<p>By Steve Dale, Tuesday at 12:43 pm photo credit: Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries, and ParksThis 13-feet and 5.5 inches, 723.5-pound male alligator held the record for the heaviest alligator ever to be killed in Mississippi</p><p>It took Beth Trammell and her team of six people an hour and a half to bring down the 723-pound beast after it became hooked on their lines. Trammell told the media once she saw the gator she said, "Oh, my gosh. It's the Loch Ness monster." After another two hours, and the assistance of a few extra hunters, the alligator was hoisted into their boat and taken back to shore to be weighed and measured, and a new, albeit short-lived, state record was set.</p><p>"We chased him for about two hours," Dustin Bockman told NBC News. "Then we got a shot on him." After the first crossbow shot hit the alligator, it took an additional two hours before Bockman and his team could take down the reptile with a shotgun. They were unable to get the gator into their boat, so they waited until sunrise and called a few fellow hunters to help them load their record-breaking catch.These animals may be huge, but in March, 18 year-old Braxton Bielski broke the record for the heaviest alligator ever caught in Texas. That alligator measured 14-feet and 3 inches and weighted 800 pounds.</p><p>My question is - what's the point? We can shoot and kill things....so? These giants survived all this time only to have their lives cut short for no real reason - except in the name of sport. A SAD commentary, at least I think so.</p><p><a href="http://www.chicagonow.com/steve-dales-pet-world/2013/09/alligators-killed-great-we-can-point-and-shoot/">Keep reading...</a></p>