# kayak Gar



## SeanStone (Sep 8, 2010)

Tuesday we went out and tried rope lures out for the first time. We took apart some spinnerbaits and made some homemade rope lures from our anchor lines.

NOTE:
I was hesitant to use them in the past because if you break a gar off with the lure in its mouth, it won't be able to free it and it will starve to death. We value all species of fish as equal, we don't favor one species over others.....so we don't want to kill all the common carp to save largemouth; or kill gar to save smallies. There are many opinions on this matter, but for now i'll leave it at that. However on the last few floats we have spotted some monster gar swimming around and the temptation outweighed the cost of losing a few fish.
OK BACK TO THE POST









We had landed some monster gar exceeding 50" in our 14' jon boat so we figured that a kayak would be the next logical step.  We didnt get any big ones, but we got the experience of handling a few in the kayaks. Oh well, we'll take baby steps. 

























Russ didnt get to land a gar, because Amanda wouldnt let him fish the good spots.  He did get the biggest bass of the day in the riffles between holes. 









We caught a ton of spotted bass, a bunch of very eager longear sunfish, and a few smallies. Hopefully we can get out a couple more times before the rains stir the creeks up too much.


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## rustyfish (Apr 27, 2004)

Yep worked great I got to watch it. As for just the frayed rope tied to your line with no weight and no spinner, no such luck. Tried tying it to a roadrunner and nope. Sean let me try an extra one ( which I named Gigantor Rope Gar Spinnerbait) no luck seemed to sink to the bottom and stay there. 

But its OK can catch little smallies all day. 

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## farleybucks (Aug 8, 2009)

Good pics and cool fish! I have always heard about the frayed rope trick for gars but never tried it....looks like it is pretty successful! We landed a few in Tennessee a few years back and my buddy lifted a not too happy 3 1/2 foot gar into his hybrid commander....needless to say he was quick to jump ship.


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## FishDoctor (Aug 9, 2012)

Hey Sean, I've been wanting to try some of these rope lures out for some monster gar I've seen. I have a couple questions about them though. 

How hard was it to get the gar all unhooked from the rope lure? And does getting a hook up with a gar on a rope lure usually mean the end of the lure?


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## SeanStone (Sep 8, 2010)

We caught three gar the first time out and id say all but one gar was untangled in less than a minute. Youll have to find a stick or use a tool to keep the mouth open while you pull the rope out.

I have read that you can catch up to 15 gar on one rope. I imagine if your catching some with bad attitudes you may only get 4 or 5 with each rope. Our ropes werent even phased by the gar we caught. If you use a spinner bait all you have to do is keep a few spare ropes ready to go in your tackle box and switch them out when needed.

One thing ill add....when you get a bite drop the rod tip just to give them a chance to really get it in thier mouth and then apply pressure. I lost two the other day becuase i saw the gar eat it and I got excited and set the hook....which ripped it right out of its mouth.

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## imalt (Apr 17, 2008)

SeanStone said:


> We caught three gar the first time out and id say all but one gar was untangled in less than a minute. Youll have to find a stick or use a tool to keep the mouth open while you pull the rope out.
> 
> I have read that you can catch up to 15 gar on one rope. I imagine if your catching some with bad attitudes you may only get 4 or 5 with each rope. Our ropes werent even phased by the gar we caught. If you use a spinner bait all you have to do is keep a few spare ropes ready to go in your tackle box and switch them out when needed.
> 
> ...


I made some rope flies for the fly rod for gar last year. I didn't end up catching any but had multiple hits because I would get excited and jerk the rope out of their mouth before they would get their teeth tangled in it. I definitely suggest for anyone that hasn't tried it to give it a try.


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## ezbite (May 25, 2006)

nice, 2 questions, did you eat any of them? i heard the back meat is good and where'd you get that float on your measuring board?


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## SeanStone (Sep 8, 2010)

Ezbite....nope we didnt eat them. We really only eat crappie and gills.....but if some one had gar fixed id try it.

We got our floats from kayakfishinggear.com. They have saved my measuring board more than once. We also put them on our anchor lines so we can drop our anchor line to help someone land a fish ( take pics and measure) or to go off and fight a fish. They are truly hamdy to have.


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