The Gator Story

We had an entertaining thing happen when we were in Big Cypress National Preserve.  Here’s a bit of background information – the campground where we were camping is in an oval shape, and a small lake sits in the middle of it.  It’s a nice walk around it, and people walk their dogs (or themselves) around the lake all the time.  However, as is true with most of Big Cypress, there can be gators in the lake or around the lake.  There are many signs warning folks about the gators, so everyone should be aware.  (Spoiler alert – there’s no bad ending to this story!)  Let’s get started with the story…..

Jeff and I were relaxing in the rig after a morning’s explorations (more about that in another blog).  I was working on some puzzles and looked up to see a young couple with their toddler sitting right by the shore.  Dad was fishing.  They had 2 camp chairs set up, a white blanket for the toddler, a tackle box and fishing poles, a bait or catch bucket and a plastic bag with perhaps lunch in it.  Their rig was almost directly behind them.  It’s very unusual to see anyone sit so close to the shore, due to the gator warnings.  I wondered aloud if I should wander over to them and remind them about the gators, but Jeff said there were plenty of signs warning them, and if they just decided to be dumb, they’d probably take offense to me treating them like they were, in fact, dumb.  Ok, point taken.

 

After a while, Jeff suddenly jumps up and exclaims that the gator (the lake has 2 gators who frequent it) was up on shore where the couple and toddler were.  Thankfully, they had seen the gator and escaped to the safety of the area in the vicinity of their rig.  In fact, Dad was up on the roof, leaving his family on the ground. (Clearly a very brave man – checking out how close the gator would come to his family from 12 feet up.)  By this time, I had gotten my camera and was standing on the opposite shore from the gator activity along with some fellow campers as we were all watching what the gator was going to do, and laughing at the silliness of the family for getting so close to shore, and at Dad for being so macho.

While we were watching the gator checking out his find, another genius drove by in his truck with his 5^th wheel trailer in tow, and stopped to check out the gator.  We couldn’t believe it when he got out of the truck and got WAY too close to the gator to take a photo with his cell phone.  Jeff said that he was clearly a candidate for the Darwin Award.  In case, you aren’t familiar with that award, it is awarded every year to someone who helped to strengthen the human gene pool by removing themselves from it in some way.  Needless to say, the Darwin Award is always give posthumously. 

Once the guy left, the gator busied himself with the lunch or whatever it was in the plastic bag the family had with them.  About half of whatever was in it fell out when he picked up the bag, but he ignored that to focus on what was in the bag.  He ended up taking the bag into the lake and I’m sure wedged it under a log or something.  Just FYI – that’s frequently what gators do.  They take their kill underwater and wedge it somewhere so it gets waterlogged and rots a bit before they completely eat it.  Ugh.

In any event, he stayed in the water, submerged, and we thought perhaps he’d had enough and was going back out however it is the gators get into the lake.  Jeff and I decided to take Max on a walk around the lake, and off we went.  Well, when we circled around to the area where the gator had been, he was back.  We stayed well away from him, putting cars, etc., in between him and us.  The reason these images look like we were fairly close is due to the zoom lens on my camera.  We were not auditioning for the Darwin Awards!!

By the time we got totally around the lake and were back with our fellow campers on the opposite shore, the gator had taken the white blanket into the water to wedge it someplace, and had returned for the rest of what was in the plastic bag.  He munched on that for quite a while.  We all got the idea that he considered all the items on shore as his “kill”.  He’s a gator, so of course, he didn’t know he couldn’t eat the camp chairs, etc.!

When he finally decided to leave again, I was lucky enough to capture the sequence of him deciding and then sliding into the water.  The sequence goes from left to right, first the top row, and then the bottom.  The final image is of his head just barely surfacing after he was totally submerged for a few seconds.  This entire sequence took about 10 seconds or so – they can move quite stealthy and quickly when they want to.  By the way, the family did get to rescue their camp chairs, tackle box, fishing poles and bait/catch bucket.  However, a few hours later, they were again right up on the shore fishing again.  This time, one of the campground hosts went over to talk to them, and the wife (pregnant, by the way), picked up the toddler and just went back to their rig.  Dad, apparently, stayed out there – another candidate for the Darwin Award??

This image if from the following morning.  As we walked Max around the lake, two people were standing on the grassy area, watching (we think) the same gator, just floating in the water.  His head was turned away from us until he noticed Max sitting next to Jeff, as we came up to the people.  Then, he ever so slowly turned around and “drifted” toward us.  He wasn’t really drifting as there was no breeze and the lake was dead calm at the time.  So, altho he looked like he was just floating, he was really propelling himself by using his feet ever so gently – like I said, very stealthy.  We quickly left with Max.  As we got back to our rig, we noticed he did get out of the water again, but was very uninterested in the people sitting up high on a picnic table a safe distance away.  Jeff wanted to nickname Max Gator Bait, but I told him that wasn’t funny.

Enjoy!