GAUTIER, Miss. — Two hunters in Gautier, Mississippi, bagged an alligator so big on the opening day of the hunting season last week that it could rival the state record.
Derrick Saucier and Jarrod Davis bagged the massive gator in Mary Walker Bayou last Friday but not without a major fight, The Clarion Ledger reported.
"It was awesome," Saucier told the newspaper. "We knew the gator was in the area."
It took the pair an hour-and-a-half after they hooked it to finally get the giant, 13-foot-6-inch reptile to shore, according to the Ledger. In the end, they couldn't get the gator into their boat and had to tow it into shallower water to actually catch it.
“He was a nuisance. He’d eaten a few pets. One of the trappers hooked him a month ago. I could still see the scar on him where the hook came out. People had been chasing him for years,” Saucier said.
The reptile could tie or surpass the state record for the heaviest male alligator ever captured in public waters. The current record is 822 pounds, the Ledger reported.
Alligator hunting season in the state runs through Monday. WAPT-TV reported that permits were issued to 960 hunters in seven zones on public waters.