Thursday, August 14, 2008

Gator season starts tomorrow

No, not football.
Florida's annual alligator hunting season begins August 15th and runs through November 1st. 4,500 permits, which include the trapping license and hide validation tag were issued for the price of $1021.50 for out of state hunters and the hometown discount price of $271. 50 for Florida residents. This entitles each hunter to harvest two alligators. Hunters are allowed to use hand-held restraining lines and snares, harpoons, gigs, snatch hooks, manually operated spears, spear guns, crossbows and bows with projectiles attached to a restraining line. Alligators are allowed to defend themselves by being alligators.
At first glance, that makes it sound like hunters would certainly seem to have the advantage. Personally, I've always believed that hunters should go out into the wilderness completely naked and equipped with one (1) state-issued knife. Whatever they come back with is theirs to keep. This would include limbs, if applicable. The use of advanced weaponry removes the sporting aspect in my opinion.
But before we concede defeat on behalf of the alligator, there are some factors to consider:
  1. Alligators get homefield advantage - Swamps and marshes are dark and murky, even more so at night when most hunting takes place because that's when alligators are active.
  2. Human beings are kinda stupid - I'm not just picking on hunters. Being a hunter doesn't automatically make you stupid. Plenty of non-hunters are stupid too. Most of them don't willingly go out and pay for the privilege of messing with alligators, though. It doesn't comfort me that there are people out there who have been issued permits to handle weapons when in reality they probably shouldn't be allowed to operate a pair of shoes without supervision. But then, I'm not an alligator.
  3. They're dinosaurs - Alligators have been around for over 200 million years. Consider the fearsome Tyrannosaurus Rex, the Velociraptor and the Pterodactyl. They're all gone but alligators are still here. During all this time, they have remained virtually unchanged, simply because that is just how badass they are. Way back when, some other dinosaur approached the alligators and said "Hey fellas? Listen, we were all just wondering if you wanted to go in with us on evolution. Most of us are seriously considering turning into birds. If that's not your thing, we hear there are some single cell organisms that have some pretty radical ideas about fur and what they're calling 'thumbs'. It sounds kind of far out and they're a long way from any kind of functional prototype but you might want to hear them out. You know, if you're not down with the whole bird thing I mentioned previously." To which the alligators said, "Nah. We're good." This probably aggravated the dinosaur who said "Fine, be that way. But when a massive comet strikes this still-unnamed-at-this-point planet and those of us who planned ahead are flying away to safety, don't come crying to me, okay?" Then the alligators ate that dinosaur because he was kind of being a dick about the whole thing and had already evolved to the point that he tasted like chicken.

1 comment:

janey jay said...

Fascinating and hilarious. As usual.

Although you know I got all excited when I saw the headline and expected to see a picture of Tim Tebow ;-)