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Spots - White Alligator
Large male alligators are solitary, territorial animals. The largest males and females will defend prime territory. Smaller alligators can often be found in large numbers in close proximity to each other. This is because smaller alligators have a high tolerance of other alligators within a similar size class.
Fish, turtles, small mammals, birds and other reptiles.
American alligators are found in the southeast United States: all of Florida and Louisiana, the southern parts of Georgia, Alabama and Mississippi, coastal South and North Carolina, Eastern Texas, the southeast corner of Oklahoma and the southern tip of Arkansas. However, the white American alligator has only been found here in Louisiana.
These alligators are extremely rare and practically impossible to find in the wild. As with all white animals, they are very vulnerable to the sun and predators.
- “Spots” is not an albino but a leucistic alligator. Albinos do not produce pigment; the skin appears white but is actually colorless and the eyes pink because blood vessels are seen through transparent tissue.
- Leucistic alligators also lack the ability of making pigment, but often this is not found throughout the body, resulting in irregular patches of normal colored skin.
- Leucism also does not affect the pigment color in the eyes.
Animalia, Chordata, Reptilia, Archosauria, Crocodilia, Alligatoridae, Alligator, mississippiensis
Unknown, perhaps 50 years