The Alligator Gar Is One Ugly Fish, With Few Friends but New Fans

WSJ ^ | 30 June 2009 | TOM BENNING

[BGHater]

Texans Kill Crafty Critters With Crossbows; Fishing Limits Are the Order of the Day

CROCKETT, Texas -- The sadly misunderstood alligator gar, reviled for its frighteningly huge and prehistoric appearance and rows of razor-sharp teeth, has been hunted for centuries.

Fishermen despise the gar because they believe the fish devour prized bass and crappie. Swimmers and boaters fear the gar's alligator-shaped jaws could take a chunk out of them in the water.

But in recent times, alligator gar have experienced a kind of trash-to-trophy renaissance as sportsmen discovered the thrill of hunting the beasts, which can weigh up to 300 pounds and reach 8 feet in length. Gar hunting, with rod-and-reel as well as crossbow, has spawned a booming market for guides who charge as much as $750 a day to lead their clients deep into the muddy backwaters of Texas where the monster fish thrive.

In the rural South, the prospect of bagging a trophy gator gar inspires a special brand of enthusiasm. "I don't consider myself a redneck, but sometimes I do redneck stuff," says Mark Malfa, a gar guide in central Texas.

Paula Boudra, an athletic 32-year-old, drove nearly six hours from Sheridan, Ark., one night earlier this month for the chance to kill her first alligator gar with a crossbow. Armed with stainless-steel, prong-tipped arrows that can pierce the gar's thick scales, her guides, Sam Lovell and Steve Barclay, steered their flat-bottom boat into the brambly creeks of East Texas's Trinity River.

John Paul Morris, the son of Bass Pro Shops CEO Johnny Morris, sizes up the jaws of the 8-foot-3-inch long alligator gar he caught on a bow fishing trip.

[Charles Martel]

This is a formidable fish living in the Mississippi, principally in the lower parts, also in Lake Pontchartrain, the Mobile, Red River, &c.

I can attest to the part about Lake Pontchartrain. My grandfather had a fishing camp on the south shore (the far north-east corner of New Orleans) in the late '50s through early '70s. My dad and uncles had fashioned long, harpoon-like spears that had detachable heads with rope eyelets.

In the evening, those huge garfish would come up into the shallows to feed on smaller fish hiding in the marsh grass - I remember seeing them swim by right below my feet as I stood on the pier. Dad would wait for one to swim underneath, then spear it. All Hell would break loose as that fish began thrashing in the shallow water. Several hundred feet of rope connected that barbed spearhead to the pier and the fish usually ran it all the way out.

Sometimes it took quite a long time for the gar to tire out or die - most of them still had some fight left in 'em when hauled out of the lake... friggin' prehistoric beasts. Back then, Dad said they were only doing that to help protect the more edible species in the lake... but they clearly got a kick out of a successful gar-gigging.

Some old fellow at a nearby camp used to come and take the gars that they killed - don't even want to think about someone *eating* those things. Blech.

There was a story (a tall tale, I've always suspected) about one of my uncles getting fed up with one huge gar that refused to quit fighting. He supposedly tied off the pier end of the rope to a hunk of driftwood and snagged that on the caboose railing of a city-bound freight train that passed by (the Southern Railway tracks run along the outside of the lake levee). Nowadays, that'd get videotaped and uploaded to YouTube. ;-)

[Two Kids' Dad]

Great stories, all. Thanks FReepers.

[vetvetdoug]

I never get to even reel the gar in....unless I am using a wire leader the gar will have the lure because nylon is no match for those teeth.

[Vendome]

Well I fished on Lake Ten Killer in Oklahoma and we never realed them in either.

We would see them and while were cutting the line scream “I hope that fancy lure of mine rusts in your mouth and you get tangled up in the line and die. You bastard! Damnit!”

[NerdDad]

Dad was 54 when I was born. He had been crippled in his 20s, so by the time I was old enough, he was too old for us to do much of his beloved fishing and hunting together. Oh, but the stories the old man had. I remember him telling about hooking a gar once (he said it was about 4 feet long). He told about the mighty fight getting it reeled in and almost into the boat before he saw what it was. His response was the same as your dad’s. As soon as he recognized it, he cut the line and was happy to have not had to deal with that monster in the boat with him. And that was dad’s way of answering my question about what “cut bait” meant. Keeping a knife at the ready must be one of those lessons that fishermen learn.

[A. Patriot]

Does anyone know of anyone trying to eat one of these? Lots of meat if they are edible.