Alligator

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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

For other uses, see Alligator (disambiguation).

Alligators

Temporal range: Oligocene-Holocene, 37–

0 Ma

PreꞒ

Pg

N
 An American alligator (top) and a Chinese

alligator

Scientific classification

Kingdom: Animalia

Phylum: Chordata

Class: Reptilia

Order: Crocodilia

Family: Alligatoridae

Subfamily: Alligatorinae

Genus: Alligator
Cuvier, 1807

Type species

Alligator mississippiensis

Daudin, 1802

Species
 • †Alligator hailensis
• †Alligator mcgrewi
• †Alligator mefferdi
• Alligator mississippiensis
• †Alligator olseni
• †Alligator prenasalis
• Alligator sinensis
• †Alligator thomsoni

An alligator, or just gator, is a large reptile in the Crocodilia order in

the genus Alligator of the family Alligatoridae. The two extant species are
the American alligator (A. mississippiensis) and the Chinese alligator (A. sinensis).
Additionally, several extinct species of alligator are known from fossil remains.
Alligators first appeared during the Oligocene epoch about 37 million years ago.[1]
The name "alligator" is probably an anglicized form of el lagarto, the Spanish term for
"the lizard", which early Spanish explorers and settlers in Florida called the
alligator.[2] Later English spellings of the name included allagarta and alagarto.[3]

Evolution
Alligators and caimans split in North America during the early Tertiary or
late Cretaceous (about 53 million to about 65 million years ago).[4][5] The Chinese
alligator split from the American alligator about 33 million years ago[4] and probably
descended from a lineage that crossed the Bering land bridge during the Neogene.
The modern American alligator is well represented in the fossil record of
the Pleistocene.[1] The alligator's full mitochondrial genome was sequenced in the
1990s.[6] The full genome, published in 2014, suggests that the alligator evolved
much more slowly than mammals and birds.[7]

Phylogeny
The genus Alligator belongs to the subfamily Alligatorinae, which is the sister
taxon to Caimaninae (the caimans). Together, these two subfamilies form
the family Alligatoridae. The below cladogram shows the phylogeny of alligators.[8][9]
Alligatoridae
Caimaninae

Alligatorinae
Ceratosuchus burdoshi†

Hassiacosuchus haupti†

Navajosuchus mooki†

Wannaganosuchus brachymanus†

Arambourgia gaudryi†
 Allognathosuchus polyodon†

Allognathosuchus wartheni†

Procaimanoidea kayi†

Alligator
Alligator prenasalis†

Alligator mcgrewi†

Alligator olseni†

Alligator sinensis Chinese alligator

Alligator thomsoni†

Alligator mefferdi†

Alligator mississippiensis American alligator

Species
Extant
Common
Image Scientific name Distribution
name

Alligator American the Southeastern United

mississippiensis alligator States and Tamaulipas, Mexico

Chinese
Alligator sinensis eastern China
alligator

Extinct
• Alligator hailensis
• Alligator mcgrewi
• Alligator mefferdi
• Alligator olseni
• Alligator prenasalis
 • Alligator thomsoni

Description

An 1854 watercolor painting of an alligator from the Cayman Islands by Jacques Burkhardt.

An average adult American alligator's weight and length is 360 kg (790 lb) and 4 m
(13 ft), but they sometimes grow to 4.4 m (14 ft) long and weigh over 450 kg
(990 lb).[10] The largest ever recorded, found in Louisiana, measured 5.84 m
(19.2 ft).[11] The Chinese alligator is smaller, rarely exceeding 2.1 m (7 ft) in length.
Additionally, it weighs considerably less, with males rarely over 45 kg (100 lb).
Adult alligators are black or dark olive-brown with white undersides, while juveniles
have bright yellow or whitish stripes which sharply contrast against their dark hides,
providing them additional camouflage amongst reeds and wetland grasses.[12]
No average lifespan for an alligator has been measured.[13] One of the oldest
recorded alligator lives was that of Saturn, an American alligator who was hatched in
1936 in Mississippi and spent nearly a decade in Germany before spending the
majority of its life at the Moscow Zoo, where it died at the age of 83 or 84 on 22 May
2020.[14][15] Another one of the oldest lives on record is that of Muja, an American
alligator who was brought as an adult specimen to the Belgrade
Zoo in Serbia from Germany in 1937. Although no valid records exist about its date
of birth, as of 2012, it was in its 80s and possibly the oldest alligator living in
captivity.[16][17]

