[Big-Un]

A few years ago the Fish and Wildlife Commission posted a picture of the results of a python trying to eat a gator...they both died! The gator was a six footer so you can imagine the size of the snake. Also, a few years back a boy scout on a conoeing trip with his troop was attacked and killed by a gator in full sight of his friends. The water was only two feet deep and the scouts were pushing their canoes to shore when he attacked. They found the boy stuffed under an embankment, the logical place to look as gators stash their prey under water to "age" so they can be eaten more easily. Not a pretty sight, but that is the way nature is.

Yes Tim, I understand gator licenses are issued by the Game Commission, and I applied for one every year until I moved to NC in '02, but it is by lottery and somehow all the ex-poachers always got a license while us poor saps obeying the law (mostly) never got drawn. I won't say it was rigged, but it sure was funny how the "experienced" hunters were always chosen.

If you run across any young gators, leave them alone! Bull gators eat the young and Mama gator is fierce about protecting them. We ran across a gator nest in the everglades while hunting and decided to play with them. They were less than a foot long overall, but when Mama gator started charging us through the knee deep water and sawgrass, it was all we could do to get back on the swamp buggy in time. They are faster in their element than on land, and they are extremely fast there. I can't reiterate it enough...LEAVE THE LITTLE ONES ALONE!