50 Fun Facts About Alligator

How many living species of alligator are there?

The American and the Chinese; several more are known only from fossils, the genus having first appeared about 37 million years ago.

The word 'alligator' is an English mangling of a Spanish phrase meaning what?

Early Spanish settlers in Florida called it el lagarto; early English spellings included 'allagarta' and 'alagarto'.

Alligators are native to only two countries: the United States and which other?

The Chinese alligator, once called the muddy dragon, is confined to a few areas of Anhui province and is critically endangered.

Southern Florida is the only place where alligators live alongside which other wild reptile?

About 2,000 American crocodiles live in Florida, and they were downgraded from endangered to threatened in 2007.

What determines whether an alligator egg hatches as a male or a female?

Nests of 30 °C or cooler produce all females and 34 °C or hotter all males, so a nest built on leaves runs hotter than one on wet marsh.

What is the easiest way to tell an alligator's closed mouth from a crocodile's?

A crocodile's lower teeth fit into grooves outside the upper jaw, giving it the famous 'toothy grin'.

An alligator's snout is usually described as which shape, compared with a crocodile's?

A 2012 study of 23 crocodilian species found surprisingly little link between snout shape and bite force.

Roughly how many teeth does an adult American alligator have?

Juveniles start with small needle-like teeth for insects and fish that thicken as they move on to turtles and birds.

Alligators swallow stones that sit in the first part of their stomach. What are these called?

They grind up food much like the gizzard of a bird, which makes sense given that crocodilians are birds' closest living relatives.

Which type of sound in male alligators' mating bellows makes the water over their backs 'dance'?

In April and May large groups form 'bellowing choruses' a few times a day, usually one to three hours after sunrise.

Which order of reptiles, including alligators, are the closest living relatives of birds?

Both are the only survivors of the Archosauria, and crocodilians appeared about 83.5 million years ago.

In which year was the American alligator removed from the endangered species list as recovered?

It had been listed in 1967 under a law that preceded the Endangered Species Act, after hunting for hides nearly wiped it out.

The American alligator is the official state reptile of Florida, Louisiana and which third state?

Its scientific name, Alligator mississippiensis, honours the river rather than the state.

Adult male American alligators typically measure how long?

The largest ever reported was a 5.84 m animal killed on Marsh Island, Louisiana, in 1890, though no specimen was kept to prove it.

The largest alligator ever reported, over 19 feet, was killed in 1890 by a member of which Louisiana family?

Edward McIlhenny, of the hot-sauce family, left it on the bank because it was too heavy to move, so no specimen survives.

Alligators dig small ponds that hold water through the dry season. What are these ponds called?

The habit is why the species is regarded as a keystone species and ecosystem engineer of the Everglades.

Which surprising food was documented in American alligator diets in 2013?

Wild grapes, elderberries and citrus were found in their stomachs, meaning gators may spread seeds across their habitat.

Which invasive South American rodent, a Louisiana marsh menace, is a favourite alligator meal?

Louisiana pays a bounty on them, and gators may be what stops them spreading east into the Everglades.

Alligators have been filmed killing and eating which unexpected marine animals?

Bonnetheads, lemon sharks, nurse sharks and stingrays have all turned up in the diet, and sharks return the favour by preying on gators.

What urban myth surrounded Saturn, the alligator who died at Moscow Zoo in 2020 aged 83 or 84?

He hatched in Mississippi, lived at the Berlin Zoo, which Hitler liked to visit, and was found by British soldiers three years after the zoo was destroyed.

Muja, the oldest alligator in captivity, has lived at a zoo in which European capital since 1937?

He survived the Axis and Allied bombings of the city in World War II and the NATO bombing of 1999.

The Chinese alligator is thought to have inspired what mythical creature?

Marco Polo was the first outsider to write about it, and it appears in the Classic of Poetry composed as early as the 11th century BC.

The wild Chinese alligator population fell below what number in 2001 before slowly recovering?

It had been about 1,000 in the 1970s and was back to roughly 300 by 2017.

Sewer inspectors first reported alligators beneath which US city in 1935, seeding the urban legend?

The city still rescues several small alligators a year, most of them abandoned illegal pets found above ground.

Gatorade was invented in 1965 by a team of University of Florida researchers led by which physician?

