Mississippi Hunters Nab Two Record-breaking Alligators in Same Day
OutdoorHub Reporters 09.03.13
Beth Trammell smashed Mississippi’s previous state record when she took a 13-foot, 5.5-inch and 723-pound alligator on Sunday, but her record only lasted about an hour. According to WLBT, shortly after Trammel certified her alligator with state authorities, Dustin Brockman shot a heavier 727-pound gator only miles away.
“He broke all the lines we could put in him. Finally put a snare on him and got him up high enough and put a shot on him. All in all probably took us four-and-a-half hours to catch him from the first time we saw him,” Bockman told WLBT.
The Clarion-Ledger reports that it was Trammell’s first time hunting. She was with her husband and four other hunters when the group hooked a massive alligator in the Yazoo Diversion Canal in Issaquenna County. When she first saw the animal, Trammel remarked that it reminded her of the Loch Ness Monster. Two other hunters drifted in to help when they saw Trammell struggling to bring in the large reptile, a fight that lasted over two hours. The animal was later brought in to Mississippi Alligator program coordinator Ricky Flynt, who approved the state record.
Trammell’s reign, however, was cut short by an even bigger specimen. Brothers Dustin and Ryan Brockman hooked an alligator around the same time that Trammell did, but instead in Claiborne County’s Big Black River. Along with Cole Landers, the Brockman brothers were able to bring the gator close enough to their boat so it could be shot with a crossbow. Unfortunately, getting it aboard their vessel was going to be a more difficult chore. The men spent four hours attempting to haul the carcass onto the boat before giving up and mounting the gator’s head on a sandbar.
“We pulled his head up on the bank far enough he wouldn’t float away,” said Dustin Bockman. “He was so heavy he wasn’t going anywhere.”
The three men then waited beside the gator for another two-and-a-half hours before help arrived. By the time the alligator was ready to be taken in to be measured, Brockman was told that Trammell had already broken the state record. However, after the weigh a surprised Flynt confirmed that Brockman’s catch had overtaken the hour-old record, but just barely by four pounds. Brockman’s catch did measure one inch shorter than Trammell’s in length.
Prior to Sunday, the state’s alligator record was held by Tom Grant, also of Issaquena County, for a gator weighing 697.5 pounds.
