I have no direct, face to snout experience with Gators or Crocs. We don’t tend to have such reptiles running loose in Detroit. My question is:
Do Gators know enough to purposely try to tip a Kayak or canoe over and dump that Kayaker into the water for easier feeding?
I have heard of ocean dwellers, such as Orcas, or Killer Whales deliberately ramming
boats full of people, seemingly just for the hell of it.
I paddle board springs and rivers in Florida at least once a month, usually more often, and have seen many alligators. They always shy away from me. That may explain why this is my first time hearing about an attack of this type.
the ones on The Far Side cartoon do...
I doubt a Gator would purposely try and tip over a canoe or kayak, I believe in this case, the person paddled over the Alligator and surprised it, when the Gator made a sudden movement, it tipped the boat over, the person fell in and started thrashing around, the Gator probably thought, game on, something is attacking and attacked back biting the person.
In the last 7-10 days in Florida, we’ve had a person killed by an Alligator and another person killed by a bear in South Florida near the everglades.
In Jacksonville where I live, we had a coyote attack a person out walking their dog, nobody was killed but the coyote was later caught and killed; after testing it was determined the coyote had rabies and everyone involved in the incident had to get rabies shots.
If you flip over a larger size gator and rub their belly, they immediately go to sleep. Good to remember.
Just a snow bird opinion here. In big residential areas, big alligators are mostly kept at bay, When we snow birded in the Tampa area most of the alligators were in the 2 to 5 foot range. We made a couple of trips to central Florida out in the sticks of Polk county. There isn’t a lot of civilization out there so the gators grow big.