Where can I buy Gar for my pond?

[Jim Thacker]

I'm hoping you guys can help me out. I have old concrete building on my property that was built in 1897 by the public water works to treat and disenfect water pulled from the salt river for the resadence in Anderson County. This little building has a moat that runs around the building about 20-25ft across that's 35-40ft deep and the little building itself looks like a tiny castle.

My entire family lives on Pumphouse Road and we have a lot of family and friends that come and hang out from time to time so my brother and I decided to clean the building out and fix it up with all the nicest stuff and turn it into a little two bedroom apartment and use it as a guest house. We're doing the whole thing in a mideval castle theme and we want to put several good size gar and other conpadable fish in the moat.

Do you guys know where I can buy some of these fish? They can be cought around here locally but they are hard to catch because they have hard mouths and you'll end up killing them if they swallow the hook. Any help would be very much appreciated.

 

[DrCase]

I snag them with a treble hook with crickets on it for fun some times.

Do you have any pics of the moat ?

 

[KC Crook]

Fascinated by the gar choice. Why?

 

[Richardspond]

LOL if you have had plan on having nothing else. They are bad fish. They can snap off your hand. That's incredibly deep and you need deep water fish but gar wow. I'd get in so much trouble here for rehoming fish, be careful you know your laws

 

[Riftlake]

http://www.aquabid.com/ I have often seen various types of gars offered on this website under "US native fish".

 

[Jim Thacker]

Thanks for the replys. I'll get some pictures up so everybody has a better idea of exactly what I'm working with pond (mote) wise.

Like I said we're doing this thing up like a castle and the castles always had alligators in the mote in the story's and movies I watched as a kid and since that was pretty much out of the question I thought alligator gar and long nose gar would be a good choice.

I also thought it would be good choice to stock it with Gar because they:

Get pretty big for a fresh water fish.

They are native to Kentucky

They have teeth

They look cool and prehistoric

All of the gar I've been around were dossal and easy going fish.

My dad had a small 6" long gar I cought out of Herrington Lake with a dip net in his gold fish pond years and the only thing it ever messed with was a dead gold fish. It ate fish food like everything he had in there.

Thanks Riftlake, I'll check that out.

 

[addy1]

That sounds really neat! Hope you post some pictures

 

[Jim Thacker]

Okay guys, here's the pictures of the old water works pumphouse that sets on my property that Me and my brother are in the process of fixing up like a mini mideval castle two bedroom/one bathroom apartment so we will have a nice little spot for company to stay or rent out.

As you can see in the pictures it's small but VERY structurally sound and 60% has a second level (basement) that's actually submerged by the water in the 45' deep mote that surrounds three sides of the building itself.

We plan on putting on demoing all the unused steel pipes and wears four to six small mushroom gold fish pond fountains with green/blue LED lights in the mote to prevent duck weed accumulation from accumulating and aerate the water for aquatic life we plan on introducing to the mote as a type of novelty for the guest to look at. We were planing on putting a few

- Long Nose Gar
- Alligator Gar
- Paddle Fish
- Koi Fish
- Gold Fish
- Fathead Minnows
- Alabama Shad
- Buffalo Carp
- Blue Channel Catfish

Gar and Paddle Fish are the main fish we are wanting in the mote and we do plan on feeding them. Anyway, I know it's probably hard to envision what this little place will look like when it's done but I appreciate all your help and input.

 

[Jim Thacker]

We're planning on using the following items on this project:

Castle towers on the corners
Wood floors
Moss covered exterior
60amp windmill electric service
100amp electric service
Corner creek rock fireplace

I really do think this thing will be cool when we're done. The building itself set over 50 years full of trash.

 

[HARO]

WOW! That's quite the ambitious upgrade!