727 pound alligator caught in Mississippi

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727 pound alligator caught in Mississippi

Dustin Bockman set a new weight record for an alligator taken during hunting season with a 727 pound specimen.

(WAPT News)

Sept. 3, 2013 at 8:07 AM By VERONICA LINARES, UPIcom

Alligator hunters in Mississippi set multiple records during the first weekend of the state's alligator season.

Beth Trammell was the first to set a record after catching a 13-foot-5.5-inch, 723.5-pound alligator in the early morning, but a few hours later Dustin Bockman, a UPS driver from Vicksburg, set a new weight record with a 13-foot-4.5-inch, 727-pound alligator caught in the Mississippi River near the Big Black River in Claiborne County.

"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 said Monday.

Bockman's catch now holds the current weight record for a gator taken during alligator hunting season by a Mississippi hunter.

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The current length record is 13 feet, 6.5 inches from an alligator taken on the Pascagoula River in 2008.

Brandon Maskew of Ellisville also set a record over the weekend with a female alligator after catching a 10 foot long 295.3 pound alligator Friday.