We have those in WV too. My brother in law and I were wade-fishing the Elk River one day, and he said "Look at the size of those 2 gars!" I said "where, I don't see them...."
He said "Right in front of you, about 5 feet away".
I was in water up to about my waist, but the sun was hitting the water in front of me and I couldn't see below the surface at all.....needless to say, I started backing up pretty quickly.
We've had them chase bass in towards the boat as we reel them in before, they're pretty impressive looking coming through the water. I don't know if they get 300 lbs around here or not, but they get pretty big.