HANDS HEADLINES

It’s well known that alligators inhabit many of the thousands upon thousands of lakes and ponds which speckle central Florida. They typically are not aggressive and keep their distance from humans. . . .Usually.

Usually, that is until you ride your bicycle alongside a conservation area with some tall grass – perfect for hiding alligators. Last Friday exactly this happened to me as I came within about 18inches of a 5 foot alligator!!

Conservation areas are “natural areas” which land developers by law must include in larger developments to help preserve some of the wetlands in central Florida. More often than not, these conservation areas include at least one pond and lots of dense grass/bushes/trees. If I were an alligator, I would like to hang out in one.

Friday morning on my normal bike commute to the office, I was pedaling along my normal route: A wide asphalt sidewalk trail which runs parallel to a rode heading to the office. A conservation area backs up to the sidewalk trail. So, as you ride to the office, the road is on your left and the conservation area is immediately to your right. The grass gets very high during the summer. And, by law, the grass must remain “natural” – meaning that no one can cut or trim it beyond a certain point.

So, now that you have the context, here is what happened:

1. I was pedaling along the asphalt trail at my normal moderate 8-10mph.
2. The whole width of the trail was at my disposal, yet for some reason I was hugging the right side.
3. At least once I thought, “Man, this grass is tall. I guess it’ll just grow out of control till the end of summer.”
4. As I glanced down, the corner of my eye caught a dark green blur buried within the grass.
5. “Yikes. That was a gator!” I said something of this sort aloud.
6. My bike tires were no more than 18 inches away from him.
7. My first thought was, “Keep pedaling, hard!”
8. Then, after I had put some distance down the trail, I turned around, crossed the road, and tried to gain an observation point to see the gator.
9. Quickly I saw what he was interested in: an armadillo (or what was left of him) had become roadkill in the middle of the road beside the trail.
10. After just a couple of minutes, the gator emerged from the grass and came right up to the curb!
11. He was aware of me, but had his eye on the roadkill.
12. After a few minutes of sitting still, he did a 180 and returned to the grass. (I guess he decided the roadkill wasn’t worth it after all).
13. Later I saw him returning to a pond in the conservation area.

After all this, I KICKED MYSELF for not taking a photo. I even had our digital camera in my backpack, just forgot! It was one of those memories that needed to be captured to share, but will definitely stay etched in my mind for a while.

If you want to see some good photos of gators found in some ponds very close to where we live, my friend Rob has a couple you need to see: Rob’s gator photo #1 Rob’s gator photo #2