best time to look for YOY

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sbuse

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Jul 1, 2009
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looking to fimd some YOY shortnose and longnose gars here in MN. anyone know when the best time to go looking would be?
 
somewhat depends on the specific temp range in the particular locality (lake, stream, etc), but june-july would be best for those species. also depends on the size you are looking for, june would be very small YOY (0.5-2"), july with somewhat larger fish (3-5"). keep in mind that YOY gars of nearly all species in all habitats "disappear" after they reach around 8-10" and tend not to reappear until the following year (sometimes 2 years) --
--solomon
 
Wiggles92;4863614; said:
I recommend looking during the month of June. I found my longnose gars on Father's Day weekend, and they were only 1" to 2.5", so they were definitely from this year.
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thanx

E_americanus;4863626; said:
somewhat depends on the specific temp range in the particular locality (lake, stream, etc), but june-july would be best for those species. also depends on the size you are looking for, june would be very small YOY (0.5-2"), july with somewhat larger fish (3-5"). keep in mind that YOY gars of nearly all species in all habitats "disappear" after they reach around 8-10" and tend not to reappear until the following year (sometimes 2 years) --
--solomon
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any 'ideal' temps to be looking in? i know all about the "disappearing". bowfins have been impossible for me to find from 5"-14" below and above are no problems.

also any "key" areas to find them in. just tring to maximise the chances on finding some.
 
spawning usually occurs around 17-22C in water temperature; like ryan mentioned check the aquatic vegetation.--
 
Just as a bit of extra info, the shortnose gars that I have were found in the 5-7" range in the middle/end of June. This was in a river near Evansville, IN, so a little farther south, I believe. They were located in a pond connected to the river, fed by the river. Unfortunately we went through a drought that summer, and the pond got cut off and was drying up when the gar were discovered.
 
Conner;4864974; said:
Just as a bit of extra info, the shortnose gars that I have were found in the 5-7" range in the middle/end of June. This was in a river near Evansville, IN, so a little farther south, I believe. They were located in a pond connected to the river, fed by the river. Unfortunately we went through a drought that summer, and the pond got cut off and was drying up when the gar were discovered.
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just to add to that - the onset of spawning and YOY is quite temperature dependent and will vary quite a bit based on specific water body locality as well as latitude. gars from southern IN will in general spawn sooner than gars in MN, etc.

we definitely don't get 5-7" gars of any kind here in MI by the end of june (some LNG's may reach that size by the end of July in some localities).

good luck!--
--solomon
 
If I knew what river (and what area of that river) mine were collected from, I'd head back to that area this summer and see if I could find some in the 6-8" range. Maybe I'll try anyways...
 
thanx for all the info. i will be looking around the rum river where our state record shortnose came from and in the st crouix where our state record longnose came from. i got a tip that down by hudson there was some backwaters were a guy used to catch some small gars. i hope i can find some.
 
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