" Lake Wales, Fla. — An alligator attacked and killed a woman on a central Florida lake Tuesday afternoon, authorities said."
Just a few weeks ago, in same general area, another kayaker was injured by an alligator.
When I paddled the coast in Far North Queensland (Aus) I was very careful of staying away from the crocs (eg: no campsite if croc tracks are nearby)
Then, for the first few years living here in FL, made sure to be aware of alligators, the last few years pretty much taking them for granted.
Maybe it’s time to swing back the other way toward being aware of them more (especially in mating season when they’re more active).
That’s absolutely heartbreaking to hear about the tragic incident in Lake Wales. My thoughts are with the woman’s family and everyone affected.
Situations like this really remind us how important it is to stay alert and informed when exploring outdoor areas, especially around lakes and wildlife zones.
Personally, I’ve started using the ShareKayak app whenever I plan outdoor activities. It helps me find safer locations, check for weather alerts, and even gives me useful info about the area before I head out. It’s quietly become part of my routine for peace of mind.
Not quite an alligator encounter but… While we were racing the Suwannee 230 this weekend I was clobbered over the head by 5+ foot Sturgeon at 3am, knocking me out of the boat and capsizing our C4.
I feel like those things are more dangerous than gators. I’ve photographed many gators, some big ones at pretty close range from my kayak w/ no issues but sturgeons are scary the way they just jump out of the water like that.
3 Likes
omg…wow! That is crazy.
1 Like
‘Other than that, how was the play, Mrs. Lincoln?’
how was the race?
Caviar’s gone to the head!
Beluga’s buddy butts head, headway is dead.
Gourmand game gone bad flies from Suwanee,
air invader egged-on far from Caspian Sea!
And thus dinner bell chimes in a belfry,
for those that “hut-hut” stirring sturgeoness spree.
Do Corps de Canoe maintain fast course in inversion,
or “roe-roe” their boat pounding paddles at perversion?
1 Like
it was a year of adversity. Extremely low water contrasted against torrential rain with massive electric storms made for slow going this year. The sturgeon incident knocked us off of our competition enabling them to break away but still managed to hang on for a decent finish. Lots of of crazy stories
When you read these remember the first reports are always inaccurate, wrong. Canoer not kayaker. Gator was hit/startled , woman landed on the gator, gator was in self defense mode, not attacked. Most of the pictures were not tiger creek. Still she died.
FWC is the responsible investigator.
I lived near Biloxi, Mississippi for a couple of years. My wife & I rented a house that backed onto a bayou. The yard had a good chain link fence. Just outside it, we had a small pier, and, adjacent to the pier, a good put in. There were 3 gators in that stretch of bayou, ranging from 10-12 foot in size, so big enough to be dangerous. I avoided them, but they do conceal themselves well, and occasionally I would be surprised by one appearing near the kayak while I was afloat, though none of them acted aggressively.
I regularly paddled from our yard, a mile or so wending through the bayou, out to Biloxi Bay, and then into the Mississippi Sound (i.e., that part of the Gulf that is inshore of the barrier islands, about 10 miles out). One day, a good-sized gator in the Bay slid off the bank and came directly at me at speed. I took off at full speed, and was able to outrun it, but it got my attention.
I thought then, and think now, that a lot of the information about alligators being relatively unaggressive, and therefore not particularly dangerous, is based on observations that no longer apply. By the mid-1960’s alligators had been hunted down to endangered species levels. The numbers were low, the ones that were around were smaller–just a matter of being younger in high hunting environment, and they were very wary. Alligators, like most other animals, avoid humans when humans are predators. In that context, they weren’t much of a threat. I realize that the endangered status has been lifted, but we still have more restricted hunting than in the “old days”, there are a lot more gators today–millions of them, a lot of them are a lot bigger, and, since they aren’t hunted nearly as aggressively, they are less afraid of humans. I think all of that translates into them being a lot more dangerous than most people realize.