SE Kerwath
Department of Ichthyology and Fisheries Science, Rhodes University, PO Box 94, Grahamstown 6140, South Africa; Current address: Marine and Coastal Management, Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism, Private Bag X2, Rogge Bay 8012, South Africa
A Götz
Department of Ichthyology and Fisheries Science, Rhodes University, PO Box 94, Grahamstown 6140, South Africa
CG Attwood
Marine and Coastal Management, Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism, Private Bag X2, Rogge Bay 8012, South Africa
PD Cowley
South African Institute for Aquatic Biodiversity, Private Bag X1015, Grahamstown 6140, South Africa
WHH Sauer
Department of Ichthyology and Fisheries Science, Rhodes University, PO Box 94, Grahamstown 6140, South Africa
Abstract
The movement behaviour of adult Roman Chrysoblephus laticeps (Sparidae) was investigated using mark-and-recapture techniques in the Goukamma Marine Protected Area (GMPA) and the Tsitsikamma National Park (TNP) on the South African temperate south coast. The study was designed to improve the spatial resolution of previous studies on Roman that suggested residence behaviour, but which could not estimate home range size. A combination of conventional barbed dart tags and visible implant fluorescent elastomer (VIFE) tags were used to tag Roman from a skiboat in the GMPA. Roman were tagged with dart tags from the shore in the TNP. Of the recaptures, 61% were within 50m of the tagging position, confirming that Roman are very resident. A few fish, independent of size and sex, moved distances up to 4km. A model was developed to quantify the degree of residence, by accounting for tag loss, mortality and the distribution of recovery effort. The probability of a Roman remaining within an area of 1ha is 0.91 (GMPA) and 0.94 (TNP) — such a small home range suggesting that individual Roman would benefit from small MPAs.
Keywords: Chrysoblephus laticeps; dart tags; mark and recapture; maximum likelihood; MPAs; site fidelity; VIFE tags
African Journal of Marine Science 2007, 29(1): 93–103