Meet the Record-Breaking Alligators: A Look at the Top 10 Largest

American alligators (Alligator mississippiensis) are typically 8.5-11 feet long and weigh 200-500 pounds. The American alligator is found primarily in the Southeastern United States along the Gulf Coast. Florida and Louisiana boast the highest populations of these enormous reptiles, which inhabit numerous wetlands, rivers, and lakes. Length and weight are considered when discussing record-breaking alligators, and there is a correlation between the two. Continue reading to learn about 10 of the largest alligators, presented in order of their weight.

10. The Robert Ammerman Alligator

Hunter Robert Ammerman had been participating in the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission’s annual alligator harvest for seven years. With help from his hunting partners, neighbor Sam White and nephew T.J. Schauf, Ammerman harpooned the gator around midnight. The angry gator dragged the boat for 45 minutes while Ammerman tried to subdue it. The gator was so big that they couldn’t load it into the boat, so they had to tow it to shore.

On the last day of gator hunting season in November, 2010, Robert Ammerman caught the state’s longest alligator. Weighing a hefty 654 pounds and measuring 14 feet 3.5 inches, Ammerman’s gator broke the 1997 record of 14 feet, 5/8-inches. Ammerman’s record-breaking reptile was caught in Lake Washington in Brevard County.

9. The Tom Grant Alligator

In September, 2012, sportsman Tom Grant and his hunting party went head-to-head with an alligator that would end up in the record books. One of the hunters, Kenny Winter, said the gator was so large, it broke the boat’s winch. It took the men an hour and a half to get the gator back to shore.

The team ended up with a massive reptile weighing 697.5 pounds and measuring 13 feet,1.5 inches long. Additionally, the gator’s belly girth was a whopping 65 inches. This catch was definitely a once-in-a-lifetime find, as alligators of this length are rare in the Mississippi Delta. The gator was captured on the property of a private hunting club in Issaquena County, Mississippi.

8. The Blake Godwin and Lee Lightsey Alligator

This record-breaking alligator attracted hunters’ attention by leaving the remains of missing cattle around the area. It was found at Outwest Farms, which specializes in wild boar and alligator hunts. The farm’s owner, Lee Lightsey, his son, Mason, one of the farm’s professional hunting guides, Blake Godwin, and two hunters spotted the troublesome gator in one of the farm’s cattle ponds. Lightsey shot the animal as it was coming out of the water just 20 feet away from the hunting party.

The gator was so large that they had to use a farm tractor to pull it out of the pond. The hunters said they were not concerned with setting records, but it was later determined that the gator weighed 780 pounds and was just under 15 feet in length. The meat that the hunters did not take was given to charity, and the alligator’s body was mounted. The gator was caught in April of 2016, in Okeechobee, Florida.

7. The Travis Bearden Alligator

The longest alligator ever caught in Arkansas was caught in Merrisach Lake, located in the bottomland forest of eastern Arkansas. The gator was situated in a pool created by the Wilbur D. Mills Dam and Lock Number 2 along the Arkansas Post Canal. 

In September 2020, alligator hunter Travis Bearden, whose catch measured 13 feet, 11.5 inches, beat the previous Arkansas record set in 2012. It took Bearden and his crew (dad Gary Bearden, brother Cody Bearden, and family friend Tommy Kelley) over two hours to contain the beast.

6. Big Tex

This alligator roamed the Trinity River National Wildlife Refuge in Liberty, Texas before becoming a little too friendly with the locals. Although the gator had not attacked anyone, it was clear people had been feeding it, and officials had become concerned for visitors’ safety. In October 2016, refuge staff contacted rescuers at Gator Country refuge and animal park to help capture the alligator. Big Tex was lassoed and relocated by Gator Country owner Gary Saurage and his team.

Rescuers measured him when he arrived at Gator Country and named him Big Tex following a vote on social media. The gator measured 13 feet and 8 inches and weighed over 900 pounds, making Big Tex the biggest alligator caught alive in Texas history. Big Tex was transferred to an exhibit area at Gator Country, where he has since become a popular attraction at the animal park and rescue facility.

