Attention Floridians--Can You Take Gar Where YOU Fish?

[IraRat]

I always throw the monsters back because they're so ugly, but since the Seminoles made a staple of this, I want to bag a nice one and give it a try.

But I was shocked to read the regs that in the main preserve I go to, they're a no-catch species, regardless of size.

Huh? Aren't these things all over the place?

Do you have any restrictions on gar in your neck of Florida?

 

[jigngrub]

Re: Attention Floridians--Can You Take Gar Where YOU Fish?

Eat the Bowfin (Grinnel) instead, it's similar in taste and texture... especially if you don't know what you're doing.

 

[IraRat]

Re: Attention Floridians--Can You Take Gar Where YOU Fish?

I think they have restrictions on the bowfin too--but not the invasive bulls-eye snakehead, which is similar eating.

It's just that I know people have eaten gar for centuries and wanted to try it at least ONCE.

Do the bowfins hit on spinners and rubber frogs like the snakehead?

 

[jigngrub]

Re: Attention Floridians--Can You Take Gar Where YOU Fish?

I think they have restrictions on the bowfin too--but not the invasive bulls-eye snakehead, which is similar eating.

It's just that I know people have eaten gar for centuries and wanted to try it at least ONCE.

Do the bowfins hit on spinners and rubber frogs like the snakehead?

Gar and Bowfin meat is soft and mushy, most people just hack the armored skin along the backbone of the Gar and then scoop the tenderloin meat out with a spoon and make fish cakes out of it... it would probably make a good chowder too. If you get the bright idea you might want to eat some Gar roe/eggs, don't do it. The roe of Gar fish is actually poisonous and will make you "go to the hospital" sick.

Bowfin meat will go soft and mushy too if you try to wash it after cleaning the fish, but if you can fillet it cleanly enough and just pat it clean with paper towels it will stay fairly firm and will fry up very nicely with a good taste and table quality. Unlike Gar roe, Bowfin roe is edible and they actually make a fine Caviar out of it. Bowfin are predators with some nasty teeth and will hit the same lures Bass and Snakehead hit.

Snakehead meat is firm and white with a good table quality.

I think one of the reasons, if not the main reason for the no harvest of Gars in your area is probably because people like to bow fish for them... but they never do anything with the fish after they kill it and it just goes to waste, and most states have laws against wanton waste of fish and game.

 

[IraRat]

Re: Attention Floridians--Can You Take Gar Where YOU Fish?

Thanks for the info.

We no longer get the monster-size gar here like so many other places seem to have. (Certainly not south and mid-Florida; don't know about up north.) I mean, I've seen photos of them in FL from the PAST where they're huge, like they're getting in Texas and other states NOW, 6 feet and up.

I've been in FL about 20 years now, and my first time out in a boat on day one, I caught a tiny one and thought I had found the missing link between fish and alligator. The thing was maybe a foot long, but scared the HELL out of me when I pulled it into the boat and saw that head and those teeth.

I had no clue what an alligator gar was.

 

[jigngrub]

Re: Attention Floridians--Can You Take Gar Where YOU Fish?

The Gar family contains seven species, in two genera:

Family Lepisoteidae
Genus Atractosteus Rafinesque, 1820 A. spatula (Lac?p?de, 1803) (alligator gar)
A. tristoechus (Bloch & J. G. Schneider, 1801) (Cuban gar)
A. tropicus Gill, 1863 (tropical gar)

Genus Lepisosteus Linnaeus, 1758 Lepisosteus oculatus Winchell, 1864 (spotted gar)
Lepisosteus osseus (Linnaeus, 1758) (longnose gar)
Lepisosteus platostomus Rafinesque, 1820 (shortnose gar)
Lepisosteus platyrhincus DeKay, 1842 (Florida gar)

You can read more here:
Gar - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Here in Alabama we're only allowed to take 1 Alligator, but there's no limit on the more common Long Nose Gar and Spotted Gar.

Check your regulations and learn how to identify the different species of Gar and you may be able to keep some of them.

 

[lncoop]

Re: Attention Floridians--Can You Take Gar Where YOU Fish?

I don't need to take Gar where I fish. Plenty there already. Sorry, couldn't resist.:lol: