longnose/spotted gar...

[JSzymczyk 0]

local pond got partially drained due to construction. I was looking around and saw several longnose or spotted gar swimming around near the surface . these fish seemed to be in the 18 to 24 inch range. I've never caught a gar on any type of tackle, and these seem to be begging to be caught on a fly rod. The water is very dirty, visibility maybe a foot, probably less. Water temp has to be in the 80s or more. This would be more or less sight fishing, casting something to a cruising fish. I was thinking maybe a long bucktail with a #6 or #8 trailer hook.

 

anyone have any advice on how to approach this?

[zip 0]

If your going to fish for gar I would suggest buying a steel or wire leader so it wont bite your regular one in half.Also as for bait,I would use something very stringy almost like a mop head (thier teeth get tangled in it) as thier heads are like steel and i never had any luck hooking one.Also if you are going to "fly fish em" out,you may have to get a heavier weight rod maybe an 8-10.

 

Also be sure to have some type of leather gloves and pliers with you as they have razors for teeth.Good luck!

[stevemcn 0]

Good luck man. I've been casting to them for a couple weeks here (lower potomac river). They must be spawning because I only had one bite out of thousands of casts. I'm gonna keep trying cause it sounds like a lot of fun to catch them and I can do it on my lunch hour.

 

Try these links for some advice.

For everything about the three types of Gar: http://www.garfishing.com/

 

For a recipe for the Hookless gar fly: http://www.geocities.com/GarManJack/

 

Good luck. Let us know how you do.

 

Steve

[TerryLee 0]

I used to catch them a lot on spinning and baitcasting tackle, both on purpose and not. I always seemed to get their attention with crankbaits and walk-the-dog topwater baits like Zara Spooks and the like. I've seen the hookless gar fly before and I would second the leather gloves for handling them. I usually carry an extra long set of needle nose pliers on trips where I expect to encounter them so I can reach out and touch them if needed.

[Kenneth K 0]

i caught some short nose gar down below KY Dam several weeks ago with a size 12 black wooly bugger. the short nose have a little more "meat" in their mouth than a long nose, so it worked pretty good. you miss a lot, but you'll catch some.

 

.. k

[panfisherteen 0]

for longnose gar,if you are planning on fishing with hooks,have a rear trailer hook attached to the fly to "hook" the gar,or if you want to not use hooks,simply tie the hookless gar fly.For any spin fisherman,i would suggest getting a popper and removing the treble hooks and then tying some nylon rope on a kook that has had the pouint removed,as when i went on a camping trip,the gar would repeatedly smash at the popper,and since there was no nylon rope on the rear hook,the gar would not get hooked

[bowfin47 0]

 

In the heat of the summer, I’ve caught longnosed gar on fast stripped long shanked #6/8 thin, rabbit stripped matucas... no wire leader... no trailing hooks. (Wire leaders.. baa.. that's why I tie flies!)

 

Usually, you'd get several rapid hits before placing the hook in the very narrow soft part of that long jaw.

 

Lots of fun.

 

 

 

 

[panfisherteen 0]

well there are gar that swim around at a couple local beaches,and i always have wanted to fish them

[JSzymczyk 0]

they're regarded as a "kill-on-sight" trash fish around here. If they hit and fight as well as I've been led to believe, I don't understand why.

 

Oh wait, anything but a LMB around here is a trash fish, that's why.

[bowfin47 0]

Throw a streamer at them...

 

What have ya' got to lose?

[TerryLee 0]

Throw a streamer at them...

 

What have ya' got to lose?

 

Exactly :thumbsup: !!

 

 

[lewy271 0]

Man I'm losing patience for people and fish, Regardless. If you want to catch a gar in that size range; because lets be honest they are not monsters and I've fished for them in the same range.

 

You can see them the are the shadows that appear and disappear, don't waste your time with steel leaders because there is no reason to use them. For 4 years I've fished for them with 4 pound straight leaders, I've never had a bite through. All these crazy flys that everyone comes up with, forget it.

 

Keep in mind I have a longnose in my fish tank bought from a Pet store, I've gotton a really good idea of how they feed. They like to ambush, not track down a streamer. They like tons of surface disturband, if I see gar sitting on the surface sunbathing I through on a stimulator. Small very small, my buddy fishes for them with hackle flies, small ones why you might ask? Well they come down on a big fly and cannot be hooked because of their jaw structure. They tend to attack from the side then they line up the prey with their body so they are able to swallow it.

