There are tons of long nose gar in the large river (Grand) feeding into Lake MI. We see them thrashing around at the surface on summer nights. The mating ritual must be quite a risky affair with all those sharp teeth slashing every which way..
There are posts online of folks who have had gar reproduce every year in their pond.
Longnose Gar in pondsIt probably would take a very prolific reproduction capable fish (crappie? northern bluegill?) to keep up with the appetite of the gar. (i'm thinking of spotted or longnose, not alligator gar)
although I can't offer them at this time to others (the goal was to find a way to easily trap, seperate, sort and ship on a case by case basis to fellow PB members), I am more and more impressed with the ability of my spotfin shiners to keep ahead of the predators in my pond. Last night after dark the shallows were boiling with SFS of all sizes going crazy swimming, launching themselves out of the water and generally having a great time. They swim terribly fast, dart every which direction...if predators can catch them, there is a huge biomass of available food and no signs of them slowing down on the reproduction.
