Shooting a gator in defense of your dog

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It's illegal for the general public to kill or harm an alligator.
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Not if you have bought some tags and hunt them during the season it isn't.

Make friends with your local FWC people and the local state-licensed trapper.

As to killing them, you can use a .22 - you just have to hit them in the brain - it isn't very large, but they will stop immediately.
 
I live in the rural midwest.
We had a drought a few years ago and beaver began showing up in odd places.

One ruined some trees on the edge of my pond.

I mentioned this to the sherriff and said it's too bad I can't shoot them.

"Depends on who's looking" was the reply.

Fini beaver.
 
If it was my dog, I'd shoot first and worry later.

The only tactic I could imagine is shooting near it, tossing dirt at it to drive it away.

Having your dog on a leash so when you see the gator, you can pull your dog to you and turn this into the gator attacked you situation that changes the equation.

Clutch
 
Sheesh. Sounds like a SSS situation would be the best to hope for.

I don't much WANT to shoot a gator, but the thought occured to me while seeing one walking my dog. I don't really plan on letting my dog get near him anyway, because I like my dog an awful lot.
 
Gators are quick and fast, if it suprised your dog or you, it would be bad.

I know for a fact they can run down a cow in a short sprint on land, and some of them probably a good horse too. They have little staying power, but they can lunge by useing thier tails and propel themselves a goodly distance in seconds.

Since your gator is small I wouldn't worry about it ATM, however if you see it stalking the shoreline, or following you on your walk call Animal control right then. Tame gators are not good gators.

I have put down numerous gators on my lease over the years for killing cattle, and once a mule. Largest was almsot 12'6". They aren't a threat to larger animals till they are 5 or 6 ft long and it can take a while for them to hit that size. Depending on the size of your dog the 30"er could be a problem.

If one grabs you, go for its soft belly side, scales there can be slit with a sharp knife
 
Here in central Virginia, we are pretty well outside of the natural habitat for gators.

However, a few years back, a gator was terrorizing a suburban lake, supposedly devouring a small pet or two. The game wardens showed up, set traps, found them empty, and claimed there was no gator. However photographic evidence clearly proved them wrong. They came out again, set traps again, no joy.

A few days later and man fishing from a small boat in the lake hooked the gator, supposedly unintentionally, reeled in into his boat, then beat it to death with a small bat. He was promptly charged and convicted of a number of wildlife law violations, including some sort of felony for violating a federal poaching law.

Morale of the story, know your local game laws, they can get you in plenty of trouble.

And if you do happen to shoot a gator in self-defense, S.S. and S. may be your best course of action.
 
Since there's no reasoning with a gator, and they don't grab for ransom, I would kill it without question and suffer the consequences. My dog's like a child to both me and my wife.
 
First YES if one tried to take my dog I would shoot it AND then deal with Fish and Game.

That story of the gator going into the house was NUTS. Too bad it didn't say what caliber the woman used to shoot the 3 foot gator with....4 times...which did seem to do much of anything to it. :eek:
 
I guess the final verdict is, yes you could be prosecuted for shooting an alligator, even if it's threatening your dog. They are listed as endangered, and technically shooting one is a crime. Now whether or not you get caught, whether the DNR officer cares to pursue it, whether the prosecutor wants to take the case, etc, all have an impact on if something would actually happen to you if you shot one. But, yes it is technically illegal. The law was not written to allow for defense of property. And yes, dogs are property, emotional attachment notwithstanding.

There are a lot of people who consider a threat to their dog as being on par with a threat to a human family member. The law does not.
 
We just had a gator incident up in my neck of the woods the other week....gator ate two pitbulls, both were trying to actively attack the gator (it trespassed on this man's property, so the dogs protected his backyard, well tried). It was a 10 footer, although locals are already telling tall tales about it being 14 foot (I'm used to seeing gators, size is determined by their head)

I suspect that one was getting shot later, as it's attitude made Cujo look like a well-mannered cuddly family pet.
 
wow ….ate two pitbulls....I guess being a dog and attacking a 10 (or 14 :rolleyes:) foot gator is NOT a good survival trait.
 
To keep it in perspective, gators are comparable in power to a crocodile about 2-3 ft smaller in length. That means this was probably about as strong as an 8ft croc....the tail swing from an 8ft croc is powerful enough to break a man's ribcage. The closing jaw of a gator is powerful enough to break any bone in the human body.

Those poor dogs messed with the wrong reptile. that gator was deinfately a 10-footer. The last place I worked had large live gators often swim under the dining platform on the lake behind work (they were only removed if they hung around the dock or did something else similarly disturbing). a 14 foot gator has a head as big as a large man's torso (groin up to shoulders)...this was a 10 footer. A 14 footer, which I saw once, actually creeped me out, and that's hard to do.

I learned a long time ago to respect nature in all it's forms. I've seen deer nearly kill grown men before (hooves are like blades)....basically if we respect nature and give them space, they'll more often than not return the favor. With predators however, all bets are off, they need to be relocated or put down before they decide we're tasty vittles.
 
Looks like we're at a pretty good consensus, here. Particularly well summed-up by Ragnar's post. Basically, it sounds like we'd pretty much all shoot it if we had to, and deal with the aftermath.

To clarify a couple points...

This gator is definitely going to have to go. He's around 30 inches and follows me down the seawall on the lake when I walk my dog. My dog is 15 pounds. (Shiba Inu, for you dog people.)

Shooting him and not mentioning it is not an option for me. I live in an apartment complex with at least 4 LEO's in residence. No way I'd get away with SS&S around here.

I go to the apartment office and complain about it regularly, but DNR won't remove it until it's 4 feet long. Once he hits that though, I'm pretty sure they'll take it out. I'm making a pest of myself.

In the meantime, it's not supercritical. He seems to have a pretty limited territory for the moment, and where I always see him hanging out, he can't access the walkway. Not until he can scale a 5 foot seawall topped with a fence, anyway. Not to say that he can't go around the fence, but I'm careful around those areas and he doesn't seem to stray that far from his little spot.

I don't really want to shoot him, personally. I'd prefer that my little mutt stay far, far away, because he'd probably be on the losing end, even with a small gator and my superhuman reflexes.:neener:
 
I bet fried gator tastes pretty good with some hot pepper suace and onions
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Very much so. I'm actually partial to barbecue sauce, but I must confess my favorite way to eat gator is as jerky. There's a local guy who makes some every now and then, and it's delicious.
 
orionengnr, you're betraying your ignorance there, about gator tail. It's good eating, for sure! :)

But enough. We're getting away into ancecdotes, not legal discussion--which will vary, state by state.
 
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