Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
-Oh! -Watch out!
Whoa!
As gators hide deeper in the swamp,
the hunters must chase them...
Because of the low water, there's so many places
that we can get in there only by airboat.
Man, that's two good ones.
Taking on bigger roles...
This is my opportunity to step up
and rise to the occasion.
-[gunshot] -Using smaller boats...
Hold on. We can't run these out the regular boat.
We gotta just pull over a little boat
over in there, a little jon boat.
And pushing their limits...
Troy wants these 15 tags filled today.
-[bang] -What the hell happened here?
My bilge pump, it flipped out the boat.
To bag the bayou's most elusive predators.
He gonna go, he gonna go!
Just stay with him, pa! Stay with him.
Oh, hell, yeah.
-Golly! -Whoo!
Oh, my God!
[gunshots]
As gator season launches into day ten...
in Bayou Tenare,
having filled all of their tags at Old River,
veteran hunter Ronnie Adams and his deckhand Timmy Aucoin
have set lines in one of Timmy's honey holes.
Why you call him White Lightning?
Well, one night I was frogging, bro,
a storm was coming on and when the lightning hit,
I looked up and I seen a big gator.
He was up on this big log, and then immediately after,
when the lightning struck again,
he was gone.
And come gator season, he goes and hides somewhere.
But this year we're gonna go back there in our holes
and try to get him.
Biggest gator I've ever seen, bro.
Come on.
Been seeing that same big gator
about once a year every year in this spot.
You sure he's back here?
Oh, he's back here.
I'm gonna be honest with you.
The way Timmy's telling me this story,
it seems like an old folklore of the swamps.
But, man, if what Timmy says is true,
I can't imagine the size of this gator.
I mean, it's gotta be 12-foot-plus. Easy.
This is the year to do it.
We gotta put White Lightning in the boat, baby.
I can't wait.
Oh, yeah, he's a monster.
Ooh, that line looks tight.
Looks kind of tangled up.
-Whoo-hoo! -You ready?
Yeah, T.
Whoo-hoo! We got a good one, baby.
Yes, indeed.
Whoo! Come on, big boy.
Whoo-hoo, baby.
Hold him. Oh, he's mad.
Lord have mercy!
Come on, legend, get a shot, baby.
Come on now, fire him up.
Go get a shot, T.
Hold him there, hold him there.
Come on now.
Drop the hammer, T!
Whoo! Good job, legend.
That's a good one here.
Ronnie and Timmy land a solid gator
on their first line of the day,
but something else got to him first.
Oh, bro.
Aw, shoot. See that?
We missing a foot of tail, bro.
It might be White Lightning, son.
That would've been an eight-footer.
Yeah, bro, that's gonna be bad on the price.
This gator we just caught,
I mean, it's a nice seven-footer,
but it's missing most of its tail.
And right now I feel like
we are literally in White Lightning's terrain.
We in his neighborhood, and I feel like
it's just a matter of hooks before we catch him.
We gonna get White Lightning by the end of the day, my baby.
I promise you.
Golly.
Meanwhile, in Bayou Pigeon...
seasoned hunter Willie Edwards and his son Little Willie
are mobilizing to help their community.
I put out a few hooks yesterday evening
in a little hotspot, a little hole.
Gotta go over with the 4-wheeler and everything to get in there.
An aggressive monster gator is terrorizing locals,
who believe it moves between a deepwater pond
and the adjacent bayou.
Willie, you sit right there on that front seat.
My landowner, she called me,
and they got a big one in there that we need to get out.
He been tormenting the people.
Yesterday Willie set lines in both the pond and the bayou,
but reaching this remote hole isn't easy.
Hold on.
You gotta watch your head.
Might have to get down in the boat.
You go down some pipelines and stuff,
and finally you pop out into a big hole back there,
and we can't run these out the regular boat.
We gotta just pull over a little boat
over in there, a little jon boat.
Yeah.
Whoo!
Coming up.
He's about to come up.
[laughs]
That's how you do it right there.
Yeah, he's longer than the boat for sure.
This isn't the giant they're looking for,
but it's too big to haul around in their jon boat,
so they'll leave him on the bank and collect it later.
We just gotta keep going and keep pushing through it.
You gotta get the big one out.
You just gotta get him out of there.
