{"id":136138,"date":"2026-01-29T10:43:37","date_gmt":"2026-01-29T10:43:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/136138\/"},"modified":"2026-01-29T10:43:37","modified_gmt":"2026-01-29T10:43:37","slug":"how-do-florida-alligators-cope-in-cold-weather-gatorland-experts-explain","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/136138\/","title":{"rendered":"How do Florida alligators cope in cold weather? Gatorland experts explain"},"content":{"rendered":"

ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. \u2013 This week, we\u2019re not the only ones trying to stay warm as this cold snap continues<\/a> in Central Florida.<\/p>\n

Alligators may not like freezing temperatures either, but they have been coping with the cold far longer than we have. <\/p>\n

On Wednesday, our News 6 team visited Gatorland, known as the \u201calligator capital of the world,\u201d to talk to the experts. <\/p>\n

[FLORIDA FREEZE GUIDE: Everything to know about rare cold, tips and more<\/a>]<\/p>\n

Brandon Fisher said alligators who live farther north in North Carolina or west in Texas are used to winter weather. <\/p>\n

\u201cOf course, here in Florida it doesn\u2019t freeze too much, at least not here in Central Florida,\u201d said Fisher. \u201cSo, these guys and gals just really stay in the water. It\u2019s a lot warmer than the air.\u201d<\/p>\n

[WATCH: Rare cold blast to send Florida into hard freeze]<\/p>\n

On Wednesday morning, most of the alligators were in the water in Gatorland\u2019s marsh. Fisher explained as the sun comes out, more of them will likely climb onto the banks to sun themselves. <\/p>\n

\u201cDo what reptiles do best by getting that energy and that warmth from the sun,\u201d said Fisher. <\/p>\n

This weekend, when temperatures are expected to drop even lower, Fisher says they will likely stay in the water. <\/p>\n

\u201cFor reptiles, you know, to go from 35, 36 degrees as a low to, we\u2019re talking 25, 26. A 10-degree difference on the weekend, that\u2019s a lot for a reptile,\u201d explained Fisher. <\/p>\n

Fisher said the bumps on their backs called \u201costeoderms\u201d act as prehistoric solar panels for alligators. <\/p>\n

\u201cBasically, in Latin that means \u2018bone skin.\u2019 Each individual bump is a bone plate, and those bone plates are tiny little holes and running through those holes are the blood vessels,\u201d said Fisher. \u201cThat\u2019s why they like to sit out in the sun. The reptiles are cold blooded, so they need heat to be able to move around digesting food, and all that. So, on these really cold days, as long as it\u2019s nice and sunny, they are going to be out for hours getting as much sun as possible, because at some point the sun\u2019s going down and it\u2019s going to get colder, and they\u2019ve got to have enough energy to survive that.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to Florida\u2019s Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, alligators are ectothermic, which means they rely on external sources of heat to regulate their temperature. When it drops below 70 degrees, they stop feeding. And when it drops below 55 degrees, they become dormant<\/a>. <\/p>\n

[WATCH: Oviedo\u2019s Lake Jesup packed with alligators]<\/p>\n

Fisher explained how alligators don\u2019t hibernate; they enter a state of \u201cbrumation\u201d – a winter dormancy period for ectothermic reptiles. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhere you get into those other states further north, a little more west, where you have somewhere the water freezes, they do a form of hibernation called brumation. And, basically, they stick their nose above the surface of the water, and let the water freeze around them,\u201d said Fisher. <\/p>\n

Fisher said videos will go viral showing alligators \u201csnorkeling\u201d while surrounded by ice in colder states. <\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re just waiting it out until that ice thaws out,\u201d said Fisher. \u201cAnd they can go, you know, months without eating. So, a few days a week of not eating is going to be okay to them.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fisher said it\u2019s one of the reasons why these animals are so resilient. <\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019ve been around since the dinosaurs,\u201d said Fisher. \u201cThey have a fifth valve in their heart that helps them control that blood flow so they can move the blood efficiently through their body. They can take it away if they need to. So, they\u2019re pumping all that blood and moving it around all over to keep all those vital organs good during the freeze. And then when it thaws out in a day or two they go on their merry way and they\u2019re good to go.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Copyright 2026 by WKMG ClickOrlando – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. \u2013 This week, we\u2019re not the only ones trying to stay warm as this cold…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":136139,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[13925,1684,19428,25639,1335,139,141,140,2411,221,21914],"class_list":["post-136138","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-orlando","tag-alligators","tag-animals","tag-cold-weather","tag-gatorland","tag-orange-county","tag-orlando","tag-orlando-headlines","tag-orlando-news","tag-theme-parks","tag-weather","tag-winter"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136138","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=136138"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136138\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/136139"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=136138"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=136138"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=136138"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}