Kyle Hammond of Fort Wayne, Indiana, has been significantly chasing large gar data in his residence state for 3 years now. He broke the Indiana shortnose gar document (which he nonetheless holds) in 2021. And on July 11, he added a second state-record gar catch: a 9 pound, 11 ounce noticed gar he caught from Rivir Lake. Now, he says he’ll be attempting for the trifecta, as the one species of gar left within the Indiana record book is the longnose.
The state’s Division of Pure Assets made Hammond’s record official on Wednesday, and the angler uploaded a video of his record-breaking catch to his YouTube channel, Indiana Kayak Fishing Journal, the identical day. Within the video, Hammond explains his quest to interrupt all three of Indiana’s gar data and reveals a few of the highlights from his day on the water — together with the second his rod broke as he bought the record-breaking fish within the internet.
“Once I began fishing for noticed gar, I used to be seeing fairly just a few fish greater than the present Indiana document,” Hammond explains within the video’s introduction. “I knew it was only a matter of time to get one to chew, hook it and land it.”
Hammond lastly bought his alternative in early July, and the chew got here earlier than he anticipated. He’d gone out on Rivir Lake at Chain O’ Lakes State park in his kayak round 6 p.m. He hooked the 9-plus-pound fish, his first of the day, solely twenty minutes into the outing. He was utilizing a spinning rod rigged with a white Zoom soft-plastic fluke, and the fish ate simply off the sting of a giant weed mattress.
“It’s the primary fish I caught at this time, and it’s an absolute beast,” Hammond says within the video. “I can’t imagine it, and I one way or the other broke my rod.”
Hammond fastidiously unhooked the toothy gar with two pairs of pliers as soon as he bought on shore and out of his kayak. He then weighed the fish on a digital hand scale and noticed that it was nicely over the standing Indiana document of 6 kilos, 12.5 ounces. So, he contacted DNR biologist Tyler Delauder and met him on the company’s Columbia Metropolis headquarters to get the fish weighed and formally measured.
Photograph courtesy Indiana DNR
Hammond additionally explains in his video how the DNR used to lump all gar data into one class. This modified just a few years in the past, he says, when the state expanded its document guide to incorporate particular person classes for the three gar species that dwell within the state.
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Now that he’s caught a document shortnose gar, which is the smallest of the three species, together with a document noticed gar, all that’s left is the longnose gar document. These fish are discovered in numerous components of the Southeast and Midwest, they usually can develop as much as six ft lengthy. The present Indiana longnose gar document weighed 22 kilos, 5 ounces, and it was caught in 2008 from the East Fork of the White River. Longnose gar are the commonest gar species present in Indiana. (Shortnose gar are widespread within the southern a part of Indiana and occasional within the north; noticed gar are sometimes present in southern Indiana and are widespread within the north, according to the Indiana DNR.)
Hammond admits that breaking the ultimate document gained’t be straightforward, however at the very least he has one thing to shoot for.
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