While fishing is a great hobby, it can sometimes be a little frustrating. Those days where you spend all day out on the water and catch nothing can be a bit of a mood dampener. Really, the only thing worse than catching nothing is losing a fish off your line. Reeling in a big one, only to have your line snap or the hook come undone, can makes the best of us want to head home.
Then we have the case of this fisherman, who had the perfect fish on his hook, but it wasn't a snapping line he had to worry about. Instead, it was a snapping alligator. Just another day of fishing in Florida, right? The video of the struggle was posted to Tiktok by user @davidbrowning0423.
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These men really had to battle it out with that alligator! The large reptile was not getting the hint, and their presence didn't bother him. They were merely an annoyance and getting in the way of his lunch. One man has the fish, which appears to be a tarpon, hooked on the one while another tries to deter the gator by whacking it on the head with the end of his fishing pole. The gator did not care. After struggling for a while, the men finally use a net to grab to scoop up the fish. The alligator narrowly misses one last snap at the net as they pull it out of the water. He slinks back into the depths in defeat.
We can't condone all of these actions, as it's certainly not a good idea to swat at an alligator with anything, let alone a fishing rod. Though we can understand the desire to land a nice fish, sometimes you've got to accept what Mother Nature tosses your way.
In a longer version of the video, David shows pictures of him with the fish and a video of them releasing it back into the water canal, plus a more detailed version of them attempting to get the alligator to go away.
@davidbrowning0423
Releasing the tarpon back into the water technically gives the alligator another chance at his meal, but it may be tougher to catch when it isn't hooked on a fishing line. As one viewer points out, it also gives him a chance to get a little bigger if he hasn't maxed out already. David commented that the tarpon was a "good one" but that there is one a little bigger that is known to hang out in the area. Hopefully, they get a chance to catch it before the gator does!
