Florida man bitten in arm by alligator

MANATEE COUNTY, Fla. — A Florida man was bitten in the arm by an alligator on Wednesday, the second attack in the area within days.

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Eric Merda, 43, of Sarasota, was near the Lake Manatee Fish Camp in Myakka City at 5:30 p.m. EDT when he was bitten by the reptile, according to a statement from the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.

Wildlife officials said Merda was swimming in the water when the gator attacked, WWSB-TV reported.

Officials with the FWC, along with the Manatee County Sheriff’s Office and Manatee County Emergency Medical Services responded to the scene, according to the Sarasota Herald-Tribune.

Merda was taken to an area hospital for treatment for a “serious injury” to his arm, the FWC said in its statement.

Wildlife officials dispatched a contracted nuisance alligator trapper to the scene, WFLA-TV reported. Officials on Thursday said that no alligators have been removed from the area, but the trapper continues to monitor the area.

“They usually move way before you’re close to them, they just want to get out of the way,” Jonathan McPherson, a boater at the lake, told WWSB. “If the guy was swimming somewhere where he shouldn’t have been, then I understand why that happened.”

Wildlife expert Justin Matthews said that based on the severity of the injury, it was most likely a large alligator.

“A 6-footer can rip your arm off, this alligator here being that close to people, I think someone has fed him before,” Matthews told the television station.

Gary Sharpe said he unloads his boat to fish regularly at the Lake Manatee Fish Camp. Sharpe told the Herald-Tribune he has only seen alligators in the 3- to 4-foot range, but added that encounters with alligators are not unusual.

“We’re in their neighborhood, so we expect to see them,” Sharpe told the newspaper. “If we didn’t see them, it would be an odd thing.”

The attack comes less than a week after an elderly woman was killed by two alligators in a lake along a golf course in Englewood, a city in neighboring Sarasota County.

McPherson said the attacks will not deter him from going to the lake.

“I personally carry a gun,” McPherson told WWSB. “I’m more worried about water moccasins than gators.”

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