Interesting couple....

harris · Jun 24, 2016

I was in Fla. this past weekend at my fiancé's parents. These were the two residents in the pond across the street from their house. Easily the largest female Fla softshell I've ever seen! To their delight, her father was feeding them pretzels. When she became too aggressive, the alligator would gently open its' mouth and nudge her out of the way. I've never seen anything like it.

ZEROPILOT · Jun 24, 2016

Nice photo.
Some of those softshells are absolutely huge when they come out onto the canal banks to lay eggs.
It's kind of rare to get a good look at one like that. They only stick the very tip of their noses out to breath and you can easily miss one that is right there because of dark water.

cdmay · Jun 24, 2016

That is totally cool and also, totally typical of our area. The female Florida softies (as we called them in the 60s and 70s) get to be enormous and are formidable animals if you ever happen to catch one on hook and line by accident.
Their relationship with alligators is a weird one. As you documented, they can coexist to a certain point. But the really big gators seem love to eat softies that they can easily manage. The super big girls they apparently ignore.
But then one often sees them together as if there is never a problem, even with the smaller adults.
Who knows?

surfergirl · Jun 24, 2016

Yall are killing me , i sure do miss south fla. We had a canal in our backyard , dark blackwater. We ate well down there. I was raised eating gator and froglegs. Never ate turtles though. for some reason my Dad had a soft heart for turtles also. Beautiful softie!

wellington · Jun 24, 2016

When you said alligator, I was thinking snapper and couldn't understand why a snapper would just nudge a soft shell. Was pretty shocked when I seen you actually meant alligator. Now to me, that's one of the altimate odd couple. Eating pretzels with a big dinner plate of soft shell right there. Great pic, thanks for sharing.

Berkeley · Jun 25, 2016

cdmay said:
That is totally cool and also, totally typical of our area. The female Florida softies (as we called them in the 60s and 70s) get to be enormous and are formidable animals if you ever happen to catch one on hook and line by accident.
Their relationship with alligators is a weird one. As you documented, they can coexist to a certain point. But the really big gators seem love to eat softies that they can easily manage. The super big girls they apparently ignore.
But then one often sees them together as if there is never a problem, even with the smaller adults.
Who knows?

Spot on! It is an interesting relationship for sure!

harris said:
Easily the largest female Fla softshell I've ever seen! To their delight, her father was feeding them pretzels.

Please encourage your future Father-in-Law not to do this. Not only is it illegal to feed alligators (and other wildlife) in Florida, it is quite dangerous. It causes them to lose their fear of people and approach them because they want treats. As Florida FWC says, a fed gator is a dead gator (because they will be euthanized eventually because they are approaching people). Also, pretzels are not a good food for either of those species. Wheat products and salt are not natural diet items for either of them.

That said, it was a cool interaction that you got to witness.

--Berkeley

Nicole M · Jun 25, 2016

Berkeley said:
Spot on! It is an interesting relationship for sure!

Please encourage your future Father-in-Law not to do this. Not only is it illegal to feed alligators (and other wildlife) in Florida, it is quite dangerous. It causes them to lose their fear of people and approach them because they want treats. As Florida FWC says, a fed gator is a dead gator (because they will be euthanized eventually because they are approaching people). Also, pretzels are not a good food for either of those species. Wheat products and salt are not natural diet items for either of them.

That said, it was a cool interaction that you got to witness.

--Berkeley

Agreed. When I worked at a horse barn on the bayou in Louisiana, we would have kids throwing food to the gators (of course this was happening unbeknownst to me)... Within a week, one alligator came right up into one of the horse paddocks looking for food. I wasn't there that day, but thank god no horse was turned out in there. Unfortunately someone called and had the gator removed and it was euthanized.

That said, this is a really cool interaction you got to witness. Thank you for sharing!

naturalman91 · Jun 25, 2016

this is a great picture.

but i would warn your her father that this will give them a BIG ticket and could also cause the gator to be killed. they don't want gator's looking to humans for food if at all possible they want gators afraid of humans steering clear of them totally.

Moozillion · Jun 26, 2016

harris said:
I was in Fla. this past weekend at my fiancé's parents. These were the two residents in the pond across the street from their house. Easily the largest female Fla softshell I've ever seen! To their delight, her father was feeding them pretzels. When she became too aggressive, the alligator would gently open its' mouth and nudge her out of the way. I've never seen anything like it.

View attachment 178037

AMAZING photo!!!

Interesting couple....

harris

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ZEROPILOT

REDFOOT WRANGLER

cdmay

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surfergirl

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wellington

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Berkeley

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Nicole M

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naturalman91

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Moozillion

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