We have been really busy with tours and parties this spring - THANK YOU!! School field trips, corporate events, and swamp tours are in full swing. We have to admit that the school trips are some of the most rewarding - seeing the wide eyes, open mind and innocent curiosity of a first grader on our boat in the swamp with an alligator is without compare!
The ABC has been such an incredible gift to the Baton Rouge area! We have met some of the most wonderful, friendly and appreciative people from all over the US and Canada attending the Congress this year. The staff and vendors from the ABC are some of the greatest people you will meet - friendly, helpful and all around fantastic people. Even if you don't bowl, go to the River Center and check out what is happening. The ABC will be happy to show you around and it is something to see. Over a thousand bowlers a day, seven days a week, nineteen hours a day, for 180 days - it's an amazing machine!!
We've also been busy on some other fronts as well! We want to welcome some new faces at Alligator Bayou!! We now have Angie, Brandon and Richard working with us. Angie and Brandon are working with Jamie on tours and reservations, and Richard is a part-time student and former soldier in Iraq. Frank has David and Richard cutting willow trees along the levee to release the smaller cypress and open the view of the old-growth trees from Alligator Bayou (more on this next issue). Frank has also come up with an idea for a bobcat exhibit and a raptor flight exhibit - Jim has found a potential bobcat to house the new habitat!
We are quite proud to have been included in the Baton Rouge Business Report's Capital Assets publication this year! We were indeed honored to have been included among such recipients as C.C. Lockwood and Governor Blanco!
Our lives are richly blessed, and we count ourselves lucky to have friend like all of you! We have had the opportunity to make wonderful friends on our "job" (if you can call it that!), and your love and support are greatly appreciated. We love all of you, and thank you! See you next month!!
 Frank Bonifay and Jim Ragland Conservationists who pursued the preservation of the Bluff Swamp. Partners for over 20 years now, Frank and Jim have tried to educate guests about the importance and necessity of the swamp habitat for both humans and wildlife. More
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Click here for summer screensaver.
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Just wanted to drop you a line and let
you know what a great time we had at
one of your recent tours! My husband
was participating in the ABC Bowling
Tournament earlier this month, and
several of us went on your Sunset Tour
on March 10, 2005. What a wonderful
and entertaining time we had! Some
friends of ours are heading to Baton
Rouge at the end of next month, and I
told them if they do nothing else they
MUST do the Alligator Bayou Swamp
Tour!!!
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HAVE SOME PHOTOS YOU WOULD LIKE TO SHARE? PLEASE EMAIL THEM TO info@dezins.com
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A South Louisiana Family
Picnic For 600
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Great weather, food, music and fun were the perfect ingredients for the 2005 LOPA Family Picnic at Alligator Bayou.
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You are hosting an event for over 600 people from Louisiana and surrounding states and you are looking for the perfect place that mixes fun, convenience, a unique Louisiana experience and great Louisiana food… what do you do?
The Louisiana Organ Procurement Agency recently hosted such an event and they chose the best attraction around, Alligator Bayou. For the third year in a row, on Saturday, April 2, our friends at Alligator Bayou hosted the 2005 Annual LOPA Family Picnic.
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Anyone care to dance? Yes they did to the music of Rodney Thibodaux and Tout Les Soir.
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“The friendly, generous and caring staff is a large part as to why we keep coming back to Alligator Bayou,” stated Kelly Ranum, Executive Director of LOPA. “Each member of the Alligator Bayou family has become a member of the LOPA family. LOPA also loves Alligator Bayou for its pure entertainment factor, the people, the swamp and the critters, and we believe that it is a comfortable family friendly environment. This is our third year there and we are looking forward to having our LOPA Family Picnic at Alligator Bayou for many years to come,” added Kelly.
LOPA, the Louisiana Organ Procurement Agency, is a private, non-profit organization that has two purposes; one is to recover human organs and tissue for transplantation in Louisiana for the six (6) transplant centers and to educate the public in all areas regarding the benefits of transplantation as well as the maintenance of healthy lifestyles.
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And the highlight of it all, swamp tours aboard the Alligator Queen.
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The picnic included donor families and recipients and entertainment of the day included a vast array of food including bbq chicken, hamburgers, jambalaya, white beans, sweet potato crunch, hush puppies and bread pudding. Live Cajun music was played all day by Rodney Thibodaux and Tout Les Soir as well as Cajun dancers led by Carey & Gwen Fontenot.
All in attendance were treated to tours of the Alligator Snapping Turtle Exhibit, the 6-acre Alligator Eco-habitat show and of course SWAMP TOURS aboard the Alligator Queen.
