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Huge gar

  • Thread starter sarracenia
  • Start date
Supposedly the 2nd largest fish ever caught out of the Mississippi R. Not sure if it's all fish, or just 2nd largest gar. but it's a monster.

alligator_fish.jpg
 
hmmm..im sensing "hoax"..
that should be a heavy fish!
why is it leaning sideways?
gravity should be making it straight up and down..
 
probably rigor mortis

my dad said it was legit. his cousin snapped the photo.
 
WOW!! HUGE!!
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I think I knwo what it may be.
In the prehistoric times, there was a fish known as the river Mossa lizard(it still had short blunt legs) they were huge like that and the head and jaws look EZACTLY the same.
The river Mossa lizard evolved inot a fish comptley, I belive that is what it evolved into.
 
The garfish, Also known as the trash fish. Not very good meat and BIG teeth. It does look pretty Cheesy, I'm not gonna assume anything though.
 
hoax...

Scott is right, it should be directly up and down... Also, a WIRE would completely cut through the gills of that fish, if its as big as is told
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a) would only hang straight down if the sting was connected to the center line of the fish, and the fish was of uniform weight distribution. Neither is the case, so the "hang" of the fish in most likely true

b) fish may not be quite as large as it looks due to perspective. If you look, the fish is 1) not touching the ground and 2) a little in front of the person.

c) who know's how tall that guy is anyway?

d) Gar's are HUGE fish by all rights. There is no reason to think hoax in this case. Just odd photo perspective.
 
i find it quite humorous so many people are quick to dismiss it as a hoax. i did a quick google search and found this:

gar article

scroll to near the bottom
 
I did not think it was a hoax, as alligator gar are the 2nd largest freshwater fish in North America (behind the white sturgeon) , and if you notice the belly, it's red all the way down from where the noose cut into it and it trickled blood down all those grooves in the scales. That is a lot of trouble to go to for a hoax.
In defense, most pics of this nature turn out to be hoaxes(like the man-eating snakes, ect).
I caught my first gar ever this year in the Missouri River. It was a modest 27 inches, compared to this giant, lol.

Joe
 
  • #10
alligator gars get HUGE. i believe the photo. i saw a 4 ft ish one in an aquarium. they only get around 2 ft up here but they are long nosed gars i think....maybe short nosed. why not believe it? gars are a pain to catch as their mouths are solid bone and darn near impossible to set a hook. most large ones are caught with snares, spears and by bow and arrow. they are a trash fish so ppl dont catch them very often on purpose unless you are "hunting" for a big one. i highly doubt its a hoax. alot of trouble for basically no reason.

Rattler
 
  • #12
I totally believe it's real. I was fishing at a friend's ranch in east Texas and had a gar surface while fighting a big bass. The gar was easily 9 feet in length!
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No joke. I have been fishing for years, I have enough fish under my belt to need no reason to lie. Just the truth. I know the Texas record is around 15ish feet... Louisiana is 18!
 
  • #13
With mucle tension, bones and unevenly distributed weight (the tail has lots of mucle) methinks theres good chance it wouldnt hang straight up and down.

Starman, while gars are indeed of very ancient liniage (along with the paddlefish, sturgeon and bowfins) they are not related to the lobe-finned fish. The shallow freshwater lobefin subfamily is gone compleyely, and the other subfamily is only just hanging in there with the Ceoelocanth (i know i didnt spell it right)
 
  • #14
I love paddle fish! Coolest looking fish ever! I must say I owe it to white bass, the bonefish of the freshwater! Greatest fish ever created
Please, don't start racial/evolutionist arguments. I just am stating my point. I still completely accept your opinions, and will listen to them all!
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Peace,
JM
 
  • #15
now paddle fish are uuuuuuuuuuugggggggggglllllllllllyyyyyy. ive seen many, many of those. saw a couple 80 plus pounders pulled out of the river this year.

Rattler
 
  • #16
How could you? They are almost (gag me with a spoon) cute... But white bass are still the best. On a 4-weight fly rod, it is an experiance to behold indeed!
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  • #17
paddlefish are absoluetley adorable! and i got a real chuckle from lithopsman's post about fish racism lmao.

we used to have a house in southern georgia on Lake sinclair, or synclair or something that sounds like that. in the summer some kind of gar with really, really long jaws would swim up the the surface and breed ; it was so cool!
 
  • #18
Hehe. I figured someone would get a chuckle out of that double entrade (or however you spell it) I must say after seeing paddlefish in situ and feeding them at the fishery in Athens, Texas, they are (put away your spoons, they are really) cute. I find their faces very innocent, and they are the one fish I could not catch. But white bass...
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  • #19
i know you sure get one heck of a work out catching them. for those of you who have never seen one they are a prehistoric filter feeding fish native to the Mississippi river drainage(im on the Missouri River and we have them here and in the Yellowstone, the next river to the south of me) and to a river system in China. being they eat plankton normal fishing tactics dont work. what you do is buy the biggest pole you can find. attatch a HUGE treble hook and about a 1 pound wieght to your line. cast it as far across the river as you can. than jerk and reel as hard and as fast as you can trying to snag one of these fish that can wiegh over 100 pounds. after 6 or 7 casts anyone but the most hardened athlete starts to wear out. once/if you snag one than the work and fun begins. the fish will take off up or down stream and you have to run full speed down the bank until it decides to stop. when it does you take up as much line as you can till the fish decideds to take off again and down the bank you go. the fights last anywhere from 15 minutes to over an hour running and being dragged up and down the bank. i know one guy who buys a tag every year that once he gets to tired to run anymore will pull out a 44 mag and end the fight a lil bit sooner. lots of meat but no bones, just a rod of cartilage down the back. its supposed to be excellent BBQed. also the roe(eggs) is used to make caviar.

BTW lithopsman walleye is MUCH better eating than bass.
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Rattler
 
  • #20
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]racial/evolutionist

racial?racial? i dont see how stating that the last member of a fish order is a rare species under protection is racial

but since were on the topic might i add that padlefish is a threatend species and only rarely spawns in the wild do to river flow changes? that doesnt mean you cant catch them, but... well you can still catch them, witch is fine with me. I actually wish that they would spawn in the wild, but they are in no danger of actual extinction because they are bred in fishfarms for restalking in the wild.
 
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