the best gar to get?

There are seven different species of gar. Alligator and Longnose gars are automatically ruled out as your dimensions are not large enough for the long term, but as with anything you can keep them for the short term. If you are new to gars, probably get a Florida as they are extremely hardy however all the gars species I have kept can get through just about anything.

Gars range in size depending on the specie, Florida and Spotted gars are generally the smallest and should stay under 24".

Feed juvenile gars as much as they can consume, this size of gar is under 12". When they start to get larger and thicker they will need to be fed every day to every other day and not in such large quantities. Feed them a variety of things such as feeder fish, shrimp, etc. Some gars are more accepting than others, my Tropicals prefer to eat the ghost shrimp that die rather than try to catch the live ones. You can get them on pellets, just reintroduce the food or starve them until they take it.

For tankmates, cichlids are generally a problem or so I've heard. Things like rays, catfish, and other bottom dwellers aren't usually an issue. Gars will snap or bite tank mates that are shiny as the flash or the fish attracts them and they attempt to eat it. I have kept my gars with stingrays, catfish, nile perch, arapaima and an african tiger fish (wasn't as issue as the tiger fish was larger than the gar) and none of them were an issue with the gar. Be careful of fish which move often in an "attractive" way, gars may act on it and bite the fish.

Luigi mbu said:

Great thanks for that so my thoughts on a Florida or spotted was right.
I've kept many fish before but gar are just so different that I wanted to find out from someone with experience with them.
What are your thought on keeping one with a mbu puffer as I have one at the moment and he's very friendly the only fish he doesn't like seem to be bichirs? If that sound like a bad idea I will start the her off in the smaller 5ft tank and but him his own 200g later.

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I have no experience with puffers. I do not believe he would eat or attack the puffer though as puffers do not move quickly (I think), they aren't shiny, and they won't be aggressive towards the gar.

Im just now starting to get into gar and this thread gave me a lot of information, thanks everyone!

Florida Gar would be the best option with that tank size. I have two and they're awesome. Both of mines are about 8inches now and I plan to move them out of my 75 gal into something much bigger.

I keep my Florida gar at 17" now with large oscars 12", arowanas 24" and a pleco 17". All getting along just fine. Oscars fight with each other but don't bother anyone else.

^ generally found the above to be a bad combo, especially with the oscars. pleco is a dangerous tankmate too, do a quick search and you'll see

to answer your original question, this is a good starting read, look through it and let us know if you have more questions!

http://www.monsterfishkeepers.com/forums/showthread.php?406951-Gar-Species-Profiles

sorry for the broken image links...i will have to fix that soon...