Habitat
A. mississippiensis

Head
Eye

Alligators are native to only the United States, Mexico, and China.[18][19]
American alligators are found in the southeast United States: all
of Florida and Louisiana; the southern parts of Georgia, Alabama, and Mississippi;
coastal South and North Carolina; East Texas, the southeast corner of Oklahoma,
and the southern tip of Arkansas. Louisiana has the largest alligator
population.[20] The majority of American alligators inhabit Florida and Louisiana, with
over a million alligators in each state. Southern Florida is the only place where both
alligators and crocodiles live side by side.[21][22] A small population is also found
in Tamaulipas, in Mexico. [23]
American alligators live in freshwater environments, such
as ponds, marshes, wetlands, rivers, lakes, and swamps, as well as in brackish
water.[24] When they construct alligator holes in the wetlands, they increase plant
diversity and provide habitat for other animals during droughts.[25] They are, therefore,
considered an important species for maintaining ecological diversity in
wetlands.[26] Farther west, in Louisiana, heavy grazing by coypu and muskrat are
causing severe damage to coastal wetlands. Large alligators feed extensively on
coypu, and provide a vital ecological service by reducing coypu numbers.[27]
The Chinese alligator currently is found in only the Yangtze River valley and parts of
adjacent provinces[19] and is extremely endangered, with only a few dozen believed to
be left in the wild. Indeed, far more Chinese alligators live in zoos around the world
than can be found in the wild. Rockefeller Wildlife Refuge in southern Louisiana has
several in captivity in an attempt to preserve the species. Miami MetroZoo in Florida
also has a breeding pair of Chinese alligators.

Behavior

Alligator vocalisations
Alligator bellow
0:24
Alligator bellow, ogg/Vorbis format.

Another alligator bellow

0:22

Alligator bellow, ogg/Vorbis format.

Alligator hiss
0:12

Alligator hiss ogg/Vorbis format.

Problems playing these files? See media help.

Large male alligators are solitary territorial animals. Smaller alligators can often be
found in large numbers close to each other. The largest of the species (both males
and females) defend prime territory; smaller alligators have a higher tolerance for
other alligators within a similar size class.
Alligators move on land by two forms of locomotion referred to as "sprawl" and "high
walk". The sprawl is a forward movement with the belly making contact with the
ground and is used to transition to "high walk" or to slither over wet substrate into
water. The high walk is an up-on-four-limbs forward motion used for overland travel
with the belly well up from the ground.[28] Alligators have also been observed to rise
up and balance on their hind legs and semi-step forward as part of a forward or
upward lunge. However, they can not walk on their hind legs.[29][30][31]
Although the alligator has a heavy body and a slow metabolism, it is capable of short
bursts of speed, especially in very short lunges. Alligators' main prey are smaller
animals they can kill and eat with a single bite. They may kill larger prey by grabbing
it and dragging it into the water to drown. Alligators consume food that cannot be
eaten in one bite by allowing it to rot or by biting and then performing a "death roll",
spinning or convulsing wildly until bite-sized chunks are torn off. Critical to the
alligator's ability to initiate a death roll, the tail must flex to a significant angle relative
to its body. An alligator with an immobilized tail cannot perform a death roll. [32]
Most of the muscle in an alligator's jaw evolved to bite and grip prey. The muscles
that close the jaws are powerful, but the muscles for opening their jaws are weak. As
a result, an adult human can hold an alligator's jaws shut bare-handed. It is common
to use several wraps of duct tape to prevent an adult alligator from opening its jaws
when being handled or transported.[33]
Alligators are generally timid towards humans and tend to walk or swim away if one
approaches. This may encourage people to approach alligators and their nests,
which can provoke the animals into attacking. In Florida, feeding wild alligators at
any time is illegal. If fed, the alligators will eventually lose their fear of humans and
will learn to associate humans with food.[34]

Diet
The type of food eaten by alligators depends upon their age and size. When young,
alligators eat fish, insects, snails, crustaceans, and worms. As they mature,
progressively larger prey is taken, including larger fish such as gar, turtles, and
various mammals, particularly coypu and muskrat,[24] as well as birds, deer, and other
reptiles.[35][36] Their stomachs also often contain gizzard stones. They will even
consume carrion if they are sufficiently hungry. In some cases, larger alligators are
known to ambush dogs, Florida panthers and black bears, making them the apex
predator throughout their distribution. In this role as a top predator, it may determine
the abundance of prey species, including turtles and coypu.[37][27] As humans encroach
into their habitat, attacks are few but not unknown. Alligators, unlike the large
crocodiles, do not immediately regard a human upon encounter as prey, but may still
attack in self-defense if provoked.

