Alligators, Sharks, Lions, and Bears … Oh My!

I came across an article on msnbc.com yesterday about a man who was attacked by an alligator. I rarely ever hear of alligators attacking humans so I looked into seeing how often this happens. While doing some research I discovered an interesting comparison that had been done between shark attacks and alligator attacks in the Southern USA by the Florida Museum of Natural History, University of Florida.

I loaded the data from the website and put it into Finder! and created some maps from the data in Maker! The above maps show the number of alligator attacks and the number of shark attacks that have occurred in the USA in the southern USA from 1948 to 2005. (Click on the maps for a larger view)
Another interesting thing to view is whether a state has had more alligator attacks, shark attacks, or if they have the same number of shark and alligator attacks. The map below examines this:

States with a yellow or orange color have more shark attacks. States with a blue color have more alligator attacks and states that are white have an equal amount of shark and gator attacks.

Finder has enabled us to view data about shark and alligator attacks in the USA but what about other predators that roam the country. Below are maps on bear attacks and mountain lion attacks that have occurred in the USA.

The data is interesting and raises the question if wild animals and humans can coexist harmoniously. The attacks are rare but have recently been on the rise as wildlife conservationists promote the growth of the species. Here’s an interesting article on the subject http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/science/05/30/animal.attacks/index.html Finder! and Maker! are valuable tools that can be used to look at this issue and hopefully come to a balance to keep people safe while not destroying our precious environment. Let’s take a closer look.

In 1990 California passed Proposition 117 which made mountain lions a specially protected species. With this recognition hunting of the lions became illegal. Being able to identify an exact mountain lion population in California is difficult for many reasons due to their natural elusiveness from humans. But, let’s look at the number of mountain lion attacks from 1975 to 1989 and compare them to attacks from 1990 to 2005. What I am hoping to see is that the proposition has caused an increase in the mountain lion population of California. This is because as populations of lions grow they will extend their range eventually making more contact with humans possibly resulting in attacks.

The map above shows that the before the proposition only 2 attacks had occurred (Brown Spots). After the Proposition 9 attacks occurred (Orange Spots). This is a possible showcase that the proposition had increased the population of the cats and caused a spike in human/animal interaction.

There are still many other variables to consider in this case. Were there increases in human population? Have original mountain lion habitats been destroyed or newly occupied by humans? Many other variables exist which can be loaded into Finder! and compared in Maker! in order to make decisions on the relationship between wild animal and human interaction.