1st Gar on the Fly

[Pittflyguy]

I always smile when I can scratch a new fish species off my list of fish caught on the fly! Had a tough weekend of fishing they bay but the pay off was nice.

 

[ryguyfi]

sweet catch. I've seen one in a small stream before, but didn't have any gear on me. I hear they have so many teeth they're tough to actually hook. Congrats.

 

[greenghost]

Just saw the gar episode of River Monsters the other night...

http://animal.discovery.com/fish/river-monsters/alligator-gar/

Scary looking fish for sure.

 

[jjsjigs]

WOW! Now that is freakin' cool!! I gotta ask... what did you catch him on?

 

[evw659]

very cool!!! How big?

 

[jayL]

Bruno got into them with a hookless piece of rope, I think. I believe that's the popular solution to them being hard to hook. Fray it up good, and they'll get caught.

I have caught them on spinning gear before. Might give it a shot with a fly if I ever see one around here.

 

[Fredrick]

The two things that Pitt has over philly is Gar and Drum

 

[salvelinusfontinalis]

That is a very cool catch!

In my youth I rolled a huge gar in a cove of the St. Lawrence River. It was right behind our camp. I threw a double jointed floating rapala at that fish and it tried to take it right away. This fish was easily over 100 lbs. My father laughed and said there was no way I was going to ever get it in on my rod anyways.
What struck me as odd was as aggressive as those fish are, it wouldn't strike the rapala again. We watched him swim back into the main channel of the river.

 

[Pittflyguy]

To be honest, it was a bit of happenstance. I was fishing for carp and wading along a weedline. The gar (which was not all that big.. .will post a better pic as soon as CW sends it to me) He sitting on the bottom almost catatonic. I dropped my carp fly just beyond him and gave it a small twitch... nothing... one more twitch which bumped him right in the nose and he snapped at it violently and he was hooked.

I have heard the same thing with a small piece of frayed nylon rope which will tangle in their teeth. No hook necessary. I watched them at sunset scooping small minnows off the surface as well... pretty cool to watch.

 

[iceyguides]

I caught my 1st gar on a fly rod this past may. It was a white gar and i think the one in your pic is a spotted or something. I caught it while fishing for shad below conowingo. Prolly 20 inches and as thick as a finger. With the difficulty i had getting the hook out of him 1 of those is probably all i need to catch in my lifetime, but i guess a big one would cool to catch.

 

[David]

While fishing the allegheny, I chalk up any missed strike to gar...gotta stop using hooks one of these days!