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I Want A Son Like Him: Five Year Old Boy Catches 800 Pound Gator



Oct 1, 2009 5 Comments ›› Erik Wong

KTRE Texas:

LIVINGSTON, TX – A young Livingston boy caught an alligator taller than a Texas tale.

Harvesting an alligator that’s 20 times your size is a piece of cake, according to 5-year-old Simon Hughes. “Well, its pretty much simple,” said Simon who caught the alligator.

Sunday morning, Simon went alligator hunting with his dad and his a family friend. They came back having bit off more than they can chew.

Chuck Cotton, a family friend, was with Simon when they discovered the beast. “We had seen the alligator previous months before, another hunter had set out a bait and hook and I went down to check it Sunday morning and saw the line was in the water, I called up Simon to see if he wanted to take an alligator and he came out,” he adds, “We didn’t know how big he would be or how small he would be and he turned out to be one of the largest I’ve ever seen.”

Scott Hughes, Simon’s father, said Simon is a natural born hunter, so an 800 pound alligator was no match for him. “Well I my got my gun out and shot him,” Simon said laughingly.

When they pulled the alligator out of the water they were shocked to find out he was 12 feet long, but the size didn’t matter to Simon. “I wasn’t even afraid,” Simon said.

But mom doesn’t feel quite the same way when she sees her son standing next to a massive reptile. Toni Hughes, Simon’s Mother said, “It sort of scares you to death because there are alligators, there snakes, all sorts of things out there.”

Many people were stunned to by this little guy’s big catch. Danny Moye, of Moye’s Taxidermy, will mount the alligator head, and make some “alligator feet” book shelve holders for Simon. He said, “I’m glad we don’t have to mount this one life size because I would have to build a body to fit him because you couldn’t buy a mannequin, he was so big.”

Toni said, “What we thought was massive was a 10 foot alligator, and this one just dwarfs the 10 foot,” she adds, “It’s just so massive and prehistoric looking.”

And of course, even with this impressive catch under his belt, Simon is setting his sights even higher. He said, “Next year I’m going to kill me a bigger alligator!”

Simon fathers said that his son’s catch was just five inches short from breaking a Texas state record.


  • Bob USMC

    Send the kid to The Stan, war over in no time flat! :mrgreen:

  • Phil Byler

    The kid is a future Marine for sure.

  • Pingback: Five Year Old Boy Catches 800 Pound Gator « The Bader Nation

  • Citizen K

    .22 hollow point into the small brain and dead. It is simple. The kid is a regular country boy and beginning to shoot that young is the norm were I grew up.

    That is a decent sized gator in Southwest Louisiana. When legal trapping was allowed again back in the mid-70′s in SW Louisiana (no where else) that was the average size. Most trappers get at least one that size annually.

    The old way is the hit them with a sledge hammer or axe handle on the head to knock them out cold. Then throw them in the flat bottomed aluminum boat (usually 16 to 18 feet with a wide bottom), run all of the traps then kill them when you get ashore before skinning them. However, sometimes they could come to and the boat ends up looking like an aluminum beer can after being run over by a lawnmower.

    Traps are basically a large fishhook on a stainless cable tied to an auger type stake in the bank. A bamboo pole with a clothespin holds the bait (usually a chunk of raw chicken) around 4 feet above the water (that way only legal sized ones can reach it). When the trapper checks his traps he will easily see which ones have been sprung. You pull the cable and shoot the gator in the head before hauling it into the boat.

    I’ve seen more than one 16 footer trapped.

  • GRIZZ

    Too bad it wasnt a FLORIDA GATOR.