ALLIGATORS WILL EAT YOU

By Trey Rusk 

 

I was raised on the Texas Coastal Prairie. My father taught me how to hunt and fish. I fished, hunted and camped most of Southeast Texas. I don’t hunt or camp out any longer but as a young man, my friends and I slept on the ground and rose early in search of wild game.

 

I live close to Dickinson Bayou. Alligators inhabit the bayou in large numbers. I visited a county park where a bayou tributary is popular for kayakers.  There were two kids rowing a kayak a stone's throw from the main bayou. At the entrance to the bayou was the head of a large alligator popping up out of the water. I yelled, to the kayakers that a gator was nearby. They continued paddling away.

 

I remember a Game Warden telling me that if you see one alligator, there are probably several watching you. Alligators were once a protected species. In 1984, the Texas Parks and Wildlife legalized alligator hunting because they were becoming a nuisance. When a nuisance usually grows on average to 11 feet in length, there can be problems.

 

I’m always amazed at people who can’t believe their pets have disappeared when they live on the bank of a bayou. These are not uncommon events and all small mammals including children are at risk. Just ask any Disney World employee where in 2016 a two-year-old child was dragged from the bank of a resort lake by a large alligator while his father desperately attempted to pull the boy’s head from the alligator.

 

In 2015, a Tommie Woodward dove into the water from a Marina/Bar on the Sabine River in Orange, Texas.   “Please do not go swimming, there’s a bigger alligator out here. Just please stay out of the water,” witness and marina employee Michelle Wright said she told Woodward. 

She said the next thing she heard was a woman screaming, “An alligator’s got him.” Wright said she used a flashlight in the darkness to scan the water. 

In an emotional interview with KFDM, Wright said, “I saw his body floating face down. And then he’s out there for a couple of seconds and then he’s dragged back down. And then he comes back up still face down and then he gets pulled down again. And then he just disappears.” 

Wright, who said she knew the victim and his family, said it was a moment she would never forget. She described the events that started out as a late-night swim as “heartbreaking.” 

In Texas we call these tragedies a “Hold my beer moment.”

 

The next day, a swamp man named “Bear” killed the gator not far from the Marina/Bar.

 

Pieces of Tommie Woodard were inside the gator. Parks and Wildlife said it was an unlicensed kill but “Bear” was never charged.