Imagine a fish with the slithery body of an eel, a long, needle-like mouth and razor sharp teeth. It sounds like it shouldn’t exist, right? Well, if you take a stroll out to the school pond, you will see two longnose gar that fit the description. Native to Kansas, the fish are believed to have been in rivers for over 100 million years and are often described as living fossils. Along with the two gar, there is now a blue suckerfish and a few bullhead catfish. So, how did fish that normally live in the river end up in the pond?

“It was tasked to the wilderness class to put fish in the pond,” says faculty member Eric Nelson. “So, we caught the fish by hand, and it was just a good opportunity to get native fish out of the river and transplant them into the pond.” With the water levels lowering in the Kansas River, Nelson went out with Friends of the Kaw to rescue fish from mud puddles. The fish that are now in the pond were swimming in the Kansas River just a few weeks ago.

Now that they are at the school, the job is still not done. “Fish often are limited by the size of the water, so I don’t know how much they will grow, but eventually once they start getting acclimated, we’ll have to feed them,” says Nelson. “We need to get a food chain established.” This would mean catching or buying smaller fish so that the fish in the pond can return to health and make it through the winter. 

The gars and the suckerfish are both very unique looking fish with distinctive features, and most people have probably not seen anything like them. So, the next time you have a break or some free time, going out to the pond and saying hello to our new fishy friends should be at the top of your to-do list.