New Study Reveals Alligators Feed On Sharks!

It's long been known that alligators eat all kinds of animals like fish, insects, snails, crustaceans, turtles, birds, deers and other stuff when given the opportunity.

Now, a new study published in the Southeastern Naturalist, comes to add one more item to the menu, sharks! Yes, you heard that right. Alligators eat sharks! Don't believe me? Here's a photo:

Alligator capturing a Nurse Shark (credit)

Unfortunately, the study is a bit disappointing because it doesn't report battles of epic proportions between gators and white sharks or something. As expected, the researchers found that alligators feed on small shark species and stingrays:

"In the article, we documented alligators consuming four new species of sharks and one species of stingray." said James Nifong, first author of the study. [2]

The four species Nifong talks about are:

Ginglymostoma cirratum (Nurse Shark)
Sphyrna tiburo(Bonnethead Shark)
Negaprion brevirostris (Lemon Shark)
Dasyatis sabina (Atlantic Stingray

Nurse Shark (credit)

Before this study, there wasn't much info in the published scientific literature about alligators preying on sharks, other than one case"reported by Tamarack (1993), who provided putative evidence (embedded spines in the jaw and head) of Dasyatis americana Hildebrand and Schroeder (Southern Stingray) depredation by a 314-cm total length (TL) male and a 158-cm TL female Alligator captured near St. Catherines Island."

Now, you maybe wondering. Alligators are fresh water animals. Sharks and stingrays are saltwater animals. How can the two meet or something?

Well, here's the catch.. Although alligators are freshwater animals, they can somewhat tolerate saltwater for a while, despite their lack of salt glands.

It's not uncommon for them to enter salt water just to move to another source of freshwater or for some quick foraging when they can't find anything else to prey on. The opposite is true for some sharks and stingrays as well.

Furthermore, alligators seem to have some nice tricks up their sleeve:

"Alligators seek out fresh water in high-salinity environments. When it rains really hard, they can actually sip fresh water off the surface of the salt water. That can prolong the time they can stay in a saltwater environment." said Nifong. [2]

I guess this is what Nifong had in mind when he set out to find if alligators feed on sharks. And boy oh boy, he did come up with some really hard proof.

Here are two more photos taken from his paper, I don't think much else needs to be said:

Alligator capturing and consuming a Bonnethead Shark in a salt marsh (credit)

Alligator captures an Atlantic Stingray in the upper Banana River Estuary of Cape Canaveral (credit)

Other than providing us with four separate and confirmed instances of American alligators eating sharks, the paper also provide us with many historical anecdotal accounts from the past, indicating that gators might occasionally feed on sharks. There are some really cool stories that are definitely worth a read.

For example, he mentions a story back from 5th October 1877 when the sports magazine "The Fishing Gazette" published an article named “Alligator and Shark Fight”, reporting an epic battle between American Alligators and sharks of unknown species that took place in a tidal inlet near Jupiter, Florida.

Another cool story, comes from 1888 from the article “Sharks and Alligators: Furious duel on the coast of Florida”, about a clash between 5 or 6 American Alligators as witnessed by a group of fisherman in the tidal Indian River, Florida. According to the fishermen, the sharks gave the gators a run for their money as they managed to remove some of their forelimbs and parts of the tail. By the end of the battle, many sharks and alligators suffered fatal wounds and died.

Although these two stories sound (and probably are) over-exaggerated, it turns out there is some truth in them!

Overall, I have to say I found this to be one of the most interesting papers I have read in a while, both from a scientific and a historical perspective :)

Here are some of my latest posts, I hope you enjoy them:

References

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New Study Reveals Alligators Feed On Sharks!

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