A Missouri angler recently landed a 10-pound, 9-ounce spotted gar, which gives him a state record and a pending world record.
Devlin Rich’s Feb. 25 catch at Wappapello Lake was approved as a state record this week by the Missouri Department of Conservation.
The current International Game Fish Assn. world record stands at 9 pounds, 12 ounces, for a 1994 catch at Lake Mexia in Texas. But the IGFA sometimes takes months to approve new records.
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The MDC stated in a news release that the gar caught by Rich was weighed on a certified scale in Williamsville and that catch details were carefully vetted.
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While spotted gar are widely distributed in the Bootheel lowlands of southeastern Missouri (and throughout the Mississippi River drainage system), they’re not commonly caught on rod and reel because of their hard, bony jaws.
“Special techniques are required to capture them consistently with rod and reel, but they do provide a ready target for the bow hunter because they often bask near the surface of the water,” the MDC stated.
Spotted gar are native to North America and date to the Cretaceous period, between 65.5 and 145.5 million years ago.
Their flesh is poor in quality and, as the MDC states, gar “are rarely used as food” by those who catch them.