Yellow Alert - Alligator, Everglades National Park

by KJ Swan

Title

Yellow Alert - Alligator, Everglades National Park

Artist

KJ Swan

Medium

Photograph

Description

Unlike crocs, Alligators hide their 70 to 80 teeth when they close their mouths - well most of them.

Each time an American Alligator (Alligator mississippiensis) loses a tooth, they grow another. They can have between 2,000 and 3,000 teeth in a lifetime. And when those teeth snap down, they exert a force of about 2,000 pounds per square inch giving little chance of prey escaping.

All those tiny dots on an alligator's face are small nodules that are very sensitive to changes in pressure. These allow the alligator to sense the size, movement and location of other animals in the water nearby. All of which gives the American alligator a deserved reputation as a formidable reptilian ambush predator. I photographed this beautiful reptile in the Everglades National Park, Florida, USA, from a respectable distance.

Uploaded

January 24th, 2020

Colors

Embed

Share

Tags