good story, I too would feign incredulity if something like that happened in my pond.
I heard y’all were in east Texas, were you in south east Texas or just east?
Gator Hunting
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Kilgore, Texas
Ok the middle east 
that ain’t too far from Beaumont where I was born
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That’s pretty funny! I wonder what happened to Ol Chomp:roll_eyes:… Alligators are very interesting, but you sure have to be careful with dogs and kids around. I will have to say that we used to swim in the river with them every summer, but they never got near us. These days I’m much more cautious with my own kids, seems like my parents never worried about it. How did we ever survive???
Lots of water traps? Like swamp golf?
Tye,
The one I just got back is the biggest. He was 11’ 2”. Here is another picture to give you an idea. L to R, my dad, me, one of my best friends.
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@Bcaves and just HOW big is the boat you’re in?.. If that’s 11’2" I can’t imagine a 15 to an 18-foot gator. Even those West Nile crocs get HUGE too…I don’t want to be near anything that can eat a small battleship in one bite 
, without some kind of weaponry…i.e. a howitzer or something to that effect… What do you do with them? use the meat or make shoes or a suitcase or napkin holder or something?
Yeah they’re good for napkin holders:stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:. The meat on a wild gator over 8 feet is terrible, you can hardly chew it. I was able to get rid of it by grinding it all up, mixing with bread crumbs and seasoning, deep frying it, and serving it to all of our church members at the wild game supper. 
Southern Baptists will eat anything.
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@Bcaves when I lived in Cali, a friend of mine used to go to a “Wild Game Cookout” every year. He tells me one day “you should go,” I said, " I don’t think so… if it does cluck, moo or oink I’m not eating it".
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I made coon casserole one year…the Baptists ate it up.
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That’s hilarious! An old man I know always tells the story about feeding the preacher an armadillo, and and after he ate it, told him it was possum on the half shell. His wife is the type that has always cooked whatever he brought home. She cooked that armadillo up pretty good they said!
LOL! If you put it in a 9X13 pan Baptists will eat anything.
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Especially if it’s a 5th Sunday!
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Amazing story… and a good one with suspense , humor, terror and a bit of sadness - when chomp (small “c”) finally went his way… only to return as CHOMP (Big “C”) - forever changed. For a northern, guy who grew up in the ‘burbs, I cannot fathom what all this would be like to experience!
I was stationed at Barksdale AFB in Bossier City, Louisiana… for 6 years and heard stories that there were Gators on the remote east side of that big base… but I don’t recall ever seeing any.
Thanks for sharing, Ben.
How did we not see THAT comin’?
Hook, line and sinker, you reeled us in on that one, @Maggie!
Something suggests to me that you have many more…
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@anon8000755,
There are plenty out there bigger than that one. Th GA state record is just over 14 feet. now I think.
He said it was only a short way from Louisiana