 

Through something small and on top like I mentioned before hackle flies or stimulators, you cannot set the hook immediately because if you do you rip it right out of there mouth, if you do set the hook immediately you only have a chance to foul them, generally in the eye. Wait for the strike, give slack, count to twenty, then set the hook. You hook up rate will be increased dramatically.

 

Yes, yes guys do catch these fish on streamers but they are a species that I fish for on a fairly regular basis. Not alot of people can say that, and anything they really have to say is about how they accidentally caught them. When they are active they are feeding on the surface, with the exception of the few aligator gar that I've caught. Otherwise if we are talking longnose, shortnose, spots or any hybrid. You are going to be sight fishing for them, running around from spot to spot looking for a group of them to surface, through the fly in the middle of the group fish it as slowly as possible causing as much disturbance at the same time. You will find yourself with multiple strikes at the same time, no they are not going to run to your fly, they are going to cruise over slowly why, because they don't want to scare off their prey. They want the prey to think they are just a log or bunch of weeds. What is you hookup rate going to be low, higher depending on you patience. Best practices, would include barbless hooks. Why you may ask, well they are not crazy fighters so any accomplished fisherman should be able to land the fish, but letting that fish hold the fly longer before setting the hook could mean some gut hooks. Which if you have a barb on the hook you are just going to kill your speciman, barbless will come right out. Also, if you do have a fowl hook you should do less damage to the fish. These are the rules to gar fishing as lewdog see's it, you can try it or not but I can tell you from experience you will increase your hookups from my personal trials over the years. Remember no leaders, these fish are smarter than you may think, they have not survived evolution and extiniction all these years because of luck. They are wary savages, and can be as interesting a pursuit as any trout.

[Harold Ray 0]

They are wary savages, and can be as interesting a pursuit as any trout.

 

That is a true statement. Gar are beautiful, ancient, savage warriors.

 

they're regarded as a "kill-on-sight" trash fish around here. If they hit and fight as well as I've been led to believe, I don't understand why.

 

The reason is unadulterated stupidity, a harsh statement you may think, but that is exactly how I feel. Gar have been slaughtered for decades, usually because of ignorance of their ways, and that is why they are in general decline nearly everywhere, and totally eliminated from many previous habitats. Alligator gar, the larger species, has been gone from a large portion of it previous range, in some cases, for years.

 

Here is Texas, we still have alligator gar, and on the Brazos, which is very near my home, it is not uncommon to catch gar that weigh 80 to 100+ pounds. I'm sure there are some out there in the more remote and hard to access Brazos waters that go 200 pounds and more. When I was younger, fish over 300 pounds were caught, weighed and photographed.

 

In this part of Texas and with the fishermen I know, gar are catch and release fish because we want them to be here a long time. Gar are relics of the dinosaur age; it would be sad if humans, who have only been a dominant species for a very short time, should eliminate a species that has been dominant in many ways for 250 million years and more.

 

The gar I mentioned above are caught on conventional tackle. I plan to try for them shortly with 10 to 12 wt. rods. For alligators, you need big, tough tackle, patience and and a kayak to get where they are. Gar fight, bite, thrash the water and you and generally raise all kinds of ---- when they're on a hook. You have to be very careful landing fish this big because they can hurt you with ease.

 

We also have the other smaller species in large numbers. Alligator gar are much larger and far more impressive.

 

Ray

[Ribs1 0]

I love this topic. I also target gar on a regular basis. I have had good success with a small rope fly like the one described by gar man Jack. I also tie a small Gartside Gurgler with a frayed nylon rope as a tail.

I am also carp crazy and spend about 30 days a year chasing them. I take a lot of heat locally for not killing carp and gar. There are so many ignorant people that think we should try to play god and get rid of the trash fish. I was fishing the mulberry hatch one day and catching carp one right after another. Another angler waded near me and got very upset that I was releasing my catch. He said "carp are an invasive species and as such should be removed from the river immediately". I asked him "do you fish for brown trout?" He said yes. I told him that brown trout are also an invasive species introduced to this country later than carp and that I would sooner kill all my catch of brown trout before killing one carp.

I almost got into a fight over that one.

[JSzymczyk 0]

since my original post, I haven't had the opportunity to try for them. the owners have been digging out and expanding the pond, so the water has turned the temperature and consistency of hot chocolate.

 

I also find it strange how people arbitrarily hate one species of fish over another. Bowfin is another kill-on-sight species here. Along with gar, it's another one I've never caught.