UF grad says alligators might be 6 million years older than previously thought
Evan Whiting grew up with a fascination of what is probably the state's most iconic animal: the American alligator. Now he's among the scientists helping to map the history of the species.
The University of Florida graduate and Florida native is the lead author of two studies recently published in the Journal of Herpetology and Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology.
In the publications, he says that his research shows alligators have remained virtually untouched by major evolutionary change for at least 8 million years and may be up to 6 million years older than previously thought, according to a release from the University of Florida.
"I grew up in Florida with alligators crawling around in the backyard," Whiting told The Record. "They're very special and familiar to me. It's been a borderline obsession over the years. Alligators are wonderful animals, and to be able to actually study them in a formal setting is really rewarding."
Whiting is not the first researcher to suggest alligators could be older than other researchers have concluded, but he believes his research has furthered the belief that alligators are among the earth's oldest living species.
Whiting, along with co-authors David Steadman, John Krigbaum and Kent Vliet - all with UF - began rethinking the alligator's evolutionary history after Whiting examined an ancient alligator skull, originally thought to be an extinct species, unearthed in Marion County. He found it to be virtually identical to the modern species.
Looking at fossils he knew to be 7 to 8 million years old, he compared the skull with dozens of other fossils and modern skeletons to look at the whole genus and determine whether there were any major changes in alligator morphology.
Whiting also studied the carbon and oxygen compositions of the teeth of both ancient alligators and the 20- to 25-foot extinct crocodile Gavialosuchus americanus that once dominated the Florida coastline and died out about 5 million years ago for unknown reasons. The presence of alligator and Gavialosuchus fossils at several localities in North Florida suggest the two species may have coexisted in places near the coast, he said.
"Essentially, what we were trying to do was figure out how old, how far back in geologic times that the living species the American alligator goes," Whiting said. "There is some discrepancy in the past as how old people thought it was. There's some disagreement as to how old the living species is.
"What we were able to come up with is that these 7- or 8-million-year-old fossils from Florida are virtually identical - at least in terms of their skull morphology - to what we see today in the modern American alligator."
What he basically came up with is information to suggest that alligators are among the most resilient species on the planet. They have survived dramatic changes in weather and sea level to remain viable in what is now Florida.
John Brueggen, director and general manager of the St. Augustine Alligator Farm and Zoological Park, said he's not surprised at what Whiting's research says about alligators. And he knows his reptiles: The Alligator Farm has every species of crocodilian on earth.
"They [crocodilians] are all survivors and that's what's so fascinating about this kind of work is we as kids tended to dream about dinosaurs and big, exotic reptiles, and these are the last remaining version of those," he said. "They didn't have to change because they can handle extremes in temperatures and extremes in water levels and they don't have to eat very often."
Both Brueggen and Whiting noted that the biggest threat to alligators is people.
Alligators were hunted to near extinction before they were listed under the Endangered Species Act. That allowed the animals to thrive again, and they were removed from the list in 1987. Now they are so prevalent that limited hunting is even allowed.
"[Alligators] became an endangered species because of our intervention," Brueggen said. "They couldn't handle the pressure of somebody going out at night and shooting every eyeball that they saw.
"But the moment we said, 'OK, here, that's illegal. Stop that,' and there was some protection, they bounced right back," Brueggen said. "We're living in a state with almost 2 million alligators living in it right now."
Whiting, now a doctoral student at the University of Minnesota, said that as long as humans stay out of the way and leave alligators some of their natural habitat, they should be able to continue as a species.
"They're a very adaptable and resilient species, and one that has been able to make it through a lot of things," he said. "And now we, humans, are giving them the most trouble because of how rapidly we're changing things for them."
Conversely, Brueggen said there really isn't a lot they have to do for alligators to keep them healthy at the zoo. In fact, he said they once had an alligator that went an entire year without eating and was still perfectly healthy.
"Alligators are [easy to care for] because we're keeping them in their native range," he said. "We're not surprising them with differences in temperature or differences in humidity.
"Alligators live here. They belong here and they thrive here."