It's gonna be a tight schedule.
Yeah, we left him right there
because we ain't got a big enough boat.
Near Bayou Long,
on his third day of helping the Landrys
fill their tags, shallow water specialist
Bruce Mitchell is on a one-day mission
to fill 15 tags
in an area hit hard by the record low water.
This is all new territory to me,
so this might take a little while
to figure some of this out.
Troy wants these 15 tags filled today.
Got to fill them on this spot of land,
so, I mean, this is total different hunting to me.
I'm usually in the marsh, and I just set these lines
in here yesterday. On the way back today,
the water's done dropped another two foot.
I don't know how I'm gonna do this,
but, hey, I'm gonna get used to it.
Whatever it takes, I'm gonna catch 15 gators
one way or the other.
Oh, yeah.
I don't know how big he is.
Definitely got a gator on here.
Oh, God!
That's a big boy. Oh.
Whoa! Come on, buddy. Get up here.
Gol!
Look at him.
Look how big he is.
Troy's gonna be liking this one.
Filling the first tag
with an 11-foot dinosaur
gives Bruce a confidence boost,
but he needs to catch 14 more gators today
to make sure all of the Landry tags for the area get filled.
This is gators nobody else can get to.
It's all on me today.
I wanna do Troy right.
I mean, so far so good.
Look like Troy sending me in the right direction.
Now the only problem is the water's dropped two foot.
In a remote part of the Atchafalaya River Basin,
while Bruce covers one tough area for Troy,
Jacob Landry and Don Brewer head out to another,
a series of barely accessible backwater honey holes.
For the task, Don has brought a special tool.
This is gonna be nice right here.
Hopefully we got some big ones on the end of the day.
You know, the low water has a lot of these back holes
and places off the rivers 100% off limits.
There's no way you get in there with a regular boat.
Snipe and treble hooking.
This is what we're doing today.
The Landrys have just eight tags
for these remote ponds,
but getting there to fill them will be a challenge.
I always wanted an airboat, but I mainly bought this thing
to where I could help out the Landrys.
Some of these places we go to
we're always getting stuck, we can't get to.
We know places that are better than what we're at.
But if we have the airboat,
we can get to places that other people can't.
Locked off by mud and levees,
these spots have kept hunters away for years,
allowing gators to get huge.
Jacob, right here in front of us. Look.
[whistles] Man, that's two good ones.
Look, look, look, look, look, look at the bubbles over there.
Look at the bubbles there.
Oh, yeah.
Damn, look at him go, boy.
Sensing his partner needs help,
Don throws in another treble hook.
-Get a hook in him, Don. -I'm trying, I'm trying.
Wrap up, big boy.
Wrap yourself up.
Come on, Don!
[gunshot]
That is a swamp donkey.
Look at that big bitch.
-One, two, three. -One, two, three.
One, two, three.
Bagging this ten-foot beast is a great start,
but with no lines set
and a lot of dry land between water holes,
they'll need to access all of the spots
and hope there are gators.
This is exactly what we wanted to happen in this area.
It's what we expecting to happen.
Hopefully we'll fill the boat and get back safe.
What a big gator, huh?
Holy crap-oly.
Forty miles away in Bayou Benoit,
swamp legend Daniel Edgar and his grandson Dorien
are hunting a family honey hole
that's reliably produced big gators for decades.
[bleep]. Nothing on it.
We haven't seen any yet,
but we're keeping our spirits and our hopes up.
But they're already at their last line,
and they've seen nothing but hanging bait.
You know, being this is probably
my most dependable spot through the years,
these lines are just not working.
Well, depressing.
They're not taking the lines.
I have no explanation for it.
They're just not taking the lines.
We've had so many alligators right here.
This drought and hot weather,
I don't know what happened, what it's done.
Despite the demoralizing start,
Daniel is not ready to give up on this area.
We can't stop. We can't get discouraged.
We're gonna just open water
treble hook, rod and reel.
We're gonna make this happen.
Keep working.
It's all we can do.
The one that's floating?
Yeah, that one right there's decent.
Right there.
Lord have mercy.
Hey, pa, hand me that rod and reel.
Got him, pa.
Oh, Lord.
Oh!
Whoa! I broke it. How did it break?
Gol.
What a giant.
I had him.
Perfect cast.
