Mark Merting is one of the first, if not the first, person to recreationally hunt and kill an alligator in South Carolina, well, legally anyways.

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The feet took him 3 1/2 hours of struggling on rope to subdue the beast-size 12-foot 'gator on Saturday (that was opening day).

One of the tricks to alligator hunting rules is that you can't just go around shooting a shotgun into the water, a hunter must first bring the animal under control before killing it. You're also only allowed one kill in a season.

A couple of stories out there on this, put The Post and Courier has the best as they've got photos.