By KRISTI ALBERTSON The Daily Inter Lake
Boys reel in 5-foot, 60-pound alligator in Kalispell pond
Some birthdays stand out as exceptionally memorable; 16 and 21 usually make the list.
Josh Bryant will never forget his 11th birthday, when he came nose to snout with a 5-foot alligator in Kalispell.
On Monday afternoon, Josh and his mother, Lynn, were trying out the new fishing pole she’d given him for his birthday. The Shady Lane fishing pond near the old Steel Bridge, where he spends three or four days a week during the summer, seemed the perfect place to test the rod.
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It was about 4 p.m. when Lynn Bryant spotted something swimming toward them.
“I thought it was a muskrat,” she said.
Then she took a closer look. Muskrats didn’t swim with just their eyes and back ridges sticking out of the water.
The Bryants couldn’t believe their eyes, but there was no doubt the animal swimming toward them was an alligator. Bryant moved to the edge of the dock and started taking pictures with her camera phone, knowing no one would believe them otherwise.
At first the alligator was almost friendly, she said, but they still wanted to get it out of the water so someone could come take care of it. A friend grabbed Josh’s pole and tried to hook the gator. He succeeded a few times, but each time the alligator simply swallowed the lure.
A few more would-be fishermen showed up soon after. One of them had a stronger pole; he, too, tried to catch the alligator but once again it swallowed the proffered minnow, hook and all.
By this time, onlookers had called friends and soon a crowd of about 50 people had gathered. Some simply watched. Others tried to help subdue the alligator, which was now agitated.
“This thing was very aggressive,” Bryant said.
“It was snapping at us kids and adults,” Josh added.
Someone brought a bow and shot it. They knew the alligator had been hit because the arrow was sticking straight up, Josh said. Then the arrow — and the alligator — disappeared for almost an hour. Suspense mounted on the banks of the pond.
“It was like a serial killer movie or something, a killer alligator,” Josh said.
The gator didn’t stay down for good, though. When it surfaced, the crowd was ready.
“His dad jumped in the water,” Josh said, pointing at his friend, Kaynen McGuire.
McGuire, 11, nodded. His father had plunged in the water with a stick, grabbed the alligator by the tail and swung it onto the bank.
“This was right out of ‘Crocodile Dundee,’ I swear,” Bryant said.
Four men held it down and tied its jaws shut with fish stringer, then put it in a canoe and dragged it up to the road. Someone produced a knife and tried to slit the animal’s throat. Still it didn’t die.
Wouldn't you like to be able to tell that tale?
"Yeah I grapped that ol' gator by the tail, pitched his ornery ass up on the bank, but he wouldn't settle down. I ended up havin' to cut his throat. Damned shame, too, he woulda looked good in my goldfish pond..."
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