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Hunters Get 2nd Chance To Go After Gators

Tribune photo by FRANK SARGEANT

Josh Garland, of Thonotosassa, hauls up a 10-foot alligator during the 2007 season.

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By NEIL JOHNSON | The Tampa Tribune

Published: June 5, 2008

TAMPA - Disappointed gator hunters prevented from getting a permit this week by a balky computer will have a second chance when the state opens another round of applications on June 17.

Thousands of people who applied when the process opened at 10 a.m. Tuesday overwhelmed the computer system handling the permits. Some people waited so long that the computer kicked them out.

There is no way to know how many people missed getting one of the roughly 4,800 permits the state Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission set aside for hunters, said commission spokesman Henry Cabbage.

The commission has not determined what time the new round of applications will start. It will run through June 23 if the permits last.

Hopeful hunters may apply for permits at county tax collector offices, retailers that sell hunting and fishing licenses or http://myfwc.com/gators/public.htm.

Despite the computer logjam, the state issued 4,550 permits in the first six hours they were available, and most were gone in the first four.

Just before noon today, only 50 permits remained, all for the Lake Poinsett area of the St. Johns River. The permits are issued for specific areas, and hunters are allowed to take their two gators only from those areas.

Cabbage said he did not expect those permits to last through today.

State biologists will determine how many more permits will be issued in the second round, but Cabbage said 500 was a ballpark estimate.

Biologists set quotas for areas based on the alligator population and how much hunting that population can sustain.

Hunters who got permits but not in the areas they wanted may be able to forfeit them and take their chances on applying for an area they want, but there will be no guarantee of getting a new permit.

The permits allow hunters to take two alligators during the hunting season that runs from Aug. 15 through Nov. 1. Each person is allowed one permit.

Cabbage said the private company handling the computer applications has assured the commission that problems will be solved.

"We've been told the problem is fixable, and we want to make sure it doesn't raise its ugly head again," he said.

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