USA: Meat producers may snap up alligator recycling bargain

Alligators, long thought of as ferocious swampland predators, are getting an image makeover courtesy of the meat industry. A test farm in the US mid-west, where alligators are as rare as, er, alligators, has forgone the gruesome and wasteful inevitability of burying its dead pigs and piglets, and is instead feeding them to a couple of cold-blooded hired hands.

February 26, 2003

Alligators, long thought of as ferocious swampland predators, are getting an image makeover courtesy of the meat industry.

A test farm in the US mid-west, where alligators are as rare as, er, alligators, has forgone the gruesome and wasteful inevitability of burying its dead pigs and piglets, and is instead feeding them to a couple of cold-blooded hired hands.

Kris Kohl, agricultural engineer at Iowa State University’s outreach service, is running the project and has 20 Iowa farmers ready to start raising the gators on the farms. Each of the recycling reptiles may not have too much time to enjoy the mid-west, as farmers expect to make some extra cash, selling them for their hide and meat.