Lost a Big Seminole Gator

[Hunter/Mason]

My wife and Sister In Law both drew tags this year. Hooked a good 1 Saturday night but only for a few seconds then I hooked them a 7 or so footer but they decided they didn’t want to kill that 1. We got him to the boat and I finally got him to come off. Yesterday evening I found a really big 1 but couldn’t get out of the channel in my bass boat. We met back up w my brother and we all got in his gator tail boat. I set up a cross bow several years ago for women to use for gators. Well the gator aider string holders broke and we had to improvise mid hunt. Took my brothers big spinning rod with 130 lb braid and tied it to the bolt ring. Made a few practice shots and it worked better and shot farther than anything. When we got back to where I found him earlier he was 100 + yds out in the grass mat. We eased up on him and he’d go down. Finally he came up close enough and we shot him. We didn’t try and fight him with the rod I was pulling on the line with my fingers. Got him to the boat 4-5 times but he had so much hydrilla on him you couldn’t see him. My brother tried to harpoon him 3 times but it wouldn’t stick in. Finally the gator grabbed and bit the harpoons end off! While he did that he also broke the arrow line. We stayed within 10 yds of him till midnight and the bolt was still in his neck. When he’d come up he would launch out of the water gasp for air and go under. We tried everything in the boat to get another line in him. Rods with the big treble hooks were useless in that thick grass. The giant grapple treble hooks we have were useless all we could do is get it all grassed up. The last time it came up it made a big growling sound and went down. We stayed another 2 hours and it never resurfaced. We went back this morning and couldn’t find or see anything. Between me my brother wives friends dad ect. We have killed a lot of gators. We’ve never had anything close to this 1 in size. True monster. If someone kills him or finds him I’d like to know how big it really was. I hate to wound or loose anything but it happens I know. The bolt is yellow with black carbon fiber strips and a piece of camo aluminum shaft at the knock end. Broadhead is a steelforce gator head. Shot in the back of the neck kinda on the right side.

 

[Toliver]

I'm going down August 31st. We generally hunt the Chattahoochee channel side of the lake. Will we be anywhere near him?

 

[Hunter/Mason]

I don’t know the lake at all was only my 2nd time on it. I could see the dam off in the distance.

 

[Toliver]

Ok. I'll let you know on the off chance we hook up with him.

 

[Hunter/Mason]

Thanks and good luck

 

[Nicodemus]

I'll keep a lookout for him and will holler at you here if I see him. I'll go out there this afternoon and take a gander. I've got a general idea of where ya'll were hunting and there are a couple of big ones in that area.

 

[Limbhanger2881]

I found two big gators dead. One just south of trails end. He was every bit of 12 feet. This was Saturday afternoon about two hours before dark. Then Sunday morning I found another one just east of the Indian mounds on the north east side of the island. The first one did not have a bolt in his neck. The second one I did not look. The second one I did not get that close to but was over 10 feet.

 

[Stickemdeep]

Sent you a message

 

[Hunter/Mason]

I found two big gators dead. One just south of trails end. He was every bit of 12 feet. This was Saturday afternoon about two hours before dark. Then Sunday morning I found another one just east of the Indian mounds on the north east side of the island. The first one did not have a bolt in his neck. The second one I did not look. The second one I did not get that close to but was over 10 feet.

We shot this 1 Sunday night, but thanks for the response

 

[mizuno24jad]

We shot this 1 Sunday night, but thanks for the response

I’m pretty sure we rode right by y’all Sunday night, you told us you broke off an arrow in one as we rode by, it was where spring creek meets the big lake

 

[Hunter/Mason]

That was us

 

[Hunter/Mason]

Got a PM earlier from SoCoKiller. He sent pics and coordinates. The gator we shot was floating about right where we left it Sunday night. Still had the bolt in his neck. My brother called some of his buddies that live on the lake and 1 of em went and cut his head off for us. He used a rope and measured from tip of nose to tail and cut the rope. Then cut his head off. Haven’t heard back yet on length. Said it stunk something awful. Used my wife’s tag. Glad for all the help watching out for him. We were at the T intersection that goes back to Big Jim’s from Seminole state park. Can’t get pics to load right now. Thanks again to everybody for all the help.

 

[Hunter/Mason]

you can see my bolt in his neck.
In the pic

 

[Hunter/Mason]

The boy that got the head for us said he pulled a rope from nose to tip of tail and pulled it tight he says 15’. I wasn’t there but he took a huge tote to put the head in and said it wouldn’t fit in the tote either.

 

[Hunter/Mason]

Back of the skull to tip of the snout is 35.4”

 

[Toliver]

That's heart breaking to lose one like that. I hope you can at least get a good skull mount out of it.

 

[Hunter/Mason]

The boy said he hardly had any teeth left and his jaw was broken.

 

[antharper]

Absolute monster ! Too bad you lost him and he was wasted , I know you hate it more than anything . Glad you got closure.

 

[Nicodemus]

That was one Godzilla size gator. It`s possible it was this one. This is one of the three biggest gators I`ve ever seen on Seminole and usually stayed around the area you killed that one. This picture I took a couple of years ago was only a few hundred yards from where your big gator was.

 

[antharper]

That was one Godzilla size gator. It`s possible it was this one. This is one of the three biggest gators I`ve ever seen on Seminole and usually stayed around the area you killed that one. This picture I took a couple of years ago was only a few hundred yards from where your big gator was.


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That nose is a loooong ways from his eyes !