FAMILY LEPISOSTEIDAE 83 



1902, page 350) . Before the days of the steel plow the skin of the gar 

 was often used to cover plowshares, and it is even now used for this 

 purpose in some sections of the rice-growing area of the United States. 



SPOTTED GAR 



Lepisosteus productus Cope 



The spotted gar usually has from 54 to 58 scales in the lateral line. 

 The snout is narrower than that of the shortnose but is not as narrow 

 as that of the longnose. The snout is about 1.6 times longer than the 

 rest of the head. The body is covered with large round spots, which 

 become diffused on the fins. There are round spots on top of the head, 

 whereas the shortnose has no spots on top of the head. 



This species ranges from Minnesota eastward to Ohio and perhaps 

 New York State, and southward to Florida and Texas. Our attention 

 was directed to this fish by Professor C. L. Hubbs, who suggested 

 that this species should be present in southern Minnesota. For many 

 years we had been puzzled by finding gars that seemed to be inter- 

 mediate between the shortnose gar and the longnose gar. This species 

 is fairly common in clear, weedy lakes of southern Minnesota; the 

 shortnose gar is more prevalent in the rivers. 



NORTHERN LONGNOSE GAR (Gar Pike, Billfish, Billy Gar) 

 Lepisosteus osseus oxyurus Rafinesque 



The longnose gar (Figure 4C) has a very elongate and subcylindrical 

 body covered with regular rows of small, hard, enameled plates. The 

 jaws are elongated, and both the upper and lower jaws are armed with 

 long, sharp teeth. It is extremely variable in color, length of snout, and 

 body proportions. The general color is greenish olive above, silvery on 

 the sides, and white beneath; both body and fins are marked with 

 numerous round, black spots. The scales in the lateral hne number 

 60-63. In this species the snout is more than twice the length of the 

 rest of the head. Some longnose gars attain a length of upwards of 5 

 feet, but the average for the species is much less. The young are very 

 pretty little creatures, each marked with a broad black lateral band. 

 They are especially noticeable for the evanescent lance-shaped upper 

 lobe of the caudal fin. 



This fish is found in all the streams tributary to the Mississippi River 

 as far north as Minneapolis and in all the lakes of that drainage, but it 

 is absent in collections from the Red River and Rainy River systems 

 and from the northern lakes not properly in the Lower Mississippi 

 drainage. 



Woolman (1895) reported it from Ottertail River, a tributary of the 

 Red River. It ranges from Montana eastward through the Mississippi 

 and the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence drainages to Vermont, and 



