets too cold), because those stories are so plentiful every year, and there were so many other crazy ones to write about.
Anyways, here are, in no particular order, the ten craziest alligator stories from 2011:
1. Not just an alligator, but an orange one: Orange alligator spotted in Florida. I’ve actually heard of this happening around where I live. Alligators den underground through the winter, and often emerge stained the same color as the dirt they’ve been lying in. Considering this one was seen in January, at a time when alligators are spending time underground, I think it’s safe to say, no, this alligator didn’t “eat too many navel oranges.”
2. If the gators don’t scare you, this guy will: Florida man arrested for cutting off an alligator’s tail. According to reports, he was driving, saw the alligator, bludgeoned it with a stick, and cut off the tail using a knife he kept in his “Taco Bell pants,” which only makes it weirder because I don’t think they were ever able to verify that he worked at Taco Bell.
3. If he weren’t bustin’ a sag, this guy could have lost his leg: Baggy pants saved him from seven-foot alligator. No one will ever catch him in a pair of skinny jeans again.
4. You really have to be careful with those doggie doors: Florida woman finds six-foot-alligator in her bathroom. When I told Matt about this one, he topped it. He said a lady once called his work because her kitchen was filled with baby alligators–they’d all come through the doggie door.
5. This one might be my favorite: Man frees his best friend from the jaws of a gator. Usually when an alligator grabs a dog, the dog gets eaten and then the alligator is killed. But this time, the dog got away and the gator hasn’t been seen around there since. Hopefully everyone learned their lessons that day.
6. This alligator accomplished something that many a criminal mind has probably dreamed of doing–he screwed with a cop car: Alligator bites police patrol car. (Follow that link to see the video.) The gator actually caused quite a bit of damage, too.
As a bonus, here’s another funny story involving the police: Police shoot alligator lawn ornament, mistaking it for live animal. It’s okay! We all make mistakes.
7. This story makes me really happy I’m not dating: Man kept alligator as a pet to impress the ladies. Apparently, coming out and admitting something like that is, among other things, unimpressive. He later denied the whole thing.
8. Cars that run on gator fat? Maybe, according to scientists at University of Louisiana in Lafayette: Alligator fat can be converted to biodiesel. According to the article, the gator meat processing industry dumps 15 million pounds of fat a year. Something they should obviously reconsider.
9. So, I guess they can live in the sewers: Baby alligator survives a flush. The poor little guy made it all the way to a waste water treatment plant, where he was found in a dumpster of filtered-out trash.
10. And last but not least, alligator-infested moats are no laughing matter, Mr. President: Obama’s comment about alligators on the border causes a right-wing stir. Those Republicans sure can’t take a joke.
So there you have it, folks: the ten coolest alligator stories of 2011.
What’s your favorite?
Very interesting and suprising. Learned lots from the stories.
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