An Oklahoma fisherman pulled in a record-breaking alligator gar in the state at 254 pounds recently, and it’s about the strangest fish you’ll ever see.
Paul Easley caught the fish measuring 8-feet-long on Lake Texoma and notified Matt Mauck, a fisheries supervisor with the Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation (DWC). The two had the fish weighed and measured before successfully releasing it back into the lake and watching it swim off. According to their estimates the fish was 50-years-old
“People think they are river monsters,” Mauck told NewsOK.com. “They are just a big, unique fish that most of the time you wouldn’t even know they are in the body of water.”
The goal of pretty much every angler is to catch a big fish, but most don’t plan on hauling in a record-breaker, let alone something that ugly and strange. Not only are alligator gar among the largest freshwater fish in North America, they’re also among the longest-living, known to live well past 70 years.
What’s the largest gar ever caught in the North America? The International Game Fish Association lists a 279-pound gar caught in Texas in 1951 by Bill Valverde.
Snagged from Lake Texoma, this 8 ft. alligator gar weighed 254 pounds with a girth of 44 inches and is the largest fish...
Posted by Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation (ODWC) on Tuesday, April 28, 2015
