Talk:Gar

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 24 June 2019 and 16 August 2019. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): GracyxMiller. Peer reviewers: Ohjeezewhy.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 21:35, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment

This article is or was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Doctor Velvet, GermanShortHair, Jac1702. Peer reviewers: Doctor Velvet.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 22:03, 16 January 2022 (UTC)

feeding live food to gar

I've written in the article "absolutely no reason to feed gar live fish such as goldfish or guppies. Not only is this cruel, but cheap ornamental fish are a very effecient way to introduce parasites into an aquarium".

anonym42069erfaqu then commented:

"whats cruel about it? if the gar is willing to eat it, its food... whats cruelty? thats like, a personal view. not a neutral view"

Feeding living animals to another animal is cruel according to the RSPCA, ASPCA, and any other animal welfare body you choose to mention. Since gars will readily take other foods, the only reason to persist in feeding goldfish to a gar is because the owner enjoys watching the gar attack live prey.

There are practical reasons, too. A varied diet of fresh and frozen invertebrates, fish meat, and pellets will give the gar the best chance of getting all the nutrients it needs. Cheap goldfish are maintained in squalid conditions and parasites are widespread, therefore feeding them to the garpike is a good way of infecting it. Finally, a gar trained to take a variety of foods is easy to look after because you aren't dependent on live foods, you can use pellets or whatever else is convenient at the time.

My comments on what they eat are based on personal experience -- I looked after a spotted gar for several years while doing my undergraduate degree in zoology. It ate pretty much anything.

Cheers,

Neale

So it's not cruel if you KILL the animal first, amirite. That totally makes sense. 2601:150:0:DA40:D822:76E:8C80:5B3F (talk) 18

41, 5 July 2015 (UTC)amancalledhorse

Species name

A question for the experts: the species name in the alligator gar article has been changed from Atractosteus spatula to Lepisosteus spatula. This article says "Atractosteus" but the external links cited on alligator gar say "Lepisosteus". Which is correct? (If the designation has changed, both should be included on the page, and the date and reason of the change should be cited.) Thanks for your help! — Catherine\^talk 02:20, 11 October 2005 (UTC)

Yes, the (currently) correct Latin name for these gar is Atractosteus spp., at least according to Fishbase...

http://www.fishbase.org/Summary/speciesSummary.php?ID=1073

Lepisosteus was the name for all the gars until relatively recently. It dates from 1803 (Lacepède, B. G. E. 1803, Histoire naturelle des poissons; Hist. Nat. Poiss. i-lxviii + 1-803 + index). Atractosteus dates from 1820 (Rafinesque, C. S., 1820, Ichthyologia Ohiensis [Part 8]. Western Rev. Misc. Mag. 165-173). Atractosteus was simply viewed as a junior synonym of Lepisosteus for many years. Apparently, E. O. Wiley (1976. The phylogeny and biogeography of fossil and Recent gars (Actinopterygii: Lepisosteidae). Mus. Nat. Hist. Univ. Kansas Misc. Publ. 64:1-111) resurrected the genus.

So, to cut a long story short, until the late 1970s all gars were Lepisosteus, after 1976 the gars were split into Lepisosteus and Atractosteus, and ever since then zoos, aquarium books, anglers, and so on have been gradually catching up. As the external links on the alligator gar article indicate, many places still don't differentiate between the two genera of gar, and treat them all as Lepisosteus.

Latin names change as our ability to see differentiation and determine phylogenies gets better, so it's no surprise that these sorts of conflicts exist. Makes life awkward for wikipedians, to be sure, but it's a result of progress in the field of systematics!

Identifying particular species of gars

Is there anybody here knowledgeable of what particular species does the Mexican Pejelagarto belong to? There is an article in Wikipedia on the Pejelagarto but it does not reference the particular species. I think that would be a valuable addition to that article.

Cheers,

Neale

Neale Monks 22:56, 13 October 2005 (UTC)

Thanks; I added your info to the alligator gar article! — Catherine\^talk 06:18, 14 October 2005 (UTC)

Agressive?

