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Effect of current and daylight variations on small-pelagic fish aggregations (Selar crumenophthalmus) around a coastal fish aggregating device studied by fine-scale acoustic tracking

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 September 2012

Manuela Capello ,
Marc Soria ,
Gael Potin ,
Pascal Cotel  and
Laurent Dagorn
Manuela Capello*
Affiliation:
UMR EME, Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD), BP 50172, 97492 Sainte Clotilde Cedex, La Réunion, France
Marc Soria
Affiliation:
UMR EME, Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD), BP 50172, 97492 Sainte Clotilde Cedex, La Réunion, France
Gael Potin
Affiliation:
ECOMAR, Laboratoire d’Ecologie marine, Université de La Réunion, Saint Denis, La Réunion, France
Pascal Cotel
Affiliation:
UMR EME, Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD), BP 50172, 97492 Sainte Clotilde Cedex, La Réunion, France
Laurent Dagorn
Affiliation:
UMR EME, Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD), Victoria, Seychelles
*
a Corresponding author: manuela.capello@ird.fr
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Abstract

Several pelagic fish species are known to associate with floating objects. However, quantitative information on the main factors that drive this associative behaviour is still lacking. Small pelagic fish offer a particularly interesting case study for this phenomenon, since the small spatial scales involved in their association with floating objects allow experimental data to be collected at a fine scale. Here, we monitored twelve acoustically-tagged bigeye scads, Selar crumenophthalmus (Carangidae), (mean fork length 16.4 cm, SD 2.1 cm) around a floating object moored in shallow water (15 m depth) playing the role of a coastal fish aggregating device (FAD). To quantify the role played by variations in current and daylight, we calculated the speed distribution, pair correlation function and group polarization for the tagged fish hourly, from midday to dusk (13:00–18:00), for varying current strengths and daylight conditions. We found that the current induced a shift in the position of the aggregation upstream of the FAD, at distances that increased with the current strength. We found evidence of an expansion and a higher coordination in the aggregation at dusk, with increasing speed, distance among conspecifics and alignment. We discuss possible scenarios in which group polarization increases at dusk and suggest complementary measurements for future experiments that could confirm our findings.

Keywords

Acoustic telemetrySmall pelagic fishMoored FADFish aggregationBehaviourDaylight effectsRheotaxisIndian Ocean
Type
Research Article
Information
Aquatic Living Resources , Volume 26 , Issue 1 , January 2013 , pp. 63 - 68
Copyright
© EDP Sciences, IFREMER, IRD 2012

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