By the way, I feel that I have witnessed a major decrease in the number of large gar in the area I fish over the past 10 years. It's an area that is heavily bowfished, and floods on a yearly basis. I, too, have emotion based opinions on the numbers of fish that I see. However, I won't use my personal observations to argue that something needs to be done, since it is merely an observation; not a well organized study. There are too many factors involved such as temperature, weather, water clarity, time of year, etc. to make well educated decisions based on those observations, so I'm going to listen to what the TPWD has to say and follow their lead.

Slim, finally we are in total agreement then, let the state biologists handle the thinking!!
Sounds like what I have been saying from the start.....
And these biologists say that the alligator gar need to be managed and are on the decline. I have agreed (I can't control all bowfishermen).
BUT, under the same umbrella, these biologists have absolutely NO restriction on long nose gar, carp, buffs, and rough fish. I agree with that. And evidently you do as well as you stated above because who better to make these decisions. Soooooooooo, that means no more whining about bowfisherman saying rough fish are, to say the least, ABUNDANT to the point TPWD biologists say get after 'em boys.
Your proof you keep wanting, there it is in practice daily. TPWD and the state biologist are using bowfishing as a management tool. Or, if you disagree with that, they at the very least know that the numbers of these rough fish are sufficient to maintain themselves as they have for years and years.

No sir, you missed the point of my post entirely. If you go back and read what I have stated previously, I don't believe that bowfishing has an effect on populations of most rough fish in large water bodies, excluding alligator gar. TPW Biologists do not use bowfishing to manage populations. It has no measurable effect, either increasing or decreasing populations. As you did earlier, talk to someone at TPW and find out for yourself like I did. My Argument the ENTIRE time is the Wanton Waste issue, which we have shown to be ILLEGAL.

My point was that bowfishermen need to STOP making claims that these fish are hurting our game fish populations, or are overpopulated in order to justify the Wanton Waste, which is illegal. If they were causing that many problems, it would be legal to dump them in a hole. Show me the studies! Show me the statements from parks and wildlife! You are very good at attempting to twist a discussion to take the spotlight off of the actual argument. But in the end, it's a distraction from the actual issue at hand. You can keep this thread going as long as you want, but you won't gain any ground.

I've never said I thought there should be limits on Carp, buffalo, drum etc. I've never said I thought that bowfishing should be banned. I'm not a threat to your sport. All I want is the fish to be used as intended, as the law states. If the TPW comes out and says that there are too many of these fish in a lake and they need to be removed, then by all means do it! Theres no reason to keep arguing the issue.

I've proven, and you have proven that dumping those fish in a hole was illegal according to TPW. That's the point I was trying to make on the other thread. On this thread, the only point I was trying to make is that the bowfishermen have a double standard when it comes to asking for studies to prove the gar need more regulations. Thats all.