I can tell you I grew up in the trinity river bottoms and on the river. Literally 5 days a week on the river after school and weekends. I've caught and bowfished gator gar my whole life and I've never seen the amount of gator gar that I've seen at falcon. Last trip down there was an area on the main lake between tigers and school bus that I bet had 15 acres of rolling gar with the average one pushing 5'. I've never seen bass look as beat up also as I have down there. Don't get me wrong in all for managing the population because I agree they are a fantastic fish to catch, but man we have to many down there.

My apologies, Crackcorn, it was Texas Outlaw that challenged my statement on the percentage of gar harvested by bowhunters. Here is a quote, directly from one of the bowfishing forums on that topic. There were two studies. One was a study done by Dan Bennett on what percentage of bowhunters targeted only gar. The other was a tag return study done by Dave Buckmeier on the percentage of gar harvested by bow hunters versus other means. It is 73%.

Just a random "texas alligator gar bowfishing" google image search..........



















Again, no problem if these are headed to the freezer and they are following the rules.
Weird........there doesn't seem to be a filet knife or an ice chest in sight.......

http://www.realcajunrecipes.com/recipe/turtle-or-alligator-sauce-piquant/

Goood stuff!!

Here's my impression of their populations around North Central Texas compared to what I have seen on Lake Livingston (A lake I think we can all agree has a healthy population.)




West Fork Trinity River:
Eagle Mountain- previously common, now rare if present at all
Worth- previously common, now rare if present at all
Grapevine-previously common, now rare if present at all
Benbrook- not present
Ray Roberts- a few
Lewisville- common
West Fork of Trinity River itself- Have seen about 3 in the last 5 years total.




Brazos River:
Whitney- a few
Possum Kingdom - a few
Granbury - a few
Brazos River itself: I have spent months of time in a kayak paddling everything between PK and Whitney and have only ever seen two alligator gar in the Brazos. My father and grandfather both insist that they used to be extremely common on those stretches.

Red River:
Lake Texoma- large healthy population

The more I hear about regulations like this the more I support local control over our lakes and streams. Lets stop pretending a centrally controlled government bureaucracy is better at managing our lakes and rivers than the communities that have lived and breathed in these areas for decades.

Used to be under county commissioner control. And it was really confusing, one county had a ten fish- ten inch limit on bass while another county had a three fish 16 inch limit, on the same lake. Attorney General ruled it would be up to the game warden to know which county the fish was caught in. Game wardens refused to enforce the law.

Interesting Chart, a little dated (2009). I have color coded it to help me interpret at least.
I think I'm in agreement with the C&R guides that feel the proposed regulation is too open ended.
I think more study is needed, but my guess is that those studies will merit some additional protection in certain areas and possibly increased bag limits in others. I do take issue with those making blanket statements that the populations are in no way threatened because of issues they have with the way TPW is studying the fish. It seems other state's wildlife agencies have not historically studied this species either and all they can report now that they believe that they are all gone

Winchester there ARE NO alligator gar in Whitney, Granbury, or Possum Kingdom , it is another case of mistaken identity , I have fished all these lakes for gar , I am not trying to cause a stink just stating facts , they are spotted gar

I would certainly defer to your opinion on that. These were just my impressions based on what I have been told, read, etc.
Mistaken identity seems to be very common, the majority of people do seem to think they are all the same fish.
I've often heard they were very common as late as the 1970's in Eagle Mountain, Grapevine and Lake Worth, do you believe that is true?
I did find a small dead one (25lbs maybe) at Eagle Mountain. (could very well have been a spotted gar as it was heavily bleached by the sun)

I have seen one alligator gar for certain near downtown Fort Worth in the Trinity that may have been 50lbs. I have had two spotting in the Trinity just below Lake Worth that were much larger maybe 100lbs. I have spent months on Brazos between PK and Whitney but have only seen two that were in the 60-80lb range and those were close to the PK dam. Even at that size they are pretty impressive sight in shallow clear water. One had a 5+lb buffalo in his mouth.

Yall really did some digging on those pictures. Most from BEFORE the one a day.
Even if it was after the one a day, I didn't see any proof that there was any laws
broken. Pictures may tell a story but damn sure don't tell the whole story.

I will certainly grant you that they don't tell the whole story. However I'd like to put it to a vote, how many people think those fish ended up as

PHOTO A




OR

PHOTO B



OR PHOTO C



OR PHOTO D?






Here's a hint, 90% of this happens at night in the heat of the summer. Note their clothing and the time of day in the photos above.

Lest you still have doubts here is an eye opening thread:

http://discussions.texasbowhunter.com/forums/showthread.php?t=208777

Not one person has mentioned yet that only 5 years ago, there was an UNLIMITED COMMERCIAL MARKET for alligator gar in Texas. The one fish per day rule also applies to commercial fishermen, so that law all but ended commercial harvest; which was exponentially more than any bowfishermen were pulling out of the water. Why after only 5 short years is there a need to pass a knee jerk regulation when the effects of the previous regulations hasn't had time to be effectively gauged?

.

Didn't even think of that. Very good point. I look far nastier than that after a day of garfishing, whether I caught anything or not!