Georgia remains a popular destination for alligator hunters given the available healthy population of more than 200,000 gators. For the past six years, thousands of applicants have competed for a chance to participate in a quota hunt, and the number of applicants continues to grow each year.
Last fall, 553 permitted hunters harvested 140 alligators. Introduced in 2003, alligator hunting continues to gain interest, with nearly 4,400 applications submitted last year, a 42 percent increase from 2006. The deadline for this year’s applications is July 31. For those selected, the season runs Sept. 6 - Oct. 5, 2008.
Interested hunters must complete a quota hunt application online at GoHuntGeorgia.com before midnight July 31 (the application period opened June 1, 2008). Hunters receive their selection status by e-mail and those selected get a temporary harvest tag and information packet by mail in early August.
“Georgia’s alligator population is monitored annually. It remains a renewable natural resource that has shown it can sustain a regulated harvest on an annual basis,” says WRD Assistant Chief of Game Management John Bowers. “This is a unique hunting opportunity in Georgia that also allows hunters to provide additional funding for wildlife conservation through the purchase of hunting licenses and associated hunting equipment.”
In Georgia, alligators typically live south of the fall line (which roughly connects the cities of Columbus, Macon and Augusta), occupying a variety of wetland habitats in the wild including marshes, swamps, rivers, farm ponds and lakes. They also occasionally inhabit ditches, drainage canals, golf course ponds and swimming pools.
Male alligators grow up to 16 feet in length, while female alligators rarely surpass 10 feet. Large alligators weigh more than 800 pounds. Opportunistic carnivores, they eat aquatic insects, crayfish, frogs, fish, turtles, water birds and more.
The Department of Natural Resources also wants to remind you about the available Georgia’s nongame wildlife license plates.
