Shortnose gar growth progression pics.

[Conner]

I'll try to keep these in order from smallest/youngest to largest/oldest, but it might get mixed up.

I picked 7 shortnose gars up from a former MFK member in Evansville, IN, on July 3, 2009. This first set of pictures is from that day and immediately after.

 

[Conner]

When I picked the gar up on July 3, 2009, they were 6-7" in length. They were kept in a 55g standard aquarium.

These pics start on July 28th, 2009. So in the span of 25 days, the most aggressive eater of the bunch grew enough to graduate into my 125g tank, because he was clearly outgrowing the 55g tank. I guesstimate at the time this gar was 9-10" in length.

These pictures follow through the end of August, 2009.

 

[Conner]

This group of pictures comes from late December, 2009 to Jan, 2010. At this point all of the surviving gar were in the 125g tank.

This 125g tank has black Tahitian Moon Sand as the substrate. The previous tank they were in started barebottom, and then received 1/2-3/8" light colored pea gravel as substrate.

Notice the drastic color difference from the above post to the pictures in this post.

Also, at this point, all shortnose gar were in the 10-14" range, depending on how aggressively they fed.

 

[mqktandy]

Nice. I really like all the gars. Wish I could find a short nose

 

[Conner]

Here is one of the shorty's that I lost. This was on April 17th, 2010. Here are 3 pretty good pics of a shortnose gar out of the water.

The rest of these pics are from late May through late July 2010. The gar in these pics are all around 12-15" in length now, I believe. The largest may have been getting closer to 17-18". There were a couple of gar that were much slower growers. I'm guessing there was some dominance/heirarchy in effect that caused them to get less food and grow more slowly than the others.

These pics show some very interesting facial coloration on a couple of the shorty's. Also shown are some good Shortnose-Florida gar comparison shots.

The last pictures are also from when the shortnose gars were first released into my 3,500g backyard pond. This was done at the end of July as well.

 

[Wiggles92]

Wow, this is a pretty comprehensive growth progression guide. Awesome job!

 

[Conner]

Here are some of the most recent pics of the shortnose gars in the pond. They were very difficult to photograph in the pond, do to the huge number of water hyacinth that were growing, as well as my chincy little point and shoot digital camera. At this point, the shortnose gars are 17-20" in length.

I've got even more recent pics of the gars, but I can't find them on my computer. I'll do some more looking and add pics as I find them. I'll also take some new ones to add when I get a chance.

All shortnose gars are now in the 19-21" range, I believe. 3 are out in the pond over wintering, and the 4th is back in my 125g tank. I had previously sold him to another MFK member, but got him back just recently.

Hope you all enjoyed, and Xander, feel free to use any and all pictures as you'd like. Same for you Solomon, for your gar websites.

 

[Conner]

Wow, this is a pretty comprehensive growth progression guide. Awesome job!

Thanks, it spans from July 2009 to December 2010.

I'm the only member I know of on here that has had multiple shortnose gars for an extended period of time (and that only being 17 months), so I figured I'd contribute to the general knowledge of the community.

 

[mqktandy]

have you seen much aggression between them? I want to add a short nose and long nose to the 12x6 pond.

 

[Conner]

No aggression, although i have noticed some dominance/heirarchical behavior in the pond. It never came to anything other than following each other around in circles or hovering over top of one another. Never violence between gars. Occasionally fins got nipped accidentally during feeding time.