Alligators in Louisiana.

Waimate Daily Advertiser, Volume IV, Issue 179, 18 March 1902, Page 4

Alligators in Louisiana.

METHODS OF CAPTURE,

Unless something is done to put a stop to their slaughter (says a correspondent, of the New York Times) the alligators of the Louisiana marshes seem doomed to extinction. The effect is seen at commercial centres in the rise in the price of |alligator skins. It is well nigh impossible to buy young alligators nearer to [Louisiana than the Florida resorts, and [one may go far out among the bayous without ever catching sight of one of the animals. On a trip through the bayou country below New Orleans during the past summer in the boat of a professional fisherman, the writer saw alligator hunters and alligator skins, but no alligator. The hunters are picturesque persons, almost always tall and swarthy, The captain of the lugger, who was also something of a trader, said he remembered the time when the saurians lay on the banks of the bayous as the boats passed, and when the skius he carried out averaged more than 7ft in length. Now it is rare that he gets a single one so long, and no alligator is so bold as to show itself to a boat.

There are two methods of hunting them. The most popular is by shining with a jack. One hunter sits in the stern of the pirogue to paddle, w bile the other kneels in the bow with a shot gun. The jack sends a stream of light into the blackness, and the animals allow’ the light to approach, just as do the deer when men go “ shining ” in the north. The man in the bow sees a pair of glistening eyes upon the water, and> sitting as still as a statue, awaits the silent paddle to bring him near. Then he raises a shot gun shoulder, a thunderous report goes roaring down the bayous, and if the shot has been a good one an alligator turns on its back in death, to lie until the hunters return next day. Then the skin is nailed up on the side of a hut to dry, and the carcase.adds its portion to the awful stagnation of the dismal swamp. The other method of hunting alligators is to find their holes in the edge of gome bayou. These holes are not unlibe those made by the musk-rat along, streams of the North. The hunter stands before a hole and rams into it a stout pole, on the end of which is fastened a shai p hook, iff thp alligator is at home, he resents this sort of' intrusion, and snaps at the stick after the manner of au angry turtle. A jerk on the pole, and the animal is hooked as securely as a trout on the fly.; Now it is dragged out and killed with an j axe. This style of alligator hunting has it.a dangers. The work of the axe must be swift and sure. The alligator must be dealt a killing blow on the forehead before it can whirl its tail to strike, the blow of evep a medium sized alligator’s tail is like that from a sledge h ai *l ni er. A hunter pulled an alligator from its hole, and missed when be swung the axe. Next minute the tail of the saurian knocked him down, and befors he could get up the aliigater was clawing at his j arm' Pis partner was at hand, and put an end to the apljnsl with a charge of | buckshot. j

•In an earlier day i ( i was a coipmoll thing for hunters to tie a pup to a tree on the edge of a boyou. The bowlings of the pop were to the alligators what the dinner bell is to the hungry farm hand ; Eaey would po for the pup, and run counter to a charge of buckshot. But 1 that style of hunting is ancient history