5. The Lane Stephens Alligator

In August of 2012, there was a massive gator roaming a Florida neighborhood. Local alligator trapper Lane Stephens, who was contracted with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, got a call to capture it. He had legally harvested more than two dozen gators already that year, including four over 11 feet. Stephens snagged the gator with a baited hook, roped it, and ended the battle with a clean kill. Overall, he and the gator fought for two hours.

Neighbors had said it was big, but Stephens didn’t expect the alligator to be 14 feet long or to weigh around 1,000 pounds. He caught the giant gator in Lake Talquin on the Ochlockonee River. Locals are advised not to swim there because of the lake’s dangerous inhabitants.

4. The Corey Capps Alligator

Corey Capps dreamed of harvesting the enormous alligator that had been giving him nightmares for three years. In October of 2020, while on a boat ride with his wife, he spotted the giant gator on the bank of the Apalachicola River, behind his home in Blountstown, Florida. Capps enlisted the help of his friend, Rodney Smith, who had gator tags that allowed them to legally harvest the gator.

The pair went out the next day in a 12-foot jon boat and harpooned the enormous alligator. It took the hunters 3.5 hours to move the gator just 100 feet. They were shocked to find this massive gator was 13 feet, 10-1/2 inches and weighed an impressive 1,008 pounds.

3. The Mandy Stokes Alligator

Hunter Mandy Stokes typically hunted boar and deer. She had certainly never planned to go head-to-head with a gator. However, in August of 2014, she and her family decided to go on a gator hunt. On that fateful first trip, she took on the gator for almost a full day. The battle took place at a tributary of the Alabama River. The Stokes family was on a 17-foot aluminum vessel, but after setting the first hook, they struggled to hold onto the beast. It wasn’t until the following morning that Stokes got a clear shot and bagged a giant.

The Stokes clan, which included Mandy’s husband John Stokes, her brother-in-law Kevin Jenkins, and his children, then had to figure out how to bring the alligator back to shore since they had failed to get it into the boat. The family eventually lashed the alligator to the hull. With the boat on the verge of tipping, everyone stayed on the opposite gunwale to balance the weight. Weighing 1,011.5 pounds, this 15-foot 9-inch monster was not only the largest gator caught in Alabama, but it also set a new world record, as the world’s longest alligator, as well as the heaviest alligator in Alabama. The Stokes alligator was displayed at the Mann Wildlife Learning Museum in Montgomery, Alabama, until the museum closed in 2020.

2. The Orange Lake Alligator

One of the largest gators on record was caught in Orange Lake in Alachua County, Florida in 1989. According to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, this male gator holds the Florida record for weight. The record-breaking alligator measured 13 feet 10.5 inches and weighed 1,043 pounds. There is no official information provided regarding the hunter who caught this giant.

1. The Mike Cottingham Alligator

During the annual alligator hunting season in September of 2012, hunter Mike Cottingham was on an outing with a private hunting club in Southwest Arkansas. Cottingham immediately realized the monster he was after was a record-breaking behemoth. He and his crew hunted the gator in an 18-foot-long, 8-foot-wide boat, which violently rocked as they wrestled with the beast. After catching it, it took five people to tie the gator to the boat and carry it up the boat ramp.

According to Mark Barbee, biologist and AGFC Assistant Regional Supervisor, “The length of 13 feet 3 inches was measured and verified by Arkansas Game and Fish Commission (AGFC) wildlife management personnel.” Barbee also notes that at the time, “Mr. Cottingham’s alligator…was the largest alligator harvested since the inaugural 2007 season in Arkansas.”

Mr. Cottingham weighed the animal by first weighing his truck and trailer with the gator aboard. He then weighed the vehicle and trailer again without the gator and subtracted the difference, which was 1,380 pounds. David Goad, who was the chief of the wildlife management division for the AGFC at the time, told the New York Daily News that the gator was “the largest, without a doubt, in terms of weight.” However, Barbee explains that AGFC personnel did not weigh this alligator, nor were they present for the weighing, so the weight cannot be officially verified. Scientists suspect the alligator was very old to have grown so large.