Animals.

I don't like animals. Common knowledge to anyone who knows me. I don't find them cute or cuddly, and I don't care to be around them for any period of time if I can avoid it. That being said, some animals do fascinate me.

Take the Alligator Gar, for example. What a terrifying "River Monster"! (It's true, I was first introduced to this fish by the TV show). I presume that most people have never heard of a Gator Gar, so let me catch you up:

Gator Gars are ray-finned fish with long snouts that resemble that of the American Alligator. Gator Gars have thick, diamond-shaped scales that Native Americans once used as arrowheads and jewelery pieces. Aligator Gar pups are believed to be born male and change to female as they mature.

Did you hear me, folks?! Gator + Fish... that can grow in upwards of 10+ feet long and weigh 365 pounds!



As you can probably imagine, Gator Gars have a monstrous reputation (though gars have proven again and again to be quite passive). In 1933, the Texas Game Fish Commission began a campaign of extermination, building an Electric Gar Destroyer complete with a 200-volt electric net to kill the fish. Extreme methods used to catch and exterminate gars over the last 70 years have caused a decrease in the amount of gars (large gars specifically) roaming the rivers. The nature-hater in me thinks of this as a good thing, but maybe, just maybe, we should learn to value the strange creatures we share our planet with.