away, and occasionally eat a golf ball. Al- 

 ligators are known to ingest stones, pine 

 cones, and other nonfood items that are re- 

 tained in a part of the stomach equivalent 

 to a bird's gizzard. Such materials may 

 help grind food that is swallowed whole. 



One preeminent question a person 

 should ask when wading through swamps 

 and along lake margins in search of North 

 America's largest reptile is whether alliga- 

 tors attack hunians. After all, male Ameri- 

 can alligators often grow to more than thir- 

 teen feet and females to nine feet. This 

 particular six-foot animal was impressive, 

 too; and enough rare and spectacular re- 

 ports of seemingly unprovoked attacks on 

 humans had made me aware that alligators 

 can be highly dangerous. Plus, this alliga- 

 tor was a mother, and the good behavior 

 record of mother alligators had been tar- 

 nished before, especially in situations 

 when maternal instinct overrode a pre- 

 sumably innate fear of humans. 



Alligators have a problem faced by a lot 

 of us — you can pick your friends but not 

 your relatives. Not that alligators have 

 many friends, but as one of almost two 

 dozen crocodilian species, they do have 

 some notorious Old World kin. Instances 

 of crocodiles eating humans in Africa and 

 Indonesia mean that New World crocodil- 

 ians will never be completely above suspi- 

 cion. Yet American alligators, if unmo- 

 lested, are shy and peaceful and, based on 

 the evidence, do not consider humans a 

 standard menu item. They unfortunately 

 exemplify how a species can have its nat- 

 ural rights violated because of public mis- 

 understanding. 



I took two students, Jeff Lovich and 

 Tony Mills, out at night to make the cap- 

 ture. Night is usually the best time to find 

 alligators, both big and small, because of 

 the reflective eyeshine that ranges from 

 red to yellow. This particular September 

 night was absolutely gorgeous, the perfect 

 setting for a Gothic novel. The light from 

 the recently risen flill moon was sphntered 

 by pine and palmettos and turned the fair- 

 way into slivers of white, black, and 

 shades of gray. Scattered ground fog and 

 mist gave the surroundings an eerie ap- 

 pearance, and the only sounds were a dis- 

 tant chorus of green tree frogs and the 

 hooting of a faraway barred owl. We 

 peered ahead searching for the pond 

 where the alligators lived. 



With Tony being six four and Jeff six 

 two, I anticipated no problem in handling 

 this six-foot mother alligator. I even 

 brought along my twelve-year-old son 

 Michael to watch the show. When we got 



to the lake, our flashlights revealed the re- 

 flected red eyeshine of a pair of gator eyes. 

 The big, gleaming eyes were surrounded 

 by what seemed like a swarm of fireflies 

 on the water's surface — two dozen pairs of 

 little yellow eyes, those of the babies. 



Our plan: We had a noose attached to a 

 cable on a bamboo pole. When the mother 

 came near shore, we planned to slip the 

 noose over her head and pull it tightly 

 around her neck. We would then put big 

 rubber bands on her snout to keep the 

 mouth closed while we carried her back to 

 the jeep. Her plan: Swim around in the 

 middle of the lake with the babies. And so 

 she did. Our revised plan: Catch one of the 

 babies. Since baby alligators in distress 

 make a distinctive grunting sound, the 

 mother should come close to shore to in- 

 vestigate. When she got close enough, we 

 could snare her with the noose, and that 

 would be it. 



Most of the babies were with the 

 mother, but a few adventurous ones were 

 in the vegetation along the shore, perhaps 

 foraging for crustaceans and insects. (Alli- 

 gators more than five feet long will eat any 

 creature inhabiting the land or water that 

 they can catch and swallow, including 

 muskrats, cottonmouths, fish, turtles, rac- 

 coons, and waterfowl.) We walked around 

 the edge of the lake and caught one of the 

 babies. It immediately started making the 

 sound of a frightened baby aUigator and, 

 to our satisfaction, along came the mother. 

 The two crimson eyes headed straight to- 

 ward the shore, fast. I handed the baby al- 

 ligator to Michael; the rest of us hid be- 

 hind two big pine trees. 



As the mother reached the shoreline, 

 Tony got ready to jump down and use the 

 noose. Only she didn't slow down at the 

 water's edge. The next thing we knew, she 

 was up on land with a startlingly loud hiss, 

 lumbering toward Michael as fast as her 

 chunky legs could carry her. Her heavy 

 tail swished against the sweet myrtle 

 bushes along the shoreline. The crushed 

 leaves filled the air with a pleasant, per- 

 fumy scent incongruous with the charging, 

 hissing reptile. 



Michael was holding the baby up in the 

 air and saying, "Dad, Dad, what do you 

 want me to do now?" Being trained pro- 

 fessionals, we each offered expert advice. 

 Jeff said, "Climb a tree!" Tony said, 

 "Throw the baby in the lake!" I said, 

 "Run!" Responding to my attempt at 

 parental care, Michael turned and disap- 

 peared into the woods, still holding this 

 squeaking toy of an alligator. With a slight 

 head start, a scared twelve-year-old can 



run a lot faster than an angry alligator, but 

 the mother was still in pursuit. 



She was moving pretty fast when she 

 passed the three of us, but Tony managed 

 to slip the noose over her head, and Jeff 

 and I grabbed the bamboo pole. We braced 

 ourselves, ready for the cable to tighten. 

 But instead of continuing forward, she 

 abruptly reversed her direction, catching 

 the three of us completely by surprise. She 

 turned back toward the lake, dived into the 

 water, and plunged to the bottom. 



Unfortunately, we all had good grips on 

 the pole. The three of us were yanked 

 down the slippery bank into the lake. The 

 noose had slipped off, and the thought of 

 being in the water with an irate, unfettered 

 mother alligator impelled us to scramble 

 out almost as fast as we had gone in. 

 Michael emerged from the woods and re- 

 turned the baby to the water. With some 

 discussion about safer and more success- 

 ful previous collecting expeditions, we 

 slunk home in defeat. 



Catching an alligator should have been 

 no problem for trained professionals from 

 an ecology lab, but this encounter left me 

 with some questions about how well 

 trained we were and whether we should 

 really be classified as professionals. Re- 

 search ecologists must be reminded occa- 

 sionally that they do not know everything 

 about animals, plants, and the environ- 

 ment. Alligators have effectively brought 

 this to my attention more than once. They 

 also serve as a strong reminder that biolo- 

 gists still have much to learn about the be- 

 havior, ecology, and evolutionary relation- 

 ships of even the most familiar species. 



One of our current questions is whether 

 female American aUigators, like birds, di- 

 rectly or indirectly provide food to their 

 young in some situations. This seems like 

 a reasonable extension of their demonstra- 

 bly complex parental care and was one 

 reason we wanted a mother alUgator with 

 recenfly bom young. I still have not ob- 

 served a mother alligator feeding her 

 young. However, after seeing the intense 

 interest at least one mother had for taking 

 care of her oiTspring, I feel certain that if 

 parental feeding by alUgators does not al- 

 ready exist, evolutionarily it may be only a 

 baby step away. 



J. Whitfield Gibbons is a University of 

 Georgia professor of ecology at the Sa- 

 vannah River Ecology Laboratory. This 

 article is adapted from his new book, 

 Keeping All the Pieces: Perspectives on 

 Natural History and the Environment 

 (Smithsonian Institution Press, 1993). 



6 Natural History 3/94 



