727-Pound Alligator Caught in Mississippi Takes State Record for Weight, One Of Three Records In First Days of Season

By Myles Collier, Christian Post Contributor Tuesday, September 03, 2013

Not even a week into Mississippi's alligator hunting season the state's record for biggest alligator caught has been broken twice, and three records were set or broken in total, according to the state's Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks.

727-Pound Alligator | MS Dept. of Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks

Local reports indicate that Beth Trammell was the first to set a record after catching a 13-foot-5.5-inch, 723.5-pound alligator with his group in Saturday, but that would prove not enough on this day.

A few hours later Dustin Bockman, a UPS driver from Vicksburg, set what is now the current weight record after snaring a 13-foot-4.5-inch, 727-pound alligator that was roped in the Mississippi River near the Big Black River in Claiborne County, beating the state record for heaviest male by 29.5 pounds.

"He broke all the lines we could put in him. Finally [we] 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 the Hattiesburg American.

"We pulled his head up on the bank far enough he wouldn't float away," Bockman added. "He was so heavy he wasn't going anywhere."

Bockman's catch now holds the current weight record for a gator taken during alligator hunting season by a Mississippi hunter. The current length record is 13 feet, 6.5 inches from an alligator taken on the Pascagoula River in 2008.

The third record set and/or broken during the first week of the season was completed by Brandon Maskew of Ellisville who was able to take the record for biggest female alligator after taking town a 10-foot long 295.3 pound alligator on Friday.