Catching captive gar out of pond?

[Conner]

Hey guys. As some of you know, I just sold my house and moved in with my parents. I've gotten everything moved with only a couple of small losses (Moving 5 aquariums, 3 of them 90g, 125g, and 220g, sucks big time). Everyone is settled in and doing fine now.

The issue I have, is I had to leave my 4 shortnose gars in my pond due to not having the time to catch them before the move. The new owner is fine with me coming back to pick them up this weekend.

What I really need is some advice on the best way to catch these guys out of the pond. The gar are between 18" and 22" (maybe 24" now). The pond is 3,500g. 15' long by 7' wide by 3-4' deep. The only obstructions in the pond is a large log that lays lengthwise along the bottom of the pond.

I have a fine meshed seine net (holes are 3mm, I think) and a large, 14 or 16" wide, 24" deep scoop net. What I was hoping to do was have 2 people slowly move the seine from one end of the pond to the other, corralling the gars against one end wall. Then I planned on using the scoop net to catch gars individually.

Does that sound like a good plan? I don't have an extra pump at the moment to drain the pond, so that probably isn't an option. Plus, there are 10 koi 5-14" and 2 8" red eared sliders in the pond as well to deal with (they get left behind, but will probably cause problems catching the gar).

So, sorry for the long winded post. Any suggestions are appreciated. (And of course pics will be taken so you can laugh at my sorry bum trying to catch gar that appear smarter than me...)

 

[Wiggles92]

Sounds like a good plan to me especially if you can actually see all the way to the bottom of the pond.

In my case, I remove my larger gars from their current pond (500 gallons) with just a big net with fine mesh that's meant for landing fishes while fishing; it's probably pretty similar to the scoop net that you'll be using.

 

[Sidrock]

This is going to be interesting...

 

[kamilusoof]

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[kamilusoof]

Cool idea..
i want to add 3 pairs of alligator gars (3"-4")to this pond

it's current stock is two 10" RTC
two 8" Tiger Oscars
four 6.5" carp

I am selling the rtc n 2 pairs of gator gars when they reach 1 feet + the oscars and carp

Any ideas to seperate the gars from the rest of the pond?
Feeding can be really troublesome As they can hide anywhere
n there are alot of rocks n can go behind the Motor Which is behind the red arrow
Its covered by a Big rock, so when they are big,no problems of them hiding there and starving themselves

 

[joe00]

Go catch them at night when the pond is as dark as possible. Bring a couple of really bright flashlights and a friend. Have your friend shine the lights in their eyes in the dark of night. They will be confused and probably remain motionless. Put a dipnet in front of them and scoop. Remember gar can't swim backwards with any quickness. This has worked for me in in the wild-your closed system should be even easier. Good luck!

 

[Conner]

Well, sorry for the late reply, but MFK was down all weekend (at least for me), so no updates till now.

Surprisingly, it took me less than 15 minutes to catch all 4 gar. The seine net idea didn't really work, since the weights on the bottom wouldn't actually drag it down to the bottom of the pond, allowing the gars to swim under it. However, the net did provide a nice barrier that the gar couldn't swim through. The scoop net worked very well for its part. What I did was herd the gars into the seine net, and then when they turned around to swim away from it, I put the scoop net in front of them, and they literally just swam right into it. I think maybe they thought it was a nice dark cave to hide in or something, because two of the shortnose gars actually swam into it at the same time, making it very easy to just lift them out of the water and deposit them in the transfer container.

All in all, I was extremely surprised how easy and fast the move went. As a result, I have not a single picture of me attempting to catch the gar. I do, however, have many pictures of the gar swimming in the pond, and some few last pics of the pond from the last time I'm likely to see it.

I'll try to get some pics uploaded in the media lounge sometime this week, but things have been very busy, and I may not be able to get to it real soon.