Louisiana just approved a brand-new recreational alligator hunting season, on top of the state's existing commercial hunt. Starting October 1, 2026, a lottery will hand out tags to 5,000 residents, two tags each, meaning as many as 10,000 wild alligators could be killed in a single month across eight zones statewide.

This isn't about food, income, or population control. The rules make that explicit: no free shooting, no pole hunting, and no selling or trading the meat, hides, or any other part of the animals killed. Hunters are limited to hook-and-line and snatch-hook methods, techniques that can leave an alligator hooked and struggling for an extended period before it dies. Killing thousands of animals with nothing to show for it but a tag checked off isn't sport. It's cruelty dressed up as recreation.

Louisiana has been down this road before. Alligator numbers crashed so badly from overhunting that the state had to shut the season down entirely from 1962 to 1972 just to let the population recover. It worked, and LDWF now counts more than 3 million wild alligators in the state. That recovery shouldn't become an excuse to open the door to a whole new hunt with no real purpose behind it.

Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry and the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries have the power to reject or roll back this new recreational season before it starts. Sign the petition now to stop the October hunt before thousands of alligators are killed for nothing.