Houston Alligator Gar 2013

[MuskieBait]

You know you want to read about it...



Here is the 3-day report on my blog.

http://muskiebaitadventures.blogspot.ca/...day-1.html

http://muskiebaitadventures.blogspot.ca/...day-2.html

http://muskiebaitadventures.blogspot.ca/...day-3.html

[Eli]

I actually really DON'T want to read about it, but I will anyway after work today.

[Giuga10]

Nice report. Congrats on the Shark.

[OldTimer]

Yes - I did want to read about it.

Now..... that's a nice Gar............. are fish getting bigger per pound....... or are you gettin' smaller?... smile.

Sharp nose...........hadn't seen pics of one of these before.... different proportions.

Good reading as always......Thanks for sharing.

Cheers,

OldTimer

[MuskieBait]

I don't know...all I know is the gar had 63" length and 24" girth and Kirk was calling it around the 40lb range. I was looking at some length vs. weight chart online and apparently a 64" Alligator Gar is around 57lbs...so not sure who is more correct. I do know that the gar is as long as I'm tall

The Sharpnose is a baby...probably just a few days old...so I wouldn't rely on those proportions too much since it'll change as it grows. But the black margins on the two dorsals and the upper caudal lobe, as well as the black tip on the lower caudal lobe...ID's it as an Atlantic Sharpnose Shark. They average 3-4' long as adults so they are a smaller shark species.

[Eli]

Exciting stuff buddy. I dunno, to me that fish looks heavier than 40 but Kirkland has seen hundreds so I'll believe what he said.

Did you happen to get any pics of the black buffs your cousin was catching? Only a few handfuls of photos of them floating around in the web. Interesting that there were many there.

Birthday next week eh? Your present is the privilege of hosting me for a full two days.

[MuskieBait]

I think my cousin has a picture of one of them. It was seriously wild seeing so many black buffs. Most of them were small...about 1-2lb in size. Next time I go back, I'm going to spend a couple of days just targeting the black buffs.

No...my birthday has already passed...it was last week

I remember Kirk said the gar was a little skinnier than usual...so maybe that's why he was calling it 40lbs. It didn't look especially skinny to me though. But like you said, he had seen hundreds, if not thousands of them...so I'm not about to doubt him.

[MuskieBait]

Here's a picture of my cousin's Black Buffalo. Pretty dark picture...but you get the idea.

Definitely a Black Buff and not a Smallmouth Buff. If you see them in person, you'll correctly call them every single time. They have shorter and stockier body...and the entire body is a really dark grey...almost like a soot colour...but the scales and slime makes them very metallic when you see them in person.

Unlike me, my cousin is tall and broad...so he makes fish look small. That Black Buff is at least 1.5lbs...perfect bait size for the gator gar.

[MichaelAngelo]

Sounds like a solid 3 days in Texas!

Gorgeous Rio Grande... it was worth the wait to get one with such stunning colouration.

How were the rigs for smallmouth buffalo? You mentioned they bit lightly. Were hair rigs in the equation at all? Rod in hand or in rod holder?

I still don't get that part about cutting the line... how did he fish the line back out of the water!!

[MuskieBait]

For SM. Buff, hair rig, but at the end of the hair was a small rubber band to hold onto the creep feed pellet. Kirk fished the rod by setting it down on the side of the boat while Johnny and I fished with rod in hand. Kirk and Johnny caught more than me. I think I was setting the hook too quick?

The cut line was fished up with a treble hook...trust me, there were moments when Kirk kept missing the line and I was having a heart attack.