Broken Back Prevention with Gars!!!

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JD7.62;1613245; said:
Hey guys, I hate to bump up an old thread but I have had an increased intrest in gars lately and saw this thread while researching them.

Anyhow last summer I was fishing wtih a friend who is currently working on his masters in fisheries management when I caught a gar that had a broke back in the shape of a "V." He said this was common and it is due to a defficiancy in their diet. I want to say Vitamin C but I cant remember. I wonder if this is the same thing you guys are talking about.
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there are several things that can cause deformities in gar. what you mentioned above is not really a broken back. i know poor water quality may cause such deformities in gar and i would imagine a poor diet could cause problems. i'm not sure how often broken backs actually occure in the wild, but i suppose it is possible. especially with the idiot fisherman that feel it necessary to break their backs and throw them back.

maybe richard or solomon can be of a little more help on this topic.
 
He is in the Bahamas right now but when he gets back I will ask him. He knows his stuff, though I am not aware of him actually doing an indepth study on gar, just somehting he mentioned after I caught it.
 
it's definitely possible that a deficiency could cause problems with gars (or many other animals), but that is not the same issue we are discussing here (although somewhat related). because gars have a particular morphology, particularly the spinal column, along with a more rigid scalation than most fishes, they are prone to break their backs when they run into objects head-on at certain velocities.

i have definitely seen how ammo-tox (and possibly associated dietary issues) can affect a gar's back in captivity, and how they can subsequently bounce back, so again, it is not unreasonable that this could occur in the wild. however, it seems that unless the gar were unable to initially catch the appropriate food, or the appropriate amount of food was unavailable in the wild, this condition should be quite rare in wild cases. i've seen/collected many gars of several species in the wild and have never seen a v-shaped back. i would lean more towards mechanical damage. interesting nevertheless--
--solomon
 
demjor19;1616991; said:
i doubt it...gar tend to be primarily nocturnal.
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:confused: If they are nocturnal then wouldnt they be more comfortable with some light during the night????:confused:
 
Gr8KarmaSF;1617018; said:
:confused: If they are nocturnal then wouldnt they be more comfortable with some light during the night????:confused:
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by nocturnal i mean they tend to do much of their hunting at night and seem to be very comfortable in the dark. i dont think that a night light would really have a possitive or negative effect on gar.
 
Well, it was a thought, thanks for the input.....
 
Gr8KarmaSF;1617938; said:
Well, it was a thought, thanks for the input.....
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i have heard the night light is helpful for fish like arowanas, but gar arent all that jumpy of a fish (except for the shortnose gar). decent thought, but i just think it would be an uneffective approach to this problem.
 
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