The wonderful thing about social media is the ability to randomly see things that make you smile, even if it is not directly from your immediate area. This story is one such event. Hunters from all over the region share a common bond, they love being outdoors, the love being responsible hunters and respecting nature. One such hunter is Corey Klocek of Baldwin township, between Zimmerman and Princeton MN. Klocek is a Military Veteran who became friends with Hastings native Tim Knoblach when their unit, based out of Inver Grove Heights, served two tours in Iraq.

We asked Knoblach about his friends interesting hunt, “It is crazy, but at this point nothing surprises me anymore. Not sure if the gator would have survived through the winter. Not sure how many people can say they shot a deer and a gator on opening day let alone have the story to tell,” Knoblach said.

Klocek was taking part in the great Minnesota gun opener last weekend when he saw his target, a beautiful 10-point buck. “I stood up in my blind to stretch, then I saw the buck. This was my first ever deer with a shotgun, as I am usually a rifle hunter,” Klocek said.

He made the shot and immediately went to track it. “As I’m walking around a pond, tracking my deer, I see this muddy spot on the shore. It drew my attention because the rest of the shore was saw grass. I looked down at the mud and saw 3-foot alligator 10 feet in front of me,” he said.

“I was shocked, confused, it just doesn’t register there is an alligator in front of you, in Minnesota… in November,” Klocek chuckled He did not know what to do at first, so called the property owner. She joined him pond side and was just as baffled as Klocek was. Then made a call to fellow Veteran and friend who works with the DNR as a conservation officer. “After contacting the game warden, I was informed I could shoot it. But first I wanted to try to catch it,” Klocek added.

The hopes in catching it was to rescue it even though he had no idea where something like that could go, or how to do it. Their capture attempts failed. They tried multiple times with multiple types of rope, unfortunately, everything they tried stayed on top of the water. It was then decided that the most humane way to proceed was to shoot it. Cold winters do not work well for reptiles and there is no place this gator could go to survive a winter in Minnesota. That would have been a miserable way to die.

He contacted another Veteran with whom he served to get advice on how to make the best shot. This friend used to live in Louisiana and had experience hunting gators. He used a rifle so that he could still have the option to harvest meat from the gator, but he was informed it may be too small to harvest anything from it. “I try to eat everything I harvest, and this is the first time I have harvested and won’t eat anything from the harvest,” he said.

“No clue how it got there, or why. I’m guessing someone had it as a pet and released it when it got too big. Either way, only in 2020 can you go out to sit for deer gun season opener in Minnesota and shoot an alligator,” Klocek said.

The pet thought process was a hot topic on Facebook in a Minnesota Reptile group. Many people have already read the same post that brought the Journal to the story, and they are not happy. Their anger is not toward Klocek though, it is toward the likely release of a pet that is not suited for Minnesota weather. Hundreds of comments from angry reptile lovers that someone could do such a thing. Some were even more angry that it is so easy to just order an alligator online and have it shipped to you. Perhaps this odd hunting story will have some good come from it, which is not why this article started. We found a weird story only to have it evolve quickly and now we get to share the message of do not release pet reptiles into the wild. They are not native to MN and it can throw the ecosystem off.

Klocek was surprised at how the story has spread so quickly, even more so at hearing the response on the reptile pages, and he is glad the anger is not directed at him. That aspect, on top of the fact that he shot a gator in Minnesota still has him dumbfounded, “I’m still at a loss of words,” he laughed, “Legit speechless.” At least he has a cool story to tell! Thanks for letting us share your story with the Journal readers!