Underwater shots of my platinum gar

[E_americanus]

WOW! that is one of the most impressive platinum specimens i have seen! gotta love the underwater shots, i use an olympus stylus tough for our field photos...several of which we are now taking underwater.

is your gar a tropical or a Cuban? it's tough to tell with platinums, and i'm having a challenging time doing so...plat trops are much more common, but the two-tone coloration in the first shot suggests it could be a Cuban. this would be the first platinum Cuban i have ever seen if that is the case.

either way, great shots and specimen!--
--solomon

EDIT - if that is a platinum gator i was way off...but if so, it shows a slightly different head pattern than we see on gators of similar size...however, plat fish are often "babied" early on and throughout life, so their morphology looks quite different than normal counterparts. great fish reGARdless!--

 

[mike_sema]

wow what a cool looking gar

 

[conchabullosa]

WOW! that is one of the most impressive platinum specimens i have seen! gotta love the underwater shots, i use an olympus stylus tough for our field photos...several of which we are now taking underwater.

is your gar a tropical or a Cuban? it's tough to tell with platinums, and i'm having a challenging time doing so...plat trops are much more common, but the two-tone coloration in the first shot suggests it could be a Cuban. this would be the first platinum Cuban i have ever seen if that is the case.

either way, great shots and specimen!--
--solomon

EDIT - if that is a platinum gator i was way off...but if so, it shows a slightly different head pattern than we see on gators of similar size...however, plat fish are often "babied" early on and throughout life, so their morphology looks quite different than normal counterparts. great fish reGARdless!--

It was called "Buaya Puteh" in the country I got it from which translated means white crocodile. I have to admit I assumed it was an alligator gar based on this title and info from a few friends who kept gars.
Thanks

 

[Madding]

I assumed it was a gator just because the trops usually come out more white than silver and have some black spotting, and I've never heard of a cuban morph.

 

[E_americanus]

I assumed it was a gator just because the trops usually come out more white than silver and have some black spotting, and I've never heard of a cuban morph.

we can assume based on the high production of platinum gators in that region of the world, but pattern for platinums is anything but consistent across the species. the tropicals we have seen out of Mexico have some black spotting, but that isn't necessarily how ALL plat trops would look, the ones from those farms just tend to have more spotting since they aren't "pure" plats...just like there are likely gators out there that have some spotting.

i haven't seen a Cuban plat before, but that doesn't mean one doesn't exist, if it happens in gators and trops, it most certainly could happen in Cubans. there was an old monsterfishkeepers book (the site actually borrowed the name from the books) that had what looked like a xanthic Cuban (tough call to make, i know)...infblue had the photos and sent them to me, i will have to dig them up.

impressive specimen either way, thanks for sharing!--
--solomon

 

[xander]

met conchabullosa last night, when/if he gets a plat cuban i'll be sure to rush down to his place and snap some shots

 

[OB-G37S]

wow nice gar and RAYS!

 

[k0y0te]

awsome underwater shots

 

[Madding]

met conchabullosa last night, when/if he gets a plat cuban i'll be sure to rush down to his place and snap some shots

Concha, watch out for this guy, he will jump the fence at night and steal all your precious gars!

Kidding of course.

 

[xander]

Sol & Michael, I'm seriously thinking, if u guys flew here, I'd bet we could plan & pull off an ocean 11 styled heist. I'm sure alcohologist would be interested to help out too.

Edit, oh crap, I forgot this was an open forum...PM me, we'll work something out.

Posted on mobile.monsterfishkeepers.com