Catch of the day! Whopping 900lb, 13ft alligator that feasted on livestock around a south Florida lake for 80 years is shot dead by a hunter
- Mississippi hunter Doug Borries caught the largest alligator by an out of state trapper in Florida which was found to be 13ft 4inches long and 905 pounds
- Borries found the monstrous creature on a private lake after being told about it from a friend who remembered the 80-year-old gator from childhood
- The prized hunter shot the gator on the top of its head using his 7mm STW rifle and then grabbed the creature from the bottom of the lake
- The gator’s meat has since been used for processing and its head is currently mounted on Borries’ wall
- Borries posted the incredible find on his Facebook page last month which has received nearly 10,000 shares
This whopping beast gives a whole new meaning to catch of the day.
A Mississippi hunter has caught and killed an 80-year-old, 905lb alligator that measures 13feet 4inches in length at a lake in southern Florida.
But even this monster – an 80-year-old who was known to feast on livestock venturing too near to its lake – isn’t the largest caught in Florida. The record for the longest alligator caught goes to a 14ft 3.5inch beast caught in Lake Washington in Brevard County and the heaviest was a 1,043lb one in Orange Lake in Alachua County
Doug Borries, a seasoned hunter who owns Dynamic Outdoors TV, documented his prey on his Facebook page. He has racked up nine world records and 36 state ones for his efforts in both hunting and fishing.
He began hunting for the alligator after a friend told him about a creature he said had been around since his childhood.
The hunt for the massive alligator began for Borries after his friend told him about the creature which was reportedly around since his childhood.
‘This guy said he’d seen the gator since he was a child. It was time for the gator to go because some of the calves were disappearing,’ Borries told WWXV25. ‘So, he was down deer hunting with me, and he asked me if I wanted to come and hunt the gator.
‘I said, “Absolutely.” To me it was a once in a lifetime opportunity.’
The gator’s meat has since been used for processing and its head is currently mounted on Borries’ wall
Mississippi hunter Doug Borries caught the largest alligator by an out of state trapper in Florida which was found to be 13 feet and 4 inches in height as well as 905 pounds in weight
Borries found the gator on a private lake in Okeechobee County about 500 yards away using the scope of his 7mm STW rifle.
The creature was then shot at the top of its head after moving 180 yards closer to Borries.
The hunter then pulled the 80-year-old creature out of the bottom of the lake and was taken aback by its enormous size.
‘I had no idea the magnitude of how big his body was until we pulled him completely out of the lake,’ Borries told McClatchy News.
‘It had been suspected of eating some of the local livestock around the lake and was considered a threat.’
Borries caught the creature last fall on a private lake in Florida after his friend told him about the 80-year-old gator
The gator’s meat has since been processed for eating and the gator’s head was mounted on Borries’ wall.
His Facebook post showing the huge gator also received significant attention as it has racked up nearly 10,000 shares.
Commenters, however, were polarized over the practice of hunting with some defending Borries for the impressive catch while others have criticized him for killing the creature.
Borries counteracted the criticism after noting the threat of alligators to human life referring to when two-year-old Lane Graves had been snatched and killed by one at Walt Disney World in June 2016.
Borries is a seasoned hunter who owns and operates Dynamic Outdoors TV which primarily focuses on hunting and fishing
He has racked up nine world records and 36 state ones for his efforts in both hunting and fishing
Top 5 largest alligator catches in the US
1. The Stokes Family Alligator – Alabama (2014)
The largest alligator caught in the world on record belongs to Alabama woman Mandy Stokes who killed the beast-sized creature in 2014.
Stokes set the world record on her first gator hunt in August of that year which measured at 15 feet and 9 inches long as well as weighed 1,011.05 pounds.
The creature had been caught by Stokes late at night with her husband John and brother in law Kevin on board a 17-foot aluminum boat.
Following a ten-hour hunt, Stokes said her crew went through the full range of emotions as they first staked the animal, before battling it, then killing it and finally struggling to take it back to shore.
‘He came up just as calm as he could,’ Mandy Stokes told AL.com. ‘When I pulled the trigger this time, water just exploded on all of us.’
When they finally got the beast back to dry land, he was so big that he crushed the winch system normally used by Alabama Wildlife and Freshwater Fisheries biologists.
The Stokes’ gator measured 70.5 inches around the stomach, 46 inches around the base of the tail and had a 16-inch snout measurement.
The alligator was mounted and put on display at the Montgomery Zoo’s Mann Wildlife Learning Museum in 2015
2. Lee Lightsey and Blake Godwin’s Alligator- Florida (2016)
The second largest alligator was found in April 2016 by Florida hunting pair Lee Lightsey and Blake Godwin in a cattle pond at Outwest Farms in Okeechobee.
The massive gator was found to be 15 feet in length and 800 pounds with the hunting pair posting their search on social media.
After the gator was shot, the creature had to be pulled out of the water using a farm tractor.
‘It is hard to believe that something this big exists in the wild,’ Godwin told Fox13.
‘Hunting is a way of life for us and we are very proud of it.’
The meat of the alligator was donated to charity with the rest being taxidermied.
3. Tres Ammerman’s Alligator- Florida (2010)
The third largest alligator was found in November 2010 in a lake in Brevard County, Florida by Orlando resident Tres Ammerman.
The gator from Lake Washington was found to be 14 feet and 3.5 inches setting a record for the state of Florida as the biggest.
The creature had been spotted and towed in by Ammerman and two other men who were on board
‘We slid up on him face-on – it’s real hard to tell their size from that angle,’ Ammerman told LiveScience.
‘As we got to within about 3 feet of him I could tell he was big, and just as he dipped into the water, I threw my harpoon and hit him where the neck and head come together.’
‘The line was spinning off my buoy. He pulled us around the lake for about 45 minutes before we tried to work him up to the side of the boat.’
It took the men two hours to reel in the creature and bring it into the dock before placing it in the garage
4. Big Tex – Texas (2016)
The fourth biggest alligator was found in Champion Lake in Texas in October 2016 by Gary Saurage.
The gator was found to be 13 feet and 8 inches as well as weight over 900 pounds and has since been considered to be the largest of its kind in Texas.
‘Capturing this magnificent creature was truly the pinnacle of my career,’ Saurage told ABC News.
‘All the alligators in the lake scattered out and made room for him and then he stopped about 10 feet from us out in the water.’
‘We had an intense stare-down for about 20 minutes before it decided to lunge.’
‘I was able to get the rope through his snout and cinch it tight, but then he just took me down the hill, man. I thought I was gon’ be a goner, but then everybody got on the rope and pulled me back.’
The gator was later tied up and taken to Gator Country in Beaumont.
5. Mike Cottingham’s Gator – Arkansas (2012)
The fifth largest alligator was found in Millwood Lake in Hempstead County near the state line in September 2012 by Mike Cottingham.
The creature was found to be 13 feet and 3 inches and weighing approximately 1,380 pounds which was considered to be one of the heaviest caught at the time.
It was so large and heavy, it required five people to lift it into his boat.
Wildlife experts estimate the gator was about 30 years old.
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