OKLAHOMA CITY - They can grow to 12 feet long.
Big reptiles, they’ll eat just about everything they encounter—smaller reptiles, animals, the occasional dog or, if possible, even the guy who feeds them—if they are hungry enough and get the chance.
They are considered an aquatic reptile belonging to the order Crocodilia, which includes crocodiles, caimans, and gharials.
We call them alligators. A cold-blooded vertebrate with scales and four limbs, they lay eggs and share common traits with other reptiles. However, they are more closely related to birds and dinosaurs than lizards. This, even though their name is Spanish for “lizard.”
The alligator’s DNA is about 65 million years old. And yes, they are filled with teeth and often have a bad attitude.
For the record, some of these creatures call far southeastern Oklahoma home and this year, one state lawmaker wants to take advantage of that and to make them pets.
Under a proposal written by Sen. Jonathan Wingard, a Republican from Ada, Senate Bill 2087 would legalize the raising of alligators hatched from eggs in captivity without a permit.
Wingard’s proposal would change the current system. Right now, state law requires a permit and written permission from the director of the Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation before an alligator can be owned.
Wingard said the bill’s current language would allow individuals to raise alligators as pets as long as the animal wasn’t taken from the wild.
Wingard told Oklahoma Voice that the proposal was a constituent request. He said he was also exploring ways to determine if there is a market in Oklahoma for alligator meat and skin.
The question remains, though, could a household make an alligator a pet?
Dian Jordan, the former mayor of Hochatown, said although she has had personal experience with an alligator as a child in Florida, she’s not sure the reptiles would make good pets.
“When I was five years old, I singlehandedly guarded a four-foot alligator with a stick,” Jordan said. “My mother was terrified when my siblings ran home, out of breath and exclaimed, ‘Mom! Come look! We have an alligator!”’ Jordan said her mother asked one question: “Where’s Dian?”
“Guarding the alligator!” her siblings answered.
Jordan isn’t the only one who questioned the idea about alligators as pets.
McCurtain County Game Warden Mark Hannah said it’s difficult to have an alligator as a pet. Hannah, who told Southwest Ledger he’s been around alligators all his life, declined to comment on Wingard’s bill, but said he hoped lawmakers would reach out to his agency to get the proper information.
“I hope they would contact our agency so that they have the latest data and information when they’re making these decisions,” Hannah said. “And I would just say to anybody thinking about having an alligator as a pet is that they (the alligator) would be very labor-intensive and costly. They’re wild animals and they’re going to do alligator things. Alligators are top-tier predators, so they have to eat. They have to eat often.”
And, because alligators require large amounts of protein and have a short memory, feeding them could be difficult, he said.
“Once they get so big, it takes a lot of food to feed them,” he said. “They don’t have much of a memory. It’s like, you know, two minutes. You feed them, and then you come back and you’re going to pet it. It’s like, ‘no.’ It doesn’t remember. It’s being an alligator and it’ll bite you.”
In addition to pets, Wingard told Oklahoma Voice he was exploring the idea of the use of alligators in food production.
“What I’m looking at and working on is there has been some interest expressed in the food production side of this, allowing meat processing plants to raise alligators to be able to have for slaughter,” he said.
Hannah said alligator is often used in the Cajun dish gumbo. “I’ve had gumbo with fresh alligator,” he said. “And it was wonderful.”
Still, it’s unlikely that the alligator would replace beef as a staple on the grill anytime soon. USDA records show Oklahoma is home to about 4.6 million cattle.
And Data from the ODWC notes that Oklahoma has between 100 and 200 alligators.
Records show alligators live in the Little River National Wildlife Refuge and the Red Slough Wildlife Management Area. Both McCurtain and Choctaw counties have the largest populations of alligators in the state, though alligators also call a few other counties in the area home.
Lawmakers began the process of reviewing Wingard’s measure and hundreds of others during the first week of the new legislative session.