I'm having a bad day. I made a really good cast
on a big alligator, and he popped the line.
I just don't feel like I'm on my game today.
Look. Equipment failed.
His-- right on his back, one of those horns.
That's the one.
You know, and if I'm not on my game,
Dorien is gonna have to step up and make things happen.
Hey, don't worry, pa.
Had him.
My grandpa's having a bad day.
I know this is my opportunity to step up
and rise to the occasion and pick up the slack.
I know that I can do it and I wanna do it.
One way or another, we're gonna put alligators in this boat.
-Oh, my God. -We'll get another chance.
Back in Bayou Tenare,
Ronnie and Timmy are hunting a spot
rumored to contain the legendary White Lightning,
a wily gator that has eluded Timmy for years.
Man, baby, I'd like to see this alligator
you're talking about, legend.
I'd like to get my hands on him.
Come on, White Lightning, come on, my baby.
Yo!
-[thud] -God dang it, son.
Motherhumper.
Dude, look at the size of that dang thing.
That's about an ugly-ass fish.
Man, this big old carp that just landed in the boat,
I mean, hey, that's a blessing.
That's a sign from the gator gods,
because, where there's big carp like this,
big bait, and food like this,
there's big gators in the area. I just know it.
Golly.
Carp are invasive fish native to Europe and Asia
that now dominate large stretches
of American waterways.
They can weigh up to 90 pounds and reach four feet long.
When certain carp species sense danger,
such as the vibration of a boat motor,
they can launch themselves
as high as ten feet out of the water,
turning themselves into projectiles
that can seriously injure a boater.
That was a prehistoric- looking fish, bro.
[bleep] almost killed me.
We got a line up here on this little island.
Yeah, baby.
You see the line?
Yup.
He's dead.
Yeah, that's the biggest gator I ever saw.
Golly.
Dude, this is a nine-footer too, bro.
That's a nine-foot gator, yeah.
Ooh, look what ate him up, bro.
-Something killed him. -Yeah.
Golly. Look at the bite on his tail.
Done ripped his tail.
I think that's White Lightning over here,
tearing up other males that's in his territory.
Looking at... 14 inches wide.
That's a foot. I done measured my hand.
That's 12 inches,
and you got two-and-a-half, three inches wider.
Let me get a back leg.
Go.
In this area, I feel like
White Lightning is the most dominant gator.
This big nine-footer we caught, man, I mean, what a waste.
He's dead on the line, but the evidence is there.
White Lightning obviously just killed this gator.
I mean, the bite marks on him, it's just humongous.
I've never seen gator marks on another gator this big.
We gotta waste a tag on him, and I'm taking it personal,
and I feel right now
more obligated to catch White Lightning than Timmy does.
Gee, that's a huge gator, Timmy. Look at it.
I think that's White Lightning.
I'll put a bullet in him, I guarantee you.
Got to be fast with that rifle though.
Two, three seconds, he's gone.
You won't see him for another year.
Oh, he's going in the lilies. He's gone.
I've been after this gator for so long,
and to come that close.
Any time he sees or hears a human,
he's gonna travel farther and farther away.
Looks like he come out just to tease me.
Man, I can't wait to catch this one here.
I hope we got him on one of these lines.
In a pond near a Bayou Pigeon neighborhood...
Willie and Little Willie are on the lookout
for a behemoth that has the locals terrified.
And although this hole is active,
they're not seeing the giant.
[both laugh]
You got 20 or 30 alligators
swimming in a pond that's not very big,
and we're going in there with a little bitty boat.
It ain't but about ten foot long, it's narrow,
and it leaks like a basket.
We get in there, the boat sinks,
we gotta swim all the way to the bank
with all these alligators.
Finally, Willie spots the gator they're after.
We forgot the treble hook,
the main thing we make sure we got in the boat
every time we go in the boat.
But we in a different boat, a little pull over boat,
and we trying to hurry up to get to the holes
and run the hooks and everything before it gets too late.
And... Little Willie, he takes a regular hook,
try to hunt with that hook.
Throw it way out there, Willie.
Right here. [whistles]
Hey...
Easy it to you, barely...
You got him. Hold on.
Let some slack in him, Willie.
Let some slack in him.
Gotta hold him with two hands!
-Aah! -He's gonna go, he's gonna go!
