Latin name: Alligator mississippiensi

Powerful Jaws!

• Its robust skull and powerful muscles allow the American alligator’s jaws to exert a pressure equal to 3,000 pounds psi. 

• The American alligator is an opportunistic ambush predator that lies and waits for its preys; thanks to the strategic placement of its ears, eyes and nostrils atop its head, it is practically invisible at water level.

• Crocodilians are the only reptiles that provide true parental care; once hatched, the young are transported gently in their mother’s jaw to the water hole where she keeps an eye on them. 

• Alligators were given their name by the first Spanish explorers who called them “el legarto”, meaning “the lizard” in Spanish. 

• The American alligator was a threatened species in the sixties, mostly due to the leather trade. Strict conservation measures we implemented and allowed the populations to recover, to the point that there are nearly a million individuals in Florida today.