Recently a video has gone viral on Twitter and it is no surprise as the video is of a cannibalistic alligator devouring another member of its own species.
Podcaster Taylor Soper tweeted the images, which she says his father filmed on Thursday, in his backyard in Horry County, South Carolina. The gruesome video shows a huge alligator swallowing a smaller one of about less than six feet long.
“This happened today in my parents’ backyard. The snack is a 6-foot crocodile,” Soper wrote.
Other Twitter users were horrified by the images. Flooding Soper’s feed with comments of disbelief like “Does Godzilla live in your backyard?” asked one, “It’s time to move your parents,” advised another, and “That is not your parents’ backyard. It’s his” someone else wrote, referring to the alligator.
During the last few days, the video has reached around 5 million views and 50,000 likes on Twitter.
“My dad captures some good things. All the credit to him, but he has no social networks.” Soper tweeted.
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Soper told local media that when his father filmed the images, it was the second time he saw a cannibal alligator on his property that same week. The previous weekend, the father believes that he saw the smallest crocodile, which eventually became the “snack” of the largest, eating an even smaller alligator.
Experts say cannibalism is common among American alligators and can even help keep their populations stable.
“Even the seemingly low rate of juvenile mortality attributed to cannibalism reported here may be an important factor in regulating the population,” wrote members of the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission in a 2011 report.
Although it is normal behavior, it never ceases to surprise millions of people who, for things like this, will probably reconsider the possibility of visiting some places in the near future.