-Oh! -Took the rope.
Burned a hole in my hand.
That rope, it ate my fingers up.
-You all right, son? -Oh, yeah.
That thing was taking off.
Losing their quarry is discouraging,
but Little Willie's sure that giant is the problem gator.
Alligator I hooked, it felt like a truck.
I gripped that rope real, real tight,
and the boat took on water and everything.
Water was pouring in.
Back in Bayou Long...
Bruce has filled four
of the 15 Landry tags for this area,
but he's encountering some setbacks.
I know I had lines there.
I guess I passed them up.
To the next curve.
I hate fishing places I don't know.
My goal today is to catch 15 gators for Troy.
I mean, I'm catching a few gators,
but I'm in a place I've never been before.
I don't know how the gators work over here.
Trying to learn this land.
I just don't wanna let him down.
[bang]
What the hell happened here?
Oh, no.
Aah!
I mean, here's my bilge bump.
It's supposed to down there.
Should be a hose there to pump it out,
but it can't pump it without a hose
and the rest of the housing.
I got a spare bilge pump, but I ain't got a hose.
I don't know what happened. Something knocked my bilge pump.
It flipped out the boat.
You got to have a bilge pump out here.
You just got to.
If not, you're going down.
A bilge pump is crucial
for maintaining the buoyancy of a boat
by removing unwanted water from the bilge,
the lowest part of the vessel.
Water from rain, waves, spray, or minor leaks
can accumulate and threaten the boat's stability.
The pump removes this water using a hose,
the same hose Bruce is missing.
Wonder if I can see if I can find my hose.
Before taking on too much water and getting stranded,
Bruce needs to turn back in hopes of finding the hose
that fell off into the water.
I gotta find that water hose.
Around high noon in the Atchafalaya Basin...
Whoo-whee!
Using Don's airboat
to break into a series of hard-to-reach ponds,
Jacob and Don have four more tags for the area.
Pull up on that flat part and we'll get out.
Check it out.
But it's slow going.
-Go take a look. -Yeah, let's look.
Uncertain whether even the airboat
can make it into one of the deep backwater ponds,
the hunters get off to investigate.
Look at them big old tracks right there.
Look at that.
Don't know if we can make it in this damn thing or not.
We'd have to cut a trail.
Big-ass log right there. That's a bad deal.
Yeah, I don't know
if I can get up this thing or not.
Gol... can't even see.
Growed up bad, ain't it?
Used to be able to stand right here
and look down there with binoculars.
Not now.
Not no more.
Yeah, this all used to be water.
There's so many trees and roots about,
I'm afraid we can't get through here with the airboat.
Uh-uh.
Unfortunately, there's hundreds and hundreds
of yards that used to be water is now 20-foot trees.
There's no trail to get in with an airboat.
Everything that we thought was there wasn't.
What a letdown.
We'll go check that one other spot.
If it's anything like this,
we won't be able to do anything, but you never--
it's not so close to the river, so maybe it's not quite as bad.
As the hunters prepare to attempt entering
another cut-off water hole,
they get an unexpected surprise.
Look, look, look, look.
Oh, right there.
Hell, yeah.
Can you take it? Can you get him?
-You see him again? -Yup.
[gunshot]
I believe you smoked him, Jacob.
Go, go, go. Go, go, go.
Go, go, go.
Hopefully he's still right there.
I got something.
Yes. Yeah, baby.
Damn good shot, Jacob.
Oh, I like it when a plan comes together.
Yes, sir, yes, sir, boss.
One, two, three.
Get that hook out...
One, two, ten.
-Bam! -[laughs]
This ten-footer is their fifth of the day.
The pair has three more tags to fill,
which, after their exploration of the area on foot,
now has Jacob nervous.
It's a double-edged sword.
We in an airboat, and weight is critical.
This airboat cannot travel on dry land
with a lot of weight in it.
So the more we fill up the boat,
the less places we get to go.
Keep that bottom back leg out.
There you go.
Damn.
Whew.
Damn!
In Bayou Tenare,
Ronnie and Timmy haven't managed
to track down White Lightning yet,
but they have caught a glimpse
of another legendary swamp inhabitant.
Look how beautiful he is, huh?
Golly, that's a beautiful bird there, Papa.