Reproduction
Different stages of alligator life-cycle

Alligator eggs and young

Alligator juveniles

Adult alligator with juveniles of various ages

Alligators generally mature at a length of 1.8 m (6 ft). The mating season is in late
spring. In April and May, alligators form so-called "bellowing choruses". Large groups
of animals bellow together for a few minutes a few times a day, usually one to three
hours after sunrise. The bellows of male American alligators are accompanied by
powerful blasts of infrasound.[38] Another form of male display is a loud head-slap.[39] In
2010, on spring nights alligators were found to gather in large numbers for group
courtship, the so-called "alligator dances".[40]
In summer, the female builds a nest of vegetation where the decomposition of the
vegetation provides the heat needed to incubate the eggs. The sex of the offspring
is determined by the temperature in the nest and is fixed within seven to 21 days of
the start of incubation. Incubation temperatures of 30 °C (86 °F) or lower produce a
clutch of females; those of 34 °C (93 °F) or higher produce entirely males. Nests
constructed on leaves are hotter than those constructed on wet marsh, so the former
tend to produce males and the latter, females. The baby alligator's egg tooth helps it
get out of its egg during hatching time. The natural sex ratio at hatching is five
females to one male. Females hatched from eggs incubated at 30 °C (86 °F) weigh
significantly more than males hatched from eggs incubated at 34 °C (93 °F).[41] The
mother defends the nest from predators and assists the hatchlings to water. She will
provide protection to the young for about a year if they remain in the area. Adult
alligators regularly cannibalize younger individuals, though estimates of the rate of
cannibalism vary widely.[42][43] In the past, immediately following the outlawing of
alligator hunting, populations rebounded quickly due to the suppressed number of
adults preying upon juveniles, increasing survival among the young alligators.[citation needed]

Anatomy

A rare albino alligator swimming

Alligators, much like birds, have been shown to exhibit unidirectional movement of
air through their lungs.[44] Most other amniotes are believed to exhibit bidirectional, or
tidal breathing. For a tidal breathing animal, such as a mammal, air flows into and
out of the lungs through branching bronchi which terminate in small dead-end
chambers called alveoli. As the alveoli represent dead-ends to flow, the inspired air
must move back out the same way it came in. In contrast, air in alligator lungs makes
a circuit, moving in only one direction through the parabronchi. The air first enters the
outer branch, moves through the parabronchi, and exits the lung through the inner
branch. Oxygen exchange takes place in extensive vasculature around the
parabronchi.[45]
The alligator has a similar digestive system to that of the crocodile, with minor
differences in morphology and enzyme activity.[46] Alligators have a two-part stomach,
with the first smaller portion containing gastroliths. It is believed this portion of the
stomach serves a similar function as it does in the gizzard of some species of birds,
to aid in digestion. The gastroliths work to grind up the meal as alligators will take
large bites or swallow smaller prey whole. This process makes digestion and nutrient
absorption easier once the food reaches the second portion of the stomach. [47] Once
an alligator's meal has been processed it will move on to the second portion of the
stomach which is highly acidic. The acidity of the stomach has been observed to
increase once digestion begins. This is due to the increase in CO2 concentration of
the blood, resulting from the right to left shunting of the alligators heart. The right to
left shunt of the heart in alligators means the circulatory system will recirculate blood
through the body instead of back to the lungs.[48] The re-circulation of blood leads to
higher CO2 concentration as well as lower oxygen affinity.[49] There is evidence to
suggest that there is increased blood flow diverted to the stomach during digestion to
facilitate an increase in CO2 concentration which aids in increasing gastric acid
secretions during digestion.[50][48] The alligator's metabolism will also increase after a
meal by up to four times its basal metabolic rate.[51] Alligators also have highly folded
mucosa in the lining of the intestines to further aid in the absorption of nutrients. The
folds result in greater surface area for the nutrients to be absorbed through.[52]
Alligators also have complex microbiomes that are not fully understood yet, but can
be attributed to both benefits and costs to the animal. These microorganisms can be
found in the high surface area of the mucosa folds of the intestines, as well as
throughout the digestive tract. Benefits include better total health and stronger
immune system. However alligators are still vulnerable to microbial infections despite
the immune boost from other microbiota.[52]
During brumation the process of digestion experiences changes due to the fasting
most alligators experience during these periods of inactivity. Alligators that go long
enough without a meal during brumation will begin a process called autophagy,
where the animal begins to consume its fat reserves to maintain its body weight until
it can acquire a sufficient meal.[53] There is also fluctuation in the level of bacterial
taxa populations in the alligator's microbial community between seasons which helps
the alligator cope with different rates of feeding and activity.[54]
Like other crocodilians, alligators have an armor of bony scutes. The dermal bones
are highly vascularised and aid in calcium balance, both to neutralize acids while the
animal cannot breathe underwater[55] and to provide calcium for eggshell formation.[56]
Alligators have muscular, flat tails that propel them while swimming.
The two kinds of white alligators are albino and leucistic. These alligators are
practically impossible to find in the wild. They could survive only in captivity and are
few in number.[57][58] The Aquarium of the Americas in New Orleans has leucistic
alligators found in a Louisiana swamp in 1987.[58]

