Average one trophy gator per night!

 

Join the Deibler Outdoors Television Team on thrilling September and October alligator hunts in Central Florida. These are thrilling airboat hunts that are fast and furious, and not for the faint of heart. Please be sure to have your insurance policy paid up!

 

All kidding aside, this hunt is a blast. You will hunt the last hour before sunset and all night if necessary. The hunting technique consists of using a throwing harpoon, crossbow, or compound bow. Archers must be quick to get a shot. Most hunting is done from a 13 foot airboat. Hunting area depends on where tags are drawn, usually Central Florida.

 

 

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COST:
   $2250 includes Florida alligator hunting license and tags to harvest 2 alligators. This fee also includes airboat, guide, lodging and alligator hide, skull, meat, etc. This hunt assumes 2 nights lodging.

The hunt cost does not include processing or taxidermy costs. A 1 night, 1 alligator hunt can be done for $1500.  2 hunters could split the 2 alligator hunt and share this wild experience. Usually average one good gator a night. Lady hunters seem to kill the biggest gators.
 

Save a poodle, hunt a gator!

from the desk of Steve Deibler

The Florida alligator is an impressive creature. 40 million years in the making, thriving with a brain the size of a walnut. Lack of brain-power is replaced with a predatory instinct, stealth, great sense of smell, vision, patience, and jaws of steel. When he grabs you in his jaws, he just sinks to the bottom, waits until you stop struggling, dismembers you piece by piece. Pleasant, isn't it !

The red eye gleams in Captain Phil's spotlight. The airboat roars to life, speeding across the shallow central Florida lake. Nancy readies the short throwing harpoon. I figure this may be the way native Americans did it hundreds of years ago, minus the airboat. Sign language is an important means of communication between hunter and airboat operator. Engine noise and ear protection prevent verbal communication. Captain Phil's head-lamp lights up the gators eye, he shakes the light up and down. This is to determine if Nancy can see the gator. Nancy gives a thumbs up. Game on ! The airboat throttles up and roars forward. When we get where the gator was, it's gone down. Captain Phil searches out the bubble trail, seeking the gators direction, as well as sizing him up. Bigger bubble trail, bigger gator !

When it comes to gator hunting, this is not the stealth approach that I've used on the soft-flowing coastal Georgia rivers. This is the NASCAR of gator hunting. Run and gun, and then do it again. This is an all-night sport. Bring a large thermos of coffee. Dozens of gators are seen, but disappear. Gators don't reach ages of 50 years, and 13 foot lengths being easy to kill.

We are hunting a limited tag unit north of Leesburg, Florida. A lake surrounded by expanding subdivisions, little kids playing and swimming, and home-owners walking little poodle dogs. By night, it's ruled by the gators. Hundreds of sets of gleaming red eyes. Demonic in the humid, thick air. If these suburbanites knew just how many gators prowled this lake, for sale signs would sprout up overnight, by the thousands !  

We have a couple of precious tags to fill. Captain Phil is a veteran alligator guide, half  Indiana Jones, half  NASCAR driver. Sanity and safety is in question here. Nancy is a feisty Georgia resident. She came to Florida, not for the beaches or Disney attractions, but for a monster gator. She traveled 7 hours south from her snug Georgia home for an adventure she won't soon forget!  Captain Phil has put us on hundreds of gators from 2 to 9 ft, but no monsters yet. He keeps saying they're here. It's just before daylight.

 Then it happens, and fast !

 We roar up on a monster gator, harpoons fly, ropes and buoy balls spring from the airboat in the swirling black water. One harpoon finds it's mark. Captain Phil's excited voice indicate  this isn't an ordinary gator, we're fighting a 12 ft giant. As Captain Phil leans into the harpoon line, the gators big back surfaces. Nancy hurls another harpoon, glancing off a scute harmlessly. The gator erupts, disappearing underwater ! Captain Phil erupts with words I cannot repeat here, as he hangs on to our only harpoon line. The outcome is uncertain. We need a second line in this big lizard! 

Once again, a determined Captain Phil plays tug-of-war with our Jurassic survivor. As daylight breaks, it surfaces again. Nancy connects this time, and the harpoon tip sinks deep beneath the gators hide. Captain Phil and Nancy, each on a harpoon line, work the gator to the bow of the boat. A tremendous head with rows of thumb-sized teeth breaks the surface.

 The moment of truth has arrived! No easy dispatches here. Captain Phil thinks we should bring it up, tape it's mouth shut, and dispatch it with a knife. He explains how to use the knife to severe the spine just behind the skull. 

" Are you crazy, have the mosquito's given you a fever Captain ! " 

He just smiles, and grabs the jaws, pinning them against the gunnel. 

" Tape it shut, tape it shut, 4 wraps ! " 

Nancy jumps in with her small roll of electrical tape and starts taping. Captain Phil loses his grip for a second, shouting: 

" Get out of the way ! "

Nancy jumps back as Captain Phil regains his grip, and composure. 

" O.K., tape him, 4 wraps, and snap it ! " 

Nancy finishes the wraps, Captain Phil works the head up, and Nancy dispatches the gator with a knife Rambo would be proud to carry. Hunter and guide rest for a minute as they contemplate the next step. The tired gator guide and lady gator hunter wrestle the 500 lb, 12 ft gator into the 13 ft airboat. I would have not thought this was possible. As the sun peeks over the mangroves, the airboat heads home at a speed slower than anything we've experienced all night.

Then there it is!  An even bigger gator, a 13 footer! Just laying on the surface, body exposed, not spooky like all the others. Sizing us up, as much as we're sizing him up. Captain Phil turns and says

" We've got one more tag ! " 

" Were would we put it ?  We don't have room for the one we've got ! " 

Captain Phil just smiles, fires up the airboat and eases on.  

" We'll save that one for next year ! " 

We motor on, as the big reptile swims off, searching for a quiet, secluded resting spot to digest last nights meal. At the boat ramp, an elderly lady on her morning stroll is walking her poodle. She looks up with wide-eyed amazement. 

" You killed that... out there! "

 Captain Phil with a grin, " No, She did !" ... " Just saving poodles ma'am ! " 

If your interested in a late night, high speed airboat adventure for trophy alligators contact Steve at 770-377-5321.

Copyright February 2007