Mississippi alligator hunters set multiple new records during the first weekend of alligator season.
According to Mississippi News Now, Beth Trammell caught a 13-foot 5.5-inch, 723.5-pound alligator early Sunday in Issaquenna County in the Yazoo Diversion Canal north of Redwood, Miss. to hold the new state record for an hour until another hunter caught a bigger one. The capture broke the previous record of 697.5 pounds.
Mississippi Alligator Program, coordinator Ricky Flynt said one hour after he certified Trammell's record alligator, he certified another record-breaking gator. Dustin Bockman, a UPS driver from Vicksburg, Miss. surpassed Trammell with a 727-pound 13-foot, 4.5-inch alligator in the Mississippi River near the Big Black River in Claiborne County
Bockman said it was a tough grab.
"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," Bockman told MS News Now. "All in all probably took us four and a half hours to catch him from the first time we saw him."
Bockman was assisted by brother Ryan Bockman, and friend Cole Landers.
According to program coordinator Flynt, Bockman's prize currently holds the record for weight for an alligator taken during hunting season by a Mississippi hunter.
A 13-foot 6.5-inch alligator taken on the Pascagoula River in 2008, holds the record for length. Hunter Brandon Maskew of Ellisville, Miss. added to the pot of records by taking a 295.3-pound, 10 inch female alligator in the river Friday night.
Alligators can be found throughout the whole state of Mississippi according to information on the alligator program's website.
They are most common in the southern part of the state the website said.
