Nothing Beats a Good Challenge

Each year I lead guided trips in some of the most pressured gator waters in southern Georgia and use only archery equipment and my airboat to accomplish it. I love all things archery and a good challenge. I have owned airboats all my adult life and travel across the U.S. competing in bowfishing tournaments.

- Tommy Woods

When it comes to alligator hunting in Georgia, you must have a line attached to the gator before you can dispatch it.

This means archery, a fishing rod with hook, a snag hook, or a harpoon, are the only methods permissible (no baiting of set hooks allowed). All I have ever offered on my guides is archery, because I feel it is the most fun option to use and the most daring. Anyone can cast a rod 100 yards, but getting within bow range requires more skill and patience.

This season, I had five hunters with tags. While we were sitting at a local restaurant situated at a quaint fishing camp where I launch the airboat, a local guide told one of my hunters "they might as well forget about killing a gator with a bow down here especially in an airboat". After more than a decade of successfully harvesting gators every year in that area, using only archery, my competitive nature forced me to prove this local wrong.

My first hunter had never killed an alligator and had only bow fished once. There were a few attempts that resulted in misses, but that was okay. The way I look at it, you cannot hit them if you don't try, so just consider it practicing. We finally had one (a gator) cooperate and he successfully got an eight-footer. The week was off to a great start.