Any Longnose Gar fisherman here?

[Jet fishin]

A fish that I dont think gets enough credit. Super smart, awesome, extreme and cool fish, tried to catch this little one im front of me for the longest time once, no success liked the dead minnows around it though. Any one purposly fish for them? What's that like? anything Gar here.

 

[BowSlayer]

I fish the spring run in belleville every year, they get big there and you can see them in the current, hundreds of them, the love a live minnow under a float, they will take shrimp as well as lures too, heck I've even gotten them on corn! They fight like nothing I've ever seen before, with 2 metres jumps out of the water and reel spoolig runs, they are definitely and under-rated fish! They are very cool looking and very sneaky and fast, Ive even had the joys of eating one ounce, it actually tasted very good, bot even like, fish, more like chicken, really tasty fish but i mostly C&R for them, because although they are very tasty, they are a pain to clean, and more fun to C&R them anyways, because its awesome watching them swim away!

 

[classic drifter]

why not try the cajun style, minnow under a jug kinda thing, only problem is you gotta chase the jugs with a boat and look for it othe next morning! LOL!!!

 

[Kit]

I would not mind trying to fish for some. Hmm maybe this year.

 

[BowSlayer]

LOL@Classic Drifter, the spot where i fish them if you put a boat in there, you'll end up washed up in lake O in not time! lol, the current is crazy, they go up against the current to spawn, you can see them come up buy the hundreds, its like a salmon run except gar, haha!

 

[nerosrevenge]

I've always wanted to fish for them, there was a good article in the 2014 Ontario Out Of Doors Annual recently on Gar.

 

[Alfiegee]

A fish that I dont think gets enough credit. Super smart, awesome, extreme and cool fish, tried to catch this little one im front of me for the longest time once, no success liked the dead minnows around it though. Any one purposly fish for them? What's that like? anything Gar here.

Hey Jf. I fish the Grand with friends often. We don't target Gar because there are so many types of fish there, we just target fish , but Gar are often included in our daily catch. One day last summer with 4 friends nothing else was biting ( except one Channel Cat ) but we caught about 30 Gar between us up to 30 inches. I have caught them in lots of other places too, lots of shallow bays along the shores of Lake O and Lake E have them in the summer months, and the Thames near London also has some.
Not saying this is the rule, but in my experience they like to hang near the surface of the water on hot sunny days ( looking forward to some of those soon I hope . That particular day when we were nailing them on the Grand we were using minnows and when we figured out that nothing else was hitting we shortened the distance from our floats to the minnow to about a foot. I have also caught them on the fly which works well when they are near the surface and you can see them.
They are a fun fish to catch, very feisty and like to take to the air when hooked.
I'm with BowSlayer about the catch and release, I keep very few fish each year, basically only ones that are bleeding badly, but I read, I believe on the inter-net somewhere, cause everything you read on the web is true, right :lol: , that Gar are the only fish in Ontario that's roe is toxic to humans. I have not tasted Gar nor ever will.

Alfie.

 

[FishChaser67]

got a few over the years ,,got this one last summer

 

[Jet fishin]

Thanks Algigee, Was fishing the grand today no gar, no fish but great to have open water. I would/am safe because I only c and r anyways, lol.