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Observers were delighted by the up-close and personal experience of the 6-acre Alligator Eco-habitat.
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“The LOPA party is always a highlight in our year. Each person who attends from the staff to the donor and recipient families are amazing gifts to all of us. They give a refreshing reminder that we should live each day as if it were our last. We are awed by the stories of love and giving,” stated Jim Ragland and Frank Bonifay, co-owners of Alligator Bayou.
To find out more about LOPA, please visit them on the web at www.lopa.org, and you’re always invited to the swamps at www.alligatorbayou.com.
The gators are starting to show signs of breeding. We've seen some "courting" going on, and so we're going to start looking for nesting. The new gators are looking like they're starting to feel at home. Hannibal (in the original pit) has been watching the fence for interlopers and visiting with the females. We're crossing our fingers and waiting to see what happens!! Our new walkway has proven to be a great way to see the gators up close! Guests love being within a few feet, but safely out of reach of the gators.
Right now, we also have a new "temporary" visitor! Leslie Lattimore, the wildlife rehabiltator with whom we work, has released a blue heron who was found dangling from kite string and being stretched by a dog. He has been in our gator pit for about a week now, and seems to be doing quite well. Although he is injured, his chances to improve and actually fly again are greatly improved in our pit! The wading birds and gators have a unique relationship. The gators will sometimes eat the birds, but the absence of predators that specifically hunt the birds (i.e., raccoons, possums and dogs) makes our pit the perfect rehab.
Spring has sprung, and with the mild weather and explosion of life makes this a great time to visit the swamp. We've been seeing pelicans, the bald eagles, the Mississippi kites are back and we even saw a swallow-tailed kite on the tour. The gators are out in droves. The barred owls are calling at night. Romance is in the air!! And our Cajun Cottages are a perfect location to experience all of this and more. Find out more about our Cajun Cottages by clicking here.
ENVIROMENTAL IMPACT: AN ECOSYSTEM AT RISK
 Most wetlands in the United States are suffering from the impacts of urban sprawl and commercial development. The statistics are staggering. In America some estimates conclude that as much as 54% of the wetlands existing in colonial times, more than 100 million acres, have been destroyed. In addition to the endangered coastal wetlands, bottom land
Being lost with the habitats are the organisms that depend on them. By 1991, the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service had placed more than 600 plants and animals on the protective list of endangered and threatened species. Fifty to 100 species are added to the list every year. This bigger picture underlines the importance of preserving and restoring the coastal wetlands and bottomland
The Spanish Lake Basin is not a stranger to the national statistics. The Basin has had a history of land use that has severely impacted its wetland ecosystem. Due to population and industrial expansion in the Greater Baton Rouge area, the outskirts of the city are being developed. The
Spanish Lake Basin is now ringed with a metro population of over 600,000 people and development is continuing. Developed areas surrounding the Basin include residential subdivisions, golf courses, two correctional facilities, an abandoned oil and gas field, pipelines, industries along the Mississippi River, waste mounds from area industries, and, to the north, Greater Baton Rouge. Each of these areas may contribute many types of pollution to the Basin, potentially endangering the lives and safety of wildlife and people.
Everyone contributes to the pollution produced by the development and habitation of an area. Typically, new developments cut down trees and replace porous soil with impervious surfaces (i.e. cement, rooftops). The action of storm water racing over these surfaces and acquiring their pollutants (such as motor oil and other automobile chemicals, litter, and industrial chemicals) is called storm water runoff and is a significant contributor to water pollution. Storm water runoff, combined with poorly treated and untreated sewage contributes to urban runoff in the Basin. Urban runoff combined with agricultural runoff (animal waste, chemicals of agriculture
The history of the Spanish Lake Basin illustrates the truth of two basic environmental tenets "everything is connected to everything else" and "nothing goes away"; especially water pollution! Basically, Spanish Lake is affected by everything and everybody around it! Due to the hydrology of the Spanish
Lake Basin, water polluted from development will drain to the lowest point, Spanish Lake, where it is likely to stay and concentrate. This pollution, combined with the deforestation accompanying development, can stress wildlife. With confined, polluted habitats, some species cannot survive and may become extinct, like the Carolina Parakeet.
So -If everyone contributes to the problem, then everyone can help to solve the problem. The health of the environment is an issue where anyone can participate and make a differ ence. In Chapter 7, students will be able to explore what is being done to help save the Spanish Lake Basin and how they can become a part of that effort.
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