RE: Alligator warning!

[wssfetch]

 
Over the past few days newspapers carried the stories of two different fatal alligator attacks that occured in Florida over the past week.  One was a beloved family dog snatched in his back yard and killed right in front of his owners eyes. The other was a 12 year old boy swimming off a dock.  Both occured in central Florida in residential areas.
 
 If you are going to vacation in Florida be careful about your kids or pets near any natural body of water--especially around dusk and around docks or boat landings.  Many gators hang around these areas because they have been fed by visitors or residents or because they are attracted to chum left by cleaning fish at the dock or landing.  Right now most of Florida has had excessive rainfall and many small streams and rivers have widened or overflowed their banks.   Those of us who have lived here all our lives know that during the monsoons any low spot can become a pond and any body of water  can become gator habitat.
 
 Relatively safe areas to swim would be ice cold natural springs and areas where there is wide sandy beach with littel or no vegetation around the edges to hide the gators.  Alligators tend to be nocturnal so avoid a midnight dip in the lake and keep your pets on lead!
 
 

[jpreiser]

 wssfetch
I use to live on a lake in central florida before moving to New Jersey.... you could always see gators sunning themselves on the banks, yet people still swam in the water crazy ...

[sandykayak]

 wssfetch
i m afraid i m one of those crazy people who likes to take a dip in the river, lake, spring, ocean etc....
 
 used to be that the gators ran away from people, but the populations are growing (I m becoming a convert to supporting gator hunting, I m afraid) and there do seem to be more gator attacks.  darn
 
 gatorburger anyone?

[wssfetch]

 wssfetch
Yeah, they are EVERYWHERE!  
 
 Hey, whn you go to Silver River SP in the fall, take a road trip to Cross Creek and visit Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings home where she wrote THE YEARLING.  And then stop by the Yearling Restaurant down the road.  Wonderful food and atmosphere. And they gator tail po  boys.  Very tasty, tender meat.  Maybe Publix should start stocking it.

[sandykayak]

 wssfetch
been there...done that....  Cross Creek was on my wish list for years and finally made it about 3 years ago...tis a lovely place.
 
 as for gatorburgers...i get mine at the Desert Inn at Yeehaw Junction.  used to go to Blue Cypress Lake but those gators are just too damn many and too damn big.
 
 I kept paddling next to someone else so we d look humongous to the gators.
 
 pity...the camping is free