Yeah, might be looking for something to eat.
Come on, I know he is.
Look, he's on his perch all by himself, dude.
You know, when I was a kid,
we didn't see bald eagles around here at all.
-There were none around. -Come on.
Yeah, and then Wildlife and Fisheries,
like, in the 1980s maybe, mid-'80s,
they started letting go pairs of them
all over south Louisiana.
-Really? -Yeah.
After nearly going extinct in the state of Louisiana,
bald eagles have steadily grown in numbers
due to vigorous conservation efforts
and currently surpass 350 nesting pairs.
Now, like, my daughter, she can actually read about them
and then come out here, see them,
take pictures, and all that.
Yeah. T, look, brother,
you should be a science or a history teacher,
because I learn something new with you every day.
-Oh, yeah. -Bro, that's America's bird.
Every time I see a bald eagle, I always wanna salute him.
But to see that one on his perch, he's like
-he's king of the swamp. -Yeah.
Near Bayou Long,
Bruce has spent a precious half hour
looking for his pump hose.
It not only may force him to look for land soon,
but it threatens to prevent him
from filling the remaining 11 tags
and letting his friend Troy down.
Clam shell?
That ain't what I was looking for.
Something knocked my bilge pump,
it flipped out the boat. You don't wanna be back here
without a bilge pump.
If I can't get out of here with the gators,
I ain't done nothing.
I cannot let him down. I got to catch gators.
My hose!
Come on, be the hose, be the hose.
Be the hose.
Oh, boy!
I think I done got lucky, dude.
Hot dog! I think I got lucky.
Ha-hey!
Lookee there.
Back in business.
A little chopped up, tore up, but we gonna make it work.
Boy, I got lucky there.
The prop hit this and busted the end of it off,
but that's good.
Oh.
Back in business.
I got my Cajun wire cutter.
Ain't nobody gonna bring you nothing out here.
If you ain't got it when you leave the landing,
you ain't got it, I don't care what it is.
All right, let's see if we got any 'tricity here.
Oh, yeah, that works.
Now let me see if I can hook up the water hose.
Put that right there, step on that.
Okay, now Imma see if it'll pump water.
We got it.
We in business.
I been doing stuff like this all my life.
Rigging stuff just to get through the day,
and that's what I did.
I rigged me up another bilge pump, got it going.
Now I ain't worried about sinking.
Whatever it takes, I'm gonna catch 15 gators.
One way or the other.
Let's go catch some gators.
I got a gator line right here.
See what we got.
Gator!
Oh, yeah, that's a good gator there.
Come on, buddy.
Whoa!
He almost bit my foot.
Where you at? Where you at? Whoa!
Get him up here.
Hey!
Whoo, I'm racking them and stacking them today.
Come on, buddy, get up here.
Close your mouth.
As is his habit,
to avoid an unexpected attack
from a gator who may still be alive,
Bruce tapes the mouth of this seven-footer
before he adds it to his growing pile.
Come on down, buddy.
But with the bilge pump delay,
his goal for 15 tags is in jeopardy.
I'm filling a lot of tags for Troy,
but I'm running out of time.
So I'm kind of worried.
Got a good many more lines to run,
so hopefully I can catch my 15.
Hey, you gotta do what you gotta do to keep on going.
Across the swamp in Bayou Benoit,
after their lines failed to produce a single gator
and Daniel lost one on his rod and reel,
Dorien is taking matters into his own hands.
I just passed up one. I have no idea how big he is.
Missed a big one earlier.
I'm not gonna miss this one.
No one person is gonna be 100% every day.
That's why a team effort works.
Let me try to make him bubble. Hold on.
There he is over there.
Looks pretty decent.
Looks like a bull.
Let me see, hold on.
If I get him to the bank, I'm gonna let you shoot him.
Get your rifle.
Get ready, get ready.
[gunshot]
As they rush to retrieve the gator,
Daniel casts to prevent him from sinking to the bottom.
Got him in the tail.
Throw the treble hook on him.
Catch his tail.
Pull him up slow. I'm gonna shoot him.
Don't let him roll.
Just stay with him. Just stay with him.
Imma shoot him.
Stay with him.
Hold on.
Don't let him get away.
Stay with him. Stay with him, pa.
Pass him one.
Take him.
