Monster Eater!!!
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Tequila;1796695; said:I know I'm going to regret asking but why?
1. they get enormous (4-5 feet) and will reach 2' plus in roughly a year.
2. try keeping it with tankmates and they will normally end up missing
3. gar in general have very specific care requirements that one should be aware of before keeping them
try to get a pic of the fish and we will properly id it for you. from there you can ask any species specific questions that you may have. if you ask/research before you buy the fish...we are generally much more forgiving and willing to help.
demjor19;1796743; said:1. they get enormous (4-5 feet) and will reach 2' plus in roughly a year.
2. try keeping it with tankmates and they will normally end up missing
3. gar in general have very specific care requirements that one should be aware of before keeping them
try to get a pic of the fish and we will properly id it for you. from there you can ask any species specific questions that you may have. if you ask/research before you buy the fish...we are generally much more forgiving and willing to help.
Ok at this point I think it best that I just say thanx too all who replied even if only one person actually replied to my original question, and leave it at that.
xander13;1797969; said:
1. Huh? What? You know I tried to leave this alone but.............
2. I asked one question about prepared foods and Gator Gars? and I got guff about the tank size, how I should do research on true Gator Gars, because I wasn't prepared to house a fish that grows large enough to saddle. Even though knowone ever asked if I had a larger tank than the 55G. They just jumped in saying things like a gator gar wouldn't last 5 minutes in 55G tank.
Or can I actually ID the different species or am I just looking at what the LFS wrote on the tank and actually think that it's a gator gar?
3. I don't recall saying that I made up my mind to purchase the fish, though if I do it will be the gator gar I saw not anyone else suggestion of what they or you in this case think I should get. Now if what I saw was mismarked so be it and if it wasn't thats fine too. I can deal with both. But now that I know that unless I wanna leave open which gar I wanna get or should I say be told I should get and unless I do my research on whatever I get. I shouldn't ask question(s) in this thread because people won't be foregiving and unless I leave things open then I shouldn't be asking questions here.
People I'm really sorry I asked one simple question in here. Maybe I should have said: At what size do you people think that I should start feeding prepared food to a gator gar in a 55G tank that I will later move to a 180G tank and then on to an even larger tank unless it grows at super duper fast rate and I just take the dam thing and throw it in the pond out back that can't be any #$&*@ smaller than 96,000 US Gallons of water, that presently has at least a hundred or so butt ugly common Gars in it now! But I'm sure someone in here going to tell me how putting a captive fish in a natural pond won't work either.
You know I asked one question - (1) and a get a ton of Guff. While I dought that gator gars or any gars grow as fast as my gourami's have - from 3 inches to 15 inches in less than 9 months, I was able to handle them and I'm able to handle a dam gar or too. And like I said it's just a hop away to the Ninty Six Thousand Us Gallon pond if I really wanna keep them forever and ever and ever.
Tequila;1796408; said:No thanx, I'll stick with my original choice, if I decide to to go through with setting up a 55 and purchasing them etc. Why should I change to something else that may look simular but really isn't. Plus I have never seen any other gars being offered that small.
xander13;1797969; said:
i was refering to that post btw.
xander13;1798355; said:
nuff said really...
Yeah and as I said, if they grow that fast I can handle them easily. Well now I guess I gotta see if they can grow that fast. Theres nothing like someone laughing at you to get me motivated, I'll start seting up the tank this weekend and purchase the gar on Monday or Tuesday and I'll see if by feb '09 if there longer than 15 inches.
I'm sure they'll take earthworms too, like the rest of the fish. Tequila;1798404; said:Yeah and as I said, if they grow that fast I can handle them easily. Well now I guess I gotta see if they can grow that fast. Theres nothing like someone laughing at you to get me motivated, I'll start seting up the tank this weekend and purchase the gar on Monday or Tuesday and I'll see if by feb '09 if there longer than 15 inches.
Good luck with that but you can prove or disprove growth rate depending on food availability, type of food as well as environment. There are many different factors that go into the growth of a fish.
On average a properly housed Gator gar (on prepared foods) will grow 5mm a day after 10days after hatch. This will roughly work out to a 30cm fish in four months.
This info BTW can be obtained easily with about 30 seconds of your time and a wonderful thing called google:
Studies on the physiology of Atractosteus spatula larval development and its applications to early weaning onto artificial diets ...
This is not "my opinion" it is a known fact these fish have one of the fastest growth rates of freshwater fishes. There is plenty of info (not anecdotal) out there that confirms this.
That aside I personally could care less if you got the fish and my question to you was more related to your original question. If it is a gator then feeding will be different than if it is a Lepisosteus and you need to take a different route to growing them out. Atractosteus gars are very different from Lepisosteus in general care, this is why proper ID of the fish is really needed should you actually care to be successful with them.
For the record my little gator (of which you can find a thread here on) is in a 55 gallon right now...(I suggest this for small gars) He is right on track with growing 5mm a day on prepared foods and has not slowed in the least..
