Anatomy and Morphology
Gar bodies are elongated, heavily armored with ganoid scales, and fronted by similarly elongated jaws filled with long sharp teeth. Their tails are heterocercal, and the dorsal fins are close to the tail. As their vascularised swim bladders can function as lungs, most gars surface periodically to take a gulp of air, doing so more frequently in stagnant or warm water when the concentration of oxygen in the water is low. They also appear to surface in fast moving rapids. As a result, they are extremely hardy and able to tolerate conditions that would kill most other fish.
All the gars are relatively large fish, but the alligator gar Atractosteus spatula is the largest, as specimens having been recorded up to 3 metres (9.8 ft) in length.Even the smaller species, such as Lepisosteus oculatus, are large, commonly reaching lengths of over 60 centimetres (2.0 ft), and sometimes much more.
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