An ancient family and/or order of ray-finned fish. Order Lepisosteiformes and family Lepisosteidae, which contains about seven species. They have a elongated snouts and bodies that are heavily armored by ganoid scales, and their jaws are filled with many small, sharp teeth. For some reason, their swim bladders can function as lungs and most of them occasionally come up for air. All gars are relatively large fish, but the alligator gar is the largest, sometimes even growing up to 9.8 feet in length. Gar flesh is edible and their hard skin and scales are often used by humans.