Alligator control, Montana style:
http://www.dailyinterlake.com/articles/2006/08/01/news/news01.txt
Kalispell is were THE dave lives…
Boys reel in 5-foot, 60-pound alligator in Kalispell pond
Some birthdays stand out as exceptionally memorable; 16 and 21 usually make the list.
Josh Bryant will never forget his 11th birthday, when he came nose to snout with a 5-foot alligator in Kalispell.
On Monday afternoon, Josh and his mother, Lynn, were trying out the new fishing pole she’d given him for his birthday. The Shady Lane fishing pond near the old Steel Bridge, where he spends three or four days a week during the summer, seemed the perfect place to test the rod.
It was about 4 p.m. when Lynn Bryant spotted something swimming toward them.
“I thought it was a muskrat,” she said.
Then she took a closer look. Muskrats didn’t swim with just their eyes and back ridges sticking out of the water.
The Bryants couldn’t believe their eyes, but there was no doubt the animal swimming toward them was an alligator. Bryant moved to the edge of the dock and started taking pictures with her camera phone, knowing no one would believe them otherwise.
At first the alligator was almost friendly, she said, but they still wanted to get it out of the water so someone could come take care of it. A friend grabbed Josh’s pole and tried to hook the gator. He succeeded a few times, but each time the alligator simply swallowed the lure.
A few more would-be fishermen showed up soon after. One of them had a stronger pole; he, too, tried to catch the alligator but once again it swallowed the proffered minnow, hook and all.
By this time, onlookers had called friends and soon a crowd of about 50 people had gathered. Some simply watched. Others tried to help subdue the alligator, which was now agitated.
“This thing was very aggressive,” Bryant said.
“It was snapping at us kids and adults,” Josh added.
Someone brought a bow and shot it. They knew the alligator had been hit because the arrow was sticking straight up, Josh said. Then the arrow — and the alligator — disappeared for almost an hour. Suspense mounted on the banks of the pond.
“It was like a serial killer movie or something, a killer alligator,” Josh said.
The gator didn’t stay down for good, though. When it surfaced, the crowd was ready.
“His dad jumped in the water,” Josh said, pointing at his friend, Kaynen McGuire.
McGuire, 11, nodded. His father had plunged in the water with a stick, grabbed the alligator by the tail and swung it onto the bank.
“This was right out of ‘Crocodile Dundee,’ I swear,” Bryant said.
Four men held it down and tied its jaws shut with fish stringer, then put it in a canoe and dragged it up to the road. Someone produced a knife and tried to slit the animal’s throat. Still it didn’t die.
“This thing’s got like nine lives,” Bryant said.
The Flathead County Sheriff’s Office didn’t hear about the incident until about 10 p.m., according to dispatch logs. When Deputy Ray Young arrived, he called Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks, which referred him to U.S. Fish and Wildlife. By this time, the alligator was in bad shape, so the federal agency told Young to shoot it.
Brian Sommers, regional investigator with Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks, got the call around 10:40 p.m.
“When I got there, it was pretty much over and done with,” he said. “It was just talking with the people that were there and picking up the critter.”
The “critter” will go in a freezer at the Fish, Wildlife and Parks office, Sommers said. He’s not sure what the agency will do with it.
He’s also not sure where the alligator came from.
“The only thing I can guess is it was probably somebody’s pet,” he said. “Maybe they got tired of it and turned it loose.”
Sommers has had to deal with pet alligators in the past, he said, but only a few and only animals about 20 inches long. At 5 feet long and roughly 60 pounds, Monday’s alligator was the largest he’s ever seen in the area.
If found, the person responsible will be charged for releasing the alligator into the wild, he said.
“Given the right circumstances, we could’ve had a pretty big problem if it got hold of a kid swimming or something,” he said.
If anyone has information about how the alligator got into the pond, call 1-800-TIP-MONT or call Crimestoppers at 752-TIPS.
Even though it’s now alligator-free, Josh won’t be fishing at the pond anytime soon.
“It was just my 11th birthday, and I had to catch an alligator,” he said. “Why couldn’t I catch a little trout?”
I like my chances in an encounter with a mere 60 pounder.
Im with Obie…They really should have shot it with a bow, then slit its throat, then shot it again…They should have called animal control and let the pros take care of it.
Who would have thought that you could go trolling for alligators in MT! I thought you had to go to the sewer to find them in the northern climates.
Alligators have been known to swim up the Mississippi River to the Memphis area. Sightings still create a bit of excitement.
Whoever let the critter go in the lake should have known it would end up dead. I am sure it would not have lived through the Montana winter.
lol … something like that around here might be on the news, but it def. wouldn’t be that big of a deal lol there was a gator PLACED by texas parks and wildlife in the freshwater pond near my house (theres also a saltwater pond or 2)
I also see them when I am water skiing in the aransas river
wooohoo i want to teach an alligator to ride a unicycle
this is montana, 90% of pickup trucks have a bow or 2-3 rifles in the back window all the time. Im more surprised that someone didnt just shoot it with a gun right away. Thats what animal control would have done.
that pond freezes a good 3-4 feet deep in the winter… so the alligator could not have been there very long. not a chance it could survive a winter here.
i am surprised that some guy grabbed it and swung it onto the bank though… but i guess people drag cows around by the neck here so maybe the guy just thought it was a mutated cow? okay… bad idea…
Okay, at five foot long and sixty pounds in weight, I doubt that was an American alligator.
I’ve lived in Florida for fifteen years, and at five foot, a gator is still pretty thin, twenty to thirty pounds, tops. After they reach the six foot size, they increase in weight dramatically for every inch longer they grow.
More than likely, that was a caymen, a South American animal of the same family. They are much smaller at adulthood, and a Five footer could easily reach sixty pounds.
Few people recognize the difference, and I’ve actually have been scouting with my son when ‘Audobun’ or some such group gave a lecture on endangered species. They included an “Alligator” handbag, to show how these animals skins were used. -Unfortunately, their bag was a caymen, easy to spot when I had one as a pet when I was young.
Gators are protected by federal law, I can’t believe there was no one arrested for attempting to kill one, except again if it was a caymen.
Of course, I could be wrong, an overfed pet…
alligators in montana?!? WTF?