Alligator Gar In South Texas

[Hitoru]

My friend's Canadian client fell though, and so there was a free spot for me if I drove us to the dusty South Texas town of Three Rivers . We were to meet up with our bowfishing guide at 1300. He showed up a hour late after having the tongue of his trailer welded back on after making a sharp corner and breaking it off. While we were waiting on him we had checked into our Hindu run shithole motel. We ate lunch and were on the water of Choke Canyon res by 1500.

Our guide was Mark Malfa , : http://www.bigfishbowfishingtexas.com/
I had never been bowfishing before and I was just kinda along for the ride as far as I was concerned. I am not down with trophy hunting/fishing. I try to eat all of what I kill.

They were shooting at carp, tilapia (yum) and alligator gar. I fumbled two shots and hit a 6+ alligator gar in the head and on the third try. Mark yelled at me for shooting it in the head, as it is bony and the arrows can pull out.

I'm on the left, struggling to hold it up. Mark told me my trip was over and I wouldn't ever do any better that my 6' fish.



Mark dressed my gar for me as I bummed some beer from the gentleman from Fredricksberg.

We had a great dinner, and we were leaving the restaurant in mark's truck when he pulled in front of a tractor trailer while talking on his cell phone. It was uncool, way to close.

Mark made it to our hotel, pulled into the parking lot and sideswiped a parked pickup with his boat/trailer. He broke the turn signals of the truck he hit and bent the shit of his own trailer.

The next day was uneventful, warm with not many fish caught. We were looking forward to the night fishing action.

After dark we saw schools of tilapia but they are real fast and hard to hit. The gars were breeding and laying about in the shallow weeds. Fish change color depending on their moods, and the gars were very moody, with some dark almost black and many silvery. We weren't wanting to bag anything smaller that we had bagged before.

I saw a lot of fish, and a few alligators but didn't shoot at any. At around 2400 we were going up a creekbed that had a lot of dead trees.Iit was about 8-10' deep and I saw a good sized gar and shot it with my bow.

Ah, it's not that big I said. Mark came unglued, he ran around, securing my line while yelling at my buddy to get ready to shoot it again."not now not now" as my buddy missed a shot. "You stupid Motherfucker" Mark yelled." I said not now "! shoot it shoot it ! now now" as my friend hits it in the head and mark cursed, "FUCK, NOT IN THE HEAD"!

The gar wrapped the line up in submerged trees and it took us around an hour to get it into the boat.

Some of Marks friend were bowfishing some distance away from us and he was keen to show off my fish. As he motored towards the other guys boat he failed to reduce his speed enough and hit their boat, breaking numerous lights on the other craft.

Here's the other view of my 7'4" 165lb, water body record alligator gar .
Look it up, I beat my guide Mark's previous record.
http://www.tpwd.state.tx.us/fishboat/fi ... _code=0164






Cheers Stiv....

[Stiv]

So VERY VERY cool amigo.

I've always wanted to go after those things in one way or the other.

It's a5t least nice to know if I'm ever down Texas way that I have a contact that not only talks the talk but walks the walk too.

Thanks for those, extremely entertaining stuff!

Best,
Stiv

[NIJ]

That is a seriously fucking big freshwater fish.

[Woodsman]

Congrats, 19D20, I am not sure how I missed this post. That is a fantastic fish!!!!

19D20, Stiv, seriously - we should do a BFC fishing trip.

I think we get some light fishing tackle with 10 or 12# line on there, a nice 16" wire leader, a big sharp as hell treble hook and chunk up some bream on it and see how big of Gar we can pull in.

Hopefully, we don't hook an alligator, but I guess that would be part of the fun, wouldn't it?

I think it would be fun as shit hauling one of those (well maybe not quite THAT big, but 4 or 5 footers) in with light tackle while in a kayak.

How much fun would it be in the summer to go fishing at night down there in a kayak?

I've bowfished up here for Bowfin (Dogfish) and Carp, and I know some folks who have speared gar (spotted) up here, but none of them are anywhere as big as those.

Muskies are the closest thing we have up here (and I think they are like "bait" for alligars) and you can spear them in the ice using decoy fish, but they are fairly scarce really.

How hard is it to find those gars? Are they scarce or fairly easy to locate?

A 10' Gar caught in Mississippi:

[Hitoru]

4-6' gars are fairly common. At night with the lights you can see then from 30' away. In the daytime they come and roll on the surface. An interesting anatomical feature of this fish is that its buoyancy bladder is directly connected to its throat, giving it the ability to draw in air from above the water. For this reason, alligator gar are often found near the surface of a body of water, making them an fairly easy target, but only for a second or two. . They also make a audible sound when the hit the surface.

The action is pretty fast when you are shooting at carp at night. They are none- native so I shoot shit out of them, and give the haul to the folks cat fishing on the shore.

I hope to go bowfishing for flounder this spring. Yum !

[Woodsman]

Do you ever fish with tackle, or are you pretty much harvesting everything with a bow?

[Hitoru]

I enjoy reel fishing very much, bowfishing is just something I did on that one trip.

[Chimborazo]

I don't think I'd get in any more vehicles with Mark.

[Woodsman]

I don't think I'd get in any more vehicles with Mark.

? The suspense is killing me.....

[Hitoru]

He is a lousy driver.


(But he knows where the big fish are to be had).

[Chimborazo]

I don't think I'd get in any more vehicles with Mark.

? The suspense is killing me.....

See below.

We had a great dinner, and we were leaving the restaurant in mark's truck when he pulled in front of a tractor trailer while talking on his cell phone. It was uncool, way to close.

Mark made it to our hotel, pulled into the parking lot and sideswiped a parked pickup with his boat/trailer. He broke the turn signals of the truck he hit and bent the shit of his own trailer.

Some of Marks friend were bowfishing some distance away from us and he was keen to show off my fish. As he motored towards the other guys boat he failed to reduce his speed enough and hit their boat, breaking numerous lights on the other craft.

[Woodsman]

He is a lousy driver.


(But he knows where the big fish are to be had).

Oh, I see what Chim was saying...I missed the first part that you hadn't gone bowfishing before this too... Cool. I grew up on lakes, so fishing was crazy and had a bow and a fishing rig for it when I was about 13-14 and tried to nail muskrats with it even (because at the time I was trading fur as I had a trapline nearby) - could never shoot them as they would instantly go subsurface as soon as they heard the "TWHACK". But we did manage to get some dogfish in the past.

How does this Mark know where those fish are - does he just know what kind of water they occupy or look for oxbow bends and deep holes in the river or ???

That had to be a just absolute stellar time. Now I want to go catch a couple of those fish, but I'd just run down there on my own with my inflatable kayak. I'll bring my wife for paddling and cleaning fish (LOL).

[Hitoru]

...oops

[Hitoru]

How does this Mark know where those fish are - does he just know what kind of water they occupy or look for oxbow bends and deep holes in the river or ???

He spends a lot of time on the water, and knows how to read the conditions and deduces where the fish should be. Did you check out his web site ?

http://www.bigfishbowfishingtexas.com/

Dial up might be slow.

If you come to Texas we can go fishing, hunting, shooting or whatever.

[Woodsman]

Did you check out his web site ?

Yeah. Not all of the images would load, but enough did that I got the idea what kind of guy he is.

I'm looking at a very white landscape right now. If I want to go fishing around here, it will be out on the ice where I will need a gas powered drill to get through it. The good thing is that I could drive my truck right to the hole, but the bad thing is if I hit a soft spot, insurance won't cover the dive team and retrieval.

I am really looking forward to spring. Only 6 more months to go!!! ha ha.