as with almost anything, there will be varying opinions on the topic. when that happens, you really need to get the full picture and be able to think for yourself. for example, from those who say that they do fine together; how long have they kept the two species together for? how many times have they successfully done this? however, in in this particular case, there isn't really much room for varying opinions...it is a FACT that plecos will eat the slime off gars(or any ganoid scaled fish) and this will lead to as you said earlier, bacterial infections and often death. true, some might have had this work for a period of time, but on any given day the pleco can attack the gar, and this more often than not ends up in a dead fish. there's really no 2 ways about it here...it is not an advisable combo. knowing this, along the potential outcome should easily help anyone make a decision...and if that is to go ahead with it, it's really not a very responsible thing to do.