I thought it should be mentioned in the article how bigger prey the gar will attack and if they are teritorial etc towards humans, dog or other domestic animals. As I dont know I'm affraid I can't contribute. Fists (talk) 04:30, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

BANDALISM

In paragraph 2. How lifeless must one be to vandalize articles about fish?

Merge with Garfish Article?

Should this not be merged or redirected to this article? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garfish --50.136.172.74 (talk) 15:51, 17 August 2012 (UTC)

Confused lead paragraph

The opening sentence in this article is confused because it tries to explain the different useage of names in America and Britain. A much better opening sentence is found at the beginning of the "Distribution" section, i.e. "The gars are members of the Lepisosteiformes (or Semionotiformes), an ancient order of ray-finned fish; fossils from this order are known from the late Cretaceous onwards." Discussion of the different names can do in the "Etymoogy" section.__DrChrissy (talk) 11:01, 13 October 2014 (UTC)

Feel free to edit, be bold. Zzorse (talk) 13:55, 13 October 2014 (UTC)

New Additions to Consider (3-9-2018 by Doctor Velvet)

Hello,

I've included some additional bits of information about this article in my Sandbox [[1]]. Please check it out! Doctor Velvet (talk) 23:51, 9 March 2018 (UTC)Doctor Velvet

Doctor Velvet, I did a quick review of your sandbox, and encourage you to continue developing the the proposed section, and include it as long as the material can be cited to reliable sources. Adding photographs and other images might be a bit trickier but if you can find some that are in the public domain, or that have been released under a CC-BY-SA compliant license, then by all means upload them. I'll be happy to collaborate with you and offer whatever help and guidance you need. ^{Atsme📞📧} 03:10, 10 March 2018 (UTC)

Gar fish distribution

Moved from User talk:Atsme § Gar fish distribution

 – This is the correct venue. ^{Atsme📞📧} 00:14, 12 May 2018 (UTC)

Greetings, Atsme

I am one of the contributing editors to the Gar page. I have revised my Distribution section, due to some improper referencing of the type of Fish, which you pointed out.

Thank you for double-checking; I really appreciate it!

If you could review again, and check to see that all the information is accurate, that would be swell.

Thank you.

Doctor Velvet (talk) 18:18, 11 May 2018 (UTC)

Hi, Doctor Velvet - please see the following research. For Beloniformes, see the clade. Lepisosteiformes are grouped with Mesozoic macrosemiids and 'semionotids' in the Semionotiformes. They are not the same as Belone belone - see this article which may also prove helpful. The information and map you provided belongs in either garfish or needlefish, not gar. ^{Atsme📞📧} 19:11, 11 May 2018 (UTC)

Regarding the Image

Map showing Gar Distribution in North America, outlined in red.
This map is not representative of gar distribution in North America.

Distribution of longnose gar (Lepisosteus osseus) in the US.

Moved from User talk:Atsme § Regarding the Image

 – This is the correct venue. ^{Atsme📞📧} 00:14, 12 May 2018 (UTC)

I did not mean to start a war; I edited the little blurb to effectively showcase the image that I included beforehand.

Could you tell me why it's incorrect?

It shows the distribution of the Alligator and the Spotted Gars; if it's an issue with the fish then I'm not sure what to say: they're both from the family Lepisosteidae.

Thank you

Doctor Velvet (talk) 22:11, 11 May 2018 (UTC)

The image you attempted to include is not representative of gar distribution. Why did you think it was? There are various species of gars throughout the United States. I provided a distribution map of only the longnose gar to give you an idea of distribution - there are many other species of gars that will each have different distribution maps so instead of trying to add so many maps to this article, we add the distribution maps to the articles of individual species. Now do you see why your map is incorrect? ^{Atsme📞📧} 00:30, 12 May 2018 (UTC)

Yes indeed. Thank you! — Preceding unsigned comment added by Doctor Velvet (talk • contribs) 18:05, 12 May 2018 (UTC)

You're welcome!! 😉 ^{Atsme📞📧} 18:50, 12 May 2018 (UTC)

Fin chart

I removed the incorrect name on the fin chart and uploaded the new version. You may need to purge cache to see the correct version. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 19:20, 8 May 2019 (UTC)