[gunshot]
Hold on. I gotta get that rod and reel out the way.
Thanks to Dorien's sharpshooting skills,
the hunters have a chance to turn their day around,
but they have a long way to go.
This is another reason why you don't
tuck your tail and boudé and get mad.
And when one has a bad day,
you know, the other person needs to step up.
You're an excellent shot, D.
I'll shoot them like that all day long.
In a remote pond near Bayou Pigeon,
Willie and Little Willie are searching for a giant menace
that has slipped through their fingers.
But after two hours,
they haven't seen any sign of him.
You gotta sit there trying to find that gator.
Trying to find him down there,
it takes so much time,
you get more of a headache, more of a headache.
But pretty much he coming in the boat.
[whistles]
With no monster in sight,
Willie knows this gator must've slipped back into the bayou,
so the hunters decide to quickly run
their remaining lines in the pond,
then swap boats and head to the bayou
in search of the problem gator.
You know what he gonna do.
You just find the first place
where he gonna hide at on the other side,
going out in the bayou, and you go there.
-Ready, boy? -Oh, we ready.
Skipping between backwater ponds,
Jacob and Don have three tags left to fill.
First, they wanna offload the weight of the gators
they're already carrying.
You know, we having luck, but at the same time,
it's a double-edged sword. We in an airboat,
and weight is critical.
You cannot go on dry land with a bunch of weight,
and we got two really solid alligators on the front deck.
And I know the more we put on that front deck,
the less areas we get to go to
because we-- there's no way
we're gonna get in with all this weight.
The hunters locate Troy and Pickle,
who have been hunting in an area nearby,
to transfer part of their catch.
-Look at this. -Y'all wanna pull these
in your boat so we can get rid of some weight?
-Yeah. -One, two, three.
Ready? One, two, three.
Three.
That's a big dude.
On three.
-Oh, Don, you all right? -Yup.
Damn, that hurt, dude.
-You all right? -Yup.
If you wanna ride in their boat that bad, just ask.
-[all laugh] -I mean, damn, bro.
Dad and Pickle, they can get the alligators in,
plus it allows us to get into more areas
where we weren't gonna go
with all that alligator weight in the boat.
The further you go back in them holes
back here, the bigger they gonna get.
I believe it.
Thank you, thank you.
All right, Peewee, let's go to work.
With the airboat light again
thanks to the King of the Swamp,
Jacob and Don have a better chance
to make it into and out of the backwoods water holes
they still plan to hit.
Back near Bayou Long,
after some unexpected delays, Bruce's day has turned around,
but he is one gator short of his 15 tags,
and he's looking for one last prize
to impress the King of the Swamp.
I got a good run today. Nice gators.
Did all right though, I guess.
As the day goes on, I'm doing pretty good,
catching a good many gators, catch 15 gators.
I know I'm gonna do that, but I wanna catch a big one.
I wanna catch a giant for Troy.
Line down.
Straight out, too. That's a good sign.
Whoa!
About to fall out.
Whoa.
Whoa!
Oh, yeah, that's a good one.
Hey!
Gol! Gol!
Oh, golly.
Hold on, slow down.
Troy said they had big gators in here.
I believe him now.
Not again.
Whoo!
Oh, golly.
Whoo! That's a good one there.
[laughs]
Hey-hey, that's what I'm talking about.
I'm figuring to bring you to Mr. Troy's house.
With this ten-foot monster,
Bruce reaches his goal of 15 gators,
and the savvy hunter is confident
the King of the Swamp will be impressed.
It was a good day today.
Took a little while, a lot of running,
had a lot of lines out, wound up with 15 gators
and a big one, so, hey, I'm pretty happy about this.
Oh, my goodness.
I love it.
Living the dream.
That's a good gator, man.
I'm pretty happy.
Back in Bayou Benoit,
with Daniel struggling at the start of the day,
Dorien's picking up the slack.
He already sniped three good gators in open water,
but the hunters have a long way to go to make their day.
There he is over there.
See his bubbles?
Cast on him.
Hold him, pa! Put the hook in him, pa.
Get him, pa. Get that rascal.
Don't give him no slack.
-You gotta pull fast-fast. -I'm not.
Give me a shot on this thing, pa.
Let's see what you got.
Hold him. That's what I'm talking about.
