Longnose Gar and Redhorse

Two friends of mine wanted to catch their Gar badly. The last two weeks had been really good for Gar fishing, but now that the fish were moving out, there were only a handful of them left in our area.

Still, we picked at fish. There were two guys also fishing for Gar and they had arrived before us. They reported no Gar caught. While we watched them fish across the river, they had one bite but the Gar came off.

When you know how to catch them, it's not hard at all. The guy across the river was sporting a centerpin reel and all dressed for the occasion, but he doesn't know the first thing about Gar feeding behaviour. Meanwhile, we were getting constant bites for an hour until the Gar smarten up. In the end, we managed to bring one each to the net for both Tristan and Stefano.

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When we hooked the rest of the Gar and they seemed to avoid our baits, we switched to Redhorse.

I sight fished a nice Silver Redhorse that was actively feeding. I had polarized sunglasses and I could see the fish and their behaviour clearly. Tristan and Stefano both had trouble seeing the fish, so I spotted the Redhorse for them, guide them to bait placement, and even told them when to set the hook when I could see the fish slurp the nightcrawler.

Tristan's Silver Redhorse

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Tristan's Shorthead Redhorse

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Stefano's Shorthead Redhorse

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Stefano's Greater Redhorse

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We could have done even better, but Stefano needed to be home at a certain time and we had a long drive back...so we were off the water by 3:30pm and left the fish biting.

I only caught one Silver Redhorse (and too many Rockbass...as did everyone), but guiding them to these fish felt just as good as catching them myself!

Very nice pics! Longnose gar are such a cool fish, way more of them in Ontario than most people think.

I wish they would let us take gar with archery equipment .... seen as many gar as we seen carp last weekend !
Glen

We used to shoot some nice gar on Manitoulin island prior to 2008 when the MNR changed the rules. Makes no sense, gar are plentiful here.

What is the purpose of shooting Longnose Gar? They are native fish. They belong here and have just as much a role in the ecosystem as other predators such as Pike and Muskie.

[QTE=MuskieBait;976279]What is the purpose of shooting Longnose Gar? They are native fish. They belong here and have just as much a role in the ecosystem as other predators such as Pike and Muskie.[/QUOTE]
So I can eat them.

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Originally Posted by gillshot

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Originally Posted by MuskieBait

What is the purpose of shooting Longnose Gar? They are native fish. They belong here and have just as much a role in the ecosystem as other predators such as Pike and Muskie.

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So I can eat them.

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I've heard too many people who simply want to shoot them because they blame Longnose Gar for competition for prey or predation on juvenile sportfish. They shoot gar and then dump the dead fish. It's a despicable practice, especially toward native species.

If you shoot to consume, I can respect that. Few people are interested in eating Gar species so that was not the immediate intention that came to my mind. Many times I have considered keeping one to see how they taste, but the risk of accidentally contaminating the meat with the poisonous eggs (if I happened to keep a female) has prevented me from keeping one to try.

They are not hard to catch on hook and line though. If you are keeping them, I would suggest using small treble hook with small chunks of cut bait, let the gar swallow the treble hook, and you have a much better chance to hook and land them.

I use #10 to #8 treble hooks for them, but even so, I don't deep hook any of them. It takes them forever to swallow their bait, and it seems like if they can feel the treble hook, they have a hard time swallowing the hook anyways (for the smaller gar). I've experimented with single hook for larger specimens and don't seem to deep hook them too often either.

Thanks for the tips on catching them. I would not worry too much about eating a female gar, just rinse the fillets thoroughly before you prepare it. Cut the fillets into toonie sized chunks before you fry it, or else the tendons in the meat will get chewy. I agree with you that longnose have a place in our ecosystem, but I would still take a few for the table every year if I was still allowed to do so.