Shortnose Gar - Lepisosteus platostomus

[King-eL]

Did they really grow 9 inches in a month?

yes they grew that fast.

 

[Polypterus]

you know spotted gars live all the way from michigan to florida i could catch one up here but you don't see alot

And if you do see them up here please just leave them alone. There is a reason why they are classified as Special concern in Michigan. If you really want a Michigan strain fish get a hold of Solomon and get one of ours that was used in a recent study. These where captive propagated fish.

It is also not true they live all the way from Michigan to Florida. The Michigan Indiana and Ontario populations are totally separated from the Southern core populations. They are not even linked at all by hundreds of miles.

On other notes.. King El I'd seriously have to see some proof of your claim. They grow fast but 9 inches in a month.. I'd have to see some proof of that as I'm not taking just your word on it. I've never seen that type of growth and I've kept a good many Shorts.

 

[King-eL]

And if you do see them up here please just leave them alone. There is a reason why they are classified as Special concern in Michigan. If you really want a Michigan strain fish get a hold of Solomon and get one of ours that was used in a recent study. These where captive propagated fish.

It is also not true they live all the way from Michigan to Florida. The Michigan Indiana and Ontario populations are totally separated from the Southern core populations. They are not even linked at all by hundreds of miles.

On other notes.. King El I'd seriously have to see some proof of your claim. They grow fast but 9 inches in a month.. I'd have to see some proof of that as I'm not taking just your word on it. I've never seen that type of growth and I've kept a good many Shorts.

I ordered my Shortnose gars from TFD and you can ask owner of TFD what was size of the gars he sold to Vancouver Canada. He shipped 13 gars here at 4-4.5 inches that was March 27, 2010. And now they are at 12-13 inches of today. If you never seen one try and powerfeed one and you will find out yourself.

Here was the pics when they were at 4-4.5 inches

Here they are now at 12-13 inches

 

[E_americanus]

And if you do see them up here please just leave them alone. There is a reason why they are classified as Special concern in Michigan. If you really want a Michigan strain fish get a hold of Solomon and get one of ours that was used in a recent study. These where captive propagated fish.

It is also not true they live all the way from Michigan to Florida. The Michigan Indiana and Ontario populations are totally separated from the Southern core populations. They are not even linked at all by hundreds of miles.

On other notes.. King El I'd seriously have to see some proof of your claim. They grow fast but 9 inches in a month.. I'd have to see some proof of that as I'm not taking just your word on it. I've never seen that type of growth and I've kept a good many Shorts.

agreed on all counts

king-el, although you do show very fast growth in your photos, the initial size estimate is off. those fish are bigger than 4-4.5"...not by a ton, but they aren't 4" fish. take it from people who have closely tracked growth rates on these fish over time. powerfeeding can definitely do impressive things, but i'd say you're off on total growth by a bit. good growth reGARdless--
--SRD

 

[Madding]

Speaking of feeding, after two days of starving my little Shortnose ate his first meal this morning before work! Two chunks of frozen krill.

 

[King-eL]

agreed on all counts

king-el, although you do show very fast growth in your photos, the initial size estimate is off. those fish are bigger than 4-4.5"...not by a ton, but they aren't 4" fish. take it from people who have closely tracked growth rates on these fish over time. powerfeeding can definitely do impressive things, but i'd say you're off on total growth by a bit. good growth reGARdless--
--SRD

Here is the link, you can scroll down to the shortnose gar and it said, "Gar, Short nose (3 special) 4-5" 10.00 7.50"
http://tfdfish.com/Specials.pdf

Ask the owner of the TFD fish what size the gars were back on March 27, 2010. The time he shipped these fish here in Vancouver, Canada. They were at 4-4.5 inches when they arrived here.

Here are some more pics back when they were at 4-4.5 inches. You can even compare that to the reflection of a 3" wide camera. That camera is set off about 12"-15" away from the glass.

 

[Madding]

That one had quite the sunken forehead. Did that go away as he grew?

 

[King-eL]

That one had quite the sunken forehead. Did that go away as he grew?

They were like that when they arrived and it disappeared as they grow ending up looking like a normal gar's forehead. I thought they stay like that but someone told me that those hump on the heads are common in juvie shortnose and longnose gars.

 

[fishfobia]

My wild caught 2 footer is not that skittish the little guys should grow out of that. If you want to see him he's on you tube fishfobia1 I'm on my phone I can't figure out how to copy the link

 

[E_americanus]

Here is the link, you can scroll down to the shortnose gar and it said, "Gar, Short nose (3 special) 4-5" 10.00 7.50"
http://tfdfish.com/Specials.pdf

Ask the owner of the TFD fish what size the gars were back on March 27, 2010. The time he shipped these fish here in Vancouver, Canada. They were at 4-4.5 inches when they arrived here.

Here are some more pics back when they were at 4-4.5 inches. You can even compare that to the reflection of a 3" wide camera. That camera is set off about 12"-15" away from the glass.

i'm not saying it isn't impressive growth, i'm just saying your claim isn't as accurate as you say it is. so now TFD (who also isn't very good at size estimates, trust me) says 4-5", as opposed to your initial 4-4.5"? on top of that, you can't estimate much with your camera if it's such and such a distance from the tank, the fish is in the water behind glass, so on and so forth.
trust me, i track growth of fishes (particularly gars) essentially for a living. they can have tremendous growth when powerfed, i'm just saying even being off by an inch (or more) is an inaccurate claim when it comes to growth. unless you had them out of the water on a measuring board, your statements are mere estimates.
nice job on growing out the fish, but 9" isn't the total growth in that time period we're looking at here.

obviously, since this isn't an aquatics journal and it's a fish forum, even growth claims that are a bit off aren't the end of the world --
--solomon