Danger! Nesting Alligators!

By Anita VanOuwerkerk

Elizabeth, Louisiana, is the perfect place to live. Mama, Daddy, and Beaux love the house. Daddy and Beaux particularly like it because West Bay Game Reserve is right behind the house, and Clyde’s Pond is across the highway. Hunting and fishing without even getting in the car! Then Daddy deploys to Afghanistan for army duty, Mama gets a job in the library, and Beaux, eleven years old, is too old for a babysitter this year. This summer challenges Beaux with exciting new adventures. He makes new friends, gets a job, and goes to summer school. The whole family calls this exciting summer the Alligator Summer.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Mar 12, 2021
• ISBN: 9781664139411

Anita VanOuwerkerk

Anita Harrison Van Ouwerkerk, the youngest of eight girls, grew up in the piney woods of Louisiana. When she wasn’t playing basketball or singing, she was often curled up with a good book or exploring the nearby swamp. Anita completed her master’s degree in education at the University of New Orleans and returned, with her husband, to the piney woods. The huge bull gator in this story lived in the lake behind the home of Anita’s dear friends, Mr. Billie and Ms. Lillie Anderson. Anita and her family spent many hours on Ms. Lillie’s back porch, sipping iced tea and peering through binoculars, watching the gators nest and raise their young.

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Copyright © 2020 by Anita VanOuwerkerk. 813098

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Xlibris

844-714-8691

www.Xlibris.com

Library of Congress Control Number:       2020923478

Rev. date: 03/03/2021

Acknowledgments

My family was most fortunate to have moved to Elizabeth, Louisiana, in 1970. We made many life long friends in that small town of 250 people, and many of us have kept in touch for half a century.

Danger! Nesting Alligators! is somewhat biographical in that one summer Lillie and Billie Anderson did have alligators in Clyde’s Pond. Lillie and I collaborated on this story about them for several years. Robert and Denise Anderson found photographs and helped in other ways as well. Robert, Denise, Gray, Bill, and their children are still friends with my adult children, Kathy Phillips, Jeff, and Joseph Vanouwerkerk. Of course, the grandchildren, David Adamik, Horton Vanouwerkerk, Emily, and Daniel Phillips are friends as well.

Kathy contributed to the completion of the book by introducing me to the young artist, Logan Johnson and hiring him to draw the black and white pictures of alligators and ferns. Kathy also researched and verified some of the alligator facts. Logan’s sister, Aubrianna Johnson, was a teen who helped me with the ending.

My son Jeff edited the final version and taught me computer skills to make the book a reality. He was and is a boost to us all.

My niece, Claudia Hazelton Bushnell was the first to encourage me when we sat up most of one night and read the first of many drafts. Patricia Heath Fohrman, another niece, edited an early draft as well.

Friends, Rev. Don Fielding and Dr. Douglas Hawes encouraged me at every opportunity. To all who wished me luck and ordered books before they were published, thanks for that encouragement as well!

Sincerely,

Anita Vanouwerkerk

Contents

Chapter 1 Alligator Neighbors

Chapter 2 The Gator Nest

Chapter 3 Fontenot's Alligator farm

Chapter 4 Fascinating Ferns

Chapter 5 Six Mile Creek

Chapter 6 Resurrection Fern

Chapter 7 Fourth of July

Chapter 8 Lilly's Louisiana Fern Garden

Chapter 9 Hatching Gator Eggs

Chapter 10 The Empty Nest

Chapter 1

ALLIGATOR NEIGHBORS

Beaux, don’t pout. We’re both upset about Daddy’s going to Afghanistan again. But he’ll be back before summer’s over.

"Mama, I want some fun this summer! Why did we move to little ole’ Elizabeth, Louisiana, anyway? I play video and computer games, but I don’t have real friends to play with.

Evelyn put her arm around him. Oh, Beaux, you know we moved here to be closer to Fort Polk to make it easier for Daddy when he’s here with us. Frank didn’t know he would deploy so soon.

Yeah, I know.

This is a terrific place to hunt and fish. The Game Reserve is behind our house and Anderson’s lake is across the highway. You’ll be twelve when Frank gets home, so study for your hunting license. Then you can go duck hunting with Daddy and the men this fall. Anyway, we’re going to be so busy, time will fly.

And Daddy will miss my birthday again.

Ignoring that comment, Evelyn said, Beaux, I’m going to need help in the garden since I’ll be working at the library five days a week. And you have your 4-H animals to care for, and summer school every morning starting next week.

Beaux nodded his head, but Evelyn felt his dismay.

Frank told you that you can fish from the levee at Clyde’s Pond, but not from the boat. And, Beaux, make sure you tell Miz. Lilly when you’re there. I see her outside working in her flower bed, so she won’t mind watching you.

Mama, don’t treat me like a baby!

I’m sorry dear, see you at lunch. Remember, you’re making deviled eggs. Gotta hurry!

Evelyn closed the door wishing she hadn’t taken the job at the library.

"Boil the eggs! Feed the animals! All I do is work, work, work! Mama’s gone, so I’m going to Clyde’s Pond. I’m going fishing!

OK, first I’ll get a pot, and put six eggs from the Fridge in it. Cover the eggs with water. Set the pot on the stove, bring to a boil, and turn the burner to four for 7 minutes.

Grab my fishing pole and red fishing hat from the back porch. Put them by the front door. Grab the key and slip it over my neck. Eggs are ready. Run cold water over them and put them in the fridge. Finished!"

Beaux looked across the blacktop to see Miz Smith’s house on the hill in the pines across Hwy. 12. The levee and a corner of Clyde’s Pond looked cool. He locked the door and hurried across the blacktop on this first hot day of summer.

He noticed the small trees covering the levee and a trickle of water running through the middle! The barbed wire fence around the levee and pasture had a new sign hanging on it.

"Whoa! It says ‘DANGER! NESTING ALLIGATORS! NO FISHING!’

"Gators? Where? I don’t see any gators. Alligators! Gators? Is that sign a joke?’

Crossing Anderson’s rock driveway, he looked toward the pine trees in front of the house. No gators in front. Then seeing Miz Lilly on the patio at the back