Oh, watch him, pa.
Give me a shot. Hooked in the tail.
Give me a shot.
Ooh, good shot.
-Good shot, pa. -Got him, pa.
BOTH: Nice.
This eight-footer is not a giant,
but it fills a tag.
And with every beast in the boat,
Dorien's confidence grows.
-Yeah. -We know what we're doing, huh?
-That's right. -That's what I'm talking about.
My grandpa always feels like he has to carry
all the weight. It doesn't have to be that way.
I can take some of the responsibility
or whatever the task may be and do a good job at it, too.
I'm glad you're in the boat with me today.
You're really pulling us through.
Dorien's making his own luck today.
Thanks for having him with me
because he's moved up.
He's making it happen.
As the hours tick by in Bayou Tenare,
Ronnie and Timmy have dedicated the entire day
to catching White Lightning,
a gator Timmy's been after for years.
And even though they spotted him once,
the beast remains elusive.
Come on now. This is White Lightning's
neighborhood you said, huh?
Yeah. We need him. I wanna get him, bro.
I've been after him for, I don't know,
eight, maybe ten years.
A long time.
-Come on now. -Yeah.
This is the year to do it, baby.
We gotta put White Lightning in the boat, baby.
I know what it's like
to wanna catch a gator that you got marked out.
I mean, I can relate to that
because I've been in the same situation.
You know, we been out here all day
trying to catch White Lightning,
and we still haven't landed him,
but we're not giving up, baby.
Where's the next one at, T?
Gonna be up... up there.
Where's the line?
It's down.
Ooh, I see some mud, boy.
Yeah.
We down here, T.
Come on, T, what we got here, baby?
Golly, he's got it tore up, son.
Talk to me, Timmy.
I don't see nothing yet.
Oh, hell, yeah.
Whoo! Golly!
Look at the size of him, Timmy!
Dude, that's White Lightning.
-Oh, now. -Yeah, that's him.
Come on now.
Whoo-hoo! Baby, what a big one here, papa!
Whoo-hoo-hoo!
-Golly. -You all right?
Get him, Timmy! Get him, Timmy!
Golly!
Whoo-hoo!
Get him, T!
[gunshot]
-Whoo! -Whoo!
That's White Lightning there, bro.
You saw how fast he was?
I can't believe we got this big gator, dude.
Come on, brother, let's do this.
-Ready? -Yeah.
One, two, three.
Golly.
Can you roll him? I'll hold him.
Look at the jaws on this dude.
All right, ready?
Oh, yeah...
See if you can roll him to you.
-Ready? -Yeah.
Pull him in.
There we go, T.
Hell, yeah, baby.
Oh, my God, dude.
Whoo!
After ten long years,
Timmy finally has White Lightning in the boat,
and the elusive gator truly lives up to the legend.
I've been tracking him down, chasing him for ten years.
When you're chasing something like that,
like, a prize like that for so long,
when you do finally get it,
it's like getting the most perfect wife.
That's how I feel with this White Lightning.
I'm excited.
I finally got something great
that I've been after for so long.
It's almost hard to believe
I even got him in the boat right now.
Yeah, T, It started on a dark and stormy night, baby.
And it ended on a hot sunny day.
Yeah, papa.
The legend has put the legend in the boat.
In Bayou Pigeon,
Willie and Little Willie suspect
the threatening monster they're after
slipped into the bayou,
so the hunters change boats
to check the lines they set here yesterday.
He been tormenting the people.
You gonna have that problem every day until you catch him.
It's time for him to go. He gotta go.
Me too.
Oh, Willie...
-Oh-hoo. -What you got there?
Oh yeah, got something big.
Oh, [bleep].
Watch your hands, Willie.
-Whoo! -Ooh!
Damn, don't want him takin'--
Big gator.
Coming up, coming up.
Whoo!
-That thing's big! -Big ain't the word.
He's touching 13, I guarantee you.
Now, we gotta get that thing in the boat.
And he just sucked up 200 gallons of water.
Look at all this. I thought he had teeth missing.
Good Lord, have mercy.
God dab it.
If he roll on top of you, ain't gonna be able
-to get you out of there. -Can't go nowhere.
All right.
What a friggin' alligator.
Goodness gracious alive.
We might have the record.