It was made at the request of football coach Ray Graves, and the team considered 'Gator-Aid' before dropping the suffix to avoid FDA medical claims.

The University of Florida football team adopted the 'Gators' nickname in which year?

A Gainesville merchant had put an alligator on pennants in 1908 because it was native to the state and no other school had claimed it.

What are the names of the Florida Gators' costumed male-and-female mascot pair?

She joined him in 1984, and they are the only male-female mascot duo in the SEC.

The Gator Bowl, held continuously since 1946, is played in which Florida city?

It was the first college bowl game to be televised nationally, and the first edition was underwritten with $10,000.

'Alligator Alley' is the nickname for which interstate's stretch across the Everglades from Naples?

The extension south to Naples and then east was approved in 1968 and the last piece of I-75 opened in 1993.

Which attraction, opened in 1893, became in 1993 the first place to display every species of crocodilian?

It began as a sideshow at the end of a railway to get visitors to buy souvenirs; the reptiles soon became the main draw.

Alligator meat has been described as tasting most like which other meat?

The tail and backbone are the prized cuts, and it turns up in Louisiana Creole gumbo.

Which History series, first aired in 2010, follows alligator hunters in the Atchafalaya Basin?

Louisiana's alligator season starts on the first Wednesday in September and lasts just 30 days.

In the 1980 film 'Alligator', the giant reptile reaches the sewers after being flushed down what?

The baby gator, named Ramon, was bought at a Florida tourist trap in 1968 before the girl's father disposed of it in Missouri.

Despite its name, the alligator gar is what kind of animal?

It is one of North America's largest freshwater fish, armoured in bone-like ganoid scales that are nearly impenetrable.

The alligator snapping turtle lures fish using a worm-like appendage on which body part?

It is North America's largest freshwater turtle and gets its name from the ridged, gator-like shell.

Which 438,000-acre peat swamp on the Georgia-Florida border is famous for its alligators?

Its name is usually translated 'land of trembling earth' but probably comes from a Hitchiti phrase meaning 'bubbling water'.

Everglades National Park was the first US national park created to protect what?

It protects the southern fifth of the original Everglades and holds the largest mangrove ecosystem in the Western Hemisphere.

Alligators become sluggish and stop eating in winter in a state that is properly called what?

Go long enough without a meal and they begin consuming their own fat reserves through a process called autophagy.

Alligators first appeared in the fossil record roughly how long ago?

Fossil skulls almost identical to today's American alligator have been found in Florida dating back seven or eight million years.

Alligators and caimans belong to which family?

The family has eight living species: the two alligators and six caimans, of which the black caiman may be the only one longer than an American gator.

Alligators generally reach sexual maturity at roughly what length?

Mating season is late spring, when big groups gather in 'bellowing choruses' shortly after sunrise.

Everglades is the third-largest national park in the contiguous US, after Death Valley and which other?

It protects the largest tropical wilderness in the US and was dedicated in 1947.

The strongest laboratory-measured bite of any living animal was once recorded from an American alligator at what force?

The same lab later measured over 16,000 N in saltwater crocodiles; the muscles that open a gator's jaw are so weak that tape holds it shut.

How does a brumating alligator breathe when the water surface freezes over?

Alligators live farther from the equator than any other crocodilian; a crocodile would drown in water of 45 °F or less.

At roughly what age do male American alligators stop growing, according to a 2016 study?

Females stop at about 31; the old belief that alligators never stop growing has been overturned.

How many eggs, about the size of a goose egg, does a female American alligator typically lay?

She buries them in decaying vegetation whose heat incubates them for about 65 days, then carries the yelping hatchlings to water in her mouth.

What colour are the camouflage bands on hatchling American alligators?

Hatchlings gather in pods guarded by their mother and are hunted by large fish, birds, raccoons and adult gators.

Which two Florida tribes originated alligator wrestling, initially as a way to obtain food?

It became a tourist spectacle from the late 1880s and remains popular despite animal-rights criticism.

Roughly how many alligator hides do farms in Georgia, Florida, Texas and Louisiana produce a year combined?

Hides in the 6–7 foot range have fetched $300 each, and about 300,000 pounds of meat are produced annually.

How many Floridians did American alligators kill in less than a week in May 2006?

Since 1948 Florida has logged about 257 attacks, roughly five a year, with an estimated 23 deaths.