What is an Alligator Farm?

By: Glenn Wilsey, Sr.

An alligator farm is a place where, alligators are raised to be sold for their highly prized hides and meat.

I have a great passion for alligators. I own alligators and I love to take walks in the everglades and get as close to wild alligators as I can. I find that the alligators in the wild are much easier to get along with than the alligators I own. In the wild, alligators will try to move away from me and as they do I can follow at a close distance and at times get right up next to them. The alligators I own know what I’m going to do and will always turn to defend themselves. That’s why alligator wrestling is so exciting for the crowds.

A big question that is asked of me all the time is, "Did the alligator heads, teeth and meat that are sold in Gator Park’s gift shop and restaurant come from wild alligators?" Well, in a word, "No." They were not the alligators used in the wrestling show either. All and I do mean "ALL" of the alligator products that are sold or purchased anywhere in the United States come from alligator "FARMS." It is illegal to take "any" alligators, parts, pieces or meat from the wild. Even if you see a dead alligator on the side of the road, you can’t do anything with it. The penalty for getting caught with an alligator or parts of an alligator from the wild can be as high as 90 days in jail or up to a $5.000 fine or both. The point was to make the penalty so severe that no one would want to get caught with any wild alligator parts. So, remember, even if you see an alligator that is dead don’t mess with it.

Alligator farms are great for the alligators in the wild. Alligator farms have taken a lot of pressure off the alligators in the wild as far as being hunted (legally or not) and have helped them in many ways.

Most of the research that goes on concerning alligators is done on alligator farms. What better place to study alligators could there be than an alligator farm where many alligators are together in one place? It means that a scientist doesn’t have to spend half of his or her day looking for alligators before getting on to the business of studying them.

Not much point in hunting alligators with so many alligator farms. Taking alligators from the wild is no longer profitable because alligator products are cheaper now than when they had to be hunted in the wild. Alligator meat is highly prized because it is high in protein and low in fat, much like chicken or fish and it’s tasty too, when properly prepared.

The alligator farmer can get their alligators in many ways.

On farms that have been in operation for many years, there are alligators old enough to lay and hatch their own eggs. The eggs must be counted and entered in a logbook. When the eggs hatch the surviving babies must also be counted and entered in the logbook. Eggs and baby alligators can be bought from other alligator farms and state appointed alligator trappers can collect eggs to sell to alligator farms from the nests of female alligators that had been deemed "nuisance" alligators. When an alligator is deemed a nuisance alligator (such as when one turns up in a neighborhood in someone’s swimming pool) trappers are called upon to remove the nuisance alligator for public safety.

(If the alligator is above a certain size the trapper has to kill it and can then also sell the hide and the meat.)

Some people assume that all an alligator farmer has to do is hatch some baby alligators and the rest takes care of itself. Well, it is a lot more complicated than that.

My friend, Kathy, bought an alligator farm just north of Lake Okeechobee in a small town called Palmdale. She calls her alligator farm "Outback Gator Ranch" (1-863-674-1400). Although her alligator farm came with many alligators, it will still be a couple of years before she will see any cash profit from the farm. Kathy takes care of the farm and also works a full time job. She has to. It takes hard work and determination to operate an alligator farm and it is very expensive just to feed the alligators. Believe me, the alligators do like to eat. Kathy is determined to make the farm a success and I’m sure (in a couple of years) she will make out just fine. In her gift shop there are many alligator products, you can buy anything from alligator hides to alligator boots.

There are so many rules to comply with on an alligator farm. The federal government strictly regulates alligator farms. Because of the strict regulations at Kathy’s farm and others, the paperwork can be as hard as raising the alligators. From the moment you receive alligator eggs you must keep track of them in a logbook. The eggs are put into an incubator, where they stay for 60 to 63 days. The temperature of the egg, will determine the sex of the alligator. The eggs that incubate at a temperature between 90 and 93 degrees Fahrenheit will be males. While the eggs that incubate between 82 and 86 degrees will all be female and anything between those temperatures will be a good 50/50 mix of male and female. When the baby alligators hatch, they will stay in the incubator for a few days. Then the baby alligators will be transferred to the rearing tanks where they will spend the next couple of months. When the babies are about 2 feet long they are transferred to the grow houses. A grow house is nothing more than a huge barn where the temperature is kept at well over 90 degrees. In the grow house the alligators grow about 3 feet per year. Compared to alligators in the wild who wouldn’t reach 3 feet long before they were 4 or 5 years old, if they lived that long, the alligators at the alligator farm have an easy (although short) life.

When an alligator is 5 to 7 feet long it is ready for processing. The alligators will be processed for their hides to be made into luggage, wallets, belts and boots. The heads, feet and teeth will be preserved and turned into anything from necklaces to back scratchers to trophies to hang on the wall. The meat will sell for about $5.00 per pound wholesale and by the time it gets to the retail market, where you can buy it, the meat will be as high as $10.00 per pound. There are many people that say, "DON’T buy ANY products that are made from any animals." However, that’s not really practical in the real world.

There are benefits to farming animals that are otherwise endangered. The alligator was on the endangered species list in the late 1960’s. That means they were protected by law from being hunted or used for their hides and meat, etc., because there were so few of them left in the wild that they were in danger of becoming extinct. That means no more wild alligators. However, by the late1980’s, the alligator was taken off the endangered species list and merely put on the protected species list because of successful alligator farming. Because there are so many alligator farms throughout the southeastern United States to provide the alligator products that people wanted, the wild alligator population increased tremendously in just a few years. The State of Florida even allows limited alligator hunting now. So lets give a big "THUMBS UP" for alligator farms.

I hope this story helped you understand why alligator farms are so important to the alligator in the wild.

Thanks so much for coming to read my story this month, so until next month remember NATURE RULES !!!!!!!

*This story or any part of it can not be used or reproduced with out written permission of the author!