Human uses
Main articles: Alligator farm, Alligator meat, and Alligator leather
Alligators are raised commercially for their meat and their skin, which when tanned is
used for the manufacture of luggage, handbags, shoes, belts, and other leather
items. Alligators also provide economic benefits through the ecotourism industry.
Visitors may take swamp tours, in which alligators are a feature. Their most
important economic benefit to humans may be the control of coypu and muskrats.[27]
Alligator meat is also consumed by humans.[59][60]

Differences from crocodiles

While there are rules of thumb for distinguishing alligators from crocodiles, all of
them admit exceptions. Such general rules include:

• Exposed vs. interdigitated teeth: The easiest way to distinguish crocodiles

from alligators is by looking at their jaw line. The teeth on the lower jaw of
an alligator fit into sockets in the upper jaw, leaving only the upper teeth
visible when the mouth is closed. The teeth on the lower jaw of a crocodile
fit into grooves on the outside of the top jaw, making both the upper and
lower teeth visible when the mouth is closed, thus creating a "toothy
grin."[61]
 • Shape of the nose and jaw: Alligators have wider, shovel-like, U-shaped
snouts, while crocodile snouts are typically more pointed or V-shaped. The
alligators' broader snouts have been contentiously thought to allow their
jaws to withstand the stress of cracking open the shells of turtles and other
hard-shelled animals that are widespread in their environments.[61][62] A
2012 study found very little correlation between bite force and snout shape
amongst 23 tested crocodilian species.[63]
• Functioning salt glands: Crocodilians have modified salivary
glands called salt glands on their tongues, but while these organs still
excrete salt in crocodiles and gharials, those in most alligators and
caimans have lost this ability, or excrete it in only extremely small
quantities.[61] The ability to excrete excess salt allows crocodiles to better
tolerate life in saline water and migrating through it.[61] Because alligators
and caimans have lost this ability, they are largely restricted to freshwater
habitats, although larger alligators do sometimes live
in tidal mangroves and in very rare cases in coastal areas.[61]
• Integumentary sense organs: Both crocodiles and alligators have small,
pit-like sensory organs called integumentary sense organs (ISOs)
or dermal pressure receptors (DPRs) surrounding their upper and lower
jaws.[61] These organs allow crocodilians to detect minor pressure changes
in surrounding water, and assist them in locating and capturing prey. In
crocodiles, however, such organs extend over nearly the entire
body.[61] Crocodile ISOs may also assist in detection of local salinity, or
serve other chemosensory functions.[61]
• Less consistent differences: Crocodiles are generally thought of as more
aggressive than alligators.[61] Only six of the 23 crocodilian species are
considered dangerous to adult human beings, most notably the Nile
crocodile and saltwater crocodile. Each year, hundreds of deadly attacks
are attributed to the Nile crocodile in sub-Saharan Africa. The American
crocodile is considered to be less aggressive. Only a few (unverified)
cases of American crocodiles fatally attacking humans have been
reported.[64]

Image gallery of extant species

•

Alligator in the Everglades National Park

 •

Alligator in the Canberra Zoo in Australia

Gator in Louisiana bayou swims

Gator in Louisiana bayou eats

Juvenile alligator found in Everglades National Park