He's a giant. He's big, huge,
and he got all this power,
and he ain't playing around.
I mean, if you got a problem alligator,
you just gotta get him out of there.
And you gotta mean business just as well,
and you gotta keep your head in the game.
That thing is big.
He knew what he was doing.
Over in Bayou Benoit,
thanks to Dorien's sniping and treble hooking,
Daniel and Dorien have turned a slow start into a good day.
Now, they're looking for a giant to top it off.
Can you tell how big that one is?
No.
Now, that one way back there?
They got two of them. They look nice.
I'm locked in. I'm focused on
filling this boat with alligators.
I know this is my opportunity to step up
and rise to the occasion and keep the team together.
Get your hook prepped, pa.
He's right there somewhere.
If he went down...
There he is over there.
Got him!
Hold him.
Don't give him no slack.
It's a big one.
-Whoa! -Bull.
-Good alligator. -No slack, no slack.
I got him.
Hooked him in the arm. Oh!
Hold that big rascal, pa.
Give me a shot on this bull.
Hold him.
Just let me get a shot on him.
Let me get a shot.
Whoa.
Whoa!
Got him.
Good shot, pa.
[laughs] That's what I'm talking about.
Okay, I'm gonna grab a leg.
Come up some. Come up some.
Okay, good job.
Let's push his head down.
-Good job. -That's what we needed.
With this ten-footer, what looked like a wash
turned into the most successful day of open water hunting
for Daniel and Dorien as a team.
We worked as a team.
We ended up having a successful day.
I pulled through for the team.
My grandpa leaned on me when he needed to,
and I was able to rise to the occasion
and come out successful.
♪ Redemption, it feels so good ♪
Yes, sir.
Dorien stepped up.
It's really rewarding when it's a family member
that you're having a bad time, and they step up
and take the lead and make it happen.
It's a good feeling, I'm so proud of him.
It's time to go home.
You did a really good job today, pa.
I'm proud of you.
As the sun starts to drop in the Atchafalaya Basin...
with one tag still left to fill,
Jacob and Don prepare for a Hail Mary attempt
to enter their final water hole in the area.
Bam!
Oh, right here, bro.
Pull into the lilies right past that dead tree.
That way it'll kind of lock us in.
Right past this cypress stuff.
To avoid spooking the alligator,
the hunters pull off to the bank
and get their rifle ready.
Perfecto.
Now we're gonna sit quietly.
You know, now where we at, it's a perfect set up.
This spot hasn't been fooled with in years.
We know there's big gators in here.
I kind of basically had wrote it off
because I knew we wasn't gonna be able to go there anymore
because we got extremely low waters.
But now that we have an airboat in our pocket,
we can go back to going to this spot
that's probably one of the favorite spots
that I was looking forward to going.
He's way over there drifting in the lilies.
Don't move.
[gunshot]
Yes, indeed, yes, indeed, yes, indeed.
Yes, indeed, yes, indeed.
[laughs]
Hell, yeah, Don Brewer.
Love it when a plan comes together.
Oh, yeah.
-Phew... bam! -Yeah.
This 11-foot dinosaur, their eighth for the day,
helps them fill their tags
for the most challenging area of the season so far,
but they still need to make it out.
Look at that beast, Jacob.
It don't like that mud.
We on sand, baby.
Maybe.
-Huh? -Maybe.
I don't have an airboat. I don't know
what to do when an airboat gets stuck.
So in the back of my mind,
I really don't know what the hell we gonna do.
You got a cane knife?
Probably not.
Don was smart enough when he brought this airboat down,
he had an electric winch in his front deck.
Because if you're stuck, another airboat
that's gonna try to come to get back there
is either gonna get stuck with you,
or he's gonna get stuck trying to pull you out.
So then you have two boats stuck.
Get where you need. I'll getcha.
If I can get this front nose going that way,
I can swing it.
Whoa, whoa, whoa, don't pull the tree out.
Give it some gas.
Ready?
I wish we had more days with the airboat and everything
where we could do things. But I understand
we got 900 tags to fill,
and we can't put 40 or 50 gators on this airboat.
It won't run.
It's not an everyday boat.
But it does come in handy when we need it.
That's what you call a warm winch right there.
Real warm.
Damn, boy.
Whoo, damn, Jacob.
Let's roll, soul.