In, January 2018, a massive blizzard hit the east coast of the United States. Even when meteorologists arrived, no one expected it to be that bad. Hundreds of canceled flights, car accidents, multi-million losses, and 300 people were left without power. Only alligators knew of the disaster, so froze themselves so that the cold would not hurt them. When George Howard manager of swamp park saw alligator noses sticking out of the frozen lake, he panicked that losing several animals at once would be terrible. He went to the alligators and wanted to pull them out, fortunately, he stopped at the last minute. When he searched on google, he found out that if he had pulled them out, they would have died. Alligators are cold-blooded meaning the temperature around them is very important, you can’t just funk her up like a sparrow to wait out the cold. They use ice to freeze so that they seek shelter from the cold. When winter comes crocodiles come onto the ground and bury themselves until the weather improves. But then how does the alligator know? Beside even humans can’t always predict the weather. But alligators can when they know the weather is going to be cold. So, they stick their noses out of the water and wait so that they can breathe air when the lake or pond is frozen. This is because they don’t have the gills to breathe. An alligator can only stay breathing for only 24 hours. Alligators have tiny dots, these dots can tell anything with excellent accuracy, these dots have worked even better than the weather forecast. But if the alligator were okay, why couldn’t George pull them out? They escaped the cold by immersing themselves in the water because it’s much warmer. If the alligator gets out of the water at the wrong moment, then the combination of frost, ice, and wet skin will instantly kill the poor thing. But why is the water warmer? The air above the surface heats up faster and moves upward, new masses of cold air take its place, and the ground cools down but on the land, water starts to heat up, this is because of it’s the flow of thermocandactitvity and its high heat capacity. That is why water gives up heat very slowly. And by the time winter has arrived the alligators can stay in the water to keep themselves warm and cozy. When the temperature goes down by 54 degrees Fahrenheit the alligators go into a dormant stage and stick their noses out of the water for things to change for the better. You might think ‘won’t the cold hurt their noses?’ The alligator’s nose is just cartilage wrapped up in thick skin that won’t freeze immediately. So, next time you see an alligator frozen and sticking its nose out, please don’t try to pull it out, you will kill the poor thing.
