Sharpshooter snipes huge alligator

Published 6:46 pm Sunday, October 1, 2017

Johnny Watkins slowly brought the rifle to his shoulder, knowing the shot would have to be almost perfect.

The target was an alligator that was cruising the surface about 60 yards away. It would later measure out to 12 feet long, weigh between 600 and 700 pounds and have to be hoisted by a forklift at the processor.

For the past couple of years, Watkins, wife Sara and sons Kade and Garrett, have spent a few days during each gator season harvesting alligators on family property in Pointe Coupee Parish.

They get two tags and have made good on both each year.

“It’s something we have been doing with the kids,” he said, “to make memories for them. We do this with fishing and hunting also.”

Watkins is a longtime hunter and fisherman who has won numerous bass fishing tournaments on Toledo Bend and Sam Rayburn.

Gator hunting he had never done before.

A neighbor by the name of Elton Savoy, whose land adjoins the family property, got Watkins interested when he talked about the alligators he had been taking each year.

“It was something that we decided to do try,” Watkins said. “It kind of coincided with LSU home football games. The first time was when McNeese’s game at LSU was canceled.

“This year, when LSU played Chattanooga, we set out the lines.”

About a third of the family property is a swamp, the other is solid ground.

He said that to begin they would place two lines out, tying each line to an overhanging limb of a willow tree that was anchored on the solid ground and fix a quarter of a raw chicken to a hook at the end of the line. He would let the chicken hang about a foot and a half above the water surface.

“We caught a 7-footer that time and we also saw the big gator we harvested last week,” Watkins said. “So we knew it was hanging around that area. Last week we went down and I hung the bait a little higher because I didn’t want to catch a smaller gator.”

On a Tuesday, Watkins went to check the line.

It was still intact but the large alligator was swimming in the distance.

He decided to take the shot.

“There’s a spot on the back of gator’s head — about the size of a lemon — that if you hit (it) will drop them immediately,” he said.

That’s the shot he made, the 270-caliber Remington putting the gator into a spin.

“It was a little bigger caliber than I wanted to use, but it is my most accurate rifle. I didn’t want to just wound that big gator.”

Watkins said the alligator came partially out of the water with a massive tail flip and bellied up when it landed.

“That was something to see.” 

He said the gator floated for about 5 minutes and then sank in the 6-foot deep water.

With the help of friend Dane Baker, the two paddled out to the gator in a small boat, jumping into the water to secure the gator with a rope. Baker then held onto the rope while Watkins rowed to the bank.

Once on the bank they used a wench to pull the gator onto a trailer and take it to a processor.

“To put your hands on something that big was a totally different experience,” Watkins said.

He said he will have the head mounted and he’s already looking forward to next year’s gator season.

“When we were getting that gator out of the water there was another one that looked just as big about 75 yards away,” Watkins said.