44 THE ALLIGATOR'S LIFE HISTORY 



and quite a number of snakes, but their stomach contents 

 showed that muskrats predominated as their food. The 

 stomach of one six-footer contained one mink, five musk- 

 rats. Another six-footer contained one rabbit, one rail 

 and four muskrats. Many of these alligators were four to 

 five feet long and some of them were over ten feet long, 

 but all of them had been feeding on muskrats. Alligators 

 taken in the bayous, canals and large lakes of these refuges 

 a few weeks after this test, had been feeding entirely on 

 fish, crabs and snakes, with an occasional rabbit, or bird, 

 and only in one was a muskrat found; showing that the 

 food of alligators depends largely on the location from 

 which the reptile is taken. 



I think the great increase in garfish in the inland waters 

 of Louisiana is due entirely to the alligator having been 

 practically exterminated in the bayous and small streams. 

 I think, also, that the large increase of dusky-ducks, rails 

 and muskrats in Louisiana marshes is due to the extermina- 

 tion of the alligator. 



Wherever alligators are abundant there will be a great 

 scarcity of all varieties of water snakes. I have seen 

 wooded ponds on Avery Island in which there were no alli- 

 gators, swarming with a number of variety of water snakes. 

 Alligators would come into the ponds from outside marshes 

 and in a comparatively short time no snakes could be found 

 in or around the pond. I have seen comparatively small 

 alligators, from four to six feet long, catch water snakes 

 that weighed several pounds, and with a few crunches of 

 the jaw kill them, then shift the snake until it was grasped 

 by the head when it would be swallowed whole. 



Alligators seem to know the difference between poison- 

 ous snakes and non-poisonous snakes. When an alligator 

 catches .a cotton-mouth moccasin, which is a poisonous 

 snake, as soon as the snake is grasped in its mouth it is 

 shaken vigorously until quite dead. This shaking makes it 

 impossible for the snake to bite the alligator, possibly in 



