A Texas rancher was bitten on the hand by an alligator that strayed on to a farm and broke into a cattle pen where calves were weaning on 4 June.

The unnamed man was straddling the animal after catching it with a rope when – suddenly – its vice-like jaws snapped shut on his thumb, causing him to shriek with pain.

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"It's bitten me to the bone," he can be heard saying in a video of the incident uploaded to Youtube.

Fortunately, the ranchman was able to maintain control of the huge specimen with the help of two colleagues and no one was hurt further.

The three men had approached the alligator after catching it with lassos on Hal Conover's land in Hawkins, around 100 miles east of Dallas.

The unlucky recipient of the bite and one of the others then dropped onto the beast's back and attempted to hold its jaws tight so they could be taped.

The Associated Press reports that the intruder was eventually taken to a nearby alligator farm.

The dramatic footage was uploaded to YouTube on 12 June but has only begun to become widely shared today (20 June).

Meanwhile in Australia, a teenager made world-famous by surviving a crocodile attack while trying to impress a woman has admitted assaulting two police officers during a methamphetamine binge funded by recent media appearances.

A string of breathtaking alligator videos have gone viral on the internet already this year, including a vicious horse attacking an alligator and a seemingly 'Jurassic' giant alligator strolling past stunned photographers, both in Florida.